And Father, as we now come to your Word, we pray that you will bless the preaching of your Word. Father, who am I but a mere man? I can do nothing. I'm powerless apart from your work. So I pray that you would use my efforts to faithfully preach your Word, to grow us in Christ-likeness, to encourage us, to convict us, to instruct us. We know that Your Word is sufficient, inerrant, inspired, infallible, unassailable, that it's profitable for teaching, reproof, correction, and training in righteousness. So, Lord, we pray that Your Word would not return to You void today. We pray that You would teach us, that You would use Your Word to shape us and mold us in the likeness of Christ our Savior. For His glory, in His name we pray. Amen. Well, if you have your Bibles with you, please turn to John chapter 19. We're going to be looking at verses 23 and 24 today. I had planned on getting to verse 27, but when you see how much stuff is in these two verses, especially with the connection to Psalm 22, which you'll also want to have a thumb in, by the way. We'll be referencing Psalm 22 quite a bit. if you have your Bibles with you. But yeah, there is so much in these two verses. I mean, there's no question that the atonement of Christ is the most significant aspect of the entire Bible, right? It's the main event, so to speak, in the entire Bible. It's the most significant aspect of the crucifixion of Christ, the atonement. And when we refer to the atonement, we're talking about the very reason that Jesus humbled himself by taking on flesh and living among us. So here we're getting into the Christmas spirit. We're talking about the reason for the season, the reason that Jesus took on flesh. The primary reason that he took on flesh was so that he could live a perfect sinless life all in order that he could present himself on Calvary. as the only sacrifice for sin that is actually able to cleanse all who believe on him of guilt and of sin. Of course, this is the doctrine that is front and center whenever we're talking about the crucifixion, and that is right where it belongs. Remember that that is the significance of it. But if you want to know what other aspects of the crucifixion are important or are significant, I'd say that probably the next one in line, the next most significant aspect of the cross is the fulfillment of prophecy. One of the ways that Jesus is foretold of or foreshadowed in the Old Testament is through very specific prophecies that the Messiah would fulfill. In fact, there's a scholar by the name of J. Barton Payne that has found that there are at least 574 verses that point to, either explicitly or implicitly, the coming of the Messiah and the work that He would accomplish. And so conservatively speaking, I would say that Jesus fulfilled at least, and possibly more, at least 300 very specific prophecies in the course of his life on earth. I mean, there are volumes and volumes of books written on this very subject. But what's interesting to note is that at least 28 of those prophecies that we find in the Old Testament, at least 28 of them were fulfilled on the day of the crucifixion. So there's a lot that goes on on this day, on the day of the crucifixion, that was very specifically foretold in the Old Testament. And the reason that this is significant is because it reminds us that the crucifixion of Christ, the atonement that Christ offered on behalf of sins, was not plan B. that it was His plan all along, that Jesus' death was neither accidental nor was it incidental, but that it had been orchestrated down to some of the most minute and irrelevant, you would think, details imaginable from eternity past by our all-knowing, all-wise, all-powerful God. Now, as we've noted in previous lessons, it was for this reason that we can say that Jesus' death wasn't a tragedy, but in Christ submitting His will to the Father's will. It was triumph. It was triumph that Christ submitted His human nature to the will of the Father, even until the very end. And fulfilled prophecy is one of those things that proves this. Prophecy said it would happen, then it happens, it proves, okay. That was God's plan that this would happen. And so to that end, John is very careful to include a few very important prophetic details. In fact, between verses 23 and 37, John tells us of four things that fulfilled very important prophecies. And we come to the first of those four in our text today. But before we start, I just want to make note of the fact that I am very aware of the fact that there are so many ministries out there, several ministries out there, that focus very heavily on studying the fulfillment of prophecy and yet they sort of seem to lose the thing that makes prophecy important. And so I just want to underscore the importance of it for you. Jesus was faithful to remain in the Father's will until the end. That's how we know the prophecy was fulfilled. By looking at Jesus' life. And so to that end, Jesus, and only Jesus, fulfills these very specific prophecies in which He voluntarily subjected Himself to abandonment by His closest friends, the feeling of being abandoned by the Father, the torment of having God's holy and righteous wrath poured out on Him to atone for the sins of His people, all so that God's plan of redemption will be fulfilled perfectly in Christ. and by Christ. But the point of prophecy, and this is the point that I'm afraid a lot of those ministries that focus on fulfilled prophecy miss out on. The point of prophecy is that because we can see that God has been faithful to His plans and purposes of redemption, we not only can stand on and trust in His promises, but friends, we must stand on them. We must stand on His promises. Fulfilled prophecy proves that we can trust in God, who ordains everything that comes to pass, down to the smallest, down to the most insignificant, seemingly insignificant, down to the most minute details. Now the first of these final four prophecies that John records for us is the prophecy relating to the Roman soldiers who crucified him and how they would cast lots for his clothes. So we read this in verses 23 and 24 of John chapter 19. Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took his outer garments and made four parts, a part to every soldier and also the tunic. Now the tunic was seamless, woven in one piece. So they said to one another, let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to decide whose it shall be. This was to fulfill the scripture. They divided my outer garments among them and for my clothing they cast lots. Do you see how specific John is? He wants to make sure we don't miss this. He wants to make sure that we see that this insignificant event, the distribution of his clothes, casting lots for his tunic, that this is fulfilled prophecy. See, if this wasn't an event that had been prophesied, we wouldn't even take notice of it. John probably wouldn't have even included it. The other gospel authors probably wouldn't have included it. Because it's not that significant of a detail if it was not specifically prophesied. It's not significant that the soldiers cast lots for Jesus's clothes in and of itself. They did that for countless prisoners who were crucified. It's only significant because the Old Testament specifically said that this would happen. And it said that this would happen way, a thousand plus years before it actually happened, way before the practice of crucifixion was even invented. But what that shows us is that God is sovereign over every single detail, including the details that really aren't all that exciting or significant on their own? Because this was something that the soldiers did in accordance with their own free will, right? So God is sovereign, so sovereign that it was impossible for this not to take place. And yet these soldiers weren't forced to do this. The soldiers freely chose to do this. So once again, we're confronted with the reality that God is sovereign and yet man is responsible for his own actions. Now historians and scholars that specialize in this specific era, this specific time frame, tell us that the typical Jew in Jesus' time would actually wear five clothing garments, a loincloth, a tunic, shoes, a turban or a scarf, and then an outer robe. In this instance of what we see, when we see that Jesus was wearing five garments most likely, is that that equates to one clothing garment per soldier who crucified Christ with only one thing left over, that being the tunic. Because the tunic was one seamless piece, They decided to not rip it up, not to divide it among them, but to leave it in one piece and to just cast lots to determine which soldier would be taking his tunic home that day. Little did they know that if they would have just held on to that, you could put that on eBay for a lot of money eventually. Don't do this right now, but wait until you get home or wait until this afternoon or something. But if you were to Google the words, what is the significance of the tunic of Christ being seamless? You'll find some very wild answers, some very odd answers. The first answer, and again, don't do this now, do it when you get home. The first answer that will pop up says this. It says, quote, it is often taken to symbolize the unity of the church and certainly tearing a garment by a prophet was seen as a sign of disunity. End quote. Now, interestingly, that was actually the interpretation of Cyprian, who lived in the third century AD, when Martin Luther started the Reformation. That's what they accused him of, of tearing the tunic of Christ. But around that same time as Cyprian, Origen taught that it represented the wholeness of Christ's teaching, or the unity of Christ's teaching. throughout the history of the church all kinds of very strange explanations have been given to explain the significance of his tunic being one solid piece. So which is it? What is the significance? Is it the unity of the church? Is it the unity of Christ's teaching? What is it? It's none of these things, if you ask me. It's none of these things. And why do I say that? I say that because John doesn't attach any significance to it. He's just letting us know that the reason they didn't cut it up is because it was a seamless piece, so the soldiers decided to send it home with only one of the men that day. Where does the text allow us to start allegorizing and saying, this represents this or that? How do you specifically draw that connection? And the answer is, you can't. You can't specifically draw that connection. And so Richard Phillips warns us of this tendency to allegorize details like this one by writing this. He says, quote, noting the tendency for gross subjectivism in such allegories, we do better to avoid this kind of interpretation altogether when it is not specifically warranted by the text, end quote. And so the question is, is this allegorical interpretation of the seamless tunic of Christ, is the allegorization of it warranted by the text? And the answer is no. And I hope that makes good sense to you because this is one of the very, very basic principles of interpretation. Don't make a bigger deal out of a detail than the text allows. But back to our text here. The fact that these Roman soldiers cast lots for this seamless tunic of Christ is only significant because God told us ahead of time that this would be part of Christ's experience on that day. So where do we find that prophecy in the Old Testament? And my first answer to that is, I'm glad you asked. You should be asking that. I think that's what John wants us to be asking. It's from Psalm 22. In Psalm 22 verse 18 we read this, they divide my garments among them and for my clothing they cast lots. The fact that John refers to this detail as the fulfillment of Scripture, of Psalm 22 specifically, tells us that this psalm, Psalm 22, is really about Jesus as the one who was suffering, whose suffering was foreshadowed by David's suffering in some circumstance in which David suffered and wrote this psalm. Little did the soldiers know that this simple act that they did probably every day of dividing Jesus' garments and casting lots for His tunic, little did they know that that served to identify Jesus as the true and as the better David of Psalm 22, who suffers unto death for the sake of God's people in accordance with God's purposes and promises. David is the one who wrote Psalm 22. And as such, he's probably the one who sang it first. He probably sang it first when he was king of Israel. But the words of Psalm 22 were true of Jesus also. which echoes the reality that Christ is the greater King who was promised to come from the line of David. Now, it's important to note that the Gospels record Jesus as having spoken seven things from the cross. The first thing that he says and the sixth thing that he says are straight from Psalm 22. Mark tells us that darkness fell on the land while Christ was on the cross, which obscured man's ability to see the spiritual torment that Jesus endured as God's wrath was poured out on Him. But Matthew tells us that when the time of darkness had nearly passed, Jesus cried out, That's in Matthew 27, 46. And this is actually also from Psalm 22, verse 1. It's exactly what David wrote at the beginning of Psalm 22. And then, just prior to yielding his spirit into the Father's hands, Jesus quoted from the end of Psalm 22, the last verse of the psalm, where David wrote, he has performed it. It's from verse 31 of Psalm 22. Now it's possible to translate the Hebrew, he has performed it, the same way that Jesus did when he said, it is finished. What this tells us is that because Jesus quoted both the beginning and the end of Psalm 22, the first verse and the last verse, not only is Psalm 22 a depiction of what Jesus experienced while on the cross, but He was probably thinking about the same things that are recorded throughout Psalm 22. That He was forsaken. that he was crushed, that he was surrounded by his enemies, that he was executed, but that in all of this, he knew that it was necessary in order for God's purposes moving into the future to be fulfilled. So listen to what we read in Psalm 22. Starting in verses 6 through 8, we read this. But I am a worm and not a man, a reproach of men, and despised by the people. All who see me sneer at me. They separate with the lip. They wag the head, saying, commit yourself to the Lord. Let him deliver him. Let him rescue him, because he delights in him." Now isn't that interesting? Doesn't that sound familiar? In fact, it's very familiar. This is expressing not only the feeling of being forsaken that Jesus endured, but also the taunts that he endured by those who were there and who threw all kinds of insults and taunts in his face on that day. Matthew 27, verses 41-43 says, In the same way, the chief priests also, along with the scribes and elders, were mocking Him, saying, He saved others, He cannot save Himself. He is the King of Israel. Let Him now come down from the cross, and we will believe in Him. He trusts in God. Let God rescue Him now, if He delights in Him. For He said, I am the Son of God. Now isn't it interesting that they are using the exact same taunts that David wrote about in Psalm 22. And of course the reason that he didn't save himself, the reason that Jesus didn't bring himself down from the cross, of course, was that it was not the Father's will that he be rescued from this physical and spiritual hour of torment. Rather, it was the Father's perfect, righteous, holy will that Christ experience the fullness of His wrath against the sins of His people without even a drop of grace, without even a drop of relief, in order that His people may experience the fullness of God's grace without even a drop of wrath and without even a drop of condemnation against them. We've already seen the scorn of the people, but that was really nothing. It's not that Christ hadn't experienced scorn before. It wasn't that nobody had ever experienced scorn before. The real suffering was enduring the scorn of God. People suffer the rejection of men, they suffer the scorn of men every day. I imagine that every person in existence who grows up experiences this at one time or another, the rejection of men, the scorn of men. But to consciously endure the scorn of wrath, to consciously endure God crushing him, No man in all of human history, nobody has ever experienced that and lived to tell about it. We saw that in Psalm 22 verse 6, David wrote, I am a worm. and not a man. Richard Phillips explains how this relates to Jesus, writing this, he says, to release the dye, the animal was crushed so that its blood would flow out." End quote. And James Montgomery Boyce adds this, he says, quote, when Jesus thought of himself as the Tola, he thought of himself as the worm who is crushed for God's people. His blood was shed for us so that we might be clothed in bright raiment. End quote. Of course this crushing The father crushing the son is exactly what Isaiah had said the Messiah would endure. Isaiah says in Isaiah 53 verse 10, but the Lord was pleased to crush him. putting him to grief. What this means, friends, is that in addition to the physical agony of being crucified, Jesus endured an exponentially greater agony wherein he was spiritually crushed under the weight of God's holy and righteous wrath against the sins of those whom Christ came to redeem. As one reads through Psalm 22, the overwhelmingly clear theme of that psalm is the grief that David, as the author, experienced over those who wanted to see him dead. In verses 12 to 18, he writes, many bulls have surrounded me, strong bulls of Bashan have encircled me. They open wide their mouth at me as a ravening and as a roaring lion. I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax, it is melted within me. My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue cleaves to my jaws. And you lay me in the dust of death, for dogs have surrounded me. A band of evildoers has encompassed me. They pierced my hands and my feet. I can count all my bones. They look. They stare at me. They divide my garments among them. And for my clothing they cast lots." I mean, as you go through this and compare it to what happened on Calvary, it's astounding. It is truly amazing how accurately this portrays the kind of death that Jesus would die. And the agony that He would endure, not only at the hands of His enemies and the evil men who surrounded Him, but at the hand of God the Father. It's accurate all the way down to this detail about Christ's clothes being divided. by his enemies. Something that would have been completely insignificant if it hadn't been prophesied over a thousand years prior. So we have to be aware of the fact that Jesus was not only tormented physically. He was tormented physically of course. but he was also tormented spiritually by God. And that he was, as such, in the midst of all this, he was completely naked as he hung nailed to the cross. See, the Roman guards, the Roman Empire as a whole, they just loved to humiliate their enemies. They loved to humiliate those who tried to rise up against Caesar. They loved to humiliate criminals. Roman guards loved to humiliate the men they were executing. And what is more humiliating? What is more shameful than that? But this should force you to consider something, to think about something. Where does the shame in being naked originate? Why is there shame in being hung naked on a cross, for example? And if you think about it, the Bible is the only source but it gives an explanation for why people feel ashamed when they're naked. If you ask an evolutionist, if you ask an evolutionary psychologist why people are ashamed about being naked, you get this answer from Google again, quote, over thousands of generations, we've learned that showing off a naked body sends out sexual signals that threaten the security of mating pairs, end quote. thousands of generations to learn that there's shame? Why would that develop? How does that help a species to continue in their existence? This absolutely makes no sense. It's one of those things where it all has to be there or it's none of it's there. So to say that thousands of generations is what it took for this to develop, I mean, Haven't monkeys been around longer than, in their opinion, longer than humanity? At least according to evolution. Why haven't monkeys learned this? Why don't they have shame? Why doesn't any other animal have shame? It literally makes no sense. Only the Bible explains why there is shame attached to nakedness. The Bible tells us that in the beginning, prior to sin entering into creation, Adam and Eve were naked before one another in the garden. And they felt no shame about it. It was only when they fell into sin, and they're walking away from their sin, that they suddenly are overwhelmed by a sense of shame and the realization, the startling realization, that they were naked. And they responded by trying to cover themselves with fig leaves. What this tells us is that shame in our nakedness is a consequence of sin. It's part of the curse of sin. Just as the thorns on Christ's crown remind us of the consequences of the fall, so too Christ's nakedness on the cross reminds us of the shame of nakedness being a consequence of the fall. Now, before we get too far ahead of ourselves, let's make sure we understand what shame even is. What is shame? Well, the dictionary definition would be something like, it's a painful feeling of humiliation or distress caused by the consciousness of wrong or foolish behavior. This is why there was no shame before sin entered into the world. Because there was no foolish behavior, there was no wrongful action that existed prior to sin entering into creation. But it's something, shame is something that everyone has experienced ever since at one level or another, in one way or another. It's what a child is feeling when they start to cry, knowing that they've done something that was wrong, even before mom or dad know about it. Even before mom or dad say a word about it. And it's what a Christian is often inclined to feel when he realizes that he has sinned against God. Even though Jesus never once sinned. And that's important to remember. Even though Jesus never once sinned. So he never had a reason to feel shame. He never once strayed from the will of the Father. He nevertheless endured shame. He endured the very humiliation and dishonor that we would rightfully feel when we stand before God someday. Hebrews 12 verse 2 tells us that Jesus endured the cross for the joy set before Him, despising the shame. despising the shame. What that tells us is that Jesus experienced the shame that we should feel before God, and that He despised that shame. He hated that feeling of feeling shame. What had He done to ever deserve such humiliation? He deserved love. He deserved devotion, adoration, worship, faith. But He endured shame. dishonor and humiliation instead. Why? Here's what I want you to understand. He bore both your sin and your shame so that everyone who believes upon him would have his righteousness and honor before God. What's our natural response to feeling a sense of shame before God because of our sin? The natural response is to refuse to look at him, to turn away, to run away. Think about what the prophet Ezra wrote. He wrote, oh my God, I am ashamed and embarrassed to lift up my face to you, my God, for our iniquities have risen above our heads and our guilt has grown even to the heavens. There's the natural response to feeling shame, that you can't even look up at God, that all you can do is run away and try to make the best of it. But Jesus bore the shame that you deserve, that you should have felt before God in order that you may look up at God without shame. He bore your shame so that you could come to God as your heavenly Father rather than as an enemy against whom you have done nothing but continually sin and who would rightfully seek to pour out his vengeance and wrath upon you. Now maybe this strikes you as odd when you hear it. Maybe you're thinking to yourself, I've never felt shame before God. What would I ever have to feel shame before God for? I've never felt ashamed or dishonored before God in any way. And my friend, if that is you, You're in a very dangerous, dark place. And I have to say that it's due, the reason that you don't know what it's like to feel shame before God is due to one or possibly two things. The first possibility is that you don't know God. You don't realize that His standard is perfect righteousness. That if you have transgressed His law, even just slightly, you have broken the whole thing. So maybe it's because you don't know God. Not that you have any excuse before God for that. Paul tells us in Romans 1 that humanity's reaction to knowing the truth about God is to suppress the truth about Him in unrighteousness. But it's not that man goes on through life without having any object of worship when man turns away from God this way. Rather, what he ends up doing is worshiping the creation instead of the Creator. That is, he invents a God in his own image, a God who will affirm him. A God who loves him just the way he is. A God who looks and thinks and speaks and everything just like he does. Who loves and desires all the things of the world that the natural man wants for himself. He invents a God who wants him to have those things too. This is the God of the satanic death cult that we call progressivism. in our time and in our area. You have people who claim to be progressive Christians, which is as silly of a concept as calling somebody a devil-worshiping Christian. We all drive by progressive churches. You've all seen them. We see their banners hanging outside that say, we affirm everyone. If you drive down into Edmonds, you can't miss it. It's the biggest banner between here and the Edmonds Ferry. A big banner that says, we affirm everyone. And that is a satanic lie, friends. And if you want to see that for yourself, go into that church and ask them to validate the Bible-believing Christian who still believes that marriage is a monogamous, lifelong covenant between one biological man and one biological woman. And that's it. That's all marriage can be. Period. End of story right there. Tell the churches that affirm everyone that you believe that, and then ask them, will you affirm me? You think it's going to happen? No, of course not. Try telling them that you hate pride. Tell them that pride is a sin and tell them that you still believe what the Bible says when it says God is opposed to the proud in James and the fear of the Lord is to hate evil. Pride and arrogance and the evil way and the perverted mouth. I hate Thus saith the Lord Almighty in Proverbs 8.13, the progressive Christian feels no shame before God, despite the fact that their values and their goals and their ambitions and the things that they like and the things that they dislike are the exact same things that the world has as their values, as their goals, as their ambitions, as their affections. Because they do not know. who God is. They don't realize that God is a holy God, a righteous God who is unchanging in all of His ways, and the things that revolted Him 3,000 years ago, he still finds revolting. The things that he loved 3,000 years ago are still the things that he loves. So that's the first reason that somebody might not feel shame before God is because they don't know God. The only other reason that a person never feels shame before God is if he doesn't know himself. Maybe he knows these things about God, but he doesn't know himself. Think of it this way. In a news report that aired on March 9th of 2016, a reporter named Jeff Rosen did an investigative news piece on mirrors and the way that they affect both women's shopping experiences and their ideas about body image. One shopper said, the clothes look better in the store than they actually do in real life. So when I get home, it doesn't look the same. Huh, what an interesting phenomenon. Why would that happen? The reason for this is because the department store she was shopping at was using something called skinny mirrors, like the ones that you used to have fun with when you went to the carnival when you were a child. And they use these skinny mirrors to alter the way their customers look in the fitting rooms, and to make their customers feel more attractive with the clothes they're trying on, which makes them more inclined to buy those clothes. Quote, it's really subtle, end quote, said the founder of the company that puts these reality-altering skinny mirrors into retail outlets of the mirror's effects. She continues saying, quote, it just gives you that little bit of extra hourglass, end quote. If you want to see yourself accurately, you don't look in a skinny mirror, right? You don't look in a fat mirror. You don't look in a short mirror or a tall mirror. Those things don't show you the truth about reality. They show you an illusion. When it comes to skinny mirrors, what they do is they show people what they wish they could look like. And similarly, this world is like a hall of mirrors. And all these mirrors distort reality. They give people a false sense of what they are and of who they truly are. There's the mirror of comparing ourselves to others. And when you look at this mirror, you look great. We see that this person over here did this, and this person over here did that, and these are things that I would never do. And so people feel good about themselves, and they consider themselves to be good and to be morally upstanding. Why? Because they've compared themselves to the lowest and the worst aspects of the people around them. But this is one of those reality-altering mirrors. Yeah, it'll make you feel good about yourself all day long. You'll gaze at yourself in that mirror, and you'll be amazed at how incredibly good you are. And you think to yourself, well, why in the world would I feel shame? I've got no reason to feel shame before God. That's what you think when you look in this mirror. Then there's the mirror of good works. which is similar to the previous mirror, but in this mirror, you see yourself as somebody who has done more good than bad, so you must be good. You see yourself as one who has done enough good in life to be classified as a good person. Not because you've compared yourself to others, but because, well, you put a Ukrainian flag on your social media bio, right next to the pride flag, right next to the BLM fist of communist class warfare. And you think that that shows that you're a good person, you've done good things, you've stood for good causes. Not only that, but you've maybe even started a GoFundMe for someone who was really in need once or twice. Oh, and that time that you went on a mission down to South America to help build houses. Oh, mission trips are supposed to involve preaching the gospel? Well, you know, you preach the gospel with your life. You preach the gospel with nothing but your actions. And when people ask for a reason for the hope within you, You just smile at them. You wouldn't want to preach because preaching is judgy and the Bible says, judge not. Maybe you're the only exception to that rule that you can't share the gospel without preaching. And so you look in this reality distorting mirror and you see what a good person you are, what a noble person you are. Sure you have some flaws, but doesn't everyone? The important thing is that this mirror shows that your good works outweigh all of your bad works. And so as you gaze into this mirror, of course, you feel no shame before God. Or how about this one? The mirror that reflects back what other people think about you. Well, you've done all your good works very publicly, right? And you've always been there for your friends. You have all these memories of hanging out together, of partying together, and making sure that all the people that you have surrounded yourself with are happy. Never mind the fact that you've cut out all these people who tried to get close to you, but had differing opinions about this or that. Those people are toxic, so they don't count. But not you. When you gaze into this mirror, the people that you have surrounded yourself with tell you that you are a good and likable person. And so when you gaze into this mirror, you feel no shame. And at the end of this hall of mirrors, You come to one that's just very old and very plain. And when you look in this one, you are absolutely horrified at what you see. Because as you look into this mirror, the figure in the mirror looks like death warmed over. It looks like a monster who is incapable of doing any kind of good. It is repulsive. It is appalling. It's disgusting. It's frightening. This is the mirror. of God's holy law. And God's holy law is the one mirror that shows people who they really are because it shows you how God sees you. And your reflection in this mirror reveals that you are an idolater. It reveals that you are a blasphemer, an adulterer, and a murderer. And when you look into this mirror and you realize that's you. What do you think happens? You're immediately stricken with a deep and profound sense of shame if you can bear to look at that image. But as you gaze into this mirror, terrified by what you see, you see that it says across the top, look to Christ. Galatians 3, that's what the law does. It points us to Christ. That's what the law of God points us to. And as you recount, the law of God, and who you really are, as you look to Christ, as you think about the events that transpired on Calvary, you realize that the only way for you to be cleansed before God, the only way for you to be made whole, the only way for you to lose this image of shamefulness in the mirror, is for Christ to take your sin upon Himself, your shame upon Himself, along with your sin, along with your guilt, along with your flesh nature, and it all must die. Friends, if you have believed savingly in Jesus, Christ bore your sin and your shame in order that you could be freed from guilt, in order that you could be freed from condemnation, in order that you could be freed from God's wrath, freed from the distorted illusions of this false reality that all these other mirrors showed you. in an order that you may be now free to walk in God's love with the confident assurance that there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death. That's Romans chapter 8 verses 1 and 2. If you need verses to memorize, memorize the beginning of Romans 8. And so now when you look in that mirror of God's law what you see reflected back is the image of Christ who fulfilled the demands of the law so that it no longer has the power to condemn you and to fill you with shame. That's how God sees those who have savingly believed on Christ. When He looks at you, He sees Christ's perfect righteousness. Because when Christ was on Calvary, He looked at Christ as if He had all of your sin laid upon Him. Psalm 22 tells us what went through Jesus' mind in his final hour. But it doesn't end in tragedy. It actually ends in triumph. Psalm 22 ends in triumph. Listen to how the psalm ends in verses 27 to 31. We read this, All the ends of the earth will remember and turn to the Lord. and all the families of the nations will worship before you. For the kingdom is the Lord's, and He rules over the nations. All the prosperous of the earth will eat and worship. All those who go down to the dust will bow before Him. Even he who cannot keep his soul alive, every knee will bow." Verse 30, posterity, that is the children in the coming generations, posterity will serve him. It will be told of the Lord to the coming generation. They will come and will declare his righteousness to a people who will be born that he has performed it. As man tried his best on Calvary to humiliate Jesus in His death, what was on Jesus' mind as He hung naked and ashamed and dishonored on the cross? According to Psalm 22, the fulfillment of God's plan from eternity past to save sinners who were yet to come, to save sinners who would love Him, who would serve Him, who would obey Him, who would believe in Him, who would tell others of the good news that is found only in Him, that He bore our sin and He bore our shame so that we may bear His perfect righteousness before God, cleansed of every sin, confident to draw near to the throne of grace in our time of need. which is always right now. To this day, we continue to declare exactly what Psalm 22 says these people will declare. We continue to declare His righteousness to our neighbors, to our children, and to the children of our children, that they too may savingly believe on Him, receiving His righteousness, being clothed in His righteousness, and that they may grow up to love and serve Christ themselves and tell their grandchildren someday about Christ. Friends, if you have believed in Christ, if you have trusted in Him and received His righteousness as your own, then this psalm reveals that Christ's thoughts in the moments leading up to His death have been fulfilled even in you. Even in you. Fulfilled prophecy proves that we can trust God because He sees the end from the beginning and nothing, nothing and nobody, no power, no principality can fruze by His hand. He's sovereign over all things and prophecy proves this to be true. It proves that we can trust in God who ordains all things that come to pass down to the smallest, down to the most minute details. And because the cross shows that God has been faithful to His plans and His promises and His purposes of redemption. We not only can stand and trust in His promises, but we must. We must trust in them because everything else is sinking sand. Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your perfect Word. Thank You for the richness of Your Word, the fullness of Your Word. Thank You for the way that it nourishes us. Thank You for the way that it instructs us and convicts us, that it turns us to Christ. We thank You and we praise Your name for these things. We thank You for bearing not only our sin on Calvary but bearing our shame as well. So that we are able to say with the Apostle Paul there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Oh Father, what blessed words for us to remember. And bring to mind in times when we might feel ashamed before you. We thank you that you have washed away every sin that you have taken away our shame before you. We thank you that Christ did these things. As fulfillment of your purposes and promises and plans of redemption. Oh Father, teach us to live our lives in light of these truths, that we are free from condemnation, that we are free from your wrath, and thus we are free to come to you as a father rather than as an enemy. Teach us, Lord, to seek you often, to come to you often, to realize our need for you often that Christ may be glorified in our lives. In his name we pray. Amen.