I would ask that you pray for
me as I preach the gospel to you tonight. I had a message
that I wanted to preach and within the last few hours I had another
message that I thought I should preach and I believe the Lord
laid this on my heart and I pray, Lord, be gracious and bear with
me as I preach this message. Again, kind of a change, and
I don't like change very much, but I believe Lord compelled
me to preach this message to you tonight, and I pray Lord
will give me the liberty that I need. If you'll take your Bibles
and turn with me to Revelation chapter 20. Revelation chapter 20. entitled this message, The First
Resurrection. Now, the scripture here says,
blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection. On such the second death hath
no power. They shall be priests of God
and of Christ and shall reign with him a thousand years. We sang that song just a minute
ago, One Day. I remember a message Brother
David preached a long time ago, and he said, it's amazing what
God can bring forth in a day. One day our brother, Brother
Hartley, was here in this world suffering, and it's amazing what
God brought forth in one day. He is no longer suffering. but rather has received what
God has promised. And he has received it simply
because of this. He is blessed and holy. He has taken part in the first
resurrection. Now, there is a resurrection
coming. I tell you this, in fact, there
are two. There are two resurrections. Two resurrections, the first
mentioned in our text, and the last when Jesus returns again. The first resurrection is that
which is spiritual, spiritual. Blessed and holy is he that hath
part in the first resurrection. The Apostle Paul tells us, you
who were dead in trespasses and sins, hath he what? Quickened,
resurrection. You that believe on Christ, you
have obtained a resurrection. And then there is the second.
The second resurrection is that which would Christ returns, Paul
says in First Thessalonians chapter four. He says, if we believe
that Jesus Christ died and rose again, even so them which sleep
in Jesus will God bring with him. For this we say unto you
by the word of the Lord, we which are alive and remain under the
coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep.
For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with
the voice of the archangel, with the trump of God, and the dead
in Christ shall rise first. Then we which are alive and remain
shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the
Lord in the air. Now listen. So shall we ever
be with the Lord. The end. When Christ comes back,
don't be thinking there's gonna be something else after. When
the resurrection takes place, the end. No more. We will so be with the Lord forever. Wherefore, comfort one another
with these words. And so as we look at this text,
I desire to comfort you who are believers. It's the intent of
the scriptures to give you comfort. Every believer in Jesus Christ
looks by faith to Christ and in hope, we anticipate his coming. We anticipate his coming. In which he will raise the bodies
of our brethren who have gone before us, and then in a moment,
those that remain shall be transformed. This mortal body must put on
incorruption. This corruptible body must put
on incorruption. And so some of us, if the Lord
comes tonight, that'd be great, wouldn't it? That'd be wonderful. That'd be wonderful. If he comes
tonight, we know this, there's going to be a noise. There's
going to be a great shout. The dead are going to be raised. And then, we shall be changed. Those that are remaining. The
earnest desire of every child of God is to be like Christ.
We now, by the grace of God, have been endowed with the Holy
Spirit. We have been given a new nature, which is created after
God in true holiness. Blessed and holy is he that hath
part in the first resurrection. You know this. If you have part
in the first resurrection, you are blessed. And listen, you
are holy. He has created in us a holy nature. A holy nature. And so thoroughly did Christ's
blood wash away our sins that God declares by searching he
cannot find them. You know that God looking for
your sins, he can't find them. Listen to what he said in Jeremiah
50. In those days at that time, saith the Lord, the iniquity
of Israel shall be sought for and there shall be none. the sins of Judah, and they shall
not be found, for I will pardon them whom I reserve. Yet we know this, if we are believers
living in this world, we are afflicted. Though blessed and
holy, yet we know this, we are afflicted. We are troubled on
every side. Yet every one of these troubles
cannot defeat the purpose of God in saving us. In this truth,
he says this, that nothing shall separate us from the love of
God that's in Christ Jesus. Nothing. He said, you know, neither
height nor depth nor any other creature. He said, you know what,
if I forgot something, if I've left out something, any other
creature that you come along, Nothing and no one can separate
us from the love of God that's in Christ Jesus. And though Satan
cannot accuse us before God, but we know this, that he is
not yet destroyed and neither is this flesh. Our foe is always
against us. He is the father of lies seeking,
walking about seeking whom he may devour. But let us be sure
of this truth that he cannot touch one of us except God decree
it. Now what happened to Joe? What
happened to Joe? He could not touch him unless
the Lord permitted. Therefore, believer, as we sojourn
in this wilderness, we are often brought into desert places, barren
and dark places and times. As we see, our brother has gone
to be with the Lord. We know this. He is rejoicing,
but we sorrow. We grieve. We are troubled in
this world. We have, but we have this hope,
this confidence that we shall be saved even as he. I like that hymn that said more,
more happy, but not more secure, the glorified believers in heaven. You know, if he's secure, but
he's not more secure than me, he's more happy. But he's not
more secure. In this confidence we have, we
shall be saved to believe on Jesus Christ alone. Even though
death of this mortal body come to us, this is our hope, even
that God shall raise our bodies to be likened to the body of
Christ. You know, Job had that. Consider Job was one of the first
books, not chronologically, but historically, was written. Look
what Job says about the resurrection. Go to Job 19. Look what Job knew
about the resurrection. Job chapter 19 and verse 25. He said, for I know that my Redeemer
liveth, and that he shall stand in the latter days upon the earth,
though after my skin's worm destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall
I see God, whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold,
and not another, though my reins be consumed within me. Job, by faith, looked to Christ,
his Redeemer, and he said, I know this, my Redeemer liveth. Don't
you know that? You believe you know your Redeemer
liveth? And because he lives, this is our hope, that though
worms destroy this body, I know this, in my own body, with my
own eyes, I shall see the Lord. See, he knew of that day of the
resurrection. He knew that he would see with
his own eyes. And let this be our calm assurance
in our sickness. Let it be a peaceful thought
in sorrow. Let this be ease to our heart
as we are surrounded by pain and even death. Let this now
by faith, let us be confident and sure that in death's cold
hour, our Savior lives. Our Savior lives. And because
he is raised from the dead, therefore we have hope too of a resurrection. And this is the result of true
faith in Jesus Christ, even as Jesus, our Savior, now is in
the body. Consider how he is in the body. He is body, soul, and spirit,
perfect in every way. And yet, this is how we soon
shall be. We shall be raised body, soul,
and spirit, perfectly glorified, even as our Lord Jesus Christ. This gospel we preach is the
same gospel Christ preached. He said, I am the bread of life
and he that believeth on me shall never hunger and never thirst.
Is that true? I ate a lot this week, so I was
really hungry. But that's not what it means.
It's spiritual hunger. Hunger and thirst after righteousness. You that believe on Christ, you
no longer hunger and thirst for righteousness. Why? You have
the righteousness of God. Christ made our righteousness
and he has by grace given us that righteousness. He has made
our redemption by his offering. And I know this, not all will
come to him. They will not all believe. But
the will of God is that all those that are given to Christ shall
come to Christ. I know this. They will come to
Christ. They will believe on him. And
all that believe, he has willed it so, and they shall be raised
the last day. This is our resurrection from
the dead. Our eternal life and glory in
heaven is forever and immutably tied to the person and work of
Christ. You see, we know we're going to be raised because it's
tied to him. This is our assurance of the
resurrection. This is our assurance of eternal
life, is that it is immutably tied to him. We are in vital
union with Christ, in vital union with Christ. And so when Jesus was talking
to Martha, I preached that this last Wednesday. If he was talking
to Martha, he said this. Martha said, I know that he's
gonna raise again at the last day. But Jesus said, I am the
resurrection and life. He that believeth in me, though
he were dead, yet shall he live. And whosoever liveth and believeth
in me shall never die. Believest thou this? We that
believe in Christ have this hope that we will never die. My brother,
he died physically, but he did not die. This is our hope in
Christ, is that we have been raised in Christ. We have been
resurrected by grace and through faith in Christ. We know this,
that we shall never die. This body may be laid to rest,
but we will never die. So as we die physically, we will
never die truly. To be absent from the Lord, Paul
said, is what? To be present. To be absent from
the body is to be present with the Lord. And so then in the text, we,
In Revelation chapter 20 in verse four, just above that, he said,
I saw thrones, and they that sat upon them, and judgment was
given to them. And I saw the souls of them that
were beheaded for the witness of Jesus and for the word of
God, which had not worshiped the beast, neither his image,
neither received the mark in their foreheads or in their hands,
and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. This
thousand years, of course, is not a literal one, but it is
a figurative one. It means all the days of grace,
all the time between Christ coming and Christ returning. This is
the thousand year reign. And you know what? My brother
is a part of that. And if we die, we'll be a part
of that. They lived and reigned with him. They were beheaded, right? So
what happened to their body? It died. We know this, that they
still live. They lived and reigned with Christ. Now, I want us to see this hope
of the resurrection. Now, what is the basis of our
hope in the resurrection? We see that we are going to be
raised. We see this, that if we die, our bodies may go to
the ground, but we ourselves will ascend into glory. What
is the grounds and hope of this resurrection, the resurrection
that we are promised? First of all, A representative
resurrection. This is the grounds of our hope.
A representative resurrection. Secondly, a spiritual resurrection. And third, the revelation concerning
the resurrection. First of all, representative.
What I mean by this is that all the elect of God were raised
with Christ as their representative. If any man is to have hope in
obtaining the resurrection, he must have been represented by
Jesus Christ. We know this, that only the elect
are represented by Jesus Christ. Well, who's that? As many as
the Lord ordained to eternal life believed. That's who. They're all that God chose. And
this whole scheme of grace is in a covenant of grace that the
father before the world began chose a people, loved a people,
a remnant according to the election of grace. This is those who were
given to Jesus Christ. Christ said this. He said, Father,
glorify the Son as thou, let me see it, John chapter 17. I'm
not gonna misquote it. John chapter 17. He said, glorify
the Son that thy Son may glorify thee, as thou hast given him
power of all flesh, listen, that he should give eternal life to
who? As many as thou hast given him.
Not one more, and not one less. All that the Father gave to Christ,
He represented them. We know that in Ephesians 1,
that those are blessed. He said, blessed be the God and
Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places, in Christ Jesus. That's where
all the blessings are. That's where all the blessings
are, is in Him. according as he had chosen us in Christ before
the foundation of the world for this purpose, that we should
be holy and without blame before him. Here's his motive, in love. Having predestinated us unto
the adoption of children, here's the means. by Jesus Christ unto
himself. And what's all this for? Unto
the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us
accepted in the beloved. Jesus Christ then, as a surety,
as a high priest, came into this world and represented all that
the Father gave him. He redeemed them by His blood
and obtained for them an everlasting righteousness. Why? For God was not willing
that any should perish, but all come to repentance. Who are the
any and the all? If you read the text, he's talking
about the church. He's talking about the elect.
God's not that God's not willing that all men should repent. If
he did, all men would repent. If God was willing that none
should perish in all the world, then there would be no hell.
But we know this, he only is willing that all his elect should
repent because they were represented by Christ. Go to first Corinthians
chapter one, first Corinthians chapter one. You get a sense of this in verse
30. Who put you in Christ? You are
in Christ, you confess to be in Christ, who put you there?
But of him, of God, are you in Christ Jesus, who of God is made
unto us wisdom. and righteousness, and sanctification,
and redemption. For what purpose? That according
as it is written, he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. God made Christ to be all our
salvation. Isn't that glorious? Do you want
a part of it? Do you want to do something for
it? Do you want to add your righteousness to his? None of God's people
do. Why? We confess this, we have
no righteousness of our own. All our righteousnesses are as
what? Filthy rags. We dare not add
anything to Christ. Christ is all our righteousness.
Christ is all our sanctification. Anybody want to sanctify themselves?
Who wants to sanctify themselves? Go ahead. Christ is my sanctification. Hebrews chapter 10. Hebrews chapter
10. And verse. Let's read verse nine,
Lo, I come to do thy will, O God. He take it the way of the first
that he may establish the second. Listen, by the which will we
are sanctified. You're sanctified by the will
of God. Here's the means, through the
offering of the body of Christ once for all. How many times
have you been sanctified? I've been sanctified once. Not
by my will, by the will of God and by the body of Christ. And
you know what Christ did for me? Look at this in verse 14.
For by one offering he hath perfected forever one group of people.
Who? Them that are sanctified. Those
that are chosen by God, those that are redeemed by Christ,
they are called by the Spirit and they are sanctified. They're
sanctified by the Spirit of God through regeneration. Therefore, all that Christ did
as a man, all that he accomplished in this life, all his faith and
obedience, he had done for his elect. And all he has done for
us, we did in him. We did in him. Now, obviously,
the scriptures bear this out in Romans chapter five. You remember,
wherefore, it's about one man, sin entered in the world, and
death by sin. So death passed upon all men,
for all have sinned. When Adam sinned, you sinned.
When Adam died, you died. That's plain language. He was
a representative man. Who did he represent? He represented
the whole race. Every one of us was represented
by that man. And every one of us died. Every
one of us died. The scriptures also confess this,
that as he was a representative man, so was Christ. Our Lord
Jesus Christ was a representative man. The second Adam. And he says this, for by one
man's disobedience, many were made sinners, so by the obedience
of one shall many be made righteous. You see, Christ, by his obedience,
obtained the righteousness of God for us. So what's the grounds
of my resurrection? What's the hope of eternal life
that I have? This, that Jesus Christ was my
representative. Now, how does one know if Christ
is their representative? I know this, he represented only
the elect. He represented only Israel, spiritual
Israel. I know this, he only represented
Jacob and not Esau. He represented Peter and not
Judas. How do you know he represented
you? Simply by this, blessed and holy is he that hath part
in the first resurrection. Have you been born again by the
Spirit of God? I like this. He told Nicodemus
this. He said, you must be born again. Now he wasn't telling
Nicodemus something he had to do. He was telling him the necessity
of his new birth. He must be born again because
God chose him. He must be born again because
Christ represented him. I was telling them in the conference
about a man in our congregation, J.D. Farmer, him and his brothers
out there in the car on a Wednesday night in this old building we
had, it just didn't have any lights in the parking lot and it was
dark. These stained glass windows looked
like red eyes just staring at you. I didn't like to pull in
the parking lot at night. And these two are in the car
and he was telling me this later, he said they were playing rock,
paper, scissors to see if they were gonna go in or not. J.D. said, I won, so we went
in. And that night, the Lord Jesus
Christ saved my brother's life, saved him. He heard the gospel
for the first time, and he came to me at the end of that message,
and he said, you know what? I didn't hear a word you said,
but I heard my shepherd's voice. I heard him. And about several months later,
he thought about that night, and he said, you know what? What
if I'd lost? What if I'd lost that rock, paper,
scissors, and I didn't? I said, J.D., there was no chance
you would lose. You believe tonight. You believe
on the Son of God. As many as were ordained to eternal
life believed. Same is true tonight. If you
were ordained to eternal life, you will believe. You see, salvation,
the resurrection is of God and not of man. That's the second
point I was wanting to make is this, that you must be raised
from the dead in order to receive what Christ has given. In order
to know your election and your redemption, you must believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ. What's the evidence of this resurrection? It is simply faith in Christ. Faith is the breath of life that
he gives us. If he gives you life, you believe. Now you that believe, can you
do anything but believe? I know this, I confess that my
faith is weak at best. But I know this, I believe Christ. I trust in his blood alone to
cleanse me. His righteousness to cover my
nakedness. I trust in his power to keep
me. And I have no confidence in the
flesh. Is that you? Then you may be
sure of your election. You may have confidence that
you have been raised from the dead. The evidence of this is spiritual
resurrection. So if you have been raised from
the dead, know this, that you are blessed and holy, having
had part in the first resurrection. And I want you to see the benefit.
Go back to your text. Go back to your text and see
this. See the benefit then of those who are blessed and holy.
Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection.
Listen, on such the second death hath no power. Second death. Now listen, we all took part
in the first death. We all took part in that. But
now that Christ has raised us and given us spiritual life and
faith in him, this is the promise that the second death has no
power over you. The second death has no power
over us. This should be most assuring. The second death has no power
simply because of this, Christ has removed your sins from you.
Those who partake in the second death will do so because of their
sin. That's what sin deserves, eternal
damnation. But consider what Christ has
done in removing the power of the second death. He did so by
his death. He did so by his death. Go to Isaiah chapter 40. I believe
that's right. Yes, it is. This is the heart of every man
that preaches the gospel. I don't want to make you afraid.
I want to comfort God's people. Comfort ye, comfort ye my people,
saith the Lord. Speak comfortably to Jerusalem,
crying to her this, her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity
is pardoned. Here's the reason. For she hath
received of the Lord's hand double for all her sins. Why shall the second death have
no power on you? Because Christ has bore your
sins in his own body on the tree. You see, it's important that,
I love the justice of God, don't you? I love the holiness of God. You know why? Because a holy
God, a just God cannot demand twice payment. If my sins were paid for in Christ,
God cannot demand them of me. Isn't that glorious? That's why
God by searching cannot find your sin. Christ paid the debt. God's justice is forever satisfied
with His one offering. Forever. So tonight, if you close your
eyes and do not wake up tomorrow in this world, you have a good
hope of waking up in glory. Why? The second death has no
power over us. The second death hath no power
over God's people. And so I pray that God be, I
know I've got plenty more, but I'm not gonna go any further. And so this is my grounds. Is
this your grounds for the resurrection? Do you have a representative
who was raised from the dead? I do. Christ is my righteousness. Christ is my redemption. Christ
was raised from the dead, and I was raised in him. My grounds
for the resurrection is that he's raised me already and given
me a new heart, a new life, a new nature, given me faith in Christ. And I know this, nothing shall
separate me from the love of God. You know that John chapter
10, that's a blessed passage of scripture. Jesus said this,
no man shall pluck them out of my hands. For the father which
gave them me is greater than all and no man shall pluck them
out of his hand. I and my father are one. This
is comforting that no trouble, no difficulties in this life
are going to separate us from this. If God has raised you from
the dead, given you faith, blessed and holy are you. And you know
this, that we have hope that when we die in this body, we
will not die. And soon this body, though we
die in this body and we ascend to be with Christ, we have hope
in this, that one day this body and that spirit are going to
be reunited. And we're going to be even as
the Lord Jesus Christ. And in that day, there'll be
no more pain, no more sorrow, no more separation from God. No more death, no more curse,
no more sin, no more ignorance. Eternal love and bliss, that's
what we'll experience. If you have not believed on the
Lord Jesus Christ, may God the Holy Spirit even now give you
faith that he exposed your sin and your need of Christ that
you would come to him by faith, and this is an act of God. If
you do, who gets the glory? God. I pray that God bless this
to your hearts.