JESUS HIMSELF ALONE || MATHEW 17:1-8

This may be the most important message I have preached all year. The burning jealousy of Christ for His bride.

Matthew 25 Parable of the 10 virgins 

Jeremiah 17 pictures for us a bush and a tree. The dry bush that trusts not and the flourishing tree that trusts.

MATTHEW 17:1-8

JESUS ABOVE ALL

BURNT: The Sacred Center of Christ Leviticus 1 “All the offerings taken together give us a full view of Christ—as many mirrors arranged to reflect in various ways the figure of that true and perfect sacrifice.” —C.H.M. (C.H. Mackintosh)   A Story of Pure Devotion My mind recalls a young, dark-haired Canadian girl, whose beauty lay not so much in her features as in the quiet creativity of her words. She was a writer of poetry and prose, able to describe a moment with the grace of a Victorian novelist. My eyes would often drift to the tattered journal she carried—the weight of it owed not to its binding, but to the sheer volume of ink pressed upon its pages. She never parted with it. Its contents, I am certain, were treasures untold. One random Saturday turned quietly unforgettable when I asked why she had left her cherished treasury behind. “I burnt it,” she said. I gasped at the waste. “Why?” She looked directly into my eyes. “Some things,” she whispered, “are for Him alone.” The hours, thoughts, pains, sorrows, joys, and life lessons she penned rose to His eyes alone. Her ink became incense. Her intent was to give her most cherished work to Him—and this, she did.   What Is Burnt Is Gone When something is truly burnt, it passes beyond possession. It can no longer be handled, owned, or used. It is consumed. Surrendered to the flame, it becomes smoke ascending, curling upward— beyond the reach of man, beyond sight of man, beyond the control of man. It cannot be claimed by anyone but the heavens to which it ascends. This fully and finally.   The Burnt Offering Such is the burnt offering of old. It is an offering for God alone. Unlike the other sacrifices, it is laid upon the stones for one purpose only: to rise to God. It is the first of the offerings described in Leviticus. When the animal is burnt, it passes beyond possession. It can no longer be handled, owned, or used. It is consumed. Surrendered to the altar, it has become smoke—ascending, curling upward— beyond the reach of man, beyond the sight of man, beyond the control of man. It cannot be claimed by anyone but the God to whom it ascends—fully and finally.   Christ, the Sacred Burnt Offering This is a divine type and shadow, revealing to us the sacred center of Christ’s heart— the sacred center of His manifold sacrifice. When Christ was laid on the altar of the cross, He could no longer be handled, owned, or used. He was, in a real sense, consumed by death. Surrendered to God, He became a sweet-smelling savor, curling upward— beyond the reach of man, beyond the sight of man, beyond the control of man. He could be claimed by none but His Father, to whom He ascended fully and finally. Christ, the final burnt offering—an obedience to God, just for God. Ephesians 5:2 — “…a sacrifice to God.”   Commentary from the Saints C.H. Mackintosh writes: “It was exclusively for God. God alone was the object of Christ in the burnt offering aspect of His death.” “Here is the deep-toned devotion of the heart of the Son presented to, and appreciated by, the heart of the Father.” In the burnt offering, Christ’s charms shine bright through His unshakable devotion to His Father. Spurgeon notes: “The burnt offering was all for God. So was Christ. His death was above all things God-ward.” The Holy Spirit reveals to us in this shadow that Christ loved the Father before the church. What excellency! What beauty and perfection! Surely His love to the Father is sufficient to rouse love in our hearts. Mackintosh continues: “The true believer finds in the cross that which captivates every affection of his heart… There are heights and depths in the doctrine of the cross which man never could reach.”   Christ’s Willing Offering The offering of Himself to His Father was voluntary. He was not forced or coerced. He revealed: “No one takes My life from Me. I lay it down of My own initiative.” (John 10:18) Matthew Henry writes: “Voluntary. What is done in religion, so as to please God, must be done by no other constraint than that of love.” His offering was not laborious duty but loving devotion.   The World Sees Waste—Heaven Sees Worship The natural mind calls this—not cooked but burnt—a waste. But Christ’s loving devotion to His Father transforms what the natural man sees as waste into worship. John 14:31 — “So that the world will know that I love the Father.” The sacred center of His sacrifice was this public display of affectionate devotion to His Father. He didn’t merely accept God’s will—it was His intention, His motive, His reason. (See Hebrews 10:5–10; John 6:38–39; 10:17–18; Luke 22:42) John Owen describes it: “The free act of love to the Father.” Spurgeon echoes: “He came not with sigh but a song to do His Father’s will.” Owen again: “The greatest demonstration of the love of Christ unto the Father is His giving Himself up to the death of the cross, to manifest what love and accomplish His will.”   The Burnt Sacrifice Was Innocent The burnt sacrifice, as the chapter foreshadows, had to be an innocent other. Christ was not only innocent—oh, much more—He was without defect. He fit the foreshadow perfectly. He alone is clean inside and out. Mackintosh: “No one had ever perfectly, invariably, from first to last, without hesitation, without divergence, done the will of God.” “It was no surface work with Him… The more the depths of His being were explored, the more clearly was it manifest that pure devotion to the will of the Father…”   Every Part of Him Aflame I mean to exalt Christ’s burning love for God and His voluntary offering of Himself to God alone as the sacred center of our revelation of what Christ is actually like. Every part of Him aflame to God. Oh, how unlike us is Christ. By this, we know what love for God looks like: the surrender of our whole selves. Romans 12:1 — “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.” Though our love is but the flicker of a faint flame, His sacred center quickens our hearts. For He exemplifies a love that stands apart from all others—ascending to God in fragrant flame. No portion eaten. No fragment withheld. No part left over. Every sinew of His sacred humanity—thoughts, deeds, motives, breath, blood— all offered up to God.   A Few Notes from Leviticus 1 The offering was made morning and evening. He is this both day and night. In the noonday sun and in the blackest night. No shade of life would alter His surrender. The offering could be an ox or a bird. He is this in the great and the small. No action was too small to be wholly surrendered to God. The bird was plucked and unsevered. Christ had His beard plucked in mockery—and yet His divinity was never severed from His humanity. He died as the God-Man. The sinner laid his hand upon the sacrifice, symbolizing imparted guilt and acknowledgment of deserved death. A foreshadow of the One upon whom the Lord laid the iniquity of us all (Isaiah 53). The Subtle Trap of Looking to Ourselves Henry Martyn, a missionary to India, once wrote that when he tried to find comfort by examining his life and searching for evidences of grace, he actually lost the brokenness of spirit he longed to keep. The more he looked to himself, the less he could rest simply at the foot of the cross. Many of us try to find peace by measuring our own faithfulness: Have I prayed enough? Have I served enough? Have I conquered this sin consistently? We think that if we can point to enough evidence of our devotion, we will feel secure. But here is the irony: the more we look to our own performance, the more we lose humility, dependence, and the sweetness of simple trust in Jesus. It is a subtle trap. Even good things—prayer, ministry, obedience—can become props we lean on to feel worthy, rather than gifts that flow from grace. Martyn only found peace when he stopped searching for comfort in himself and began to pray as a dying man—helpless and needy—resting on Christ alone. This is the lesson: Our comfort never comes from our own faithfulness, but from Christ’s faithfulness for us. Brokenness of spirit and assurance of love thrive best when we lay aside self-scrutiny and fix our gaze on the cross.   Christ in the Burnt Offering As a burnt ox – He gave all His strength and labor to God. As a burnt sheep – He meekly followed God to death, patient and quiet in suffering. As a burnt goat – Though sinless, He was thought to be a sinner, sent in the likeness of sinful flesh. As a burnt dove – He was pure, single-eyed, plucked, unsevered, and holy.   The Preacher’s Duty The priests were to arrange the wood and position the sacrifice. John Gill sees this as a type of the preacher’s duty: “Evidence given of Him in the gospel, in which He is clearly set forth in His person, nature, and offices.” Trapp agrees: “The minister must rightly divide and dispose the Word of God, and evidently set forth Christ crucified.” Trapp also writes of the fire consuming the sacrifice: “Typifying the scorching wrath of God upon Christ—or the ardent love of Christ to God.”   The Sweet-Smelling Savor In all this, we see the “sweet-smelling savor unto God.” Christ as the burnt offering: the perfect Man, without defect, pure in and out, in action and thought, motive and deed, great and small—voluntarily offering Himself in love and devotion to His Father. To miss this is to reduce the gospel to a scheme for man's relief. If we fail to see this, we are but a step away from shaping the gospel into a man-centered escape plan, robbing God of His rightful glory in the work of His Son. Spurgeon wrote: “Christ did not die out of mere pity for man, but first of all out of love for the Father.” The salvation of man was the love song of the Son to the Father.   Three Effects on My Soul Adoration of such a lovely individual A desire to receive Him as my own A longing to surrender myself As Matthew Poole writes: “To serve the Lord with all singleness of heart, without self-ends, and to be ready to offer to God wherein we ourselves should have no benefit.” God has graciously met our need— and may He give us an enlarged capacity to enter into and enjoy His provision.

GOLDEN GODS Exodus 32 Unveils the tragic anatomy of idolatry: Only pure intent towards God can wait on God. If God be not our sole desire we will settle for something else, something less. Even something we claim to be Him. Aaron made a God from his own hands and presented it as Yaweh. They eat at the table of the Lord and then rise up to sin against Him. God has every right to destroy them Moses, as a type of Christ, intercedes for mercy even placing himself in their judgment. When confronted Aaron made little of his evil and excused it with a lie. Moses with holy jealousy burned the idol and cast it upon the waters. This chapter is a divine photograph of the kind of rebellion in our natural human hearts. We must remember that these are not pagans but pilgrims. These are God’s people. They heard the thunder of God. They saw the smoke of Sinai. They tasted the manna of heaven—They had passed through the sea on dry ground. They saw Pharaoh drown. They stood under the pillar of fire by night and cloud by day. They know His presence and power. Even still, they made an idol of our own hands.  Waiting has a way of exposing the idols in their hearts. Their idolatry did not spring from ignorance, but from impatience. Only pure intent towards God will refuse to settle for anything that is not exactly Him.  And thus, the human heart is  revealed. And the sad truth remains— man would rather have a visible idol than an invisible God. Something we can control. Something that serves our interest. Something that we shape from our own substance. Behold Aaron, yielding to their desires, melting their gold and forged a god!  O tragic sight—the hands once anointed for the tabernacle, now fashioning an idol image! Aaron defended his spinelessness -  “I cast it into the fire, and there came out this calf.” He shifted the blame suggesting that idolatry is something uninvited, and innocent.  So often our rebellious heart seek to disguise itself in the garments of accident. So as not not take the full credit for out revolt. Can you believe that they named this idol Yaweh? Even today, men create their own way and call it Yaweh. Delirium!  Oh the evil of the human heart when it ceases to bow before the living God. The human heart, if it be not set upon God for God alone, will always forge a substitute. So often we settle for religion in place of relationship, we perform services that ignore the Savior. It is important to note that the golden calf is not merely an object—it is a theology: a God we can touch, manage, control. A god made by the manipulation of man for man.  A religion without the presence of God. Without the voice of God.    May we read and tremble. For this story is not an ancient Israel problem; it is alive in every age. John Calvin is famous for saying,  “heart is an idol-factory.” I like to say “The unsatisfied heart is an idol factory.” We learn from this instant that idolatry often begins when we are no longer aware of God’s presence. When the soul is distracted from God’s presence, it is tempted to shape a counterfeit—sometimes of gold.  When the soul wants something more than God it will not wait for Him.  It will recreate Him and move on without His presence and voice. In these days the idol takes the form of carnal desires, worldly ambitions, material possessions, success in ministry, self-absorption. But, while the people danced, led and defiled, Moses prayed. He pleaded with the Lord, arguing not with sentiment but covenant: “Why should the Egyptians say…?” “Remember Abraham…!” He speaks to men for God, but also to God for men. And herein we find a the cream of the chapter—a sacred shadow of Christ. Jesus has stood in the gap for us. He is our great intercessor. Moses prays “Blot me out rather than blot them out.” The echo of Calvary in that cry! Jesus is the final mediator who would come, not only to plead, to bear the wrath, and to restore a covenant broken by rebellion. Oh, that we would see our modern idols for what they are! They are not golden calves, but they are equally God-eclipsing. Some bow to the shrine of platform and ministry; others adore the opinions of men or the pleasures of the world. Even sound doctrine, when divorced from love and presence, is a lifeless image. Oh the great danger of—orthodoxy without intimacy! Paul the Apostle warns us in 1 Corinthians 10 that “these things happened as examples for us,” and that “we must not be idolaters as some of them were.” He does not speak to pagans, but to believers! To those who “ate the same spiritual meat” and “drank of the spiritual Rock.” He says, “let him who thinks he stands take heed, lest he fall.”And there is something more dreadful still - some early Jewish scholars believed that golden calf may have moved—animated by demonic power, or dark enchantment. Whether fable or fact, the truth remains: We empower what we adore. What we give our hearts to will rule us. And what we desire more God will one day mock us. Let us hold fast to the invisible, and refuse the golden glitter of lesser gods. Let us hate that which we make for ourselves and receive only Him sent from above. Let us, like Moses, dwell in the cloud, face to face with God, even when everyone else dances in self gratification. Let us, like Christ, be found interceding for the guilty, rather than condemning with stones. Let us cast down our idols!  Let not our ministry, our reputation, our theology, our pleasures, nor our own wills rise up to take His place. May we grind each competitor to powder and scatter them on the waters. For what we have made with our hands could never satisfy like He who made us with His hands. I once had a dream in which my eyes were fixed upon the lovely Lamb of God.  My heart was full of joy and peace.  I cannot describe the bliss I felt in looking at Him.  When I removed my eyes from him, and fastened them on other things, the longer I looked at them the more they gradually turned to gold. My kids, my wife, my house and books and friends. The most terrifying of all was as I looked at my own hands gold was slowly taking over my flesh.  I came out of the dream realizing that whatever takes my  hearts affection from the Lord will turn to gold and become an idol. I know that my heart, like theirs, is constantly tempted to shape gods of our own. Even now, our own selves can turn to gilded calves.  Yet amidst the ashes of rebellion, the mercy of God calls again—covenant restored, tablets rewritten, fellowship renewed.

David talks about our great need for the Holy Spirit in everyday life.

TO THIS MAN WILL I LOOK   “To this man will I look, to him who is humble and contrite of spirit and trembles at my word.” —Isaiah 66:2     The context of this statement is the building of a house for Him. God confronts the absurdity of thinking He is contained by space. Nothing can contain Him. Yet, there is nothing outside of Him. Hannah Whithall Smith once wrote, “People are always trying to enter God’s presence but when I read the Bible I see that you cannot get out of it.” Part of the error of the human perspective is that God is like us. That He is here and not there or He must arrive or that He has left. Though we know that the glory of God can depart and manifest, God when understood rightly, envelops all things. He sees, hears and rules all. Tozer once wrote, “The Christian believes, ‘God is there’ while the mystic believes that ‘God is here.” In other words, the truth is not merely that God exists, but that you are before Him in all that you do. Humility and the recognition of the all-present one are inseparable. Recently, the drama amongst Christian ministers is at the highest point I have ever witnessed it.  I have found the best way to communicate with each side is to keep before my eyes that the Lord is here. Present. Listening. Let us absorb and conduct ourselves from this revelation of God from God, “heaven is my throne and earth is my footstool. Where is the house you will build for me? Has my hand not made everything?” Yesterday I was on a plane returning from preaching at the Chicago HUB conference. From the plane I saw the Disney fireworks show.  A show that I have seen many times. This perspective of the show was much different.  Those massive, loud and bright bursts that squint the eye and pain the ear covering the entire sky above were as small as an app icon on my iPhone.  From this height I heard nothing and could cover the entire show with my pinky.  Maybe the height or our lives is determined by the greatness of our God.  If we think God comes and goes, is here and leaves, can be contained in our auditorium the world is loud, large and squints the eye. But if we believe He is the omnipresent one and nothing is done in the dark or behind his notice, we can raise to that altitude where the greatest displays of men are smaller than a child’s hand.   After the Creator of all things declares His greatness, He then swoops down from the highest heavens to the crawling worm and whispers, “To this man will I look.” Breathtaking utterance - Yaweh has revealed to all men what it is that He searches for. John Trapp translates it, “I have an eye to thee.” Giving a romance tone like that old Flamingos tune, “I Only Have Eyes For You.” Brian Simmons comments, “There is one my eyes are drawn to…” Motyer translates it, “For this one I will look.” We have both an understanding that God notices and searches for this one.    “To this man will I look…” He will turn His countenance towards this man.  His countenance is His blessing, keeping, graciousness and peace (Numbers 6). His countenance is that shining of His face.  He lights upon this man.   What other heaven is there? God’s face? The very thing God calls us to seek, “Seek my face.”  That very thing David determined to seek, “Your face Lord will I seek.” His presence and person overshadows the humble.    I want to call attention to the fact that man is thinking house and God is thinking humility.  Man thinks building and God thinks bowing. Man thinks place, God thinks person. Man says, “do?” God says “look.”  Yaweh discloses, “Humility attracts Me!” Andrew Murray defines humility as, “The sense of our entire nothingness.” A true faith that prostrates itself before all that God has revealed Himself to be.  Isaac Ambrose cautions us, “if at anytime the soul begins to feel advanced in regard to the accomplishment of duty and spiritual things let us fall down before God and humble ourselves for the pride in our hearts.” Who are the humble? Motyer says they are “those ready to take the lowest place.” For He who is little in his own eyes will not be troubled to be little in the eyes of others. The high mountains are barren but the low valleys are fruitful. Accordingly the showers of God’s grace fall into lowly hearts.    Those who are humble are “contrite of spirit.” Notice that it doesn’t say, “contrite” only.  Rather it says, “contrite of spirit.” Meaning, it is not a moment of contrition but a way of contrition.  It is not merely an appeal for mercy but a disposition of mercy. It is recognition of a great need for mercy.  An awareness of frailty. A friend said to me today, “I am as messed up as everyone else, I just want to be honest about it.” Dane Ortlund said, “I went from being an unaware screw up to an aware screw up.”  It is living with a ‘need for mercy’ frame of mind. Motyer translates it, “crippled in spirit.” The word, astoundingly is the same word used in 2 Samuel 4:4;9:8 for Mephibosheth. Saul’s disabled son. A lameness. A deep sense of the damage of sin and helplessness to please God in ourselves. Earnest Kevan wrote, “Sin so crippled man’s moral powers that he cannot perform anything that is truly acceptable to God.” Another Theologian writes that it is to “recognize a radical defect that runs from top to bottom.” The natural man is like water on a hill, left to itself it quickly runs downward. Brian Simmons comments that this imparts a “tenderness” of spirit. The man who knows his personal deformity is granted Christ’s beauty.   Martin Lloyd Jones wrote, “The way to become poor in spirit is to look at God.” How do we make our souls dwell in the valley of humility - in view of God look at humanity. All that you are, see your own soul, all you have and do not have. Look upon your body, remember your actions and lack of actions, see your condition, sufferings, home life, incidents with others, seldom virtues. How often you have placed self first, preferred yourself, made yourself the center, forgotten to think of others or even to consider God. Your lack of constant joy, peace, trust, patience, peace, selflessness. You do not know if you will live tomorrow or not.  “If the Lord wills you, you will do this or that.” How little time you have and that it is not yours anyway.    Those who are humble and contrite of spirit tremble at his word. From a crippling faith in God the humble live with a great value of His word. To tremble at His word means we believe it. It is important to us. His spoken words are more valuable than 10,000 gold and silver pieces. The crippled man finds His treasure to be God’s word. Brian Simmons comments, “living in awe of all I say.” Motyer defines treasuring God’s word as, “longing to obey it. To receive it not as the words of man but the very creative word of God.” For the word of God is not “inspired” but “expired.” The God-breathed word. It is God extending Himself to us. Thomas Watson calls the word of God, “the sundial by which we set our lives.” As Luther told us to remember, “the Scriptures did not grow on earth.”    There is a story of a young boy on a ship whose mother gave him a bible. With it she told him, “Whatever happens in your life, never let this book go.” The ship wrecked, his parents drowned and the boy was found holding only his bible.  The Captain asked him why he chose to save his bible over everything else. He said, “My mother told me, no matter what happens in life, never let this book go.” When they arrived on land, the captain took the orphaned boy to a Christian merchant that he knew. After telling the story to the merchant that captain said, “I thought he might be a Christian.” The merchant gladly received the boy and said, “He who holds on to the word in peril is a Christian indeed.”    Lady Jane Gray was made fun of by her peers for reading the Bible while they all played. Her response was, “All amusements are but a shadow of the pleasures which I enjoy reading this book.”    In summary - amidst all the trials, temptations, and thunder storms of this short life, amidst all the different opinions throughout human existence, amidst all the joys and pleasures of living, there is one kind of person that God looks for and looks at.  Upon this one and this one only does God cast the light of His favor and face. The one whose faith has brought him low, crippled his life and clings to God through His word.     

IN THIS PODACT I TALK ABOUT LOVING JESUS IN THE MIDST OF TRIALS.