Lars Larson Live Stream

First Baptist Church Leominster iconFirst Baptist Church Leominster

2 views

0 comments

00:04
♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪
00:47
Here's to John 12 once again. We're slowing down a little bit as we're working through this because it's so wonderfully rich.
01:15
But we're in no hurry. This is the third occasion that we're considering this passage of John 12, 20 -36.
01:24
Here, of course, our Lord declared, The hour has come that the Son of Man should be glorified.
01:32
That's in verse 23. Jesus made this statement in response to two of his disciples, two brothers,
01:39
Philip and Andrew, telling him that there were certain Greeks and there were certain Gentiles who wished to see him.
01:48
And so their desire and request signaled to Jesus that, indeed, his hour had arrived for him to be lifted up.
01:55
And in John's Gospel, this idea of Jesus being lifted up carries the idea of him being exalted, but by means of the cross, being lifted up on his cross, and then to be raised from the dead and enthroned as king over the inaugurated promised kingdom of God.
02:12
And so his exaltation, his glorification, as the Lord over all the world would result in him having the ability to draw all people, all kinds of people from all over the world onto himself, including
02:27
Jews and Gentiles. And so the fact these Greeks wished to see him necessitated, he saw, the need for him to be exalted.
02:38
And later in this passage, verse 32, we read Jesus saying, If I am lifted up from the earth, and he's talking specifically about his cross, if I am lifted up from the earth,
02:49
I will draw all peoples. And what is meant there is all kinds of people, Gentiles too.
02:57
I'll draw all people to myself. Let's read the passage again, John 12, 20 through 36.
03:05
Now there were certain Greeks among those who came up to worship at the feast. And then they came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida of Galilee, and asked him, saying,
03:14
Sir, we wish to see Jesus. Philip came and told Andrew, and in turn
03:20
Andrew and Philip told Jesus. But Jesus answered them, saying,
03:25
The hour has come that the Son of Man should be glorified. Most assuredly
03:30
I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone. But if it dies, it produces much grain.
03:40
He who loves his life will lose it. He who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.
03:47
If anyone serves me, let him follow me. And where I am, there my servant will be also.
03:54
If anyone serves me, him my Father will honor. Now my soul is troubled, and what shall
04:02
I say? Father, save me from this hour. But for this purpose
04:08
I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name. And then a voice came from heaven, saying,
04:15
I have both glorified it and will glorify it again. And therefore the people who stood by and heard it said that it had thundered.
04:25
Others said, An angel has spoken to him. Jesus answered and said,
04:31
This voice did not come because of me, but for your sake. Now is the judgment of this world.
04:37
Now the ruler of this world will be cast out. And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to myself.
04:48
This he said, signifying by what death he would die. The people answered him,
04:54
We have heard from the law that the Christ remains forever. How can you say the
04:59
Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man? And Jesus said to them,
05:06
A little while longer the light is with you. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you.
05:12
He who walks in darkness does not know where he is going. While you have the light, believe in the light that you may become sons of light.
05:23
These things Jesus spoke and departed and was hidden from them. The outline that we have been using for the last few weeks is set before you in your notes.
05:34
There are five divisions. We've addressed the first two almost. All right.
05:40
Of this outline, here's the outline again. We have in verses 20 and 21, the desire and request of the
05:46
Greeks. Two. Jesus speaks of the necessity of his cross in order to inaugurate and advance his kingdom.
05:54
And then thirdly, Jesus' appeal for help from his father to endure his cross.
06:01
Fourthly, the father purpose to glorify Jesus before the people through his cross.
06:07
And then fifth, Jesus exhorts those Jews who heard him to believe that which they had been taught and had witnessed regarding him.
06:15
And so, again, last week we began to address this second point more fully.
06:22
And today we want to begin by, again, looking at this second matter.
06:29
Jesus speaks of the necessity of his cross in order to inaugurate and advance the kingdom. Now, last
06:36
Lord's Day, we were considering the words of our Lord Jesus when he spoke of the necessity of dying upon his cross in order to inaugurate and advance his kingdom.
06:47
Before we move on, however, I'd like us to consider more precisely the instruction that our
06:54
Lord gave his disciples when he announced to them that he was about to die. And so, verse 26.
06:59
And read it carefully, please. If anyone serves me, let him follow me. And where I am, there my servant will be also.
07:08
If anyone serves me, him my father will honor. And we began to address this somewhat last week.
07:15
What it is to be a servant of Jesus Christ. The true Christian, that is the true disciple, is literally a slave of Jesus Christ.
07:24
And that's what servant means. The Christian lives to serve his master, Jesus Christ.
07:31
Jesus is the master. The Christian is the servant, the slave. Of course, his occupation as a slave is a voluntary one.
07:39
It's his delight. He takes great pleasure and receives great blessing in being a servant, a slave of Jesus Christ.
07:47
And so the true Christian desires foremost that he serves his master faithfully. The Lord put it in our hearts.
07:54
That's our desire. But in the light of this passage, specifically, how is that service to be performed by the
08:04
Christian? Jesus declared, if anyone serves me, let him follow me.
08:11
We serve Jesus Christ by following him. What does this suggest to us?
08:17
Well, following Jesus suggests following him in the course that he's traveled before us. He's gone ahead and we're following him.
08:26
In doing so, we're to conform our way of thinking to his way of thinking. And we're to act and react to what we face as he has acted and reacted to what he encountered and overcame.
08:37
That's what we're to do in following him as his slaves, as his servants.
08:44
And so to follow Jesus is to observe and consider how he lived, regarding him and his ways as our pattern or as our example to live in the same way.
08:55
But again, specifically, how do we follow him as set forth here in this context?
09:02
And so let's consider this. We read that although Jesus, and we would qualify this in his human nature, he of course is a divine person with a divine nature and a human nature, two natures in one person.
09:18
In his human nature, he desired that he would escape his suffering and death. He denied himself, however, this desire, purposing rather to glorify his father through what he encountered and endured.
09:31
Rather than serving himself first and foremost, he served his father. How is this translated into our lives as his servants, as his followers?
09:43
We too face tribulation in our life as he was about to do so. We have sickness and weakness of body.
09:51
We have difficulty and disappointments due to events that transpire in our lives. We have heartache and hardship in our relationships.
09:59
None of us are immune, is immune to difficulties, tribulation.
10:06
And we naturally want to escape these troubles. They're ever before us.
10:12
We wish to be healed of our infirmities. We desire our sufferings to end. And so we are, as the
10:19
Lord Jesus first requested, we ask our father to remove what is burdening us or causing us pain or threatens our well -being.
10:29
But if we're following our Lord Jesus rightly, we are to subordinate these desires, these personal desires, to the greater goal and desire of glorifying him in whatever we are experiencing.
10:43
And in this way, we are following Jesus as set forth in this passage. And so we are to pray,
10:50
Father, yes, I desire and ask that you bring an end to my trial. Jesus asked his father, you know, do
10:55
I have to go through this? Do I have to go to the cross? But more importantly, we pray, may you enable me to glorify you through this trial that you've called me to face and endure.
11:09
And so our natural human reaction and response, I want this to end.
11:16
And we pray to that end. And oftentimes that's right at the top of the list because it's pressing upon us.
11:23
This was pressing upon Jesus, obviously. But then he subordinated this human desire in order, he desired to glorify
11:32
God most through what he was about ready to encounter. And what
11:37
I'm advocating, what we're advocating today, what this teaches us is that although it's perfectly right and we ought to pray, and thankfully
11:45
God does answer our prayers and bringing healing to us, bringing relief to us from our afflictions, rather than desiring primarily to escape these things, be relieved of these things, our primary desire is that we glorify
12:01
God through these things. And therefore, if that means an ongoing enduring of it, so be it,
12:08
Lord. We'll go through it. This is Jesus' purpose. Nevertheless, I'll go through it.
12:14
May you be glorified in this. And so this is what it is in this context to follow him.
12:21
But again, sadly, we do not naturally think as our Lord instructs us to do. We wrongly think that it's not normal for us to experience difficult health issues, troubles in relationships, trials and troubles of every sort.
12:35
And when we do experience those things, and we all do at different times and different degrees, we assume that it's the
12:42
Lord's will to relieve us of that difficulty, to bring healing to us of our infirmities and to resolve our difficulties quickly on every occasion.
12:52
And we wrongly think that if we're living in a manner that's pleasing God and we're praying rightly unto him, that he will fix our problems sooner or later.
13:00
And so we ask our Heavenly Father, as did the Lord Jesus, Father, may you remove this cup from me.
13:07
But again, if we're following Jesus rightly, we would append our request with this word of acquiescence.
13:13
Nevertheless, Father, not my will, but thine be done. Father, if you can glorify yourself through my enduring this hardship, then so be it.
13:21
If this is possible for me to do so, then I do not ask foremost that you remove me from my tribulation, but I ask that you give me the grace to endure it and thereby glorify you through it.
13:35
That's what the Lord Jesus is telling his disciples here, his servants, his slaves.
13:41
Follow me. And specifically, we're following him as he was dealing with his cross that was just before him.
13:50
And one of the reasons we fail to respond initially in this way to our trials is because we falsely assume it's
13:56
God's will for us to live trouble -free with little difficulty or heartache. And the whole health and wealth gospel is this idea, is that God wants you to be free of pain.
14:08
God wants you to be healthy. God wants you to have all these wonderful relationships with your family and among friends.
14:17
And everything is supposed to be going very smoothly for you. But that's not how
14:23
God works within this fallen world. That's not what the Lord Jesus experienced.
14:28
And if you're walking with him in faith and fellowship, that's not what you're going to experience. Because in actuality, tribulation is the normal for Christian in any one of its forms.
14:42
The absence of tribulation in your life is abnormal and temporary.
14:50
Tribulation's coming, you can be assured of that in one form or another. And so let's underscore the fact that disciples, that is true
14:59
Christians, are destined for tribulation in this world. It's clear from the scriptures that the abnormal life of the
15:06
Christian is to live with little or no tribulation. Our Lord himself declared to his disciples, these things
15:13
I've spoken to you that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. That is the nature of the
15:19
Christian life. One of trouble, but be of good cheer.
15:26
I have overcome the world. It's the normal course of life for Christ's disciples to have tribulation.
15:34
One of the first words of instruction the Apostle Paul gave to new churches, this is after he got stoned.
15:40
He came in, started a church, and then they drug him out and stoned him, left him for dead. Well, he had to come back and tell these new
15:47
Christians. You can imagine their puzzlement, their disillusionment. This guy's a god, look what happened to him.
15:53
He died, you know, he was stoned out there, left for dead. And Paul came back and returned to Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch, strengthening the souls of these brand new
16:05
Christians. Exhorting them to continue in the faith, saying, we must through many tribulations enter the kingdom of God.
16:13
That is the nature of the Christian life, tribulations. And the
16:19
Apostle Peter wrote, perhaps in 1 Peter he was writing to new Christians, maybe about ready to be baptized, something.
16:27
Beloved, do not think it strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened to you.
16:35
Again, it's strange if something doesn't happen to you. Don't think it's strange when it does, because that's the way it is.
16:43
But rather rejoice to the extent that you partake of Christ's sufferings, that when his glory is revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy.
16:52
If you reproach for the name of Christ, blessed are you, for the spirit of glory and of God rests upon you.
16:58
On their part he's blaspheming, but on your part he is glorified. They're the idea of being glorified even in the tribulation, in the difficulty.
17:09
And so God has not promised that we will escape tribulation. He has not even promised that we'll be delivered from tribulation in this life.
17:18
But rather he's promised us that he will save us through many tribulations.
17:25
This is the course that our Lord took, and it's the course that we will take if we're following him.
17:31
His path to glorification was through his cross, and so the path of our glorification is through the crosses that we bear in following him.
17:41
Paul expressed it this way in Romans 8. The spirit himself bears witness with our spirit, we're the children of God, and if children then heirs, heirs of God, join heirs with Christ.
17:51
If indeed we suffer with him, that we may also be glorified together. And then
17:57
Paul says, I regard the suffering to this present time not even worthy to be compared with the glory that's going to one day be bestowed upon us or revealed in us.
18:07
And so if we see this truth rightly and clearly, then when we encounter tribulation, particularly when it's heaped upon us by unjust unbelievers, we'll rejoice in what we encounter.
18:19
And this is what Peter himself expressed along with the other apostles in the book of Acts. They were all beaten.
18:28
When they had called for the apostles, this was the Jewish leaders, and beaten them, they commanded that they should not speak in the name of Jesus and let them go.
18:36
So they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were accounted worthy to suffer shame for his name.
18:43
And daily in the temple and in every house they did not cease teaching and preaching Jesus as the Christ. They glorified
18:49
God in and through their persecutions, in and through their tribulations. And that's what we're to do.
18:56
And when the Lord enables you to do so, you're going to find yourself also glorying in Jesus Christ, rejoicing in that, even as it might be a very, very difficult thing that you're going through.
19:09
They were companions in tribulation. As they stood forward and testified of Jesus Christ the Lord, they suffered public shame for doing so.
19:17
But rejoiced that the Lord had counted them worthy to experience this great blessing of being beaten and abused for him.
19:26
Incredible. And of course, that shows you to be quite different than the world, right?
19:35
In fact, it's a wonderful testimony that you're a Christian. When somebody can look at you, look at the misery that person is going through, getting beat down, and it's been unrelenting.
19:46
And yet he or she still rejoices in Christ. There must be something to this. And of course, that was a testimony of the early
19:54
Christians in the Roman era of persecution, wasn't it? There were many people converted who went to the games to see
20:01
Christians slaughtered by animals and through cruelty.
20:07
And they concluded what they believed must be true, for who would go through this if it weren't true?
20:14
And that's the kind of witness you and I can bear to the world too. Is that in the midst of and in spite of what we're enduring, we're rejoicing in Jesus Christ.
20:24
And that's what it is to follow him. We're attempting to glorify God in our tribulation.
20:31
We bring most glory to God through our tribulations, not from being delivered from them.
20:36
Although one day we will be delivered from them all. And so this enduring in faith through tribulation, not deliverance from tribulation, is one of the major lessons, we would argue, of the last book of the revelation of Jesus Christ.
20:50
John wrote of himself while in exile for his witness of Jesus Christ. I, John, both your brother and companion in the tribulation, is what
21:01
John wrote. By the way, I might just interject this at this time.
21:06
Our dispensational friends argue the church is not going to experience the tribulation, a future seven -year tribulation, they argue, that's going to come right before the second coming of Christ.
21:17
So we're going to escape that. God doesn't want us to encounter tribulation. But the book of Revelation speaks that the entire church age is one of tribulation.
21:29
He saves us through tribulations, not from it. What John was experiencing was not unique to him.
21:36
He was on an island. You can see it from the shore of Turkey, looking out across the sea, the island of Patmos, just off the shore of Ephesus on a clear day.
21:47
But even though John was in Patmos, probably him alone, what he was experiencing was not unique.
21:54
The Christians in the seven churches of Asia Minor to whom he was writing were also experiencing tribulation of a different form, maybe.
22:01
John described himself as a companion with them in tribulation. It is our lot as Christians.
22:08
It is what our Lord faced and overcame, and as his followers we are to face and overcome our tribulations as well.
22:16
Not to escape them, but to endure them with a strong testimony of your faith in Christ.
22:25
And we can take the step further. We often speak of our present citizenship in the realized kingdom of our
22:31
Lord Jesus Christ. We are presently reigning with Christ. Now this is an important principle that few people understand.
22:41
We are reigning with Christ presently in this church age. And that is what it means when Paul says, as Christians we are seated with Christ in heavenly places.
22:49
He is on the throne, and we are seated with him in heavenly places. We are reigning presently with Christ.
22:55
But how is our reign best seen in this life, in this world, fallen world within Christ's kingdom?
23:02
Greg Beal, who was our Bolton Conference speaker a couple of weeks ago, wrote in his wonderful commentary on Revelation in verse 9,
23:10
John identifies himself with his readers and with Jesus as one who reigns in the initial form of the kingdom by persevering through tribulation.
23:21
Do you see what he is saying there? How do you and I reign in the kingdom of God in this current world?
23:28
It is through persevering in our faith through tribulation. That is what it is to reign with Christ.
23:35
And then he explained it more fully. John and his community are people who even now reign together in Jesus' kingdom.
23:43
But this is a kingdom unanticipated by the majority of Jews. The exercise of rule in this kingdom begins and continues only as one faithfully endures tribulation.
23:55
This is a formula for kingship. Faithful endurance through tribulation is the means by which one reigns in the present with Jesus.
24:04
Believers are not mere subjects in Christ's kingdom. Fellow partaker underscores the active involvement of saints not only enduring tribulation, but also reigning in the midst of tribulation.
24:16
Such kingship will be intensified at death and consummated at Jesus' final parousia.
24:22
That is the Greek word for second coming appearance. This ironic exercise of rule is modeled on that of Christ, who revealed his veiled kingship on earth before his exaltation by enduring suffering and death in order to achieve his heavenly rule.
24:38
Again, in John's gospel, remember, being glorified was being lifted up on the cross. And God is glorifying you as you are enduring in faith in your tribulations.
24:51
The way of the world is we have to escape tribulation. Get it over with. God delivered me from it.
24:57
And we're missing out entirely on actually what God is doing in our lives. Just as Christ ruled in a veiled way through suffering, so do
25:07
Christians, which argues further against the proposal that saints do not exercise kingship until the final coming of Christ, when they're exalted over their enemies.
25:17
No, we're reigning now. And the way that reign is seen is that we believe on Jesus regardless of what we are encountering and facing in life.
25:27
Tell you what, I reflect over our people, and I could give you a list of people that suffer a great deal.
25:36
And yet they are very devout, sincere believers in Jesus Christ. They're glorifying
25:42
God a whole lot more than some sports star pulling down $20 million a year, you know, and lifts his finger to heaven when he hits a home run.
25:52
It's the person that's believing on Jesus in spite of what they are experiencing in life that brings great glory to Christ.
26:02
I forget her name now, but we had a young lady out in Sacramento. She had rheumatoid arthritis when she was from four years of age.
26:11
She was crippled over. She could hardly walk. And she just wanted to grow up and have a family and whatnot.
26:18
But she just was ravaged with pain. And through her teenage years she was taken to all kinds of Pentecostal meetings, being promised that she'd be healed of her disease if she had enough faith.
26:29
Of course, she never had enough faith. They would argue she was never healed. And then she learned that's not the way of the
26:36
Christian life. She had just a wonderful testimony and sweet spirit. And then she contracted lupus, which is like an arthritis of the soft tissue it's been described.
26:46
This woman suffered. Then she finally died probably in about her middle thirties. But I've never seen such a beautiful testimony of glorified
26:57
God in her tribulation. And that's what we're talking about here.
27:04
It's not to escape our trouble and difficulty, but it's to persevere in faith, bringing glory to God through that thing, whatever it is that God has called you to face.
27:15
And so it's human, it's natural to want to escape. Jesus wanted to escape. That wasn't sinful.
27:22
It's part of being human. But he relegated that subordinate to bringing glory to his
27:28
Father through it. And that's what it is to follow Jesus closely and in fellowship with him.
27:38
And so this is what Jesus declared in John 12, 26, when he said, If anyone serves me, let him follow me.
27:44
And where I am, my servant will be also. If anyone serves me, him my Father will honor.
27:51
And so we are to follow Jesus by desiring and seeking first and foremost to glorify God in what we suffer, rather than principally to seek first and foremost to escape our suffering.
28:04
That's the way the world thinks. And this is very important for us to understand, for there is great ignorance and error among Christians regarding the nature of our present reign in the kingdom of our
28:15
Lord Jesus Christ. Most Christians think that they're only reigning when they're delivered from suffering, when the
28:22
Lord brings our tribulation to an end, when he heals us of our difficulties and sickness.
28:30
And so they might say to themselves, I must not be right before God. It would not seem that I'm reigning with Christ, seeing that I have this continual unrelenting issue and problem.
28:39
In other words, tribulation. But in reality, you're reigning with Christ because you are sustained by God's power in your faith, in spite of what you're going through.
28:52
Now this is Christianity ABC, but it's something that would seem that not a whole lot of people see.
29:01
The Christian in this age is reigning by persevering in the midst of their tribulations in this life, not in the escape or deliverance from them.
29:09
That will take place one day, thankfully. Again, in Revelation 1 -9,
29:21
John wrote of his camaraderie with the Christian brethren in their tribulation. I, John, your brother and companion or partner in tribulation and the kingdom.
29:31
Not only did he share in tribulation, but he shared in the kingdom with them. To reign as a
29:37
Christian in this fallen world is to live in faith and fellowship with the
29:42
Lord Jesus through all the hardship and difficulty of this fallen world that we encounter.
29:50
On page 5 of your notes, I'm going to drop down a little bit. I have another block quote of Greg Beal. John and his community are people who even now reign together in Jesus' kingdom.
29:59
They're partners in the kingdom, he said, companions in the kingdom. But this is a kingdom unanticipated, again, by a majority of Jews.
30:06
The exercise of the rule of this kingdom begins and continues only as one faithfully endures tribulation.
30:13
This is the formula for kingship. Faithful endurance through tribulation is the means by which one reigns in the present with Jesus.
30:22
Believers are not mere subjects in Christ's kingdom. Fellow partaker underscores the active involvement of saints not only enduring tribulation, but also reigning in the midst of tribulation.
30:33
This ironic exercise of rule is modeled on that of Christ, who revealed his veiled kingship on earth before his exaltation by enduring suffering and death in order to achieve his heavenly rule.
30:48
And that's how we are to live as his slaves, following him.
30:56
Now let's consider in a measure the difficulty that Jesus endured. Letter C there on your notes on page 5.
31:06
The course that Jesus was to take, of course, was very difficult for him, wasn't it? This is suggested in other places, but here the writer of the
31:15
Hebrews wrote of Jesus and his sufferings. Who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with vehement cries and tears to him, that would be the
31:24
Father, who was able to save him from death, was heard because of his godly fear. Though he was a son, yet he learned obedience by the things which he suffered.
31:35
He learned in the way he suffered. And what the writer of the Hebrews is talking about here, how could the infinite, omniscient
31:44
Jesus learn anything, right? He learned experientially what he had never experienced as God.
31:52
As a man, he learned suffering. And this actually qualified him to become a high priest to you and me.
31:59
He learned through his suffering. Now, this might lead us to a matter that we'll just touch upon briefly here.
32:12
In all of Jesus' struggles and his temptations and whatnot, the question has long been asked, in all of his trials and troubles, was
32:19
Jesus Christ capable of sinning? Was he? Was he not? In his human nature.
32:27
Some argue that he was capable of committing sin. Others say he could not have committed sin.
32:33
Some argue if he could not commit sin, how can you say his temptation was that real?
32:42
I remember probably 35 years ago thinking this question. How could Jesus really relate to me because he never succumbed to temptation?
32:51
How can he really know what I'm like, you know, because I'm a sinner? And I came across a sermon by Spurgeon where he talked about the temptation
33:03
Jesus endured. He says his temptation was infinitely greater than yours because you never endure temptation to where it is very great because you always yield.
33:17
He never yielded. His temptation must have been infinitely greater than yours.
33:23
And that's a matter for me. But the fact is Jesus could not have sinned.
33:28
And when we speak about Jesus and his incapability of sinning, we speak of his impeccability.
33:36
That's the word that's used. If we talk about Jesus and say that he had the ability to sin, we would say that he was peccable.
33:45
But we would argue that he was impeccable. He was not capable of sinning. But the temptation nevertheless was very, very real.
33:54
Arthur Pink addressed this matter. We're living in a world of sin, and the fearful havoc it has brought is evident on every side.
34:02
How refreshing then to fix our gaze upon one who is immaculately holy, who passed through this scene unspoiled by its evil.
34:11
And such was the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God incarnate. For 33 years he was in immediate contact with sin, yet he was never to the slightest degree contaminated.
34:21
He touched the leper, yet was not defiled even ceremonially. And just as the rays of the sun shine upon a stagnant pool without being sullied thereby, so Christ was unaffected by the iniquity which surrounded him.
34:35
He did no sin. In him was no sin. He knew no sin. He was without sin.
34:41
He was holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners. But not only was Christ sinless, he was impeccable, that is, incapable of sinning.
34:50
No attempt to set forth the doctrine of his wondrous and peerless person would be complete without considering this blessed perfection.
34:58
Sad indeed is it to behold the widespread ignorance thereon today, and sadder still to hear and read this precious truth denied.
35:06
The last Adam differed from the first Adam in his impeccability. Christ was not only able to overcome temptation, but he was unable to be overcome by it.
35:17
Necessarily so, for he was the Almighty. True Christ was a man, but he was the
35:22
God -man. And as such, absolute Master and Lord of all things, being Master of all things, as his dominion over the winds and waves, diseases and death clearly demonstrated, it was impossible that anything should master him.
35:38
Jesus Christ was impeccable. He could not sin. Well, our
35:46
Lord concluded his struggle on this occasion with an affirmation of his true desire and commitment.
35:52
Jesus said in prayer, Father, glorify your name. And so the Father was glorified in the death of his
36:00
Son. Later we'll read in John 17, too, our Lord's prayer to the Father.
36:05
Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son also may glorify you, as you have given him authority over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as you have given him.
36:19
And so the Lord Jesus desired that glory be given to him so he could glorify his
36:26
Father. And Jesus Christ glorified his Father, perhaps most clearly and fully, when he died upon the cross.
36:36
What do we mean by glory? Well, when we speak about glory, we're talking about the weightiness of a person, the importance of a person.
36:45
In the ancient world, oftentimes the glory of a king was displayed in the ornateness of the throne he sat on and of the garments he wore.
36:56
Solomon, his glory was not arrayed, Jesus said, say, as the lilies in the field.
37:02
But Solomon's authority and glory was showed forth in the way he dressed and showed himself.
37:10
And so the idea of glory is literally heavier weighty. And so to glorify the
37:16
Father is to help people see the weight, the majesty, the unimaginable power and authority and greatness of who
37:28
God is. And of course, again, the fullest manifestation of the glory of God was in the person of his
37:36
Son, Jesus Christ, and the place and way in which Jesus Christ most fully showed forth the glory of the
37:45
Father was in his death upon the cross. And therein, of course, all of the attributes of God was displayed openly in his love for the world, in his wisdom in saving sinners, in his justice in punishing sin.
38:00
Every one of God's attributes was fully on display through the cross of Christ. The glory of the
38:06
Lord was revealed. The brightness of God's glory was displayed through Jesus hanging on the cross.
38:13
And of course, only eyes inspired by the Holy Spirit could see that. Nobody saw it just looking at him hanging there.
38:19
But we see it through the eye of faith. And so where is the glory of God most fully revealed in Christ?
38:27
It was when Jesus died on his cross to secure the salvation of his people. And it was
38:33
Jesus' primary desire that when he died upon that cross he would glorify his Father. Now, in verses 20 and 7 and 28, we're on page 7 now of our notes.
38:45
I have to kind of skip through or we're not going to get through. We may not anyway. We see in verses 27 and 28,
38:51
Jesus' appeal for help from his Father to endure his cross. Upon our
38:57
Lord announcing that the time had arrived to die, that is be glorified, we read of his personal struggle as he was facing death.
39:05
We read his words of distress and petition in verse 27 and his Father's response in verse 28.
39:12
Now my soul is troubled. And what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour.
39:18
But for this purpose I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name. By the way, in that translation, if you're looking at your notes carefully, there's a question mark.
39:30
Father, save me from this hour. Probably shouldn't be a question mark.
39:35
It probably ought to be a statement where Jesus is actually requesting, all right, do
39:43
I have to drink this cup, Father? And so it's not like a positing it and then he just said, no, no, you've called me to this hour.
39:54
This is a struggle Jesus was having. He knew it would lie before him. Now when we think about this, this brings another matter up and we have it under that first division, letter
40:08
A, the sufferings of Jesus Christ in his human nature. Jesus said, now my soul is troubled.
40:17
The trouble that lie before him, the cross, pressed upon his soul and he was troubled by it.
40:24
His soul was troubled when he would cure us of the trouble of our souls.
40:30
Later he'd tell his disciples in John 14 .1, let your hearts not be troubled. But here he says, my heart is troubled.
40:39
Matthew Henry wrote of our Lord's words. Now the black and dismal scene began. Now were the first throes of the travail of his soul.
40:47
Now his agony began. His soul began to be exceedingly sorrowful. The sin of our soul was the trouble of Christ's soul.
40:54
And when he undertook to redeem and save us and to make his soul an offering for our sin, my soul is indeed troubled.
41:06
Now, as we enter this portion of John's gospel, here John chapter 12, in which the sufferings of our
41:13
Lord Jesus are recounted, issues of difficulty arise as we reflect precisely on how
41:21
Jesus faced his cross. Of course, Jesus is both fully
41:26
God and fully man. He is the eternal son of God, the same essence as God the
41:33
Father and God the Holy Spirit. He took upon himself our human nature, and that human nature means his soul and his body that he derived from his mother,
41:45
Mary. Our confession of faith states the matter clearly. I'm not going to read that because of the time, but basically it's an assertion of the early creeds of Nicaea, Constantinople, that Christ, Jesus Christ, is one person, divine person, with two natures side by side, not to be separated, but not to be confused or conflated.
42:10
He had a divine nature, a human nature in one person. And this means he had two ways of thinking as a man, as eternal
42:20
God. He had two wills as a human person, as a human nature, and the will, of course, which is in perfect conformity with his father.
42:33
He had desires that were of his divine nature and desires of his human nature.
42:41
And these, of course, were in his one person as he lived out his life here on earth and continue to, of course, exist unto eternity.
42:52
He came from heaven as the eternal son of God, he went back to heaven as the eternal son of God, coupled with our human nature.
43:01
There is a man enthroned on the throne of God in heaven and will be unto eternity.
43:08
But when we read of the sufferings of Jesus Christ, such as here in the opening words of verse 27, we should understand that his sufferings were those experienced by his human nature, not his divine nature.
43:23
I'm on the top of page eight now in the bold and italic font. The divine nature of our
43:30
Lord Jesus is in every way infinite and immutable. Immutable means unchanging.
43:38
God cannot change, for he's infinitely perfect and unchanging in all his attributes. And the one attribute of God that speaks to this matter is
43:48
God's impassibility. When we say that God is impassible, we're saying that God cannot experience pain,
43:57
God cannot experience suffering, cannot experience death. And therefore, these experiences of our
44:03
Lord Jesus were in his human nature only. One wrote of this, it will become more obvious that it is critical to distinguish between what
44:13
Christ does according to his divine nature and what he does according to his human nature, lest suffering be attributed to the divine.
44:23
We don't go there. Because that would mean that God is changing, and that's not possible.
44:31
He's infinite, immutable in every way. This is a very important matter.
44:39
A failure to recognize this will result in wrong conceptions of our triune God and of the deity of our
44:44
Lord Jesus. Here is a word that speaks to this matter. One point where some disagree with divine impassibility, and again, that's the idea that God is immutable.
44:58
He doesn't change. He cannot be affected, changed. He cannot experience passions that control him or suffering or pain that somehow diminish his blessedness because he is infinitely blessed always.
45:16
Failing to maintain the creator -creature distinction among other important biblical and theological distinctions, some ascribe suffering to the divine nature of Christ and even to the
45:26
Father and the Holy Spirit. This is a mistake of mammoth implications. Now, we don't have time to go down that road, but this is important.
45:36
All the suffering that Jesus endured was in his human nature because it was on our behalf, paying for our sin.
45:47
The human nature of our Lord Jesus underwent all manner of change as he grew from child to adulthood.
45:53
He interacted with people and with events that transpired about him, but his divine nature was in every way infinite, perfect, unchanging, glorious in every respect.
46:03
And so when our Lord declared, Now my soul is troubled, he was speaking of the struggle and trouble he was having in his human soul as he anticipated his sufferings of death that he would experience in his human body.
46:17
We'll not say more about this matter at this time, but I think it's important that we go on record about these things because this is a point where some people get themselves into difficulty.
46:31
We read further of our Lord's words that express the distress of his soul. Verse 27, Now my soul is troubled.
46:37
What shall I say? Father, save me from this hour, but for this purpose I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name.
46:50
John does not record what the Synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke record, the events of Jesus in the
46:56
Garden of Gethsemane, where he prayed to his father and expressed,
47:02
May this cup pass from me. You don't find that in John's Gospel. But you do have this.
47:08
This is the equivalent of the Gethsemane experience recorded in the Synoptics.
47:15
And J .C. Ryle drew the comparison. This is interesting. Ryle wrote, I see in the whole event here described a short summary of what took place afterwards more fully in Gethsemane.
47:26
There is a remarkable parallelism at every step. A. Does our Lord say here, my soul is troubled?
47:33
Just as he said in Gethsemane, my soul is exceedingly sorrowful even unto death. B. Does our
47:39
Lord say here, Father, save me from this hour? So he says in Gethsemane, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me.
47:48
C. Does our Lord say here, for this cause came I unto this hour? Just so he says in Gethsemane, if this cup may not pass from me except I drink it, thy will be done.
47:58
And fourthly, D. Does our Lord say finally, Father, glorify thy name? Just so our Lord says.
48:04
Lastly, the cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it? In verse 27 we read that even in his inward struggles,
48:15
Jesus was committed to doing the will of his Father. God had a purpose for him coming into the world, even coming to this hour.
48:23
And he would be faithful to his Father. Through all that was before him. Although Jesus performed many signs, teaching, he taught, he healed people and what not, it was this event, the cross, that was central to his experience.
48:40
The manner of his securing the salvation of his people, and his obedience unto the Father, even unto the cross.
48:47
And in doing so, he would glorify his Father. Now again, what we're saying is, it's natural.
48:55
It's a human desire to escape tribulation. Jesus wanted to escape it in his human nature.
49:03
It was not sinful for him to desire that. And it's not sinful for you who want to escape the difficulty that you are experiencing right now.
49:13
In fact, we would say that's pretty human. That's pretty normal. What becomes sinful, of course, is when you're willing to escape what you're going through by compromising the word of God, by disobeying
49:26
God in order to escape your afflictions. That is when it becomes sinful.
49:33
And this, of course, is what Jesus refused to do. We can recite occasions when it was perfectly proper to flee tribulation.
49:42
Jesus told his disciples, when you see Jerusalem surrounded by the Roman armies, you flee. It was right for them to flee.
49:49
When the Apostle Paul was converted, he immediately preached Christ in Damascus. And then they conspired to kill him.
49:56
They let him down in a basket on the outside wall of Damascus, and he escaped. It's perfectly right to escape tribulation if you're not violating the word of God, the commandments of God, in doing so.
50:12
And Jesus would have sinned had he tried to escape the cross. And you and I sin when we want to escape difficulty and trouble in our life, but to do so, we have to violate the word of God.
50:31
And you know what it is when you're put in a situation and you know you have to obey God's word, but you know if you do, it's going to result in some ramifications for you.
50:43
But you've got to do it, don't you? And certainly that's got to be true of an elder, of a man of God, if he's worth it at all.
50:53
Regardless of the possible consequences, if this is the will of God, we're going to do it, as God enables us to do.
51:00
And that should be our desire and commitment on every part of us. Jesus affirmed it was his
51:06
Father's will to die upon his cross. For this purpose, I came to this hour.
51:12
And then we read of this voice in heaven, the bottom of page 10. A voice came from heaven saying
51:17
I've glorified it, and I'll glorify it again. This is the third occasion in the
51:23
Gospels when a voice came from heaven, God the Father spoke. The first was at his baptism.
51:28
The second was at the Mount of Transfiguration when he was glorified before the disciples, the three disciples.
51:36
And then here is the third occasion. God the Father said I have glorified. He didn't say
51:41
I've glorified Jesus, your name. I've glorified my name through you. But we shouldn't limit it to just those times when
51:49
God spoke on those three occasions. But rather, God the Father glorified himself.
51:55
God the Father glorified God the Father in everything that had to do with Jesus.
52:02
The Father glorified himself through the birth of Jesus, through the infancy narratives of Jesus, through the ministry of Jesus, the life of Jesus.
52:10
But most fully and clearly, God the Father glorified himself through the death of Jesus.
52:18
That he was willing to give his son to die upon a cross in order to secure our salvation.
52:25
All of the attributes of God are gloriously presented on the cross of the
52:31
Lord Jesus. And then the voice came from heaven, I glorified it and I will glorify it again.
52:38
And with that, he's talking about the cross that was right before him, but also it speaks about the resurrection as well.
52:49
I'm going to close with this paragraph and it's on the top of page 12. The name of the
52:54
Father has been glorified by the entire ministry of Jesus. And now spoken of at its end.
53:01
And it's not finished. While the cross is probably to be understood as a climactic glorified act of the
53:07
Father by the Son, we may still speak of the perpetual glory distributed between the
53:12
Father and the Son. But the Father's final remark, I will glorify it again, offers confirmation that in this moment of anguish filled with the decision to love or hate life in the world, the
53:24
Father is confident in the service of the Son, so confident that he predicts it. And his predictions never fail.
53:30
The last remark by the Father therefore points not only to the cross, but also to the resurrection.
53:39
Well, may the Lord infuse in each of us the great desire longing to glorify God, not in just escaping tribulation.
53:48
And again, it's not wrong to desire that. And oftentimes the Lord does allow us to escape it.
53:54
But let's put right at the top of the list, but Father, may you glorify yourself through us as a church, through me as an individual
54:05
Christian, through the way that I deal with the trouble that you have ordered for my life.
54:13
May I be faithful and true to you. Amen. Let's pray. Father, thank you for your word and thank you,
54:21
Father, for the example of Jesus Christ displayed so wonderfully before us.
54:27
Help us, our Lord, to address these matters, our Lord. Again, some of us in particular are facing extreme hardship and difficulty.
54:38
They're suffering inwardly, maybe physically, maybe in other ways, day after day, and they desire relief, they desire an end.
54:48
But we pray, Lord, that you would put it within our souls, a greater desire to glorify you, our
54:53
Father, through these things that we are encountering. We thank you that there will be a day when we're completely delivered,
54:59
Lord, from the afflictions, the tribulations of this world. But until then, may you help us to be true as we follow our