Hello, and welcome to this message from Pastor Skip Heitzig of Calvary, Albuquerque. Our series called The War Is Over celebrates the songs from our worship team Battledrums' debut album, now available on iTunes, Google Play, and at battledrumsmusic.com. In this series, Skip looks at how these songs apply to us as we live in victory over sin. If you'd like to support this ministry financially, you can give online securely at calvaryabq.org/giving.
In Isaiah chapter 53, the prophet Isaiah not only captured the heart of Battledrums' song "By Your Stripes," but he presented the very heart of the gospel. In this message, Skip points out three truths that are the cornerstone of the Christian faith. We invite you to turn to Isaiah chapter 53. But before Skip begins, check out this sneak peek of "By Your Stripes."
[MUSIC - BATTLEDRUMS, "BY YOUR STRIPES"]
What a great, great song. The song is "By Your Stripes," and the text this morning is Isaiah chapter 53. If you turn in your bibles, the ones that you brought, or if you didn't, there's a Bible in front of you somewhere. Or your neighbor may have one. You might want to look over his or her shoulder. Isaiah 53.
Have you ever done anything extravagant for someone? Or has someone ever done an extravagant act for you? And when I ask that question, my mind goes back to when we were first married, and I thought I was going to speak at a friend's church in California.
And I flew into LAX, and my wife pulls tickets to Hawaii out of her purse. It was a set up. She was getting me to Hawaii and I didn't know it. And I was in LAX, and for the first time I realize, she just bought us tickets to Hawaii. And I thought, how extravagant a gift. And what a wonderful time we had.
But then I go back even further to a time when I was a little kid and my mom drove this old Toyota Corolla. And I think she loved that little car, but my dad thought she needed a new car, so he decided to buy or a brand new Monte Carlo.
On Christmas morning I'll never forget looking out through the windows to the driveway where my dad said, honey, come just look. I got you something for Christmas. And there was this car with a three-foot wide ribbon that wrapped it up with a huge bow on top. It just took our breath away. That was an extravagant gift, I thought.
When you hear the word "extravagant," usually it has a negative connotation, somebody who spends way too much for something. You might think of George Clooney who spent $13 million on his wedding. That's extravagant. Or Lady Gaga who bought a single fish for her pond, $60,000. One coy.
Or you might think of Kanye West who put in his house toilets that cost $750,000, gold toilets. Would you agree that's extravagant? It's way over the top. $300,000 I understand, $750-- no. It's like, what?
But I want you to know something, God's love is extravagant. It's an extravagant kind of love. And if you were to look that word up in the dictionary, it simply means unrestrained or exceeding what is appropriate.
Isaiah 53 tells us of God's extravagant love. It tells of the fatal disease that we all have, but how Jesus came from heaven to earth with the cure. And in coming to Earth with the cure, he contracted the disease himself, and it took his life. That is extravagant love.
No wonder John in the New Testament said, "Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us." No wonder Jesus put it this way, "For God so loved the world." His love is extravagant love.
One of the great parables of the New Testament was given by Jesus to tell that truth. It's the parable of the prodigal son. You know the story, we all do. How the son left his father's house and spent all of that inheritance, wasted it away until he had no money left, and the only place for him to go is back home.
So he comes back home, his head hanging in shame, and his father sees him afar off and runs toward him. And with loving gestures he says, "Bring the best robe, put a ring on his hand, sandals on his feet, and kill the fatted calf for my son who was lost is found." Extravagant love.
The Book of Isaiah is quoted in the New Testament about 85 different times. But do you know that Isaiah chapter 53 is quoted in the New Testament more than any single other chapter from the Old Testament. It is so important that Phillip in Acts chapter 8 led an Ethiopian eunuch to Jesus Christ using Isaiah chapter 53.
Now, this chapter is called a Servant Song. Servant Song. There are four of them in Isaiah. They speak of a servant, the servant of the Lord. And each of the Servant Songs portrays him in another dimension. This is the fourth of the Servant Songs, and it is the most important, the most memorable.
So the first one is Isaiah 42, the second is Isaiah 49, the third is Isaiah chapter 50, part of it. And now Isaiah 53, the fourth of the Servant Songs, it predicts the servant of the Lord who will be the Messiah. And here we find out the sin bearer for the world.
Scholars call this the Mount Everest of messianic prophecy. Others refer to this chapter, Isaiah 53, as the torture chamber for the rabbis. Interesting, isn't it? You know why they call it that? It's because this chapter is so obvious that it can only refer to Jesus Christ, that it has bugged Jewish rabbis for centuries trying to make it apply to something different than what it obviously speaks of.
One author said this, "This section contains unarguable, incontrovertible proof that God is the author of scripture, and Jesus the fulfillment of messianic prophecy. The details are so minute that no human could have predicted them by accident, and no imposter fulfilled them by cunning."
Isaiah 53, this section actually doesn't begin in Isaiah 53, it begins in 52. The Song begins in 52:13 and goes through chapter 53:12. There are five stanzas to this song. I'm not going to go through all of them. I want to confine my thoughts to versus 4, 5, and 6 largely. And that is because we don't have the time to go through it all, so I want to be confining because of the time.
But also because Chapter 53 verse 4, 5, and 6 is the meat, the heart of the passage. It's the heart of the passage because frankly it's the heart of the gospel. And it's the heart of the gospel because it's the heart of the father sending his son into the world.
Really what you have before you is Christianity 101. This is as basic as it gets, folks. And here it is in a nutshell, that the innocent should take the place of the guilty. That's the heart of the gospel. That the innocent should take the place of the guilty, or that the perfect doctor should take the place of the imperfect diseased patient.
Let's look at our text, Isaiah chapter 53. I said we're going to go through 4, 5, and 6, but for context's sake, do you mind if I go up to verse 1 and read down? I thought you'd say that. Let's begin.
"Who has believed our report? And to who has the arm of the Lord been revealed? For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant and as a root out of dry ground. He has no form or comeliness--" attractiveness, beauty-- "and when we see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.
He is despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid as it were our faces from him. He was despised, and we did not esteem him. Surely he is borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, and yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted.
But he was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement for our peace was upon him, and by his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray, and have turned everyone to his own way. And the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all."
I mentioned that this is Christianity 101, this is the basic stuff. This is the basic heart of the gospel. And there are three basic truths for the sake of time that I want to share with you out of this passage that are quite simple. We all have a sickness, we all need a specialist, and we can all have a serum, a cure. We all have a sickness, we all need a specialist, and we can all have a serum. We all have a sickness.
There's something in the text that is striking. As you begin to read those versus that I said is the really heart of it, they tell us of a collective problem. Notice the words "our griefs." "Surely he has borne our griefs," verse 4. Griefs means sickness, literally. Then it speaks of our sorrows, and then a couple verses later, our transgressions, our iniquities.
In other words, we all have a sorrow that comes from a sickness that is brought on by our sinfulness. That's what this passage is unfolding. We as a human race have a fatal disease that has as its consequence a profound, painful sorrow, an alienation from God.
It's what Paul said in the New Testament, Romans 3. "For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God." So we're dealing now with a disease that is not contained. It is a pandemic. It affects every one. As it says in verse 6, "the iniquity of us all."
Now I realize, and I know that you know, that the whole concept of sin nowadays is very unpopular. In fact, it's denied. It's denied. From the behavioral psychology of B.F. Skinner to the evolutionary theory taught by Charles Darwin, they believe, they teach, and most people espouse a purely mechanistic view of humanity.
There is no higher power. There is no such thing as sin. Guilt and sin is developed by religious leaders and kooks like me to control the masses and use that guilt for their own benefit. And not only is that the voice of the secular world, but there are many religious voices that would say the same thing.
For example, Eastern religions like Hinduism teach that sin and righteousness, good and evil, are relative terms, that everybody stumbles on their way towards self realization. And if you mess up in this life, you can just be reincarnated in the next and you'll get chance after chance after chance in other lives.
Buddhism does not recognize sin, but teaches the principle of karma. The Baha'i faith teaches that humans are naturally and basically good as does Christian Science. In fact, it would seem that the Bible is the lone voice in the world that says, nope, we've all got a disease that need a cure.
In fact, one minister even, one very, very famous pastor once said these words, "I don't think anything has been done in the name of Christ and under the banner of Christianity that has proven more destructive to the human personality and hence counterproductive to the evangelism enterprise than they often crude, uncouth, and unchristian strategy of attempting to make people aware of their lost and sinful condition."
In other words, he is saying, the worst thing you could ever tell someone is that they are spiritually sick and sinful and in need of a savior. So we have the Bible, the lone voice saying, nope, we all have a problem that brings sorrow and death.
Because you see, until you come to grips with it, it's like having a fatal disease. And you just walk around in denial. You're going to die soon and you know, and you go, no, I'm good. I'm fine. I'm all good.
Several years ago I was speaking at a church on a Sunday night, and I was in the car driving afterwards, driving home. And there were no restaurants open at that time in this place. So I had to go to one of those convenience stores where they have those burritos that are in the refrigerator. You put them in the microwave for like 30 seconds and you have a meal, at least they call it that.
And so I bought a burrito, maybe two, maybe eight. I don't know. But I was eating burritos, and I'm driving along, and I'm starting to feel uneasy, queasy, like something's not right. And my friend with me goes, hey, are you OK? And I go, I'm fine, I'm good, no problem. Keep driving, it gets worse, and he sees that it's getting worse. So once again, you OK? No, I'm good, no problem.
Later on I have abdominal pain and stomach cramps so bad that I'm driving in the car and kind of like, doubled over. And he goes, you're not OK. I'm good. A few hours later, 2:00 in the morning or so, I am admitted into a local hospital in the emergency room. Then and only then do I realize and admit I have a problem.
And I remember the doctors using a term, I remember they said, well, we need to do on him a B.E. B period E period. The initials B-E. I understood what that meant. I had a little bit of medical background. That stands for barium enema. I don't have to describe that, do I? It's just horrible. But then I thought, I have a problem.
Now, I come by this denial honestly. I had a father who denied any physical ailments or illnesses to the extent that when he was working on his car one day in his garage, while the engine was running and he got his hand to close to the fan and it cut the tip of his finger off, I saw it hit the lid of the car and hit the engine, the top of his finger.
And he's shocked by it, and it starts to bleed. So he takes his handkerchief and he puts it around the finger really tight until the handkerchief is filled with blood, and dripping on the engine, and hitting the fan, and it's spurting a few places. I'm a kid going, ah!
And only then did he say, I think I have a problem. I'm going to go to the hospital, get this fixed. I can't fix this til I fix this. So he goes inside the house, puts on a clean shirt while this is bleeding, get his shaver, thinks he needs to shave his face before he is seen in public. I'm going, dad, you're dying. I'm good.
Now, unfortunately what Heitzig see men do with physical maladies, the general unbelieving world does with spiritual infection. They go through their lives, living in denial of sin, refusing any treatment for it, and the infection just gets worse. So one of the seminal truths of this passage in the Old Testament is that we all have a sickness.
Which leads us to a second. We all of a sickness, we all need a specialist. And he is introduced in this passage. You'll notice in verse 5 how it's written, "but he--" he being that servant that is spoken about beginning in Isaiah 52 verse 13-- "surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows--" oh, that's verse 4-- "but he was wounded for our transgressions.
He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement for our peace or that brings our peace was upon him. And by his stripes, we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord is laid on him the iniquity of us all."
Do you see this language of substitution throughout these versus? It's that whole concept of substitution. The innocent is substituted for the guilty. The perfect is substituted for the imperfect. The sinless one is substituted for those who have iniquity. That is soaked through the entire passage.
God is telling the Jews 700 years before Christ even came to the earth that he would send his servant who would be a substitute for our sins, a sacrificial lamb who would be slaughtered. Look at the language in verse 7, "He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth. He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, as a sheep before it shears is silent, so he opened not his mouth."
In other words, our disease requires a specialist. No quick fix, no ibuprofen will fix this. No little C-pack and you'll feel better. This is so serious that it requires a specialist to do a special thing, a substitution. And why is that? Well, since the essence of sin is man substituting himself for a God, the essence of salvation is God substituting himself for man. It's the great exchange.
It's what theologians call vicarious atonement. I don't care if you remember the term, but the principle you need to know. Vicarious atonement is that God substituted Jesus so that he got our punishment.
I remember when I first heard the gospel clearly so that I understood it. I was listening, and I remember the evangelist saying that Jesus wants your life. He loves you just the way you are, just give him your life. He'll take you as you are, beat up, broken, sinful, whatever. Give him your life, and he in exchange will give you his life. He'll give you eternal life.
And I remember hearing those words, and my first thought was this, God is getting a bad deal. In this exchange, this is a really bad deal for God. He gets me, and I get him, his blessings, his glory, and his heaven later on. He's getting a bad deal. But then I immediately had a second thought, but I am getting the deal a lifetime, and I would be an utter fool to pass this deal up, this great exchange.
Let me illustrate this substitution for a moment with an example that happened here in the State of New Mexico. Up at Los Alamos Labs in 1946, they were working on a project known as the Manhattan Project. It was a project that was-- they were determining the amount of uranium, U-235, that was needed for an atomic chain reaction.
And there was a physicist-- it's well documented-- a young Canadian physicist by the name of Louis Slotin who was working in the labs that day. And when uranium is enriched to that point and an atomic reaction is about to be set off, they call that critical mass.
And so one day when Louis Slotin was in the lab, and they would take two hemispheres of uranium and bring them close together. And just when the mass of uranium, these two hemispheres reached a critical point to set off that reaction, he would separate it with a tool like a screwdriver. Again, this is 1946.
One day he took the hemispheres, he brings them together, brings them together, the mass is going critical. He has to put a screwdriver and separate them. The tool slips and hits the ground. Suddenly the entire room fills with a bluish haze. Critical mass has been reached. The chain reaction is beginning.
He knows he can only do one thing. He reaches in with his hand, his bare hand, and he separates the hemispheres of uranium, stopping the chain reaction, saving seven people who are in that room that day with him, but giving himself a lethal dose of radiation. And nine days later he died.
2000 years ago, Jesus stepped into sin's most concentrated radiation. And he allowed himself to be touched by its curse. It took his life. It saved ours. The cross broke the chain reaction that condemns all of us to die eternally. Vicarious atonement, substitutionary death.
Now, fortunately that whole truth that I just discussed is found in a single verse pf scripture. I love it when the Bible does that, puts these whole complex things in one single verse, one nugget. It's one of the most important verses in your Bible. Second Corinthians 5:21.
This is what it says. "God made him who knew no sin to be sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in him." Once again, "God made him--" that's Jesus-- "to be sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in him."
Let me translate that another way. God the Father treated Jesus Christ as if he had committed every single sin by every single person who ever lived. Or put another way, God the Father treated Jesus Christ like you and I deserve to be treated so that he could treat us like Jesus Christ deserves to be treated.
That's the great exchange. He bore our sins that we could bear his righteousness. This is why I love that old hymn that says, "I owed a debt I could not pay. He paid a debt he did owe. I needed someone to wash my sin away." We all have a sickness. We all need a specialist.
Which leads us to the third truth. We can all have a serum, a cure, a medicine that we can take that fixes the problem. I say we can all have it. We don't all have it. We don't all take it. But we can. In verse 5 it does say, "and by his stripes we are healed."
By the way, can I just say something really quick? And that is that these verses that we are honing in on, verse 4, 5 and 6, are written in Hebrew, what is called the prophetic present tense. It's as though it has already happened, as though we're at the foot of the cross watching what has just happened with Christ. And we're applying it to ourselves, we who believe by his stripes are healed.
But now I want you to go back to where the passage begins, and I want you to notice a word. It's a very important word. Go back to chapter 52. It begins in verse 13. Interesting, isn't it, how we preachers are? We say we're going to read a few verses, but then we end up reading the whole passage anyway.
"Behold my servant shall deal prudently. He shall be exalted and extolled very high, his crucifixion. Just as many as were astonished at you, his visage--" that is his physical, facial appearance-- "was marred more than any man, and his form more than the sons of men. And so he shall sprinkle--"
By the way, the word sprinkle means to sprinkle with blood in a sacrifice. It's the same word used of the Old Testament mosaic sacrifices. He shall sprinkle-- what's the next word? Many. No, it's doesn't say all, does it? Many nations or peoples, literally. He will sprinkle, he will atone for many peoples. "Kings shall shut their mouths at him, for what has not been told them they shall see, and what they had heard they shall consider."
Now, go down. Keep thinking that thought, go down all the way the chapter 53, verse 10. "Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him. He has put him to grief. When you make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. He shall see the labor of his soul and be satisfied by his knowledge. My righteous servant shall justify--" What's the word? Many. "For he shall bear their iniquities."
You see this is the thing about a cure. You've got to take it. You have to use it. Serum sitting on a shelf does no one any good. You can have the right answer and the right serum, and here we are looking at the serum, and analyzing the serum, and studying the serum, and underlining certain words we like in the serum, and memorizing what the serum bottle says. But if you don't take it, you will die.
So it says he will sprinkle many nations, he will justify many. Not everyone, but someone. Because you see, there are those who will take the medicine, but there are many who will refuse it. When Jesus stood before Jerusalem he wept over the city.
Do you remember when he wept over Jerusalem? And he said, "Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often I wanted to gather your children together, but you were not willing." I think he would say that of many lives today. I wanted to give you salvation and cleanse you of your sin, but you were not willing. We can all have the serum, but we need to take it.
Which leads me to conclude by asking this, how do people deal with the disease that they have, that the Bible says we all have? Well, one way is what we just discussed, by denial. We deny it's even a reality. We just live in complete denial. Like Heitzig men when it comes to physical problems, or like certain religions in saying there really isn't sin. It's just unnecessary guilt, so we deny it.
But you know what the Bible says about that? If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. That's what it says about that. Here's the second way people deal with the melody, the sickness. It's not that they deny it, they have a sneaking suspicion that they really are sick.
So their answer is to work really hard to offset it. They're going to fix it themselves. Yeah, I know I'm sick, but I'm going to get better, I promise. I'm going to work really hard and be a good person, and try to apply the laws of my religious experience, and I'll redeem myself.
Well, you know what the Bible says about that? Paul said, "For by the deeds of the law, no flesh, no one shall be justified." So it won't work. You can't fix it. So you can deny it, but that doesn't fix the problem. You can try to fix the problem by self help and self-improvement, but that will not fix this problem.
So what is the solution? There's only one solution. Confess it. Confess it. Which means agree, to word confess means agree with God that what God says about our condition is our condition. That's what confess means. OK, God, I agree. I'm really sick. I need help.
And that's what the Bible tells us. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. The rest of the verse says, "but if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness."
And if you're thinking, well, how could confession make that much of a difference? How could making a statement of agreeing with God be such a big deal? If God already knows we're sinners, why do we have to say it? And here's why. Because when you confess, it's an admission that you messed up, and it's a declaration that you can't fix it yourself.
And when you admit that you messed up, and you can confess and agree and declare that you can't fix it yourself, now you're ready to take the medicine. Now you're ready to take God's solution. You're not denying it. You're not trying to fix it yourself by working really hard to earn it. You're simply saying, I can't fix this. I need you. I need the serum.
We say it often, God has a big eraser. But you've got to be admitting you got some smudges that need erasing. And we're saying that God has the cure for the oldest and most profound disease of mankind, but you've got to walk into the doctor's office and say, I admit I'm sick.
And when you do that, the most wonderful thing happens. God's extravagant love kicks in. It kicks in. As soon as you are willing to make that admission, God's extravagant love kicks in. And he says, all that I have promised will be yours.
I want to conclude with a little story that kind of sets all of this, I think, into an illustration ties it all together. The day is over, and you're driving home. You tune into your radio. You hear a little blurb about a little village in India where some villagers have died suddenly, strangely of a flu that has never been seen before. It's not influenza, but three or four fellows are dead, and it's kind of interesting. They're sending some doctors over there to investigate it. You don't think much about it.
But on Sunday coming home from church, you hear another radio spot, only they're saying it's not three villagers, it's 30,000 villagers in the back hills of this particular area of India, and it's on TV that night. CNN runs a little blurb, people are heading over from the disease center in Atlanta because this disease strain has never been seen before.
By Monday morning when you get up, it's the lead story. For it's not just in India, it's in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran. And before you know it, you're hearing this story everywhere. And now they've coined it as the mystery flu. The president has made some comment that he and everyone are praying and hoping that all will go well over there, but everyone is wondering, how are we going to contain it?
That's when the president of France makes an announcement that shocks Europe. He is closing their borders. No flights from India, Pakistan or any of the countries where this thing has been seen. And that is why that night you are watching a little bit of the news before going to bed.
And your jaw hits your chest when a weeping woman is translated from a French news program into English saying, there's a man lying in a hospital in Paris dying of the mystery flu. It has come to Europe. Panic strikes. As best as they can tell, once you get it, you have it for a week and you don't even know it. Then you have four days of unbelievable symptoms, and then you die.
Britain closes its borders, but it's too late-- Southampton, Liverpool, Northampton. And it's Tuesday morning when the President of the United States makes the following announcement. Due to a national security risk, all flights to and from Europe and Asia have been canceled. If your loved ones are overseas, I'm sorry, they cannot come back until we find a cure for this thing.
Within four days, our nation has been plunged into unbelievable fear. People are selling little masks for your face. People are talking about, what if it comes to this country? And preachers on Tuesday are saying, it's the scourge of God. It's Wednesday night, and you're at a church prayer meeting when somebody runs from the parking lot and says, turn on your radio now.
And while the church listens to a radio app from a smartphone with the microphone stuck to it, the announcement is made. Two women are lying in a Long Island hospital dying from the mystery flu. Within hours it seems, this thing has just swept across the country. People are working around the clock to find an antidote. Nothing is working. California, Oregon, Arizona, Florida, Massachusetts-- it's as though it's sweeping in from the borders.
And then all of a sudden, the news comes out. The code has been broken. A cure can be found. A vaccine can be made. It's going to take the blood of someone who hasn't been infected. And so sure enough, through all the Midwest, through all of those channels of emergency broadcasting, everyone is asked to do one simple thing. Go down to your local hospital and have your blood type taken. That's all we ask.
When you hear the sirens go off in your neighborhood, please make your way quickly, quietly, and safely to the hospitals. Sure enough, when you and your family get down there late Friday night, there's a long line. And they've got nurses and doctors coming out and pricking fingers, and taking blood and putting labels on it.
Your wife and your kids are out there. And they're taking your blood, and they say, wait there in the parking lot, and if we call your name, you can be dismissed and go home. You stand around scared with your neighbors wondering what in the world is going on, and that this is probably the end of the world.
Suddenly a young man comes running out of the hospital screaming. He's yelling a name and he's waving a clipboard. What? He yells it again. And your son tugs on your jacket and says, daddy, that's me. Before you know it, they've grabbed your boy. Wait a minute, hold on.
And they say, it's OK, his blood is clean. His blood is pure. We want to just make sure that he doesn't have the disease. We think he's got the right type. Five very tense minutes later, out come the doctors and the nurses crying and hugging one another. Some are even laughing. It's the first time you've even seen someone laugh in a week.
And an elderly doctor walks up to you and says, thank you, sir. Your son's blood type, it's perfect, it's clean, it's pure, and we can make the vaccine. As the word begins to spread all across that parking lot full of folks, people are screaming and praying and laughing and crying.
But then that grey haired doctor pulls you and your wife aside and says, may we see you for a moment? We didn't realize that the donor would be a minor, and we need you to sign the consent form. You begin to sign, but then you see that the number of pints of blood to be taken, that line is empty. How many pints of blood, you ask.
And that's when the old doctor's smile fades and he says, we had no idea it would be a child. We weren't prepared. We need it all. But, but-- no, no, you don't understand. We're talking about the world here. Please sign. We need it all. We need it all.
But can't you give him a transfusion? Well, if we had clean blood, we would. Can you sign? Would you sign? In numb silence, you do. And then they say, would you like to have a moment with him before we begin?
Can you walk back, can you walk back to that room where he sits on a table saying, daddy, mommy, what's going on? Can you take his hand and say, son, your mommy and I love you, and we would never let anything happen to you that just didn't have to be. Do you understand that?
And when that old doctor comes back and he says, I'm sorry, we've got to get started. People are dying all over the world. Can you leave? Can you walk outside while he is saying, dad, mom, dad, don't leave. Why have you forsaken me?
And then next week when they have the ceremony to honor your son, and some folks sleep through it, and some folks don't even come because they go to the lake, and some folks come with a pretentious smile and pretend to care, would you want to jump up and say, my son died! Don't you care? I think God would want to say, my son died. Don't you care how much I love you?
This is the gospel. This is as basic as it gets. We all have a sickness. We all need a specialist. God has provided the serum. You can deny that you have a problem. You can try to fix it yourself. Not a smart strategy, not a good plan. When you confess, when you admit, the Bible says, "He who covers his sin will not prosper, but who so confesses and forsakes it will find mercy."
Thank you, God. It sounds so shallow in light of the extravagant love that you have showered upon us. But we say from the bottom of our hearts, those of us who are in the "us," in the "we," who have received Christ, thank you for this enormous, incredible deed of the innocent dying for the guilty. The perfect doctor dying for the imperfect diseased patient. By your stripes, we are healed.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
And Lord, if there's anyone in this room or on the radio or on the internet or in the sound of these words outside who have yet to meet Jesus Christ personally and have their sin forgiven, have their disease eradicated by your cure, I pray they would turn to Christ, receiving your gift and having new life.
If you have joined us today in any of those capacities, especially those of you who are right here in this room, if you realize maybe for the first time, it's true. I am soul sick. I am sin sick. And I want to take God's solution.
As gruesome as it is to think that the perfect sinless son of God died and took my punishment, it's a time for celebration, because the one who stood in for us has taken the consequences from us. And he rose from the dead conquering death itself and one day you can see him face to face.
If you need to do that personally, if you've never personally turned your life to Christ, ask him to forgive your sins. If you're not a follower of Jesus Christ today, or if you wandered away from him and you need to come back home and walk with him, as our heads are bowed, as our eyes are closed, mine will be open, I want you to raise your hand.
And in raising your hand you're saying, here I am, Skip, pray for me. I'm going to give my life to Christ today at this moment. I'm going to receive the cure right now. If that describes you, I want you just to raise up. Raise it up high.
God bless you my left, and you, and you to my left again. Place your hand up high. In the back, see a couple of you guys back there. Anyone else? Right there, right in the middle. In the balcony, God bless you. Any others out there? Raise that hand up now. Raise it up high. God bless you. Yes, ma'am. And you in the back.
If you're outside, there's a pastor out there. Go ahead and raise your hand up if you're outside. Hold it up, and that pastor will recognize you. If you're in our overflow rooms, you raise your hand. There's a pastor there who will recognize you.
Father, thank you for these, and thank you for what it means for them in the future. They're about to step into a newness, a freshness of life not known heretofore for them. We're so grateful, once again. And we pray, Lord, that for them, they would have a lifting of their spirits, a joy that they have never known. In Jesus name, amen.
Let's all stand. As you stand up, we're going to sing a song. And I'm going to ask you to do something. If you raised your hand, could I ask you to find the nearest aisle, walk down it, and walk right up here in the front where I'm going to lead you in a word of prayer, receiving Christ. Let's just seal the deal right here and right now.
You're in a group of friends. They will applaud your coming forward. But if you're in the back or in the balcony, come down the stairs, in the family room, come through the door. Walk right up here just for awhile. It I won't take long. And come and stand right here. Let me pray with you.
You're admitting you have a problem. You're declaring you can't fix it on your own, and you're asking God for his solution. That's what it is.
We'll give you time. You might be in the back, or in the middle of a row, or walking down the steps of the balcony. Or you may be right up front. Just come, stand right here. Make it public. Jesus called people publicly, you know.
And if you didn't know it already, this isn't just a religious experience where we go hang out at a building once a week, this is a lifestyle change. This is a whole paradigm shift. We actually believe Jesus is alive right now, risen from the dead, and will lead us and guide us and forgive us. And that he has that power.
Nice, come right on up. Who else? Some of you have watched altar calls like this for years. And that's the problem, you just watch them. You need to be in one. And you need to be in this one. If you don't know Jesus, if you're not sure that when you die, not if, when you die you'll be in heaven, you need to make sure.
You've got nothing to lose. You have everything to gain. You have nothing to lose. It's a good deal. It's the best deal. Take God up on his offer of forgiveness in Christ. Anybody else? Anybody else?
It's Labor Day weekend. You know what that means to me? He did all the labor, I get all the benefit. He did all the work on the cross, and it's a finished work. Anyone, anybody else?
Well, those of you who have gathered, I want to lead you in a prayer. I'm so glad you're here. I didn't call you up to embarrass you, but to welcome you in the name of Jesus to his love and his forgiveness and his plan for you. So I'm going to lead you in a prayer. And I'm going to say this prayer out loud, and I'd like you to repeat these words out loud. Say them from your heart. Say them to the Lord.
Let's pray. Tell him, Lord, I give you my life. I know that I am a sinner. Please forgive me. I believe that Jesus died for me. That he shed his blood for my sin. And that he rose again from the dead, that he's alive right now. I turn from my sin. I repent of it. I turn to Jesus as my Savior. I want to follow him as my Lord. Help me. I can't do it on my own. I need you. In Jesus' name. Amen.
Jesus looked beyond the cross and the pain and saw you and me. He was willing to endure the cross so we could become children of God. How will you share that beautiful truth? Let us know. Email us at mystory@calvaryabq.org. And just a reminder, check out Battledrums' alum, The War Is Over on iTunes, Google Play, or at battledrumsmusic.com.
Thank you for joining us for this teaching from Skip Heitzig of Calvary, Albuquerque.