Christ is the central figure and source of all things, encompassing creation, redemption, and the church itself. The sermon emphasizes that salvation, forgiveness, peace, eternal life, deliverance, access to God, and the power to live a Christian life are all exclusively through Christ. It illustrates how different individuals experience salvation through Christ, whether dramatically like the Philippian jailer or gently like Lydia, highlighting that the means may vary but the destination is always Christ. The message concludes by urging believers to recognize Christ's absolute preeminence in God's eternal purposes and to live lives unreservedly at his disposal, magnifying him in all things.
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into a house? Yes, the church is likened to a house. Whose house are we? Congratulations Christ there to that house. He's a son over his own house. It is his house. Is the church likened to a family? Yes, the church is likened to a family. Congratulations Christ there to the family. He's the firstborn among many brethren that in all things he might have the preeminent. And the firstborn is the title of absolute preeminent. Or a family that is composed of all those who have been regenerated by the Spirit of God and brought into that wondrous family and given that unspeakable privilege of looking up into the face of the great God of heaven and saying, Abba, Father.
Is the church likened to a bride? Yes, the church is likened to a bride. Just relating this Christ there to the bride. Well, he happens to be the groom. That's all. And you've never heard of a bride without a groom. I've heard of many a woman who has been left waiting on the steps. All dressed up but nowhere the girl. The groom didn't arrive. And the bride gets her virtue and her value from the groom. Remember that, folks? Newspapers nowadays go into raptures about the dress of the bride. Column after column devoted exclusively to describing the beautiful dresses of the bride.
And the poor old groom just missed in a short sentence. He wore a dark suit. But eliminate the groom and what you have. You have nothing. The bride, I is not her garment, but her dear bridegroom's face. I would not give it glory, but on the king of grace. Not that the crown he gave it, but on his pierced hand. The land is all the glory in Emmanuel's land. All things are of him. As for the source. Creation is of him. Redemption is of him. The church is of him. But more, all things are through him as to the channel.
Every blessing you now possess, whatever we'll enjoy, will come to you fully and wholly through the mediation of the blessed Lord Jesus Christ. You'll never get anything from the Father except through the Son who declared, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes under the Father but by me. In the first place, salvation is through him. Are you saved? You say, yes, thank God I'm saved. What's all mine? How do you get saved? Why do you reply? Jesus said, I am the door. By me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved. I took him in his word. I came to him as the door. I believed he loved me and bore my sins and died to me.
I took that step of faith. I crossed the threshold of that door. I own height as the Lord of my life. And that moment I was saved by his master's grace. Yes! That's how every person in the world is saved. And no one is ever saved apart from faith in him. How they think unto him. There are many ways to Christ. But only one way to God. And that's true Christ. Remember that. Many ways to Christ. Some people are kissed into salvation. Others are kissed into salvation. But whether you're kissed or whether you're kicked, what does it matter? You get in, that's the main thing.
You get in. No two people are saved under exactly the same circumstances. There are some preachers that preach their own particular experience as though it is a mold for everybody else. What nonsense and words. Why are you hung over hell for six weeks? No. Did you lose five nights a week in a row? No. Lose an appetite for fourteen meals? No. Then you're not saved. What utter fiffle and worse than fiffle. You've heard of the little girl, haven't you? Who is being examined for church membership?
And one of the elders with a deep bass voice and a baleful eye looked at the poor little shrinking thing and fired this dreadful collecting at her. How long did you spend in the bug of despondency? And the poor little thing that knew her children's progress quite well, replies, please, sir, I didn't come that way. I went right to the cross. Bless her heart. Amen. No need to wander through the bog of this ponderancy, not the slightest. In fact, John Bunyan tells of himself that the king had provided stepping stones through the bog. That usually fear followed so hard after the pilgrim, he forgot all about the stepping stones. There are the preachers that will not believe that a person is born again, and that he's born again with an alarm clock in the left hand and a calendar in the other.
Nonsense again. Little children. to come to the Lord Jesus. They don't have such a great experience, a thrilling experience. As you had, you came as an adult. They were wooed by the wonderful story of the love of Christ. They were kissed into salvation. I had to be kicked. But whether it's one or the other, it matters not, we're brought to him. Here's a person who comes to the door of salvation. He takes a wire from his pocket and starts working on that door.
After seven years of hard, unremitting labor, he makes a wonderful discovery. The door was wide open all the while. Giving himself a good swift kick, he passes through that door, and then, if you please, expect every other person to be as foolish as he. Nothing of a kind. Your experience is not my experience. When God saved you, he gave you an experience peculiarly your own, exactly suited to your personality, and your complex personality, to him is an open book. Preach the gospel. The spirit likened to wind, which blow it squarely blisters, sometimes like a gentle zephyr, sometimes with a force of a cyclone.
Take the case of Lydia. the cellar of circles, and she listened to the voice of the Apostle Paul. The miracle of regeneration was done in her heart without any outward pomp or circumstance whose heart the Lord opened. She attended unto the things which the Apostle Paul spake. But in that same city the Philippian jailer needed an earthquake to wake him up and bring from his heart the question, what must I do to be saved? So whether it's a Lydia type of conversion, or whether it's the Philippian jailer type of conversion, all ends in Christ. Salvation is through him. Neither is there salvation in any other.
For there is none other name given under heaven among men, whereby we must be saved. Second, forgiveness is through him. Through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins. Are your sins forgiven? How are they forgiven? Through faith and that one who bore those sins in his own body on the tree, who assumed their liability, and then expiated that sin by the sacrifice of himself. Forgiveness comes through faith in him. But more, peace is through him. Do you have peace with God? You reply, yes, thank God. I have peace with God. It is well with my soul. And how? Why, you reply, Romans five and one, make that perfectly clear.
Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Why through him? Because all things are through him. This peace was brought by him. This peace was practiced by his speck of blood. This peace is preached through him. This priest's peace is possessed by us through faith in him. And we, in turn, preach peace. by Jesus Christ. Eternal life is through him. Are you the possessor of eternal life? You reply, yes, thank God, what's all mine? And how did this eternal life come to be your presence and your eternal possession? You reply, the word of God makes that perfectly clear.
For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life? What comes next? Through Jesus Christ our Lord. What is eternal life? Forging someone's word to inquire after this meeting is over, do you have eternal life? You reply, yes. Thank God I have eternal life. How do you know the word of God assured me of that fact? That having believed on Christ, I am now the possessor of eternal life. The next question, what is eternal life? What is eternal life? What is eternal life? This is the true God thinking of Christ and eternal life. Eternal life is a person. Don't think of eternal life in terms of quantity, the number of years, millions, a trillion, or a billion, as the case might be.
Eternal life is a life that has a certain quality to it. That eternal life was manifested in the person of the Blessed Lord Jesus so that the Word of God declares, He that hath the Son of God, Has what? Eternal life. For eternal life is in him. In him was life, and the life was the light of man. And this eternal life comes to us through the mediation of the Son of God. Deliverance comes through him. Are you saved? You say, yes, thank God I'm saved. Delivered from sin's doom? Yes. Delivered from sin's doom. How? By the one who endured the cross and despised the shame. who was delivered for my transgressions, that I might be delivered from my transgressions.
Salvation from sin's doom is to him who bore the penalty. Salvation from sin's power. How is that made possible? To a man of God's right hand, one who ever riddest, as our intercessor, as our advocate for the Father, as our great high priest in heaven. And ultimately, salvation from sin's possibility and sin's domain is going to be made good in our experience through that same person, who with the voice of the archangel and the pomp of God shall rapture his people, shall raise the dead to be with him and to be like him forever. Deliverance from sin's doom and from sin's dominion and from sin's domain comes through him.
But more, access is through him. For to him, wrote the Apostle Paul, we both, Jew and Gentile, have access by one spirit unto the Father. Access into God's presence comes to him. Having in high faith over the house of God, let us draw near with the two hearts in full assurance of faith. Having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, our bodies washed with pure water. If any man sinned, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. Let us come boldly to the throne of grace. and who made it the throne of grace. But the one whose grace we know, who though rich for our sake, became poorer, that we through his poverty might be rich.
But more, the power to live the Christian life comes through him. I don't suppose anyone, honor, lives such a God-glorifying and Christ-magnifying life as did the Apostle Paul. Let's ask Paul. Paul, how did you do it? How did you manage it? Paul replies the Apostle Paul, simple as ABC. I can do all things. All right, what comes next? To Christ! Which strengthens me. Why to him? Because all things are through him as to the channel. And now, last week. All things are to him as to the object. All things head up in him.
First, to him the theme of prophetic witness. To him give all the prophets witness that whosoever believes on him shall receive remission of things. To him, Acts ten forty three. They tell me there's a circular chapel in Switzerland containing nothing but statues. The central statue is a statue of Christ. And surrounding the central statue are statues representing all the prophets of the Old Testament, both major and minor. And all these prophets are adopting the same attitude. Each is standing with outstretched hand and with a finger pointing toward the central statue. There stands Moses.
Moses, of whom did you speak when you spoke of one likened to your brethren, becoming the prophet of God? And Moses points to Christ. Isaiah, to whom did you refer? When you spoke of one despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrow to the crater with grief. And Isaiah points to the central figure. Jeremiah, you spoke of the branch of the Lord being made glorious. To whom did you have reference? And Jeremiah points to him, Ezekiel, you saw that wondrous vision of a throne upon the wheel set within the wheel. And upon that throne one likened to the Son of Man. Who is this Son of Man?
And Ezekiel points to Christ. Daniel, you saw the ancient of days. And before the glory of that vision, your comeliness was turned within you to corruption. You were brought down, sat upon your face, until that hand set you upon your knees, and not the witty caused you to rise to your feet. Who was that one whose vision you saw by the river Kivar? And Daniels points to sight. And so the rest, Hosea, and Joel, and Amos, and Obadiah, write through. All with one voice. Testified. of him. Touch the scriptures, and then you think you have eternal life. They are they, which testify of me, and beginning at Moses, and all the prophets.
He expounded unto them, in all the scriptures, the things concerning himself. To him, the theme of prophetic witness. To him, the center of his people's gatherings. Oh, Jacob was dying. His physical sight was real bad. He sadly needed an oculist. But never was the old gentleman's spiritual reading Keener that when he pierced the centuries yet unborn, and said of Judah, the scepter should not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh comes, and unto him shall the gathering of the people be. Yesterday morning witnessed the gathering of the Lord's people in this place. I wonder what brought the people here. Was it the architectural beauty of this place?
These glorious arches? These magnificent stained glass windows? Well, hardly. A jolly nice place, I must admit. But not by any stretch of imagination. A poem in architecture. Was it the dear brethren that were the attractive centre? Oh, these dear brethren, someone so dear, we wouldn't buy them at any price. A peculiar bunch, but the best was going anyhow. No, indeed. It wasn't the dear brethren that was the attractive centre. When we gathered here yesterday morning, what brought us here? On to him shall the gathering of the people be.
He is the center of his gathered faith. Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there and I in the midst. Who else do you want when Christ is there? Christendom has supplanted The virtue and the value of the presence of Christ, with the virtue and the value of the presence of a humanly ordained clergyman, apart from whose presence the Lord's Supper cannot be celebrated. What a travesty on the simple New Testament pattern he has given to us in the pages of Holy Scripture. Christ is the host at his own table. We he's honored yet. And so, according to thy gracious words, in meek humility, this would I do, O Christ, My God, I would remember thee.
To him, the center of his people's gathering. To him, the subject of our eternal song. What a song we're going to sing in heaven. O unto him that loved us, and washed us all loosed us from our sins in his own blood, and has made us unto our God a kingdom of priests. O unto him, be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen. Christ, your consummation, of all God's eternal purposes. And wonder of wonder, you and I, who once wandered in our folly by prodigals, far from him, with enmity in our hearts toward him, knowing not God, and desiring not his way, were arrested by the Spirit of God, and in marvelous grace were brought into living vital union with him whom to know is life eternal, whom to know is to love, whom to love is to serve, and whom to serve is the greatest delight imaginable.
shall we chuck into our hearts. For this day and all the day, that our blessed Lord Jesus, the one to whom God has given a name that is above every name, at the mention of that name of Jesus, ultimately every knee shall bow in every tongue and breath, that he is Lord of the glory of God the Father. In the meanwhile, we know that Christ is the consummation of all God's eternal purposes, that all things are of him as of the source. Creation is of him. Redemption is of him. The church is of him. All things are through him as of the camel. Salvation is through him. Forgiveness is through him.
Peace is through him. Eternal life is through him. Deliverance is through him. Access is through him. The power to live a life to his honor and glory comes wholly and solely through him. All things are to him. as for the object. To him the theme of prophetic witness. To him the center of his people's gathering. To him the theme of our eternal song. Blessed be his name who loved us. Who gave himself for us. And may it be yours and mine to give to him that which God has given to him. The place of absolute preeminence in all his divine purposes.
May it be yours and mine to apprehend this glorious fact and to revel in the enjoyment that comes to us from the assuring word of God that we are linked with God to him, who is a consummation of all his eternal purposes. God grant it for his name's sake. Amen. Turn to number two, please. Number two, sing the first and last verses. And then our brother Gibbs will dismiss this meeting. So he stands. We're seeing these two verses. Number two. Oh, there is a power behind you, and there is just one thing for you.
Bring forth your joy, your joy, and your joy is gone. Bring forth your joy, and my heart is gone And now to the king eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, the glory for ever and ever to our blessed Lord Jesus, to whom?
He has revealed himself in all the glory of his being. Oh God, our Father, accept our thanks for him. And may our lives from now on be placed unreservedly at his disposal, that he to us shall be magnified. We ask it in his name as we seek thy parting blessings. Amen. Thank you.