Obedience Required (part 2) - [Hebrews 10:1-10]

The Awesome Wonder of Forgiveness and Eternal Salvation

Well, this morning I'd like to ask you this question to start the sermon. What blows your mind? What would you think would be awesome? I think that's a word, of course, we throw around all the time, awesome.

How many times in your life have you been so amazed your mouth just drops and you just stare? And you're thinking, that is just incredible, that is awesome. Those moments, I say, I think, are few and far between.

Of course, when you watch a baby being born, you think, this is just, this is awesome. Maybe the first time you went to the Grand Canyon or Niagara Falls and you think, this is awesome. I remember when I went to the Sea of Galilee for the first time and I thought, a real historical Jesus walked around and by this sea and I just had to pick up a rock and just skip it and I just thought, this is like one of my most spiritual moments ever.

It's awesome to think we're not worshiping some phantom, but a real historical Jesus. Maybe when you got married, you thought, this is awesome. But these moments are few and far between. And of course, at the top of the list for Christians, the most awesome thing is knowing that we're so sinful and we deserve God's judgment, our conscience even bearing witness to that, we get to be forgiven.

Isn't that awesome? No matter what you've done, Christian, you're forgiven because Christ's death is so great. That old song that says, grace greater than all our what? Sins. It is awesome to be forgiven.

And we won't know the half of it until we get to glory and see our risen Savior face to face. But maybe number two in my list of awesomenesses is that God chose sinners before Genesis 1 to save. It's amazing to think of that.

What was God doing before he made the world? Now we know God exists. The Bible says in Psalm 90, before the mountains were brought forth, even from everlasting to everlasting, you are God. God is eternal.

And so even before Genesis 1, 1, I probably can't even use the word before because it's a time word. In eternity, God existed before he created anything. This great God who said to Moses, I am who I am.

I just exist. What's your name? I exist. I am. This God in Revelation 1 who says, I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, the one who is and the one who was and the one who is to come, the Almighty.

This morning we're going to look at, in the book of Hebrews, what was God doing before he made the world? Now of course when Augustine was asked that question, what was God doing before he created the world, Augustine's alleged sarcastic reply was, creating hell for curious souls.

I wouldn't go that far. Robert Ingersoll, the famous atheist of the 19th century said, if God created the universe, there was a time when he commenced to create. Back of that commencement, there must have been an eternity.

In that eternity, what was this God doing? He certainly did not think. There was nothing to think about. He did not remember. Nothing had ever happened. What did he do? Can you imagine anything more absurd than an infinite intelligence, an infinite nothing wasting an eternity?

Well today we're going to look at what the Bible teaches that God was doing. And of course, God is existing as a triune God, one God, three persons with perfect satisfaction within the Trinity, perfect love, perfect contentment.

Please take your Bibles and turn to Hebrews chapter 10 and we're going to ask the question and answer it. What was God doing in eternity past? Was there a plan that he made in eternity past? What was that plan?

And I think as we study it today, you are going to say, that's awesome. It will rank right up there on your awesome list. You will probably say with Paul in Romans chapter 11, oh the depths of the riches, both of the wisdom and knowledge of God, how unsearchable are his judgments and unfathomable his ways.

The Eternal Decree of God and the Glory of the Godhead

The eternal decree of God. And what I like about this topic is, it forces you to study who God is. The focus is on the Godhead. We're thinking about who he is and what he does instead of spiraling down into ourselves.

Remember Luther said we're curved in on ourselves, just naturalistically, naturally narcissistic. The study of the Godhood helps you. Spurgeon said, this study of the Godhead is the highest science, the loftiest speculation, the mightiest philosophy, which can ever engage the attention of a child of God.

There is something exceedingly improving to the mind in a contemplation of the divinity. It is a subject so vast that all our thoughts are lost in its immensity, so deep that our pride is drowned in its infinity.

I like that. And the book of Hebrews starts off from the very beginning, like Genesis chapter 1, without a lot of intro, without a lot of formalities, it's just instantly God. And this God in Hebrews, like the God in Genesis, he exists and he exists for his own pleasure and he exists to be exalted by his creatures.

Jesus in this book of Hebrews is known as the great king, the great savior, the great high priest. He's the mediator and he expects to be worshiped. You say, well, how good is Jesus? He lays out, does not the writer of Hebrews.

Angels are great. You'd probably worship them, but you shouldn't. Jesus is greater. Moses is great. If you met him, you probably be a groupie, but you shouldn't be because Jesus is so much greater. Aaron is great.

The system of the old Testament was great and purple and vestments and incense and gold, but you shouldn't worship that. Jesus is the one with whom you have to do on that day. And he's the one that you will focus on as you live by faith.

Why Jesus Had to Be Born: Animal Sacrifices Were Inadequate

Last week we asked this question. We began to look at Hebrews 10, one to 10. Here was the question. Why was Jesus born? Why did what we call Christmas have to exist? And the answers are found in verses one to 10.

Why was Jesus born? Number one, he had to be born because the sacrifices of animals were inadequate. Verses one through four. Let me just read that. Make a couple of comments in review. He had to be born because sacrifices of animals wouldn't do.

Verse one, for since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make perfect those who draw near.

And we know they didn't work because they kept going. Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered since the worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have any consciousness of sins.

But these sacrifices in these sacrifices, there is a reminder of sins every year, for it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. So remember, God wants obedience of his creatures.

We disobey the ways of sin is death. There's a sacrifice. There'd be no sacrifice needed if there was obedience. If you obeyed, you wouldn't need a substitute, a sacrifice in your place. Sin is so bad against God.

Something has to die. Either you do or the sacrifice in here in anticipation as shadows, as as the silhouette, as this outline in the Old Testament would show us, sacrifices needed to be done, but they are all pointing to the real one and done final sacrifice.

I like verse three when it says there is a reminder of sins every year. That is language only use. Remember when Jesus talks about the Lord's Supper? What is it? What is the Lord's Supper as he's instituting it?

He's with the disciples in the upper room and it's the last Passover, the first Lord's Supper. And he says what? Do this in remembrance of me. The sacrifice was do this in remembrance of your sins. Do this in remembrance of your sins.

These sacrifices meant you remember your sins. Make them very clear in the forefront of your mind. You sin all the time. But now in the new covenant, because of what Jesus did, all those types and shadows pointed over here and now we have the reality and the new covenant is do this in what?

Remembrance of me because the new covenant is he remembers your sins no more. Christ had to be born because the sacrifices were pointers. They didn't ultimately forgive one sin. Number two, we also observed last week.

Why was Jesus born? Sacrifices didn't work. And secondly, he had to be born because only Christ's sacrifice could fulfill God's will. Only his sacrificial life and death could fulfill the will of God.

Verse five of chapter 10. And by the way, if you're here visiting, we're thankful you're here. We just march through the Bible verse by verse. And the main thing about Bible study that's important is that you see it for yourself and you can see the context.

I want you to be able to read this when you go home and say, that's exactly right. When you hear me say something and you go, my pastor is so smart or intellectual or are so this, that or the other, he sees things in the text I could never see.

It's a bad thing. I want you to see that. Now, you might see now he showed me context and he's shown me this, that and the other so I can grasp it, but I want you to know and what you need to know is sinful people need a sacrifice and not just animals, but the ultimate sacrifice, Jesus.

And what did this Jesus do? Verse five. Consequently, when Christ the Messiah came into the world, he said, and I asked the question last week, what'd you say when you came into the world? What did Mr. Crane, young Mr. Crane, one day old yesterday say when he came into the world?

I wasn't there, but I could guess he didn't say this. Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired, but a body you have prepared for me. In burnt offerings and sin offerings, you have taken no pleasure.

Then I said, this is the Messiah talking. He existed in eternity past. He's doing the father's will. He enters into the world, into the time space continuum, if you will. And he said, verse seven, behold, I have come to do your will.

Oh God, as it is written of me in the scroll of the book before Genesis one, the father and the son with the spirit have a plan and that plan could have been eradicate humanity. They deserve it. And justice would have been upheld.

But this plan, because God is a gracious God and a forgiving God and a God who loves to give pardon said to the son, I want you to go obey. Adam didn't obey. Somebody has to obey. And Adam was the representative of all humanity.

He disobeyed Jesus, my son in eternity past. You go rescue the lost people by being the last Adam and perfectly obey. Notice verse five, a body you have prepared for me. Here we have the sinless Jesus.

Think of the Holy Spirit hovering over Mary to make sure that baby Jesus was not tainted by sin. And you have the triune God making sure that this baby Jesus born of a virgin who has to be real man to be a representative for real man and for real women.

He is his maid. This body is made for the Lord. And now with that body, he obeys. No wonder Paul said in Galatians four, but when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son born of a woman born under law to redeem those who were under law so that we might receive adoption as sons.

Jesus was righteous. He didn't have to obey the law to get righteousness. He obeyed the law to give righteousness to us. Now I want to ask you this question. When was this decided that Jesus would get this body?

Was it kind of just this knee jerk thing? And here's plan A. It went south or if then flow charts. This was planned in eternity past that the father would give the son a body and that son would become incarnate and he would live the life on earth and die on the cross for sinners and be raised from the dead.

One thing we know about God and we've learned from scripture is that God decrees things. He plans things. He purposes things. And anybody that talks about a God who winds everything up and just lets it go.

I mean, I guess in my mind, the only person that creates something and he's not in charge of it, that person's name is Dr. Frankenstein. I guess that might work. But the God who creates everything, he's in charge of everything.

And there's a plan and there's a purpose. So much so that when you think of the plan of God, I don't want you to think of plans plural purposes, plural decrees, plural. It's one thought in God's mind for all eternity and existence.

Everything that's ever happened isn't stages, isn't time, isn't success of things. It's just the decree of God, the purpose of God. Ephesians chapter three, including sending Jesus. Nobody's in eternity past forcing God to do it.

This is free. Nobody's saying, God, I don't think you figure this out properly. You need to be a little more educated. There could be a little kind of a problem that might have a bump in the road. No, God is free in his decision and wise.

And God's decree didn't have to happen. He didn't have to do this. He was under no obligation to send his son. Would you send your son, your only son who is perfect to go suffer your wrath for the sins of other people?

Pink said God was alone when he made his decrees and his determinations were influenced by no external cause. He was free to decree or not to decree, to decree one thing and not another. This liberty we must ascribe to him who is supreme, independent, and sovereign in all his doings.

Where is that God these days preached from the pulpit? And this decreeing God decrees from his eternal love, his eternal goodness, his eternal kindness. Turton said that very thing, the triune God does not decree all things in order to increase his goodness, which would be impossible, but in order to communicate to his creatures a share in his goodness.

He's not doing it because we say, oh, he's better now, but so we get to understand this great God who's worthy to be worshipped and exalted. So when you look back to chapter 10, verse 5 through 10 essentially, do you see two times, one in verse 7, one in verse 9, behold, I have come to do your will, O God.

There it is again in verse 9, behold, I have come to do your will. Here's my question. When was that will determined? When was that will decided? When was it told the son, you go do this? And that's what we're going to look at today.

When Jesus said, I have authority to lay down my life, crucifixion, I have authority to raise it up again, resurrection. This commandment I received from my father. Christian, when did he receive that commandment from the father?

When Jesus prayed in John 17, I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do. When did Jesus receive the work from the father? And the answer is in eternity. We call it eternity past, but eternity.

The Eternal Promise Before the Ages Began

Turn your Bibles to Titus chapter one. And let's just think through this for a minute. This passage here in Titus one is the best. It just makes you have an exalted view of God. This passage along with this topic for this sermon makes you take a telescope and look and have it the right side, the right side to your eye.

You know, you take the lens and the big side of the telescope. I don't know what the parts of the telescope are. There's the big side, there's the eyepiece. When you put the eyepiece there, you see how big things are and you see properly when you flip it around the wrong way and you've got that big thing right here.

What do you see then when you look through the telescope the wrong way? What do you see? I'll tell you what I see, my eyelashes, my own self. And this is kind of our life, you know, left to ourselves.

We just focus on ourselves. This kind of contemplation, Spurgeon says, the telescope is switched and you're going to see God for who He is. And you go, that God is worthy of worship. No wonder they're in heaven falling on their faces saying, worthy is the Lamb who was slain.

Titus chapter one, verse one. Paul, a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, for the sake of the faith of God's elect, I'm here to preach the gospel to the elect so they come to faith and their knowledge of the truth.

I'm here in gospel ministry so that the elect here and also the saints begin to grow in sanctification, which accords with godliness, holy living, and also for glorification in hope of eternal life. Hey, Paul, what's your ministry?

Justification, sanctification, and glorification. He doesn't personally do it, but he talks about the one who does. He talks about the one who justifies, the elect come to faith, talks about the one who sanctifies, they become godly, and about the one who glorifies.

That's why I'm in gospel ministry. But look at the comma, which God who never lies promised before the ages began. They just kind of just stop and let that sink in for a second. The God who never lies.

By the way, Paul is writing to Titus who is on the island of Crete. And Crete, guess what's on Crete? Guess who's on Crete? Go ahead and say it. Well, Cretans. Yes, I know that. There are lazy gluttons there, there are evil beasts, and there's who else?

Liars. That's an island full of liars. You know, you've got survivor and the idol's island, what do they call it? This is liar's island. Everybody there's lying. By the way, when we went to Crete years ago with the church and some of us, Lucille and others, we went and so we're walking around in Crete and the people in Athens said, be careful of the Cretans because they're not very good.

And I said, they're like lazy gluttons there and evil beasts and liars? They're like, yes. I go, some things never change. I'm not really a Starbucks fan, but I wanted to get the Starbucks mug that said Crete just to set on my desk as a statement.

Everything about the Cretans, it was lies, lies, lies, even with pagan mythology. How does Zeus get the woman? By lying so he can sleep with her. Even the Cretans lied and said Zeus's tomb is on our island, which is also a lie.

What's the text say? This is the unlying God. This is Hebrews chapter six. It's impossible for God to lie. Paul says, I'm in gospel ministry. I want the faith of the elect to come to true fruition. I want people to learn and grow in godliness.

I want them to be glorified. And this is a promise from God who never lies. But here's the part I want to focus on. Promised before the ages began. Does the text say promised to angels, promised to people, promised to Abraham, promised to anybody?

What does the text say? The text says he promised. To whom did he make the promise? Eternity past, there's no one there except the one God subsisting in three persons, the father, the son, and the spirit.

And within the triune God in eternity past, there was a promise made. He promised. He determined in eternity past to go rescue sinners. To whom did God make the promise? The father to the son. I just start thinking about this for a second.

Wait a second. Before the world began, if you're a Christian, the father said to the son, I want you to go rescue him. You just put your name right in there. You go rescue Mike Abendroth along with all these other people.

I didn't have to decree it. He didn't deserve it. But I'm so gracious. I'm so good. I'm so forgiving that I'm going to go rescue this man. And it's going to display to people that I'm a great God. The plan is great.

The execution is great. The application is great. Everything about this is great because the greatness is not found in that Mr. Abendroth. That's for certain. Before time begins, there's a plan to go rescue individual sinners called the elect.

This is called the covenant of redemption. This is called the pactum salutis. This is called the covenant of life. I don't care what you call it. I call it awesome. That's what I call it. Without this, there's no salvation.

Without this, there's no heaven. Without this, there's no forgiveness. Here's how Martyn Lloyd-Jones described it. There was a great eternal counsel between the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. Do we realize, I'll turn it to you, do you realize that your salvation was planned before the world was created?

It is the realization of this fact that makes a man stand on tiptoe and shout out praise to God, chosen before the foundation of the world. Lloyd-Jones, the three persons met in a conference. I speak with reverence in terms of Scripture and planned it.

Let us get rid forever of the idea that salvation was an afterthought in the mind of God. It was not a thought that came to God after a man had fallen into sin. It was planned before the foundation of the world.

The work of Jesus, the cross, His life, the incarnation, the virgin birth, it's all planned, all determined. It had to happen because God doesn't make accidents. God doesn't perform things randomly. Turn, please, with me, if you would, to Ephesians 1, and you'll see the same kind of language.

Remember, we're in the book of Hebrews, and the Lord Jesus says, I come to do your will. When was that will given? When were those instructions for obedience given? God requires obedience, and now the Son will go obey where all the sons of Adam disobeyed.

Ephesians 1, I know you know the verse, but could you read it enough? We learned that Pastor John here lives in Beloit, Ohio, and he lives by the road called Damascus, right? Something close. That's a road to Damascus.

Okay, don't all the roads lead to Damascus. This, by the way, was written not a year after Damascus Road experience where Paul got saved, not five years, not 10 years, not 20, but probably 25 years later.

Do you know when you're a new Christian, you're all fired up? God is so great. You're running around evangelizing everybody, and you're like, okay, slow down, peppy, you know? And we older people try to do that.

Why do we do that? It's great to be around these new Christians, and they just can't stop saying, listen, I deserve to go to hell. I get to go to heaven. Why? How? I didn't do it. I didn't merit it. I didn't even look for it.

I wasn't seeking it. God just said, you're mine. And He arrests us in the middle of our sin. And Paul never got over it. And here's Paul 25 years later. Did Paul get over his salvation? Blessed be the God and Father, verse 3, of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.

And at the top of the list, what does Paul praise God for? Before he praises God for redemption through the Son, before he praises God through sealing through the Spirit, here's the number one thing Paul praises the triune God for.

Verse 4. By the way, you tell me I don't believe in predestination. Yes, you do. It's just what your definition is. Verse 4, even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, not because we are holy.

He doesn't pick based on what we are because He picks for free grace, but that we should be holy and blameless before Him. Predestination is so unloving, Pastor. In love, He predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ according to the purpose of His will.

Who ties in praising God to sovereign election? Paul does. You should. Praising God that He would choose you and He knew all about you. I tell the story all the time. It's, I know you probably hear it too often, but in my mind I'm thinking, okay, I asked Him on May 6th to marry me in 1989 and we got married on June 6th.

You're like, why did you do that? And I tell people regularly because if she ever found out who I really was, she might say no. So let's get this thing done. I know she's a man or a woman of her word.

She's not going to back out once we say I do. Let's run to the altar. Come on. Promise is kept. Worked. The Lord knew though everything about me that I would ever do with all my sins. I hadn't committed them yet, but He knew it and eternity passed.

He said, you know what? I'm choosing you anyway that you would be holy. I'm choosing you anyway that you would be blameless. And in love, I'm going to predestine you. I'm going to pick you. There's a bunch of apples here and I just pick the ones I want.

They're all rotten essentially, but I'm just going to pick these out and they're going to be mine. And I'm going to send my son to go die for them, rescue them and make them into what he is by union with Christ, by giving them his righteousness imputed.

And they're going to look just like him in the sense of the legal standing. And then he on that great day of judgment is going to hand them back to me. Perfectly. The perfect bride. That's why when it comes to all this and people are like, I just pastor need four more ways to get through a work week.

No, you don't. Because you've already broken all the other work week laws. Why should I give you four more to break this week? I already broke them too. I need to know who God is. Remember what that lady said to John Newton, the author of Amazing Grace?

She said, Dr. Newton, I know God would have to choose me before I was born because He would never choose me afterwards. Isn't that true for every one of us? Everyone who's laughing, you're Stan convicted.

So do I. Before the foundation of the world, it has to be free. Well, what about my free will? I'm not talking about you right now. I'm talking about God. He's got free will, does he not? And he freely said, you're mine.

Charlie Crane, you're mine. Jim Crusoe, you're mine. Carol Rathbun, you're mine. And son, I just can't accept them into my heaven because they're sinful and I'm holy. So what I want you to do, they're the lawbreakers.

You go law keep for them in obedience. And the positive sanctions of the law, you go keep for them. And the penalty for law breaking, you go pay for them. And when you go do that, since you're sinless and you have had that great exchange, then I'll raise you from the dead.

And then I'll start having the Holy Spirit apply that work to people in time. And so we have this eternity past. It's planned. At the cross, it's in Christ's life, cross, it's accomplished resurrection.

And then in time, the Holy Spirit begins to make people alive. And Paul says, I praise God for that. Nobody praises God like this when they think, you know what? I chose God. I did the work. I took the first step.

God helps those who help themselves. Whatever God's given you, you do what you can with it and then God will do the rest. This is full bore. God only gets the praise. As my brother would say, you're not going to get to heaven and fist bump God and say, we did it.

And this is not really that awesome unless we know how sinful we really are. But deep down, don't we know? It's like empirically true. I couldn't empirically prove this, but I probably could empirically prove that we're sinful people.

You say, well, that's just one or two verses here or there. Second Timothy chapter one, he called us with the holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was granted in Christ Jesus from all eternity.

How about Revelation 13? And all who dwell on earth will worship him. Everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life of the lamb who has been slain. There is a book.

You say, well, I think God looks down the corridors of time. He sees that I believe in Jesus and pick me. You like that? I call that wormhole theology. Some kind of wormhole thing that he... Here's what God sees when he looks down the corridor of time.

People dead in sins and trespasses, people blinded by Satan, the God of the age ruling them, and they can't do anything. Plus, if God looked down the corridor of time and saw that you did something, that he would be learning something in eternity past, that can't work either.

This is all so God can be extolled and God could be the one who's praised. And dear friends, what God determined to do in eternity past, can you lose in time? Well, I'm really struggling with anxiety or I'm really struggling with this, that or the other.

I'm not loving my wife like I should. I'm not submitting to my husband as I should. I'm not doing this that I should. I'm not doing this, that and the other. I know Christian sin. But what do you do when your child sins?

Kick them out of the family? Especially when that determination in eternity past has been to, I'm going to rescue them and redeem them and sanctify them and glorify them. Can you undo in time what God has decreed in eternity past?

The answer is obvious. Jesus had to obey. He needed a body to obey. And the father said, you go seek and save the lost. Yes, father. You go give your life a ransom for many. Yes, father. You go keep the law.

Yes, father. You go reconcile people. Yes, father. You go redeem people out of the slave pit of sin. Yes, father. And every time we should have been the one saying, yes, father, we will obey. We'll love you.

We'll love our neighbor. We couldn't, but the Lord son did. Swiss theologian Heidegger said the covenant of God, the father with the son is a mutual agreement by which God, the father exacted from the son perfect obedience to the law unto death, which he must face on behalf of his chosen seed to be given him and promised him.

If he gave the obedience, the seed in question as his own prerequisite and inheritance. And in his return, the son in promising this obedience to God, the father and producing in the literal act demanded of him in turn, the right to demand the seed for himself as an inheritance.

The father gives it work for the son to do, and he does it. When was that work decided? Turn to John chapter three, please. Let's continue to answer that question. I know we're skipping around here or there, but it's important for you to understand that God is eternal.

His plans are eternal and they're worked out in time. And once you start to think about this, I think you're going to say, this is incredible. This is wonderful. Why don't people tell me about this all the time?

You say, that's controversial. Oh, it in fact could be. But here's what I say to people who say, well, pastor, I don't think you should be talking about this on Sunday morning. This should be for home group.

If you're going to split up the church, do it at Pradeep's home group, split up his church, his little home group rather. Sorry, it's not a church. Do it there. This can't be for everybody. This is Paul and Ephesians to a bunch of farmers and aggregarian folks.

Who aren't really, I mean, they're smart, but they're not intelligentsia academia. He just wants them to know. Did the Holy Spirit mess up by putting this in here? God, keep that stuff, that eternal decree stuff to yourself.

It just causes problems. No, it doesn't cause problems if you'll submit to it. It causes praise. Show me somebody who looks at all the promises of God about all the eternity past and still says, well, whosoever and I've got free will, I want to help them and work with them and help them mature.

But God's on first. To use the language, it's God who's the one who's God, the Godness of God. Where is the Godness of God from the pulpits these days? Oh, God's my buddy. God's my friend. He's my little toy.

He does what I say. Now, here's what we're gonna do with John. Did I say John chapter three? All right, John chapter three. I want you to follow with me and see if you see a theme. What's the theme? John 3 .17.

For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Verse 34, please. What's the theme? For he whom God has sent utters the words of God, for he gives the spirit without measure.

John 6 .29. You already see the theme and it's a recurrent word. John 6 .29. Jesus answered them, this is the work of God that you believe in him whom he has what? Sent. The theme is he sent. When did the father send the son?

That's the question. Jesus kept saying over and over and over. The father sent me. The father sent me. The father sent me. When did he decide to send the father? That's the question. And of course, the answer is in eternity past.

6 .38. For I've come down from heaven not to do my own will because obedience, by the way, has to be fulfilled. Adam failed. We need to obey. The will of him who sent me. Obey the father. Do this and live.

Love God, love neighbor. And this is the will of him who sent me that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on that last day. I'm going to live for every one of those who elect, die for every one of those, and every one of those that the father has given.

And by the way, he didn't give all and he didn't give none, but these sum that the father has given, the son dies for those sum, lives for those sum, the Spirit of God raised for those sum. 6 .57. As the father sent me and I live because of the father, so whoever feeds on me, he will also live because of me.