Morning, brothers and sisters.
Really, I should not even have to get up here today, because everything I was going to say has already been said. So, really, I will just review what you were all doing this morning.
Let us turn to John 19. Actually, we will begin at John 18:38 and read through John 19:18.
Pilate saith unto Him, What is truth?
And when he had said this, he went out again unto the Jews, and saith unto them, I find no fault in Him.
But ye have a custom, that I should release unto you one at the Passover: will ye therefore that I release unto you the King of the Jews?
They cried out therefore again, saying, Not this man, but Barabbas. Now Barabbas was a robber.
Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged Him.
And the soldiers plaited a crown of thorns, and put it on His head, and arrayed Him in a purple garment;
and they came unto Him, and said, Hail, King of the Jews! and they struck Him with their hands.
And Pilate went out again, and saith unto them, Behold, I bring Him out to you, that ye may know that I find no fault in Him.
Jesus then came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple garment. And Pilate saith unto them, Behold, the man!
When therefore the chief priests and the officers saw Him, they cried out, saying, Crucify Him, crucify Him.
Pilate saith unto them, Take Him yourselves, and crucify Him: for I find no fault in Him.
The Jews answered him, We have a law, and by that law He ought to die, because He made Himself the Son of God.
When Pilate therefore heard this saying, he was the more afraid;
and he entered into the Praetorium again, and saith unto Jesus, Whence art Thou? But Jesus gave him no answer.
Pilate therefore saith unto Him, Speakest Thou not unto me? Knowest Thou not that I have power to release Thee, and have power to crucify Thee?
Jesus answered him, Thou wouldest have no power against Me, except it were given thee from above: therefore he that delivered Me unto thee hath greater sin.
Upon this Pilate sought to release Him: but the Jews cried out, saying, If thou release this Man, thou art not Caesar’s friend: every one that maketh himself a king speaketh against Caesar.
When Pilate therefore heard these words, he brought Jesus out, and sat down on the judgment-seat at a place called The Pavement, but in Hebrew, Gabbatha.
Now it was the Preparation of the Passover: it was about the sixth hour. And he saith unto the Jews, Behold, your King!
They therefore cried out, Away with Him, away with Him, crucify Him! Pilate saith unto them, Shall I crucify your King? The chief priests answered, We have no king but Caesar.
Then therefore he delivered Him unto them to be crucified.
They took Jesus therefore:
and He went out, bearing the cross for Himself, unto the place called The place of a skull, which is called in Hebrew Golgotha;
where they crucified Him.
Let us also look at Hebrews 12:3.
For consider Him that hath endured such gainsaying of sinners against Himself, that ye wax not weary, fainting in your souls.
Let us pray.
Heavenly Father, we come to You today with great thanksgiving and praise because You have given to us a Savior. Lord, it is only because of Him that we can be before You and not die. Lord, we thank You for Him.
Lord, we want to be able to see Him today—to see Him more clearly in a way that would change our lives, would change the way we go, the way we look at things, and the way we look at You.
But, Lord, we cannot see Him rightly unless You show Him to us. Lord, as we read here, men looked at Him, but they did not see Him rightly. But You see Him rightly, and You grant sight so that we might see Him rightly.
So that is what we are asking today: that You would open Your Word to us, that we could see our Lord and our Savior. Lord, may that have the effect on our lives that You want it to have, that You planned it to have from the beginning. In Jesus’ name, amen.
All right. This morning, I want to really work on a couple of verses.
You guys must get tired of seeing me weep. But I must have a big bottle of tears, you know?
But I want to look at two verses out of this whole ordeal in Scripture. Here we have our Lord Jesus being brought to His death, His crucifixion. The two verses are these: “Behold, the man,” and, “Behold, your King.”
I want to look at these two verses because I think these are the most important verses in this passage. Yes, we know that our Lord was crucified. But before our Lord was crucified, we know that in John 1:29 and John 1:36 the Lord Jesus was introduced by John the Baptist as the Lamb of God.
If you remember, he said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world,” in John 1:29. Then he pointed Him out to his disciples and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God.” John and Andrew then went out and followed Him.
We find out that the Lamb being spoken of here was not literally a lamb. He was a man. All the typology concerning this Lamb of God pointed to a man—not a sacrificial animal, but an actual man—because it was a man who was to take away the sins of the world. All those other things were types.
In order to understand His role as the Lamb of God, we want to look at a couple of Old Testament passages. They will help us in dealing with these words, “Behold, the man.”
When Pilate brought Him out, he was saying, “I want you to look at Him.” He said, “Behold, the man,” after Jesus had been scourged. It was as though he was saying, “I want you to look at Him. This is the man. Is this enough? Have I done enough? Are you satisfied with this?”
That was intended to bring out sympathy. In some ways, Pilate did not want to do this. He knew that the Jews wanted this man, our Lord Jesus, dead.
But He is the Lamb of God. He had to die. It is interesting that, even in this chapter, the people had no sympathy for the Lord. They said, “Crucify Him.” But that was right in God’s purpose.
It might not have been morally right, but it was right in God’s purpose. We need to understand that. Jesus was meant to die. He is the only Man who was ever born who was meant to die.
No other man was meant to die. We were all meant to have eternal life. All of us. That is what God created us for. None of us were to die. Sin brought in death. But only our Lord Jesus was born to die, and He had to.
So this was right, and it was good in God’s eyes, even though we look at it as a human tragedy. Men in the world today look at this as a human tragedy. We can say, yes, it was a human tragedy, but it was the will of God.
We need to understand that, because in understanding that, there is a freedom that is ours. We need to have that freedom.
Now, if we look at Exodus 12, which speaks of the Passover, let us read a few verses.
Now the Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, saying,
This month shall be unto you the beginning of months: it shall be the first month of the year to you.
Speak ye unto all the congregation of Israel, saying, In the tenth day of this month they shall take to them every man a lamb, according to their fathers’ houses, a lamb for a household:
and if the household be too little for a lamb, then shall he and his neighbor next unto his house take one according to the number of the souls; according to every man’s eating ye shall make your count for the lamb.
Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male a year old: ye shall take it from the sheep, or from the goats.
And ye shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same month: and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it at even.
And they shall take of the blood, and put it on the two side-posts and upon the lintel, upon the houses wherein they shall eat it.
For I will go through the land of Egypt in that night, and will smite all the first-born in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the Lord.
And the blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where ye are: and when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and there shall no plague be upon you to destroy you, when I smite the land of Egypt.
This lamb could not simply be taken and killed that day. They had to take the lamb on the tenth day. Then came the tenth, the eleventh, the twelfth, and the thirteenth. For four days they had the lamb before they killed it.
What was the purpose of that? Why did they have to have it for four days? Why could they not kill it right away?
Because the lamb had to be without blemish. This was the only way they could determine whether it was without blemish. Sometimes we look all right on the outside, but upon further scrutiny, you start to see flaws.
Many of you, when you were searching for your spouses, found that it was the same way. A lot of you wanted to get married right away: “Oh, I found the one.” But then, upon closer examination, you started to see the flaws. You said, “I cannot have this one.”
Or, if you just had to have that person, you took them, flaws and all. Well, I am glad my wife took me with all my flaws.
But the whole thing was this: for the lamb to be acceptable to God, it had to be without blemish. It was up to the men, up to those families, to check the lamb out and say, “Okay, I see that this is acceptable. This is acceptable, and I can take it to God now.”
So they had to behold it.
The lamb had to be without blemish, and we are looking at the Lord Jesus in that way—without blemish. A lot of us say, “Well, He was innocent.” That is not really true. He might have been innocent of crimes, but as a being, He was not innocent, because innocent just means you are untested.
That is why God put Adam and Eve in the garden. They were innocent, and He had to test them to see their true mettle. What were they like?
In the same way, our Lord Jesus was not innocent. He was tested and found true.
So, in beholding Him, we see that He was without blemish or defect. It was the idea of looking at His character as a man. His character as a man was without blemish and without defect.
If there had been some defect in Him, He could not have been offered. Then there would have been no offering for sin.
Even Pilate came to the place of saying—three times in this section—“I find no fault in Him.”
It is interesting, but anybody who reads about Jesus can only say this about Jesus as a man: “You find no fault in Him.” You read through the Gospels, and you find no fault in Him as a man. That is important: as a man, you find no fault in Him.
Even though He dined with sinners, there was no fault in Him. Not only that, but He could be with sinners and none of it rubbed off on Him. There was no place for it to hang its hat, no place for it to catch and trap Him.
He could be with them. Remember, the Pharisees really had trouble with this: “How can You be with them? What are You doing being with sinners?” He could be with them and still be perfect and without sin.
He was still holy—in other words, separate unto God. It was not merely that He did not do wrong things, but that He was separated unto God. He was doing God’s work, and where God sent Him, He could go without being defiled, without having to wash His feet, so to speak.
He is holy. We spoke today of Him being righteous. All the things He did were right. Even His dining with sinners was right. Even His forgiving the harlot was right. All the things He did were right.
People saw that. The people who lived in Nazareth and saw Him grow up, when they looked at Him, could say, “I find no fault in Him.”
The only fault they really found was that He was a prophet, and they did not like it. They were saying, “How can the prophet come out of Nazareth? Is this not Joseph’s son? He is nothing special.” But they could not find anything wrong with Him.
Before the Sanhedrin, they could not find anything wrong with Him. Even though they had false witnesses and everything, they could not find anything wrong with Him. So they had to ask Him, “Are You the Son of God?” He said, “Yes.” They said, “Okay, now we have found something wrong with You. You claim to be God.” But He was.
So, really, He was telling the truth. There was no wrong in Him. Even Pilate, the shrewd man that he was as a Roman ruler, looked at Him and said, “There is nothing in Him.” Even the scourging could not bring out wrong in Him. Nothing.
He did not curse Pilate. He did not curse the soldiers when they struck Him. There was nothing—no wrong in Him.
Another thing: the passage says that the lamb was to be taken from the sheep. You might say, “Well, big deal. You find sheep.” That is right: you find him in the flock. That is important, because He had to be one of us.
That is really important. He did not just come down from nowhere. I do not know if you guys read Greek mythology, but some of those people just come out of nowhere and there they are. It was not like that. He had to be like us.
In every way, He had to be like us. He had to live in this world like us. He had to be one of the flock. He had to be one of the sheep. Otherwise, it would not do.
The instructions for the Passover were to take it from the flock. The instructions concerning our Passover are the same: You have to take Him from the flock. He has to be found in the flock.
Let us look at a couple of Scriptures to make this point. In Isaiah 53, beginning with verse 1, we read:
Who hath believed our message? and to whom hath the arm of the Lord been revealed?
For He grew up before Him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground:
He hath no form nor comeliness; and when we see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him.
He was despised, and rejected of men; a Man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.
He is just like us. He came as a root out of dry ground. He did not come in palaces. He did not come in wealth. He came as a root out of dry ground, just like any poor person born into the world.
A root out of dry ground—what good can come out of this ground? A root came out of it.
He did not grow up in a palace. He was not separate from the sorrows and griefs of humanity. He had no sin, but that does not mean He was not affected by the sin that was in the world.
He knew sorrow. Did not Mary’s husband die? He knew the sorrow of that. He knew the toughness of being in a family that was fatherless after some years.
He was acquainted with grief. He saw it around Him in Nazareth, where He lived. He saw it when He began His ministry. He was not held from it.
Remember Nehemiah? You could not come before the king with a sad face. The king could not know that anything was wrong out there. It was not like that for Jesus.
Everything that was sad and crummy about human existence, He knew. He lived here. He lived among us. That is important.
He knew sorrow and grief. He knew loneliness. You teenagers, you always think, when you get to that place as teenagers, “I am alone. No one understands me,” and things like that. Do you think the Lord did not know loneliness? Do you think He did not know what it was for people to misunderstand Him?
He was acquainted with all these things that we go through. He knew rejection. He knew what it was to be rejected by His own people.
Look here in this chapter that we read: “We have no king but Caesar. Away with Him. We want Barabbas.” He knew rejection.
Even before He came to the cross, He knew rejection: “This cannot be the One.”
He knew the silence of God when He was on the cross and cried out, “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” God never answered Him.
He knew what it was like for God not to answer Him because of sin—not His sin, but because He bore the sin of the world. He knew that God was silent because of that sin.
But He knew it, just as some of us have known it or know it. He was not held away from these things. He suffered in every point in which we have suffered or may suffer.
He knew separation from God because of sin. We cannot say of the Lord Jesus that He cannot relate to me and I cannot relate to Him. There is no way, because in every way He was like us, except He did not sin.
But He knew the sufferings of sin because He bore our sin. He knew the silence of God because God does not hear sinners, so to speak. He knew that because He bore our sin.
He knew loneliness. He knew rejection. He knew death in His family. He knew poverty. He knew it all.
The reason why He did that was for us. Hebrews 4:15 says:
For we have not a high priest that cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities.
That is why. In other words, this makes Him approachable.
That is the one thing: if you look at the Lord Jesus throughout all the Gospels, you have to say, “This Man was approachable.” Who held themselves away from Him?
Little children came to Him. Sinners came to Him. Lepers came to Him. Those possessed by demons came to Him. Those who were sick came to Him. Even those who were holy came to Him by night. Remember Nicodemus?
He was approachable. Brothers and sisters, you have to understand that: whatever your state is, even if you have never known the Lord yourself, you can know this—He is approachable. You can come to Him. Ask forgiveness. Ask mercy. He is approachable.
He is entreatable. He can be entreated.
Even when people said, “Oh, You are too high for this, Lord. Get those little children away,” He said, “No. For of such is the kingdom of God. Do not stop them from coming to Me.”
Behold, the man.
So, He is approachable.
We have to see Jesus in this way because we have to see for ourselves that He is an acceptable offering for us to offer. We look at Him and say, “I can offer Him because, when I look at Him, I see no spot or blemish.”
I look at Him and say, from my standpoint, He is a worthy offering on my behalf. You are offering Him on your behalf. You are offering Him for you.
When you think about that, you have to say, “Well, I look at Him, and from what I can see, He is worthy. He is a worthy offering.”
On the other hand, we often look at the outside. Remember when Samuel was looking for the king whom God had called after Saul had failed? He went to Jesse’s house, and the sons came before him. He saw the firstborn, a big strapping guy like me, and said, “Behold, the Lord’s anointed is right here.”
Remember what the Lord said? “It is not him. Do not look on the outward appearance, because I do not look on the outward appearance.” What does He look on? He looks on the inside.
Even when we come before God, as we are getting ready for the Lord’s table, generally speaking, we look at ourselves. We take a look in the mirror. We are looking at the outward, and we say, “Well, I did not do this, and I did not do that. I am pretty clean, so I can go to the Lord.”
In other words, we look at the law of Moses and say, “Okay, I look okay.” But remember, God looks at the inside.
The Lord Jesus Himself said that unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, it is not worth a lick. God looks at the inner man.
If you look at the Sermon on the Mount, He says, “Oh, you think it is good that you do not commit adultery? Yes, but what about your heart? What about inside?”
When you are looking at other women, are you looking at them in a way that says, “I want those relations with her instead of my wife”? Well, gee whiz, guess what? You are dirty inside. There is a blemish inside. You are not holy.
So the Lord looks on the inner man. The offering has to be acceptable to God too. We may see things and say, “This is good,” but then we have to present it to God, and God looks at the whole life, not just the outward stuff.
When He looked at our Lord Jesus—when He looked at His Son—what did He see?
If we look at the very beginning of the Lord Jesus’ life, we have this in Luke 2. Remember when the Lord was brought to the temple by His parents, and then He stayed back? They did not know He was back at the temple, and they went back and found Him.
Remember what He said to them? “Did ye not know that I must be in My Father’s house?” Then there is this little statement: He went back with them and was subject to them.
When the Lord looked at His Son, when He looked at this One who was offered, where did Adam go wrong? He did not subject himself to God.
But this new Man, from the beginning, subjected Himself to God by subjecting Himself to His parents. The next verse says that He went home and grew in stature, with God and with men.
In other words, there was something pleasing about this Man to God as well as to other men. We were pleased with Him, but God was pleased with Him too.
As a matter of fact, God was so pleased with Him that twice He spoke out and said, “This is My beloved Son.” He did not merely say, “This is My beloved Son.” Both times He said, “In whom I am well pleased.”
Not merely pleased, but well pleased. Remember when Jesus submitted to baptism by John the Baptist? Then, at the Transfiguration, when the Lord Jesus could have walked right into glory, Moses and Elijah were with Him. What were they talking about? They were talking about His departure at Jerusalem. They were talking about His going to the cross, His offering, the sin offering.
God said, “I am well pleased with Him.”
Back in Isaiah 53:10, it says:
Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He hath put Him to grief:
when Thou shalt make His soul an offering for sin.
That has always puzzled me. In Isaiah 53:10, where it says that it pleased the Lord to bruise His Son, we might look at that and ask, “Why would the Lord want to bruise His Son? What kind of God is this who would bruise His Son?”
There are parts of Christendom right now that are using that very argument. You need to read some of these new books that are out. They ask, “What kind of God would bruise His own Son?”
The pleasure is not in the bruising of His Son. The pleasure is that He is an acceptable offering. That is what the pleasure is.
God is pleased that He has found an offering worthy to be offered and acceptable to Him. That is what is pleasing to the Father: this offering is acceptable.
God will provide Himself a lamb, and He did. It was acceptable to Him, and it was proven. It was not an innocent lamb. It was a Lamb without blemish. It was proven, and God delighted in that.
Now, what is the application of this? How does this apply to our lives? This is a nice teaching, but what good is a teaching if it has nothing to do with our lives?
So how does this apply to our lives?
On Yom Kippur, the elders had to take that lamb for the sin offering, put their hands on it, confess their sins, and the lamb was slaughtered. That is what they did.
Our application is that we are to do the same thing. We are to lay our hands upon Him who is blameless, whom we find no fault with, confess our sins, put our sins upon Him, and let His death be as our own.
That is the application. Brothers and sisters, this is probably the hardest thing for Christians to do—not merely for people who have never known the Lord, but for Christians.
It is hard because we are like the Galatians. We start by the Spirit, and then we want to be made whole by the flesh. But we have to take His death as our own.
That is the only cure for sin. That is the only way to wash away sin. You cannot say, “I am going to do better,” because we never do.
So we have to own His death—His death as ours. We must take it for that, and we have to understand this: because that death is ours, let us live in the good of that. Let us live the rest of our lives in the good of that.
In other words, we have an open heaven. Live your life under an open heaven. That is what this means. That is the application to this. Live here the rest of your life under an open heaven.
Live under the smile of God and not the frown of God.
The veil has been rent. It has been torn asunder. You now have peace with God. You have now been reconciled with God. Live as if you are reconciled. Do not hold yourself back from Him.
Come fully into His presence because that offering is good. He has accepted the offering. He has accepted it. He has taken it and said, “It is good.” Well, walk in now.
In 1 John 4:18, where it speaks about not drawing back but coming, it says that perfect love casts out all fear. Why? Because fear intimates that punishment is coming or torment is coming.
Well, brothers and sisters, the torment is gone. The punishment has been spent on this offering. There is no reason for us to live in that fear anymore, but to come rejoicing.
As we did this morning, and as we were exhorted to do last week, come rejoicing into His presence. Live before Him as though everything is clean between us, because it is.
It is clean between us. There is nothing now between myself and God because of what Christ has done.
And if I do sin—oh my gosh, what if I do sin? I have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, whose blood is a propitiation for my sin. I can come right there, confess it, and it is under the blood. I am clear before God again. Praise the Lord.
God’s wrath has been satisfied.
We read in Isaiah 12 today:
Though Thou wast angry with me, Thine anger is turned away.
Live in the truth of that. That is the application. There is no other application except this: live in that truth.
There is one other word that I said I wanted to deal with. Pilate held Him up after he had scourged Him, put a purple robe on Him, a crown on His head, and a scepter in His hand. He said, “Behold, your King.”
In John 19, the King who is presented does not look like much of a king, does He? As a matter of fact, He looks like a conquered king.
Pilate said to Him, “Do You not know that I have the power to crucify You or set You free?” What kind of king has someone else exercising power over Him? What kind of King is this that we have? They mocked Him.
What kind of power does this King have? Well, this King does not look like He has too much power. The world looks at Him in that way. “Jesus was not very powerful. He was a good man, did good things, but He sure did not get out of this scrape.”
“If He was so powerful, where were those twelve legions of angels He said He could call down?” We have a different King here.
Who took the throne in heaven? Who took the throne in heaven? Tell me. What do you see on the throne when you go into Revelation?
A Lamb as though it had been slain. Right. You have to have a Lamb before He comes to the throne.
But we do see a King. Even though we do not see the kingliness except in His character, here we do see a King.
Once He bowed to death, we know what happened to the Lord. What happened to Him? He went into the grave, and now we have monuments there: “Here lies the Lord Jesus. He was a good man.” Right? Is that what we have?
I know you are in here. I can hear you breathe.
What do we have? An empty tomb. Why? Did someone steal His body? What happened?
He was raised from the dead. Let us not stop there.
Let us look at Acts 2. In Peter’s sermon, Acts 2:22 says:
Ye men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a Man approved of God unto you by mighty works and wonders and signs which God did by Him in the midst of you, even as ye yourselves know;
Him, being delivered up by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye by the hand of lawless men did crucify and slay:
whom God raised up, having loosed the pangs of death: because it was not possible that He should be holden of it.
Then Acts 2:32–36 says:
This Jesus did God raise up, whereof we all are witnesses.
Being therefore by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He hath poured forth this, which ye see and hear.
For David ascended not into the heavens: but he saith himself, The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit Thou on My right hand,
till I make Thine enemies the footstool of Thy feet.
Let all the house of Israel therefore know assuredly, that God hath made Him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom ye crucified.
Behold your King.
Your King is One who suffered and died, but He was not left in the grave. God raised Him. Not only did God raise Him, but He did not remain on earth so that we could go visit Him in Palestine and have a conference with Him. No, He ascended to the right hand of God.
Look at Philippians 2. We have read this many times, beginning in verse 5:
Have this mind in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:
who, existing in the form of God, counted not the being on an equality with God a thing to be grasped,
but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men;
and being found in fashion as a Man, He humbled Himself, becoming obedient even unto death, yea, the death of the cross.
There is our Lamb. Behold the Man.
Wherefore also God highly exalted Him, and gave unto Him the name which is above every name;
that in the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things on earth and things under the earth,
and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
This is our King. This is our King. He is not merely one king among many.
He is above all. His name is above all kings. We think of the great people in the history of the world, and we can line them all up. But if you had little spaces between them in greatness, you would find the name of Jesus so far above the others that you could not even see the others.
This is our King. Behold your King.
He is not merely a spirit who rose. He is a man. He is a Man who is a King. He is a Man who has been brought into the heavens—a Man like us, except without sin.
Because He is in the heavenlies, if we were in Him in His death, then we are in Him in His ascension and His resurrection. We are now in the presence of God. Before a holy God, because we are in Him, we are holy.
Now, what is the application to this?
Live in the truth. Live in that place to which you have been brought.
Is Paul not saying that if you are hidden with Christ in the heavenlies, why are you playing around in the dirt down here?
Live where He has brought you.
We are before the Lord all the time, and when you are in His presence, you see Him. All of a sudden, that has an effect on you.
You see, brothers and sisters, we are affected by what we see and where we live. Where are we to live?
“1024 Cottage Mill Way, Midlothian, Virginia.” Well, yes.
Brothers and sisters, actually, I have a residence right now in the heavenlies. Not a mansion that is waiting for me to come to it, but right now I can be in the government. Right now, I have access to God.
Live in that truth: that He is here for us, that He has opened this way for us. This is our salvation. Our salvation is not what I can do. Our salvation is that He has given me this, and I live in it.
God is my salvation. He has done this.
Not only that, but that very life which God raised from the dead and which was able to ascend into heaven is in me. That life is in me.
I need to understand that. No, I do not merely need to understand that. I need to let it live in me.
I need to hear its crying in me. It is saying, “I want more light. Do not go here.”
I need to hear that life in me that cries out to live. I need to unshackle it and let it free. When I do that, I am going to find out that I am free.
Christ died for freedom—not freedom to say, “Okay, my sins are gone now. I do not have to worry about judgment. I can do what I want.” That is not the freedom we are talking about.
Romans 6 says that now I can present myself to God. Now I can present myself to God. He does not find anything wrong with me, and I can say, “Here I am. What do You want of me? How can I please You? I am complete in You now. How do You want me to please You?”
This is my lot now. This is what God has given me in His Son. This very thing. Let us take it now.
I had some hymns here that I was going to read, but I am not going to. I will just say this in closing.
Let us rejoice.
We were exhorted to that last week, and I want to exhort it this week. When we go home today, it should not be, “Oh, gee whiz, I am going to dissect this teaching,” or whatever.
I hope you go home today rejoicing in what God has done—light, because the burden has been rolled away. You have been brought into a new place with the Lord. You have seen the place that has been given to you.
Rejoice in that. Go away from here happy. Let that affect you. Meditate on those things. Think of what is now yours.
Let those things be your thoughts—not, “Oh, gee, tomorrow is Monday. I have to write a quiz. I have a lecture to do. Then I have to walk the dog when I get home.” All of a sudden, we are caught up with those things.
No, let these things carry you.
I think sometimes we wake up, and we just wake up and go, “Yeah, it is another day. Working for the man.”
I would wake up and say, “I am in heaven. Lord, I am in heaven.”
Wake up with the consciousness that You have nothing against me. “Oh, Lord, I am so happy. You have nothing against me.”
Then, because of that, you can find yourself praising Him. It is like, “Oh, God, I thank You. The reproach has been rolled away. I have a clean slate. There is nothing against me. I can come right to You this morning.”
Before I look at this day, I just want to start here, saying, “I want to breathe this in.” Just go, “Oh.” Just that I am forgiven. Just that You are in me. Just that You love me. I want to start my day right here. I want to start on this ground.
“Lord, I know there is a day ahead of me. There are things that are going to drag me away from You, but I want to start right now saying, ‘Lord, I know I am going to be caught up with them. But during the day, by Your Spirit, take me up into heaven again.’”
“When I get home and can put things away, I just come to You and say, ‘Lord, I am glad I can come to You. If there is still something here, Lord—if I have sinned—wash me. Wash me, please wash me. I just want that. I want to breathe You in again. I want to know Your presence.’”
The Lord does not turn us away. Sometimes the Lord hides from us because of sin, or He is trying to draw us out, but we are never separated from Him.
Is that not a wonderful thought—to never be separated?
One of the scariest thoughts I have ever had is when one of your children gets lost. You feel that separation, and it hurts so much. That is how the Lord felt when we were lost.
Remember when you found your child—how rejoicing you were. That is how the Lord is. You remember how your child was weeping when they were lost. They did not know where you were.
When they found you, first they wept: “Where did you go?” But after a while of being in your arms, they were in perfect peace.
Oh, brothers and sisters, that is for us. We were lost.
An offering has been made. Have you seen it? Have you seen that it is good enough for you? Take it. Take hold of it. Take it to God. Let Him tell you, to your face, “I find this acceptable.”
Come into My presence and live there. Live there forever.
This is what Christ has won for us. This is what He has won for us: the presence of God forever, never to be separated from Him.
Rejoice in this as you go home today. Rejoice in this. Live in the good of it.
Sit down with Christ. Hebrews says that when He had finished the work, He sat down. Sit down with Him. Sup with Him, and let Him have you.
Let us pray.
Lord, we want to thank You for Christ. I want to thank You for His humanity, how perfect it was, how acceptable it was to us.
When we look at Him, we see no fault in Him, just like Pilate. We praise You, Lord, that when You look at Him in the inward parts, You see no fault in Him. How acceptable He is.
Lord, we thank You that the offering for us is good. Lord, we thank You that You did not leave Him in the grave, but You raised Him up. When He came up, He took us with Him, and we are in Your presence even now.
Oh, Lord, we pray that You would open our minds, open our eyes, and reveal this to us. Reveal to us our place in Him before You.
Then, Lord, I pray, set our spirits free, that we can just rejoice that You have brought us to such a place. In the presence of our enemy, prepare a feast.
Here we are, O Lord. We tell You we love You. We tell You how grateful we are that You have taken everything away and brought us into Your presence.
We thank You. Help this, Lord. Help these words, these truths, this reality, dawn upon us today, Lord. We ask this in Thy name. Amen.