An Outburst of Glory

You can turn in your Bibles to 1 Timothy 1.11. You may remember that last week we dealt with this verse as well. I'll just read, I know I'm picking up mid-stream in Paul's thought here, but 1 Timothy 1.11, in accordance with the gospel of the glory of the blessed God with which I have been entrusted. And I want us to think about the gospel and the ways that it does bring the glory of the blessed God into display because that's really why God saves sinners. We can look back from this whole thing before the foundations of the world and we can recognize that God had a plan. That plan had to do with sinners being rescued by Christ. That plan has been devised by God to put Himself on display in a way that He would never have been put on display if sin had never entered. We look at a sovereign God and oftentimes the place we start is saying, Wait, if God knew that sin was going to come, why even create man in the beginning? Or why not create man so that he was unable to sin? Weren't there angels that were called elect angels that never sinned? Certainly. Couldn't He have designed mankind to be elect from the beginning and never to have fallen at all? Certainly. Is God not strong enough to prevent sin? Certainly. If God can make sinners into saints, certainly He can keep pure people, unfallen people, from ever having fallen in the beginning. If He actually has devised a way to rescue that which is fallen and broken, ugly and defiled, and He can bring it to a place of beauty and restoration, certainly He could have prevented it from happening in the first place. But it was not God's intent nor His design to prevent it in the beginning. If it had been guaranteed, it would have been prevented. Men are not robots. Men have done what they have willingly wanted to do, and God has designed this thing that when men exercise their wills to do what they have wanted to do, such things have come to pass to accomplish God's purposes. And one of the things man willed in the very beginning was he willed to eat that fruit. And it has fallen out perfectly according to God's design. So that right there in the beginning, that fruit undoubtedly, the core of it still lay there on the ground somewhere when God says, the woman is going to have a seed that is going to crush the serpent's head. God has done this Gospel to put Himself on display. Last week, I wanted us to think about God's wisdom. How His wisdom is put on display. This week, I want to emphasize God's glory as a lawgiver. Listen, this is not a minor attribute of God as a lawgiver. In fact, brethren, sometimes I think we miss a reality in Scripture. Like for instance, just turn over to James 2. You may remember some things are said there about the law. You know about keeping the whole law but failing even in one point. You become accountable or guilty of all of it. James 2, let's read that. Verse 10, Whoever keeps the whole law, we have to remember, the law is God's law. God is a lawgiver. Whoever keeps the law that God gives but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it. James says, For he who said do not commit adultery also said do not murder. If you do not commit adultery but do murder, you've become a transgressor of the law. And sometimes we can start to think, well, how do I become guilty of murdering if I committed adultery? Or how do I become guilty of adultery if I've committed murder? How do I become accountable for all of it if I break it at one point? And we try to make these connections. Well, if I committed adultery, I probably hated the husband of that woman and so that's murder. You can try all that. But that's not the point. You see, the point is at the beginning of verse 11. You see the point? For he who said the one thing is exactly the same God who said the other thing. You see what the issue is? The issue is the lawgiver himself. You see, every law given by this God was given by this God. And so any time you break any one of these laws, you break His law. That's the issue. For he who said the one thing said the other. You can't take these commandments as separate from each other because ultimately they go back to the one and the same lawgiver. You see, one act of rebellion is always against Him no matter at what point that rebellion manifests itself. God repeatedly in Scripture is seen as a lawgiver. Very soon after the beginning of the creation there in Genesis, what do you see? You see a tree. A tree that He is not supposed to eat from. And we have a transgression by Adam in the very beginning. What did he transgress? Well, he transgressed a commandment given by God not to eat of that fruit. God commands His angels. We find that in Scripture. God commands men. If you just think about how much Scripture talks about the law, the commandments, about the statutes of God. Why? Because God is a God who communicates. And He communicates His will for us, for His angels, for His creation. He communicates what that will is. And we call that law God communicating His will to us about what He wants us to do, what He does not want us to do. He doesn't just create this whole creation and just let the thing run crazy. He has laws. He is a God of order. He is a God of righteousness. You remember the commandments. They have certain qualities about themselves. What sort of qualities? Well, the same qualities of God Himself. Why? Because they come from Him. They're expressions of His will. You should not be surprised that you find that God's law is holy. You should not be surprised at that. Because the God who gave them is holy. You can't separate what a person says from who they are. Sometimes we talk about the law, but we talk about it almost as though it's disconnected from God. But it's not disconnected. That's the issue. You break one, that's the God who gave that commandment that's really the issue in all of it. God presents Himself in Scripture as a lawgiver. Now, if you remember where we're at, we're actually in 1 Timothy 1.11, and what I want to talk about is the Gospel and the way that it brings the glory of God, not like last week, His wisdom, but this week as a lawgiver. I want us to think about that. So turn in your Bibles to Romans 5. Brethren, you know what? When we start talking about the Gospel, it can seem foolish. And Scripture talks about that. That's why we look at His wisdom, because on the surface, it looks foolish. This week, I want to talk about God as a lawgiver, because actually, at first glance, the Gospel seems to challenge God as a lawgiver. And yet, in reality, it actually puts Him as such on display in a really magnificent way. Now, notice Romans 5.19. Just dive in halfway through that verse. We have the comparison of Adam with Christ here, and I'm not so interested in Adam's disobedience, but let's look at Christ. Halfway through verse 19, by the one man's obedience, the many will be made righteous. Now, the law came in to increase the trespass. How? To make us more guilty. With the law comes light. With the law comes expression of God's will. You see, you can be out there doing wrong, you don't really know you're doing wrong, and then God says, don't do that. Now, suddenly, your rebellion is confronted by, wow, God has spoken. God has been clear. God has given certain precepts and statutes to govern my life, and now when I rebel, I do it against that much more light, so my transgression is that much more aggravated. That's the idea. The law comes in to increase the trespass. You see, from Adam until Moses, what do you have? You have a trespass committed by Adam against a commandment not to eat a certain fruit. But then what you find is all the way from Adam to Moses, people kept dying while they're connected to Adam. That's true. But you know what? When Moses comes along and He gives a law to mankind, now suddenly He makes us like little Adams. Now we have our own law that we disobey. Now we're confronted by God says, thou shalt and thou shalt not, and we rise up in rebellion against that very real, very stark expression of God's will for us. It aggravates sin. The child may be doing wrong. Then you tell that child, don't do that. Now when he does it, it's aggravated. Why? Because now he's heard the words of his parent. He's got real clarity on where that line is drawn, and transgression is when we cross that line. And it's aggravated. It increases the trespass. But here's the thing. Because of this one man's obedience, because of that, where sin increased, no matter how aggravated it becomes, no matter how much it's increased, no matter how much the guilt is multiplied, grace abounded all the more because of the merits of what Christ and His obedience did. No matter how sin increases, the grace is greater than all my sin we sing. Brethren, do you recognize? We can go out into this world of filth and depravity and unimaginable wretchedness, and we can tell people what Paul told people. What can we tell them? No matter how great your sin is, you say, but you don't know the things I've done. We just heard John Sitesmith said that they have made contact with a pastor in Rayonosa who formerly was a cartel member. And he has opened doors to preach the Gospel to the cartel. And some of these guys are saying to him, but you don't know how many people I've murdered. But you see what this is saying? No matter how great that sin is, no matter how increased it is, grace abounds more. We've got a Gospel like that because of the value of what Jesus Christ did in His obedience. That grace that draws on the merits of what Christ did is greater still. And so without any effort of your own, without any goodness on your part, without any law keeping on your behalf, but solely based on the obedience of another man, you can be declared righteous by faith in that man. Brethren, God looks on the obedience of His Son and says that's more than valuable for whatever you've done. It's always above. It's always beyond. It's always one step ahead. You cannot have done enough. Don't you be ever so much this ungodly sinner. You have to remember what He says back in chapter 4 of this very same epistle. He speaks there about God justifying the ungodly. Based on the obedience of one, many are declared righteous. That's the issue. Absolutely free. Absolutely of grace. It's unmerited. Brethren, if we preach that message accurately, full, free salvation, no goodness on your part required. Brethren, if we preach that accurately, it should stop people in their tracks. It really should. It should cause people to accuse us of something. Actually, to accuse us of the same things Paul got accused of. People say, you know what? You can't tell a message like that to people. You can't say that. That's dangerous. Why? Because what it says is this, you're telling me that after all the things I've done, God's grace abounds more. It's higher. It's bigger. It's able to answer to everything I've done. Yep, that's what I'm saying. What if I was guilty of one more sin? Would it still be sufficient? Yes, it abounds more. What about if I do two more sins? Ten more? What if I'm twice as guilty? What if I've done far more horrific things? What if my sin was vastly more aggravated? Yes. Yes. God's grace still abounds more. And you know what? Is that true? Is it true? You better believe it's true. That's our hope for the chief of sinners out there. Absolutely, it's true. And so the accusation comes. That teaching instills, and it will instill the idea that we can disregard God's law because it gives us no incentive whatsoever to obey. Right? I mean, isn't that an accusation that comes? Where's the incentive to obey? If you're saying your obedience plays no part in your salvation, it's only based on the obedience of another man. Where's the incentive for holiness? Where's the incentive for obedience? In fact, will it not give people the exact opposite incentive to say if grace abounds more, then I can just live loose? It doesn't matter. Holiness doesn't matter. I'm not accepted on that basis anyway. Brethren, that's real. The Gospel at first glance seems like it gives no incentive to obedience. You see what I'm saying? Look, this tremendously good news created a problem for Paul. And if we preach it like him, it's going to create the same problem for us. Brethren, you think about this. The terrible thing about sin, like James was showing us, why do you break the whole thing if you break the law at one point? Because he who said the one is the same who said the other. Brethren, the thing about sin is that it is rebellion against God. It is man shaking his fist at God. It is man defying God. You can say, I don't feel like I'm doing that. Maybe your fist isn't actually raised. But when God says don't do this, He draws that line. To transgress means to cross over. You cross over the boundary that God has set. And that's rebellion. He says don't cross that fence. Don't cross that line. No trespassing. And we trespass. No trespassing means don't come on this land. And we go on that land that He's forbidden. Just like Adam ate that fruit, he was forbidden. We go where we're forbidden to go. Or we don't stay where we've been charged to stay. Brethren, we hear this so often, it comes off our tongue. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. But you have to recognize what that means. Brethren, the idea behind that, that's the real wickedness of sin. Sin is a depreciation of God's glory. Here, the most spectacular, the most majestic, the most beautiful, the most valuable, the most worthy being ever imagined expresses His will to really very insignificant creatures of His whom He created and has every right to dictate to how we live. And we look up at Him in defiance. Don't cross that line. Like that little kid that, you know, don't touch that. We do that. And our children do that, but that's us. And it's not always just hesitatingly. A lot of times, we just grab it. What are you going to do about it? And you know what? He doesn't do anything immediately, so we become emboldened to do it again and again and again. That is the real wickedness. It depreciates the glory of God. It spits on God. Do you see what happens? Brethren, when God passes over my sin, in the Gospel, when God pardons my sin, when He passes over it as though I have not sinned, when in fact I have sinned, do you know what it looks like? Do you know what it appears to be? It looks like God is saying that His glory doesn't really matter very much to Him. That's what it feels like. Seriously, you're going to let a guy like that just slide? I mean, if you really understand, that guy was in rebellion against you. You're just going to let him slide? It makes God look as if God cares more about sinners than He does about His own glory. That's what it looks like. Brethren, it looks like He cares very little whether His law is honored or not. It makes God look as though He's not being true to Himself. It makes God call into question whether God is really interested in preserving His own glory. That's what it looks like. Brethren, I want you to think about God's honor when it comes to the law. Think about God's honor as a lawgiver. If He gives a law to you, and you look at Him, you recognize who He is, and He has given you a law, and you become totally consumed, totally preoccupied with obedience to that law because He gave it, you invest all your heart and all your soul and all your mind and all your strength to respectfully and reverently, meticulously, obey His law through and through at every single point. Out of love, out of fear, you tremble at His Word. You love Him. You don't just fear Him like a slave driver. You love Him. You fear Him reverently like a father. Your whole heart is given to Him. See, if you give a law to somebody and they respect it and honor it and obey it in that fashion, the lawgiver is honored. Think about the other side. If that God gives a law, He gives it to mankind. And mankind looks at it and says, No. And that lawbreaker is swiftly thrown into the fires of hell. Not for a day. Not for an hour. Not for a year. Not for a thousand years. But He is thrown into the hellfire of outer darkness. And He is thrown where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth, and He will never come forth until the last bit of that debt is paid, which can never be paid, because He's insulted a God of vast honor and glory. And He will suffer, and the smoke of His torment will go up forever and forever and forever and forever and forever. And as people see that, the redeemed look on that, and they say, Wow, that is a lawgiver. You do not want to dishonor. Brethren, when that happens, the lawgiver is honored. You see in both cases, He's greatly honored. Oh, but when full, free pardon is extended to lawbreakers, a salvation that may be had as a gift, simply by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. The question is, does that make us, at first glance, feel like God as a lawgiver is greatly to be feared? Greatly to be respected? Taken seriously? No, at first glance, and don't you find this to be true? I find people all over this world that seem to have this idea that since Jesus Christ saves, God's a pushover when it comes to disobeying Him. Don't you find that attitude? I find it. Friends, I had that attitude. Well, God is a God of mercy. God is a God of grace. God sent His Son. We expect God to send His Son into this world to die for us because we think so highly of ourselves. And we so diminish God as a lawgiver. We think that because He's willing to send His Son, we are so valuable that He'll do anything and everything to keep us out of hell. And we've got it so wrong. It's so backward. Brethren, it is assumed that God does not take His own honor very seriously. But I'll tell you this, all you have to do is read your Bible. I can remember as a new believer reading my Bible and just coming across account after account after account in Scripture where God did take His honor very seriously and dropped men dead in the spot because they dishonored Him. Sometimes like Uzzah, even unknowingly. Bang! He's dead. Whoa! David was afraid. He was angry, but he was afraid. And I'll tell you, this God is to be feared. Breaking His laws should be something that we consider a very, very, very serious matter. But we basically have a mindset in the world today that takes God as a lawgiver as a cheap thing. Brethren, you read your Bibles and you find that God drops Ananias and Sapphira dead and in the ground very quickly because they lied to the Holy Spirit. You find 70,000 men are killed because David was going to number the people. You find that the two eldest sons of Aaron are struck dead in a moment because they thought to get innovative in the offerings. Brethren, I'll tell you, God is not to be played with. One man, one time, sins on one day by taking a bite out of a fruit He's not supposed to. And look, you can look at what just happened in San Bernardino. You can look at what's happening around the world and trace it all the way back to that bite. Brethren, it unleashed such things in this world. God is serious. It brought condemnation upon the whole race. God is serious about His honor as a lawgiver. Serious. You talk about something that He guards with the utmost jealousy, He guards His honor. You ever read Malachi? He did not take it lightly that they offered to Him blemished sacrifices. You ever read Job? Even righteous Job, when he begins to even put a hint of a shadow of question upon the character of God? God does not toy with mankind who dishonors Him, even when it's one of His favorites. The rebuke is swift and strong. Brethren, we serve a God who guards His honor with the utmost jealousy. And oh, I tell you what, to be a lawbreaker and step in front of this God on judgment day, a holy terror, absolutely terrifying. But you know what? Paul says that the Gospel is the Gospel of the glory of the blessed God. The Gospel seems like God isn't really as interested in His glory as He ought to be, as we know Him to be, because He's just pardoning sinners, radical disobedience to the law. But you know what Paul says? Paul says, because he anticipates this kind of thing, especially in the Roman letter, and he says this in Romans 3.31, Do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By our Gospel? By believing on Christ? Do we overthrow the law? And he says this, by no means, God forbid. On the contrary, we uphold the law. Now you remember, the law. What does the law require? The law requires absolute obedience. The law commands perfect obedience to all the commandments, all the time, not one breach of anything ever written in the book of the law to do them, because if you violate even at one point, you're under a curse. Even to the slightest degree. You know what happens? We find the law comes with commanding power. Do this, and live. Do this, and it comes with condemning power. Cursed is everyone who does not abide by everything written in the book of the law to do it. Commanding power. Condemning power. That's what we find in the law. And what have you and I done? We've trashed God's commandments 10 million times over. Oh brethren, we are so hell worthy. And for God to be able to say to us lawbreakers, fear not, there is no condemnation for any of you that are in Christ Jesus. Brethren, it's very difficult to measure difficulty when it comes to God, but you know this is what Romans 3 is about. How God can be just and yet justify sinners. This is the most difficult thing in the gospel that God is confronted with in devising a way to save sinners. This is the issue. How do you do this? Because it seems like God is setting aside the law, both in its commanding power, we break it, it's condemning power, we're let free. How does faith uphold either end of the law? And He says no, doesn't overturn it, doesn't undo it. He says this faith, it upholds it. It upholds it in both cases. In both. We establish and uphold the law in all respects if we're saved by Jesus Christ. Well how? Well remember 5.19 again. How? By one man's obedience. By one man's obedience. Do you see that? The man Jesus put an honor upon the law. How? By being born of a woman, coming under the law, keeping the law, fulfilling all righteousness. John, we've got to fulfill all righteousness. His Father can look at Him, I'm well pleased. He kept it at all the minutest points. And think about it. What does God demand? That we love Him with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength. You know what that means? That's what Christ did. Without reserve, with every ounce of His energy, never was there a momentary lapse, not at all. He fulfilled God's law to its fullest expectation. Well pleased the Father could look at Him. He obeyed. He fulfilled. But there's more. We know that He obeyed, but we have to consider the extent of His obedience. You know what Philippians 2, verse 8 says? That He was obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. First, He honors the law in its commanding authority. He comes under it. He keeps it to perfection. I mean, as a little boy playing with his buddies, kept it to perfection. Always living with respect and with regard to what His Father delighted in. Always. And every moment. And as His suffering became more intimidating, as it became more daunting, He still pressed through. He learned greater obedience and greater obedience in the face of His sufferings. And He pressed on and He was obedient even to the point of giving up His life. First, He honors that commanding authority by obeying the law to its utmost possible extent. And then, He goes further. He also honors that law in its condemning power. He dies. But brethren, there's more. There's more. I don't know how best to describe this. I want to be able to communicate it to you and help you to feel what I'm feeling in the best way that I know how is this. Have you ever noticed, people can pay a high price for something that they're buying? And as I think about it, there's one of two reasons why you pay a lot for something. First, you may pay a lot for something because of its intrinsic value. For instance, a man may pay a million dollars for a new heart. It's that valuable. A man may pay a million dollars for that great big house because it's that valuable. But you know, I've read where a man paid three million dollars for a baseball. I've read where $115,000 were paid for the lock of hair off a certain man's head. In that case, we don't pay a lot for the intrinsic value of the item. Why do we pay a lot? Because that baseball belonged to Mark McGuire. It was his 70th. Because that lock of hair belonged to Elvis Presley. You see, here's the thing. In the first case, if you pay more and more and more, what's honored? The thing itself. In the second case, if you pay more and more and more, the thing itself isn't honored. The person to whom it belonged is honored. You see that? Brethren, the issue here is we sinners are bought with a price. But the price set for us did not have to do with our intrinsic worth. Because if you read Scripture, you know what it says we were worth? Worth less. That's what Scripture says. Worth less. You see, so often sinners go wrong at this point. If the price to ransom us goes up and up and up, it's not like the first scenario. It's not because our intrinsic value must be that high. Brethren, the reason the price goes up and up and up, it's not a reflection of our value. The higher the price paid, the more it does honor to the one offended. You see, that's the issue here. That's what we have to recognize. The blood of bulls and goats. Brethren, just on one occasion when they dedicated the temple, it says that they were sacrificing beyond count. In 1,500 years under the old covenant, can you imagine how many millions of bulls and goats and sheep were sacrificed? The number of pigeons and turtle doves were sacrificed. And brethren, for all of that, the author of Hebrews says, it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. Why? Because it does not duly reflect the honor of the one offended. And no matter how many sacrificial animals were laid on that altar, it never duly satisfied God. You say maybe we need something greater. Maybe we can go find an archangel that's spotless, unblemished, flying around the throne of God. Brethren, the thing that we have to recognize is no creature has that value. It's not costly enough to magnify God's law sufficiently. Brethren, do you imagine that God would do such things as He did to His only Son if there was any cheaper way to pay the price? He did this to His Son. His Son. The Son from His own bosom. The Son in which He took delight. The Son who is more precious to Him than anything else. Do you imagine that God would ever have sent His only begotten Son to the cross if He could have duly honored Himself as a lawgiver any other way? Would God have poured? Brethren, Psalm 22, the soul is poured out like water. Listen, to have love for somebody and see them suffer is to suffer. You will spare them. According to the measure of your love, you will sacrifice of yourself to spare that one from suffering. And yet, in all of God's love, He could watch His own Son in such agonies that it's like His soul becomes liquid. All the substance goes out of it. He's melted under the sufferings of the vials of God's wrath and it's poured out. Do you think God would have abandoned Christ to that experience? The shame. The shame of it all. To die like a criminal. This is God the Son co-equal in glory. I had the glory with the Father before the foundation of this world, sitting on thrones, being bowed down to by the creatures that He has created, and to suffer such shame. God had never known that shame ever in His existence. Unthinkable! And then to be forsaken of God. The infinite worth of Jesus dying on that cross. I'll tell you, brethren, you want to know the seriousness of our law-breaking? You gaze at that cross and you see the wrath of God and you see the tremendous agony that Jesus faced even in the days before, in the time before, the months before, the agony that He was pressed with in this coming judgment, falling upon His own head. This thing, terrible seriousness, is displayed of man's rebellion against God as a lawgiver. The crushing of the Son of God shows how serious God takes this. If one who is His own fellow, the very radiance of His own glory, the one who is His delight, if He's willing to turn His back on that Son of His and pour out His wrath full measure, what will He do to sinners who trample on that blood, who trample on that offering, and just in their pride, boldly sprint towards that judgment day as though they're going to be able to stand there as lawbreakers on their own merits, having rejected Christ to the extent of His sufferings? Brethren, a man rightly instructed about God and His law will come to grips with this. The fact that you have insulted the law and the giver of that law, brethren, what do you think? What do you think? Do you think God's going to allow you because of some partial effort on your part to keep the law in the best of your ability, to the best of your power, and to be as good as you can be? Brethren, any attempts partial and worthless, if you think that that's going to answer the demands of God's law according to what His honor is worth, brethren, that is the height of foolishness to think that you're going to survive before God. Is God merciful? Yes, He is. But I'll tell you this, He shows His mercy to mankind only in a way that is going to fully exalt Himself as a lawgiver. And He did it by Jesus Christ coming and perfectly honoring that law and perfectly draining the dregs of God's wrath, facing the condemnation that's demanded by that. He honored it on both respects. It's commanding authority. It's condemning authority. But then, to us the lawbreaker, the price paid is so high. I mean, you can imagine this. You can imagine this. I desire to magnify My mercy to free these lawbreakers, to let them go free, to pardon their sin. But I've given a law and if I'm going to be honored as the lawgiver, well, how high does that price have to be? If the price is down here, my honor as a lawgiver is not very high. But if you up it, up it, up it, up it, up it, the higher that price goes, the more the lawgiver is honored. And brethren, I'll ask you this, is there a higher price that could have been offered when the highest imaginable price available anywhere in this world is paid? An infinite value. Then the lawgiver can say, I'm honored. I'm honored to free them when such a price has been paid. Even God Himself. God incarnate. This is Emmanuel. This is the one we have the honor of saying. He came. He came among us. Brethren, you don't want to plead any of your own law keeping. Your only hope on that day can be this one man's obedience. Lord, from the time You saved me, I hungered and thirsted after righteousness. But I was like those little children that John wrote to. Little children, I write to you that you don't sin, but if you do, and Lord, I was one of them that did. And oh, I took hope. I took courage. My trust was in the fact that Jesus Christ the righteous made propitiation. I had an advocate with you. Lord, my confidence is on His obedience. On His fulfilling of the law. That's my trust. I cling to Him. No other way. His perfect obedience to the law. It's that obedience that's performed by another. The Lord Jesus Christ is the end of law for righteousness. That's what Scripture says. That's my hope, Lord. Because I know what I deserve. I trust you can all grasp how the Gospel provides for the honor of the law and the lawgiver. Not only by showing that it's been honored by obedience and sufferings of our incarnate God, but by requiring a ransom price for the lawbreaker on the lawbreaker's behalf that has such value that no higher value can even be imagined. I mean, brethren, you should not want the Gospel to accomplish your rescue if God's honor would be jeopardized. I can remember coming under conviction and I came face to face with, God needs to throw me into hell. I deserve it. Brethren, we should want to defend God's glory, God's honor at every step. And that's why Paul's so delighted in this Gospel. He can say, that's the thing about many of these things. If we're talking about God's power, if we're talking about God as a lawgiver, if we're talking about God's wisdom, I mean, on and on, it's like he designed the Gospel so that to the unaided eye, at first glance, it doesn't seem to be wise, it seems to be foolish. At first glance, it doesn't seem to honor Him as a lawgiver, it seems to dishonor Him. At first glance, it doesn't seem to be any expression of power, it seems to be an expression of weakness. But you see, God designed it like that. That's just at first glance. But when you really begin to look into the depths of it, you begin to recognize, wow, wow, wow. God put Himself on display in a magnificent way as a lawgiver. Brethren, we should tremble for lawbreakers who do not know our Lord Jesus Christ. God will not deal with such lawbreakers slightly. And those who are involved in our lives, Jesus told the 72 who went out preaching the Gospel, those people you go and preach that Gospel to who refuse and reject you, are going to be more tolerable for Sodom in the day of judgment than for those people. Brethren, we should tremble. The people you talk to out here in this world, if they lightly and glibly press on towards judgment day, if you sit in this church under a false profession, don't be deceived. Don't be deceived. Judgment day will be a terror to you unimaginable. And if you think because God showed kindness and mercy in the execution of His Son, that He will therefore deal with you lightly on that day, don't believe it. Because what will be the reality is, in addition to all the commandments you broke, you despised His Son and would not repent. When you were called upon by Him and commanded to repent and called upon to believe on His Son, that His Son is the Christ, the Son of the living God who came into this world to save sinners. And you very boldly and arrogantly and pridefully went on in your way without Christ's righteousness as a covering, without trusting Him. Bold to stand before God having despised His Son. I tell you, it will be more tolerable for the sodomites than for you. For those who had sex, tried to have sex with angels, it will be more tolerable because God in His jealousy for His broken law will smite you with such exact justice as will send you hurling into hell forever. And the smoke of your torment will go up forever and you will suffer and you will suffer. And it will be wailing and weeping and gnashing of teeth. And you will despise yourself that such a Christ who honored the perfections of the law was set before you. Such a price was paid and you turned your back on it and said, I would rather stand there in my own efforts and my own religion and my own righteousness and I will bet my soul on it that it will go well. You guys go overboard with your Christ and I'm going to stand there in my religion, in my effort and all I can say is, woe unto you. It will be horrific, the horrors of hell and all. What torment to know that in all the history of mankind, in all the places I could have been born, I came into contact with the truth and I spurned it. I just counted those people at that church radicals. They went overboard. No, we're not going overboard. No, brethren, when we make a big deal out of what Christ did, when we make a big deal out of this Gospel, there's a reason. Because there aren't multiple ways for your soul to be saved. Multiple ways, wide, broad, if you would be destroyed. But the way to life, the gate is narrow. There's one way. Jesus Christ is the way, the truth and the life. There is no other way to the Father except through Him. By way of faith in Him, in His obedience. And I tell you, to stand there in that day robed with Christ's righteousness, God will look at you and He as a lawgiver, He will be so honored and satisfied in every conceivable way. The lawbreaker is brought in to dwell forever in the favor of God and the smile of God. Because total and perfect satisfaction is made. Brethren, this just exalts the law and the lawgiver in a way that nothing else could. Father, we pray for mercy. Lord, You designed this. You gave man a way of escape, a way out. Through the obedience of one, the many will be made righteous. Oh Lord, I pray that there would be many in this room that would make up the many that are found to be righteous through the obedience of another. Lord, grant repentance to the Gentiles of this city as well as to those other places where it was granted. Lord, arise in Your might, in Your sovereignty, in Your glory. Lord, speak a word of command. You are the God who commands. You are the lawgiver. Father, we pray that such a commandment would be given to save many in the city of San Antonio. Give commandment to save. We pray this for the glory of Christ, for the glory of You as a lawgiver. Amen.