If you will, turn in your Bibles
tonight to Romans chapter 12. Such a good group of people here
tonight, good singing. What a wonderful blessing to
be able to come together and worship the Lord. Some of the
people have asked me, are you still able to have a Sunday evening
service? A lot of the smaller churches
have quit having services on Sunday evening. And I understand
every church is different, every location, every situation. But
I'm so thankful for our Sunday evening services, for those of
you who are faithful, and what a blessing it is to meet together
and worship the Lord together. Romans chapter 12, verse 1, I
beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you
present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto
God, which is your reasonable service. As you know, I try on
the times that we observe the Lord's Supper to bring a shorter
message, shorter in time. I'm not always successful, but
I try. And I try to do this because
I believe that the supper itself is a message. I believe that
when we look upon the bread and the wine which are separated
tonight, we see a message. We not only hear a message, but
we see a message. And the message that we see is
a message of the greatest of all love. For God so loved the
world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth
in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. It's a
message of grace, for you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. Though he was rich, yet for your
sakes he became poor, that you through his poverty might be
made rich. It's a message of mercy. God
passed by the angels, did not have mercy upon one angel that
fell, and yet God is merciful to sinners. It's a message of
righteousness. God spared not his own son when
he was charged with the sins of his people. God struck his
son. It's a message of justice. God's
justice is satisfied. Not one attribute of God is tarnished
in any way in God. forgiving sinners, justifying
the ungodly. It's a message in itself, isn't
it? The Supper of the Lord. The death of the Lord Jesus Christ
upon the cross was the worst of all deaths. The physical pain was great.
We know that. We don't have the ability to
even try to explain or try to speak about the great suffering
of our Lord physically. And yet we know that His real
suffering was the suffering of His soul. I read Isaiah 53 this past week
as we read just a few minutes ago. Isaiah 53 speaks of Jehovah's
servant. his suffering servant, his successful
servant. But I notice that three times
his soul is mentioned. In verse 10 we read, yet it pleased
the Lord to bruise him. He hath put him to grief when
thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin. And I ask you and I
ask myself tonight, Can we enter into that as we eat this bread
and drink this wine that his soul was made an offering for
my sin, for your sin? In verse 11, we read, he shall
see of the travail of his soul and shall be magnified. Can we
enter into that tonight as we eat the bread and drink the wine?
He is satisfied as he sees you redeemed by his precious blood. He shall see of the travail of
his soul and shall be satisfied. And as he looks upon his people
tonight, those of us here who know him, he's satisfied. His work is successful. he has accomplished the purpose
for which he came into this world. And then verse 12, therefore
will I divide him a portion with the great and he shall divide
the spoil with the strong because he hath poured out his soul unto
death. Can we enter into that tonight
as we eat the bread and drink the wine? that our blessed Redeemer
is King of kings and Lord of lords, that he tonight is reigning
and ruling over all things. As we come to this verse tonight,
verse one of chapter 12 of Romans, I could not help but notice back
the last word of chapter 11. Amen. Or as I like to say, amen. Amen. Are we able to say amen to what
the apostle had just said in that passage, beginning in verse
33, when he said, oh, the depth of the riches, both of the wisdom
and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are His judgments
and His ways past finding out? Amen. So be it. His wisdom is unsearchable. His judgments, they're past finding
out. Can we say amen that there are
things in God's providence that we do not understand and will
never understand in this life. And yet, are we able to say amen?
That's all right. We don't have to understand.
We don't have to know. Amen. Whatever the Lord does
is right and it's good. Are any of us his counselors? Is any man his counselor? Is
any man his creditor? Does God need anyone? For who
hath known the mind of the Lord, or who hath been his counselor,
or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto
him again? No, not one. Amen. God needs no one. He's perfect
in himself. And notice verse 36, for of him
is salvation of him or is it of men? For of him and through him is salvation
through the work of men or a salvation of the Lord as the scripture
says. For of him and through him and to him are all things to whom be glory for ever and
ever. Amen. Amen. I was rereading a
book recently. Excellent book. His title is
The Reign of Grace by Abraham Booth. Abraham Booth was a Baptist preacher,
I believe, in the 1700s. pastored eventually around London. And there's a biographical sketch
of Abraham Booth in this book that I was reading. And I found
this interesting, that he was so respected among his peers,
among the other pastors in an association they had, that they
had a meeting one time and they assigned each pastor a different
part of the model prayer. And the first preacher, he preached
on these words, our father, which art in heaven. And the second
man, he preached on a few words that follow. Hallowed be thy
name. But do you know what they assigned
to Abraham Booth to preach on? Amen. Amen. And the message he brought on
prayer, evidently was so good that they
just insisted it be put in print. And it was used of the Lord speaking
to God's people about prayer. But verse one of chapter 12 tonight,
the commentators, they will tell you that chapter 12 begins a
new section in this book of Roman, this letter of Romans rather,
It begins what is called the practical section. And this is
something that is seen in almost all of Paul's letters. First
you have the teaching, the doctrine, and then you have the practical. And that's the way it always
should be. What we believe, what we know to be true has an influence
on our lives, the way we live, what we practice. That's the
way it must be so, must be rather. And I thought we might think
of the teaching, that is the doctrine, as building the house,
and then the practical as furnishing the house. Tonight, I want us to look at
one point. I want to make one point only
from this verse. God's children, you and I, those
of us who know Christ tonight as our Lord and Savior, those
that he addresses here as brethren, we are appealed to as priest. Priest. You say, where do you get that?
How do you see that? It's apparent because of the
word sacrifice. Sacrifice. In the Old Testament
law, it was the work of the priest who offered sacrifices. Now it's true, there were exceptions
to the rule. We know, for instance, Elijah,
he was not a priest, he was a prophet of God, and yet on Mount Carmel,
he offered a sacrifice, and it was a sacrifice that God accepted
by fire. But the work of sacrificing was
the work of a priest. And we are called here to present
our bodies as a living sacrifice. So we are addressed as priests. Does the New Testament teach
that believers are priests? Absolutely. Absolutely. And I want us to look at a few
places where we see this. If you look In Revelation chapter
1. Revelation chapter 1 verses 4
and 5. I'm sorry, verses 5 and 6. Revelation
chapter 1 verses 5 and 6. And from Jesus Christ, who is
the faithful witness, and the first begotten of the dead, and
the prince of the kings of the earth, unto him that loved us,
and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made
us kings and priests unto God and his Father. Our believer's
priest, yes, the Lord Jesus Christ has made us kings and priests
unto God. Every child of God, every believer,
That's one of the reasons we do not agree with those denominations
that have a separate order of priest and laity, as they like
to refer to everyone else. No, we're all priests of God,
made priest by Jesus Christ. Every believer is a priest unto
God. Look in chapter five of Revelation. Verses 9 and 10, And they sung a new song, saying,
Thou art worthy to take the book, to open the seals thereof, for
thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood, out of
every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation, and hast
made us unto our God kings and priests, and we shall reign on
the earth. Every child of God is made a
king, a kingdom of priests. Look with me in 1 Peter, 1 Peter
chapter 2. Beginning with verse 5. You also,
as living stones, are built up a spiritual house. We thought
this morning for just a minute about a foundation. A house has
a foundation. Every believer is a living stone
built up a spiritual house upon the foundation. You know the
wonderful thing, I was reading this this morning, thinking about
that verse in Zechariah, that from the first child of God,
whoever was the first one the Lord saved, Abel, Adam, Eve,
I don't know, doesn't make any difference. But from the very
first one, was laid upon this foundation and receives life,
became a living stone in this spiritual building that Christ
is building. And one day, and maybe it will
be today, maybe it will be tonight, that last stone, that very last
one of God's elect is going to be added to the building, the
spiritual house. And do you know what's going
to happen when that last stone is added? What's going to take
place? The scripture says there's going
to be shoutings of grace, Grace, grace unto it. And every stone,
every living stone that's built on this foundation, Jesus Christ,
we all confess the same thing. For by grace are we saved through
faith. And that not of ourselves, it
is a gift of God. Not of works, lest any man should
boast. For your living stones built
up a spiritual house. Now notice a holy priesthood,
a holy priesthood made priest under every stone is a priest
in this spiritual house. to offer up spiritual sacrifices
acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. And look down to verse nine.
Notice there, the apostle says that we are unholy priests to
it, but notice in verse nine, but you are a chosen generation,
a royal priesthood. Kings and priests, he hath made
us unto God. We're made priests unto God.
But it goes without saying that our priesthood has nothing, nothing,
nothing to do with us offering a sacrifice of atonement. Has nothing to do, our priesthood
has nothing to do with us as priests offering a sacrifice
of atonement. Thank God that our great high
priest, has offered the one blood sacrifice of atonement of propitiation. It's blasphemy even to thank
or to suggest that his one offering must be supplemented by any work
of any other priest, any other sacrifice. For by one offering,
he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified. Well, if
we are priests and we have nothing to do, and we don't, we have
nothing to do with the sacrifice of atonement, then what kind
of sacrifice do we offer? What kind of sacrifice? Because
a priest was to offer gifts and sacrifices. This is what the
writer of Hebrews tells us. He must offer gifts. He's taken
from among men to offer gifts and sacrifices. What then are
to be our sacrifices? Well, we read it just a few minutes
ago in 1st Peter. Spiritual sacrifices acceptable
to God by Jesus Christ. Did you know in the Old Testament
there were sacrifices that were not blood sacrifices? They were blood sacrifices, but
they had nothing to do with sin. They were sacrifices. Thanksgiving,
sacrifices of Thanksgiving. Let me show us that in 2 Chronicles,
just a moment. 2 Chronicles chapter 29. This is during the reign of Hezekiah,
who was a good king of Judah. In 2 Chronicles chapter 29 and
verse 23, He's reinstituting worship as
God had commanded. Verse 23, it says, And they brought
forth the goats for the sin offering. 2 Chronicles chapter 29 and verse
23, And they brought forth the he goats for the sin offering
before the king and the congregation, and they laid their hands upon
them. Laying hands upon an animal for a blood sacrifice pictured
the transference of the guilty person's transgressions to the
sacrifice, just as our sins were laid upon Christ. We read that
in Isaiah. For he hath made to meet upon
him the iniquities of us all. He bare our sins in his own body
on the tree. He was charged with our sins. He had no sin of his own, and
he was not turned into sin either. He wasn't turned into sin, my
friends. He was made to be sin, the scripture
says, but he was made to be sin by imputation. He became responsible
for the sins of his people so that he called them my iniquities. They became his iniquities. But he himself remained holy,
harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners. And I must believe
this, I must insist upon this, because if he was somehow turned
into sin, that means the sacrifice was not perfect. And it had to
be perfect to be accepted. He was charged with our sins. Just like this he goat on the
day of atonement when the high priest laid his hands upon his
head before that goat was slain and his blood was taken into
the Holy of Holies and sprinkled on the mercy seat and before
the mercy seat. That goat was still the same
goat, but it was a pitcher. of transferring the sins of the
nation of Israel to the substitute. But notice, they not only did
that, verse 23 and 24 says, and they brought forth the he goats
for the sin offering before the king and the congregation. They
laid their hands upon them and the priests killed them. That's
what a priest did. He offered a sacrifice. Priests
killed them and they made reconciliation with their blood upon the altar,
to make an atonement for all Israel. For the king commanded
that the burn offering and the sin offering should be made for
all Israel. But now notice, look down at
verse 31. Then Hezekiah answered and said,
Now you have consecrated yourselves unto the Lord. Come near and
bring sacrifices and thank offerings unto the house of the Lord. And
the congregation brought in sacrifices and thanked offerings, and as
many as were of a free heart burnt offerings. What are the
sacrifices that we are to offer? We are to offer the sacrifice
of thanksgiving. And not only that, but look with
me, if you will, in Hebrews chapter 13. Hebrews chapter 13, verse 15. By Him, Hebrews 13 and verse
15, by Him therefore, by Him, by Christ, If we have anything to do with
God and God has anything to do with us, it's going to be through
Christ. We must have a mediator. Even when we offer our sacrifices
of praise. Remember, we saw last week that
plaque on the high priest that said, holiness to the Lord. He
was to bear the iniquity of the children of Israel in their holy
things. Even in our holy things, our
prayer, our praise, our giving of offerings, we need always
Christ's mediation. Our prayers must be washed in
his blood. Our tears must be washed in his
blood, my friends. Everything that God accepts from
men must come through Jesus Christ. For by him, therefore, let us
offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually. That is the
fruit of our lips, giving thanks to his name. Now notice this
next verse, but to do good, this is sacrifice also, but to do
good and to communicate, we are to give unto others, to share
with others, to communicate. Remember John said, how dwells
the love of God in a person who says he loves God, but Then he
sees his brother in need and just turns a blind eye and a
deaf ear. To do good and to communicate. Forget not, now notice, for with
such sacrifices God is well pleased. I beseech you, therefore, men
and brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your
bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable under God, which is
your reasonable service. I hope to come back to this next
Sunday, but by this is meant a complete sacrifice. I beseech
you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you
present your bodies, body and soul, a complete sacrifice. Under the Old Testament dispensation,
when animals were presented to a priest as a sacrifice, the
whole animal was presented. They didn't just present one
of his ears or one of his feet or his tail or something like
that. No, the whole animal. And that's
what the apostle is telling us, beseeching us here by the use
of the word body, your bodies, your body, you, whatever makes
up you. A living sacrifice, holy and acceptable
unto God, which is your reasonable service. May the Lord bless these
thoughts and words to all of us here tonight. I ask the man if