undivided attention today and
speak to you on the subject Preaching Jesus Christ. Preaching Jesus
Christ. Now the disciples, the Apostles
of our Lord, were men whose whole lives were dedicated to the Lord
Jesus Christ. These men like Peter, James,
John, later the Apostle Paul, they were men who loved Christ
And they believed Christ, and they lived Christ, and these
men preached Christ. If you read in Acts 5, verse
42, you'll find this is said of the apostles, and daily in
the temple and in every house, they ceased not to preach and
to teach Jesus Christ. In the temple, in every house,
their subject was the Lord Jesus Christ. And then in Acts chapter
8 verse 5, talking about the ministry of Philip, it said he
went down to the city of Samaria and he preached Christ to them.
And then picking up the ministry of Philip out in the desert when
he spoke to the Ethiopian eunuch, the scripture says in verse 35
of Acts 8, then Philip opened his mouth and began at the same
scripture and preached unto him Jesus Christ. This was the subject,
Jesus Christ. And in the 11th chapter of Acts,
verse 20, it says, when they came to Antioch, They spake to
the Grecians, to the people who'd come up there from Greek, preaching
the Lord Jesus Christ. Now it's evident from all these
scriptures that the apostles not only loved Christ and believed
Christ, but Jesus Christ was their subject. They preached
Christ. Now the tendency of natural men, if left alone, apart from
God's Spirit dealing with them, the tendency of natural men is
to go further and further and further away from God, if left
alone. Any natural man will go further
and further away from God if God doesn't bring him to himself.
And preachers are no exception. Preachers in churches are no
exception, if left alone. and left to their own wisdom,
preachers and churches will go farther and farther and farther
away from the living God and away from the gospel. An example
of this is found in the early days of the church. When our
Lord died on the cross and was buried and rose again, ascended
back to the Father, The apostles and their followers preached
Christ. At Pentecost, Peter preached Christ. All these men preached
Christ. At Mars Hill, Paul preached Christ.
Philip went down to Samaria and preached Christ. And for several
years after the Lord ascended back to heaven, back to the right
hand of God. They preach Christ. But if you
read the book of Corinthians, both epistles, and the book to
the Galatians written by the Apostle Paul, you'll find that
these churches and these preachers soon departed from preaching
Christ. and began to major on other things. They became taken up with other
things. And you see that in the book of Corinthians and in the
book of Galatians, how they departed from preaching Christ. And it's
no different today. It's no different in our day.
Where, let me ask you this, where in organized religion, with all
the churches in your town and in my town and all over the country,
where in organized religion can a person go and hear Jesus Christ
preached. I'm talking about without all
the entertainment, without all the organization, without all
the promotion, without all of these things, and just hear the
Word of God taught, hear the Word of God read, and hear the
Lord Jesus Christ preached. You just tell me, where in organized
religion today can you go and hear Jesus Christ preached? Who He is, what He did, Why he
did it, where he is now, the glory of his person and his work. Oh, I know men preach about Christ. But my friend, you can preach
about Christ and not preach Christ. You can preach about the gospel
and not preach the gospel. You see in the book of 2 John,
John deals with this subject. And he talks about the doctrine
of Christ. Not doctrines about Christ, or
doctrines concerning Christ, but the doctrine of Christ. Our
whole doctrine is Christ. Now I do not hesitate to call
myself a sovereign gracer, or Calvinist, or whatever term you
wish to use to identify one who believes in the sovereign grace
of God. I believe the Bible. I believe that Almighty God is
absolutely sovereign in all things, in creation, in providence, in
salvation. He works all things after the
counsel of his own will. I believe in a sovereign God. I believe man is fallen, depraved,
unable and unwilling to come to Christ apart from a divine
revelation. I believe that. I'm acquainted
with the old catechisms. I'm acquainted with the Heidelberg,
and the Westminster, and the Philadelphia, and the London,
and all these catechisms. I preach the message Luther preached,
Calvin preached, Zwingli, Huss, Owens, Edwards, all of these
Whitfield, these men of old. I believe their message. I don't
hesitate to preach these doctrines. But if you ask me what my creed
is, I say my creed is Christ. I don't hesitate to take the
name Baptist. There's only one scriptural baptism,
and that's by immersion. The scripture says, he that believeth
and is baptized. It didn't say he that's baptized
and then believes. Our Lord told him to go into
all the world, make disciples and baptize disciples, not baptize
babies, baptize disciples. Baptism by immersion. I don't
have any doubt about that and I don't hesitate to call myself
a Baptist But if you ask me, what is my creed? My creed is
Christ And I don't hesitate to say I believe in a local church
Our God has a church of the firstborn which he purchased with his own
blood There's a church whose names are written in heaven but
there's a local church and I'm pastor of a local church and
I believe in the the Lord's ordinances and the personal return of the
Lord Jesus Christ. But if you ask me, what is my
creed? My creed is Christ. If you ask me, what is my body
of divinity? I reply, there is but one body
of divinity, and that's Christ Jesus. I don't preach a program
or an organization or a denomination or even a doctrine or a system
of truths or a catechism. I preach Christ. Christ is our
message. That's what Paul said when he
came down to Corinth. To all of these intellectual,
philosophical people, greatly learned people, he said, I am
determined to know nothing among you save Jesus Christ and Him
crucified. There is but one body of divinity.
In Him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily and you're
complete in Him. We preach Christ. Jesus Christ
is the sum and substance of our gospel. And if we don't preach
Christ, we haven't preached any gospel. Jesus Christ is the incarnation
of all truth. They said, what is truth? He
said, I am the truth. He is the truth. You shall know
the truth and the truth shall make you free. The truth's not
a series of doctrines. The truth is a person. I am the
way. I am the truth. I am the life.
Christ is the wisdom of God. He's made unto us wisdom. He's
called the wisdom of God. In the book of Proverbs it talks
about the wisdom of God. That's Christ Jesus. He is not
only the wisdom of God, He's the righteousness of God. He's
the embodiment of the righteousness of God. He is the fulfillment
of all the holiness of God. He is our sanctification. He
is our full redemption from Alpha to Omega, from beginning to end.
Our acceptance with God is in and through and by and because
of Jesus Christ. Not because of anything we have
done or anything we shall do. Jesus Christ is our hope. Christ
in you, that's the hope of glory. Jesus Christ is my life. When
Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall you appear
with him also in glory. Christ is our salvation. So, what is my creed? My creed's
Christ. What is my confession of faith?
Christ died for my sins, was buried and rose again, who is
even at the right hand of God, who intercedeth for me. And my
friends, if I had one more message to preach, that message would
be Christ. If I have 1,000 messages yet
to preach, the theme of every one of them would be Christ and
Him crucified. And what I'm trying to say, and
what I've tried to enforce upon this telecast for 14 or 15 years
is this. Men today, as in every day, are
not preaching Christ. They're preaching doctrines about
Christ. They're even using the name Christ.
But as far as preaching Christ, clearly, emphatically, preaching
Christ, there are not too many folks doing it today. And I ask
this question, what is it then to preach Jesus Christ? All right,
preacher, let's hear you make good now on this subject. What is it to preach Christ?
When you say you preach Christ, the apostles preach Christ, all
who are sent of God ought to preach Christ, Then what do you
mean? What is it to preach Christ?
All right, I'll give you four or five things. Number one, to
preach Christ is to declare in no uncertain terms, no uncertain
terms, that Jesus Christ is very God of very God. That he's very
God of very God. Not only the Son of God, but
God himself. The Lord our God is one God.
One God, and Jesus Christ is that God. God manifests Himself
as Father, Son, Holy Spirit. But He's one God, and that one
God is Jesus Christ, who being in the form of God, Thought it
not, Robert, to be equal with God, who has expressed exact
image of God? In fact, in Hebrews, the Father
said to the Son, Thy throne, O God, is forever. I'm saying
to preach Jesus Christ is to emphatically, unconditionally,
in no uncertain terms, to declare that He's their God of their
God. Now when you refer to Jesus Christ
as only a great prophet, and many people do this, or a great
teacher, and many call him a great teacher, or a great healer, or
even a great man, you have declared him to be a great imposter. Now that's right, let me say
that again. If you only say that Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth,
is a great prophet, or a great healer, or a great preacher,
or a great man," I replied, then he's a great imposter, because
he said, I and my father are one. And he said to the disciples,
he that has seen me has seen the father. And again he said,
no man has seen God at any time save the son, and he to whom
the son will reveal him. Isaiah declared this, that a
virgin shall be with son, and thou shalt call his name Emmanuel,
which is being interpreted, God with us. God with us. And then again in Isaiah he said,
unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and his name
shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting
Father, the Prince of Peace. Who is Jesus Christ? He's God. He's God. Jesus Christ is one
of two things. Now this is preaching Christ.
It leaves no room for compromise. It declares him to be who he
is. He said, I am. Moses asked when God would send
him down into Egypt to deliver the children of Israel. He said,
well, they'll ask me who sent me. Now whom shall I say has
sent me? And God replied, tell them I
am that I am. Jesus Christ referred to himself
over, over, over, over again as I am. before Abraham was, I am. We seek Jesus of Nazareth, I
am. Again he said if you believe
not that I am, you'll die in your sins. Jesus Christ is one
of two things. He's their God and their God
or he's the arch deceiver of souls. Now which is it? So we
preach Christ, we preach Him in His eternality, we preach
Him in His deity, we preach Him in His eternal glory, we preach
Him as the creator of the world, all things were made by Him,
for Him, and by Him all things are sustained and held together,
that in all things He might have the preeminence. This is preaching
Christ. And you can spend months and
months and months on His deity, His Godhead, His glory, His eternality,
Christ Every attribute of God is revealed in the Son. God was
in Christ reconciling the world unto himself. That's what I'm
saying. Have you understood that? That's preaching Christ. And
until men understand this, until we speak so that they'll understand
this, and those people that took up stones to stone him, they
understood him. He said, I and my father won,
and they took up stones to stone him. And he said, now many good
works have I done among you. For which of these do you stone
me? They said, we're not stoning you for a good work. We're stoning
you because you're a man and you say you're God. They understood
what he said. How many of you out there believe
that Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, is their God, of their God? That you can fall with Thomas
at his feet and say, my Lord and my God. All right, secondly,
what is it to preach Christ? It's to declare in no uncertain
terms, emphatically, so as to be understood that Jesus Christ
is true man, his true humanity. Now we must never make him less
man because he's God, or less God because he's man, he is the
God man. Jesus of Nazareth, now listen
to me, Jesus of Nazareth is a real man. You say, these things you're
talking about this morning, I don't hear them preached. That's exactly
what I'm saying. People do not know who he is,
and how shall they believe on him of whom they've not heard?
And how shall they hear that somebody preaches Christ? Whosoever
shall call upon the name of the Lord Jesus Christ shall be saved.
That's the true name, the name which identifies him, the name
which reveals him, the name which is true to his character. There
are a lot of folks talking about Jesus that are not talking about
this Jesus. It's another Jesus, Paul said,
another spirit and another gospel. Read that in 2 Corinthians. Jesus
of Nazareth was a real man, bone of our bone, flesh of our flesh,
living, talking, walking, feeling, thirsting, hungering, suffering,
tempted, tested, in all points as we are. He was numbered with
the transgressors. He took upon himself the likeness
of sinful flesh. He was made in the form of a
servant. and became obedient. He was made
of a woman, just exactly like I or you were made of a mother,
fashioned in the womb and brought forth into this world, Jesus
Christ, the Son of God. He had no earthly father. The
Heavenly Father is His Father. He was begotten of the Holy Spirit.
We were begotten of a human father. We were born nothing but flesh.
Our Lord Jesus Christ is begotten of the Spirit of God. Conceived
by the Spirit of God. But He was made of a woman and
made under the law. In order to redeem His people,
He had to become a man. If you don't have a real human
savior, you don't have a gospel because the law was given to
man, must be fulfilled by man perfectly, or you have no righteousness. And if you don't have God in
human flesh, you have no gospel. Romans 1 verse 3, Paul says,
the gospel is concerning his son. who was declared, who was
made to be of the seed of son of David, according to the flesh.
He was made according to the flesh, the son of David, and
declared to be the son of God. He's the God man. Man to be tempted,
man to obey, man to suffer, God to satisfy. And you cannot be
right in the rest, if you're not right in your thoughts about
him. Who is Jesus Christ? All right,
thirdly, preaching Christ. Now listen to me. Preaching Christ
is to preach the solitariness of his work in redemption. What
do I mean by solitariness? Well, just what I'm saying. Alone. You play a game called solitary
with cards. That's you play alone. You don't
have a partner. You don't have anybody in the game but one person.
And I'm saying that Jesus Christ redeemed us by himself. That's
what it says in Hebrews 1.3, when he had by himself purged
our sins, he sat down on the right hand of the majesty on
high. Hebrews 9.26, he put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. And I'm telling you this, his
life of obedience is our righteousness. His death on Calvary is our justification. His holiness in thought, in word,
in deed is our sanctification. His presence is our acceptance. And he did it all alone. The
banquet of mercy is served up by one host who prepared the
meal. and furnish the meal, and invites
the guest, and serves the table, and that's the Lord of Glory.
The royal bath of mercy in which black souls are washed white
from their guilt, stain, and sin is drawn from the veins of
the Son of God. And no deeds, and no works, and
no decisions, and no professions of faith, or anything that we
do contributes to the salvation of our souls. Jesus paid it all. All the debt I owe, sin left
a crimson stain. He washed it white as snow. The
efficacious work of Christ does not depend in any way upon the
creature. And the sufficient sacrifice
of the Son of God and his faithful obedience as our representative
does not need your approval to make it sufficient in the sight
of Almighty God. Every attribute of God is fully
met in Christ and we're accepted in the beloved. The gospel, my
friend, is not a proposition. It is a proclamation. You're
complete in him. That's preaching Christ. And
then fourthly, preaching Christ is to preach Jesus Christ as
the only mediator between God and men. God and men. That's in 1 Timothy 2, 5. The
Word plainly says there's one God, one Lord, one God, and one
mediator, one between God and man, and that's the man, Christ
Jesus. Now listen to me. This is preaching
Christ. In declaring what the Word says
about the mediatorial office of Christ, there's one God and
one mediator. In declaring Jesus Christ to
be the only Mediator, we set aside and strongly reject any
other Mediator, any other Mediator, any other intercessor. Here's
God in His holiness, here's man in his inability, and there's
one Mediator between God and man, one means of communing with
God. One means of approaching God.
One way to come before the Father, and that is through Christ. No
one else, nothing else. Mary, Mary, who gave birth to
the Son of God, who was a human instrument God used, who found
favor in the sight of God. is only a sinner saved by grace.
She's not a mediator, she's not an intercessor, and she cannot
aid any sinner. The saints, Jews, Saint Christopher,
any of the apostles, And present-day imposters are not mediators. No creature, no angel, no organization
can pray to God for you or plead to God for you or bring you to
God. Only the Son of God ever liveth
to make intercession for us. He said, no man has seen God
at any time. The only begotten hath declared
Him. No man knoweth the Father, save
the Son. No creature knoweth the Father,
save the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal him. He said,
I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto
the Father, but by me. And the apostle plainly declared,
Other foundation can no man lay than that which is laid, Jesus
Christ the Lord. Is that clear? That's preaching
Christ. That's preaching Christ. The
sufficiency of Christ. He's the only mediator. There's
no coming to God. God is unapproachable except
through Jesus Christ. All right, here's the fifth thing.
Preaching Christ. Now listen to me. I'm talking
about the Jesus Christ of the Bible. The apostles ceased not
to preach Jesus Christ. Preaching Christ is to preach
Jesus Christ as King of kings and Lord of lords. Now, my friends,
to preach Jesus Christ as anything less than he is, is to deny his
Godhead and rob him of his glory, and after all, not preach Christ
at all. Listen to his own words. Now
you listen to his, he describes himself. He said, as the father
quickeneth the dead, so the son quickeneth whom he will. He'll
make alive whom he will. He'll show mercy on whom he will
show mercy. He'll be gracious to whom he
will. He says, no man takes my life from me. I lay it down. I have the power to lay it down
and take it up. He said again to his disciples, all authority
is given unto me in heaven and earth. He prayed to the heavenly
father, I, you have given me all power over all flesh that
I should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given me.
And again, he said, the father loved the son and had given all
things into his hands. He died that he might be Lord
of the dead and the living. Now, does this sound like the
weak, defeated, frustrated reformer that I hear preached today called
Jesus? Does this sound like the pitiful Jesus who wants you to
let him in your heart, and he stands outside the heart's door
and knocks, and nobody will let him have his way? No, sir. I
have no time or patience with preachers who present Jesus Christ
only as a reformer, or an example, or an offer, or an effort, or
a partial savior. He's the King, King of kings
and Lord of lords. He'll have mercy on whom he will.
He's the king of creation, he's the king of providence, and he's
the king of salvation. He bought this universe with
his own blood. It's his, as are all creatures
in this universe. And he has a church, he said,
other sheep I have, which are not of this foal, them I must
bring, and they shall hear my voice, and they shall be one
foal. All that my father giveth me
shall come to me, and him that cometh to me I'll in no wise
cast out. The gospel of Jesus Christ is
not a bare plea or invitation to rebels. It's a glorious command
of King Jesus to his subjects. Come unto me, all ye that labor
and are heavy laden, and I'll give you rest. What is it to
preach Christ? It's to clearly, emphatically,
to declare him to be their God of their God. God in human flesh. God our righteousness, God our
sacrifice, God our sin offering, God our King, King of kings and
Lord of lords, who is seated in heaven, expecting till his
enemies become his footstool.