FERGUSON: Well, what a great morning we’ve had  already in God’s Word, and a treat and a treasure   earlier to listen to Johnny and rather unusual  experience for me to be singing alongside R.C.   and C.J., who are the only two friends I have  in the world, neither of whom actually has a  

First name. And I hope as we continue on today,  which is an arduous day for us…most of us,   unlike those Ephesians who listened to Paul for  five hours a day every day of the week apparently,   we’re not used to having five hours of Bible  exposition, but at the end, I really do trust  

That we will all be able to say that it did as  much good and God’s Word was at work among us. We’re coming to our next theme in our  series at this conference. The title is,   “The Substitutionary Atonement of Christ.” And I’m  going to ask you to turn back to the passage that  

Dr. MacArthur mentioned last evening, the prophecy  of Isaiah, or as I shall say for the rest of this   address, Isaiah, that’s the same prophet, and I  want to ask you to turn to chapter 52 and verse 13  

And keep your Bibles open there at this great and  most glorious of Old Testament chapters. Isaiah   is speaking here as the mouthpiece of God, and  clearly, we recognize of whom the prophet speaks. “Behold, My Servant shall act wisely; He shall be  high and lifted up, and shall be exalted. As many  

Were astonished at you—His appearance was so  marred, beyond human semblance, and His form   beyond that of the children of mankind—so shall  He sprinkle many nations. Kings shall shut their   mouths because of Him, for that which has not been  told them they see, and that which they have not  

Heard they understand. Who has believed what they  heard from us? And to whom has the arm of the Lord   been revealed? For He grew up before Him like a  young plant, and like a root out of dry ground;  

He had no form or majesty that we should look  at Him, and no beauty that we should desire   Him. He was despised and rejected by men,  a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;   and as one from whom men hide their faces He  was despised, and we esteemed Him not. Surely  

He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows;  yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God,   and afflicted. But He was wounded for our  transgressions; He was crushed for our iniquities;   upon Him was the chastisement that brought us  peace, and with His stripes we are healed. All we  

Like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every  one—to his own way; and the Lord has laid on Him   the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed, and  He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth;  

Like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like  a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so He   opened not His mouth. By oppression and judgment  He was taken away; and as for His generation,  

Who considered that He was cut off out of the land  of the living, stricken for the transgression of   My people? And they made His grave with the wicked  and with a rich man in His death, although He had  

Done no violence, and there was no deceit in His  mouth. Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush   Him; He has put Him to grief; when His soul makes  an offering for sin, He shall see His offspring;  

He shall prolong His days; the will of the Lord  shall prosper in His hand. Out of the anguish of   His soul He shall see and be satisfied; by His  knowledge shall the righteous one, My Servant,   make many to be accounted righteous, and  He shall bear their iniquities. Therefore,  

I will divide Him a portion with the many,  and He shall divide the spoil with the strong,   because He poured out His soul to death  and was numbered with the transgressors;   yet He bore the sin of many, and makes  intercession for the transgressors.”

Our Heavenly Father, You are in Your holy  temple and our prayer is that all the earth   will be silenced and silent before You. We pray  for ourselves that you will unstop our ears,   that you will melt our hearts by renewing  our minds by Your truth, that as we come to  

You like Greeks of old and say, “We would see  Jesus.” We pray that through His Word He will   manifest Himself to those who love Him and trust  Him. And to those who as yet do not know Him,  

He will for them make a new appearing and  this we pray for His great namesake. Amen. I attended a school where the one obligatory  subject was religious education. It was part   of the law of the land. The content of that  religious education varied. In my case,  

It was largely memorization of Scripture, although  I was very far from being a Christian little boy.   And so, part and parcel of school life for me all  through my elementary school and high school days   was the public reading of Scripture. I’ve never  forgotten the occasion in the role of students who  

Were prescribed for the reading of the Scriptures,  when one of my closest friends at school who was,   I think, trying to be a Christian,  but certainly wasn’t yet a Christian,   was assigned this passage for reading in our  school assembly. And I remember the cringing  

Feeling I had sitting in the back of the assembly  when my close friend announced that, “The reading   this morning is taken from the Gospel according  to Isaiah, the Gospel according to Isaiah.”   I’d been a Christian believer for a couple of  years and two thoughts almost instantaneously  

Came into my mind. One was his name was Hugh, I thought, “Oh, Hugh, how could you possibly do   this in public!” And the other thought was,  “What you have just said is far truer than   you ever realized.” Because this is, in a very  profound way, the gospel according to Isaiah.  

And if you’re particularly familiar with the  writings of the Apostle Paul, I think you more and   more will have become conscious that this whole  section of Isaiah, from Isaiah 40 onwards, made   a powerful impression on the whole thinking about  the Apostle Paul as to what the gospel is and how  

The gospel works and how the gospel is the saving  righteousness of God. But, of course, this passage   not only makes an impression on the Apostle Paul,  this passage, next interestingly to the 110th   Psalm, is the most cited passage in the whole of  the New Testament Scriptures. And far beyond Psalm  

110 is the passage in the Old Testament to which  there are more allusions in the New Testament than   any other passage. And one cannot read either the  Epistles or the Gospels without appreciating here   for the apostles having learned at the feet of  the Lord Jesus, was the passage to which the  

Lord Jesus must’ve turned again and again and  again and again. Was He asking the teachers in   the Jerusalem temple as a 12-year-old boy, “Who  is this of whom the prophet speaks?” So, I take   it from His earliest years, the Lord, His Father  was impressing upon Him ever more profoundly the  

Shape and pattern of the ministry to which He  was being called as our Lord and Savior. And so,   as He rises from the dead and walks on the Emmaus  road, He chastises His dear followers by saying,   “Haven’t you understood the Scriptures that have  taught us that the Son of Man must suffer many  

Things and then enter into His glory?” You will be  familiar, I’m sure, with the context of the whole   second half of the prophecy of Isaiah from chapter  40 onwards. Isaiah is looking forwards into the   future when the people of God will be exiled in  Babylon. When the nation, as one commentator says,  

Will have been disemboweled and their hopes  desecrated, and the awful command of God that   if His people returned from serving Him, they  would be sent into the far country; the very   words that Jesus would later use in the parable of  the two sons, is language that’s drawn from God’s  

Deuteronomic law, “Disobey Me and you will go into  the far country.” And now as Isaiah looks forward   in history to their fate and destiny in the far  country, he sees that their greatest need is for  

God to bring about a new Exodus, a second Exodus.  And he sees in a marvelous way in chapter 45,   coming over the horizon of history, the great  figure of Cyrus, described, pagan though he is,   as especially anointed by God to break down the  barriers to God’s people returning to the Promised  

Land and returning to His promised blessings in  Jerusalem. And Isaiah gives to the people this   glorious hope of a return from exile in their  bondage in Babylon. And yet, simultaneously,   Isaiah recognizes that that exile in Babylon is  neither the darkest exile, nor is it the deepest  

Bondage, and that what God’s people need is not  simply a return from Babylon, what God’s people   need is salvation from their sin and guilt, from  the dominion of darkness and bondage to Satan. And   so, even as Cyrus is appearing over the horizon  in Isaiah chapter 45, already there has begun in  

Chapter 42, to appear over the horizon a shadowy  figure described by God as “My Servant.” And in a   series of poems or songs, Isaiah is given an  enriched revelation into the calling of this   Servant, into the preparation of this Servant,  into the character of this Servant, until  

Eventually in this, the fourth of the Servant  Songs, beginning in chapter 52 and going right   through chapter 53, he is given this illumination  into the suffering of the Servant of God. Often when we read the Scriptures, either a  narrative or a Psalm, a poem, unlike some of  

The things that we find in our Western literature  and in our Western poetry, very often the place to   look in the Hebrew Scriptures for the key to the  whole is not just that the end, but at the center.   And if you’re using almost any modern translation  of the Old Testament Scriptures, you’ll notice  

That this passage from the end of 52 to the end of  53 is broken up into five stanzas, and it is the   third, the central of those stanzas that takes us  to the very heart of God’s revelation to Isaiah,  

And as a matter of fact, to the very heart of  the gospel, and we will get there in a moment. But, first of all, notice the shape of  this poem, of this song. Do you notice   how it begins in chapter 52 verses 13 to 15?  With the exultation of the Servant and then  

It ends in chapter 53 in verses 10 through 12  with again the exultation of the Servant. And   the shape of this song is what they used to teach  us at least in schools and the old mathematics,  

The shape of this song is in the shape of a  graph, a parabola which begins in exultation   and goes down to the depths and then brings us up  again to a glorious exultation. If at all you’re   familiar with Philippians chapter 2, you’ll  realize that this is the same parabolic shape;  

He is in the form of God, counting equality  with God is not something that he grasps,   but He makes Himself of no reputation, and He  comes down and down and down and once He is come   to the place where He has emptied Himself and  become obedient even to the death of the cross,  

God highly exalts Him and gives Him the name that  is above every name. It’s the very shape of what   the Lord Jesus did in the Upper Room in John  chapter 13, knowing and He had come from God  

And that He was going to God, He laid aside His  garments, girded Himself with the servant’s towel,   bowed further and washed His disciples’ feet  and then He took His place again at the head   of the table and asked His disciples if they  had any inkling whatsoever as to what it was  

He had just done. He could as easily have said to  them, “Don’t you yet understand the fourth of the   Servant Songs that portrays the suffering and the  glory of the Messiah who is to come?” And so, in   this marvelous passage, we have a kind of tapestry  of the Suffering Servant. Unlike many tapestries  

There is side action going on around in order to  help us to understand what it is that is really   going on in the center, at the very heart of the  gospel, the message of the Suffering Servant. So, let’s look together for a few minutes at this  marvelous song about the Suffering Servant. Stanza  

Number one in chapter 52 verse 13 to verse  15. This is a stanza that explains to us in   a very moving way that the Servant’s triumph  is wholly unexpected, the Servant’s triumph   is wholly unexpected. “Look,” says God, “look  at Him, look at my Servant as He acts wisely,  

He shall be high and lifted up and exalted.”  And yet this wisdom is not the wisdom of this   world and this exultation is going to come  in the strangest and most unexpected of ways,   because, behold! His triumph is unexpected  because of the nature of His appearance.  

“He is to be,” notice the language, “so  marred beyond human semblance.” This is   Isaiah’s sense that the One who is to  come in order to repair the disfigured   image of God is going to become disfigured  Himself. As that marvelous commentator,  

Old Testament scholar, Alec Motyer says, “What  Isaiah encourages us to say is not, is not,   the question is this He? but as we gaze upon  the Suffering Servant, to ask the question is   this human?” This is what we mean when we say that  He descended into hell, that He was, as it were,  

To repair our humanity in the process of virtually  becoming unmanned, deserted by God. And so,   it is completely astonishing for Isaiah that this  One who is so marred should at the same time have   such an extraordinary effect on the nations. Look  at what he says, “He will sprinkle many nations.  

Kings shall shut their mouths because of him.”  The language of “sprinkle” there, incidentally,   is the language of the Levitical law code, it’s  the language of the sprinkling of the blood of   sacrifice that brings cleansing and forgiveness.  And here is this picture of the Suffering Servant,  

Disfigured beyond all ordinary humanity. And  yet the paradox, the as yet unresolved paradox   of His ministry is that one day this One will  sprinkle not simply the Jews, but will sprinkle   the nations. And certainly no one who knew his  Bible as well as Isaiah knew his Bible would  

Miss the connection between that statement and the  great essence of the Abrahamic covenant promise,   “In your seed will all the nations of the earth  be blessed.” And the promise of the second Psalm,   when the Father says to His Son, “Ask of me and I  will give you the nations for your inheritance.”  

But you see, it’s the tension of the situation,  miss the tension of the situation and we probably   miss the wonderful grace of God in the gospel.  If we don’t feel that there is so much in the  

Gospel that ought not to be for sinners, then  we scarcely begin to taste the wonder of God’s   grace to us in Jesus Christ. Here is One who  gains worldwide triumph by being marred beyond   human semblance. So, the Servant will triumph,  but His triumph will be totally unexpected.

And so, Isaiah now in the next stanza, the next  few verses of his poem picks up that notion that   the Servant is going to suffer so grievously and  he begins to focus attention now, not so much on   the way the Servant’s triumph is unexpected,  but the way in which the Servant’s humiliation  

Is described. A younger generation has taught me  the word “prequel.” I think it is a relatively new   word, at least in the Oxford English dictionary,  maybe also in Webster’s. What is the prequel?   Well, we’re used to the sequel. The prequel is  something that you’re given afterwards that helps  

To explain something that you were given earlier.  And that’s what these following verses are,   they’re really the prequel to help us understand  and tease out, to pull a strand out of this   tapestry and see where it gets its connections.  And so, he describes the Servant’s humiliation  

So beautifully. He describes Him so poignantly; He  was growing up before the Lord like a young plant,   and then these words, “Like a root out of a dry  ground.” It must have meant something very special   to Isaiah. Do you remember at the end of his  call, this is a Ligonier conference, everyone here  

Remembers the end of His call in Isaiah chapter  6, when everything is being demolished under the   judgment of God and yet God says that there’ll be  a stump that will remain. And then in Isaiah 11,  

He looks forward to the One will be anointed with  the power of the Holy Spirit, and he says about   Him, “There shall come forth a shoot from  the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his  

Roots that shall bear fruit.” And now the Lord is  showing to him that this One who would bring hope,   this One who would be full of the Spirit, the man  of the Holy Spirit who would exercise justice and  

Righteousness, who would be marked by perfect  holiness. There was no beauty in Him by nature   that we should recognize Him or be drawn to  Him. He was the son of David. But look at   David’s house, a carpenter and a young maiden and  a baby born in a cave, an outhouse in Bethlehem.  

This is where the royal line of David has ended.  This is dry ground. This baby is a tiny shoot.   And you and I would pass His crying as we walked  past the cave. We would pass Him by in the street  

And think there was nothing unusual, attractive,  extraordinary about Him. And then as He grew from   those inauspicious origins, He would experience  an ongoing rejection. He would be despised. I wonder if you’ve ever been despised. I wonder  if you’ve ever had the humiliation of losing  

Your reputation unjustly. I remember one occasion  coming home to my wife and I said to her about a   situation, I said, “You know the only thing I can  lose here is my reputation. It’s the only thing  

I can lose. So, let’s go forward.” I was a grown  man and I had no idea whatsoever how appallingly   painful it is to lose your reputation. “And  He made Himself of no reputation.” And the   disposition of men and women towards Him was  “He was despised and rejected by men.” How  

Could He be Messiah when He “shared our griefs  and was a man of sorrows, and we hid our faces   from Him and esteemed Him not?” Isn’t this the  reason why our Lord Jesus prays in John 17:24,   “Father, these have been with Me and they have  seen Me in My humiliation. My deepest longing  

For them is that they may see Me in My glory.”  He was despised and men esteemed Him not. And,   of course, all this is really setting us up. This  is the revelation of God that’s coming to Isaiah  

To make Him say, “Lord, tell me more. Bring me to  the center of the tapestry so that I can begin to   work out,” because, Isaiah, you remember how Peter  says this about all the prophets, they wrote these   things down and then they studied them themselves  and they were scratching their heads and saying,  

“Who was I speaking about when I said this?  What did God mean here?” And so, He comes,   you notice in verses 4 through 6, to the  Servant’s suffering being explained. The   Servant’s exultation is unexpected. The  Servant’s humiliation is described. The  

Servant’s suffering is explained. And he brings  us now to the great paradox, “But surely He has   borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; and  yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God,   and afflicted.” You see he’s in the position…  as Isaiah as he gets this word from God, he’s in  

The position, he’s looking forward actually to the  confession of believers in the New Testament day,   the first Christians looking back on this and  saying, “We never puzzled it out. He made it so   clear to u,s but we never puzzled it out. We can’t  understand how He could be One who would bear our  

Griefs and carry our sorrows, who went about  doing good, but then was treated as a derelict,   was beaten, and chastised and smitten and  afflicted.” Well, of course, their eyes were   blind until the Lord Jesus opened their eyes  just to put things together, that faith should  

Have been able to see that what was happening  to Him was that He was becoming a curse for us,   that the blessing promised to Abraham might flow  through His cross and reach the nations. But you   notice how Isaiah almost says, “Now come now,  camp on this for a little while, steel yourself  

To look into the heart of the cross where He was  wounded for our transgressions and crushed for   our iniquities and chastised to bring us peace  and beaten in order that we might be healed.”

I don’t know if they say it any longer, but they  used to say that every kind of wound known to   medical science could be found on the body of  the dying Lord Jesus Christ. He was wounded,   but not only wounded—that was external, really;  He was crushed. He was crushed. It’s not quite the  

Same language here, but I do still think there’s  an echo of what the Lord had promised in Genesis   3:15 here, don’t you? That as the Lord Jesus would  crush the head of the serpent, His own heel would  

Be crushed and He was being inwardly crushed.  And then He’s portrayed as One who is actually   suffering for our peace, a chastisement. Now,  that’s interesting because basically, basically,   chastisement is family language. Punishment is  legal language; chastisement is family language.  

And yet at the same time, He is One, with His  stripes we are healed who is judiciously beaten.   Do you notice how perfect this statement is?  Because as it speaks about the sufferings of   Christ, it moves from the relatively external to  the internal. Jesus is wounded, Jesus is crushed,  

Jesus is chastised within the context of His  family. Jesus is beaten. He is legally punished.   And just as there seems to be a kind of increasing  intensity in the description of the sufferings of   Christ, there is an increasing intensity in  the description of why it is that He suffers.  

He’s wounded for transgressions, for breaking  the law of God. But then what He is bruised   for is iniquity. He is inwardly crushed for the  inner perversion of my heart. And because of my   dis-peace, “There is no peace,” saith my God,  “for the wicked.” He undergoes chastisement in  

The family to bring me into the family so that  as He is beaten with rods in a legal judgment,   my whole being, my sickness may be relieved  and I may be set free. And in this,   Isaiah says, the Lord, Yahweh, Jehovah was  present. “We like sheep have gone astray,  

Turned everyone to His own way, but the Lord  has laid upon Him the iniquity of us all.” Let me pause here just to underline a series  of things you and I need to grasp that Isaiah   is teaching us about the nature of Christ’s  atonement. Number one, this atonement involves  

The imputation of our sins to the Lord Jesus and  the imputation of the Lord Jesus’ righteousness   to us. The Lord lays upon the Lord Jesus. He is  wounded for our transgressions. He is bruised for  

Our iniquities. He takes what is ours and it’s  counted to Him. And when He goes to the cross as   One who knew no sin, He goes to the cross as One  who is there going to be made sin, He is going to  

Bear our sins on His own body to the tree as Simon  Peter says. And yet, marvelously, when He makes   His soul an offering for sin by His knowledge,  verse 11, the righteous One, my Servant,   will make many, not just to be accounted innocent.  You understand there is a difference between the  

Gospel and what happens in an ordinary law court,  unless that law court happens to be in Scotland   where there are three verdicts that can be given,  you’re either going to receive a guilty verdict,   or a not guilty verdict. Don’t transfer that to  the gospel as though that’s all the gospel gives  

You. Now, what the gospel gives you is this, that  your sins are imputed to the Lord Jesus Christ.   He’s wounded for transgressions that are ours and  iniquities that are ours and a dis-peace that is  

Ours and a sickness that is ours; and it becomes  His. And He takes it. He takes all the judgment   against my sin, takes all the judgment of His Holy  Father against the sin of all of His people. But  

When you come to faith in Jesus Christ, you’re not  just pronounced “not guilty,” as though to say,   “You’re free now, start again, try again.” No, by  His righteous knowledge, perhaps by the knowledge   of His righteousness, He will account many to  be righteous. By His righteousness, His life of  

Obedience, His obedience to the death of the cross  … It’s so important for us to understand that   what Jesus is doing throughout the whole course  of His life is obeying His Father in our place.   Not just that He may then be qualified to be the  perfect sacrifice who’s able to bear the judgment  

Of His Father against our sin, but in order  that when we come to faith in Jesus Christ, the   righteous One, not only do we understand that our  sins are been imputed to Him, but we understand  

That His perfect righteousness is counted as  ours as we trust in Him. I love to say and I   love to think and I love to say it again that you  and I can stand before the judgment seat of an  

Infinitely Holy God as righteous as the Lord Jesus  Christ because the only righteousness you have to   stand before that throne is His righteousness.  Isn’t that glorious? And this is what He is   saying. He’s saying, “Look closely to see the  glory of this gospel. There is imputation here.”

Second, there is substitution here. “In my  place, condemned, He stood. Wounded for my   transgressions, bruised from my iniquities. In  my place, condemned He stood and sealed my pardon   with His blood. Hallelujah! What a Savior!” Yes,  now note He is our representative; Jesus is our  

Representative. This may not mean much to some  of you, but it’s a very important thing to see,   He is our representative. He represents us before  the Father, but He’s not just a representative.   Your representative in Congress, if you are  privileged to have taxation and representation,  

Which some of us aren’t. I’m not complaining  about it, but it’s true. He represents you   there. He doesn’t substitute for you. He  doesn’t come along when you’re in trouble   and take your place. He may serve for you, but  he doesn’t stand in your place as a substitute.  

And this Suffering Servant stands in our place  as a substitute so that a great exchange takes   place in order that I might stand where He now  stands. He comes and stands where I ought to   stand and takes my place. You know it’s just  possible that Barabbas, the bandit, that his  

First name was Jesus. You know that some of you  from the textual traditions of the New Testament,   that what the people were being offered was Jesus,  the Son of the Father God, or Jesus the son of the  

Father, the bandit. My dear friends, Barabbas  would never in the rest of his life have said,   “You know, but Jesus came and represented me. He  would’ve said, “He came and He took my place.” I had, until recently, apart from our joint  glorious faith, one thing in common with Joni  

Eareckson Tada, and she let me down. She watched  the Titanic movie! I’ve never seen the Titanic   movie. But I have a friend, a dear friend who  was minister of a church in Glasgow called the   Harper Memorial Baptist Church, and the reason  the church has that name is because the memorial  

To John Harper was a memorial to their minister  who sailed on the Titanic. Sailed on the Titanic   And if I remember rightly, he gave someone  who was not a Christian his place on the   boat. That’s not merely representation;  that’s substitution. That’s why in the  

Garden of Gethsemane He agonizes as He does.  Thirdly, it’s imputation, it’s substitution. Thirdly, it’s penalty. Notice the language, is  this the Jewish people looking back who have come   to faith, beginning to understand what Christ has  done. “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have  

Turned—every one—to his own way; and the Lord has  laid on him the iniquity of us all.” John Brown,   the great old Scottish writer thought that the  picture here was of the sheep going astray and as  

They went astray they were in danger of an awful  death at the hands of marauders. And, of course,   the shepherd would come and he would put himself  before the sheep. The reason you know the shepherd  

Is a good shepherd is because he laid down his  life for the sheep. And you remember how that   seems to be the significance of the fulfillment  of the Zechariah prophecy, when the fountain is   open for sin and uncleanness, “How will that take  place?” Zechariah asks. And the answer the Lord  

Gives is, “I will smite the shepherd and the sheep  will be scattered.” And the Shepherd comes and He   dies on the cross, a violent death, a death that  is a penalty for sin. Do you know Vernon Higham’s  

Great hymn, “Great is the gospel of our glorious  God, where mercy met the anger of God’s rod;   a penalty was paid and pardon bought, that  sinners lost at last might be brought to Him:   O let the praises of my heart be Thine, for  Christ has died that I may call Him mine,  

That I may sing with those who dwell  above, proclaiming, Jesus King of love.” But there is a fourth thing here, yes, indeed  marvelously through our Lord Jesus Christ there   is imputation and substitution and penalty. But  there’s something else in this central picture,  

In the tapestry, and it’s the hand of deity;  it’s the hand of deity. Notice verse 6b,   “the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of  us all.” This is the heart of the cross,   my friends, that He was there because it pleased  the Lord to bruise Him. He has put Him to grief.  

You understand that this is why our Lord Jesus  wrestled as He did in the garden of Gethsemane,   not simply because of the physical suffering,  which must’ve been awful for Him to contemplate,   but because what He was being called to do, there  was not an ounce of His holy humanity could ever  

Desire. He was being called so to give Himself  to the judgment of God, that He would for the   very first time in that thirty-three-year-old  humanity, as the God-man cried out, “I am   forsaken. Why?” You see, He could never want that;  that was really the last temptation of Christ,  

Wasn’t it? What devilish fiends appeared in the  garden of Gethsemane to taunt Him that this is   what His Heavenly Father wanted Him to do. Now,  isn’t that divine child abuse? Not when you read   the prophecy of Isaiah and see how already in the  Suffering Servant songs Jesus was being portrayed  

As one who delights to listen to the voice of  His Father and who goes willingly to the cross   and to the suffering and knows that His Father  will sustain Him even when He is unconscious   of His Father’s presence. And not when we  remember that if David cried over his son,  

“O Absalom, my son, my son, Absalom, my son.”  But in the very in-being of God there would be   a cry that would go out, that would silence all  heaven, “O Jesus, My Son, My Son. Jesus, My Son.”  

Says Jesus, now hold that thought if you  can, if you can bear to hold that thought,   hold this Bible truth beside it. Jesus says,  “The reason My Father loves Me, is because I   lay down my life for the sheep.” Isn’t that  something? That His Father’s heart burst with  

The awfulness of what His Son was willing to go  through; at the same time the heavenly Father,   as it were, His heart was bursting with that  almost contradictory divine emotion that said,   “O My Son, My Son, that you should obey Me like  this. It almost undoes Me that You should be so  

Obedient to Me.” As we get frail echoes of it  when we see our own children doing something   marvelous because they love us and our hearts  swell with pride. It’s not just heaven’s love   and heaven’s justice that meet in the cross;  it’s heaven’s pride in the Son. The angels as  

It were, peering over the balconies of heaven in  amazement at what the Son is doing and casting,   as it were, a side glance if they dare to the  Father to say what is He going through as He   watches His Son so perfectly obedient even  to the death of the cross. Don’t you think  

The heavenly Father in that occasion was able to  sing, My Jesus, I love Thee, if ever I loved Thee,   my Jesus, ’tis now, Thou art mine. Well, verses  7 through 9, the Servant’s triumph is unexpected,   the Servant’s humiliation is described, the  Servant’s suffering is explained, the Servant’s  

Obedience is underlined. You notice that? “He  was oppressed and afflicted, yet He opened not   His mouth.” “Don’t say anything,” His Father had  said, “take it all.” “And like a lamb that is led   to the slaughter, like a sheep that before its  shearers is silent, so He opened not His mouth.”  

Isn’t it one of the marvelous things that we find,  I think particularly in Luke’s Gospel in Luke 23.   There are seven occasions in Luke chapter 23 when  those individuals most intimately involved in   the crucifixion of our dear Lord Jesus, seven  times they declare He is absolutely innocent  

Of any of these crimes with which He is being  charged. And you know what these crimes were;   the crime of blasphemy, that He made Himself equal  to God, the crime of treason, that He proclaimed   Himself to be a king, the very crimes of which  you and I are most guilty before the judgment  

Seat of God—blasphemy. That we’ve made ourselves  in a thousand ways the center of the world, and   treason that we have said we will not have You to  rule over us. And in silence He takes our place,   in obedience He bears our judgment. He became  obedient to death, even death on a cross.

I notice you’re very good at this, what’s the  next word? “Therefore,” therefore. There has   got to be a “therefore,” and that’s in verses  10 through 12, isn’t it? The Servant’s rightful   humiliation leads to His glorious exultation.  He is rightfully humiliated because He takes  

Our place; He is wrongly executed because He is  innocent of any of these crimes, and therefore   God has highly exalted Him and given them the  name is above every name. And we see it all here,  

The name above every name. Oh, it was the will of  the Lord to crush Him and put Him to grief, but   He brings justification. He divides His portion  with the many, divides the spoil with the strong,  

Because He pours out His soul to death, He bears  the sin of many and He makes intercession for   the transgressors. It’s this marvelous picture  of Jesus being highly exalted, highly exalted,   glorious reigning, pouring out His Holy Spirit  as He is exalted at the right hand of the Father,  

He goes to His Father, He goes to His Father  who has said to Him, “My Son, if You’ll do this,   then You may ask of Me and I will give You the  nations for Your inheritance.” There they are,   Chad, France, Lebanon, Thailand, Belize,  Ecuador, Bolivia, Sudan, Laos, Honduras,  

All the way along the nations for Christ’s  inheritance. And He comes in glory and that   great angel train us as He is come near to the  throne of God and the angels have cried out,   “Who is this King of Glory?” And those angels  accompanying Him have responded to them,  

“It is the Lord, the King of Glory. Open the  gates and let Him in.” And as He goes to the   throne of His heavenly Father, His Father  says, “What is your wish?” And the Son says,   “Dear Father, You said, You promised, ‘Ask of  Me and You would give Me the nations for My  

Inheritance,’ and they need Us to send the Holy  Spirit in order to accomplish that. May I now   send the Holy Spirit,” and there is Pentecost, and  there is the preaching of Peter, and there is the   martyrdom of Stephen, there is the conversion  of Saul, and eventually there is you. And the  

Reason most of us are in this room this morning  is because these words have come gloriously true. Two things to say; number one, there was a man  from Africa, one day he was traveling home,   he was reading, actually reading this very  passage, and a Christian found him in the middle  

Of the desert. He was reading out loud, it was in  antiquity. He was reading this passage out loud   and the man who was a Christian said to him, “Do  you understand what you’re reading?” And he said,   “How can I possibly understand this unless  somebody explains it to me?” And you know the  

Story, the man was Philip, the man who had Isaiah  53 was a treasurer, a high official from Ethiopia,   perhaps the Sudan. And Philip told him the good  news about Jesus. And the man came to faith. That’s all this has been this morning.  This is the good news about Jesus. Are you  

Trusting Him for the forgiveness of your  sins, the cleansing of your conscience,   bowing before Him to be the Lord of your life?  What a great thing it would be if at this   conference you did that! I have another question  for those of you who are already believers; I can  

Put it like this in the words of Hudson Taylor,  the founder of the Great China Inland Mission,   “If Jesus Christ be God and died for me, is  there anything too great for me to do for Him?” Our Heavenly Father, we bow in reverence before  our Great Savior and King. Thank you that You’ve  

Given us this promise in the gospel that we who  have seen Him in His humiliation even in our own   day will one day see Him in His exalted glory.  And we pray until that day dawns that we may  

Trust Him, love Him, and serve Him with all  our being. We ask this with the forgiveness   of all of our sins and the assurance of  our salvation. In His great name, amen.

#Sinclair #Ferguson #Substitutionary #Atonement #Christ

At this season of the year we particularly rejoice and reflect upon the Savior’s atonement it is indeed the most supernal mind-expanding passionate doctrine this world or universe has ever known it is what gives hope and purpose to our lives then what then is the atonement of Jesus

Christ in one sense it is a series of divine events that commenced in the Garden of Gethsemane continued on the cross and culminated with the Savior’s resurrection from the tomb it was motivated by an incomprehensible love for each of us it required a being who was sinless who had infinite power over

The elements even death who possessed a boundless capacity to suffer the consequences of all our sins and ailments and who in fact descended beneath it all this was the mission of Jesus Christ this was his atonement what then is its purpose

It was to make it possible for us to return to God’s presence become more like him and have a fullness of joy this was done by overcoming four obstacles first physical death second spiritual death caused by Adam and by our sins third our afflictions and infirmities and fourth our weaknesses and

Imperfections but how can the Savior accomplish this without violating the laws of justice suppose for a moment a man contemplating an exhilarating free fall makes a rash decision and spontaneously jumps from a small plane after doing so he quickly realizes the foolishness of his actions he wants to

Land safely but there is an obstacle the law of gravity he moves his arms with astounding speed hoping to fly but to no avail he positions his body to glide or float so to slow the descent but the law of

Gravity is unrelenting and unmerciful he tries to reason with this basic law of nature it was a mistake I will never do it again but his pleas fall on deaf ears the law of gravity knows no compassion it makes no exceptions fortuitously though the man suddenly

Feels something on his back his friend in the plane sensing the moment of foolishness had placed a parachute there just before the jump he finds the ripcord and pulls it relieved he floats safely to the ground we might ask was

The law of gravity violated or did that parachute work within that law to provide a safe landing when we sin we are like the foolish man who jumped from the plane no matter what we do on our own

Only a crash landing awaits us we are subject to the law of justice which like the law of gravity is exacting and unforgiving we can be saved only because the Savior through his atonement mercifully provides us with a spiritual

Parachute of sorts if we have faith in Jesus Christ and repent meaning we do our part and pull the ripcord then the protective powers of the Saviour are unleashed on our behalf and we can land spiritually unharmed this is only possible however because the Savior overcame the four obstacles that can

Prevent our spiritual progress first death he overcame death through his glorious resurrection the Apostle Paul taught as in Adam all die even so in Christ shall all be made alive second sin the Savior overcame sin and guilt for all those who repent so deep an expansive hisses cleansing power that

Isaiah promised up promised though your sins be as scarlet they shall be as white as snow on occasion I have met with good Saints who have trouble forgiving themselves who have innocently but incorrectly placed limits on the Savior’s redemptive powers unwittingly they have converted an infinite

Atonement to a finite one that somehow falls short of their particular sin or weakness but it is an infinite atonement because it encompasses and circumscribes every sin and weakness as well as every abuse or pain caused by others Truman Madson made this comforting observation if there are some of you

Have been tricked into the conviction that you have gone too far the you have had the poison of sin which makes it impossible ever again to be what you could have been then hear me I bear testimony that you cannot sink farther than the sweeping the light and sweeping intelligence of Jesus Christ

Can reach I bear testimony that as long as there is one spark of the will to repent and reach he is there he did not just descend to your condition he descended below it that he might be in all and through all things the light of

Truth and quote one reason is so essential to understand the Savior’s atonement and it’s infinite implications is that with increased understanding comes an increased desire to forgive ourselves and others even though we may believe in Christ cleansing powers the question often arises how do I know if

I’ve been forgiven of my sins if we feel the spirit then that is our witness that we have been forgiven or that the cleansing process is taking place press in here newbie Irene taught if you have felt the influence of the Holy Ghost you

May take it as evidence that the atonement is working in your life some of us but if I have been forgiven why do I still feel guilt perhaps in God’s and mercy the memory of that guilt is a warning a spiritual stop sign of sorts

That at least for time cries out when additional temptations confront us don’t go down that road you know the pain it can bring in this sense it serves as a protection not a punishment is it possible then to remember our sins and

Still be free of guilt Alma remembered his sins even years after he repented but when he cried into Jesus for mercy he said I could remember my pains no more yay I was Herald up by the memory of my sins no how could he remember his sins but have

No pain or guilt because when we repent we are born of God we become as the scriptures say new creatures in Christ with perfect honesty we can now say I am NOT the man or woman who committed those past sins I am a new and transformed

Being third afflictions and infirmities Alma prophesied that Christ shall go forth suffering pains and afflictions and temptations of every kind why that his bowels may be filled with mercy that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities

How does he accomplish this sometimes he removes the affliction sometimes he strengthens us to endure and sometimes he gives us an eternal perspective to better understand their temporary nature after Joseph Smith had languished in Liberty jail for about two months he finally cried out o God where art thou

Instead of providing instant relief God responded my son peace be unto thy soul that adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment and then if thou endure it well God shall exalt thee on high Joseph now understood that this

Bitter experience was but a dot on the eternal spectrum with this enhanced vision he wrote the Saints from that same prison cell dearly beloved brethren let us cheerfully do all things that lie in our power and then may we stand still

With the utmost assurance to see the salvation of God because of the Savior’s atonement we can have an eternal perspective that gives meaning to our trials and hope for a relief and forth weaknesses and imperfections because of his atonement the Savior has enabling power sometimes referred to as grace

That can help us overcome our weaknesses and imperfections and thus assist us in our pursuit to become more like him Moroni so taught yeh come into Christ and be perfected in him that by His grace he may be perfect in Christ

There seems at least two channels or means of availing ourselves of those enabling powers that can refine even perfect us first the saving ordinances the Scriptures tell us in the ordinances thereof the power of godliness is manifest sometimes when we think of ordinances as a checklist necessary for

Exaltation but in truth each unleashes a godly power that helps us become more like Christ for example when we are baptized and receive the gift of the Holy Ghost we are made clean thus becoming more holy like God in addition

Through the Holy Ghost our minds may be enlightened in our hearts often so we can think and feel more like him and when we are sealed as spouses we inherit the rights of Thrones kingdoms principalities and powers if you get as

Gifts from God a second channel for these enabling powers is the gifts of the Spirit because of Christ’s atonement we are eligible to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost and its accompanying spiritual gifts these gifts are attributes of godliness therefore every time we acquire a gift to the spirit we

Become more like God no doubt that is why the Scriptures in join us on multiple occasions to seek these gifts President George Q cannon taught no man ought to say oh I cannot help this it is my nature he is not justified in it for

The reason that God has promised to give gifts that will eradicate our weaknesses if any of us are imperfect it is our duty to pray for the gift that will make us perfect in summary the Savior’s atonement gives us life for death beauty

For Ashes healing for hurt and perfection for weakness it is heaven’s antidote to the obstacles and struggles of this world in the Savior’s final week of mortality he said in the world ye shall have tribulation but be of good cheer I have overcome the world because the Savior performed his atonement there

Is no external force or event or person no sin or death or divorce that can prevent from achieving exaltation provided we keep God’s commandments without knowledge we can press forward with good sheer and absolute assurance that God is with us in this heavenly quest I bear my

Witness that the Seavers atonement is not only infinite in scope but individual and reach that it cannot only return us to God’s presence but enable us to become like him the crowning goal of Christ’s atonement of that I bear my grateful and certain witness in the name of Jesus Christ amen you

#Atonement #Jesus #Christ

SPROUL: The last thing Thabiti asked me before he went and sat down was, “Please bring the book.” I have the book, and I’d like to read from that book from Paul’s letter to the Galatians, chapter 3 beginning at verse 10 and reading through verse 14, Galatians 3:10 to 14.

“For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse, for it is written, ‘Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.’ Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for ‘The righteous

Shall live by faith.’ But the law is not of faith, rather ‘The one who does them shall live by them.’ Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us – for it is written,

‘Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree’ – so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith.” Can we pray, please? Our Father and our God, Your curse reaches throughout the earth and is heaped upon everyone

In it who is not covered by the righteousness of Jesus. O Lord, even now we tremble at the very thought of being under Your curse, and we can’t possibly imagine what it would mean to have the fullness of that curse poured out upon us.

And so, as we contemplate the manner in which it was poured out upon Jesus, we beg You, in Your Spirit to condescend to the frailty of our understanding, the weakness of our minds, to give us illumination of this text that Your Word would pierce our souls for

Our sake and for the sake of Jesus. Amen. It has now been over fifty years, over a half of a century, that I have contemplated and studied and read a host of tomes written about the meaning of the cross of Christ.

And yet, I still believe that I have not been able to do anything more than to touch the surface of the depths and the riches that are contained in that moment of redemptive history. I suspect that when my eyes open in heaven in the first five minutes of my beginning

Of eternity, there, I will be absolutely staggered by the sudden increase of understanding that will come to me when I behold the Lamb who was slain and hear angels and archangels singing in my ears, “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive honor and glory, riches, dominion,”

And to see the Apostle Paul and to say, “Thank you for knowing nothing but Christ and Him crucified.” Beloved, when we go to the New Testament and we read not only the narrative event of the cross but the many didactic expressions that explain to us its meaning and significance,

I think we are soon aware that there is no one image or one dimension that can comprehensively explain the cross. Rather, we find many images, many metaphors that would indicate that the cross is a multifaceted event. It is by no means one dimensional.

It is as a magnificent tapestry that is woven by several distinct, brightly hued threads that when it is brought together gives us this magnificent, finished work of art. When the New Testament speaks of the atonement of Jesus, it does so in terms of substitution.

It calls attention to a death that in some way was vicarious. We see that it speaks of the satisfaction of the justice and of the wrath of God. We see the metaphor of the kinsman-redeemer who pays the bridal price to purchase His bride with His own blood, releasing her from bondage.

We see the motif that is used in the New Testament that speaks of ransom that is paid. There is the motif of victory over Satan and the powers of darkness, when the serpent’s head is crushed under the bruised heel of the Redeemer.

But there is one image, one aspect of the atonement that has receded in our day almost into total obscurity. We heard earlier of those attempts to preach a more gentle and kind gospel. And in our efforts to communicate the work of Christ more kindly, we flee from any mention

Of a curse inflicted by God upon His own Son. We shrink in horror from the words of the prophet Isaiah in the fifty-third chapter of his book describing the ministry of the Ebed Yahweh, “the suffering Servant” of Israel that tells us, among other things, that “it pleased the Lord to bruise Him.”

Can you take that in, that somehow the Father took pleasure in bruising the Son, when He set before Him that awful cup of divine wrath? How in heaven could the Father be pleased by bruising His Son, were it not for His eternal

Purpose through that bruising of Him to restore us as His own children? But there is this curse motif that seems utterly foreign to us, particularly in this time in history. When we speak of the idea of curse today, what do we think of?

We think perhaps of a voodoo witch doctor who places pins in a replica doll of his enemy. We think of an occultist who is involved in witchcraft, putting spells and hexes upon people. The very word “curse” in our culture suggests some kind of superstition.

But in biblical categories, dear friends, there is nothing superstitious about it, and the idea of the curse is deeply rooted in biblical history. We need only go to the opening chapters of Genesis to the record of the fall of man that

Provokes from God His anathema on the serpent who’s cursed to go on his belly, and the curse that is then given to the earth itself that it would bring forth thorns and briers, making it difficult for Adam to live by the toil of his brow.

And it brings the excruciating, and I choose that word carefully, pain given to the woman who would bear a child. But not only do we find this idea of curse there early in Genesis, but if we fast forward

To the giving of the law under Moses, we understand that with the covenant God makes with His people at Sinai that He attaches to that covenant, to the stipulations of that law, dual sanctions – a positive sanction and a negative sanction.

The positive sanction is articulated there in terms of the concept of blessedness. Let me quickly jump back to Deuteronomy chapter 28 that we read this litany of blessings. “And if you faithfully obey the voice of the LORD your God, being careful to do all His

Commandments that I command you today, the LORD your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth.” Listen to this, “And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, if you obey the voice of the LORD your God.

Blessed shall you be in the city, blessed shall you be in the field. Blessed shall be the fruit of your womb, the fruit of your ground, the fruit of your cattle, the increase of your herds and the young of your flock. Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.

Blessed shall you be when you come in, and blessed shall you be when you go out.” Do you hear what God is saying to Israel? “If you keep My Word, then I’m going to bless you in the city. I’ll bless you in the country. I’ll bless you when you rise up.

I’ll bless you when you lie down. I’ll bless you in the kitchen. I’ll bless you in the bedroom. I’ll bless you in the living room. I’ll bless your fields. I’ll bless your goats. I’ll bless your sheep. I’ll bless your cows.

I’m going to bless you all over the place that your life will be nothing but an experience in divine benediction and blessedness.” But God goes on to say that “If you do not obey the voice of the LORD your God or be

Careful to do all His Commandments and His statutes that I command you today, then all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you. Cursed shall you be in the city. Cursed shall you be in the country. Cursed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.

Cursed shall be the fruit of your womb, the fruit of your ground, the increase of your herds, the young of your flock. Cursed shall you be when you come in, and cursed shall you be when you go out.” In the kitchen, in the living room, in the bedroom, in the garage, cursed.”

You know one of the things I love about Christmas is the singing of carols, and one of my favorites is Joy to the World. And there is one line in there that I love. It always gets my attention, I’m sure you can guess which one it is. What is it, Ligon?

“He comes to make His blessings flow. Far as the curse is found.” He comes to make His blessings flow, where? “As far as the curse is found.” As far as the curse is found. How far do we find that curse?

The Apostle Paul says that the whole creation groans together in travail, waiting for the manifestation of the sons of God. We live in a planet, dear friends, that is under the curse of God. Well, what does that mean?

And I’d like to take some time with you this afternoon to explore the meaning and the significance of this idea of God’s divine curse. And I want to look at it in a couple of different ways. First of all, when the prophets of the Old Testament spoke not their own opinions but

The Word that God had placed in their mouth so that they could preface their announcements by these words, “Thus saith the Lord,” that the favorite method the prophets use to express the Word of God was the method that was called “the oracle.”

It seems that sometimes the only place we hear of the idea of the oracle is in Greek mythology when we hear of “the Oracle of Delphi,” where people would go and consult the oracle to ask how the future was going to turn out. “Will we be victorious? Will we be defeated in battle?

Will I marry Susan, Betty, or Jane?” And they were looking to these self-appointed prophets there at Delphi to give a divine pronouncement. Well, there were oracles before there was an oracle at Delphi. There was one called Isaiah, one called Jeremiah, Amos, Hosea, Ezekiel, Daniel.

And they would use this oracular form to communicate the Word of God, and there were basically two kinds of oracles known to the prophets. There was “the oracle of weal,” which was an oracle of good news, an announcement of prosperity coming from the hand of God.

And then there was also “the oracle of woe,” which oracle would be an announcement of doom brought from the hand of God. And the normal way in which the oracle of weal would be uttered was by the use of the

Term “blessed,” by the pronouncements of a divine benediction, as David begins the Psalms, “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, or stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful, but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and

In that law he meditates day and night. He’ll be like a tree planted by rivers of water, bringing forth his fruit in his season. But the ungodly are no so. They are like the chaff which the wind driveth away.”

How often did our Lord exercise the function of the prophet and make oracular pronouncements, such as He did on the Sermon on the Mount when He looked to His disciples and He said to them, “Blessed are the poor, blessed are those who mourn, blessed are those who hunger

And thirst after righteousness, blessed are the pure in heart, blessed are the peacemakers, blessed are those who are persecuted for My sake,” and so on, giving us that section of the Sermon that we call “The Beatitudes,” where Jesus pronounces the blessing of God upon certain people.

But the oracle of doom, in contrast, was normally prefaced by the word, “Woe.” As you recall Amos pronouncing the judgments of God on the nations, “Woe! For two transgressions and three, woe unto you Assyrians, woe unto you Damascus, woe unto you Israel.”

Or the incredible moment when Isaiah beheld the unveiled holiness of God, he pronounced an oracle of doom upon himself. He understood who God was, and for the first time in his life he understood who Isaiah was. And he cursed, not God, but he cursed Isaiah, “Woe is me. I’m coming apart. I’m undone.

I’m ruined because I have a filthy mouth, and I’m not alone. Not only am I exposed to the woe, but I live in the midst of a people of unclean lips who are equally exposed to the judgment of God.”

And so we see these statements in the Bible, these oracular statements of blessing and curse, weal and woe. And yet somehow, we love to hear the story of blessedness, but we never want to hear the woe. I don’t think there’s ever been a culture in the history of the world that has experienced

More discontinuity at that level. Everywhere in this country you see automobiles with bumper stickers that read “God Bless America.” After 9/11 Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell suggested that perhaps the events of 9/11 were God’s judgments upon America.

And the outcry and outrage of the press was so severe, they had to recant their musings on that point, because we believe in a God who is infinitely capable of blessing people, but is utterly incapable of cursing them.

When I was a young Christian, I heard a sermon from Billy Graham in which he said, “If God does not judge America, He’s going to have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah.” But the idea of God bringing judgment and wrath and curse upon a nation has been expurgated

From our Bibles and from our theologies, as we do exactly what Mark Dever warned us about doing earlier today. But if you really want to understand what it meant to a Jew to be cursed, I think the simplest way is to look at the famous Hebrew benediction in the Old Testament.

You all know how it goes. Those of you who are clergy use it for your final benediction countless times, “May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make His face to shine upon you and be gracious unto you.

May the Lord lift up the light of His countenance upon you and give you His peace.” Now, if you notice the structure of that famous benediction that it follows a common Hebrew poetic form known as “parallelism.” There are various types of parallelism in Hebrew literature.

There is antithetical parallelism, where ideas are set in contrast one to another. There are those synthetic parallelisms, where there is a building crescendo of ideas, a new idea is placed on top of another one, and another new idea comes in.

But one of the most common forms of parallelism is what is called “synonymous parallelism,” and as the word suggests, synonymous parallelism states the same thing simply by using different words. And there is no more clear example of synonymous parallelism anywhere in Scripture than in

The benediction here, where exactly the same thing is said in three different ways. So, if you don’t understand one line of it, then look to the next one and maybe it will reveal to you the meaning. Now to get things complicated, we see in the benediction three stanzas, as it were, with

Two elements in each one. “May the Lord bless – keep, make His face to shine upon you – be gracious unto you, lift up the light of His countenance upon you and give you His shalom, His peace.”

Now, what is so important for us to understand the curse is to understand, first of all, how the Jew understood blessing. How did he understand it? “May the Lord bless you.” What he meant by that is to be blessed by God is to be bathed in the refulgent glory that emanates His face.

“May the Lord bless you” means “May the Lord make His face to shine upon you.” Is this not what Moses begged for on the mountain when he said, “O God, I’ve seen what few mortals have ever seen. I saw the plagues that You brought to Egypt. I saw the river turn to blood.

I was there between Migdol and the sea when You dried up the sea and let us walk through. But now let me have the big one. Please let me see Your face.” You know what happened. God said, “Moses, you don’t know what you’re asking.

Haven’t you read the book you wrote that no man can see Me and live? Moses, I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’ll carve out a niche in the rock over here and I’ll place you there in the cleft of the

Rock, and I will allow My backward parts to pass by and I’ll give you an instantaneous glance of My backward parts, but My face shall not be seen.” And when Moses had that brief glance of the back side of God, his face shone for an extended period of time.

But what the Jew longed for was, “O God, just let me once, just once see Your face.” You see, his ultimate hope is the same hope that is given to us in the New Testament, the final eschatological hope of the beatific vision.

“Behold, what manner of love is this,” John says, “that we should be called the children of God. We don’t know yet what we will be, but this much we know that we will be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.” Don’t you want to see Him?

The hardest thing about being a Christian is serving a God you’ve never seen. And so, the Jew asked for that benediction. “O God, bless us to the degree that You would make Your face shine upon you.” Last week, Charlton Heston died – Moses, Ben-Hur. How many of you ever saw Ben-Hur?

Let me see. Almost everybody, good! Wait a minute, I’m going to try that the next time I do an invitation, if I can get that many hands up in the air. I don’t do invitations, except to weddings and graduations, things like that.

You remember that scene in Ben-Hur where he’s been reduced to slavery, and he is being dragged behind his captive and they finally come to this well in the midst of the desert. And he comes there and he’s in the sand and his lips are parched, and he’s overcome with thirst.

And all of a sudden, you see the shadow of a human thing. You never see this person’s face, but whoever it is who meets Ben-Hur stoops over and gives to him a cup of cold water.

And the point of view of the camera is from the gaze of Ben Hur, who looks up into the face of the one who is giving him this drink of water, and instantly Ben-Hur’s face begins to shine.

And you don’t have to be told who it was who gave him the drink of water, because the Lord Jesus made his face to shine upon this slave. “May the Lord lift up the light of His countenance upon you and give to you His peace.”

Every time I hear that benediction in church, I get chill bumps because it so incorporates my highest dream to see His face. But my purpose this afternoon is not to explain the blessing of God but its polar opposite, its antithesis, which again can be seen in vivid contrast to the benediction.

It would be the supreme malediction that would read something like this, “May the Lord curse you and abandon you. May the Lord keep you in darkness and give you only judgment without grace. May the Lord turn His back upon you and remove His peace from you forever.”

In the imagery of atonement on the Day of Atonement, we know that there are several animals involved in the ritual of that day. The priest, before he can enter into the holy of holies, where the high priest and only

The high priest and only this one day of the year can go, must first himself make a blood sacrifice and go through an elaborate process of purification. And then there are two more animals involved – one who was killed; the other that survives.

The one that is killed yields his blood, which the chief or high priest takes into the inner sanctum and sprinkles on the mercy seat, sprinkles on the throne of Yahweh to bring reconciliation. And yet in this drama, there is no power in that blood other than it’s pointing forward

To the blood of the Lamb, even as the blood on the door posts on the night of Passover pointed beyond itself to Christ our Passover, who was sacrificed for us. We know two things from the Day of Atonement. One, that without the shedding of blood there was no forgiveness of sins.

We also learn from the author of Hebrews that the blood of bulls and goats cannot take away sin. But in that half of the drama, with the blood sacrifice that is sprinkled on the mercy seat, what is symbolized is an act of propitiation, which some brilliant translators in the middle

Of the twentieth century decided to take out of the New Testament to their everlasting shame. Those two words that are so central to the core of the gospel, propitiation, expiation – what’s the difference? They have the same root, but different prefix.

I want our people at Saint Andrew’s in Sanford, Florida to always understand propitiation and expiation if they’re going to understand the gospel. And I tell them, I said, “You know our church is built in the classical style that is called

The cruciform, so that if you looked at it from the air, the shape of our building forms the shape of a cross.” And I say, “If you come down the center aisle, let it remind you of the vertical piece of the cross.

Let it remind you of propitiation, because in propitiation the Son does something to satisfy the justice and the wrath of the Father. It’s a vertical transaction.” That is what is prefigured in the sacrifice that is made on the mercy seat.

But let’s not forget that other animal that liberal theologians try every which way to erase from the biblical record as we’ve already heard. Yes, I’m speaking of the goat, the scapegoat who becomes the object of imputation, where the priest now lays his hands on the back of that goat, symbolically indicating the

Transfer, or the imputation, of the guilt of the people to the back of that goat. So at the end of that ceremony, the priest lays his hands on the goat and says, “May the sins of the people be upon this goat,” and then says to the goat, “Thank you very

Much for standing still during this.” And he says to the people, “You are dismissed.” No, no, no, no, no. The significance really reaches its crescendo after the imputation of the sin of the people to the back of the goat, when the goat is driven then into the wilderness, outside the camp.

You remember when God numbered the people according to the tribes and they pitched the tabernacle, the tribes were in a circle and what was in the middle, equidistant to every settlement of every tribe, was the tabernacle indicating God is in the midst of His people.

And to be driven out of the covenant community, to be driven outside the camp was to be driven to the place where the blessings of God did not reach, sent into the outer darkness, into the wilderness, into exile, into the curse. That’s expiation.

When in the cross, not only is the Father’s justice satisfied by the atoning work of His Son, but in bearing our sins, the Lamb of God removes our sins from us as far as the east is from the west. How does He do it? By being cursed.

Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law. Listen to this, not simply by being cursed for us, but becoming a curse for us. He who is the incarnation of the glory of God now becomes the very incarnation of the divine curse.

As it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs upon the tree.” Many, many years ago I was asked by the Quaker community of Pennsylvania, the Society of Friends, to come to one of their meetings and explain to them the difference between the old covenant and the new covenant.

And there I talked about the Day of Atonement in Israel and the crucifixion of Christ in the New Testament. And as I spoke of Christ becoming cursed, my message was interrupted by a guy in the back who stood up and shouted out loud, “That’s primitive and obscene!”

Has that ever happened to you when you’re preaching? I was taken aback and just to give myself a chance to think, I said, “What did you say?” as if I didn’t hear him. Everybody in the room heard him. I said, “What did you say?”

And with great hostility he said, “I said that’s primitive and obscene!” And I said, “You’re right. I love the words that you have chosen to describe this dynamic. What could be more primitive than killing animals and sticking their blood over the

Throne of God, or taking a human being and pouring out his blood as a human sacrifice? That is primitive. You’re right. You know, one of the things I love about the gospel, sir, is that it wasn’t written merely

For an agnostic elite group of scholars who had to have their Ph.D. in theology in order to understand it. But the drama of redemption is communicated in terms so simple, so crass, so primitive that a child can understand it. But I really like the second word you used – obscene, obscene.

If there ever was an obscenity that violates contemporary community standards, it was Jesus on the cross. Because after He became the scapegoat, and the Father imputes to Him every sin of every one of His people, we see the most intense, dense concentration of evil ever experienced on this planet.

Jesus was the ultimate obscenity.” And so, what happened? The Bible tells us that God is too holy to even look at sin, and He cannot bear to look at this concentrated, monumental condensation of evil, and His eyes are averted from His Son.

The light of His countenance is turned off, all blessedness is removed from His Son whom He loved, and in its place was the full measure of the divine curse. All of the imagery that portrays the historical event of the cross is the imagery of the curse.

It was necessary for the Scriptures to be fulfilled that Jesus not be crucified by Jews, but He has to be delivered into the hands of the Gentiles. He has to be executed not by stoning, but He has to be killed by Gentiles outside the

Camp, outside Jerusalem at Golgotha, so that the full measure of the curse and the darkness that attends it be visited upon Jesus. And God adds to these details astronomical perturbations, where at midday He turns the lights out on that hill outside of Jerusalem so that when His face is moved away, when

The light of His countenance is shut down, even the sun won’t shine on Calvary. And bearing the full measure of the curse, Christ screams, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?”, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” Oh, and look at how the theologians play with that!

“Oh, well Jesus was taking this occasion to identify with the psalmist in Psalm 22, which begins with those words so that He can call attention to those who are looking upon this spectacle that this is really a fulfillment of prophecy.”

I don’t think Jesus was in a Bible quoting mood at that time, or as Albert Schweitzer opined, “This was a cry of a disillusioned prophet who believed that God was going to rescue Him at the eleventh hour, and He felt forsaken.” He didn’t just feel forsaken; He was forsaken.

For Jesus to become the curse, He has to be utterly, totally, and completely forsaken by the Father. I started off by saying to you I’ve been thinking about these things for fifty years, and I can’t begin to penetrate that, what it meant that Jesus was forsaken by God.

But there is none of this to be found in the pseudo-gospels of our day. Dear brothers, every time I hear a preacher on television or live, who says to his people, “God loves you unconditionally,” I want to ask that this man be defrocked for such a violation of the Word of God.

What pagan, who hears that announcement that God loves him unconditionally does not hear in that statement that he has no need of repentance, he can continue in sin without fear knowing that it’s all taken care of, that God doesn’t hold grudges, that God loves him unconditionally?

Well, there is a profound sense in which God does love people even in their corruption, but they are still under His anathema. I know that almost everybody here is a minister or related to a minister and so on, but you

Know just because you’re ordained there’s no guarantee that you are in the kingdom of God. And with this size of professing Christians assembled in one hall, the odds are astronomical that there are many people in this room right now who are still under the curse of God,

Who have not yet fled to the cross, who are still counting on this nebulous idea of the unconditional love of God to get them through, or even worse, still thinking that they can get into the kingdom of God through their good works, through their service, who don’t

Understand that unless you perfectly obey the law of God, which you have not done for five minutes since you were born, you are under the curse of God. And here’s the reality that we must make clear to our people, that they will either bear

The curse of God themselves, or they will flee to the One who took it for them. Cursed of God! The Father turns His back. Thomas Aquinas once was asked. “Thomas, do you think that Jesus enjoyed the beatific vision through His whole life?”

Thomas said, “I don’t know, but I’m sure that our Lord was able to see things that our sin keeps us from seeing.” Remember that the promise of the vision of God in the Beatitudes is the promise made to whom? To the pure of heart.

Beloved, the reason why you can’t see God with your eyes is not because you have a problem with your optic nerve. What prevents us from seeing God is our heart, our impurity. But Jesus had no impurity. And Thomas said He was pure in heart.

So obviously He had some, some experience of the beauty of the Father until that moment that my sin was placed upon Him. And the one who was pure was pure no more, and God cursed Him.

It was as if there was a cry from heaven, excuse my language but I can be no more accurate than to say, it was as if Jesus heard the words, “God damn you.” Because that’s what it meant to be cursed, to be damned, to be under the anathema of the Father.

As I said, I don’t understand that, but I know that it’s true, and I know that every person in this room and every person outside in this hotel and on the street and across the world who has not been covered by the righteousness of Christ right this minute

Draws every breath under the curse of God. If you believe that, you will stop adding to the gospel and start preaching it with clarity and with boldness because, dear friends, it is the only hope we have, and it is hope enough. Let’s pray.

Our Father, the work, the Person of Your Son is our only hope in life and in death. And so, we hope for our life and for our death in His life and in His death. Give us the grace to cling to the gospel. Amen.

#R.C #Sproul #Curse #Motif #Atonement