It is a real joy this evening to introduce Dr. Mark Minnick. Probably 99 percent of the folks in this room know that Brother Minnick is a great preacher of the Word of God. And I've had a distinct privilege of knowing him far closer than just a great preacher of the Word of God as a personal friend. I remember landing 1971 at Bob Jones University as a freshman in the dormitory coming from a denominational background and knowing very little of the Word of God. Brother Minick was across the hall as a freshman coming from Pennsylvania knowing very little of the Word of God. And we together began immediately to debate each other. We argued about every major doctrine that neither of us knew anything about and were entrenched in our debate with each other. And, you know, over the years that has improved. We we still argue sometimes, but what a blessing to see God's grace. I was thinking about introducing him tonight and what it means to be a friend. And I want to thank him publicly for his friendship. He's had me a number of times preaching his pulpit at Mount Calvary. And it's always a joy to be with those dear people and to open the word of God in a pulpit where a man preaches par excellence the word of God. It has been a joy to be with Dr. Mennick at times when he's taken hard stands and been criticized for hard stands as a Bible fundamentalist, a separatist, and also as a compassionate pastor who has taken a stand for the Lord Jesus Christ. And we've often sat over breakfast or been together and talked about the things that are sometimes very difficult in doing right and having that balance of biblical compassion. And I want to thank him for being a Christian gentleman. If I had to really sum up my relationship to Mark Minnick over the years with all the debating that we did, sometimes I was pretty rough on him. But he was always a Christian gentleman to me. And I want to thank him for being that. And I want to thank him for being a faithful friend. And I want you to pray for men like Dr. Minnick that God would give them grace in their leadership position to maintain that balance of being a Christian gentleman but standing true and firm to the Word of God. And Brother Mark, I want to thank you tonight for your Christian example and for your faithful friendship. Thank you so much. That's the nicest introduction you've ever given me. He usually has a standard joke that he tells. I was very glad that he didn't do that tonight. It's something about how finally he's gotten my theology straightened out. I always tell him afterwards, you haven't straightened my theology out at all. I feel exactly the same way I did when we were freshmen. But I really do rejoice, as I know all of you do, in the friendships that the Lord gives to you over the years. And this dear brother has, although our paths don't cross nearly frequently enough, has always been a very warm friend. And I'm so grateful for that. I know that I speak for all of us in saying again tonight how appreciative we are to the folks of the church here your pastor and staff for hosting us so comfortably. And everywhere that we go in the facilities here, we see your attention to detail. Thank you so very much for working hard to try to give to all of us a very enjoyable time when we can think about really nothing except receiving what the Lord has for us. You've had a true ministry in our lives these days. We're very grateful for it. And I know that we all deeply appreciate those of you who are ministering to us musically. Music is very uplifting and soul-stirring. Very grateful for it. I want to also publicly tonight express an appreciation that I know would be the heartfelt feeling of those in this room who are my age and younger, for the generations of men who have gone before us and who have fought the battles that they have, who have been consistent in their positions, and who have handed off to us as a next generation, churches and schools and mission boards and publishing houses. We have a tremendous responsibility of stewardship. And I think that we, all of us, owe a great deal to the men who have gone before us. Fr. Stedman, mentioned his coming to Bob Jones University in the state that he was in, and I came in nearly the same state. In fact, I had never seen Bob Jones University. I had never heard of it until two months before I came. The summer before I went off to college, I had written to Wheaton and to Moody and the King's College and to Roberts Wesleyan and two or three other evangelical schools. And a man named Hal Webb, happened to come through our city, Erie, Pennsylvania, and got me into his trailer and said, you need to write to Bob Jones University. And so I did. And when the material came back, I looked at the young people who were featured on the brochures, and I thought to myself, if I went to that school, maybe I could be like that. And I had the feeling that That place could make me a new person. I didn't mean make me a Christian. I already, by the Lord's grace, was a believer. But I really needed what the Lord gave me there. And I've often thought, if I hadn't gone to Bob Jones University, if I'd gone to one of those other schools, who would I have married? Where would I have served the Lord? What would be the state of my life? What would be my convictions? I'm so grateful for the school that I went to and that I've had an opportunity all these years of being a part of. Very grateful for the older men who took an interest in me and shared something of their lives with me and committed something of their ministries to me. And I know that there are many in this room who have had the same kind of experience. really, I think, want to be certain. Look around at this fellowship. We've encountered so many of you who are older in the hallways. I just want to remind all of us who are younger that we really ought to be telling these folks how grateful we are for the Lord's use of them. There's not a one of them who would begin to say that looking back, He necessarily would do everything in the same way. Who among us would do that? Hindsight is 20-20. I think to myself all the time, if I could start over with my children, what a great parent I could be now. That's, you know, one of the things that you really, before God, you just have to leave behind you, forgetting the things that are behind, and you just keep pressing forward with the growth God has given you in your life to date. Some of our older brethren are, from time to time, really severely criticized. And I think that the vast majority of it is very unfair and very failing to really be representative of a Spirit-filled temperament. Scripture tells us very clearly how you know wisdom that is from above. Wisdom that is from above is first pure and peaceable and gentle and easy to be entreated. And it is full of righteousness. It does not bear false witness. And I think the more spirit filled the Lord's people are, the more aware they are of the blessings for which they need to thank God and for the gratitude that they need to show And thank you, those of you who are older. Really, you're the ones who ought to be preaching at this conference somewhere. We ought to maybe have a FBF conference in the future where nobody gets to speak who's under 70. And let's hear from our older brethren while we still have an opportunity to gain something from what they have learned. I'd like to ask you to open your Bibles tonight. to the first chapter of the book of Romans. Romans and the first chapter. This conference has as its theme, the glorious gospel. And I would like to raise the question tonight as to what the glory of the gospel is. Where is the glory located? Well, if we came with a blank mind to the New Testament, opened it to the first page, and began to look for the answer to that question, you know, of course, that we would be confronted with four books, each of which is called a gospel. And when we read those books from beginning to end, it's apparent that each one of them is occupied with one subject. And that subject is Jesus Christ. The subject is a person. So you would come away, I think, with the initial impression that not only is Jesus Christ the gospel, but that he is the glory in it. The Gospels introduce us to the facts regarding Him. That's their function in the overall scheme of Scripture. They are an introduction. They do not explain all of the facts. And you think all of the times that you read of things that our Lord taught, statements in His discourses, for instance, that have to do with deep or broad theological themes, and He doesn't explain what He meant. It really isn't the function of our Gospels to fully explain. They introduce this individual. The next book of our New Testament, the book of Acts, is designed by God to show us what to do with those facts about that person. And you know, of course, that the theme verse, the key verse to that book is found in the first chapter. that you shall receive power after that the Holy Spirit is come upon you, and you shall be witnesses unto Me." So I open the fifth book, and it appears to me, just with an initial impression, that that book too is occupied with the same subject. You shall be witnesses unto Me. So I've got these facts in the Gospels, and the next book shows me what to do with those facts. And if I follow right through the practice of the first generation of believers, and that's roughly what you have in that book, you have just about 25 to 30 years. That's enough because it shows you what the first generation did and what every generation to follow is supposed to replicate. Those people are proclaiming those facts. And if you look at the last verse, you turn to the first chapter of Romans, but you can of course glance right back at the last verse of that fifth book. If you look it with me, please. 28th chapter of Acts and 31st verse. It refers to the Apostle Paul in the capital of the empire preaching the kingdom of God. And we need to know how to do that. And teaching those things which concern that same individual. So from beginning to end, that fifth book of my New Testament is occupied with the proclamation of the facts to which I was introduced in those four books called the Gospels. And that's the way the structure of our New Testament is arranged thus far. Many years ago, there was a survey that was taken among evangelical people. I don't remember where I read this, so I don't have the source anymore. One of the questions these people were asked had to do with why they tended to be so hesitant about giving the Gospel. And they were actually given a number of choices. The number one choice in terms of respondents when that survey came back in was that people hesitated to give the gospel because they were afraid that someone would ask them a question that they didn't know how to answer. I think that we can all identify with that. Well, here's a book in our New Testament designed to show the proclamation of the facts and to motivate us to do in our generation what the first generation did, which is to get those facts to their whole known world. And the question, of course, is what about all of the inquiries that are raised as to what those facts actually mean? What the implications are? And that's why in our New Testament that we have a third major section comprised, as you know, of 21 books. And the function of these books called the letters or the epistles is to explain or interpret those facts. All of the things that our Lord did not sufficiently enlarge upon by divine design Those matters that he simply introduced that do raise questions in inquiring minds, those questions are answered in great detail in the letters that are written to believers and to the churches in which they congregate. And of course, as you know, the last book of our New Testament is the consummation of the whole thing. It shows us the end of the story. So, when we ask the question that I began with tonight, where is the glory in the Gospel? You would expect that you would find that explained in what portion of the New Testament? Most certainly in the epistolary section. And that's why we have turned there tonight. And I'd like to call your attention to the opening statements of this book. The opening statements of the very first epistle. The first letter. If you notice please, the opening verse, we're introduced to the writer, the Apostle Paul, who refers to himself as a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, and notice this please, separated unto, I'm going to put it in these terms, the first four books, separated under the Gospel of God that is, of course, the theme of our conference. Now, this morning during Brother Hartog's message, I just picked up on the fact that in 1 Thessalonians 2, he called our attention to the fact that the expression, Gospel of God, occurs three times there. And I was just alert to this because I knew the passage I was preaching on tonight. But as I listened to him explain without really alerting us to the study behind what he was saying, he pointed out that the expression gospel of God can have reference to the fact that this is the gospel which God gave or God sent. In other words, that he himself is the source or the author of this gospel. Or he also pointed out that the expression can mean that the gospel concerns God, that He Himself is the subject of it. It has to do with Him. In this particular passage that we're looking at tonight, as we're going to see, I think it's clear that by gospel of God, the Apostle is referring to what God Himself has given or what He has authored. what he is the source of. And I want us to read now, right down through the fifth verse, and we'll see that. Paul says, he himself is separated unto the gospel that is given by God, or sent by God, the gospel which he, that is God, had promised afore by his prophets in the holy Scriptures. And now this second point about God's gospel, that it concerns His Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord, which was made of the seed of David, according to the flesh, and declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead, by whom And he's referring now to God. Really, you can connect the first verse with the fifth verse. The Gospel of God, by whom we have received grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith among all nations for His name. And I want to conclude our reading there tonight. Where is the glory in the Gospel of God? Well, there are many, many passages in the epistles in which we would find aspects of the answer to that. But we're going to be occupied tonight with the initial statement that is given in the epistolary literature. This is really where it starts as far as the divine providential arrangement of our Bibles is concerned. First of all, verse 2. One feature, one aspect certainly of the glory that pertains to God's gospel is its relationship to the Old Testament scriptures. And what that second verse is making clear, look at the wording again, this gospel which he had promised afore by his prophets in the Holy Scriptures. Clearly, the Holy Scriptures here is a reference to the Old Testament. An aspect of the glory of God's gospel is its relationship to all of the previous revelation. In other words, that the gospel is not a new redemptive attempt. It's not a second approach, let alone something new. It is something promised. And that becomes particularly evident when you have that interpretational statement in hand, and then you go back and read the opening chapters, particularly to the Synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Matthew, of course, begins with the ancestral origin of Christ. You have that lengthy genealogy. You go into the second chapter, that whole chapter is built upon four geographical references from the Old Testament. that tell you about the geographic origins of Jesus Christ. His ancestral and his geographic origins. And those two chapters are a bridge into the whole New Testament. We have the same thing when you open up the first chapter of the Gospel of Mark. And right out of the gate, Mark is quoting from Malachi and quoting from Isaiah. And you see this, I think, particularly when you look at the first two chapters of Luke. If you look there at the statements of Gabriel and Zacharias and Mary and Elizabeth and Simeon in the temple, it's amazing in their statements, in their prayers, how they reference Old Testament statements and promises. The Gospel was promised previously in the Holy Scriptures. Now, the book of Romans as much as any New Testament book capitalizes on that. There are nearly 60 direct references to the Old Testament Scriptures in the book of Romans. Paul quotes from 13 Old Testament books and every category of Old Testament literature. The Law, the Prophets, and the Writings. Now, not all of his quotations have to do with the Gospel specifically. But nevertheless, as he handles the explanation of it, the need for it, the process by which it was given, the provision, the ramifications of it, it's clear that he is very concerned to root everything back in those Old Testament scriptures and to assure his readers that there is nothing that he is talking about that is an innovation. There is nothing here that is creative on his part. There is nothing that is new. All of this goes back to what God has said previously. In some cases, centuries and centuries earlier. In fact, the thesis of the book of Romans. That the gospel is the power of God unto salvation to everyone. Can you finish this with me? To everyone that believeth That thesis introduced in verses 16 and 17 in this first chapter, this thesis Paul grounds on the bedrock of an Old Testament statement in a book you never would have expected to find the foundation of the faith in. The book of Habakkuk. Second chapter and the fourth verse, Paul ends his introductory statement saying, quoting that Old Testament scripture, for the just, the righteous shall live by faith. All through, he's making this point. Now, men, what that means, I think, by way of application is that in our preaching of the gospel, the better that we can trace its roots, back into the previous revelation, really show our people the richness of the purposes of God from all eternity that He began to unfold in the opening chapters of the first book of our Bible. The more we can give our people an appreciation for that and the all-wise God who has been working out this plan all through human history, the better our people will understand the glory of the Gospel. God really has been governing and working all things after the counsel of His own will in order to bring these promises to fulfillment at a point in human history that Paul refers to in Galatians as the fullness of time. In the fullness of time, the Gospel finally flowered in its full revelation. I don't know whether you read sermons by preachers of the past to enrich your own devotional life as well as to serve as some help in your sermon preparation. But if you do, you probably have from time to time read sermons by Charles Haddon Spurgeon. That marvelous set, 63 volumes in length, contains over 3,500 of this dear man's sermons. There is a textual index to those sermons that is published by Pilgrim Publications, and the textual index runs to 69 pages. I was very interested one time in just thumbing through that as a matter of curiosity to discover that of those 69 pages, 36 of them are occupied with the New Testament texts from which Spurgeon preached, and 33 pages are occupied with the Old Testament texts from which he preached. And if you have ever done any reading of Spurgeon's sermons anywhere, you know that almost without exception, his sermons got to the Gospel. There are so many subjects that are necessary for the Lord's people to hear about that you just simply don't find Spurgeon addressing from the pulpit. He was preoccupied with this subject of Christ. And it's interesting, isn't it, that nearly half of the whole history of his preaching was occupied with Old Testament texts. Now, Spurgeon did argue for judicious spiritualizing. In fact, in his lectures to my students, there is a chapter entitled on spiritualizing. So you do occasionally find him squeezing oil out of a rock and you're wondering how he got it from that text. But that is so rare. And Spurgeon, even in that chapter to his ministerial students, said it's OK to do that, because at least when you do that, people will listen and stay awake. They wonder how you ever got that out of that text. Fact is, it'd take a preacher to get that out of that text. Nobody else would have ever seen that in that passage. But my real point is, here's a man who was so saturated with Scripture. His own personal ideal was what John Bunyan said, that a preacher's blood ought to run bibline. You cut him anywhere and he bleeds Bible. This was Spurgeon's ideal and he soaked himself personally in Scripture. That wonderful set, Treasury of David, you know that whole thing was done in Spurgeon's devotional hours. You read the prefaces to those volumes, he did not do that for preaching or teaching or publishing. He did that for his own entertainment, he said. He did that for years to enrich his own life. And this man found honey in the rock everywhere. And his preaching from Old Testament texts is rich. And I look at a legacy like that, and I find my own heart hungry to be able to weave together the Scriptures in that fashion. Somebody has said that, for instance, the Gospels provide the wool and Paul weaves the garment. But you can even go further back with that, that all of that wool is being raised in the first 39 books. It would be a wonderful thing to really understand how it all goes together and to trace the trajectory of these marvelous themes of the Gospel back into the soil in which they first were planted. The old English poet, George Herbert, had just a little rhyme that G. Campbell Morgan memorized and made his own ideal. It stuck with me through the years. It's been a great blessing as I've thought about it. But Herbert was thinking about the Bible, God's supernatural revelation, and he was comparing it to the heavens, God's natural revelation. And he found himself writing, Oh, that I knew how all thy lights combine and the configuration of thy glory, seeing not only how each burst doth shine, but all the constellations of the story." That is a marvelous ambition for a preacher. All the constellations of the story. Not a text here and a text there. But how does this all fit together in the providence and design of God? That's part of the glory of the gospel. Clearly, Paul himself understood and was communicating that. And that brings us secondly and lastly to the question of what this gospel concerns, and you'll see that's exactly the way that third verse introduces it. This Gospel of God promised before in the Old Testament Scriptures. Now, it concerns. And verses 3 and 4 are occupied with that. And this is really where the heart of the matter for us is tonight when we try to answer that question. I want to raise it again. Where is the glory in the Gospel? Well, it has to do with who it concerns. It concerns God's Son, Jesus Christ, our text says. Andrew Bonar, 19th century Scottish pastor that no doubt has endeared himself to many of you and certainly has to many previous generations through his journal and his life, as well as his putting together the memoir and remains of Robert Murray McShane, was a man who had a deep spiritual walk with the Lord. And Bonar wrote in his journal in 1843, September 30th, I feel sometimes an awful persuasion that there are few ministers anywhere who preach Christ fully. It is exceedingly difficult for the most faithful to preach Christ a right, to show the freeness of salvation without any conditions, and to do this in a way that lays guilt upon the sinner, and to do it in a way that glorifies every attribute of God at the same time, not casting into the shade one feature of his plan of redemption. I think Bonar was right about that. It is exceedingly difficult to really preach Christ aright without casting something into the shade to hold it all together. Well, the passage that we have before us in verses 3-4 is bringing certain things together. So we've got a blessed and inspired guide right here. Let's look at it carefully. Remember, we're still raising the question, where is the glory in the gospel? Part of it is in the fact of its relationship to all of the Old Testament, the previous revelation of God. And then there's this part of it has to do, in fact, the heart of it has to do with who it concerns. It concerns God's son. And the first thing that we have in our text before us in verse three are certain designations for him. Now folks, I want to spend just a moment with this tonight. I don't want to be tedious at all with this, but I want you to look at those designations. His Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord. Let me tell you what I find myself doing and I think is very common to the Lord's people. We rattle off Lord Jesus Christ or Jesus Christ as if those were His first, middle, and last names. And when we talk to people, we talk to them that way, and I think that's pretty much the impression that people have. Actually, some of those are not names proper. Jesus' proper name, first and last, is not Jesus Christ. I want us to spend just a moment with these designations, because this is part of the glory of what the Gospel concerns. The Gospel concerns His Son. That obviously is a term that communicates the unique, I want to use that expression, the unique relationship that this person has to God the Father. He is the only begotten of the Father, the Scripture says. He is the unique Son of God. I one time, when I was pastoring a small church in North Carolina, became concerned as I was visiting in the community that the people whose doors I was knocking on had really been indoctrinated falsely and it was making it much more difficult to reach them with the gospel. So naively, I decided that what I wanted to do was go and interview the pastors of the churches they attended. And I will never forget sitting down in the living room of the man who was pastoring the Presbyterian church in the town. And he was a fellow just a little bit older than I, and he had his library in his living room on the shelves, and I'm glancing at the titles. We basically had the same kind of grammars and the same kind of lexicons, and there were even certain commentary volumes that I had and he also had. But when we came to discuss doctrinal matters, we often just diverged dramatically. I will never forget asking him about Jesus being the Son of God, and without batting an eye, the man said to me, yes, of course Jesus was the Son of God in the same way that we all are. He just went further than we've been able to go yet. But the Gospel communicates the uniqueness of the relationship of Jesus the God the Father. And that is going to be exceedingly important in just a little bit in this passage tonight. If you'll notice please, then we have these words, Jesus Christ. Jesus is the term that communicates His relationship to sinners. We know that because the angel said it. When Joseph was in his dilemma and the angel was sent to him by God, the angel instructed to him, you call his name Jesus, for he it is who will save his people from their sins. And we know the word Jesus means. Savior or Yahweh or Jehovah saves, so you call the baby Jehovah saves because the baby is going to be the Savior, which, of course, Raises the question, then, as to who the baby is. If Jehovah saves and the baby saves, then who's the baby? You call Him the Savior. So we know from the first chapter of Matthew that the words, Soter, communicates the relationship of this person to sinners such as ourself, his relationship to God, unique relationship, the only begotten Son, his relationship to sinners, their Savior. Now, here's this word Christ. And, you know, of course, that this is the Greek form, the Greek word for the Old Testament word Mashiach that we transliterate into our word Messiah, and it means anointed one. That term does express relationship to God, who is the one who anointed him, but it also communicates relationship to these offices that the Old Testament tells the reader need to be ultimately fulfilled for the redemptive purposes of God to come to pass. So Messiah is a term that shows not only relationship to God the Father, but to these offices of prophet and priest. And what's the third one? Prophet, priest and king. All three of these terms express relationship to something. And we'll come back to this just a little bit later in the passage. Now, folks, those three relationships are communicated through a little acrostic. that forms the Greek word Ichthus. The first letter of that acrostic is the first letter of the word Iesus, Jesus. The second letter of that acrostic, the Chi, is the first letter of Christos, Christ. The third letter of that word, the Theta, is the first letter of the Greek word Theos, which is the word for God. The fourth letter of that word, ikthus, is the upsilon, which is the first letter of the word wios, which is the Greek word for son. And the last letter, the sigma, is the first letter of the Greek word soter, which is the Greek word for savior. So the acrostic stands for Iesus Christos Theos, or Theou, Weos Soter. Jesus Christ, God's Son, Savior. Now, the thing that is so interesting about that word is it's the Greek word for fish. Ikthus. We find this word in a word like ichthyology or ichthyologist. This is a person who studies fish. And in the ancient world, as you know, when Christian people were being put under tremendous pressure during the days of the Roman persecutions, they would have ways of communicating to one another that they were believing people. One of those ways was by drawing in one stroke a kind of a semi-circle line and seeing if the person that you were talking to would pick up and with one stroke invert the line and cross it at both ends, forming a kind of a dolphin-shaped fish with just two inverted lines. It communicated that he also believed that Jesus Christ, God's Son, is Savior. So these words, these designations that we're looking at, bring those things together beautifully. And of course, you know that that fish sign is still used today to communicate I'm a believer. But there is a final designation that is left out of the Ikthus. Look at it in the text. What is it? The gospel concerns God's son, Jesus Christ. What's the last word? Our our Lord. Now this term has reference to Jesus' authority. And actually, not just His authority over believers. Paul says here, our Lord. But He's not restricting Christ's Lordship to believers alone. And the Scripture makes very clear that Jesus is Lord of what? He's Lord of all. In fact, this is exactly what Peter says to Cornelius when he brings the Gospel to the Gentiles at Caesarea. And in the midst of his sermon where he's talking about the promise that God made to the fathers, he makes this comment, he is Lord of all. Jesus is Lord of all. And folks, the glory of the Gospel in part consists in these unique features to this person. The uniqueness of the relationship he bears to God, to us as sinners, to the offices that God's Word, the Old Testament says, have to be fulfilled in order for God's redemptive purposes to take place, as well as his relationship to all things. He is Lord of all things. Now, the Gospel proclaims that this person sustains, ready for this, all these relationships simultaneously. This is very important. Simultaneously. Now, every one of these relationships is disputed by unbelievers. You think of every one of these. I give an illustration about the disputation over what it means that Jesus is God's Son. But you and I could go through each of these words and we would have our own illustrations taken from perhaps our own experience of unbelievers disputing each of those terms and the relationship that the gospel says that he bears and is being communicated through those terms. How is it possible for one person to be all of these things and bear all of these relationships, I want to come back to it again, simultaneously? The answer to that is in the last major thing that the Apostle communicates in these verses about the Gospel. And let's look again now at verses 3 and 4. He says, verse 3, concerning His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, now notice this, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh. I'm going to read right on into verse 4, and declared to be the Son of God. Now put those two back to that. made of the seed of David according to the flesh, and Son of God." Well, we're talking now about what is termed the natures of this person. And he is the only person with more than one nature. Part of the glory of the Gospel centered in this person is the uniqueness of a person with two natures. Let's look at them carefully. The first one, of course, is his humanity, communicated in that third verse as being made of the seed of David according to the flesh. And I just want to point out, I'm not going to spend any time with this, but folks, this is not merely talking about his physical body. It's talking about his entire humanity. The fact, as the confessions of the faith put it, that he had a man's nature with all of the essential properties and common infirmities thereof. I'm quoting from the Philadelphia Baptist Confession of 1742, but that kind of a statement could be quoted from all of the Orthodox confessions. When it says, made of the seed of David, according to the flesh, the word flesh here is encompassing the entirety of his humanity, not just his physical being. And that part of him, look at the wording again in verse three, which was made a term made. Has reference to coming into being. That nature is not eternal. That nature came into being and it came into being in the lineage of the Old Testament King David. Why is that so important? Well, folks, because there's something in the Old Testament called the Davidic Covenant. God promised this man that he would never lack a descendant on the throne as long as there was a throne for a descendant to sit upon. That covenant assured David that it would be out of his loins and in his lineage that the Messiah would come. And the significance of that, folks, is that whoever is the fulfillment of that, of the seed of David and anointed to be the Messiah, and he can't be anointed to be the Messiah unless he is of the seed of David, but whoever encompasses those things then has all the prerogatives assigned to the Messiah in those offices. For instance, Do you know the most quoted Old Testament chapter by New Testament authors? Paul said the gospel is rooted back in the promises of God. Do you know what is the most frequently quoted Old Testament chapter by New Testament authors? Well, it has to do with this very matter of this person having all the prerogatives of the Messiah because he is heir to the Davidic covenant. He is of the seed of David. Folks, that passage is the 110th Psalm. The 110th Psalm is quoted nearly two dozen times in your New Testament. It is absolutely phenomenal. Nearly half the New Testament books reference that psalm. And that is the psalm that our Lord himself quoted in the midst of the debates with the Pharisees regarding his person. And he asked them, as you recall, what say you of the Messiah? Whose son is he? And they said, he's, help me here, he is David's son. So our Lord replies, well how is it then that David in spirit says, the Lord, Yahweh, said to Adonai, said to my master, said to my Lord, Yahweh said to my master, Sit thou on my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool." How is it that David called the Messiah, who is his son, you just said the Messiah is David's son. How is it that David calls his own son his master? How do you account for that? Why, that's the riddle the Pharisees couldn't solve. And that is the fourth verse of this chapter. Look at that fourth verse. This person, made of the seed of David, according to the flesh, at the same time, folks, simultaneously, is declared to be the Son of God. I'm going to read the whole thing. The Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead. Now, if there's anything that ought to be abundantly clear out of that fourth verse without our looking at it any more closely, it ought to be this. That that verse is claiming deity for him. Declared to be son of God. So that in verse three, if you're asking about this person and where the glory of the gospel is, even when I understand it concerns him, well, the glory, if you just keep boring into this issue of where is the locus, where is the center of the glory? If you keep boring in on that, folks, you come to this. You come down to these two natures. One, that he is of the seed of David, so he has the credentials necessary to be heir to the Davidic covenant. And whoever is heir to the Davidic covenant is the one to whom Yahweh says, sit on my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool. But how can that person be David's son? Here's the other side of it. He is God's son. He is deity and his humanity was assumed. His humanity came into being, but he is the eternal son of God. Now that, according to verse four, was declared by something. The word declared is a term that occurs seven other times in the New Testament. And what becomes clear when you look at all of the occurrences is that it is a term that really doesn't have reference to what we mean by declared. If I use the word declared, we're thinking in terms of perhaps what I'm doing tonight, and that is speaking to people, asserting things vocally. This is a term that has reference to fixing or to appointing or to demarcating something. It's actually the word from which we get our word horizon. It's marking off the boundaries of something. Now, folks, that fourth verse is saying that there was something that occurred in the life of this person that so marked off his boundaries, that so demarcated him from every other human individual, that there ought to be no question whatsoever but that he is deity. What is it that demarcated him from all the rest of humanity to be the Son of God? Well, the verse says he was fixed or appointed Son of God by what event in his life? By the resurrection. By the resurrection from the dead, out from among the dead ones. A marvelous thing. Now, how can that be? How can it be that the resurrection appoints Him Son of God? Well, if that's the only statement that was made there, there'd be something erroneous to that statement. But folks, I'm leaving out two words. I want you to look again at verse 4. You've got to keep the whole statement together before you really understand what this is saying and the glory in it for Christ and for God. He was demarcated He was appointed, look at this, to be the Son of God, and what are the next two words? Say them with me. With power. The verse is not saying He was appointed Son of God by the resurrection. It's saying He was appointed, or fixed in place, Son of God with power by the resurrection. Now what's the point of that? This is not talking about the fact that because of the resurrection, Jesus became omnipotent. This is talking about His having a position of power that He did not have previous to what event? Previous to what event? Previous to the resurrection, He did not have this power. He did not have this position of supreme power. He always was Son of God. He took flesh. But these days of His earthly ministry, the Scripture calls the days of His sufferings. He is a man of sorrows. He is acquainted with grief. This was true of the entirety of his earthly life and ministry. Peter refers to this whole period of time as his sufferings. But when he rose from the dead, he rose to an entirely different position. Peter says, There was the time of his sufferings, and then there was the time of his exaltation. The resurrection was the event in the life of this person when he was fixed or appointed to be son of God, which he always was, but son of God with that position of great The power. The resurrection is what fixed that. An absolutely remarkable thing. Now folks, this is the crowning note of the glory. The glorious Gospel. The final crowning, triumphant note in that symphony is that Jesus, through the resurrection, is fixed or appointed now in a position of power that was not true of Him in the days of His humiliation. What does that mean? What are we talking about that that's the crowning note of the glory? Well, I want to show you something that's remarkable. Look back with me, if you will, at verse 3 again. Notice those designations again. His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. Alright? Jesus Christ our Lord actually occurs at the end of verse 4 in all the Greek texts. Every single one of them. It doesn't matter what textual family you're looking at or what text you're looking at. Our translators in this version have placed it at the front of the verse because it helps our understanding. But I want to read, folks, I want us to read the text as the Spirit of God breathed it right out. Look again at the verse. Look at verse 3 again. The gospel concerns His Son, who was made of the seed of David according to the flesh. That gives Him the messianic prerogatives. But nobody believes that. Everybody during his earthly ministry, except a few of his followers, everybody disputes that. Toward the end of his ministry, just previous to his crucifixion, he asked that question. How is it that the Messiah is David's son? But I'm going to quote for you now an undisputed messianic passage, the 110th Psalm. Jehovah or Yahweh said to my master, my master is David, said to my master, sit on my right hand until I make your enemies my footstool. Everybody disputes this fact, folks, but verse four, there came the moment when it should have been apparent to all by means of the resurrection of the dead, that this person who claimed to be Son of God actually is Son of God with power, now read it, Jesus Christ our Lord. Do you see how the initial statement in the epistles, designed to explain the facts of the Gospels for us, folks, how the initial opening statement about the Gospel, The gospel of God promised in the Old Testament concerning this person. Let me tell you the most basic facts about this person. And here comes the glory, bore right into this now, come right down to the fine point, made of the seed of David according to the flesh, but demarcated appointed Son of God with supreme power by the resurrection from the dead. I'm talking about, Paul says, Jesus the Messiah, our Lord. You just got to the focal point of the glory. Now you think about it this way. What is the Gospel? If you were to go to your New Testament, and to try to find the most succinct statement of all of the elements of the gospel, where would you go? Okay. Now, it depends on whether you're looking for the most succinct statement of His work or the most succinct statement of His person. The gospel is both. That's what was introduced in the Gospels. That's what I become aware of when I study my epistles. The epistles are going to say to me, you know what? You got four books back there, and they're all about this person, but they're about two things concerning that person. His being, his person, the uniqueness of his being and his work. Now, if I'm looking for a succinct statement about his work, I go to what? I go to what book of the New Testament? Somebody said it. I heard somebody say it. I'm going to go to 1 Corinthians. What chapter? 15 verses 3 and 4. Paul says, I'm going to declare to you the gospel. How that the Messiah died for our sins according to the Scriptures. Let's say it together. And that He was buried and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures. That was promised to and that He was seen. There's the succinct statement of His work. And there's a glory in that. But here's this side of things. The glory of His person. And the person is what makes possible the glory of the work. And the epistles open with a statement about the person. And when Paul brings that down to its finest point, folks, the finest point, the triumphant note, the glorious apex is this, that this person, man of sorrows, acquainted with grief, crucified, buried three days and three nights in the heart of the earth, but by resurrection declared Son of God with power. Jesus Christ our Lord. Just like Psalm 110, verse 1 said, Yahweh says to my Lord, sit on my right hand now. What happened to Jesus on the other side of the cloud? The Bible says He was taken away from them and He blessed them with His hands as He was ascending. And a cloud received Him out of their sight. What happened on the other side of the cloud? In Christian church history, it tells you. Now, I want us to listen to this. Here's Peter. It's the day of Pentecost. Peter says, you men of Israel, hear these words. Jesus of Nazareth, a man. That's Romans 1.3. A man approved of God among you by signs and wonders and miracles, which God did by him in the midst of you, as you yourselves also know. Him being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, you have taken and with wicked hands have crucified and slain. Dramatic pause. Had to be a pause right there. Just let that sink in. This Jesus hath God raised from the dead. I'll bet another pause. Whereof, we all, the 120, we're all witnesses. Therefore, having been exalted to the right hand of God. Peter's answering what happened on the other side of the cloud. Having been exalted to the right hand of God, he has shed forth this which you now see in here. He's talking about the events of the day of Pentecost. Having received of the Father, the Holy Spirit, he has shed forth this which you now see in here. Because, he says, David is not ascended into heaven. But David said himself in the 110th Psalm, verse 1, David himself said, the Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool. Therefore, let all the house of Israel know But God has made this same Jesus whom you crucified both Lord and Christ. Now that is Peter showing a gospel preacher what to do with all the facts. There are the facts of his work and there are the facts of his person. And a gospel preacher who has come to really grasp the glory of it all, can put it all together and preach it like that. God has made this same Jesus whom you crucified, he has made him Lord and Christ. Now, folks, you know, of course, that this is the whole foundation for any right that we have to go anywhere on this globe and evangelize. Isn't that correct? What did our Lord say in what we refer to as the Great Commission? What did he claim? All what? All power. And what is that word power? That particular term translated power is what word? That's the word. All authority is given unto me. On earth and in heaven. It's exactly what Peter said to Cornelius of his household. He's Lord of all. All authority is given unto me. Going therefore, because I have all that authority, disciple all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. And how does it go on? Can you quote this with me? Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have. Somebody is issuing commands. Somebody is seated on a throne with all the throne rights. Somebody is the heir to David's throne and someone is seated at the right hand of God on the Father's throne. And that is Jesus Christ and our whole basis for the Great Commission, our whole basis for world evangelization is this fact. And that's what Peter is preaching on the day of Pentecost. What does Paul make of that fact? Let me ask you to turn to the 10th chapter of this book. And we're hastening toward a conclusion now. Go to the 10th chapter of Romans and look at these verses through the eyes of what we have just seen in that first chapter in the opening statement of the glory of all of this. It's a remarkable statement. Paul is expressing here in this passage exactly the nearness that God has given to himself, the access that anyone has to him. And he puts it in these terms. Look at the ninth verse. If you will confess with your mouth. The Lord Jesus. And believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. I just pause on that for a moment folks. We talk about the fact that all that is necessary for people to be justified is for them to be leave true or false. True or false, absolutely true. What must they believe? In addition to believing in the work that Jesus Christ did for us on the cross, they have to believe that He was raised from the dead. Now, you try this exercise sometime. And this is not a broad brush condemnation, but I do think it is interesting. You know that you'll see it. How often gospel tracts don't even mention the resurrection. Have you ever noticed that there are a lot of them that don't even mention the resurrection? Now, I'm certain that that doesn't mean that those authors don't believe that Jesus rose from the dead. They're assuming that they're taking it for granted. But the literature that they're producing sometimes to be given to lost people does not make explicitly clear that Jesus rose from the dead. Romans chapter 10 verse 9 puts the focus of the content of belief right there. You've got to believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead. And if you really believe that, then you've got to be prepared to confess what fact with your mouth. What does that verse say? Folks, you've got to confess with your mouth. What's it say? The Lord Jesus and remember, Those are not his first and last names. What this means is you confess with your mouth that Jesus has that supreme position. He's Lord. He's Lord of all. This is exactly what Paul and Silas said to the jailer when he inquired, what must I do to be saved? And Paul replies to him, believe, and again, we race through this as if these are three names. Read it this way, folks. Believe on the Lord Jesus, the Messiah. You know, in the days of the Roman Empire, when people were required to burn a pinch of incense and to confess, Caesar is Lord. That's quite a thing for a person to distinguish himself by saying, not so. Jesus is Lord. You confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord. And Paul explains. Look at the 10th verse. With the heart, man believes unto righteousness. With the mouth, confession is made unto salvation. I want to keep reading here because the Scripture says whoever believeth on him will not be ashamed because there's no difference between the Jew and the Greek. Keep reading because the same here it is the same Lord over all. Is rich under all that call upon him for whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Now folks, this is such a critical matter that Jesus himself, in what we would perhaps call the greatest of his sermons, and the opening one that we have in our New Testament, ends that sermon by talking about the fact that it is possible for people to call him with this title, to call him by this title, And yet their entire life be such a contradiction to it that he will confess to them that he never knew them. And the thing that is so frightening about that statement is that he says it of preachers. Many, many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name? So folks, clearly it is possible with my mouth to confess that Jesus is the Son of God with power and that the resurrection is the event that declares this and fixes him in this position as the promised Messiah and Lord of all. It's possible for me to confess that with my mouth and yet really not to be a regenerated person in my heart. Did you know that the motto for the World Council of Churches is Jesus is Lord? That is their motto. That is the summary of their theological confession. But Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians chapter 12 and the third verse that nobody, nobody can really do this genuinely apart from the Holy Spirit. It is the Holy Spirit who glorifies this individual. and impresses this upon the hearts of people until they really are subdued under the Gospel. The Gospel of what He did and the Gospel of who He is. And folks, I think that we all know, almost all of us who do personal work, we know what it is to deal with people. And you see a remarkable shift in their spirit right while you're talking to them. And you're giving the same words that you gave last week to somebody else. Or it may be that you're giving the same words to the same person that you talked with yesterday. But this time, we use words like this. We'll say, there was real brokenness. Or we'll say, he really was humble. And what we're really talking about, folks, is this. God's Holy Spirit subdued that person. So persuaded him of his sinfulness. So persuaded him of the deity of Jesus Christ. So persuaded him of the righteousness of Jesus Christ. So persuaded him of the folly and the desperateness and the hopelessness of his position before God. Yes, he was really humble. He was sobered. He was broken before God. Now, the Holy Spirit does that. And folks, when the Holy Spirit does that, an individual is ready to confess with his mouth that Jesus is Lord. It is the work of God's Spirit. We should not be afraid to proclaim the entirety of the Gospel facts. Folks, our country, I fear, is overrun with people who have made easy professions They have never really understood the person that they were coming to in the first place. And the result of it is, in many, many quarters, a kind of Christianity that is so shallow and you preach to it and you reason with it and you almost browbeat it and it will not budge for Jesus Christ. It simply will not yield anywhere. People really have to be confronted with the fact that somebody is seated on a throne. And I want to tell you, one instant after they pass into eternity, they will be disabused of their folly because they will see that He is on a throne and He has been ever since the ascension. And the Scripture tells us that the day is coming When God the Father is intent that because of the sufferings of this person that he is also going to be supremely exalted and that every knee in that day is going to bow and every tongue is going to confess. Every tongue is going to confess that Jesus Christ, let's say it, is Lord to the glory of God the Father. Now folks, that of course does not mean that people understand all the ramifications of yieldedness. Of course not. But when God's Spirit works, a person comes to a point of yielding to the authority of Jesus Christ. And if he is not prepared to do that, he is not expressing genuine, saving faith in this person. The sooner that we confront people with this, and the more that we exalt Jesus Christ this way with our people, the sooner people have the possibility of being rightly related to the Son of God. This is at the heart of the glory of the Gospel. Don't fear to preach it. The results don't lie in your hands anyway. Go ahead and be bold. Give people all the words. Tell them all the truth. Have faith that the Holy Spirit will use the entirety of how the Scripture presents the person and the work of Jesus Christ and then leave the results with God. After faithfully preaching the word that way. And may God help us to live as if we personally believe that Jesus is truly Lord. Let's bow for prayer. Loving Heavenly Father, we praise You tonight for the joy of having considered this passage and seeing in it these truths and finding our own hearts rising to the blessedness of this. Our gracious Father, we pray that our lives would show forth the praises of this One who is highly exalted at this very moment. And we pray that we would not be found disputing His authority. That in our own lives, we would give way and yield to his every desire. Our Father, we know that so much of our own fruitlessness in ministry, so much of our own discouragement is often due to the fact that we are unyielded ourselves. We pray that you would give to us hearts that are so filled, so controlled by Your Holy Spirit, that we would say, Yes, Lord. And that His commandments would not be grievous to us. That we would be pleased to do all His will. That we would show ourselves to be bond slaves of Jesus Christ. We pray it for His glory. Amen.