In this sermon, the speaker begins by acknowledging the importance of an introductory lesson in understanding the message of God. He then highlights the significance of the second man, Jesus Christ, who came to undo the mistakes of the first man, Adam. The speaker emphasizes that Jesus is not just a cute baby in a manger, but a new representative for humanity, starting over and winning the race for the whole race. The sermon also touches on the concept of representation in sports and the speaker's struggle with reading critical material about the Lord.

Well, good morning, brothers and sisters in Christ. It is so good to be back and to share with you what revelation the Lord has given of Himself. We always look forward to Haša and the Lord has used it in such a mighty way. Just for interest, how many are here for the first time? There haven't been. Well, praise the Lord. We welcome you. It's our testimony on how faithful the Lord has been to meet us, and we just pray for you folks especially, that the Lord would really minister unto your heart. But you know, that's not really what it's about. We're here that we might minister unto His heart. We have come to honor Him and to praise Him and to give Him joy, and as a byproduct of that, then we also get blessed. So, we're glad you're here, and we pray that God will open your heart to a full revelation of Christ. As we come to the Word of God, there's a principle of Bible study that is absolutely indispensable, and that is total reliance upon God's Holy Spirit. With all of the helps and the aids and the books and the commentaries and the Word studies and so on, so many things to assist us. And yet, at the end of the day and the bottom line is this, we must come as little children before Him, and we must ask the Holy Spirit to unveil Christ to our hearts. And it's only then that our spirits are fed. As I prepared for these messages, this verse became very, very meaningful to me. Let me begin with this verse. Actually, I'm not even going to give you the whole verse. I'm going to give you the first part and the last part, because that's the part that touched me. It's Isaiah 32, 6. Isaiah 32, 6 says, A fool speaks nonsense. And at the end of the verse, to keep the hungry person unsatisfied, to withhold drink from the thirsty. Anybody hungry here? Anybody thirsty here? I would be a fool and speak nonsense if I didn't give you something to satisfy your soul. A fool speaks nonsense. If he lets the hungry go out hungry, and if he lets the thirsty go out thirsty. That's why it's imperative that I proclaim Christ, because no other message can satisfy hunger and satisfy thirst. When we just sang that song, boy, that became a prayer as I sat back there. My gracious Master and my God, assist me to proclaim, to spread through all the earth abroad the honors of thy name. I don't want to be a fool. I don't want to speak nonsense. You know the difference between straw and grain. The Lord's going to feed you no matter what I say. You've come with a hungry heart. He'll meet you. He'll minister unto you. Let's trust God together as we open up his word that we would truly come to have our spirits fed, to see, to behold the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm going to ask you to join me, please, in prayer. Our Father, we do praise you this morning that we have a privilege again to come and to wait before you and to receive from you. You have been so faithful. You are faithful in this moment. You will be faithful through all the ages of eternity. We pray that in a special way this weekend, we might tap into that great fountain that we might drink deeply and imbibe deeply and receive everything you want us to receive. We just trust you as we look minister unto us, show us the Lord Jesus Christ. We did not come for a soul massage. We have come for a revelation of Christ. We ask you, Lord, in your mercy to give us that. In the matchless name of our Lord Jesus, amen. Now before I begin sharing the burden that's on my heart for this weekend, let me just sort of say a thing about an introductory lesson. Those of you that know me, you know how we approach things. An introduction lesson is very difficult for me because it's tedious on the level of earth. I think it's important. I think it's very, very basic to get us looking in the right direction. But do pray, if you would, that the Lord would assist me to proclaim because I really long that he would do that. In an introduction lesson, we don't just have a text. I can't say turn to such and such a chapter and we're going to look at that portion. As you see from the notes before you, there will be a text tonight. And in the subsequent lessons, there will be a text. As close as we'll come to a text this morning. Maybe you want to put a marker in 1 Corinthians 15 and 2 Corinthians 11 and Genesis 2. And I'll be quoting other verses. But we're all over the lot in an introduction lesson trying to focus on one thing. I want to give you that I have been praying and is the prayer and is the thing in my heart for this weekend. And it comes from Galatians 4 and it's verse 19. And you might look at that and say, that's not a prayer. Yes, it is. Because I've been praying it. That's how I grew. It's a prayer. And Paul talks about travail in his heart. Travail is prayer. My children, with whom I am again in labor, or over whom I travail, until Christ be formed in you. And that's been my prayer that Christ would be formed in me. And I've been praying in a special way as we go through this weekend that Christ would be formed in you. And the message that I have on my heart for this week is Christ formed in you. Christ formed in me. So that's what we're going to be looking at. I think most of you know by now that for many months I have been going through that portion of Scripture that deals with the first 30 years of our Lord Jesus and his ministry. And some would say, the first 30 years, there's very little information on that in the Bible. And that's the obscure years. And God doesn't say, well, where are you going to get your information? Well, let me tell you where I'm not going to get it. I don't know if you're familiar with those books called spurious gospels and apocryphal gospels. There are books written, and old books, very old books, about the boyhood life of Christ. And it tells about Jesus growing up and some of the so-called miracles he did. That's not our text. So many of those are just so contrary to the person of Christ as we know him. Let me just give you a couple of examples from that. When Jesus was 40 years old, see, I have to read this joke. I'm not going to preach it, but I just want to give you an illustration. I can't be released. Sometimes I wonder why I have to do this. I read all of the critical stuff about the Lord, and it drives me nuts. And yet I feel like I have to read that somehow to prepare my heart. But I'll deliver you from it. But anyway, I was reading this gospel. When Jesus was 40 years old, a friend broke a clay pool he had made. He had made a pool, and then by a miracle, water came in, and then by a miracle, water went out. And he was playing with his pool, and a child drank it. And so he killed the child. And then the parent of the child came to Mary and said, that's all right, that he should kill my child. And so Jesus kicked him in the ribs, and he came back to life. That's actually in there. And then when he was six years old, a similar thing, somebody bumped into him, and he didn't like it, and so he killed that child. And again the parents came, and Jesus reached on, lifted him up by the ear, and he was alive again. Those are the kinds of stories that are in those particular books. He made some clay animals on the Sabbath day, some birds and some animals. And some of the religious leaders came into Joseph and Mary and rebuked them, that he's making things on the Sabbath day. And so Jesus clapped his hands, and the clay pigeons flew away, and the clay animals ran away. Those are the kind of miracles. Now we're going to look at the 30 years, but we're not going to look at that kind of thing. According to one of the records that I read, Mary saved all of the bath water that she bathed Jesus in. And people would come and collect that bath water, and when they washed in that water that Jesus had been washed in, they were healed from every disease, including leprosy and so on. The story's full of how incompetent Joseph was as a carpenter, and how Jesus kept rescuing him. One time he didn't cut a board the right size, and so Jesus stretched it out, you know. And one time he was given a contract to build a king's throne, and he worked two years on the king's throne. And then he saw that he didn't follow his facts. And he came to Jesus, and so Jesus took one end of the throne, and he took the other, and they stretched it out to the right size, and so on. We're going to look at the 30 years of Christ. Not that. Say, where are you going to get your information? There's a lot of it in there. You know, see, there's not a lot written, but when you take all of the infancy stories, and when you take the story of the 12-year-old Jesus, and when you take all of the record of the baptism of our Lord Jesus, and how John prepared the way, and when you take the temptation in the wilderness, that's a lot of scripture. And it's all about those first 30 years. And so we're going to find our scripture, especially in the gospel history. I'm not really concerned that you end up with light more than has on, oh, we've got some information about the 30 years. I want God's heart about the 30 years. I'm not just talking about, let's get some facts, and let's pull everything we can discern. He was a carpenter, and his family were godly, and they kept the customs, and he knew three languages, and you can see things through comments that are made. He didn't study in the normal schools, and all that kind of thing, and he was in Nazareth, and he grew up there, and he had a normal development. I'm not interested in that. I'm interested in that, but that's not this weekend. That's not what we want to study. We're so accustomed to studying these stories, and I've already heard several comments about how familiar the stories are. We're so accustomed to study the stories in an isolated way. We all know the Christmas stories. We know the story about how Gabriel came and appeared to Mary and so on, about the virgin birth, and the shepherds, and Simeon and Anna in the temple. We could tell those stories. We know about the wise men, and about Herod's destroying of the children, and the rescue in Egypt, and God calling them out and settling in Nazareth, and the story of 12-year-old Jesus. In a detached way, we've already studied the baptism of Christ. In a detached way, we've already studied the temptation. You know all the stories. The question is, has God ever dawned on your heart, not the isolated stories, but the segment for 30 years. How is Christ revealed in that period of time? And how do all those stories tie together to give us that revelation of Christ? That's what we want to look at. As I was trying to wrestle with how to share this with you, I was sharing it with my son Stephen, and he advised me, just give them your burden. Just tell them. They're not interested in your outline, or your illustrations, or how you're going to present it. They want to see the Lord. They want to see your burden, so just tell them. And so let me try to just lay it before you first. We're not trying to trick you. We're not trying to build it up so then I can spring something on you. We're here to proclaim the Lord. We're trusting God to assist us to proclaim the Lord. And so let me just set it before you. This is what I want you to see this morning. Three things. Of course, three things. You've got to have three points. Number one, if you're going to get God's heart on those 30 years, you have got to see God's revelation of his Son. How does God reveal Jesus? Of course, there are many answers to that question, but I think this is the chief answer. He is the representative man. He's the representative man. There are other ways he's presented. He's the God man and he's the perfect man in all of the rest. I'm not talking about Jesus as the ideal man. You say, well there, he's the great example. He's the great model. That's man as God created man to be. The model, the specimen of humanity. That may be true, but that's not the point. We're not going to study the 30 years so we can copy. So we can imitate. So we can say, now that's how we ought to live. That's how he lived. If you do it that way, you're going to miss God's main point. If we see him only as an example, I think we'd miss God's heart. He's the representative. He did not live on the earth to show us how to live. He did not do it first so that we could do it second. That is not what it's all about. If you miss this, you miss the 30 years. He came as our substitute. He came as our representative. He came to be man in our place, in our womb, in our stead, for us. You might be a good example to me, but you're not my representative. I might be a good example to you, but I'm not your representative. There are probably some things about you I should emulate. But Christ was a representative. You know, I think thousands of Christians miss this. I don't want to develop it too much now because I'll pick it up later. If you ask the average Christian, is Christ your substitute? Is Christ your representative? Almost without exception, they would say yes. Christ is my substitute. He became sin for me. He died for me. And so they have seen Christ as substitute. At the end, he's my substitute on the cross. Don't answer this. Just think for a moment. When he was in Gethsemane, was he your substitute then? Back up. He transfigured as your substitute. When he faced Satan in the wilderness, did he do that as your example? So you'd know how to face temptation? Quote scripture and that. Did he do it first so you could learn to do it second? He did it once so you don't have to do it. He was circumcised. Was he circumcised for you? He was substituting his circumcision. Is that what Paul had in mind in Colossians 2, 11, that we're circumcised in him, in Christ, with a circumcision not made with hands? I know. He died for me. When he died, I died. When he was buried, I was buried. We hear it all the time. We say it. We teach it. We love it. We identify with it. He's my substitute. He died, I died. He was buried, I was buried. He rose, I rose. He's seated up, seated with him. I've never heard anyone stand up and testify he was circumcised. I was circumcised with him. See, I've appropriated his death because he was my substitute. I've never appropriated his circumcision. This ain't something because he was not only my substitute in death. The 30 years shows that he was my substitute in life. He died for me, but he also lived for me. And so we need to look at Christ as our representative. He's different from every other person. Ever since Adam sinned, we're not looking at man when you look at man. Let me give a stupid illustration. Actually, I read a good illustration by Morgan and I updated it. He talked about a train wreck. I'm talking about something else. I want you to picture, if you would go back in your mind, it's not 9-11-2001, it's 9-12-2001 in this illustration. It's the day after. And let's assume or pretend that somewhere on this earth there's a person who is completely uncivilized, completely backward, uncultured, as primitive as primitive can be. Some aborigine in some deep dark jungle someplace that's never heard of culture, never heard of anything. And somehow you were able to communicate with this person. And you wanted to take this ignorant person and lift them out of his culture, his darkness, his ignorance, and bring him to enlightenment, America. And let's just say that you communicate with this person and you say, I want to take you to the financial capital of the world. I want to take you to lower Manhattan. So you put him in the plane and all the way over on the plane you begin to explain to him, you're going to see the most amazing things you can imagine. I'm going to show you the World Trade Center. I'm going to show you the Twin Towers. And then you try to explain, you're going to see buildings 110 stories high, 1,377 feet above the level of the sea. Amazing. And as you talk, his eyes are big with amazement. Then you tell him that these buildings house more than 450 different businesses. And that more than 50,000 people are employed in just these two buildings. And you go down and underneath there's a great shopping complex underneath. And so you arrive September 12. You go to ground zero and you say, there it is. What does he see? You see, he sees 100,000 tons of rubble. He sees a wreck. He doesn't see a North Tower looking over a great metropolis or a South Tower. He doesn't see that. He sees a pile of melted steel, crumbled concrete, twisted everything, a mass grave. That's all he sees. And let me ask you this. The fireman named that place the pit. As we stand at the pit, we stand at ground zero. Did I lie to him? Behold, the Trade Center. Is that the truth? Look at the Twin Towers. Did I tell him the truth? Sure I did. That's the Twin Towers. But the problem is, it's not fair. Because it's after the fall. It's the Twin Towers after the enemy did his monstrous deed. And that's the problem with the study of man today. And that's the problem with anthropology and psychology and psychiatry and some of these educated are trying to study man. They're not seeing man. Even theologians, they're not seeing man. They're seeing man after the fall. And man after the fall is not man as God intended man to be. And so the first thing we've got to see, if you don't understand that 30 years, you're not only going to see a man walking, living, growing, but you're going to see a representative man. Hold up. The second thing we must see is that that representative man lived a perfect life. In perfect obedience to his father God. Every moment of every day, every day of every week, every week of every month, every month of every year, he lived flawlessly, perfectly. You're not going to understand that 30 years unless God gives you a vision of that. He's not only a representative, but he's a representative who obeyed perfectly and satisfied God. And then there's a third thing we must see. It's sort of self-evident. And actually, when we start tonight looking at the heart of my burden, this is where we'll pick up. If you're going to read those 30 years, you've got to see that Christ is gradually revealed. If ever a portion of scripture gives a progressive revelation of Christ, it's this 30 years. Because as you see him, he grows. He starts off and we see him as a promise, and then as a seed implanted in a person, and we see him in the womb, and then we see him as an infant in the manger, and then we see him as a little boy in the house, and we see him as a young adult, and we see him growing and growing and maturing and developing, until finally he becomes mature, and then his ministry begins. I'm going to come back to that. Luke chapter 240 says the child continued to grow and become strong, increasing in wisdom, and the grace of God was upon him. Christ growing. Christ maturing. I'm concerned so much. I was when I first started the study. I was all over the lie. How can he be God and man, and what is the God-man, and how could he grow if he's God and all that kind of... Set that aside. Deal with that another time. Just know this. As you come to the gospel record, you see a representative man. As you come to the gospel record, you see a perfect representative. And as you come to the gospel record, you see him progressively revealed. First you see this, and then he gets bigger and bigger, until finally he's matured so he can carry out his redemptive ministry to all the earth. Now, God helping me, I want to take those three realities. That's what Steve told me to do, just tell you those three things. Now we're on the same page. Now let me go back. This is the tedious part. God can help you to follow along, but we need to see this. I want to take those facts, because behind every fact is a glorious principle. And if we can understand those facts and the glorious principle, God has done a most wonderful thing with those 30 years. If we can see that this weekend, we'll never be the same. That's what's on my heart. So one by one, let's go back. He's a representative. He's perfect. He's progressively revealed. Let's look at that. Only two times, as far as I know in the history of the world, God has given us a representative man. Only twice. Once is Jesus. What's the other one? That's it? So you already know what I'm going to share. We can't look at any man because that's the And more than 110 stories have fallen. So we can either look at Adam 1 or the last Adam. I asked you to put a marker in 1 Corinthians 15. If you go there, please. 1 Corinthians chapter 15, this is not your bright idea or mine, but God in his word, this is not an accident that God has made a connection between Adam and the Lord Jesus. Chapter 15, verse 45, I want you to notice this, that Adam is called the first man. Well, that's not so deep, but it tells me this, there were none before him. That's clear, right? If he's the first man, there were none before him. Now look at verse 47. Christ is called the second man. The first man is from the earth, earthy. The second man is from heaven. Verse 47, Christ is called the second man. If Adam's the first man, there was none before him. If Christ is the second man, there's none between them. You see that? And then look, please, if you would, at verse 45. Christ is called the last Adam. The last Adam because he's a life-giving spirit. Adam's the first Adam, there's none before him. The first man, there's none before him. Christ is the second man, there's none between him. And Christ is the last Adam, there's none after him. You see how clear that is? There's the first man, none before him. The second man, none between them. And the last Adam, there can be none after him. In other words, from God's viewpoint, there are only two men that have ever lived. There are only two men that have ever lived, as God intended man to live. And they have this in common. They have many differences. They have this in common. They were both representative men. Now if I'm going to see Christ as the representative, it will help me first to see the first representative. And so what I'd like to do is show you Adam one, then we'll look at Adam last. We'll drive home this idea of representation. What did it look like before the tower fell? Before man sinned, you say well let's turn to Genesis. No, let's turn to 2nd Corinthians. I say that because that is fully developed form. That's a look at Genesis that sheds light on Genesis. 2nd Corinthians chapter 11, hold along please as I read these first three verses. We get some spiritual insight here as to what it was like before the fall. That you could bear with me, this is chapter 11 verse 1, in a little foolishness, indeed you do bear with me. Paul says I'm jealous over you with a godly jealousy. I espoused you to one husband that I might present you as a pure virgin to Christ. I fear lest by any means as the serpent beguiled Eve in his craftiness, your mind should be corrupted, now note this, from the simplicity and the purity of devotion to Christ. That verse 3, the new American standard, says let astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ. King James just says corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. Kenneth Wiest in his expanded translation reads it this way, lest your mind be corrupted from the simplicity, the single hearted loyalty and purity, uprightness of life which you express toward Christ. In other words, it was Paul's concern for the Corinthians. God had used him as the instrument to lead them into wedded union with the Lord. He brought them as a virgin into a marriage relationship with God. But as he watched them he said I have a concern for you Corinthians. And my concern is that Satan will do to you what he did to Eve in the garden before she fell. What was his concern? He said has Satan deceived Eve? I'm afraid Satan's going to deceive you from, and he names two things, your simplicity and your devotion to Christ. What did it look like before man sinned? Life was sinful and devoted to the Lord. That's what Satan did back then. That's what he did and that's what Paul was afraid of. When we get saved, when we come back to the Lord, that's our new life now. It's simple and devoted to him period. That's our life. Simple life lived in union with God. That's how it was back then. Life was simple. Isaiah chapter 51 verse 3 has a description of Eden. It says the garden of the Lord. Joy and gladness was found in her thanksgiving and the sound of the melody. That's what it was like. Joy, gladness, thanksgiving, the sound of the melody. Man as God intended man to be simple and related to God and living out a holy life and a happy life and a happy life because of holy life. And it's just this wonderful devotion to the Lord. You say well that was Adam. No that was Adam the representative man. He wasn't living for himself. God didn't look at Adam and say there's Adam. According to the record, even though Adam didn't have a family, God looked at Adam and said I see your family. And even though his family didn't have a family because they weren't even around. He looked at Adam and said I see your grandchildren. And even though they weren't around he looked at Adam and said I see your grandchildren's grandchildren. And I see your grandchildren's grandchildren's grandchildren. Your great great great great great. And he looked at Adam and he said I see all the notions of the world. And Adam was one man. But he wasn't one man. He was one representative man. And as he stood there the whole race stood there. And if we're going to understand the 30 years, you got to see that the last Adam was like the first Adam. Now hold on a minute. Let me get into the second truth. Christ is not only the representative man, but he lived in perfect obedience to God. This was true of both representatives. God desired that man live simply and in devotion to him. But he didn't want to live by it. He didn't want to force that. And so he made a covenant with Adam. Now some theologians get ahead of my case and they say he didn't make a covenant with Adam. The first covenant in the Bible was with Abraham. He had a covenant with Abraham. Had a covenant with David and so on. Had a covenant with Moses. But never made a covenant with Adam. Well just because the word covenant doesn't appear doesn't mean there wasn't a covenant. The word trinity doesn't appear. And there's the trinity. The word rapture doesn't appear. The word Shekinah doesn't appear. There's the Shekinah glory. The word substitute doesn't appear in your Bible. Well there's a substitute. Absolutely. In fact the word covenant does appear though. Galatians Genesis rather chapter 2 verse 15. Jehovah took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and keep it. And Jehovah God commanded the man saying of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat. But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil thou shalt not eat of it. For in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. See that's a covenant. There's a duty required. There's a promise made. There's a punishment threatened. That's a covenant. In fact Hosea later on, this is how I say the word covenant is used. Because the prophet Hosea looked at these God's people. Hosea 6-7 says like Adam they have transgressed the covenant. And so it's actually called the covenant. Well theologians try to name everything so they name that covenant. But any theology book, good theology book, they'll give you a name. It's the covenant of works. The covenant of works. Adam was required. He's living simply. He's in devotion to God. And here's the covenant. Obey and live. Disobey and you die. That's it. Simple. If he had obeyed and walked in that path of obedience eventually he would have come to the tree of life and been sealed in that obedience. He would have passed the test and everything would have been different. But it's all about obedience. God did not give him any out. There was not one jot. Not one form of failing was allowed. No latitude in the covenant. Obey and live. Adam couldn't come back later and say I tried my best. I really put my best foot forward and I'm really sorry and all. There was no room for repentance in the covenant. It's a covenant of works. It's all about God's will and God's pleasure and God's heart and God's authority. It's real clear when the commandment isn't a moral issue. Do it. Because I said so. I saw that with Stephanie Greer yesterday. She said to a little child I need you to stand here. And the child said why? And Stephanie said because I said so. Exactly why? God said don't eat that tree. Why? Because I said so. Instead you walk in simplicity and devotion to me and you know the story. I'm amazed I go to read some of these commentaries and some of these theologies and they try to identify Adam's sin. They say it was pride. Another said no it was unbelief. Another said no no no it was selfishness. No it was independence. No covetousness. It was covetousness. That was his sin. My guess is probably it was one of those things but God names it. Romans 5 19 as through one man's heart made sinful. It's a covenant of works. Obey or not. Or disobey. God said to Adam in effect here's the deal. I'm going to make a covenant with you. We're living sinful and in devotion with me and you have all this. The law's written in your heart. You're happy. You're holy. It's wonderful. Here's the deal. I'm going to let you represent the whole family tree. You pass the test. They pass the test. You flunk. They flunk. That would be the whole thing. When you act they act. The destiny of the whole world depends on your action. You're the representative of the entire race. Well you know the story. Without going into the sad details of it. Adam disobeyed. Adam number one sinned. The first representative man went down and the towers came down and that's been the history of society ever since. Man fell from his integrity. The image of God was ruined. In the middle of the history God lenders a great mirror the law so that they could see how terrible their fall was. Man could not have fallen any more than he fell when he fell in his theologians call it the federal head. Enter the second man. Thousands of years go by. Galatians chapter four and verse four. But when the firmness of time came God sent forth his son born of a woman. Born under law. Enter the second man. Don't miss this brothers and sisters in Christ. I know it's old to you. You've heard it all but nothing's changed. God is starting over. Adam last. The second man. It's like the Garden of Eden all over again. There's another man on the earth as God intended man to be. God had figured out a way for a person to come and not only do what Adam didn't do but undo everything Adam did. The first Adam did. In other words the second man had to live for the whole race. Same deal. If you pass they pass. If you flunk they flunk. See we look at the manger and say oh what a cute little baby. That's not just a baby. A new start. A new race. That's a new representative. God's beginning all over again. And right from the start the issue was the same. You know the Bible actually says that Jesus spoke when he was an infant. It's not in the gospel record it's in Hebrews chapter ten verse seven. Then I said lo I'm come. I actually wrote to the publishers of the red letter edition thing. That thing's not in red letters. They missed it. These are the words of Jesus. Then I said I look like I am come in the will of the book that's written of me to do thy will oh God saying above sacrifices and offerings and whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin thou wouldst not neither has pleasure therein the which I offered according to the law. Then he said lo I come to do thy will. When he came into the world he said what did he say I come to do thy will. That's what it's all about. When the disciples brought him food to eat because he was tired and hungry. Remember what he said John four I have meat to eat you know not of. Therefore the disciples said one to another has any man brought him anything to eat. Jesus said my meat is to do the will of him that sent me to finish his work. This is representative man. This is the second man. This is the last animal. Do or die. John six thirty eight Jesus said I'm come down from heaven not to do my own will but the will of him that sent me. He claimed in John eight never to do or say anything on his own. When he lifted up the son of man he shall know I am he and that I do nothing of myself. As my father has taught me I speak these things. He that sent me is with me. The father has not left me alone. I always do those things that please him. And so when you read the record. The second man came to do what the first man wouldn't do obey. It's about obedience. Who can forget disseminate. Nevertheless not my will that thine be done. If you don't understand that thirty years you got to see that it's the representative man living a life of perfect obedience until finally he could go on the cross and say it is finished. It's finished. We read in Hebrews that he learned obedience by the things that he suffered. That he cried out unto him able to save him from death. Was heard in because of his piety. Finally he brought that obedience Philippians chapter two even to death. Even the death of the cross. See you never going to understand that thirty years. If you don't see Jesus as the second man. As the last Adam. As our substitute our representative. Doing what the first man didn't do and undoing what the first man did. I finally how is he revealed in the Bible. Answers little by little. He matures before our eyes. Friends in Christ this is my burden. Here's where I'm trying to go. God assisting me to proclaim. God wants us to know the Lord Jesus as our substitute. And as the one who does the work. But according to the thirty years he is progressively revealed. Before his life could become redemptive he had to grow and grow and grow and grow and then his ministry began. Here's the essence of this weekend. As he came. Almost. What he did then. He does now. And here's the wonder of this weekend. The way he was progressively revealed then. Is exactly the way he is progressively revealed in your heart. Step by step we'll read those stories. You'll be amazed you'll say oh yeah. I never knew that's what it's all about. Ephesians 4 19 I tell you is my prayer. I'm in labor over you. Till Christ is formed in you. You see so many hostels we've come together and sort of talked about how to grow in Christ. Not this year. Not this year. It's not about how to grow in Christ. I want to show you how Christ grows in you. And that's my burden. How is he formed in you? Because in some of us he may still be a fetus. We gotta watch him grow. In some of us he may be an infant we'll see the principles we'll look at the characteristics of each of the revelations of Christ. He may still be an infant he may be a young adult. He may finally have matured to where he can begin to minister. We need to follow that. We need to follow that. He desires to be in us now. So we say why study this 30 years? Because I see a substitute who wants to come into my heart to be a substitute. To be a representative. As far as I can trace it back Hudson Taylor is the first one that ever used the expression the exchange life. I can't follow it back any further than Hudson Taylor. But that's what it's all about. It's about Christ coming in to live in my place as my substitute. I was sharing some of this with a brother and he got all upset he said are you saying Christ lived by works? And he still does. He's come into your life to live by works. He doesn't by works he gives it to you by grace. You brothers and sisters we miss it. We miss this idea that Christ is my representative that my life is exchanged it's his life. But sometimes he's trying to live the Christian life. It takes God to be a Christian. There's only one person that's ever lived a Christian life and his name is Jesus. And he's the only one that can live it again. It takes God to be a man as God created man to be. It takes God to be a Christian. It's not your life. It's not oh I'm struggling to get through this. It's him. He wants to come in. That's the 30 years. He's the substitute. He does the work. He's progressively revealed. And as I studied those 30 years I saw that he comes into my life to be a substitute. He comes into my life to do the work. And he is progressively revealed. And as I saw him as a fetus. And as I saw him as an infant. And I looked at my life and I see the development of Christ. This is my prayer. That Christ be firm in you. That's what we want to look at this weekend. And God helping us. The other day I was very moved. My wife is big on these Olympics. And I went into the room at the wrong time I guess. Because she was doing a little dig you know. And she's there you know she's watching the swim team. And she's watching the men's all around gymnastic and these people on these poles and all that kind of thing. And when I walked in she looked at me lit up and she said we won. We won. She's been doing that with the Red Sox lately too. We won. And see I've been meditating on this stuff. And I heard her say we won. She didn't even get wet. She wasn't in the pool. How could she identify with that? How could she say we won? She wasn't running. She wasn't lifting. She wasn't on the balance beam. But somehow she was able to identify with that and that became her team and her athlete. And she began to praise the athlete. And look at the preparation he did. And look at the form. And I'm listening. Because I've been studying representative. See I can enter into that because they're the soldiers. I see them as my representatives. I can enter into that. A little bit in sports. Not as much as my kids. But they can enter in. That's my team. Amazingly the one place I couldn't enter in is the House of Representatives. Somehow that. And so because Lilly was dancing around and entering in it hit me. And I asked her. This whole thing took place in Ireland and I asked her. If you had read about some athletic team two thousand years ago before our nation was a nation. If you had read that they represented something called the United States and they won the gold. Would you be dancing around right now? And she said no. And I began to think about how we look back at our Lord Jesus and all that he has done. And we're told to enter in. We're told to identify. We're told that he won and that should be our victory. And there's two thousand years in between and we're trying to appropriate and identify and enter in. And then it hit me. He was my substitute. He is my substitute. You know why she couldn't enter in? Because it was now. It wasn't then. It was now. That's called you to walk on a balance beam. You didn't know you were going to fall off. But he's not. He's going to be doing flips on your balance beam. Strange thing. Cow cows or whatever they call them. I don't know. It's him that's under those heavy weights. It's him tearing down the track. Now. Not then. Now. It's him. And if we could see him as our representative now. How we would cheer on that athlete now. And in the hour of temptation we'd say run Jesus run. It's him. It's his life. He's the substitute. He's the one lifting the weight. He's on the balance beam. He's swimming the course. He's the Christian life. It's him. And we would learn then to identify if we could see that. Now he lives in me as a substitute. As he did in that thirty years. We'll show you that. And how he walked then. He's come to do it again. He wants to live again. Now. Him. Our representative. For us. In our place. Instead of us. In exchange life. He comes in to live. To do the work. Now. And the way he does it is by being progressively formed in us. We want to see those stages. We want to watch Christ being formed in us. And we'll be able to see every step. Those stories are not just Christmas stories. It's God telling us how he wants to do now what he did then. As he came he comes. As he worked he works. As he was progressively manifest then he is progressively manifest now in our lives. So with that as an introduction we pray as we go through this weekend. As we look at these wonderful stories and we see Christ formed because we'll see him being formed in our life. To the place where he can then begin to minister. This is all preparation for that redemptive ministry where he pours himself out for the world. Well that's what's on my heart. And may God help us. Let's bow. Father thank you for your word. Not what we think we know about it but all that you know about it. Show us Christ our representative. Show us Christ the worker. And show us how Christ is formed in us. We ask in Jesus name. Amen.