Alright, thank you Sarah. Let's turn in our Bibles to Isaiah chapter 42. Our subject is the saving commandment. The saving commandment. Whenever men and women hear the word commandment, they generally begin to think of Mount Sinai, think of their works. But there is one commandment called in scripture the Holy Commandment. It's one commandment and it's called the Holy Commandment. It has two parts to it, but it's one commandment. And this commandment doesn't come from Mount Sinai, it comes from Mount Zion. This commandment is effectual when it comes from God and it's spoken into the heart. It's how we believe. It's how we believe. It's how God's people are made righteous. It's how we're saved. Whenever we're in need of being corrected, it's how we are corrected. Everything is in this command. Everything regarding salvation and our perseverance is in this command. And my prayer to God is that He would speak this commandment in our hearts today. If a person is a sinner, lost and undone, or if they're a believer and a burden with the cares of this world, with their sins, with various trials, If God speaks this commandment in our heart, if he speaks this commandment, the things of this earth will go strangely dim in the light of his glory and grace. This is it. Concerning Christ Jesus, his son, God commands, verse one, behold my servant. That's the holy commandment. Behold my servant. Speaking of Christ, he says, Behold my servant whom I uphold, mine elect in whom my soul delighteth. I have put my spirit upon him. He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. He shall not cry, nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard in the street. A bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking flack shall he not quench. He shall bring forth judgment unto truth. He shall not fail, nor be discouraged, till he hath set judgment in the earth, and the owls shall wait for his law. This is the saving command. God holds up his son. He holds him up. He set him forth. And he holds him up. And he says, Behold my servant whom I uphold. Behold my servant whom I uphold. The son of God, equal with God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but he took the form of a servant. and was made in the likeness of men. This speaks of Him as the mediator. That's how He is the servant. As the Son of God, He's God. But as the God-man mediator, He's the servant of God. And He took the form of a servant. And He's not just a servant. He's the servant. He's not just a servant of God. He's the servant of God. He's the servant in whom all All other servants of God are complete and accepted. God the Father upheld him, he strengthened him while he walked this earth, but God upholds him in the sense that God has set him forth and exalted him and held him up for all to see. And God commands, behold my servant. In Romans 3.25, speaking of Him holding Him up or setting Him forth, in Romans 3.25 it says, Christ is He whom God has set forth. He set Him forth. He set Him forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood to declare His righteousness. To declare God's righteousness for the remission of sins that are passed through the forbearance of God. To declare how God can be just and uphold his law and honor his law and justify his people. He set him forth. He set him forth. God is so well pleased with Christ. He is so well pleased with Christ because He is holy in His person. He is righteous in His person. He finished the whole work the Father gave Him to do. And in doing that, He highly exalted God. And God held Him up. God exalted Him to the right hand of God. And the scripture says, wherefore, he highly exalted the father. And the scripture says, wherefore, God also hath highly exalted him. He's upheld him and given him a name above every name. That is some kind of title. Think about that. He gave him a name above every name. That at the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow And every tongue shall confess that he is the Lord, the glory of God the Father. And praise God the Father. And why do we praise God the Father? Because the Father chose him. He chose him. Look here, he says, he's mine elect. He's mine elect. God the Father is pleased for the Lord Jesus Christ to have all preeminence. And He is the preeminent elect of God. The Son is. For sinners who hate the truth of election and reject and despise the truth of election, you can't do that without despising and rejecting the first elect. And the first elect is Christ. The preeminent choice of God. God the Father first elected Christ to manifest God's righteousness, to uphold His law, to honor His name, to manifest who God is. He chose Christ to do this, to be the salvation of His people. And then God elected His people in Christ. He chose His people in Christ. And God the Father is He who first trusted Christ. He trusted Him with the glory of His name. He trusted Him with the salvation of His people. He first trusted Christ. That's what Ephesians 1.11 is saying. In whom we have obtained an inheritance being predestinated according to the purpose of Him who worketh all things after the counsel of His own will, that we should be to the praise of His glory who first trusted in Christ. God first trusted Christ. He first trusted Christ. In eternity, before anything was made, He elected a people by grace in His preeminent elect Son, the Lord Jesus. And God declares here that it's Christ with whom He is delighted. He said, He's my elect and whom my soul delighteth. You take the Pharisees, they're like so many in the world today, they were like me and you when we were dead in our sins, like we sadly can be now, even now, because we still have this self-righteous sin nature with us. But they were going about trying to establish their own righteousness by the works of the law. And they were doing everything they did to be seen of men. They kept coming to Christ and asking our Lord Jesus questions to try to entangle Him so they could justify before men why they would not believe on Him. That's the whole purpose of why they kept on trying to find something to condemn Him. And they were saying by all of that, behold us, we're the servants of God. And God declares He has one servant. He has one servant who is the delight of his soul. Now he's delighted with all his people in Christ, but he has one servant who by himself, by his faithfulness to God, is the delight of God's soul. And that's Christ. That's the word Jesus Christ. Behold my servant whom I uphold, mine elect, and whom my soul delighteth. Several times God said this, several times when Christ walked this earth, several times He said it. At our Lord's baptism, when the Spirit of God descended on Him like a dove, God the Father spoke from heaven and He said, Thou art My beloved Son, in Thee I am well pleased. Christ took Peter and the others up into the mount, And there appeared Moses and Elijah, and Peter wanted to build three monuments there to them. And the Lord spoke, and Peter hid his face, and the Lord walked over and touched him and said, Fear not. And when he looked up, he saw no man save the Lord Jesus Christ. And if God says, behold my servant, and He speaks that into the heart of somebody here today, you will behold no man but the Lord Jesus Christ. We won't see ourselves as being righteous anymore. We won't see ourselves as being wise and holy and our own redeemer anymore. We'll see one. We'll see God's servant in whom God is delighted. And when God speaks that in our heart, He makes us delighted with Him. He makes us to be delighted with him. Anybody that's exalted themselves is God's servant. That's what we always need. We need God to speak and say, behold my servant whom I uphold, mine elect and whom my soul delighteth. This is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. Hear ye him. That's what God spoke in the mount. When they heard that voice and they hit their faith, God said, this is my son in whom I'm well pleased. Hear ye him. Hear ye him. That's the saving command. When that command comes, you know what happens? Every time, without fail, you hear Christ and you look to Christ. And salvation's in a look. Salvation is entirely in a look. That's believing. That's what we're talking about. Believing on Him. Believing on Him. Now, secondly, I want you to see the two things here that the Father sent Christ forth to accomplish, and this is why he is so well pleased with Christ. The Lord Jesus alone is salvation. He is the one that God the Father sent forth into this world to establish his people in perfect righteousness. He's the one to establish us in righteousness. He said in verse one, he said, I put my spirit upon him. He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. God the Father chose him to be the Christ before the world was made. He chose Him in eternity, set Him up in eternity to be the Christ before He made anything. But at our Lord's baptism, when the Spirit descended upon Him, that was God the Father publicly anointing the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what Christ means, anointed. Messiah is anointed. And that was what that was, Him anointing Him publicly, showing everyone, this is Him. That's why He spoke and said, this is my Son, whom I'm well pleased. hear Him. And the Lord Jesus Christ came to do just what He said that day. When He went to John, John said, I need to be baptized of you. Can you imagine how John felt? Can you imagine if Christ came and wanted you to baptize Him? And John said, I need to be baptized of you. And the Lord said, thus it behooves us to fulfill all righteousness. He was fulfilling all righteousness for us, for God's elect. That's what He came to do, to fulfill all righteousness. Go over to Isaiah 49. This is Christ declaring what the Father said to Him. He's declaring right here what the Father said to him, what the Father sent him forth to accomplish. He said in Isaiah 49 and verse 3, He said unto me, thou art my servant, O Israel, in whom I will be glorified. In verse six, he said, it's a like thing that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved of Israel. I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth. That's what our Lord Jesus was sent forth to do, to be the salvation, the righteousness of His people, to give us life, to bring us to Him and bring us safely to God the Father, blameless in Him. I've put my spirit upon Him. He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. To bring forth judgment. Now, first of all, that involves what Christ did for His people. to bring forth judgment is to establish the law, is to perfectly fulfill the law in perfect faithfulness to God and to completely, totally justify His people who must die because we're sinners. That's what Christ came to accomplish, to bring in a perfect righteousness for us completely, totally justifies from all our sins. Now there's not one fallen son of Adam who could accomplish that. We died in Adam. We fell in Adam. We became just rotten sinners in Adam and none of us could accomplish that. We could not. The Lord Jesus alone is the righteous servant of God. He's the righteousness of God. He's the righteousness of his people. The Lord Jesus alone. False religion when they speak of election and foreknowledge, they speak of it as God looking down through time and seeing who would believe and that's why He chose them. Well, look what God says. Look back at Isaiah 41 and verse 28. And this really is an unfortunate chapter division because this goes together. This goes together. Isaiah 41, 28, I beheld And there was no man, even among them, and there was no counselor that when I asked of them could answer a word. Behold, they are all vanity, and their works are nothing. Their molten images are wind and confusion. Behold my servant, whom I uphold, mine elect, and whom my soul delighteth. I've put my spirit upon him. He shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. Before I forget this, I don't have this in my notes, but why does he say he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles? Didn't he bring forth judgment to his elect in Israel as well? He did, but you know, before God established national Israel, there was nothing but Gentiles. That's all there was. And the Lord Jesus came first to his elect in Israel. He came first to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And when he finished with Israel in 70 A.D. and destroyed the nation, this nation that exists now is the work of men. That's the work of men. That's established by men, that political nation. There's nothing now but elect Gentiles. It doesn't matter if they're from Israel, or France, or England, or United States. They just elect Gentiles. Just like they were before He even made an Israel. And it's what Paul was saying in Romans 11. Whenever the Lord has called the last elect out from among the nations, out from among the Gentiles, then all His spiritual Israel will be saved. That's it. We're not saved because we're from a particular nation. You weren't saved because you're from Mercer County or Pennsylvania or wherever. We're saved by grace. We're saved by grace. But our Lord Jesus accomplished judgment for His people. He came forth as a man to represent men. A man fell, a man sinned, it had to be a man that's going to obey God and establish righteousness and make his people righteous. There's just the first Adam and the last Adam. We're either going to be found in the first Adam or the last Adam. And the Lord Jesus Christ is the last Adam. He's the head and substitute and representative of everybody the Father entrusted to Him. Chose by grace and gave to Christ. And Christ came forth as a man and took upon Him the seed of Abraham. That's God's people. And He made Himself under the law. The God who gave the law became a man under the law and the God-man obeyed his own law in the place of his people. Do you imagine that God is going to let me and you glory and boast that we fulfilled the law of God when God's own Son came down to accomplish that work for His people? and having fulfilled all righteousness, having obeyed God in every way constantly from conception all the way to the cross. Our Lord then went to Gethsemane, was made sin for His people. And this one who was the spotless Lamb of God bore the wrath and curse of God with the sin of His people on Him. And He absolutely, thoroughly satisfied the justice of God toward us. We died in Him. It's not as if we died in Him, brethren. We died in Him. Paul didn't say, it's as if I'm crucified with Christ. He said, I am crucified with Christ. I am risen with Christ. We were in Christ and we died. Oh, if we could get that. This is the thing that we, you know, whenever we're down and we're cast down because of our sin and we see the sinfulness of our flesh, it takes God to say, behold my servant and turn you to Christ and renew that inward man to know your old man died in Christ at Calvary. died in him. Justice is satisfied. He established judgment. He declared the righteousness of God. He declared how God is just and he justified his people. He's just and he's the justifier. He honored the law and he justified his people. That's what he accomplished. That's why God's well pleased with him. Look down at Isaiah 42, look down at verse 21. The Lord is well pleased for His righteousness sake. He is still talking about Christ His servant. He is well pleased for His righteousness sake. He will magnify the law and make it honorable. You know, you have to look to the cross to see what it took to magnify the law and make it honorable. This is what the Lord said when He gave the law in Deuteronomy 10.12. He said, Now is for what doth thy God require of thee? Here's what God requires of you and me. If He's going to receive us and say He's well pleased with us, this is what He requires of us. To fear the Lord thy God, to walk in all His ways, and to love Him, and to serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, to keep the commandments of the Lord and His statutes." Let's see if anybody's done it. You know the Ten Commandments. What's the eleventh one? Can anybody here name me that one right off the top of your head? You don't even know what it is, I bet. There's more than ten. There's over 600. And Christ obeyed perfectly. He said, I do always those things that please Him. And then He went to the cross and bore the curse and the wrath of God in our place because God's elect did not please Him. And that's what it took to justify us. So now, if God's elect, He's made His people righteous in Him. You know what He says of us and ourselves? He says, you were the servants of sin. You were the servants of sin. That's why we couldn't be looked to to do this work. That's why it had to be the Lord Jesus Christ. Holy God. We're talking about holy God. We're talking about God who knows what's in the heart. You and me can fool each other outwardly. We can't fool God. God's looking on the heart. And Christ was holy in the heart. He was righteous in His heart. Everything He did was from a pure motive. Always pleasing the Father. always pleased Him. So He trusted it all to His Son. Isaiah 59, let's look there real quick, Isaiah 59 and verse 16. He said, He saw there was no man. and wondered that there was no intercessor. Therefore his arm brought salvation to him, and his righteousness sustained him. For he put on righteousness as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation upon his head, and he put on the garments of vengeance for clothing, and was clad with zeal as with a cloak. That's what our Lord Jesus did, and He's that righteousness. He established judgment for His people. He accomplished the work. He didn't come and make it possible. He accomplished it. He accomplished it. He justified His people. There's a people in this world right now, you sitting here that He's called or justified before God. That's far more than just as if I never sinned. That means there is no record ever of any sin before God. Before the all-knowing, all-seeing God, no record. I blotted them out, He said. I will not remember them, He said. They can be searched for and they won't be found, God said. I pardon whom I reserve. They're gone. They're gone. And there's a people walking around in this world right now today that don't yet know Him, that are lost and blind. Some are probably out doing many wonderful works and thinking they're pleasing God and thinking God's well pleased with them. And they don't know God and they don't know they're the servants of sin. They don't know that what they're doing in doing those many wonderful works is nothing but glorified sin. And God hates it. but because Christ justified him, he's going to do this next thing. Here's the next thing he came to do. There's another work the Father entrusted to Christ, the work of preaching the gospel and the work of establishing judgment in the heart of his elect. spiritual discernment, so that we behold Christ and we believe on Him as our only righteousness. He says here in verse 2, He shall not cry, nor lift up, nor cause His voice to be heard in the street. A bruised reed shall He not break, and a smoking flax shall He not quench. He shall bring forth judgment unto truth. He shall not fail, nor be discouraged, shall He have set judgment in the earth, and the owl shall wait for His law. Christ is the perfect preacher. He's the perfect preacher. He's the prophet, priest, and king of His people. He did what He teaches His preachers to do. And He's even the righteousness of His preachers in our preaching. He really is. He fulfilled the office of prophet in perfect righteousness. He really did. That's what He's saying here. He did not cry. nor lift up, nor did He cause His voice to be heard in the street." This doesn't refer to the volume of His voice. It doesn't refer to the fact that He preached publicly in a street, in a synagogue. It means our Lord didn't debate with men. He didn't wrangle with men. He didn't exalt Himself over others by striving and disputing and debating doctrine with men. He was not contentious. He was not boastful of himself. He didn't exalt himself, lift himself up over others using his doctrine and miracles and in any way promote himself. None of that. He obeyed God his Father. He's the servant now. He's the perfect preacher when He walked this earth and He served God perfectly as the Holy Prophet of God. He simply proclaimed the Word of God with no sin in Him whatsoever. And He trusted the Father. He prayed to the Father and He trusted the Father to draw His elect to Him. That's what He tells His preachers to do. Preach My Word. pray to me to bless it, and wait on me to bless it. That's it. Now listen, he said in John 7, 16, he said, my doctrine is not mine, but his has sent me. You get what he's saying? He preached what the Father sent him to preach. That's what he did. He said, he that speaketh of himself seeketh his own glory. He said, but he that seeks his glory that sent him. The same is true and no unrighteousness is in him. That's Christ, the perfect preacher, the prophet. He said in John 6.37, all that the Father giveth me shall come to me. That's his perfect faith. He preached the word the Father gave him to preach. Well, didn't he have power to quicken? Yes, he did. He had power to silence a storm. But as the servant of God, he's faithfully trusting the Father while he walked this earth. And he said, all that the Father giveth me shall come to me, and him that cometh to me I will no wise cast out, for I came down from heaven not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me. He said, no man can come to me except the Father which has sent me drawing. And I'll raise him up at the last day. It's written in the prophets. He believed God. He said it's written in the prophets. They shall all be taught of God. Every man, therefore, that hath heard and hath learned of the Father, been taught by the Father. He comes to me. You see, He didn't cry and lift up and wrangle and be contentious with men. He didn't have to. He preached the Word of God and He trusted the Father to bless it and draw His people to Him. We see that's the meaning. If you go back, go to Matthew 12, I want you to see this. That's the meaning if you go to Matthew 12 and look at it in the context to where He fulfilled this prophecy. Matthew 12 verse 14. He fulfilled it his whole life, but this is where it says he fulfilled it. After the Pharisees accused him of breaking the Sabbath because he plucked corn and gave it to his hungry disciples on the Sabbath day, And then he went into the synagogue and healed a lame man, a man with a withered hand, and they accused him of breaking the Sabbath. And it says in verse 14, then the Pharisees went out and held a council against him, how they might destroy him. But when Jesus knew, he withdrew himself from them. He just withdrew from them. He declared the Word of God to them, but then he didn't strive, he just withdrew from them. And great multitudes followed him, and he healed them all. And he charged them that they should not make him known. He was not self-promoting at all. that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying, Behold my servant, whom I have chosen, my beloved, in whom my soul is well pleased, I will put my spirit upon him, and he shall show judgment to the Gentiles. He shall not strive nor cry, neither shall any man hear his voice in the streets. A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench, till he send forth judgment unto victory, and in his name shall the Gentiles trust. See there verse 19, he shall not strive. He's not going to strive with men. When he speaks of not breaking the bruised reed, not quenching the smoking flax, of course that applies to his weak disciples, his true people. Mr. Spurgeon applied that to the Scribes and Pharisees and I don't know if that text actually applies to them but I know this is true. He could have broken them and snuffed them out just like that. That's all he had to do. And he didn't worry about trying to meet them and argue doctrine and straighten them out. He just preached the gospel. He is that gospel. You want to expose crookedness, just preach Christ. You want to see a crooked stick, lay a straight one down beside it. And he just preached the gospel. And he left them and he just went and ministered to his true chosen bruised wreaths and smoking flags. Was tender with them. And he taught them the gospel. That was his humility, that was his meekness as the righteous prophet, son of God. He trusted the Father in perfection representing his people. So he preached only the Word of God. He prayed to the Father to bless it. And he waited on the Lord to draw his elect to him. And by this, he set judgment in the earth in the hearts of his people. He set spiritual discernment in the hearts of his people. He called out his apostles and established the gospel in the earth in spirit and in truth. That's what Christ accomplished. Truly a bruised reed he shall not break, and smoking flecks shall he not quench. He shall bring forth judgment unto truth, Matthew said, till he send forth judgment unto victory. What's the victory? Faith is the victory. That's what it means, till he gives spiritual discernment and faith. It makes you trust Him who is the victor in whom we're more than conquerors. That's what He does. It says at the end of verse 4, "...and the owls shall wait for His law," Matthew 12 said, "...and in His name shall the Gentiles trust." He's talking about putting judgment in the heart. Spiritual discernment in the heart to see two things. Everything about me is grass. I am the sinner. And to see, He's God, my Savior, my righteousness, my wisdom, my holiness, my redemption, my all. That's what He's working in the hearts of His people. While He walked this earth, He preached the gospel in perfect righteousness, setting forth. He is the one way, declaring the sinners, unless they eat His flesh and drink His blood, unless they behold God's righteous servant and believe on Him, they have no life in them. Because they have no righteousness. Righteousness and life are the same. He dealt tenderly with His elect and He accomplished setting judgment in the hearts of His people in Him. Now, now, He's risen to the right hand of the Father and all power in heaven and earth is given to Him as the prophet, priest, and king. He's sending forth the gospel. And He prayed to the Father and sent forth the Holy Spirit. And He is successfully right now sending that gospel to His people and calling out His people no matter how the devil's got his gates raised up and trying to block and trying to keep the gospel out, Christ, the gates of hell will not prevail against Christ and His gospel. Remember when he sent forth his disciples into the world to preach the gospel, he based it on this, all power in heaven and earth is given unto me. So you go forth and preach the gospel. You're going to suffer, you're going to be rejected, you're going to be despised, because the Lord was. He said, but all power is mine. You trust me and you go preach my gospel. Our doctrine's not our own. We're preaching Christ as He commands. We're preaching Christ. What does God say here? What does He say right here? What's the command? Behold My servant. That's why we preach Christ and be crucified. God said, Behold My servant. Hear Him. Look to Him. Trust Him. So we preach Christ just like He commanded. And He commands us not to go forth and try to make disciples. Not to try to baptize, Paul said. God, he didn't send me forth to baptize. Well, I thought he told us to make disciples. Yeah, but not until he's made them a disciple. When he's called them, then you teach them, but don't go out and try to make people believe because you know what you'll do? You'll water the gospel down and take the edge off of it to try to make that happen. That's not what we're sent to do. We're sent to declare his glory. That's it. whether he saves one or he saves a thousand or he don't save anybody, like Jeremiah. We pray to him, send the Spirit, bless the Word, because we can't make it effectual. He's the only one that can send forth this Word in power and bless it and call his people out. And so we wait on him to do it. And here's the thing about his preacher, just like Christ was the perfect preacher and perfect righteousness. He is the righteousness of His preachers. In our preaching, we don't preach without sin. We don't do anything in perfection like He did. He's the righteousness of His preachers. And then He went to the cross and put away all our sin for not preaching and ministering in perfect righteousness. He's righteousness for all His people in every way. And He sends the Holy Spirit and He puts judgment in the heart of His people. He said, when the Spirits come, He'll convince my people of sin because they believe not on Me. There's only one way our sins are put away. That's when He gives you faith to look to Christ only. That's where our sins are put away. He said, this Holy Spirit will convince them of righteousness because I go to my Father. He was raised again for our justification. By Him sitting at the right hand of God, we know He accomplished what He came to do. He is the righteousness of His people, and He will convince His people of judgment. He went to that cross and crushed the serpent's head by taking away all the sin of His people and making us perfectly righteous. The devil don't have a thing to accuse us with anymore. And be sure to get this last word. Verse 4, He shall not fail nor be discouraged till He's accomplished this. Our Lord Jesus didn't fail in doing His work for us. He made us the righteousness of God in Him. And He shall not fail to work this in the heart of His people. He will call out every single elect, redeemed child because He bought them. He purchased them. They're His blood-bought children. Behold the servant of God. Behold Him. Behold Him. He's the cure all the time in every situation. Whether it's Him first calling us and making us to behold Him, this is the saving command, Behold My Servant. Or if we're a believer and we're troubled and we're cast down, it's always the same command that saves us, Behold My Servant. And He turns you back to Christ, and when you see Him, you know everything is fine. I'm complete in Him. Everything's fine. He's ruling everything. Everything's fine. Let's go to Him. Our gracious God and our Father, we thank you for this word. Thank you for sending forth your son. Thank you that your people have a perfect righteousness. Thank you for establishing judgment in our heart to know Christ, to know you. to believe on you. And Lord, we pray you work this in your people. We pray you call out your lost sheep and that you work it in those that already believe you, that are troubled, that you make us behold Christ and know we're more more, more, more than conquerors through Him that loved us. Help us remember this, Lord, and help us to always be looking to Him. Forgive us, Lord, for looking at ourselves, for looking at one another, for looking at the waves and everything else and trying to do things by the wisdom and works of our hand. Lord, we thank You that You're going to save Your people and never let us go. We ask you to bless it to us now, Lord. In Christ's name we pray, amen.