Gospel—Bruce Conrad
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It turns out he had been at the Lord's Table breaking bread for decades.
So what happens? It's not that people are mischievous, but they just haven't made the connection sometimes.
And of course, we know for those raised in Christian homes or raised in a Christian environment that, uh, sometimes it's many years before we really know that we've made a connection with Christ and we have assurance that we received God's salvation. And so let's start tonight with singing one of the hymns on the hymn sheet.
Hymn #2.
Let's just sing the first two stanzas of hit #2 if time permits.
Perhaps we'll sing the last two at the end. If some brother was trying to raise the tune for hymn #2 Comes. Is Jesus strictly calling?
Nsnoise.
Nsnoise.
Let's pray and ask for God's help. Our God, our Father, we thank thee again for the great opportunity to rehearse.
In nine years.
Wonderful message that has reached our ears and for many of us in this room has reached our hearts. Uh, we thank the our God and Father, the Taoist pleased to send thy Son, the darling of thy bosom into this world to be a Savior for sinners. We thank thee, our God and Father, for giving us thy precious word and we might open it and read and understand these realities that have affected our lives will affect our entire eternity.
And tonight as we open Thy word, we ask for Thy blessing, we ask for the liberty of thy Holy Spirit that we would be able to take up by precious word in a way that would make it good to some man or woman, some boy or girl tonight who is still unsure whether they're saved or lost, whether they're on the broad road or whether they're on the narrow road. And we just commit the time to the our God ask for Thy help. And we ask it in the worthy and precious name of our God and our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.
Amen.
Well, turn with me, please, to the Gospel of Luke.
Matthew, Mark and Luke.
I'd like to.
Take up tonight.
The most solemn time as a brother mentioned this afternoon.
When the Lord Jesus Christ was hung on a cross.
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Most everyone has read the story, most likely dozens if not hundreds of times.
In the 22nd chapter we read the account of the Lord being betrayed by one of his disciples, and they came and took him from the garden and took him to the House of the high priest.
And for that evening, he was mocked.
And.
Blasphemed and abused.
And when it came about morning, they were emboldened to take him to the Gentile authorities to pilot.
As we read in the early part of the 23rd chapter, Pilot being a Political man.
Felt that he could achieve something for himself if he sent this notable prisoner to Herod.
And so they took the Lord over to Herod.
And then after some time.
He sent back to Pilate and I'd like to read the account picking up at that point in Luke 23.
In verse 20.
Pilot therefore willing to release Jesus spake again to them, but they cried, saying crucify Him, crucify him.
And he said unto them the third time, Why, what evil hath he done? I have found no cause of death in him. I will therefore chastise men, and let him go.
They were instant, with loud voices requiring that He might be crucified, and the voices of them and of the chief priests prevailed.
And Pilot gave sentence that it should be as they required. And he released unto them him that for sedition and murder was cast into prison whom they had desired. But he delivered Jesus to their will, And as they led him away, they laid hold upon one Simon a Sarinian coming out of the country, and on him they laid the cross, that he might bear it after Jesus.
In verse 33.
And when they were come to the place which is called Calvary.
There they crucified him.
And the malefactors, one on the right hand and the other on the left.
Then said Jesus, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. And they parted his raiment and cast lots. And the people stood beholding, And the rulers also with them derided him, saying, He saved others, let him save himself, if he be Christ the chosen of God. And the soldiers also mocked him, coming to him, and offering him vinegar, and saying, If thou be the King of the Jews, save thyself. In a superscription also was written over him in letters of Greek.
And Latin and Hebrew, this is the king of the Jews. And one of the manufacturers which were hanged railed on him, saying, If thou be Christ, save thyself and us. But the other answering rebuked him, saying, Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds. But this man have done nothing amiss. And he said unto Jesus.
Lord, Remember Me when thou comest into thy Kingdom. And Jesus said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, today thou shalt be with me in paradise. And it was about the 6th hour, and there was a darkness over all the earth until the 9th hour, and the sun was darkened in the veil of the temple was rent in the midst. And when Jesus had cried, with a loud voice he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.
And having said thus, he gave up the ghost.
Now with the centurion saw what was done, He glorified God, saying certainly this was a righteous man.
And so we have at least three crosses here that we read about.
We have two men who are in the process of being put to death for being thieves. Tells us in another one of the Gospels that they were thieves. They took something that didn't belong to them. We don't know what it was. It says in the Old Testament that men do not despise a thief if he steal to satisfy his hunger. Apparently it wasn't something that men would not despise. It was something more serious. We don't know whether they were old or whether they were young, whether they were a 20 year old or a 60 year old, whether they had families or.
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Grandchildren, whether they stole a little or a lot.
And if we needed to know all that kind of detail, we'd have it in the Scriptures. But we don't. But the point is, here are two men who went along in their lives. You know, as it says in the Scripture, some men's sins are open beforehand and some they follow after. And I've committed sins. I'm sure that we're worse than what these men committed, as far as I know, if they were only put to death for being thieves and my life was spared, but these men's lives were not.
And little did they know their loved ones know. We don't know if they're wise or their children were there beholding. Maybe the mother of these men was there beholding. And there they were taken out and I suppose the the the spikes put through their hands and their feet and lifted up into a pre dug hole probably. And boom, there they are. And at that point in life, you're pretty well sure it's over.
We've perhaps many of us visited people in the hospital and and some some of the dear friends of mine, Saints of God, and they're just almost happy because they're just awed with the fact that by tomorrow I could be with the Lord. And others have that look of panic and fear in their eyes because they've never passed this way before. They don't know what to expect. And death seems like a long way off when we're young.
But it's the king of terrors and it stalks young and old. Many times I've been to, umm, funerals and especially if I'm asked to speak. And sometimes you don't know the person that well. And you get there and you find the place and you walk a little in the in the graveyard looking to the Lord about what to what to say or and you end up reading the tombstones made it a habit now to read them more diligently. And you see, you do the math died.
And born. And sometimes it's five or six years or seven or eight. No one's promising a young person that they're gonna live to be 20. And if you're 20, nobody's promising you you're gonna see 25 or 30. And so it is. Death is awaits and it's out there. And as the scripture says, it's the king of terrors to someone who does not know their destiny. Well, the destiny awaited these men. And to think of the audacity of them, it says in the other gospel that.
Umm, it, it says that they were being mocked and umm and blasphemed and and umm and sneered upon. One of the translation says, and it says the thieves that were crucified with them cast the same in his in, in his teeth. Can you imagine? I, I would think this is just me thinking. I would think if I was knew I had only a few hours left to live, I would have something else to occupy my thoughts and my mind other than mocking in a derogatory manner somebody else that's right next to me that's going through the same thing.
It's just unbelie. I I've pondered this many, many times. It's unbelievable to me. But that's the heart that I have and that's the heart that you have because our hearts are framed alike.
But the wonderful story that I want to get to is that as time went on, one of the thieves had a change of heart.
They had a tremendous change of heart.
And as you pick up here, where we read in verse, uh.
40 It says of the other the other manufacturer or thief for the children's sake. A malefactor is the opposite of benefactor, right? A benefactor does good or gives good. A malefactor is somebody who who does bad.
But the other answering rebuked him, saying, does not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation, and we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds. Wow.
That man, there's something going on there. There's something going on there. People that work in prisons and work with prisoners are always amazed how there's so many innocent men in prison. How all the men, so many, I shouldn't say all, so many of the men were framed, didn't do it. You know, all the whole excuses. We make excuses when we're little kids, when we're six years old and don't turn in our homework, and we make excuses when we're 60.
And in between.
But this man has a change of heart his.
Says in the in the book of Proverbs. I think it is that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
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And he says to his his, his fellow, his fellow thief, he says, Don't you hear God?
Don't you fear God?
He's starting to wake up and he's starting to fear God. He realizes perhaps that I've got a few hours left and I'm I don't know where.
And then to say, we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds.
Wow, that's that's wisdom taking hold in the in this man or boy's heart as well. To say I deserve this, to say I deserve this.
I can remember like it was yesterday when somebody was asking me in the in the lunchroom about this circumstance and.
My neighbor had given me a book to read.
He was a Christian.
And, uh, I was not. And, uh, he knew I was not. And so he gave me this book to read, hoping that I would become a Christian. And so I thought, OK, I'll be polite and I'll read this book. So I started to read the book one night on a bus heading home from a trip.
And you know it. To use the word convicted me is is almost sounds too trite.
But somehow God used that book to open my eyes for the first time and I was 23 years old.
And I realized something that I had never sunk in before, that I was a Sinner and that I was worthy of death.
And I can remember sitting in the back of that bus, that dark Greyhound bus, and I'm just, and I thought I was a pretty good guy. I mean, I did this and that, but you know, All in all way at all, you know, pretty good guy. I thought not that night, but the jig was over.
And I can remember the bus stop in some place in Nevada is heading back east and and it's the middle of the night and I'm sitting there staring ahead because I'm in state of shock, spiritual and emotional shock.
And I said to myself, you know, if God just was, if God himself walked on this bus and came down the hall on the aisle of this bus and said, Bruce, it's time for you to go. I'd have got out and gone because I felt just like this man did. I felt like I felt I was worthy of death. And I, the Lord let me Stew in that for a while, for a couple 100 miles, I guess. And then I'm looking out the window. And I said, but you know, I'm not dead.
And man, I got all my fingers and toes and and I'm still kind of whole and my mind I still have and my most of my health.
That doesn't compute. That doesn't make sense. I'm not. I should be. I'm just worthy of death.
And so that's where I picture this man.
Here he is, though. He really is going to die. He's got hours or minutes left. I don't know much about crucifixion. There are medical doctors. I've heard talk about it. I think I've heard Brother Pross speak about it and others. I don't understand all the details about how that works. But these guys knew that the jig was up for them. And he's able. This man is able, with his change of heart, say I receive the due reward of our deeds. But then he turns to the middle man on the middle cross next to him.
And says this man hath done nothing amiss. How little did he know? How many people in how many languages would quote his words down through the ages, huh, The centuries? How many times we've heard brothers at the Lord's table, or giving thanks or in prayer quote those words in our language, at least in English? This man hath done nothing amiss. We don't necessarily know what it was.
That impressed him about the man on the middle Cross. We know, and we read in this account how majestically the Lord behaved Himself through all that contradiction of sinners against himself. There were times when He answered.
There were times when he remained silent.
And there were time there was. There was never a time when he was anything other than dignified and gracious and majestic in the moral character of his being.
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And perhaps God had stirred this man's heart, who was starting to awaken to see himself the way God sees him, as a guilty Sinner worthy of death. And now he starts to see that this man is different.
Wonders the majesty. And he was there on the cross too, and he could see and hear all of the blasphemy and the cursing and the spitting and the derision, the sneering by the priests and the soldiers and all this people wagging their tongues as they went by. He was the song of the drunkards, the psalmist tells us, and they that sat in the gates spake against him every his his superscription was written in the in the academic language, in the religious language.
And in his own language.
We're not exactly sure what it was that impressed him.
But he turns to him, and he says, turns to the Lord Jesus.
And he says, Lord, Remember Me.
Will now come us into thy Kingdom.
Well, we all know, naturally speaking, dead men don't enter into kingdoms.
Dead men go into graves.
What was it he saw, and how did he see it? We don't know. Was it? Did he ponder the superscription that he read there? Did he take to heart that all of these envious men were coming up and mockingly calling him a king?
Had he heard in the town that he lived in, somewhere in the land of Israel, that there was this man who claimed to be the king of Israel, who was the son of David, who was going to sit on his his father's throne?
We don't know.
And it probably made no important no difference to him until just a few minutes ago.
Pondering his faith, pondering this majestic man next to him.
And listening to the testimony.
Sometimes when people think they're giving a testimony about one thing, they're really giving a testimony to the exact opposite. Brother was just telling me about a story at at dinner the same the same way.
And perhaps all those people who came up with their directions and saying all those mocking things had the exact opposite effect on this thief. But he turns to him and says, Lord, Remember Me when thou comest into thy Kingdom.
There are a lot of a lot of men and women of faith down through the centuries.
Who it says God or the Lord remembered.
God remembered Noah. He remembered the promises to Abram.
He remembered Hannah.
There's a lot of men and women, and indeed, God always fulfills every promise he makes. Always 100 percent, 100.00%. He always does what he says he's going to do.
And here the thief says, Remember Me will now comest into thy Kingdom.
Now there are 7 as as people speak about it sometimes 7 utterances that the Lord made from the cross. If you count the time where he said to his mother, woman, behold thy son. And he said to John, behold thy mother. If you count that as one, then there are 7 utterances. And you have to flip back and forth between at least three of the gospels to to read them all and to and to try to discern what order they're in. In this gospel we have it looks like.
About four of them referred to at least, and three of them are are are quoted out to us and this might have been the second thing that the Lord spoke or the 3rd.
But I I think about this all the time, because the Lord communicated volumes and volumes in this one sentence to this repentant thief.
Think of all the truth and all the factual spiritual truth and reality that it communicates in one sentence, when he says, Verily I say unto thee, today or this day.
Thou shalt be with me.
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In paradise.
Sometimes we we go to a funeral.
It's just six or seven or eight people sometimes.
Way out in the country.
And a clergyman may come very well meaning and read a bunch of scriptures from John 14 or First Thessalonians or all these different places. And I, I tell you, sometimes it gets me confused and I come away and I'm, I have to kind of get back in my car and get resorted out, you know, which scriptures apply to what. And a lot of people are.
Not clear throughout all of all the believers that are.
Out there in the earth today, and it's a nice thing to get a basic outline of these wonderful truths and realities.
And this verse is wonderful that way it wasn't going to be. He didn't have to wait as to the timing, the Lord said today, today.
He knew he was gonna die that day.
That's pretty obvious.
And the Lord said today.
Thou shalt be with me.
In paradise.
If you knew nothing more than that.
That's a wonderful amount of things to know.
I enjoy that verse that later on that the Apostle Paul uttered in Second Timothy chapter one.
He says Speaking of the Lord Jesus victory on Calvary's cross, he says he abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.
And so it's not as if immortality is a new thing or that life is necessarily a new thing. I thought our, our, our brother took it up very nicely today.
But it's now been brought to light in a clearer way than it was before.
If an Old Testament St. who was born of God, born again, had faith, as Hebrews 11 tells us.
And that with that faith aspired. It says Abraham looked for a city whose builder and maker was gone. And different men and women aspired in different ways with faith.
But as one brother told me, he says it's like seeing the Northern Lights or like, like sometimes went up when a thunderstorm will happen at night and there'll be a a blight bright flash of light and you can kind of see the surrounding countryside. But it's it's not light on for good. But now the light's on for good. And these things that men and women of faith embrace, but they weren't revealed in the way they are now after the cross.
And now it's true that life and immortality are brought to light, brought out to sea plainly by the Gospel.
And so the Lord here, just before the Lord bowed his head, he says these wonderful words to this thief who repented and will speak about repentance at a moment, God willing.
He said today, no wait, no thousand years, no three years, no 40 days, no purgatory, no nothing today.
Thou shalt be with me. The Lord said that he was going to be wherever this place was, He was going to be there too, and He was going to be with him. Doesn't speak about it being a Kingdom or not.
And he says in paradise.
That sounds like a good place. I I haven't looked. Maybe years ago I looked up what that studied that word and I it's been so long I don't remember what the what the word really means in the original language, but it sounds good, doesn't it? Paradise.
Sounds like there's nothing wrong with that. And before that he says with me.
What a message to hear. What a what a mess you talk about a message of hope. What a message to hear when you're at the 11.9 ninth hour and you hear a message like that. Today thou shalt be with me in paradise.
But you say to yourself, you may say, or you may rest the question.
How could the Lord do that? Why would He do that?
And is that fair?
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If, if and. Just reasoning together.
It's this repentant thief was given by the goodness of God was given to repent.
And he was obviously given faith to lay hold of who that man was in some measure on the middle cross.
Because by grace, we read, are you saved through faith and that meaning the faith not of yourselves, It's the gift of God. How is it that that one thief got that gift and the other one didn't?
It doesn't sound fair.
Well, there's nothing fair at all, is there?
About a man who never sinned, bearing the judgment that I deserved or that you deserve.
Is there anything fair about that?
Is there anything fair about a man who lived a perfect life?
Who went through this world blamelessly, inside and out, who knew no sin, who did no sin, and in him was no sin, That he should have to go and bear the judgment for your and my foolishness.
Some of our sins are just repugnant, some of man's sins are are are just notable and horrible, and some of them are just small.
And just the to think that more, you know, just stealing something you don't need, just the small things and the horrible, most horrible thing, the famous sin you can ever and everything in between and on and on and on. So that the stench.
Of man's sin in this world rose up before God, as her brother was saying this morning continually, Is there anything fair about one who had no liability for any of that, that he should come and take it all upon himself?
And pay and buy and discharge that whole load of sin away. There's nothing fair about the gospel about a blameless 1 taking the judgment for a totally blameworthy one, if we want to talk about fair.
And as Paul says, and by the way, who art thou that replies against God?
The old brothers used to put it this way.
That the gospel expresses the love of God and the love of God is so vast and so powerful and so huge. It's so whatever the word, the opposite of exclusive it it goes out to all. And it could be said of the Lord. I stretch forth my hands all the day and no man regarded. It doesn't say God so loved the church, it says God so loved the world.
That he gave his only begotten Son. That's the heart of God.
He's not willing that any should perish. He wants all to come.
And so he gave his Son in love for all. And when you read the gospel verses or the verses that the children memorize when they're young, there's so many of them have that word all and the word whosoever, that's the heart of God. But the reality is, is our brother was saying before the cross, in the lack of fruit that the 1St man could produce for God, that no one would come.
Left to ourselves, and I know most everyone knows this, left to ourselves, there'd be no one here tonight.
Left to ourselves, none of us would have come.
If there's 120 of us here, 150, there have been 150 excuses.
All may none would. What happens then?
God says no, it's not gonna stop. It's not gonna end there. Some shall.
And he sees our backs going down the broad Rd. that leads to destruction.
It's just as difficult.
You. I've loved you before you were even formed in your mother's womb. You're coming with me.
Is is God not free to do that?
I think God is free to do that.
And if God didn't do that, you wouldn't be here as a as a Saint of God, and neither would I.
All may, none would, some shall.
God and sovereign grace reaches out and here, and as the hymn writer put it, the sovereign love arrests that man.
And Paul could say I was apprehended.
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And the profit could say, the Lord could say in the profits I am found of them that sought me not.
And so he says of this thief, you know.
That's that's you know, that's enough for you.
You're good to come.
Today thou shalt be with me in paradise.
We've spoken a lot about the two thieves and not that much about the Lord on the middle cross.
Indeed, the Lord was.
The hope of Israel.
He indeed was the son of David, the one who was destined to sit upon the throne of his father David, it says in the very first chapter of this book of Luke.
More than that, he's destined to be a king of kings, and as the Son of Man, he would be the head over all the nations.
We had before us in the Reading meeting that he's taken his place by redemption as heir of all things.
We read in the pictures in the Old Testament from the earliest chapters of the Bible.
How that Abraham had a son, and to him he gave all that he had.
That's who the middle man was. We read in the very first chapter of Luke's gospel that.
An Angel is sent to Mary.
With this glad tidings, this message, fear not Mary verse 30 of the first chapter of Luke. For thou hast found favor with God, and behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth the Son, and shall call his name Jesus.
He shall be great and shall be called the Son of the Highest, and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David, and he shall reign over the House of Jacob Forever. That hasn't happened yet.
And of his Kingdom there shall be no end. That hasn't happened yet either.
And then verse 35 the Angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall over shadow thee. Therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.
This man on the middle cross is the Son of God.
In a Christian country, we're so used to almost all of us, maybe it's changing now of hearing scriptural terms and names and expressions. Son of God, Holy Spirit, their schools named that way. It almost seems crazy that you know a school with these sacred names playing against another school in some game. But these names are all around us that we can become from the earliest age dull to them.
And I told you about two things that.
Have changed my life on that bus.
There was a third thing.
MMM And the third thing.
Was that Jesus was God?
And it was like.
An explosion went off in my.
Mind and heart that I haven't gotten over yet.
I went to Sunday school every week.
In those days, you had attendance pins and my little his little blue blazer, and I had pins that hung halfway down my chest, which is a testimony to my mother's diligence, not mine. I went to Sunday school, learned the verses, I colored in with my crayons, all of the pictures, and I knew the stories. And as I got older, I went and I sat in the Pew for the real church service and I.
You know, sat there and more or less listened and sang the hymns.
And somehow I made it through 23 years without ever dawning on me.
Any of the reality of what this was all about.
It's astonishing to me now to look back.
And I I I was taught John 316 and other verses.
But somehow it never impressed my dull head.
That God sent his own Son and that the man Christ Jesus is God.
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And I don't know what it was in the book I read, it doesn't matter.
Picked up the book years later and it's you know, I don't, I don't even recommend it to anybody. The the Spirit of God used it with me to teach me something I should have learned.
That is age or younger that Jesus is God.
And so, as I say, I haven't gotten over that yet. I'm sure you haven't either.
And to read verses like in the book of Colossians, that in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead.
Bodily, and to read in John chapter one, that the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, that God was pleased to to present himself in all that he is in a man.
You know when a when a the best artist that ever lived or worked decides I wanna express everything that I feel and think.
And I wanna put that into a.
A painting or a piece of music, they can't do it.
They can make wonderful works of art, but they can't express everything they're feeling and all the breadth of their experience just as one man or one woman. It's impossible, I think, but it's not impossible with God. And when God decides and he says I want to express everything that I am.
And this is God's speaking.
Not a man, but God. All my majesty, my love, my holiness, my righteousness, my wisdom, my compassion, my discernment.
And every virtue that you and I are able to even think about.
And God decided I'm gonna display all of that and I'm gonna do it all perfectly and I'm not gonna leave anything out and I can do that.
And that was that holy thing that was born in Bethlehem's Manger.
Astonishing.
With the Son of God, who was with the Father before the worlds were made, Proverbs 8 teaches us right then I was by him as one brought up with Him from the beginning, before the earth was.
And so in Luke chapter one where we read he didn't become the Son of God in Bethlehem, the Spirit of God wants to impress upon you and me that this one who came, as the hymn writer put it, from Godheads fullest glory down into this world, never lost, never stop being everything that he was by becoming what he became.
And that way of expressing it is not original with me, but I love it. He never ceased to be who he was by becoming who he became. He took became a man. He took manhood.
Holy sinless manhood to his person it became a true man.
But he didn't leave anything behind. Except perhaps you could say that His glory, the display of His excellence here was.
Sales, but nothing left out. God can do that, and God did that.
And the Spirit of God just wanted to confirm, hey.
Son of David.
Son of Man, King of Kings, Lord of Lords, the last Adam, Son of God, always was, still is.
And what a strange what a strange, strange event. We don't know much about those two thieves. We don't know what their life was like, whether they were really old or young. Their lives LED up to this point.
And this point that was, as the hymn writers put at the center of two eternities.
It was in God's mind and in God's heart that his Son would come. In the fullness of time, He would come.
And that everything would come together at that one strange and special tank.
When Satan's power would be unleashed in a way that it really had not been before.
And man would be left unrestrained in a way that was unlike what had been allowed before.
And God's love exposed his Son not only to that, as it's put that great contradiction of sinners against himself.
But also.
To Satan's wrath and fury.
And so the man on that middle cross.
He is the Son of God Himself.
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And we get back to the question of what's fair or what's not fair.
And God in the gospel, you know.
Has gotten. I think someone mentioned this today.
God himself.
Has gained immeasurable glory through the through the sending of his Son, the Lord Jesus could say, then I restored that which I took, not away.
Her father used to come to the little meeting I lived in in May.
And he would always impress that upon us.
And he would when I was young, and he would stand over me, and he would say, Who did the Lord Jesus die for? Oh, he died for me. He died for God.
And he would press upon us and teach us and we haven't forgotten it. I trust that beautiful side of things that God got such great glory to himself by the work of his Son. And all that outrage of, of stench of sin in this world has been addressed more than adequately by the work of this man on the center cross.
In the old, in the Lord, Jesus could say to his Father before he went to the cross, I have glorified thee on the earth.
In the Old Testament, I think it was such that if you stole something, you had to restore it and you had to add the 5th part, right? So if you stole 100, you had to restore 120. And I suppose that's a picture to get us to, to think about these kinds of things. And so the Lord Jesus came and like, like the man, the Hebrew servant, he, he stands forth.
And he's he, he allows his ear to be pierced through with an awl. And he says, I love my master, I love my wife, I love my children. I will not go out free. And his ears pierced through with an awe. And he declares that he's going to serve forever.
In the Lord Jesus by his work on Calvary's cross, which we didn't quite get to here in the account, the Lord Jesus by his work on Calvary's cross laid a foundation where God can now be righteous in justifying the vilest Sinner that believes.
And this is what we learn in the book of Romans, for example, in Romans chapter 3, that he is the propitiation or mercy seat for our sins and that God might. Let's turn there to Romans chapter 3 briefly. Our time is almost up.
In Romans chapter 3.
And verse 25, Speaking of Christ Jesus, whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation or literally a mercy seat through faith in his blood to declare his that's God's righteousness for the remission of sins that are passed through the forbearance of God to declare, I say at this time his. That's God's righteousness, that He might be just in the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.
Absent the work of Christ on Calvary's cross.
And God, I suppose, could have been just. And just like the animals were put in review before Adam, one after another to see what he would call them. But there was they just passed through one after another.
And Samuel came and they went through Jesse's sons one after another, through review. And God could have had a review of every man, woman and child.
And all of sinned and come short of the glory of God.
And he could have been just in just having one Ave. that we all went down and God would have been just but not a savior.
And again, absent the cross of Christ and the work of Christ on Calvary's cross, and people have this notion that God is just nice and too nice to really hold the center accountable for his sin. And he's just going to justify like, like our vision when we're little of our grandfather, just a kindly man who never yells and just everything is nice.
But that would be unrighteous.
And we know from from understanding the gospel that now because of the work of Christ, mercy and truth met together at the cross of Calvary, and righteousness and peace have kissed each other. And because of the work of Christ, God has now, through the work of his Son, laid a foundation where he can bless the vilest Sinner. Repeating myself, but still be just in doing it. It's so beautiful.
00:50:06
There will be a time, I suppose, when Israel has brought, brought black in the brought back into blessing where other nations would say, Israel, the Jews, those people, why are you blessing them?
It's the same principle of grace having been wrought by God on their behalf. Jesus, we're not taking that up tonight, But he died for that nation. He died for them.
If my chums from the neighborhood I grew up in and said you took Bruce Conrad to glory, are you kidding me? Christ died with Bruce Conrad. There's a lot of Bruce Conrads out there I think died for this one.
It's not fair.
In that sense.
What God has found a way where he can be just and justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. That's why the thief on the cross that repented that God is able to justly and righteously bring him into eternal blessing. And it started for him already. We know the day it started because that day the Lord said you'll be with me in paradise and he's been there ever since. He's been there ever since.
When we go back to Loop 23 and finish up a few thoughts, a few more of the versus.
I'm not sure we read about the thief again, anything, he said.
We read in verse 44 and verse 45.
There was darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour. 3 hours of darkness.
When the man in Christ Jesus bore the judgment that a holy and righteous God poured out an unmitigated fashion against sin.
Imported out upon Christ.
The sun was dark, and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst.
I kinda think the thieves were still alive.
That they saw the sun darkened. Perhaps they heard the Lord's cry.
I'm not sure of the exact order.
Eli Eli. Lama Sabachthani.
I think they were still alive and they heard him give that. It says with he made a he cried with a loud voice. I understand in the original language it's just one word. Telestai means either finished or completed or victorious, something like that.
And then last of all, he says, Father, into my hands I commend my spirit. And having said thus, he gave up the ghost. Can you imagine?
Witnessing this.
From how far apart were they? We don't know. Can you imagine witnessing this?
Pondering who this this is The this is the coming king.
He's going into a Kingdom. I'm going to be there with him. The realities of who this man was, the very Son of God, broke upon his soul. Now the sun has peaked across the horizon. It's morning time for him. And then he sees these things and hears these things, and he sees a man.
Address his God and Father, bow his head and die.
It's so touching how it says the Lord says of himself. The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the son of Man had nowhere to lay his head. This is where he finally lays his head.
Just down on his own.
Just.
And the centurion gives a testimony. Surely this was a righteous man, we read in another gospel.
That the soldiers came along at the at the desire.
Of the powers that be that they don't want these dead people hanging on these crosses. You know, it's a holiday you know we don't want. This is unsightly.
And so they want this to be hastened along. So they come, and they break the legs of the first thief, and they break the legs of the 2nd. And I again, I apologize, I don't understand the Physiology of it, but you have to assume that it hastened their death rapidly.
00:55:08
What a cruel, cruel thing to do to just finish off someone's life like that in such a cavalier fashion. And it says when they came to the Lord Jesus, he was dead already.
And so the thief must have seen the Lord expire.
And I'm not sure what he thought, but he could have thought he's going there, to that place.
He's going there and he's there and it's today. I'm going to be with him in a moment.
What a message to hear.
This happened some years ago as everyone knows, and we can't witness these things first hand like this thief did.
But you can have all the blessing and more. This thief he repented repentant literally means to turn around the hang AU turn.
Literally what it means hang AU turn, go another direction to have a complete change of thought. And that's what happened with that thief. He had repentance towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. And the scripture says if thou shalt confess with thy mouth, Jesus is Lord, and believe in thine heart that God has raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
That's what he did.
That's exactly what he did.
But his hands were nailed, his feet were nailed. He never got a chance to walk as a believer. He never got a chance to do a good work. Let him that stole steal no more, but rather let him do that work which is good with his hands. Never got a chance to do that. He had a chance to make a wonderful confession that changed his eternity with his lips. So do you. No one can promise us whether we have a minute or an hour or a day or a year, or however many much time in this life.
But we can tell you when the authority of God's Word, there's some wonderful facts that I can relate to you on his behalf.
And no matter who you are on the authority of this book, I can tell you with assurance that God loves you, that he sent his Son to die for you, and then if you put your trust in Him.
That you're gonna be with him too, for all eternity.
Paul could say absent from the body present with the Lord.
And in another place I'm in a straight betwixt the two.
He so much wanted to be with the Lord, with so much loved the service that he had on his heart for his brethren, he didn't know which to choose. Wasn't really his choice anyway.
And so the Lord lay down his life, a sacrifice for sin.
Lead that righteous foundation that God could bless the wildest Sinner. Won't you? Calm and accept the Lord Jesus as your Savior tonight, if you haven't done so already?
Confess him as Lord. Believe in your heart.
And you're going to be saved and be with Him forever in the Father's house and home of peace and joy. Well, let's just see, time permitting, a minute or two after these last two verses of him #2.
Come for night is gathering quickly over the world's fast, fleeting day. If you linger till the darkness, you will surely miss your way. Verse #3 and four of hymn #2. Someone would restart that for us, please.
01:00:32
Nsnoise.
Umm.
Our God, our Father, we thank thee again for this message of love.
That has reached out to us. We thank Thee, our God, for that.