The Kingdom of Christ
February 5th, 1989 @ 8:15 AM
John 18:36
Play Audio
THE KINGDOM OF OUR LORD JESUS
Dr. W. A. Criswell
John 18:33-37
2-5-89 8:15 a.m.
And once again welcome to the throngs of you who share this hour on radio. You are a part now of our dear First Baptist Church in Dallas, and this is the pastor bringing the message entitled The Kingdom of Our Lord Jesus. In our preaching through the Fourth Gospel, the Gospel of John, this is a scene in the eighteenth chapter, reading from verses 33 to 37:
Then Pilate entered into the judgment hall again, and called Jesus, and said unto Him, Art Thou the King of the Jews?
Jesus answered him, Sayest thou this thing of thyself, or did others tell it thee of Me?
Pilate answered, Am I a Jew? Thine own nation and the chief priests have delivered Thee unto me: what hast Thou done?
Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world: if My kingdom were of this world, then would My servants fight, that I should not be delivered. . .but now is My kingdom not from hence.
Pilate therefore said unto [Him], Art Thou a king then? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I am a king—the strongest affirmation in the Greek language—to this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should be the King of truth, that I should bear witness unto the truth. And every one that is of the truth heareth My voice.
[John 18:33-37]
This is a little segment, a little pericope of the trial of the Lord Jesus before the Roman procurator. And as you read through the trial, of which this is a segment, you cannot but be overwhelmed by the incredulous, unbelievable succession and series of paradoxes and anomalies in that confrontation.
He who came to deliver the prisoner free is Himself now arraigned and arrested and imprisoned. He who came to lead us into life is Himself now bound over unto death. He who through all eternity was surrounded by the hosts of angelic angels worshiping Him, He is now that lone and solitary figure in the judgment hall [John 18:33]. He who was described by the prophet Isaiah as being the wonderful Counselor [Isaiah 9:6] is now before a vapid and vacillating judge [John 18:33].
And the Jews, who refused to enter the judgment hall of the Gentiles lest they be defiled, are there in the presence of the Holy One of Israel. And the most astonishing of all of the claims that could ever be made: the Lord Jesus says to Pontius Pilate that He is a king [John 18:37]. And Pilate looked incredulously, amazingly, unbelievably on that poor peasant from an unknown little city in Galilee. “You are a king? [John 18:37]. How could such a thing be?” One of His own disciples betrayed Him [John 18:2-3; Matthew 26:14-16, 47-49]. His own countrymen have delivered Him up [John 18:35]. He is not acclaimed, but derided and scorned [Matthew 27:39-44].
He stands there a pitiful figure [John 18:33]. Had He been of the line of the pharaohs, had He belonged to the family of Nimrod, had He been of the race of the Caesars and said He was a king, then Pilate might have been somewhat impressed. But this Man, peasant, standing there with a crown of thorns and a castoff purple robe and a reed for a scepter in His hands [Matthew 27:28-29; John 19:2, 5], and He says He is a king? [John 18:37].
And yet never in history did any man ever stand so imperiously sovereign and royal as did that Man. They might spit upon Him, and buffet Him, and deride Him, and curse Him [Matthew 27:30-31], but they could never deny or destroy the sublime truth upon which He stands [John 18:37]. And as though that were not overwhelming enough, this peasant who claims to be a king speaks of a kingdom that belongs to Him [John 18:36]; a kingdom whose reality lies not in things seen, but in things unseen [John 18:36].
And Pilate listens, and with his lips curled in scorn asks what kind of a kingdom over which this peasant presides. The only kingdom that Pilate knew was the iron dominion and domain of Rome. It was a kingdom of armies. It was a kingdom of tax collectors. It was a kingdom of marching marshal forces. It was a kingdom that exacted tribute from a conquered and enslaved people. He could imagine no other kind of a kingdom. And this Man, this poor peasant standing before him claiming to be the King over a kingdom, and where was His power to rule? So subject Himself, so bloodied and beat, what power did He have to rule? [John 18:36].
In this next [chapter], he says to that peasant, “I have power to crucify You or to release You” [John 19:10]. And what he did, true to his word, he delivered that peasant to be crucified unto death [John 19:16]. That’s what the story says. And I read it here on the Word of God. Pilate, “I have the power,” and he delivered Him to be crucified, and to die [John 19:16].
But I ask you, dear people, who emerged victorious and triumphant and ascendant? Was it Pilate or was it that subjected, beat, and bloodied peasant? Who truly reigns?
In the diadem of that peasant there shined the everlasting stars of all God’s creation. The sovereignty of His spirit has seized and held the noblest men and women of all the generations. And the kingdom of that despised and derided peasant has ascended over all the dust heaps and ash heaps of the great kingdoms of this earth.
The only reason that we know the name of Pilate is because of this confrontation with the Lord Jesus. He is buried in an utterly unknown and forgotten grave. The kingdom that he represented is a candle that has been thrust into everlasting darkness.
But the kingdom of our Lord rises, and shines, and rules, and lives forever and ever and ever. The paradoxes and the anomalies of this confrontation, they are, I say, incredulous and unbelievable. He says, this King, He says, “My kingdom is not of this world” [John 18:36]. Our Lord could have built His kingdom here.
Do you remember that verse that closes the story of the feeding of the five thousand? When our Lord fed that great throng, there were five thousand men. How many others were there, women and children? We don’t know; thousands and thousands, when our Lord fed that vast multitude with that little boy’s lunch [John 6:5-14]. Do you remember the next verse? It says, “And they sought by force to take Him and make Him a king” [John 6:15]. It was obvious: “Here is a Man that can lead us against the imperial power of the Caesars of Rome. This Man can deliver our nation. Look at Him, He can feed an army on a handful of food. Look at Him. If our soldiers are killed, He can raise them from the dead. He is invincible!” Then the verse says, “And the Lord went away and hid Himself in a mountain to pray” [John 6:15].
Or look again; our Lord could have built His kingdom, I say, in this world. When He was arrested, Simon Peter drew out his sword to defend Him. And the Lord said to him, “Put up the sword. If I would and if I will, I could ask My Father for twelve legions of angels” [Matthew 26:52-53]. You consider that; twelve legions of angels. A legion had six thousand soldiers. Twelve legions would be seventy-two thousand angels. Do you remember reading in the life of King Hezekiah when he was shut up by the armies of Sennacherib? One angel, just one, passed over the Assyrian army that night, and the next morning they counted one hundred eighty-five thousand dead corpses; one angel [Isaiah 37:36]. “If I will, I could ask My Father that He send Me seventy-two thousand angels” [Matthew 26:53]. He could have built His kingdom in this world.
But our Lord repudiated it [John 6:15]. One: had He built His kingdom in this world He would have shared it with Satan, and sin and death would have been forever king in this earth. What a bargain that would have been for Satan, to share the kingdom with the Prince of glory and the God of heaven. But the Lord repudiated it. When Satan came to Him in that third temptation and said, “I show You the kingdoms of the world and all their glory; I will give it to You if You will kneel down and worship me,” the Lord said, “Get thee behind Me Satan. Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and Him only shalt thou serve” [Matthew 4:8-10].
Look again. Had our Lord built His kingdom in this world, it would have been founded upon force, upon armies. There was a Pax Romana, an universal peace by the power of the armies of Rome. There could have been a Pax Christiana, a universal kingdom of Christ built by might and by strength. But Christ repudiated it, saying to Simon Peter, “Put up the sword” [Matthew 26:52]. Pilate represented the only kingdom that he knew, the iron force of the Caesars of Rome. But even then, after seven hundred years, he represented a dying domain.
All of those great kingdoms have crumbled into the dust [Daniel 2:31-45]. That glorious vision of the course of history seen by Daniel: the head of gold [Daniel 2:32, 37-38], the Babylonian kingdom is gone; the breast and the arms of silver [Daniel 2:32, 39], the Medo-Persian kingdom is gone; the midsection and thighs [Daniel 2:32, 39] of the Grecian kingdom is dead and gone; and the two iron legs of the Roman kingdom [Daniel 2:33, 40] have perished in the dust and forgotten grave of the earth, its grandeur is vanished.
And no one could ever say Jesus is the king of glitter and pomp, that He is the king of the sword and the coercive conversion, that He is the king of the sensualists and the ephemeral. His kingdom is in another world. And the glory of that kingdom is not of this world, the kingdom of marbled hall, alabaster colonies; Jesus repudiated it [John 18:36].
My sweet people, there is more to be seen and to be felt and to be known in the manger of that cattle stall [Luke 2:11-16], and in the cross on that Calvary field [Matthew 27:32-50] than in all the golden palaces of the world. And the entrance into that kingdom is not by proud and marshal array, but by humility and by bowing [Philippians 2:9-11].
Who is greatest? Jesus took a little child and set him in the midst. And the more like that child you are, the greater you are [Matthew 18:1-5]. And when the disciples were quarrelling among themselves, “Who will be greatest” [Luke 22:24], Jesus disrobes, bound Himself with a towel, and washed their feet [John 13:4-5]. This is the glory of the kingdom of our God [Matthew 20:16; Mark 9:35].
May I speak now of the kingdom of Christ? First: it is He and He alone. It is not He and Satan. It is not He and sin and death. It is not He and anyone else in heaven above or in earth below. He is King alone.
As the great prophet Isaiah in chapter 59 [Isaiah 59:16] and again in chapter 63 [Isaiah 63:5], “He sought someone to deliver; and finding none, His own arm brought deliverance.” All of us sinful creatures, subject to judgment and death; He came to do what we could never do, and to be what we could never, ever be. He is King alone, in glory and majesty.
All hail the power of Jesus’ name!
Let angels prostrate fall;
Bring forth the royal diadem,
And crown Him Lord of all.
[from “All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name,” Edward Perronet]
King Jesus, alone.
A second thing about His kingdom: He says that He is the King of truth, of reality [John 18:37]. That’s an amazing thing! Truth not in a book, not in word and language, not in creeds and philosophies, but true incarnate, truth living. He said in John 14:6, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.” Truth and life are in Him.
When you look at our Lord, how amazingly true is that? He is absolutely transparent from head to foot. Everything He did, He did in public; nothing in private. And when He was in solitude, His disciples were there to observe Him and to write about Him; everything open and public. You could touch Him. You could see Him. You could behold Him. You could walk with Him. He was incarnate in our very presence [John 1:1, 14].
And God sent Him into this world that thus He might be [John 3:16]. An angel could not rule over us in a kingdom. An angel has not our nature. He doesn’t know anything about the trials and the troubles, the sorrows, and the death that we experience.
But He does. The great Book of Hebrews describes it:
He was made like unto His brethren.
In all things and ways, He was tried as we are, that He might be a sympathetic High Priest interceding for us.
Wherefore, come boldly unto the throne of grace, that you might find grace and help in time of need.
[Hebrews 2:17, 4:14-16]
He is that kind of a King. He is that kind of an incarnate Lord. And we did not need and we do not need another echo of a Seneca or of a Marcus Aurelius, or even of a Socrates or a Plato or an Aristotle. We need a Savior, we need a great Deliverer. And Jesus is that to us; the King of our souls, of our lives, of our hearts, who knows all about us and yet loves us and sympathizes with us.
The kingdom of our Savior, in a third place, is open to everybody, to everybody. The truer and the humbler you are, the more you’ll feel at home with the Lord Jesus—open to everybody. You will not need a Diogenes’ lantern to find those who worship at His feet. They will come to the light of our Lord, a kingdom that welcomes anybody and everybody.
I have preached in the illustrious, beautiful church, attended by greater numbers than any other in the Church of England, in London. The pomp, the ceremony, the elective and the illustrious that were there, I have preached there.
I have also preached in a leper colony in western Africa, in Nigeria; the church made out of mud, the building made out of mud, the pews made out of mud, the pulpit made out of mud, and the pulpit lectern and stand made out of mud, listening to those lepers sing about the Great Physician.
Sweet people, whether it was in that august, illustrious Church of England or whether it was in the mud church in Nigeria, I preached the same gospel, the same Lord. Anyone is welcome—high and low, rich and poor, learned and unlearned—the kingdom of our Lord Jesus. Again, it will find its greatest glory when Jesus comes again.
Lord Jesus, You were born for us, and You died for us, and You bled for us and someday you are coming for us. Not the least of His saints, will he leave not in the dust of the ground or in this trial or tribulation, Jesus is coming again [Acts 1:11].
And last, His kingdom is forever and ever [Revelation 11:15]. There’ll be no more death, there’ll be no more sorrow, no more crying, and no more sin [Revelation 21:4]. Death will be conquered, and sin will be vanquished [Revelation 21:4], and we’ll live forever at His side, in the glory of our eternal home [John 14:3].
Within a few days of last week, I conducted four funerals. We live in that kind of a world, by the open grave, and all of us wasted by time and living under the weight of sin. What a glory and what a triumph, when the Lord lifts us up out of the dust of the grave [1 Thessalonians 4:16-17], and out of the trial and tribulation of this life [John 16:33], and we are made eternal citizens of the city of God, the New Jerusalem [Revelation 21:2-3], strangers and pilgrims here, and our home in heaven [Hebrews 11:13-16]. This as Jesus, King Jesus, Lord Jesus, come for us.
In this moment now, we sing a hymn of appeal. If there is a family here to put life with us, we welcome you with all of our hearts. If there’s a couple here to dedicate home and ministry and service to Jesus, a thousand times welcome. If there is one somebody here to accept Jesus as Savior [Romans 10:9-10], that Roman road is so plain and so simple. “I recognize, Lord, that as a sinner I face the judgment of death [Romans 6:3]. And Lord, You died for me that I might have eternal life [Romans 3:23]. And I accept Your love and grace in my heart [Romans 5:8], in my house and home, and in my life, and in keeping with the great commandment, I confess You openly and publically as my Savior” [Romans 10:9]. You come, and welcome, while we stand and while we sing.
THE
KINGDOM OF CHRIST
Dr. W.
A. Criswell
John 18:36
2-5-89
10:50 a.m.
Once again, we welcome
the throngs of you who share this hour on radio and on television. This
is the First Baptist Church in Dallas, and I am the pastor delivering the
message entitled The Kingdom of Our Lord and Savior Christ Jesus.
In our preaching through the
Gospel of John, the fourth gospel, we have come to the last and climactic and
concluding days of His life in the flesh. And out of that scene and
trial, we read in John chapter 18, verses 33 to 37:
Then Pilate entered into
the judgment hall, called Jesus, and said unto Him, Art Thou the King of the
Jews?
Jesus answered him,
Sayest thou this of thyself, or did others tell it thee of Me?
Pilate answered, Am I a
Jew? Thine own nation and the chief priests have delivered Thee unto me: what
hast Thou done?
Jesus answered, My kingdom
is not of this world: if My kingdom were of this world, then would My
servants fight, that I should not be delivered: but now is My kingdom not from
hence.
Pilate therefore said
unto Him, Art Thou a king? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I am a king –
the strongest affirmation in the Greek
language.
To repeat it, “Thou
sayest I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I
into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that
is of the truth heareth My voice” [John 18:37].
In these hours of the
trial and finally the crucifixion of our Savior, there was an incredible and
unbelievable series and successions of paradoxes and anomalies. He who
came to set the prisoner free is now arrested and arraigned and
imprisoned. He who came to lead us into life is now bound over and
delivered into death. He who was the center of angelic worship through
all of the ages before, the eternity past, is now that lone and forsaken figure
standing in the judgment hall. And He of whom the prophet Isaiah said, “His
name will be called Wonderful, Counselor” [Isaiah
9:6], is now standing before a vapid and vacillating judge.
The Jewish people who
were crying for His blood refused to enter the Gentile judgment hall lest they
be defiled. And yet He stands there in their presence, the Holy One of
the God of Israel. And the most amazing anomaly and paradox of all; He
says, “I am a king.” Pilate listened incredulously and looked in
amazement. “You, this peasant from an undistinguished village in Galilee,
You are a king?” Betrayed by one of His own disciples, delivered up to
death by His own countrymen; instead of being exalted and honored, He’s denied
and derided.
Had He been of the line
of the Pharaohs, had He been of the family of Nimrod, had He been of the race
of the Caesars, Pilate might have looked upon Him at least in interest if not
in honor. But this Man despised and spit upon, derided and denied, and
soon to be crucified and killed, He is a king? And not only did He speak
that He was of royalty, and I might say that intrinsically imperial He was, and
however He might be spit upon and denied, the centuries cannot deny the
nobility of the truth on which He stood and on which He stands. A king, and He
says, “I am the Lord of a kingdom.” He speaks of “My kingdom” – one whose
reality lies not in things seen, but in things unseen. And Pilate curled his
lips in contemptuous disdain, “A kingdom,You?” The only kingdom to which Pilate
had ever been introduced was the iron kingdom of the imperial Caesars of Rome,
a kingdom of armies and of tax gatherers and of marching men, a kingdom that
exacted obedience and tribute from its enslaved and unwilling subjects.
And this Man is King of a kingdom! His power to rule, where was it?
Standing there crowned with thorns, with a castoff dirty purple robe over His
shoulders and with a reed for a scepter, where was His power to rule?
And in the exchange of
words in the next chapter, Pilate says to Him as a representative of the Roman
government, “I have power to crucify Thee, or to release Thee” [John 19:10]. And in keeping with that
imperial ableness and might and glory, he delivered that peasant to crucifixion
and to death. But I ask you, dear people, who was triumphant, and who was
victorious, and who was in ascendancy? Upon the brow of that humble
Galilean is not today a crown of thorns but a diadem filled with all the
everlasting stars of God’s heaven above us. And His sovereignty of Spirit
has grasped and seized the hearts, and minds, and admiration, and worship of
the noblest men and women of the ages. And His kingdom has arisen in
increasing glory and power above all the dust heaps of all of the dominions and
kingdoms of this enduring world.
There is none like Him
and the domain over which He rules. And as for Pilate himself, the candle
of rulership that he held in his hand has been extinguished into the darkness
for two thousand years. And the domain in the empire he represented has
been lost, its grandeur forgotten. And as for Pilate himself, the only
remembrance of it lies in this encounter he had with the Lord Jesus. And
he lies in an utterly forgotten grave.
The kingdom of our Lord,
bringing with it imperishable riches to those who call upon His name, is in
ascendancy over all of the dominions and nations and empires of the
world. There’s none like Him, and there’s none like the kingdom over
which He rules. He speaks of His kingdom as not of this world. “My
kingdom is not from hence. It’s not of this. It’s not of the earth.
It’s not of time. My kingdom is in another realm, in another glory, in
another definition, in another age, in another life. My kingdom is not
from hence, not in the earth.” He could have built His Empire down here
in this earth. He said to Pontius Pilate, “If My kingdom were of this
world, then would my servants fight” [John 18:36].
We’d declare war. We’d conquer the earth.
I want to show you, if I
can, that was not empty speech and vain language. Do you remember the
verse that closes the story of His feeding the five thousand? There were five
thousand men fed. How many other thousands there, women and children, we’re
not told. There were five thousand men fed with a little handful of food,
with a little boy’s lunch. And when they saw that miracle, do you
remember the next verse? “And they sought by force to make Him a king” [John 6:15].
The reason is
obvious. Here is a man that can feed an army in a handful of food.
And as you’ve heard all your life, an army marches on its stomach. If the
army starves, the battle is lost. Here is a man that can feed an army in
a handful of food, and not only that, but here is a man who can raise the
dead. If a soldier is slain, He can speak him back to life. How
would you face an invincible foe like that? He could have been the head
of a great, vanquishing, triumphant army and conquered the world.
Instead, He said to Simon Peter, “Put up your sword.” Do you remember
again when He was arrested and arraigned, and Peter drew that sword, the Lord
said, “Simon, Simon, if I will, I could ask My Father for twelve legions of
angels” [Matthew 26:52-53]. A legion is six
thousand soldiers. Twelve legions would be seventy-two thousand
angels.
And do you remember in
the [thirty-seventh] chapter of the Book of Isaiah in the days of Hezekiah when
the Judean king was shut up in Jerusalem and the Assyrian army held him in a
vise? That night one angel – one – passed over the Assyrian host, and the
next morning they counted one hundred eighty-five thousand dead corpses [Isaiah 37:36]. And the Lord says, “If I
will, I could ask My Father for seventy-two thousand angels.” He
repudiated a conquest of this present darkened world.
Would you look
again? Had He built His kingdom in this world, if His kingdom were of
this and now; one, He would have shared it with Satan, and with darkness, and
with sin, and with death. What a bargain that would have been for Satan
to be coequal with the Prince of glory! And what would God have been in
His definition and character thus to compromise the world with Satan? The
Lord repudiated it.
In the third temptation
when Satan brought before the Lord Jesus all the kingdoms of the world and
their glory, and Satan said, “This, all of this will I give You if You will bow
down and worship me,” and our Lord said, “Get thee behind Me Satan: [for it is
written,] thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve” [Matthew 4:8-10]. Had our Lord acquiesced
in building His kingdom in this earth, its foundation would have been by force,
by a marching army.
There was a Pax Romana,
world peace, because the army of Rome had conquered civilization itself.
There could have been a Pax Christiana, the force of the marching armies
of Christ, the sword of God conquering and vanquishing the entire population
and nation and civilization of this world. The Lord repudiated it, “Simon
Peter, put back that sword in its sheath.” The only empire and kingdom
that those men could think of, could recognize, was that represented by the
iron will of Rome.
But our Lord, looking
upon that vision of Daniel, our Lord repudiated it all. That head of gold
represented the kingdom of Babylon, gone. Those shoulders and arms
represented the kingdom of the Medo-Persians, gone. The mid-section and
thighs represented the kingdom of the Greeks, gone, perished in the dust heap
of the earth. And those iron legs represented the kingdom of Rome,
represented by Pilate, and its seven hundred years of history was already
beginning to disintegrate and to die.
Jesus will never be known
as the king of the glitter of pomp, or of the conquesting conversion by the
sword, or by the fascinating, sensuous display of the ephemeralities of this
time and of this earth. His kingdom is in another category, and its glory
is not of this age. The glory of the kingdoms of this world can be found
in marble palaces and colonnaded halls and jewel diadems. And the Lord
repudiated it all.
My sweet people, there is
more meaning in the humble manger of Christ in a cattle stall and in the bare,
rugged cross on Mount Calvary than in all the sweep of all the palaces and
colonnaded alabaster columns of this world. And the entrance into the
kingdom is not by might, and not by power, and not by riches, and not by
force. When they asked, “Who’s the greatest?” He took a little child and
set the youngster in the midst and said, “The more like that little child you
are, the greater you are.” And when the disciples quarreled about who
would be next in the kingdom after Jesus, our Lord disrobed and girded Himself
with a towel and began to wash their feet. This is the kingdom of our
Lord.
May I describe it in the
few minutes that remain? The kingdom of Jesus; first: He alone is
Lord. It is not shared with Satan, or with darkness, or with death, or
with sin. He alone is King, King Jesus. In the fifty-ninth and in
the sixty-third chapters of Isaiah, twice repeated, “God looked for someone to
deliver, and found none.” Then He said, “My arm shall bring deliverance
and salvation” [Isaiah 63:5]. That
arm of deliverance and salvation is Jesus our Lord, He alone and none
other.
All hail the power of
Jesus’ name!
Let angels prostrate
fall.
Bring forth the royal
diadem
And crown Him Lord of
all.
It’ll be King Jesus, and He alone.
Again, the kingdom of our
Lord is one of truth. “To this end was I born, and for this cause came I
into the world, that I might bear witness to the truth” [John 18:37], truth incarnate; truth in flesh and in blood;
truth not in a book, in a creed, in a philosophy, in a discourse, but truth
living and viable, the truth of God. John 14:6, He says, “I am the way,
and the truth, and the life.” And the truth of God in Christ Jesus is
ever here before us. He’s transparent from head to foot. His whole
life was in public. And even in solitude, the disciples were there to
observe and to describe.
Truth; you can handle
it. You can touch it. You can feel it. You can see it.
You can hear it, truth of God that lived and walked in our midst, truth
incarnate. How desperately we need somebody who is like us, who can
understand and sympathize with our foibles, and our weaknesses, and our trials,
and our temptations, and our sins.
Had it been an angel come
down, what kind of a kingdom over which could he rule? He’d know nothing
of us. But someone in our nature made like unto us! There are no
more beautiful passages in all God’s Word than those glorious Scriptures in the
Book of Hebrews,
It behooved Him to be
made like unto His brethren.
Tried in all points as
we are, though He without sin.
Able to sympathize with
those who suffer and hurt.
Wherefore, come boldly unto
the throne of grace, that we
might find grace to help
in time of need.
[Hebrews 2:17, Hebrews 4:15-16]
There is no trial, there
is no hurt, there is no suffering, there is no despair, there are no tears and
no sorrows that He has not experienced. He knows all about us – that kind
of a Lord. We did not and do not need another echo of a Seneca, or of a
Marcus Aurelius, or even of a Socrates and a Plato and an Aristotle. We
need a Savior, one who can walk with us, who loves us, who understands us, who
sympathizes with us, who can forgive our sins, who can take us to Himself in
heaven. And that somebody is King Jesus, the Lord Jesus; none like Him in
heaven or in earth.
The kingdom of our
Savior, it is open to everybody, to everyone, anybody, anyone, rich or poor,
learned or unlearned. That kingdom, the parameters and the perimeters are
infinite. There are no restrictive acts. There are no immigration
quotas. There are no color boundaries. Anybody! The truer and the
humbler you are, the more you will feel at home with the Lord Jesus. You
don’t need a Diogenes’ lantern to find those who are brought into His presence
and into His kingdom. It’s a wonder and a marvel! The kingdom of
Jesus, open to everybody.
I have preached in the
Church of England. That is the largest attended in the British Isles, in
the city of London; there in that elegant pulpit, pomp and ceremony, and the elite
of the British Empire seated there in the ritual. And I have preached in
a leper colony in Nigeria, West Africa, and the whole church made out of mud; the
church house made out of mud; the pews made out of mud; the pulpit made out of
mud; the lectern made out of mud; the whole church made out of mud: and in the
pulpit, getting ready to preach, listening to those lepers sing, “The great
Physician now is near; the sympathizing Jesus.” And dear people, whether
it was in August, in the elegant pulpit in the city of London or that mud
church in Nigeria, West Africa, the message was the same. The Savior was
the same. The Lord Jesus was the same. Anyone is welcome.
You, I, the greatest, the humblest, the richest, the poorest, the highest, the
lowest, welcome. This is the kingdom of our Savior. It is a kingdom
whose glory will fill the earth at His coming.
O Lord Jesus, You not
only died for me, bled for me, ascended for me, intercede for me, but, Lord,
someday You’re coming for me. Not the least of His saints will He leave
in the dust of the earth hidden in the graves of this world.
Jesus is coming for
me. And in that glorious day of triumph, we shall reign with Him as kings
and priests upon this earth: the kingdom of our Lord Jesus. And last: it
is a kingdom that shall abide forever. Death is conquered, and sin is
vanquished. No more will we bow by the open graves and weep our hearts
away. No longer will time waste our lives away and we sink under the
weight of the judgment of death. In this last week, within a few days, I
had four funerals, one after another. Weep and cry and bid goodbye.
Death shall be no longer. “Neither sorrow, nor crying, nor shall there be
any more pain: for these things are all passed away” [Revelation 21:4]. This is the everlasting kingdom of our
Lord. Strangers and pilgrims are we here. Our home, everlasting
home, is in the city of God that will soon be coming down.
O blessed Savior,
wonderful Lord, the King of my heart, and of my house, and of my home, and of
my life, and of this dear church, and of the preaching of the gospel of hope
revealed to us in Holy Scripture, and in the Spirit of Christ who moves in our
midst: blessed Jesus!
And now to you who have
listened on television, could I make a humble appeal? If you will pray
this simple prayer, God will open for you the doors of His kingdom, the gates
of heaven, everlasting righteousness and life, joy and happiness unspeakable. A
simple prayer, “Lord, You know, as I know, that I am a sinner, and I face the
judgment of death. Death awaits me because I am a sinner. I confess
that Lord. You know it, and I face the judgment of death.” Number
two: “Lord, You died in my place. You paid the penalty for my sin that I
might live. And, Lord Jesus, I love You for it. And I invite You
into my heart, and into my house, and into my home, and into my life.” And
one other; on this screen you will find a telephone number. Call us and
tell us you have opened your heart to receive Jesus as your Lord and Savior.
God says in His Holy
Word, Romans 10:9 and 10, “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus is Lord,
and believe in thine heart that He lives,” that He can save and deliver, “thou
shalt be saved. For with the heart one believeth unto salvation, unto a God-kind
of righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto that deliverance.”
Call us. Tell us you have received the Lord in your heart, and it will be
a new day and a new life and a new blessing. It is in His hands and
ableness as the King of glory to bring a gift to you.
And to these who are in our
sanctuary this holy hour, as we sing our hymn of appeal, on the first note of
the first stanza, “Pastor, this is God’s day for me, and I’m coming down that
aisle, down that stairway.” A family you, to put your life with us in our dear
church, a couple you, to dedicate your house and home to the Lord, or just one
somebody you, “Pastor, I received the Lord Jesus in my heart for all that He
promised to be, and here I stand.” God bless you in the way as you come while
we stand and while we sing.