Shai Linne - Greatest Story Ever Told

Stricken, Smitten, and Afflicted

Stricken, smitten, and afflicted,
See Him dying on the tree!
’Tis the Christ by man rejected;
Yes, my soul, ’tis He, ’tis He!
’Tis the long expected prophet,
David’s Son, yet David’s Lord;
Proofs I see sufficient of it:
’Tis a true and faithful Word.

Tell me, ye who hear Him groaning,
Was there ever grief like His?
Friends through fear His cause disowning,
Foes insulting his distress:
Many hands were raised to wound Him,
None would interpose to save;
But the deepest stroke that pierced Him
Was the stroke that Justice gave.

Ye who think of sin but lightly,
Nor suppose the evil great,
Here may view its nature rightly,
Here its guilt may estimate.
Mark the Sacrifice appointed!
See Who bears the awful load!
’Tis the Word, the Lord’s Anointed,
Son of Man, and Son of God.

Here we have a firm foundation,
Here the refuge of the lost.
Christ the Rock of our salvation,
Christ the Name of which we boast.
Lamb of God for sinners wounded!
Sacrifice to cancel guilt!
None shall ever be confounded
Who on Him their hope have built.

Why God Created the Universe — For Good Friday

1. The apex of God’s display of his own glory is the display of his grace.

“God predestined . . . according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace” (Ephesians 1:5–6). Grace is the endpoint in the revelation of God’s glory.
This is seen in the way wrath serves to make God more glorious for the vessels of mercy. “Desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, God has endured with much patience vessels of wrath . . . in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy” (Romans 9:22–23).

2.  God’s glorification of his grace was planned before creation.

“God chose us in him before the foundation of the world . . . to the praise of the glory of his grace” (Ephesians 1:4–6).

3. God’s glorification of his grace was to happen through the Son of God, Jesus Christ.

“He predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ . . . to the praise of the glory of his grace” (Ephesians 1:5–6).
“God called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began” (2 Timothy 1:9).

 4. From eternity the apex of God’s glorification of his grace was designed to be Christ’s crucifixion for sinners.

Before there was any human sin to die for, God planned that his Son be slain for sinners. We know this because of the name given to the book of life before creation. “Everyone [will worship the beast] whose name has not been written before the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb who was slain” (Revelation 13:8).

5. God’s glorification of his grace in the crucifixion of his Son for sinners was the ultimate purpose for creating the universe.

“All things were created through him and for him” (Colossians 1:16). For all eternity we will sing “the song of the Lamb” (Rev. 15:3). We will say, “Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain” (Revelation 5:9).

6. Therefore God planned from eternity that the revelation of his glory would be the ultimate reason for creating the universe.

This glory would be supremely displayed in God’s grace. This grace would be supremely glorified in Jesus. And the apex of that glorification in Jesus would be reached when he was slain to save a people who would spend eternity magnifying the greatness of that grace.  In other words the universe was created for the glorification of God’s grace at Calvary, echoing through eternity in the Christ-exalting joys of the redeemed.

 [John Piper from desiringGod.org]

Time-Lapse Milky Way

What Does it Mean to Accept Christ?

The Mystery of the Word Made Flesh

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

John 1:14

We Beheld His Glory

It must always be kept in mind that what God thinks about a man is more important than what a man thinks about himself.  As far as God is concerned, what a man is always is more important to God than what that man does. We judge a man by his performance, by what he can contribute. But God sees deeper inside and bores to the very core of what that man really is. God is looking for goodness. It is his character and personality that God looks for. God is never impressed by anything a man can do.

Now bring this over to Christ. What was it that made Him glorious? It was what Jesus was that made Him the glorious person that John writes about. His glory lay in the fact that He was perfect in a loveless world; He was purity in an impure world; He was meekness in a harsh and quarrelsome world. Everything that the world was, Christ was the exact opposite. That was what made Him glorious. “We beheld his glory” referred to the deathless devotion of Christ and His patient suffering and unquenchable life, and the grace and truth at work in Him. He was the glory of the only begotten Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. Thai was what made Jesus wonderful. That was His glory among men.

All of this is little known in the world today. Men and women in all their wild, money-inspired and profit-inspired revelries are not celebrating the great miracle of turning the water into wine. Neither are they celebrating all of the healing acts that Jesus did; the raising of the dead, the cursing of a fig tree, or any of the other miracles that Jesus Christ did (see Mark 11:12-14,20-21; Luke 22:49-51).

The poor world around us, lost in the depravity of its own heart, with little remnants of religious instinct left, does not celebrate what Jesus was. The glory of the Son was that He was God walking among men. Here was something that was not man, but yet was man. Here was God among men. Here was a man acting like God in the midst of sinful men, and this was the wonder of it all.

Being in the Very Form of God…

We celebrate a man today who was God made flesh. We celebrate the deep, dark mystery or the miracle of that which was not God being taken up into God, and being made flesh, so that we now have Jesus Christ who is God and yet who is man. Out of His fullness, we receive. Does it mean that everybody has received the fullness of Jesus Christ? No, it cannot mean that.

What does it mean? Simply that Jesus Christ, the eternal Son, is the only medium in which God dispenses His benefits to His creation. Only through Christ will God dispense blessings on humanity. It is Christ the eternal Son through whom God dispenses His benefits to His creation.

Because Jesus is the eternal Son, because He is of the eternal generation and equal with the Father as pertaining to His substance, His eternity, His love, His power, His grace, His goodness and all the other attributes of deity, He is the channel. He is the medium through which God dispenses all His blessings, all His fullness of all that we receive, as the doe that goes down to the edge of the lake and drinks. Have you received the fullness of the lake? The doe might answer, “Yes and no. I am full from the lake, but I have not received of the fullness of the lake. I did not drink the lake down; I drank what I can hold of the lake.”

Grace upon Grace

Out of His fullness, God has given us through Jesus Christ grace upon grace, so that the only medium through which God does anything is His Son. Whether He created or whether He is creating, it is all through Jesus Christ our Lord. If He speaks, it is through the eternal Word. If He reveals Himself, it is because He who was in the bosom of the Father has revealed Him. If He provides, it is through the medium of Jesus Christ. If He sustains it, it is because it can be said, “He is before all things, and by him all things consist” (Col. 1:17).

Wherever the voice of the creature crosses the vast gulf to the ears of the Creator, grace must operate. We have restricted grace to John 3:16. We must have forgotten that everything God does is out of the grace of His fullness. The only thing that can cross that vast gulf is that amazing grace of God. The great hymn writer, John Newton, put all of this into lyric beauty in his hymn ‘Amazing Grace”:

Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound,

That saved a wretch like me.

I once was lost but now am found,

Was blind, but now, I see.

As amazing as this hymn is, it is just the beginning. John Newton goes on to say:

Through many dangers, toils, and snares

I have already come.

‘Tis Grace hath brought me safe thus far,

And Grace will lead me home.

Whatever any creature has, the amazing grace of God is channeled from God to that creature.  It is grace upon grace.  Even before a person has put his faith and trust in Jesus Christ, he is a recipient of God’s grace.  Even the person who refuses Christ cannot get away from the channel of blessing flowing into his heart and life. He may spend all of eternity in the hell prepared for the devil and his demons, but while he is upon earth, he is a recipient of grace upon grace. Everything God does is by grace. No man, no creature, deserves anything. Salvation is by grace alone. All that God does flows out of grace.

Without exception, everyone has received grace from God.  Everyone has received life and a mind that stores up memories of a lifetime. All of that is evidence of God’s grace toward humanity.

The whole universe is God’s beneficiary and joins to give praise to the Lamb that was slain Under the earth, on the earth, and above the earth, John heard creatures praising Jesus Christ, and all joined, “Saying with a loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing” (Rev. 5:12).

“Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created” (Rev. 4:11) tells us that the whole universe is a beneficiary of Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ is All in All

This is where our witnessing to the non-Christians is important.

Everybody we witness to has already benefited from Christ. In our witnessing, we are simply presenting Christ in His new office. Apart from the Lord Jesus Christ, God never did anything.

Throughout His entire universe, God works through the Son.

When we go to an unsaved person and say, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ,” we are only saying, believe on the One who sustains you and upholds you and has given you life and pities you and spares you and keeps you. Believe on the One out of whom you came. All of His fullness we have received, or we have received out of His fullness, and we only present Jesus as Lord and Savior.

There are those who would offer a divided Christ. They say, in effect, “Accept Christ now as your Savior.” And then later on say, “Now, accept Christ as your Lord.” The Bible does not teach anything of the sort.

There is no Saviorhood without Lordship. Jesus Christ is both Lord and Savior, and He was Lord before He was Savior; and if He’s not Lord, He’s not Savior. When we present this Eternal Word that was made flesh and dwelt among us to men as Lord and Savior, we present Him only in His other offices. Previously He has been Creator, Sustainer and Benefactor. Now we ask men to believe on Him as Lord and Savior; but it is the same Lord Jesus.

The suggestion that the Old Testament is a book of law and the New Testament a book of grace is a false premise. There is as much grace and mercy and love in the Old Testament as there is in the New. There is more about hell in the New Testament than there is in the Old. When it comes to judgment and the fury of God burning with fury upon simple men and simple creatures, it is found in the New Testament, not in the Old. If you want excoriation, blisters and burns, do not go to Jeremiah, go to Jesus Christ.

The God of the Old Testament is the God of the New, and the Father of the Old Testament is the Father of the New Testament. The Christ who was made flesh to dwell among us is the Christ who walked through all the pages of the Old Testament. Was it the law that forgave David when he committed his immoral sin? No, it was grace. Was it grace that said, “Babylon has fallen, the great harlot is fallen, Babylon, is fallen’? No, it was law.

There is perfect and absolute harmony between all persons of the Godhead. What he says here is the contrast between all that Moses could do and all that Christ could do. Moses gave the law. That was all Moses could do, for he was not the channel through which God dispensed grace. God chose His only begotten Son.

Here lies the contrast: “the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ,” means only that all that Moses could do was command righteousness; but Jesus Christ produces righteousness. All that Moses could do was forbid us to sin; but Jesus Christ came to save us from sin. This is not to pit one against the other, but to show one doing what the other could not do. For Moses could not save, but Jesus could. The Holy Ghost, in Romans 10:4-7, said the law Moses gave was holy, just and good and must not be spoken against. But it could not save. But because Jesus Christ is the eternal Son, the channel through which God dispenses grace to the world, grace came through Jesus Christ.

Grace precedes everything—from the first day of creation until the Virgin Mary gave birth in a Bethlehem manger. For it was the grace of God in Christ that saved the human race from extinction when they sinned in the Garden. It was the grace of God in Jesus Christ yet to be born that saved the eighth person when the Flood covered the earth. And it was the grace of God in Jesus Christ yet to be born, but existing in preincarnation glory, that forgave David when he committed his sin; that for gave Abraham when he lied; that enabled Abraham to pray God down to 10 righteous persons when He was threatening to destroy Sodom; that forgave Israel repeatedly.

It was the grace of God in Christ yet before the Incarnation that made God say, “I have risen early in the morning and stretched out My hands unto you.” It made him say, “Like as a father pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear him” (Ps. 103:13). Jesus is the channel through which grace comes. And He said, “I am the truth,” and it is through Him that grace is released to the world, through His wounded side, to sinners like you and me. All the grace of God anywhere comes through Jesus Christ. Then he says, “No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him” (John 1:18).

[An except from A.W. Tozer’s And He Dwelt Among Us]