Greatest Display of God's Holiness？ The Cross — Michael Durham

The Cross as the Supreme Display of God's Holiness

The greatest display of holiness is not the burning bush. The greatest display of holiness is not Isaiah chapter 6. No sir, the greatest display of the holiness of God is a little hill outside the walls of Jerusalem where they took our Lord and pinned Him to a tree.

The Son of God Bears the Absence of God's Presence

And there, there the sun refused to shine. It could not participate in the shameful acts of wicked men as its Creator was being put to death. And there, in one moment, one excruciating, indescribable moment when the Son of God, Jesus Christ, the eternal second person of the Godhead and that man born of the virgin is gripped with the absence of God's presence.

Christ's Substitutionary Death and God's Wrath Against Sin

I remind you why He's there. He's there because of you. He's experiencing the wrath of God, a holy God against your sin. And by His substitutionary death, you can be set free, not only from the condemnation of guilt, but set free from sin.

Deliverance From the Power of Sin

You can be delivered from sin right here, right now. God is a redeemer, a deliverer of His people. He didn't suffer the agonies of a holy and righteous God just to keep you out of hell. Oh no, He's a greater deliverer than that.

Christ Bears All Iniquity for Complete Redemption

He means to deliver you from sin. All of your sin, all of your filthiness, all of your idols, all of your iniquity, He took upon Himself. All of our iniquities was laid upon Him. And look at Him there.

Christ's Invitation to His Church

Look at Him as the Father pours out the cup of holy breath and He drinks it all. So that God now can look at you and come to you and visit you without destroying you and say, come, come away, my beloved, come.

Behold, I stand at the door and knock. Oh, it's not an evangelistic text. It's a text for our church. The church. And I think it's an appropriate text for this hour.

This excerpt was taken from the full sermon, Surprised by Grace, that was preached at Sovereign Grace Community Church's conference in Corpus Christi, Texas. Find the messages on their sermon audio page at sermonaudio .com slash corpuschristians.