A Great Sermon by the Greatest Preacher

A Great Sermon by the Greatest Preacher

(No. 2409)

INTENDED FOR READING ON LORD'S DAY, APRIL 21, 1895.

DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON, ON LORD'S-DAY EVENING APRIL
17, 1887.

"And lo, a voice came from Heaven, saying, This is My beloved Son, in
whom I am well pleased." Matthew 3:17.

A CERTAIN divine, who had taken this verse as his text, spoke upon it
under these three heads. "First," he said, "here is a great pulpit–the
voice was from Heaven. Secondly, here is a great Preacher–it was the
Father who spoke as only God can speak. And, thirdly, here is a great
sermon–'This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.'"

I do not think that I could arrange my thoughts better than under these
three divisions, that is to say, if I intended to preach at any length
from the whole passage that I have taken as my text. It is from Heaven
that this voice comes. It is the voice of the Father, Himself, that
speaks. And what the voice says is worthy to be treasured in the hearts
of us all. "This–this Man who has just come up dripping from the River
Jordan, upon whom the Spirit, like a dove, descended and rested–this
is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased."

But, on this occasion I am going to say, first, that the Father was
well pleased with Christ. Secondly, I want to ask the question, are we
well pleased with Him? And then to answer, on behalf of many of you,
"Yes, that we are! For we also can say of the Lord Jesus that with Him
we are, indeed, well pleased."

I. The first division is in the text itself–THE FATHER WAS WELL
PLEASED WITH HIS BELOVED SON.

I find that the translation would be even more accurate if the passage
read, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I was well pleased." Let us
begin, then, with that thought–the Father had been well pleased with
His Son. The past, rather than the present, though not to the exclusion
of the present, seems to be intended in the Greek word here used–"This
is My beloved Son, in whom I was well pleased." That is to say, "Before
He was born here among men, before His first infant cry was heard at
Bethlehem, before He was obedient to His parents at Nazareth, before He
toiled in the carpenter's shop, before He had reached the prime of His
Manhood and was able to come forth and to be dedicated to His sacred
ministry in the waters of Baptism–before that–I was well pleased with
Him."

Yes, and we must go further back than that, for He "was" before He was
here! "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and
the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things
were made by Him; and without Him was not anything made that was made."
In those far-distant ages when the worlds were made, when matter and
mind were spoken into existence by the creative Word of God, the Father
took counsel with His beloved and equal Son–Jesus Christ as well as
the Father was Infinite Wisdom–He balanced the clouds, weighed the
hills, appointed the throbs of the tide and kindled the light of the
sun! He was the Father's Well-Beloved before the earth was! Yes, and in
those primeval days, when as yet there was nothing but God–if your
imagination can get back to the time when our great sun and the moon
and stars slept in the mind of God like unborn forests in an acorn
cup–in that eternity when there was no time, no day, no space, nor
anything but God, the All-in-All, you will realize that even then the
Only-Begotten was with the Father and in Him the Father was well
pleased, for as God is eternal in His being, He is eternal in the
trinity of His Person! The Triune Jehovah is the theme of praise both
on earth and in Heaven! As we have often sung–

"Holy, Holy, Holy Thee, One Jeho vah e vermore, Father, Son, and
Spirit! We, Dust and ashes, would adore! Lightly by the world esteemed,

From that world by You redeemed, Sing we here, with glad accord, Holy,
Holy, Holy Lord! Holy, Holy, Holy! All Hea ven's triumphant choir shall
sing When the ransomed nations fall At the footstool of their King!
Then shall saints and seraphim, Harps and voices, swell one hymn, Round
the throne with full accord, Holy, Holy, Holy Lord."

We cannot fully comprehend the great doctrine of the Divine Filiation
and the less we pry into it, the better. But certain it is that the
Sonship of Christ does not imply any second position in order of time.
As the Father was always the Father, so the Son was always the Son.
Before all worlds and time, itself, He was with the Father, co-equal
and co-eternal with Him. Now, dear Friends, a love which has endured
forever–which, even now, is eternal–since it had no beginning and can
have no end, this is a mighty love, indeed! And it helps to make us
wonder all the more that God should so love the world as to give His
only-begotten Son, freighted with such love as this, to come down here
and live, and die, that He might save a guilty race that had only just
begun–an infant race of a few thousand years. It will forever be a
marvel that the Father would have been willing to sacrifice the Eternal
and Ever-Blessed for the sake of such worthless creatures as these! Let
your minds and hearts adoringly dwell, then, on that first view of the
text, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I was well pleased."

Now read it, "The Father is well pleased with the Lord Jesus Christ
always." The, "I am," of our version, containing, as it does, within
itself the, "I was," of the original, implies perpetuity and
continuity. God the Father is always pleased with His beloved Son.
There was never a time when He was otherwise than pleased with Him!
Yes, He was pleased with Him even in Gethsemane, when His sweat was, as
it were, great drops of blood falling to the ground. He was pleased
with Him when He gave Him up to be nailed to the Cross of Calvary, for,
though it pleased the Father to prove Him, and He did, for a while,
hide His face from Him because of the necessary purposes of His atoning
Sacrifice, yet He always loved Him. I think that our Lord was never
fairer to the eyes of His Father than when He was all ruddy with His
bloody sweat. And that He never seemed lovelier to Him than when His
obedient hands were given to the nails and His willing feet were
fastened to the tree. Then must He have seemed to be God's rose and
lily, first spotless, then all bloodied–the gathering up of all the
loveliness of which only the Infinite mind of God could conceive. The
Well-Beloved was always dear to the Father–the Father was always well
pleased with Him–and He is well pleased with Him now!

How little there is, even, about those of us who are the Lord's
children which can please our heavenly Father, but God is always well
pleased with Christ. We get to wandering away from Him. Our garments
become defiled by sin. Sometimes the Lord has need to chide us and to
chastise us, but as for His beloved Son, He is always well pleased with
Him! And, blessed be His name, He is well pleased with us in Him! Oh,
that we could always remember this glorious Truth of God! Still,
whatever we may be, the finger of the great Father always points to His
dear Son in Glory, and He says, "This, this is My beloved Son, in whom,
notwithstanding all that His people do, I am always well pleased."

Let me read the text again a little differently and say that God is
perfectly pleased with Christ. He could not be more pleased with Him
than He is and there could not be anything in Christ that would be more
pleasing to the Father than what there already is in Christ. I believe
that the Father is perfectly well pleased with Christ as God, with
Christ as Man, with Christ in the manger, with Christ preaching the
Word throughout Judea, with Christ working miracles, with Christ in
Pilate's Hall, with Christ upon the Cross, with Christ in the grave,
with Christ risen again, with Christ at His right hand and with Christ
soon to come in the glory of His Second Advent. The Father is always
perfectly pleased with His beloved Son. What the great Father's mind
is, none of us can know, for the finite cannot measure the Infinite. We
have no standard that can apply to Him, but we are sure that it must
need an Infinite Objective of delight to satisfy the Infinite mind of
the Father–and Christ fully satisfies it.

Sometimes, when I have been very earnestly pleading with the Father in
prayer, I have felt as if I could cry, "Hear me, O God, hear me, O my
Father, hear me for Your dear Son's sake!" And then I have changed my
plea and said, "Look at Him! Are you not well pleased with Him? Was
there ever such beauty as You see in Him? Was there ever such obedience
as He rendered to You? Was there ever such truth, such holiness, such
absolute perfection as you see in Him?" And I have felt that then I had
a good plea with God, for He is infinitely satisfied with His dear Son!
There is nothing to satisfy God in all the worlds He has made–He could
make as many more, in a moment, if He pleased. There is nothing to
satisfy Him in anything that is merely spoken into existence. But with
His other Self, His Only-Begotten, in every condition and in every
case, from every point of view, He is well pleased and perfectly
satisfied–and well He may be, for Christ is worthy of His Father's
satisfaction and delight.

Then further, to change our note, yet still to play much the same tune,
the Father is overflowinglypleased with Christ. Can you catch my
thought? The Father is not only pleased with Christ so much as to love
Christ and to dwell in Christ, Himself, but He takes us up and He
delights in us when we are in Christ because He has more delight in
Christ then even Christ, Himself, can hold–and He wants more empty
vessels into which to pour the rich wine of His soul's delight. He
loves Jesus so much that He can afford to love poor wretched sinners
such as we are for Christ's sake! He does, as it were, say to Himself,
"I have filled the ocean bed of my dear Son's Nature with my Divine
Love. Now bring here all the dried-up torrent-beds that you can find
and I will fill them, also. Yes, bring here the dry Saharas, the wild
deserts where never a drop of dew has fallen, and I will make them all
to rejoice and blossom as the rose with this superfluity of love which
I have to My dear Son! There is enough to make Me love, even the world,
for His dear sake." Our Lord Jesus has so won the Infinite heart of the
Most High that the Divine Love overflows to us!

Beloved, let us come and get under the drippings of this love! Here is
Christ's cup running over–let us draw near and drink from the overflow
of the love of God to Jesus Christ. You men, you women, you have
committed so much sin that God cannot love you in yourselves–you have
so offended His infinite justice that His pure and holy Nature repents
that He ever made you! But look, look, I see another Man come in, a Man
like ourselves, in every respect a true Man, but such a Man that when
the great Father sees Him, He says to Him, "My Son, My Son, I am so
delighted with You, the one perfect Man, that for Your sake I am glad
that I made men. I am delighted that I made them in Your image. You
shall be the Firstborn among many Brothers and Sisters. For Your sake I
will not destroy men from off the face of the earth. For Your sake, for
the sake of that one Man, My Fellow and yet Man, I will bless the
untold multitudes whom I have chosen before the foundation of the
world, and whom I give to You to be the reward of Your soul's travail,
who shall be accepted in Your righteousness, loved because of My love
to You and saved in Your salvation."

Sirs, if you had Paul or Apollos here to speak on such a theme as this,
even they might fail to deal with it as it deserves! Only God the Holy
Spirit can make us get even the shadow of an idea of how much God loves
His Son and how ready He is to love us, also, and how truly He does
love us who are in Him!

That God should pity me, I can understand, but that, for the sake of
His dear Son, He should actually take a complaisant delight in me and
love me, this is, indeed, wonderful! And His Son has so loved me that
He has espoused me to Himself. Before the earth was, He chose me for
His love–and now He loves me for His choice. Let this thought ravish
your hearts–it is enough to do so! Before the daystar shot forth its
first beams of light, the heart of Jesus Christ was set on you and He
loves you, now, as much as He loved you, then, and He will always love
you! When all the things that are shall have gone back into their
natural non-existence, He will still love you with all the power of His
Infinite mind! No, He is not only espoused to you and bound to love
you, but He has taken you into a marriage union of the most mysterious
kind–and He will never be content till He shall eat the marriage feast
with you and you shall sit down with Him and the chorales of the
universe, every sigh and sorrow hushed to rest, and every joy let loose
from the secret treasury of bliss! As the Lord Jesus lives in Glory
with His Father, so will He have you to be with Him at His right hand,
to sit upon His Throne, even as He has overcome and has sat down with
the Father upon His Throne!

1 have also to say yet something more. The Father is well pleased with
His Son actively. That is to say, His pleasure in His Son shows
itself–He does something to honor His Son. When we pray, "Father,
glorify Your Son," that prayer is only a faint echo of God's resolve
and determination that He will glorify His Son. Can you picture that
wondrous scene when He shall come in His Glory and all the holy angels
with Him–He that once was spat upon, crucified, dead and buried–can
you imagine the splendors of that august moment when Heaven shall empty
out its legions of angels to accompany the returning Prince of the
kings of the earth? Then shall sun and moon be ashamed and hide their
diminished light, for the Lamb, Himself, shall shine with a brightness
before which they shall be black as sackcloth of hair!

Then, with the ten thousand times ten thousand of His Father's
courtiers who will come streaming out of Heaven's golden gates, He will
sit upon the Throne of His Glory. I was going to try to picture the
scene, but I could not possibly do it. I will only say, "Thus shall it
be done unto the Man whom the King delights to honor," while ten
thousand, thousand trumpets blow to raise the sleeping dead–and quick
and dead from sea and land stand before His dread tribunal and every
eye shall see Him–and they that hated Him shall call upon the rocks to
fall upon them, and hide them from His face! In that day shall it be
seen how God has resolved to prove His good pleasure in His Son by
giving Him glory, honor, majesty, dominion, power and might forever and
ever. Yes, dear Friends, God loves to glorify His Son! Here I must
leave this part of my subject, for I want to come to a practical point
in the latter portions of my discourse.

II. We have seen that the Father is well pleased with Christ. Now let
me ask, in the second place, ARE WE ALSO WELL PLEASED WITH THE LORD
JESUS CHRIST? Can we look at Him and say, "This is my beloved Savior,
in whom I am well pleased"?

If so, listen to this. Here is the point where God and our souls can
meet. God loves Jesus–so do we. The Lord delights to glorify Jesus–so
do we. He will make all things subservient to the honor of Christ–so
would we. God's love is like the sun and we reflect its light just as
little drops of dew that hang upon the blades of grass reflect it, but,
as the dewdrop is agreed with the sun, so are we agreed with God. I
like to feel that, notwithstanding all my imperfections and sin, I can
meet God in Christ! Can you meet Him there, dear Friends? I know that
many of you can–what a blessed meeting place it is! Across that marred
body of the spotless and lovely Jesus, God and man embrace one another!
I am a sinner and the Father takes the sinner's hand, and says, "I have
forgiven you for My dear Son's sake." And we stand there and say,
"Heavenly Father, we bless You for Jesus. "And He says, "I gave Him to
bless you, I intended Him to bless you, and now I delight that you
should bless Him and should praise His name." You know that if you take
us upon any other ground, there is a point of difference–God and man
cannot agree until they come to the God-Man, Christ Jesus–and then,
where God and man have met in one Person, and are joined together in an
everlasting union, there God meets men and they are bound together in
an alliance that shall never be broken! What a blessed thought this is!
Our love to Christ enables us to find a meeting place with God in the
Person of His dear Son.

Well, next, can we say that we are well pleased with Christ? Then, as
the Father says He is well pleased with Christ, here is a place for
cooperation as well as for union. Now we can be laborers together with
God, for this is a work in which we delight, and it is a work in which
God also delights. See, Brothers and Sisters, you can go and try to
show how much you love the Savior. And when you do that, God is also
showing how He loves the Savior. If this is the work in which you
engage, you are sure to have God with you. Suppose you were to adopt
some highly ambitious projects–for instance, the formation of a
religious sect, the building up of a confraternity of which you would
be the head, with the objective of honoring and glorifying
yourself–well, you would have to look a long while before you would
have God with you! But if the one aim of your life is to glorify
Christ, you know that God the Father is with you, for it is His
ever-present desire to glorify Christ!

If your ministry is full of Christ, it is a ministry that God can
bless. "Oh," said a Brother to me, only today, speaking of a certain
minister, "I could not hear him, for there is nothing of Christ in his
sermons." Where there is nothing of Christ, Brothers and Sisters, there
is nothing of unction, nothing of savor–and a man is quite right not
to attend such a ministry as that. Leave Christ out of your preaching
and you have taken the milk from the children! You have taken the
strong meat from the men. But if your objective as a teacher or
preacher is to glorify Christ and to lead men to love Him and trust
Him, why, that is the very work upon which the heart of God, Himself,
is set! The Lord and you are pulling together–and God the Holy Spirit
can set His seal to a work like that! Is it not a marvelous thing that
we should be workers together with God?

When He made the skies, we could not help Him. When He lit up the
stars, we could not help Him. When He rules nations, we cannot help
Him. But when He comes to glorify His Son, then we can be workers
together with Him! It is by means of men, by the use of instruments,
that Christ is to be glorified! And, therefore, here is a sphere for us
in which our weakness stands side by side with Omnipotence! Our folly
is taught of Divine Wisdom and made to co-operate with Omniscience! I
bless the Lord that He said of Jesus, "This is My beloved Son, in whom
I am well pleased," for as we, also, are well pleased with Him, here is
a blessed point of co-operation!

Once more, if we can say, "Yes, we are well pleased with Christ," then
we have before us a fountain of pleasure. Are you pleased with Christ?
Then you may always be pleased! Are you well pleased with Christ? Then
you shall never lose the source and spring of your pleasure! Not long
ago you were well pleased with a dear wife, but she is gone, yet the
Lord lives. It is but a little while ago that you were well pleased
with a sweet child. The lamb has been caught away to the heavenly fold,
but the Good Shepherd is with you always–you can still be well pleased
with Him! A few years ago we were pleased with our physical strength
and with our youthful vigor. It is all gone, now, but Jesus is not
gone–we can still be well pleased with Him! By-and-by, we may come
into such stress of circumstances that all that pleased us shall be a
dissolving view. Our wealth will leave us, or we shall leave it. All
that lies below must be renounced, for a film is coming over the eyes
and the breath is drawn with pain, and the spirit is about to depart to
God who gave it.

Ah, then, Beloved, it will be a blessed thing to be well pleased with
Jesus, for He will be with us in death, and with us throughout
eternity! If you are well pleased with Christ, you have a fountain
which neither frost can freeze nor heat can dry. We may be too well
pleased with earthly friends and we may make idols of them, but we can
never idolize Christ. We may worship Him, for He is God and He,
therefore, deserves our homage and adoration. There is no fear that we
can lavish too much affection upon His Divine Person. You may be well
pleased with Him and be still more well pleased with Him, and be better
pleased and better pleased, still, with Him the older you grow! And in
Heaven, itself, you may still continue to be more and more completely
taken up with Him, for is He not the river of pleasure which is at the
right hand of God forever? Oh, yes! It is a blessed thing to have our
good pleasure in Christ since it will endure world without end!

But, once again, if you can say of Christ that you are well pleased
with Him, I think it suggests to you a line of testimony. People need,
sometimes, to say a word to others to do them good. Do you not think
that it would be a very easy thing, sometimes, to say, "I wish you
would let me tell you of a Friend of mine, and what He did for me"? You
could not preach, perhaps, but you could, any one of you, tell the
story of what Jesus did for you. "I do not know," says one, "I should
break down if I tried." Well, that would not matter–it might be a
grand thing to break down, as you might also break down the person to
whom you were talking–and the two of you, breaking down, you might,
perhaps, take to your knees and get nearer to God that way than in any
other! I think that even the most humble Christian woman might find
somebody, possibly of her own rank and sex, to whom she could say, "I
would like to tell you about my dear Friend." Why, they might think
they were going to hear a piece of gossip, you know! Perhaps they would
lend their ears at once and then they would be surprised to find what a
dear Friend is Jesus. Possibly they would be wonder struck–at any
rate, I am sure they would remember it better than they would a sermon
from me, because it would come with a surprise power which would take
possession of their thoughts!

"Oh, but," you say, "I could not speak that way." I do not believe that
you could hold your tongue if you really tried to speak for Jesus. I
believe that if you once began, you would be obliged to go on. I have
heard of a good woman who said that she could not come before the
Church to tell of her love to Christ. And when they said, "Well, then,
we think we cannot receive you," she said, "But I could die for Him."
"Oh!" said the minister, "that is better than anything else that you
could say. If you say you could die for Christ, come along with you,
you have already said enough." I do wish that, sometimes, as the Father
said, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased," you would
break the silence, and say, "This is my beloved Savior, in whom I am
well pleased–

'In the hea venly Lamb thrice happy I am, And my heart leaps at the
sound of His name.' "I must tell somebody. I cannot keep such a good
thing all to myself." I suggest it to you as a line of testimony, very
simple and very easy to sincere-hearted persons, that you should
imitate the Great Father in this respect and publicly or privately,
according as you have opportunity, express your love to Christ.

If anybody in this Tabernacle can say, "Yes, I am well pleased with
Christ, I delight in Him," I think that fact may be to you a very
blessed token for good. Faith in Christ ought to come first and I used
to think it always did. But I correct myself as I go on learning. I
meet with a great many persons who have a very sincere love to Christ,
which love does not bring them any comfort, or bring them salvation,
either, because they have not learned to trust Christ. The trust in
Christ that saves the soul is not admiration of His Person or even love
of Him–it is faith in His atoning Sacrifice, reliance upon His
finished work. And if you are relying upon Him, you can then say, "I
love Him, I delight in Him, I rejoice in everything about Him, He is
very dear to me."

Well now, how came this about? It is the work of Grace in your soul,
for by nature we are enemies to God by wicked works, and if there is in
your heart a trustful love for Jesus, so that you are well pleased with
Him–depend upon it, the Spirit of God has been at work in your soul
and you are a new creature in Christ Jesus! The kind of faith that I
have seen in some, and which I am sure is good sound faith, is this.
One said, "I believe myself to be the most unworthy creature who ever
lived and I cannot understand why God should have the slightest love to
such a wretch as I am. But I do trust myself on the merits of the Lord
Jesus Christ with all my heart and I feel an inward union to Him. I
love Him and I long to be with Him and, somehow, I feel certain that He
will never cast me into Hell." No, dear Heart, how could He? How could
He cast out one who loved Him? How could He cast out one who trusted
Him? What? Shall it be said in Hell, "Here is a sinner who trusted the
Savior"? Never! What? Shall they say, "Here is one in the unquenchable
fire who was united to God in Christ Jesus"? It is impossible! Such a
thing can never be! Therefore have no fear about it. With this trust in
Christ you may live, you may die, you may rise again, you may stand in
the Day of Judgement! If you are well pleased with Christ, God is well
pleased with you. If you delight in Christ, God delights in you. This
is a seal of the Spirit of God upon His work in your heart and you may
go away and rejoice.

Only take notice of this one thing. Imitation is the sincerest form of
admiration and if you really, trustfully, love the Savior, you will
endeavor to be like He. It will be your desire at all times to tread in
His footsteps. "Well," says one, "I sincerely hope that I may do so.
May the Holy Spirit help me! But one thing I know, I rejoice in my dear
Savior's name." I can say that, too, yet, when I get home, tonight, it
is very likely that I shall feel very, very, very weary and possibly,
all of a sudden, a spirit of depression will come over me. It often
does when one is very weary. And then I fall back on this fact–I did
my best to extol my Master. I have preached nothing else but Christ
and–

"Ever since by faith I saw the stream His flowing wounds supply,
Redeeming lo ve has been my theme, And shall be tiil I die," and He
will not cast me away! I have no hope but in Him and He cannot put me
away!

O dear Souls, cling to my Lord! If you cannot do that, look to my Lord,
trust to my Lord, be well pleased with my Lord and my Lord shall be
well pleased with you! I do not ask of you a difficult thing, for, if
ever there was One with whom we ought to be well pleased, it is the Son
of God, who became the Son of Mary, that He might save us from our
sins! Oh, think much of that wondrous love of His! If we do not admire
it and love Him for it, surely our hearts are turned to stone! May God
break them and give us new ones–and enable us henceforth to love
Christ with all our heart, mind, soul and strength! Amen and Amen.

EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON: PSALM 2; MA TTHEW 3.

Psalm 2:1-3. Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain
thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take
counsel together against the LORD, and against His Anointed, saying,
Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us.
The conspiracy was both strong and influential, The kings and the
rulers combined against Jehovah and against His Christ. They were very
determined. They set themselves with resolute purpose. They took
counsel together. They were full of a horrible enthusiasm–they
raged–they thought the work as good as done, but they imagined a vain
thing. The fight was against Jehovah and against His Anointed, the
Christ, the Messiah! What came of it all? Did they break their bands
asunder and cast away their cords from them? Listen–

4. He that sits in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in
derision. For what can mortals be as compared with the Eternal? The
fire can readily enough consume the twigs. Shall men set themselves in
opposition to Omnipotence and hope to prosper? And when God determines
to glorify His anointed Son, shall worms of the dust prevent Him from
doing so? What can come of all their opposition? God simply laughs at
them–Jehovah has them in derision!

5. Then shall He speak unto them in His wrath, and vex them in His sore
displeasure. He scarcely needs to lift His hand! He has only to speak
and when Jehovah speaks in wrath, His words are thunderbolts! Men's
hearts are indeed troubled when God's Words come hot with anger into
their spirits. This is what God said–

6. Yet have I set My King upon My holy hill of Zion. "You have raged,
you have deliberated, you have resolved, but it is all nothing! There
is My Son, the crowned King." And such is the Anointed tonight–the
Christ is on the Throne–let His enemies say what they will, He must
reign, nothing can prevent it! He must be King of kings and Lord of
lords, for thus is it written concerning Him.

7. I will declare the decree: the LORD has said unto Me, You are My
Son; this day have I begotten You. This is the seal of the Anointed. He
is the Son of the Highest, the only-begotten Son of the Father, who
says to Him, "You are My Son; this day have I begotten You."

8. Ask of Me, and I shall give You the heathen for Your inheritance,
and the uttermost parts of the earth for Your possession. Christ is
asking of His Father–even He cannot have what He desires without
asking for it! Prayer is so essential to the progress of the Kingdom of
Christ that even Christ, Himself, must ask! But then God has promised
to give to Christ the heathen for His inheritance, and the uttermost
parts of the earth to be His possession. This is the great strength of
all missionary enterprise. Dear Friends, we may be quite sure that the
earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Lord when we read such a
text as this–"I shall give You the heathen for Your inheritance, and
the uttermost parts of the earth for Your possession.'' If men will not
yield to the Lord when He is made known to them. If they resist the
drawings of Divine Love, what will happen? Listen–

9. 10. You shall break them with a rod of iron; You shall dash them in
pieces, like a potter's vessel. Be wise now, therefore, O you kings: be
instructed, you judges of the earth. "You rulers, you magistrates, you
senators, you governors of the earth, be wise, be instructed."

11. Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice with trembling. "If you are
wise, you will obey the superior King–you will yield obedience to the
great Lord of All."

12. Kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and you perish from the way, when
His wrath is kindled but a little. The kings and rulers are bid to do
this–let each one of us do the same–let us give the kiss of homage to
Him whom God has made to be our King and take Him to be our Lord and
Ruler forever and ever.

12. Blessed are all they that put their trust in Him. It is so. Those
of us who have tried it can bear our witness that it is so–there is no
life like a life of trust in God. The nearest approach to Heaven that
we can live in this mortal body is a life of simple confidence in the
Lord Jesus Christ! Now let us read concerning our Lord's first coming
and appearance among the sons of men. Turn to the Gospel according to
Matthew, at the third chapter.

Matthew 3:1, 2. In those days came John the Baptist, preaching in the
wilderness of Judea, and saying, Repent you: for the Kingdom of Heaven
is at hand. There is no entering the Kingdom of Heaven without leaving
the kingdom of darkness! We must repent of sin, or we cannot receive
the blessings of salvation! Of every man, whoever he may be, whether
outwardly moral or openly wicked, repentance is required. It is the
door of hope–there is no other way into the Kingdom–"Repent you: for
the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand."

3, 4. For this is He that was spoken of by the Prophet Isaiah, saying,
The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare you the way of the
Lord, make His paths straight. And the same John had his raiment of
camel's hair, and a belt about his loins; and his meat was locusts and
wild honey. His raiment and his food were like his doctrine–rough and
simple. There was no mincing of words, no making of pretty phrases with
John the Baptist! His message was simply, "Repent you: repent you: for
the Kingdom of Heaven is coming." We need more of this John the Baptist
teaching nowadays, that men may be plainly told their faults and warned
to put away those faults that they may receive Christ Jesus as their
Savior!

5-7. Then went out to him Jerusalem, and all Judea, and all the region
round about Jordan, and were baptized of him in Jordan, confessing
their sins. But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to
his baptism, he said unto them, O generation of vipers, who has warned
you to flee from the wrath to come? These were the influential people
of the times– the Pharisees were the Ritualists of that age, and the
Sadducees were the Rationalists of the period. Why, John, you ought to
have smoothed your tongue, a bit, and have said some very pleasant
words to these great men, for, by so doing, perhaps you might have won
some of these Pharisees, or coaxed some of these Sadducees into the
Kingdom! Ah, no, that is not John's method! He is plainspoken and he
deals truthfully with his hearers, for he knows that converts made by
flattery are but flattering converts that are of no real value!

8, 9. Bring forth, therefore, fruits meet for repentance: and think not
to say within ourselves, We have Abraham as our father: for I say unto
you, that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto
Abraham! Pointing to the stones in the River Jordan and all along the
banks, he said to the Pharisees and Sadducees, "There is nothing, after
all, in your natural descent from Abraham. God has promised that
Abraham shall have a seed, but think not that He is dependent upon you
for that seed–He can fulfill His promise without you! He can turn the
very pebbles of the stream into children for Abraham! God is not short
of men to save. If some of you will not have Him, do not think that He
shall have to come a-begging to you. There are others who will have Him
and His rich Sovereign Grace will find them! Beware, you that are proud
and think much of yourselves, for God will not humble Himself for you!
He has regard to the humble and the lowly, but the proud He knows afar
off."

10-12. And now also the axe is laid unto the root of the trees:
therefore every tree which brings not forth good fruit is hewn down,
and cast into the fire. I indeed baptize you with water unto
repentance: but He that comes after me is mightier than I, whose shoes
I am not worthy to bear: He shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit, and
with fire, whose fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly purge His
floor, and gather His wheat into the garner; but He will burn up the
chaff with unquenchable fire. The Christ is the Minister of Mercy, but
there is about His Doctrine a searching and a trying power! Only the
sincere in heart can endure Christ's winnowing fan. As for the
insincere, they are blown away like the chaff on the threshing
floor–their end is destruction! God give us to be numbered among the
wheat that Christ shall gather into His heavenly garner!

13, 14. Then came Jesus from Galilee to Jordan unto John, to be
baptized of him. But John forbid Him, saying, I have need to be
baptized of You, and come You to me? It seemed very strange that John,
the servant, should be required to baptize Jesus, the Master.

15. And Jesus answering said unto Him, suffer it to be so now: for thus
it becomes us to fulfill all righteousness. Then he allowed Him. That
is to say the Teacher must, Himself, obey the laws which He is about to
lay down. And, inasmuch as He is going to bid others to be baptized, He
will set the example and be, Himself, baptized! I think, also, that the
Baptism of Christ was the picture, the type, the symbol of the work
which He afterwards accomplished. He was immersed in suffering. He died
and was buried in the tomb. He rose again from the grave–and all that
is set forth in the outward symbol of His baptism in the River Jordan!

16, 17. And Jesus, when He was baptized, went up straightway out of the
water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto Him, and He saw the Spirit
of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon Him: and lo, a voice
from Heaven, saying, This in My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.
And we are well pleased with Him, too.