If you'd like to, you may turn
back to Matthew 27. It says that these Pharisees
and religionists brought our Lord to Pilate. They went through
a mock trial. His wife warned him not to have
anything to do with this just man. She'd suffered many things
that night because of him. suffered many things in a dream
because of him. Pilate was troubled about all
of this, and so he said, well, it's customary to release unto
you on this day a prisoner. Whom shall I release unto you,
Jesus, who's called the Christ, or Barabbas, a noted criminal
and murderer? And they hollered, give us Barabbas.
We'll take Barabbas. Well, he said, what then shall
I do with Jesus, who's called the Christ? And they said, crucify
him. He said, what evil hath he done?
Why crucify him? They said, crucify him. Just
crucify him. So Pilate turned him over to
the soldiers, and they took him down to the soldiers' hall. And
the Scripture says here, they gathered about him a whole band
of soldiers. And they had heard it said that
he was the king of the Jews. So after they had scourged him,
and a scourging, I don't know whether I can describe one or
not. I've read about them. But they take the victim and
they tie him to a post, strip his clothes from off him, and
they tie him to a post. And the scripture says a scourging
is 40 lashes save one. In other words, you're not allowed
to give a man over 40 lashes, so they give him 39 just to be
on the safe side. And they tie him to a post, and
then a soldier stands back with a whip. And I'm told that these
whips have leather straps and in the end of the leather straps
they tie pieces of bone, pieces of glass, and pieces of metal. And they take this whip and they
just lay it across the back of the victim and then snatch it
back. And when the whip with all of
these leather leather strips and with the bone and the glass
and the metal in it just tear into the flesh and rake out great
strips of flesh. And one of the writers said when
a person was scourged in a hall that blood and flesh was just
splattered all over the wall back there where they threw the
whip back and came down again and threw the whip back. And
our Lord's back was just lacerated, just lacerated from his neck
down to the end of his spine. And then they put on him a scarlet
robe. He said he was a king. A king
wears a scarlet robe. So they put a scarlet robe. And
you know how that back was in such pain and agony and festering
and bleeding. And they threw that robe around.
And then somebody got up and planted a crown of thorns. And
they took that crown of thorns and pressed it down into his
brow, pierced his brow with a crown of thorns. A king ought to have
a crown. The king ought to have a robe and the king ought to
have a crown. The king ought to have a throne. So they put
a box over there and sat him down on a box and he was sitting
there with his hands in his lap and one of them said, a king
ought to have a scepter. A scepter. And so they went out
and got an old hollow reed and brought it in and hit him in
the head with it first. Hit him in the head with the
reed and then they put the reed in his hand and he sat there
on that mock throne with that crown of thorns upon his holy
brow. and his back streaming blood,
and they plucked out his beard, and he sat there with that mocking
robe and that reed in his hand, and they began to bow the knee
and say, Hail, King of the Jews! Hail, King of the Jews! And then
they came around, the scripture says here in verse 30, and I
guess the culmination or the height of their hatred and their
mocking And they walked around and cleared their throats and
spit in his face. Just spit in his face. There
he sat, the most miserable, humiliated, suffering person I suppose that
ever endured this type of agony. Not a friend, his disciples had
forsaken him and fled and denied him, sold him out. And he sat
there as these soldiers mocked him. And let me tell you something. He was tried in this character
of king. Pilate said, what evil hath he
done? They said, he made himself king.
You remember? We have no king but Caesar. This
man says he's a king. When the soldiers mocked him,
they mocked him as a king. They bowed their knee and said,
hail, king of the Jews. That's the office in which they
mocked him. and ridiculed him and rejected him. And then when
they crucified him, they nailed him to a cross and wrote over
his head, Jesus of Nazareth. And when a person was crucified,
they wrote the crimes for which he was crucified and the crimes
with which he was charged over his head. And they put over his
head, Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews. And they said, Pilate,
don't write up that King of the Jews. He said, what I've written,
I've written. And that's what stayed. Let me tell you this.
That's the character in which you're going to own him and you're
going to receive him and bow to him if you ever say, King.
King. He is King. But anyway, they
took him out there and they said they nailed him to a cross. And
then they walked around the cross and they began to say things
like this. Oh, they were having a ball. They were having a time.
They walked around the cross and shouted insults. One of them
said, he trusted in God. He trusted in God, let's see
if God will have him now. Let's see if God will own him.
Another one said, well, he saved others, himself he cannot save. Boy, that fellow preached a good
sermon, didn't he? That's a good sermon. In saving
us, he couldn't save himself. If he had saved himself, he wouldn't
have saved us. They said, come on down from
the cross, come on down. If you come down, we'll believe
on you. If he'd have come down, we wouldn't have had a Savior.
What held him to the cross? You think those nails held him
to the cross? Why, he put the ore in the ground from which
those nails were made. You think that cross held him
up there? He planted that tree from which
they made that cross. You think human weakness held
him to that cross? Our Lord Jesus could have stepped
off that cross as easily as I stepped down off this pulpit, or easier.
I can't step down without his power. He could have done it
alone. But his love for us held him to that cross. His submission
to the Father's will held him to that cross. His determination
to save a people held Him to that cause. They said, come on
down and we'll believe on you. And they just exhausted, exhausted
their hatred and their insults and their shouts. And then they
got some vinegar and gall and put it on a hyssop and stuck
it in his mouth and he spit it out and wouldn't drink it. And
then it says here in verse, look at verse 36. And sitting down,
they just got tired of it after a while. They'd walked around
there for an hour or two or three hours and carried on and laughed. cast lots for his garments and
cast insults in his teeth, and finally they just sat down and
watched him, and watched him. Now then, I wonder what thoughts
went through their minds. Do you? As they sat down and
watched him, his vision so barred he didn't look like a human being.
His face was swollen, His beard had been plucked out. These pictures
of Christ on the cross, they're not realistic at all. You wouldn't
have in your possession or on your wall a picture of what Christ
really looked like on that cross. His visage was so marred, he
didn't look like a man. His body was so beaten and swollen
and festered. There wasn't a place, there wasn't
blood. He was naked. He didn't have that little lawn
cloth on, he was naked up there. He had that crown of thorns,
and the spittle, and the blood, and the flesh, and he was hanging
there between heaven and earth. You could tell all his bones.
It was the most terrible looking sight man was doing to God, what
their evil, unregenerate, depraved hearts had always wanted to do
to God. They wanted to kill God. They wanted to put God out of
business. And they felt like they had. And they just sat down
and watched him. What a terrible sight. It would
have turned the stomach of a human being. Turned the stomach as
he hung there between two thieves in that boiling sun. And I know
what the thief thought. The thief said, I'm getting what
I deserve. You've done nothing amiss. Remember
me, Lord, when you come into your kingdom. I know what the
centurion down there thought. I know what one man thought.
When it was all over, he stood there and said, surely this man
was the Son of God. That's what he thought. I don't
know about the rest of them. But what I'm asking this morning
is this, what do you think? That's what I want to know. I
want to boil this whole thing down. You see this man born of
Mary in Bethlehem's manger. The angel said he's the son of
God. The angel said he's the son of God. Who lived on this
earth thirty-three and a half years, he said he was the son
of God. I and my Father are one. He that has seen me has seen
the Father. Went about doing good. Raised the dead, healed
the sick, gave sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf. He said
I'm the bread from heaven. I'm the light of the world. I'm
the water of life. I'm the Savior, the Redeemer,
I'm the Christ, I'm the Messiah, I'm the one of whom the Old Testament
speaks. I'm prophet, priest, and king. I'll be coming into
my kingdom. Destroy this body, this temple,
three days I'll raise it up." And they took him at his word
and they destroyed it. They nailed him to a cross. They
put him through the most humiliating, agonizing day any man's ever
endured, and then they spit on him and nail him to a cross.
and then laughed at him as he hung there and died. Now I'm
asking you personally, what do you say about all this? What
is your opinion? What do you think of Jesus Christ
and his death? Please, I'm not asking you if
you're religious. That's not the question. Don't
be sidetracked. You say, well, I'm a religious
person. That is not the question, Clarence.
That is not the question I'm asking. I'm not asking you if
you believe the Bible, if you respect the Bible. You say, I
was brought up to believe the Bible. That is not the question. Most
everybody claims to believe the Bible. Well, I'm a church member. I'm a preacher. That's not the
question. That's not the question at all. There are a lot of preachers.
Somebody said, hell be full of preachers. Well, I'm a church
worker. I'm a Sunday school teacher.
I'm a Christian. That's not the question. I'm
asking you this. As you view in your mind this
morning, and as you view in your thoughts this morning, that death,
that agonizing death, that God-ordained, God-appointed, God-permitted,
man-accomplished death of that person called Jesus of Nazareth,
what do you think about it? What do you, Jim, Gary, what
do you Luther, think about all this. Watch me, what I think
about this. Mike, what do you think about
it? Who is he? And what's he doing on that cross?
And you've got to have an opinion. Now turn to Acts 26. You can't
sidetrack this issue. You can go over there and hide
somewhere in the law. You know somebody said one time,
you preachers on your way to Sinai. on your way to Sinai. Bob, take this down in your mind
and remember it. Somebody said, a preacher's on their way to
Sinai, and use it sometime, you fellas, in the message. On your
way to Sinai, to give everybody a good glimpse at what we call
the holy law of God and the requirements of God and all these things.
Why don't you just take your congregation and sit down at
Calvary and let them look at Christ? They'd be better off.
Somebody said, oh preacher, on your way to Armageddon, on your
way to Armageddon to straighten everybody out on the events and
advents and straighten everybody out on the eagles and the lions
and the bears, whoever they are. Why don't you just stop at Calvary?
You don't need to go to Armageddon and they don't either. Sit down
at Calvary and watch him there. And on your way to the Synod
of Dorrit, and on your way to the Diet of Worms, and on your
way back there to some of the old ecclesiastical meetings of
the great high muckety mucks making all these confessions
of faith, the Nicene Fathers and all that, why don't you just
stop at Calvary, Jim, and sit down there. And take your congregation
and sit down and watch him. And find out who he is and what
he did and why he did it, what's going on there. Because you've
got to have an opinion. In Acts 26, old Paul was preaching
to King Agrippa. Listen to this, Acts 26, verse
19. He said, King Agrippa, I want
to tell you something, verse 22. I obtained help of God. Having obtained help of God,
I continue to this day. Now stay with me. King Agrippa,
I witnessed to the small and great, kings and peons. I witness
to the small and great. I don't say anything other than
those things that Moses and the prophets said should come, that
Christ should suffer. That's my message. Huh? That's
my message. That's all I got to say. I'm
not here to straighten you out on Christian education. I'm not
here to straighten you out on the social issues. I'm not here
to straighten you out on who ought to be the Caesar. I'm not
here to straighten you out on capital punishment. That's not
my business. He said, God, with the help of
God, with the help of God, I'm going to witness to the great
and small, and I'm not going to say anything except what the
prophets and Moses said, that Christ should suffer and be the
first to rise from the dead and show light to the people and
to the Gentiles. I'm determined to know nothing
but Christ and Him crucified. Preachers, let's get back in
the preaching business. Somebody called me yesterday
and said, I want to meet with you and Doris. I've got a wonderful
financial opportunity that I want you to look into so you can advise
other people. I said, I'm not interested. Well,
don't you want to advise your congregation about how they can
make a living? No, I want to advise them on how they can live.
That's my business, how they can live, not make a living.
You can make a living for 60 years and go to hell. I want
you to live in Christ. This is my business. Yes, your
business. This is my business right here. Paul said, this is
my business. My business is to witness that Christ should suffer. And then verse 24, and as he
spake for himself, old Fester said with a loud voice, he was
a gripper's right hand man. He said, Paul, you're crazy. You're beside yourself. You're
radical. You're fanatic. You've been studying too much,
much learning has made you mad. That's what they're saying, don't
preach Christ, Christ, Christ, grace, grace, grace, let's get
on something else. You're just crazy. Paul said,
wait a minute, verse 25, I'm not crazy, I'm not mad, most
noble Festus. I speak the words of truth and
serious soberness. Watch it now, for the King knoweth
of these things, before whom also I speak freely. I'm persuaded
that none of these things are hidden from him. This thing was
not done in a corner. That's what I'm saying. Jesus
Christ, rejected, denied, betrayed, tried in a mock trial, nailed
to a cross, was buried and rose again. It wasn't done in a corner.
Wasn't done. That's what he's saying to this
man Festus, this man Agrippa. He said, you know about these
things and they're not hidden from you and you got an opinion.
You got an opinion. You can't get around it. You
got to have an opinion. You got to. This is the question
of question. What think ye of Christ? This
is the issue of issue. What think ye of Christ? The
Bible says right here, right here, right here is the difference
in life and death. Eternity with God or eternity
without God. Blessing or cursing. Salvation
or condemnation. Right here! Here it is! Israel had been sitting down
there in Egypt in slavery for 400 years. 400 long years. Twice as long
as this nation has been a country sitting down in slavery. God
Almighty was pleased to deliver them. God Almighty was pleased
to give them life from the dead. Dead nation lives a dead people
live and enslaved people are freed God Almighty is free to
bring them out of Egypt into Canaan bring them out of darkness
into light to bring them out of death into life What's the
issue when I see the blood? I'll pass over you when I see
the blood That was the issue then, that was the issue at Calvary,
and my dear friend, that's the issue right now. When I see the
blood. Almighty God didn't say, when
I see your strong weapons, when I see your great armies, when
I see your accumulation of gold and silver, when I see your determination,
when I see your energy, when I see your enthusiasm, when I
see your dedication, when I see your faith, oh no! When I see
the blood. I see the blood. It's the blood
that maketh atonement for the soul. Without the shedding of
blood, there's no remission. We have redemption through His
blood, the forgiveness of sins. Huh? His blood. When I see the
blood, Old granddaddy's sitting over there in the corner leaning
on his cane. He lives with his son and his
daughter-in-law. And he's sitting in there waiting
and he knows God's coming through there at midnight. God's coming
through in judgment. God's coming through in wrath.
God's coming through in death. And he looks over there at that
firstborn son, his grandson, and he turns to his son and he
said, son, son, where you at? And he asked him, Bob, is the
blood on the door? That's all I'm interested in.
He didn't ask you how much you got in the bank, son, written
you got enough for the trip from here to Canaan. He didn't say,
son, let me ask you something. If you got enough for us to eat
on this trip, son, is the blood on the door? That's all I care.
And I expect that firstborn son, strong, 18, 19 years old, right
here in the beginning of his life, He's sitting in there,
and he knows God's coming through. He knows judgment's ahead. He
knows God's wrath is coming upon Egypt. He can hear the wail.
He can hear the wind. He can hear the awful stillness
and death of that night, the cold clamminess of it. And he
looks at his dad, and he said, that is the blood on the door. And that's what I'm forcefully,
emphatically, so seriously and solemnly asking you this morning,
is the blood on the door, Cesar? Because God said, when I see
the blood, not when you see it, it ain't got nothing to do with
it, not when you see it, when I see the blood, when I see the
blood, my faith has found a resting, resting place, a resting place,
not in divisive creed, I trust the ever-living one. His blood
for me shall please. I don't need any other argument.
I don't need any other plea. It's enough that Jesus Christ
died and that he died for me. That's it. Let me ask you. You've
got to have an opinion. This wasn't done in the corner.
These things are not hidden. I know Satan's a powerful enemy.
If he can, he'll sidetrack you. He sidetracked about 90% of the
churches, 95% of the preachers. He's got them sidetracked. He's
got them playing games. He's got them doing everything
in the world but preaching the gospel. He's got them giving
out yo-yos and ice cream cones and McDonald's and hot dogs and
packing pews and giving away orchids to the oldest mother
and the youngest mother. He's done everything in the world
to sidetrack them, to get them to doing everything but lifting
up the Son of God. As Moses lifted up the serpent
in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up.
And every pulpit in which he's not lifted up crucified, buried
and risen, ascended and reigning, is an abomination to God. And
in order to be put out of business and burned down, I'm determined,
Paul said to the city of Corinth, to preach nothing but Jesus Christ,
in Him crucified. Because God said, when I see
the blood, I'll pass over you. Not when I see your fleet of
buses, Not when I see your Sunday school board, not when I see
your great roll of people, not when I see the number of baptisms,
when I see the blood. What do you think about it? I
warn you, listen to me, listen carefully to this now, listen.
Beware of any religion. You may have it, I don't know.
You may have this kind of religion, but I'll tell you, you better
beware of it. Because it's not of God, beware of any religion
in which the central theme is not Christ and Him crucified.
Now, you can read the Bible, you can study theology, you can
read the law, you can do great works, you can talk of peace
and love, and you can do great humanitarian things, but unless
you can look, look by faith to Christ crucified, and experience
by grace in your heart the power of his redeeming death and his
cleansing blood, and find peace with God in your heart through
his cross. Your religion will someday add
to your condemnation. I warn you, beware of any hope
of the favor of God. Beware of any hope of acceptance
with God. Beware of any hope of a relationship
with God apart from the blood of the Lamb. That's right. Without Christ
crucified, listen to me, your religion is no more than pagan
ritualism. You may use the Bible as your
foundation. You know something? Every religion
has its Messiah. Jim, even Jim Jones was a messiah. He made himself a messiah. Every
religion has a leader. Every religion has a messiah.
Buddha, Mohammed, Confucius, Mao Zedong, huh? Old Sun Moon
from Korea. Every religion has a messiah.
Every religion, every religion has ceremonies. Special days. Every religion has principles,
laws, precepts, and moral requirements. Every one of them. Yours does
too. Every religion has rewards and punishment, right? Rewards
for the good, punishment for the evil. Only the gospel, only
the gospel has a crucified, buried, risen, ascended Redeemer. And that's what we preach. Now
you get busy with all these other religions, preaching all these
other things, and you ain't ten cents worth of difference from
them. And you offer your comrades no hope. The only hope is that
when Christ died, He died for our sins. And all these other
things are in addition to Him. I have Christ, I have everything.
Listen to me, without Christ crucified, You have a well without
water. It's no good. Without Christ
crucified, you have a stove with no fire. It'll just mock you.
Without Christ crucified, you have a lighthouse with no light.
You'll be destroyed on the rocks. Without Christ crucified, your
religion is a comfort to the devil and an offense to God. And you call on a God who will
not hear, you face a law dishonored, you face judgment with no advocate,
you face justice without mercy, and you face an eternity to mourn
over your stupidity. Let's take the whole world to
Calvary. Not to Sinai, not to Armageddon,
not to the great religious gatherings, conventions, creeds, catechisms. Let's take them to Calvary. And
just sit down. Sit down! And watch him. Now I ask you, what is it to
you? What is it to you, all ye that
pass by, and behold my sorrow? Is there any sorrow like unto
my sorrow, with which my Father hath afflicted me? What is it
to you? That's the question. Well, I like what Paul said.
Turn to Galatians 6. He summed up his thoughts. He summed up his ministry and
life and intentions, he said in chapter 6 of Galatians, but
God forbid. That was Paul's way of emphasizing
something. Something, you know, that's almost
exclusively Paul's way of speaking, God forbid. He don't want to
use that, only disciples. When somebody said something
that was totally ridiculous, totally ridiculous, instead of
cussing, Paul said, God forbid. That was his form of being real
emphatic. He preached one time, salvation
by grace, that the grace of God was glorified in saving the chief
of sinners, that the grace of God reached to the depth and
lifted the lowest sinner, that the grace of God made white the
blackest sinner, the grace of God was magnified in forgiving
our sins. And somebody said, well, that's
sin that grace may abound. He said, God forbid. God forbid. You wonder what he said to Cecil?
Ain't that what it is? That's just exactly how he used
it. God, what's the matter with you? And here when they're talking
about glory, and look back here at verse 12. He said, many of
these preachers, they desire to make a fair show in the flesh.
They like to have a crowd. They like to have big reports.
They like to impress people. They want to make a show in the
flesh. So they constrain you to be circumcised. In other words,
constrain you to do this, do that, do that, be baptized, join
the church, do all these different things in order to be saved,
keep the law, only lest they should suffer persecution for
the cross. That's the reason they do these
things. They ain't going to preach grace alone, Christ alone, salvation
alone by the blood. They're going to preach all these
other things because if you preach grace alone, Christ alone, the
cross alone, you suffer for it, for the cross. It's offensive.
Verse 13, but neither they themselves who are circumcised, they don't
even keep the law themselves. They're a bunch of hypocrites.
They're a bunch of hypocrites. They put all these burdens on
you, but they don't carry them. They talk about you tithing,
giving your offerings, and selling your home, doing all that. They
don't sell theirs. They require you to do this, that, and the
other to be perfectly holy. They're not perfectly holy. There's
no hypocrite like a preacher hypocrite. They that constrain
you to be circumcised, they don't keep the law either, but they
do this. They desire to have you circumcised
that they may glory in your flesh. You're following them like a
little puppy dog. And they like to brag on the
fact that you're following them. He's doing what I say to him.
He's following me. And then Paul started to cuss.
God forbid. God forbid! that I, this preacher, should
glory, delight in, take pride in, put any value upon, become
obsessed with, dedicated to anything except the cross of Christ. You
see that? Let them play their games. Let
them get their disciples. Let them glory in the flesh.
Let them brag about what they make you do that they don't do.
Let them do it, but God forbid that I should glory, take any
interest in, become obsessed with saving the cross of our
Lord Jesus Christ, by whom this world is crucified unto me. This world is dead to me, and
I'm dead to this world. I belong to him. He bought me.
I'm not my own. He purchased me. I belong to
him. For in Jesus Christ neither circumcision
availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature." What do
you see? What do you see in the cross?
Well, let me tell you something. I'm going to give you this in
close. I see man's sinfulness. That's there. All the wretched,
rotten wickedness of man. I see God's purpose to save.
I see that. God's going to save some people.
That wasn't in vain. He didn't hang his son on that
cross in vain. I tell you that. Somebody's going to be saved.
And then I see thirdly Christ's love for his people. Greater
love hath no man than this. He lay down his life for his
friend, the enemies. I see love, love like I've never
seen before. And I see the wrath of God against
sin. But chiefly, let me show you
Romans 1. This is what I see. This is what I see in that cross
and everything that transpired from his birth to his resurrection. From his birth, from the time
he breathed in Bethlehem's manger, he was my representative. He
took on himself the work of redeeming my soul in active and passive
obedience, in righteous obedience, and in submissive death. He's
my substitute. What I say, Romans 1.16, I'm
not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, Christ crucified. For
it, that is the gospel of Christ crucified, is the power of God
unto salvation to everyone that believe it, to the Jew first
and also to the Greek. For what? For therein. Where?
In the gospel of Christ crucified. Is the what? Righteousness of
God. Holiness of God. Requirements
of God. Revealed. That's where it's revealed. And nowhere else. It's not revealed
from Sinai. It's not revealed from Armageddon.
It's not revealed from the old church fathers. It's revealed
from the cross. What is? The holiness of God. The righteousness of God. The
requirements of God for sinners. It's revealed at the cross. That's
right now. There's a righteousness needed.
Turn one page to Romans 3. Take this Bible, just turn one
page from where you are, and look at verse 10, Romans 3, 10.
Listen to it. What an awesome, awful, awful
charge. It is written, there's none righteous,
no not one. Nobody here righteous. That's
bad, isn't it? Yeah, it is. Fatal, yeah, because
there's a righteousness needed. God requires a righteousness.
Who shall stand in his presence? Clean hands, pure heart. Trouble, we're in trouble. Wait
a minute, there's a righteousness provided. Look y'all, there it
is at Calvary. He who knew no sin was made sin
for us that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. That's what I see at Calvary.
Righteousness provided and bless your heart, righteousness imputed. What Christ did, He did for me
and reckoned it to my account. And turn one more page now. One
more page, Romans 4. Just turn one more page. And
it says here that old Abraham, verse 21, Romans 4, was fully
persuaded what God promised he was able to perform and provide,
and therefore, therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. Now, it was not written for Abraham's
sake alone. It was imputed to him for righteousness,
but for me too, me too, to whom it shall be imputed, what? Righteousness,
if, if what? If I work my fingers to the bone,
and preach till my dying day, and give my little ten percent.
No, if I believe, if I believe, if I believe on him that raised
up our Lord, from the dead, and in the resurrection of Christ,
I see a righteousness accepted. Accepted. Because if the Father
had not accepted him and us in him, he'd still be in the grave.
He'd still be in the grave. But when God raised him, he said,
I accept him. So what I say, I'm sitting there
with you, and I'm not just marveling at the blood. I'm marveling at
the blood that saves sinners. I'm just not marveling at the
suffering. I'm marveling at the substitutionary
suffering for sinners. I'm marveling at the righteousness
I need, God requires, Christ provided, that righteousness
which he accomplished, imputed, and in both of us, him and me,
accepted because I've raised together with Christ and seated
in the heavens. Now then, if that won't make
you happy, you're beyond making happy. If that won't give you
some hope, I don't care how low down you are, I don't care how
sinful you've been, I don't care what your background, if you
can sit down there and look to Christ and believe God said you'd
have a righteousness. But you gotta believe. Can you
believe? Can you believe? That's good
news. And that's small and great, rich
and poor, black and white, old and young, ignorant, Jew and
Gentile, Catholic, Baptist, whoever you are. But leave your fount,
and leave your water, and leave your tables, and leave your doing,
and leave your zeal and enthusiasm, and leave it all, and come to
Calvary. Come to Calvary, because he's going to have the preeminence.
Can you? I'm going to sit down at Calvary,
I'm going to wait there till he calls me home. And everybody
comes by, I'm going to say, come over here, I've got something
to tell you. You know who that is? That's the Son of God. You
know why he's there? That God may be just and justify.
You know what he did? He redeemed the people. I'm going
to say, are you interested? No, I'm a Calvinist. Well, I see you. No, I'm a free
will Baptist. Well, I'll be seeing you. No,
I've always been a Catholic. Well, I'll see you. No, I'm interested
in my righteousness. Well, I'll see you. But if I
can find me somebody to say, you reckon it can be that he
died for me? And can it be that, you mean
me, that I should gain an interest in his blood? Died he for me? Who him to death pursued depth
of mercy? Can there be mercy for folks
like me? I said, yes, just sit down. Sit
down. And let's stay here together.
Because he's coming back someday and call us home. That's the
message. That's the message. And Paul
said to Festus, he said, that's all I'm going to preach. Because
that's all you need to preach if you preach it. He said, what
will make people holy? That message. What will make
people generous? That message. What will make
them love each other? That message. Christ, that's
right. Anything else, if it requires
anything else, then Christ died in vain. Our Father, bless the
Word now, we look to Thee to do what no man can do. That's
strip the sinner, break his heart, open his eyes, and reveal Christ
to him, Christ crucified, and bring us to love him, to trust
him, to believe him, and to walk in his love and obey him in righteousness
and holiness and godliness to adorn this glorious gospel of
grace with an obedient walk. Use this message for your glory
and for our good, for Christ's sake we pray, amen.