and she shall bring forth a son,
and thou shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save his
people from their sins. Now all this was done, that it
might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet,
saying, Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and be with child,
and she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name
Immanuel, which being interpreted, is God with us." My friends,
when a person manifests an interest in a relationship with God, when
a person gives some evidence of being awakened or convicted
or quickened by the Holy Spirit and comes to us and asks of us,
what must I do to be What must I do to be saved? Now, what shall
we answer? If this question is put to us
by a person who we believe is really interested in the gospel,
they're really interested in knowing the Lord, they're really
interested in this thing of salvation, and they say, what must I do
to be saved? What shall we answer? Well, my
friends, the answer is given to us by the Apostle Paul. When
the Philippian jailer, under conviction, trouble disturbed
because of his sins, fell at his feet and said to Paul, Sirs,
what must I do to be saved? The apostle replied, Believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thou
hast. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ,
and thou shalt be saved, and thou hast. That was the answer.
And that's what he told him. when he asked him, What must
I do to be saved? Here is a trembling, troubled man. Here is a convicted,
troubled soul, and he's crying out of the depth of his heart,
What must I do to be saved? And the Apostle replies, Believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved. Now, my
friends, that answer may seem to some people to be old, out
of date. And it may seem to others to
be so simple that something has to be added to it. But those
who know who Christ is, and what Christ did, and what the Lord
Jesus Christ suffered, and why he suffered, and where he is
now, to those, this answer is sufficient. It's not only fresh
and new, but it's sufficient. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ,
and thou shalt be saved in thy house. And those who know who
Christ is, and have believed on him, know that this is the
only way to God. Neither is there salvation in
any other. For there is none of them under heaven given among
men, whereby we must be saved. There is no other name, other
foundation can no man lay than that which is laid, Christ the
Lord. And our Lord himself said, As Moses lifted up the serpent
in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up,
that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have everlasting
life. For God so loved the world that
he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him
should not perish, but have everlasting life. Then in verse 36 of John
3, he said, He that believeth on the Son hath life. He that
believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God
abideth on him. John wrote again in 1 John 5.11,
this is the record, this is This is God's word, that God has given
to us eternal life, and this life in his Son. He that hath
the Son of God hath life, he that hath not the Son of God
shall not see life. These things are written to you
that believe on the name of the Son of God, that you may know
that you have eternal life, and that you may believe on the name
of the Son of God. That's the answer. What must
I do to be saved? Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ,
and thou shalt be saved. And that's the only way to God,
and you can't improve on it. There's not a better answer.
So my message this morning is going to consist of four questions.
If men are saved by believing on Christ, these four questions
have got to be dealt with and answered. Who is Jesus Christ? Who is Jesus Christ? What did
Jesus Christ do? What did Jesus Christ do that
I should believe on him? Thirdly, just why did he do what
he did? Why did he do what he did? And
fourthly, well, why is he not? That's my question. And these
questions must be answered. The answer must be found. You
know, in Mary, I read the scripture a moment ago where Mary was with
child, and the angel appeared to Joseph and said, Fear not
to take unto thee Mary to be thy wife. That holy thing which
is in her is the Son of God, and she shall bring forth a son
And thou shalt call his name Jesus, Jesus Christ of Nazareth. For he shall save his people
from their sin. And this is a full form, one
of the writings of the prophet Isaiah, who said in Isaiah 7,
14, Behold, the Lord himself shall give you a sign, a virgin
shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt
call his name Emmanuel, God with us. Jesus Christ of Nazareth,
Mary's son, and Emmanuel, God with us. is one and the same
person. Who is Jesus Christ? What must
I do to be saved? You must believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ. Well, who is Jesus of Nazareth?
All right, will you listen to me for a little while? Who is
Jesus of Nazareth? Well, first of all, our Lord
asked that same question what men thought. He asked one day,
asked the disciples, he said, whom do men say that I am? What
are they saying out there about me? Whom do men say that I, the
Son of Man, am? Peter replied, he said, well,
some say you're John the Baptist, and some say you're Elijah, and
some say you're one of the prophets. And then Christ said, but whom
do you say that I am? Who am I? Who am I? And Peter
replied. And our Lord said, this is the
foundation on which I'll build my church. He said, thou art
the Christ. Thou art the Christ, the Son
of the living God. Peter looked at Jesus of Nazareth.
Peter looked at Mary's son. Peter looked at this one born
in Bethlehem, and he said, you are the Christ. You are the Messiah. You are the prophet of whom Moses
wrote. You are the consolation of Israel.
You are the one who is the fulfillment of every type, of every promise,
of every prophecy of Old Testament Scripture. You are the one for
whom we live. You are the one that God promised
to send. You are the Redeemer of Israel.
You are the King of Israel. You are the Son of David. and
the Son of God. My friends, the Bible teaches.
Now you listen to me for a few moments. Will you listen? Let's
learn something. I hear preachers all the time
say, believe, believe, believe. Well, I want you to, I want you
to know what to believe. You can't just believe. Faith's
got to have an object. And if you don't believe on Jesus
Christ, let's don't get the wrong one. Let's just don't believe
on somebody named Jesus. Let's find out who he is that
we might believe. You can't trust an unrevealed
Christ. Whosoever shall call on the name of the Son of God,
the name of the Lord shall be saved. But how shall they call
on him of whom they've not heard? And how shall they hear without
a preacher? How are they going to believe on one of whom they've
not heard? All right, now watch this. Who is he? The Bible teaches
that the living God is a triune God. Now I know I'm going to
upset some folks right now, but let's just be upset. Let's find
out what God's Word says. And I know the Lord our God is
one God. I know that as well as you do.
The Lord our God is one God. There's not three gods, there's
one God. But that God, according to this Bible, is three in one.
Now over in Genesis 1.26, God said, when he was creating this
world, let us make man in our image, after our likeness. To whom was he speaking? Was
he talking to the angels? Was he talking to the cherubims
or the seraphim? Was he talking to the devil?
No. God said, let us make men, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
One God, but three in one. All right, watch this now. Will
you listen? You never learn if you don't listen. He that hath
ears to hear, let him hear. Christ said that over and over
and over again. In 1 John 5, verse 7, there are three. There
are three that bear record in heaven. This is in the Bible,
1 John 5, 7. the Father, the Word, and the
Holy Ghost, and these three are one. When our Lord Jesus Christ
was baptized, the Scripture says in Matthew 3, 16, he came up
straightway out of the water. And the heaven was opened, and
the Spirit of God descended upon him like a dove. And a voice
from heaven said, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well
pleased. Was Christ speaking? No, Christ
wasn't speaking. Was the Holy Spirit speaking?
The Holy Spirit wasn't speaking. The Father was speaking. The
Father said, this is my son, and gave him the Holy Spirit.
And he said to John, upon whom you see the Holy Spirit descending,
that's the Messiah. And then in John chapter 14,
verse 16, the Lord Jesus speaking to his disciples, he said, I
will pray the Father, and he will send you another comforter
who will abide with you forever. This is the Holy Ghost. When
our Lord sent his disciples out to preach, he said, go and baptize
men in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Our God is one God. The Lord our God is one God.
We worship one God. But that God is Father, Son,
and Holy Spirit. You say, I don't understand that.
I know you don't. I don't know what a human being
does. You can't comprehend God. If I could comprehend God, God
would be amazing. He wouldn't be God. Human minds
cannot contain God, whom the heavens won't contain. We receive
his word by faith to seek the things that belong to God, to
reveal things to us. Let's take what he's shown us
and accept all of it by faith. All right, who is Jesus Christ?
So, God is a triune God. Jesus Christ is the Word, the
thing that's directed in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the
Holy Ghost. In the beginning, John 1, 1 and 2, was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and all things
were made by him. Verse 14 says, And the Word was
made flesh, and dwelt among us. God came down here and dwelt
on this earth in the person of Jesus Christ. A virgin shall
conceive and bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name
Immanuel, which is being interpreted, God with God in human flesh. Are you listening? God in human
flesh. All right, watch this. In 1 Timothy
3, 16, great is the mystery of godliness. God was manifest in
the flesh. Right here on this earth. So
who is Jesus Christ? He's God in human flesh. He's
the Word. He's the second person of the
Divine Trinity. And to believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ is to believe. that he is the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what Thomas said when
he bowed before him. He said, My Lord and my God. And the scripture says, If thou
shalt confess with thy mouth, Romans 10, 9 and 10, Jesus to
be Lord, and believe in thine heart God raised him from the
dead, thou shalt be saved. Now, I want you to hear something.
that you don't hear preached very much, but it's so important.
Will you stay with me a minute? Who is Jesus Christ? In Exodus
chapter 3, verse 14, Moses, God had selected Moses to deliver
Israel from Egypt. And Moses was on that mountain
one day, and he saw a bush that burned but was not consumed.
And God spoke to him out of that bush. And God told him that he
was going to send him down into Egypt to deliver the children
of Israel out of bondage. And Moses said, well, they won't
believe me. God said, I'll go before you. I'll tell you what
to say. I'll lead you. And Moses said, now, when I go
down there and I say unto them that God sent me, they're going
to ask me, what's his name? When I tell them that God of
our fathers has sent me to deliver you from Egypt, they're going
to ask me, what is his name? What's the name of the God of
our fathers? What is the name of the God of Abraham and of
Isaac and of Jacob? What am I going to say? All right,
listen, you listening? Exodus chapter 3 verse 14. And
God said, you tell them, I am that I am. That's it. That's my name. I am. I am. Now listen to me. Jesus
Christ Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus down here on earth in the flesh,
born in Bethlehem of the Virgin Mary. He said in John chapter
8 verse 24, if you believe not that I am, you shall die in your
sins. Now you take your Bible and turn
over there, John 8 verse 24, and you say the preacher says
that Jesus Christ said, if you believe not that I am he, that
he is in a pallet It's not in the original. It's not in the
Great Testament. Jesus Christ said, if you believe
not that I am, that he is supplied by the translator. And they didn't
help that scripture at all. It shouldn't be in there. I am.
And then down in verse 58, he says, before Abraham was, I am. I am. Who is Jesus Christ? I am. He's one spoke out of that bush.
He's the one who spoke to Abraham, he's the one who divided the
Red Sea, he's I Am. And then when he was out there
in the garden, before he went to the cross, and the soldiers
came to arrest him, in John 18, verse 5 and 6, and he turned
his disciples away, and he stood before those soldiers with their
burning torches and their swords and their spears, and he said,
Who seek thee? And they said, We seek Jesus
of Nazareth. You know what he said? John 18,
5 and 6, he said, I am. I am. What happened? And everyone fell flat on their
backs, every one of them, when our Lord identified himself,
I am. Who is Jesus Christ? I am that
I am. Oh, the condescending mercy of
God. Oh, the great glory of the grace
of God. He laid aside His glory in the
person of His Son and came down here and was born of a woman,
made under the law to redeem them born under the law. I preach
you what did Jesus Christ do? To sum it up, He pleased God. That's what He did. He pleased
God. No man's ever done that. No man
ever will do that. No man can do that. Paul said
in Romans 8, verse 8, So then they that are in the flesh cannot
please God. Jesus Christ was in the flesh
and the world was made flesh and brought among us. He pleased
God. He pleased God. Yes, he did. Scripture says he
knew no sin. He said, I always do those things
that please my Father. Well, the Father said that. He
said, This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased. He
was tried by men. Tried by Satan, tried by God. He was born under the law of
the home, under the law of the land, under the mosaic law, under
the ceremonial law, under the moral law, and never offended
in one jot or one tit or any law. He was perfect. He lived
a holy, perfect, immaculate life without sin. That's right. Jesus Christ knew no sin. He
did no sin. He was tempted in all points
as we are, yet without sin. He had no sin. But his work wasn't
done. That's not all that he did. When
he was born without sin and lived without sin, he still had to
do something else. That's his active obedience,
his holiness, his righteousness. He had to die. He had to die. He said, for this hour, for this
cause came out of this hour, he knew that he was going to
die. He was born to die. Jesus Christ came to die. He
didn't come just to live. He came to die. He came to give
his life a ransom. Why did he have to die, preacher?
Because of weakness? Oh, no. No, no. He said, no man
takes my life from me. I lay it down. I have the power
to take it up and to lay it down. No man takes my life from me.
Well, did he die as an example? Oh, no. No, he didn't die as
an example. There were plenty of men who
died as examples. Abel was an example. He died
for what he believed. He died for what he believed.
Peter died for what he believed. James died for what he believed.
Paul died for what he believed. John the Baptist died for what
he believed. They're good examples, but Christ didn't die as an example. Well, did he die as a martyr?
Oh, no. He didn't die as a martyr. A martyr's death would accomplish
nothing. A martyr's death doesn't accomplish anything. brings judgment
on his executioner, takes him to glory real quick, but it doesn't
accomplish any saving benefit. Why did he die? Jesus Christ
died. He died as a substitute. He died
as a substitute. Listen to the scripture. He was
wounded for our transgression. He was bruised for our iniquities.
The chastisement of our peace was laid upon him by his stripes.
We are healed. He must die because those whom
he represented Because those with whom he was numbered, because
those with whom he was identified, because those for whom he came,
because those whom he came to save, deserved to die. That's
what he did. He died in their place. He died
in our stead. He took our sins in his body
on the tree, and there he died. You know, if you read 1 Corinthians
15, 1 through 4, and get past verse 2, you'll learn something.
Paul said, I declare unto you the gospel, which I preached
unto you, and by which you are saved, if you keep in memory
what I preached unto you. Now watch this. How that Christ
died for our sins, according to the Scripture. Did you ever
read that? What Scripture? According to the Scripture. We're
talking about the Old Testament Scripture. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus,
Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges. That's the Scripture,
the Psalms, Isaiah. And he rose again the third day
according to the Scripture. Everything that Christ suffered,
everything that Christ did, everything that Christ bore was according
to the Scripture. You see, Abel's sacrifice is
Christ. The brazen serpent lifted up
by Moses, that's Christ. The lamb, the Passover lamb slain
and its blood put on the door, that's Christ. That rock that
Moses smote, that's Christ. All of these Old Testament sacrifices,
they don't put away sin. The blood of an animal cannot
save the soul of a man. They're pictures, they're types,
so Christ comes. And what he did as the high priest,
as the sin offering, as the sacrifice, as the atonement, all of that
is a full film of the scripture. The Old Testament's Christ in
picture. The New Testament's Christ in
person. You'll give an account of these things someday that
I'm telling you today. It's not just belief. It's belief
on the Lord Jesus Christ. And I said, who is he? He's the
Christ. He's the Lord. He's the Christ. All right, now watch this. Why
did he do this? Why did God do this? Why did
God come down here in human flesh and obey the law, live under
the law, subject to the law, submissive to the law, keeping
the law, and go across and die an ignominious, hateful, awful,
anguish-filled death?" All right, listen. The answer is found in
Romans 3.26, and you need to read this and understand it.
"...that God might be just, and justify them that believe on
Jesus." Now, God is love. God is love. But God cannot manifest
his love. at the expense of his justice.
Now, my friend, that's something to think about. God is merciful. God delights to show mercy. He's
precious in mercy. But he cannot show his mercy
at the expense of his righteousness. God has character. God has attributes. Listen to this. He said in Numbers
14, 18, the Lord is long-suffering. The Lord is of great mercy. The
Lord forgives iniquity. The Lord forgives transgression.
but by no means clearing the guilty. We're all guilty, that's
right. That's the reason God can't just
look down and wipe out your sin. His justice won't let him do
that. His righteousness won't let him receive an unrighteous
man into his bosom, into his family, into his kingdom, into
his fellowship. If God receives a sinner into
his fellowship, that sinner's got to have a perfect righteousness.
If God takes a man to heaven to be his son and heir and child
and reign with him, that man has got to be without sinning.
His sins have got to be punished, paid for, God's law, justice,
righteousness, satisfied. That's why Christ came, to do
for you what needed to be done, to do for you what God's righteousness
demanded, what God's law demanded, what God's justice demanded.
Listen to Colossians 1.19. That in Christ should all fullness
dwell. That's where it all is. That's
where everything God has. It's in Christ. It's not in a
church. It's not in a denomination. It's not in a water, baptismal
water. It's not in bread and wine. It's in Christ. Everything's
in Christ. All fullness, all divinity, all
deity, all righteousness, all redemption, all sanctification,
all benefits, all blessings, all hope in Christ. All fullness. I don't want any itch in this
view, I want fullness for what's in Christ. So read on. And having
made peace through the blood of his cross, to reconcile all
things unto himself, I say by him all things, whether they're
in earth or heaven. And you, who were once alienated
enemies of God in your minds, that's where the trouble is in
our minds. We hate God by nature. by wicked works hath he now reconciled
in the body of his flesh through death to present you holy, unblameable,
unreproachable." You think about that in God's sight. Christ came
down here. Why did he do this? Why did he
come to the earth? Why did he obey the law? Why
did he go to the cross? We preach this, but tell people
this so they can believe on the right Jesus, so they can look
to the right Christ, so they can receive the right Savior.
He came that God the Father might be just and justify the ungodly,
that God, the righteous God, might show his mercy in righteousness,
that he might be faithful and just to forgive us of our sins. We confess our sins, he's faithful
and just to forgive us of our sins and to cleanse us from all
unrighteousness. Where is Jesus Christ now? Where
is he now? Listen to the Word of God, Acts
5.30, "...the God of our fathers, raised up Jesus, whom you slew
and hanged on a tree. Him hath God exalted with his
right hand, to be a prince and a Savior, and to give," not to
wait around for somebody to do something for him, but to give,
"...repentance to Israel and the forgiveness of sin. Paul
said in Hebrews 10, this man, after he had offered one sacrifice
for sin forever, sat down on the right hand of God. Having
finished his work, he sat down on the right hand of God. And
there's one God and one mediator between God and man, and that's
the man. There's a man in heaven, there's
a perfect man. a glorified man, a successful
man, a righteous man, and he's there interceding for us at the
right hand of God. He prays for his own. And Paul
said, because we have such a high priest, let's come bold into
the presence of God. We can do it now and God can
receive us and be holy and just and righteous. He can receive
folks like me and you because we believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ.