Well, it's wonderful to be here again. And this is a right at the top of my favorite conferences to do because there's hungry people here. And one of the good signs, not just of a conference, but of our families and of our children is when we're hungry actually William Perkins the father of Puritanism once said here are 14 marks of grace by which you may know that you know God." And when he got done with all 14, he said, well, maybe you still don't know if you really know him. So he said, here's one more mark that every believer, every believer can identify with. And that is this.
Do you want to know God better? You can't say yes to that, my friend, you are not a Christian. If you can say yes to that, Perkins said, you are a Christian. You see, that's the hallmark of a Christian. With all of Paul's knowledge that we just heard about If you would have asked him Do you still want to get to know God better?
Well, yes Philippians 3 I count everything else but garbage that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection. So this wonderful theme at this conference of knowing God is critical, it's germane to the totality of who we are and what our spiritual life is and our eternal destiny as to whether or not we're ready to meet God. This is a critical subject. And the challenge of this subject is that every one of us knows so little of God compared to what we will one day know if we end up in heaven. And a friend whose wife struggled with assurance of faith all her life the very end the very end of her life she broke through into Liberty the last few days and when she died her husband who knows God better than almost anyone I know on the face of the Earth, he sent tremendous insights into the knowledge of God.
He called me five minutes after she died, And I said, my dear brother, your wife now knows God far better than you have ever known him. My friend, the best is yet to be. Just imagine getting eternity to know our God better and better and better in Jesus Christ. What a future awaits the people of God. But here, here we need to be humble and recognize that we are all just kindergartners in this knowledge of God.
And yet we must know him. We must know him intimately. Boys and girls, you must know God. And to know God, Like the Greek language and the Hebrew language says is something intimate, something personal. Like you know your mom, you know your dad, you know your brothers and sisters.
You don't know a stranger. If a policeman comes along and gives you a ticket or you gives your dad a ticket rather You don't you don't say well, I really know him Well, you've seen him But you see this conference isn't asking you have you have you got some head knowledge about God from the Bible? You all have that but do you know him with a personal intimate knowledge? Is he more real in your life children teenagers than the chairs you're sitting on right now. Is God the most real person in your life?
See, that's what happened to Mary. God became very real to Mary. And when I got this assignment from Scott Brown, you see, immediately I started thinking of all the ways that God revealed himself to Mary so that she knew him. And so what I'd like to do is rather than just read a straight portion of scripture, I want to read from two portions, but I want to stop and show you ten attributes of God, ten attributes of God that Mary came to know in an intimate way. And I'm going to do that in the first 10 minutes.
And then we're going to pull back, we're going to pray, and I'm going to take you deeper, I hope, into three of those attributes. Okay? So, turn with me please to Luke 1. Luke 1. This is where the angel comes to meet Mary.
You remember that, children? And tells her that she is going to give birth to the Messiah, the long awaited Messiah. So number one, Mary gets an experiential knowledge, experiential knowledge. That is, in the experience of her soul by the Holy Spirit of God's grace. That's attribute number one.
Look at verses 28 through 30. And the angel came in unto Mary and said, hail thou that art highly favored. Highly favored means grace. The Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women.
And when she saw him, she was troubled at his saying, and cast in her mind what manner of salutation this should be and the angel said unto her fear not Mary for thou has found grace or favor with God So Mary experienced here you see a confirmation from heaven that she had found grace with God. God was gracious to her. Number two, look at verse 31. Here She gets an experiential knowledge of God's Omniscience that's a fancy word. It simply means God knows everything verse 31 Behold thou shalt conceive and I womb and bring forth the son and shall call his name Jesus Jehovah saves Jehovah salvation what a glorious thing this is that God knows all the details of Mary's life and gives this glorious confirmation.
You'll bear the Messiah not only, but I am all-knowing. I'm telling you what you should name the child, and this is what the child shall be. Jesus, Jehovah, salvation. Number three, look at verses 32 and 33. Mary experiences here a personal knowledge of God's immensity, that is God's bigness, God's control over all things.
He that is Jesus, verse 32, shall be great, shall be called the Son of the Highest, and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David. And he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there shall be no end." Oh, the immensity of God in and through his Son. And then number four, look at verses 35 and 38. Mary gets an experiential knowledge here of God's will of submitting to that will and Obeying that will these are one of the this is one of the three we're gonna come back to because it's so critical in Mary's life verse 35 and 38 the angel answered and said unto her the Holy Ghost shall come upon thee the power of the highest overshadow thee therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the son of God and Mary said verse 38 Behold the handmade of the Lord be it unto me according to thy word that is Lord I will obey I will submit to thy will. And number five, look at verse 37.
Mary gets an experiential knowledge here of God's omnipotence. Amni potens, that means everywhere powerful. So the word omnipotence, boys and girls, is the fancy word that God has all power. That's one of his attributes look at verse 37 for with God nothing shall be impossible that is printed upon the very soul of Mary Then number six verses 44 to 48 Mary experiences the knowledge of God's joy God is a god a profound joy and believers experience him to be such for lo as soon as the voice of thy salutation sounded in mine ears this is Elizabeth talking to Mary verse 44 the babe leaped in my womb that's John the Baptist leaped in my womb for joy and blessed is she that believed that's Mary for there shall be a performance Of those things which were told her Mary from the Lord and Mary said my soul Doth magnify the Lord and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior. For he hath regarded the lowest state of his handmaiden for behold from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed." Blessed means true happiness, true joy from within because her joy was in God my savior.
So much for Mary being sinless. She says, God my Savior. You don't need a Savior if you're sinless. Number six, or number seven rather, Luke 1.49. Mary has an experiential knowledge of God's holiness.
For he that is mighty had done to me great things, and holy is his name. This is her confession. She's experiencing this great God, this gracious God, This God that moves her with joy is a holy God. And so now she's into what we call her magnificat, that is her song of praise. And one attribute after another comes from her lips, you see, She's praising this God she intimately knows even as a teenager Because she was just a teenager when she gave birth to the Lord Jesus Christ And then number eight look at verses 50 to 55 She has an experiential knowledge of the attribute of God's mercy.
God's mercy. His mercy is on them, verse 50, she says, that fear him from generation to generation. He has showed strength with his arm. He's scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts He's put down the mighty from their seats exalted them of low degree He's filled the hungry with good things the rich he sent empty away He's helped his servant Israel in remembrance of his mercy as he spake to our fathers to Abraham to his seed forever then for nine in 10 I want you to turn to John 19 John 19 Let's go to verses 25 through 27 verse 25. Mary experiences the knowledge of God's justice.
That's the second one I want to look at with you in more detail. There stood by the cross of Jesus, his mother and his mother's sister Mary the wife of Cleophas and Mary Magdalene. And I want to show you in this sermon how that the sword of God's justice was also piercing the heart of Mary so that though she didn't understand everything that was going on she knew that her son was dying for something larger than himself he was satisfying the justice of God and then number 10 verses 26 and 27 Mary has an experiential embrace and knowledge of God's love. Jesus therefore saw his mother, the disciple standing by, whom he loved. He saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son.
Then saith he to the disciple, Behold thy mother. And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home so I want to look with you in this address at Mary's knowledge of God's will Luke 1 38 and Mary's knowledge of God's justice John 1925 and Mary's knowledge of God's love, John 19 26 to 27. Let's pray together. Great God of heaven, we thank thee that all thy attributes are one in thee, and that like bright light, they shine through the prism of our human experience into so many colors, that we may know thee in such a diversity of attributes as Mary did. And as we now look at three of them in particular and seek to probe them in some depth, we pray, Lord, that we might grasp, perhaps more fully than ever before, what a beautiful thing it is for a lost hell worthy sinner like us or like Mary to know thee intimately in thy glorious and splendorous attributes.
Lord may we treasure that knowledge. May that knowledge mean more to us than all other knowledge on the face of this earth. Help us to know thee, and to know thee better, and to count everything else but garbage and loss, to know thee in the power of thy resurrection. Bless us now we pray in Jesus name. Amen.
Well Mary is a true believer. By the grace of God, she shows an amazing pattern of faithfulness in her life, faithfulness that grows out of an intimate knowledge of this glorious God in his glorious attributes. And this is what makes her, by the grace of God, respond with such remarkable submission and obedience to the attributes of God. And I want to say to you this evening that the only response that is possible and that makes sense when we come to know God intimately, is that we respond in submission and obedience to our great and glorious God. So I want to ask you a question right from the get-go tonight.
Are you responding to God with obedience and with submission? Do you know what it means to lay down your life to the will of God? Do you know the will of God? And knowing it, are you willing to lay down your life? No questions asked.
No questions asked to the will of God. That is what we can learn from Mary. Now it's fascinating that Mary, to lay down her life, to truly sing the Magnificat of Luke 1, verses 46 to 55, she had to also be a student of the Word of God. And I want to draw that connection with you from the beginning. To know God comes through knowing him in his word and when we know him in his word and we experience the knowledge of his attributes in the inner man you see through the word, the written word revealing the living word Jesus Christ we come to bow by the grace of the Holy Spirit under this God and want to do his Word, obey his Word, submit to his Word, because his Word comes from him and we want to obey him and submit to him.
It's interesting that in this little Psalm as it were, if I can call it that, that Mary sings this song of praise. She quotes from Psalm 34, Psalm 71, 95, 98, 103, 111, and 138, as well as from Genesis, Deuteronomy, Isaiah, Micah, and Habakkuk. And she's a teenager. But she knew her Bible, you see, exhaustively. She was not trained in a theological seminary.
But there was someone in her life that was filling her with the knowledge of himself. And that is the Holy Spirit was taking the things of Jesus and of God and revealing them to her and filling her with the very word of God. Through Mary's veins ran the royal blood of David and that blood was bebline. And so this magnificat, which is the only long statement Mary makes in the entire New Testament corpus, opens a window into her soul, and it shows us the nature of this word-saturated, word-marinated, God-fearing young woman whom the Spirit has been preparing unknown to her to carry out God's amazing sovereign will by becoming pregnant and delivering the Messiah. This is incredible.
God's only begotten Son, Jesus of Nazareth, and whom that spirit would soon entrust with the care and nurture of the Son of God, Son of Man." Well, you might say, something like that could never happen to me because she was filled with the Holy Spirit. And of course, in one sense, that's true. No one here is going to be carrying the Messiah. He's already born. He's come.
He's died. He's risen. But you see in essence God has a calling for every single believer. And God has a way of preparing every single believer to carry out that calling in submission and obedience to him. And Mary reflects that in this wonderful magnificat.
What she's really saying is, God has made me acquainted with Him and by the mind of His Spirit revealed through His word, I am prepared by the grace of God to do, Lord, whatever thou dost desire me to do. Behold, verse 38, behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it unto me according to thy word. This is a woman who knew what it means to bow under the will of God. She wasn't in a trance here or experiencing a vision. She was speaking the word of God she had memorized and the Spirit was bringing that word to mind to bear on her situation so that she responded rightly to the revelation of God's will brought to her by the angel.
And so Mary is immediately won over by spirit work faith in the power and according to the will of Almighty God, believing that God is all powerful and could indeed use her for the birth giving of the Son of God into this world. As one old Puritan put it, faith never rests so calmly and peacefully as when it lays its head on the pillow of God's omnipotence. And so Mary responds, in no small act of faith, she's an unknown village girl, And that she would be told she will have a child without any physical union with a man and that the child conceived would be The Son of God and She responds Behold the handmade of the Lord be it unto me according to thy word. This is amazing. When Sarah was told she'd bear a child when she was old, she laughed.
Zacharias, and he was told that his wife Elizabeth would have a child. He responded in unbelief. How different was Mary, who was not a theologian, nor a priest, nor had spent all day in the books of the law. She was a simple country girl brought up in a quiet rural home. She receives a promise from the angel.
God shows her his will. She comes to know that will in the experience of her soul from the word of the angel and she simply believes in it, she trusts implicitly in God and in his power to accomplish whatsoever he pleases. But there's two more things here. She doesn't just believe in the power of God, she has, first of all, glad submission to the will of God. It's one thing to know the will of God, but to know it intimately means glad submission to it.
I had an elder in my church for many years who got infection in one knee and he went and had surgery and the infection came back. Went and had another surgery, The infection came back. Went to have another surgery, and the doctor said, if this time it doesn't work, I'm going to have to take your leg off. And you know what happened, boys and girls? For two months, the infection did not come back.
And we rejoiced, the whole church rejoiced for this dear brother. And one day he called me up and said pastor. I want you to know I want you to know Infection has returned, but don't you worry about me pastor. This is the will of my Father. He must have something to teach me yet.
He must have something to teach me yet. So you would respond, oh, well, my leg is going to come off. So my father has something to teach me yet. Behold, the handmaid of the Lord. For Mary, you understand, it was even more radical, even more radical because there were greater risks.
A leg is one thing, Your whole reputation is another. What are people going to say? Please tell me Gabriel, when they find out that I'm betrothed to Joseph, but we've never had an intimate relationship and I'm expecting a child. Will they think I'm a prostitute? Will they say she's been with another man will they reject me well I will I somehow be stoned as Deuteronomy 22 says if a damsel that is a version be betrothed into a husband and man find her in the city and lie with her.
You shall bring them both out into the gate of that city and shall stone them with stones that they die." There's so many questions Mary has to ask. What's going to happen to me? Am I going to be rejected as an outcast forever? But no, there's no questions. Not a single question.
I mean this is amazing. Behold the handmaid of the Lord. Beat unto me according to thy will. This is an experiential knowledge of acquiescing to the attribute of the will of God. Behold, the handmaid of the Lord.
We just heard about how Paul said he was a slave of the Lord Well, the same word is used here. Do lay that is a female slave. I am the Lord's slave I'm the Lord's servant. Let them do whatever he sees fit. You see if you have an experiential knowledge of the will of God, you want God's will to be done more than your own will because you trust God's will more than your own will.
Mary teaches us here how to acquiesce to God's will. She relinquishes all forms of protest. She abandons all arguments with God, all objections against the will of God. Behold, she says. That expresses the entirety of her being she's relinquishing everything it's the depth of her confession it's like Abraham in Genesis 22 when he was told to go offer Isaac the promised son he said behold here I am this is Mary behold here I am the handmade of the Lord.
Of here is a possessive tense. I belong to the Lord. He possesses me. She knew the Lord. She knew she belonged to the Lord.
He was hers and she was his. The Lord here is curious, master, possessor. The commentator Lenski says she is Jehovah's willing property for him to use as he in his covenant graces desires. She's willing to risk her entire life, her entire reputation for the Lord and His will. This is a deep, deep experiential knowledge that God's will is always best for us.
His will often is in conflict with our will, oh, to be sure. Plotting a course that we would not have plotted, a road that we would not have chosen. But there's a lesson here, you see, and that is that the one that matters is this. The one thing that matters is this to be where God wants us to be Doing what God wants us to do when he wants us to do it Now that may mean that many of our own ambitions are not fulfilled It may even mean that many of our own gifts appear not to find fulfillment. But the one thing that matters when we have an experiential knowledge of God's will is we want to be where God wants us to be, doing what God wants us to do.
We want to be able to say, I am the Lord's doulos, I am the Lord's willing slave, thy will, thy will be done. Thy will is the one thing that matters to me. And if you know the sweetness of bowing under God's will you see you will know an inner joy a profound joy you two children a profound joy of knowing that you are exactly where God wants you to be, doing what God wants you to do. That gives a peace that passes all understanding. So Mary lays aside all her questions, she submits entirely to God's will, and she believes that God will somehow vindicate her character in due season, not because she deserves it, but out of his free, super-abounding, gracious promises.
What I do now, thou knowest not, but thou shalt know hereafter. What a comfort that verse is when you can't understand the will of God. You may know hereafter, that hereafter may be 10 minutes later. It may be a week later, it may be years later, it may not be till eternity, but you rest when you have an experiential knowledge of the will of God. You rest in that will and you trust that God makes no mistakes with you, even if it means your life.
It's like Daniel's three friends. You remember that story, boys and girls? When Nebuchadnezzar threatened to throw them into the burning fiery furnace if they didn't bow before his idol you remember what he said what they said rather our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace and he will deliver us out of thy hand o King but if not and the but if not is added because they don't deserve it but if not be it known unto the Oh King that we still will not serve thy gods nor worship the golden image which thou has set up so here's and again we can only scratch the surface, but here's the beauty of knowing God experientially. You learn to trust Him so much that you put your entire life into his hands without fear, asking no questions, but just saying, thy will be done. Boys and girls, let me say this to you.
When I was, my son, our son was maybe eight years old. We were on vacation somewhere, and somehow, I don't know how, we were walking somewhere, but suddenly it was late at night. The road got very dark. And I'll tell you, I was actually a little bit afraid. And I was holding my son's hand, we were walking along, and I looked down at him and I said, are you afraid?
Are you afraid? He said, no, no, Daddy. I was kind of surprised. I mean, I was afraid. So I said, well, why not?
Well, he said, I'm holding your hand. I'm holding your hand. You're my dad. You're gonna take care of me you see That's exactly what happens when you know the will of God experientially. You trust that will so much.
You trust your Father's, your Heavenly Father's ability so much that you just don't worry about whatever may come your way. Now, here's where the rubber hits the road. Many times, let's be honest, we're not there. This is a sweet experience that Mary has here. Were there times that Mary had questions?
Oh sure, of course. She pondered all these things in her heart, the Bible says again and again. There were struggles, of course there's struggles in the life of faith. But you see, there are also times of sweet submission to the will of God. As one old Puritan put it, let us therefore be willing to go anywhere, do anything, be anything, whatever the inconvenience, so long as God's will is clear and duty is plain.
Bishop Hall put it this way, all disputations with God after his will is known arise from our infidelity. There is not a more noble proof of faith than to captivate all powers of our understanding and will to our Creator and without all questionings to go blinded with us whoever He will lead us." So Mary bows under the will of God and she does it in submission but also obedience. The primacy of obedience is everywhere in the Bible exalted. She says, be it unto me according to Thy word. And the be it unto me is the word ganoyto, which is the optative of wish.
Hence, may it be. But it's in the aorist tense, which leaves the time of fulfillment to God. If it had been written in the present tense, you see, she would be saying, let it happen to me now. But no, let it happen to me whenever thou wilt. Have it happen to me.
Let me obey completely in exact accord. Kata is the Greek word. In exact accord to thy will, gladly, cheerfully. So literally, if you translate this fully in the nuanced meaning of the word, be it at thy exact time, in exact accord with thy will. Lord, thou canst do me no wrong.
I considered a favor to obey thee. You see, bowing and then obeying are twin graces in the experiential life of faith. And what a good place that is. You see, it's one thing for Samuel to say, you remember the story, children, speak Lord, for thy servant heareth. But Mary says something deeper, far deeper, do Lord, for thy handmaid is willing.
Obedience is greater than sacrifice. Unconditional obedience is greater than our notions of personal satisfaction, of self-development, of self-fulfillment. In the last analysis, it is on the path of obedience that we find our own fulfillment too, because we were created to obey God. We were created to glorify God. And When we do so with all our heart and bow under the will of God and obey the will of God, we find our greatest personal fulfillment in surrendering to this God.
Be it unto me according to thy will. You see, when you come to this place experientially you're just saying to God use me make me fruitful No matter how it is. I'm willing to be used however that will do it and then this grace becomes you see passive so wonderfully passive even as it's active cook to go out and do the will of God I Mean your father's hands show me guide me lead me you see it's not my vision of my life that matters then. It's God's vision of my life that matters. I don't say to God, well I've got a five, 10 year plan for my life, Lord.
And you're kind of messing things up here with these unexpected developments. No, no, what you say then is, Yes, Mary had her own plans for her own life She was going to marry Joseph and they were gonna live happily ever after and they were gonna just kind of be well Normal people in society and yes, God was overturning all of that but you see in this moment in this moment all of Mary's plans become utterly and absolutely irrelevant it's not Mary's wisdom or imagination that produces savior for the world It's not even her faith or her courage that produced the Savior. It is God who does it, and God is informing her that He's going to do it in and through her. So God breaks our dreams to replace them with his majestic will. He breaks our dreams to replace them with his majestic will.
And then we experience the beauty of that will and we learn to agree with the Word of God we learn to guide our desires by the Word of God we learn to ground our expectations and hopes and trust upon the Word of God and we place our amen behind the Word of God this is Mary's experiential acquaintance with submission and obedience to God's will. Now fast forward to John 19. Mary now has brought up her son, her wonderful son, her son who never disobeyed her at any point along the way except when she was wrong Mary's a very special mother she has a special love bond with her son This was a special son and that made for a mother who pondered many things in her heart. She heard from Simeon when he was just a few days old that one day a sword would go through her own heart, the sword of God's justice, because of her son, and that he would be for the fallen rising again of many in Israel, and for a sign which will be spoken against. Mary felt the point of that sword already in Jesus' infancy, when Herod had sought to kill her son, and she had to flee to Egypt.
But now, 30 years later, when he began his public ministry, she felt that sword going through her again, when he was rejected on so many sides, despised by many, when he became a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, the sorrow pierced her own soul. Of course it did. It's her son. She saw the hatred, the rejection by his own nation, the radical rejection by the religious leaders and by Jerusalem who didn't believe he was a Messiah and the other children that she apparently bore later, his brothers and sisters, they also rejected him as he was growing up but now on the cross now on the cross Simeon's prophecy reaches the climax of its fulfillment a sword shall pierce through thy own heart all the questions that Mary must have had, don't you think? The depth of the sword wound that must have pierced her while she stood at the cross.
These words are so simple and yet they're so profound. Mary, the mother of Jesus, and Mary, the wife of Cleopas, and Mary Magdalene, the three Marys, stood by the cross. Oh, what an experiential acquaintance Mary must have had with the justice of God at that moment. She stood there prayerfully, she stood there sympathetically, she stood there watching, no doubt with tear-filled and somewhat puzzled eyes. She couldn't follow it all.
And yet there was her son, her only son, her perfect son, who had never, never sinned against her, nailed to the cross. Israel's hope and salvation nailed to the cross the one of whom Elizabeth had said my soul doth magnify the Lord for the babe has leaped in my womb and Mary responded and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior that one is being nailed to the cross. The one of whom the angel said, thou shall call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins, nailed to the cross. A poet puts it this way, at the cross or station keeping, stood the mournful mother weeping, where he hung her dying Lord, for her soul of joy bereaved, bowed with anguish, deeply grieved, felt a sharp and piercing sword. And yet now one word of complaint comes from Mary.
She's silent, she's meditative. How much did she know about Jesus being a substitute for sinners? It's hard to say, isn't it? Maybe all these ponderings for 33 years of how he would be Savior, maybe she was beginning to see the light. And yet, even not fully seeing the light of the justice of God, she knew that something was happening that God was exercising his justice.
And even though she didn't understand everything, you see, even though she couldn't see that the resurrection lies behind the crucifixion, and that it would soon be Lord over all, spiritually speaking. She bows under this as well. She stands by the cross. She doesn't fall down. She doesn't faint.
She stands by the cross. She cannot leave it. She's gazing at Jesus. This is her son. This is her son.
The one of whom she feels like Peter. To whom else shall we go? That was the words of eternal life. She sat at his feet, she's heard his teaching. She, the mother, has become the disciple of the Lord, and now he's dying.
Oh, the sword of the justice of God. And yet at the same moment, all the love of God, all the love of God, Jesus turns when he sees his mother, verse 26, and the disciples standing by whom he loved, he says unto his mother, woman, behold thy son. And to the disciple, behold thy mother. And from that hour, that disciple took her unto his own home. Mary was experientially acquainted not only with submission to the will of God and with experiential knowledge of God's justice like a sword, but also she experientially embraced God's loving compassion in the words of her own son from the cross.
Jesus looks down from the cross. He sees a mother without her firstborn son. His mother Mary stood by the cross as a lonely widow. Joseph had already passed away. Her other sons were not of her mind, at least not till later, for neither did his brothers believe in him.
John 7, 6 says, there stands Mary looking so alone. Her life was Jesus, and Jesus was soon going to die Was there desire in Mary's heart that Jesus would come down from the cross? Perhaps so. Even for the briefest of embraces. Perhaps so.
It would be unnatural not to be so. But if he had come down, you see, even for one moment, the cross would have failed. The substitutionary obedience would have been put aside. Salvation would have failed. God would not be God.
But instead, you see, on the cross, Christ puts his own suffering on the background. For the third time, his first word from the cross was a word of forgiveness. Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. His second word was a word of mercy. Today, thief on the cross, thou shall be with me in paradise.
And his third word, Three out of three other people-centered words when he's in the midst of agonizing pain. His third word, woman, behold thy son, Behold thy mother. A compassionate, loving word, reflecting the compassionate love of the heart of his Father in heaven. Now it's remarkable that Jesus doesn't say, mother, behold thy son. He says woman.
The word woman, contrary to some commentators, is not a harsh word, it's not a cold word. It implies actually honor and respect. It's much like the word madam today. But no doubt Mary in her heart would have preferred to hear mother. But you see for Mary, she has learned experientially.
It's not what she wants to hear that is most important, but whether what she needs to hear. And you see on the cross, Jesus is a level higher than Mary. The natural tie with the mother as mother had to be severed. Only his relationship with her in the Spirit would now remain. Jesus had to lovingly sever Mary's tendency to allow her fleshly relationship with him to come in the foreground.
And that's a blessing for Mary. That she sees more in Jesus as her surety and savior than as her fleshly son. And so Jesus had to sever lovingly, kindly, compassionately by saying, woman, behold thy son. He had to sever the secondary relationship in order to accent the primary relationship that he was his mother's savior. Oh, what a lesson, what a deep lesson Mary had to learn here.
Jesus had to willingly surrender his earthly sonship to his loving mother Mary, and Mary had to surrender his earthly sonship to his ultimate Saviorhood and Lordship. It's actually a deep way for both Jesus and for Mary, much like Abraham had to sacrifice his son, but he received him back. Mary had to go through with a sacrifice. Her son was the greater Isaac. Yes, the ram caught in the thickets to be offered for a burnt offering.
So all earthly ties had to be cut to serve the heavenly ties, and all heavenly ties demanded the severing of the earthly tithes. What a lesson here that we have to learn under the amazing love of God. All our idols have to go. All our human reckonings, all our pride have to go, and we have to bow as a poor, hell-worthy sinner before a glorious substitute Savior and Lord. What a gospel, a gospel that demands our all, A gospel that is full of love.
It was a look of love that Jesus gave to Mary. Woman, behold thy son. He thrusts her back and he thrusts her down in order to rescue her and lift her up and strengthen her and comfort her and he gives John he gives John as her son to care lovingly for her and it's as if Mary says again with holy adoration and silence, behold the handmade of the Lord. She accepts it all. Again she says no word.
It's as if she says the Lord is taken, The Lord is given, the Lord is taken. Blessed be the name of the Lord. Jesus gives to Mary a new son and to John a new mother. They receive a son and a mother from the Lord and in the Lord. And from that hour, that disciple took her unto his own home.
From that hour, John gently leads her from Golgotha to his own house. Mary may not witness the end of Jesus' suffering. She had seen enough. She had received healing for her wounded soul. John must now receive her and take her and remove her from the horrible scene of Golgotha, from that hour.
John is writing this 60 years later, and he remembers the exact hour, this sacred hour when he became the son of the mother of Jesus, took her into his own home. Wouldn't you have liked to be a fly on the wall to hear their conversations? As John explained to Mary how that he felt he was the disciple that Jesus loved, there was a special love bond with John. And Mary must have explained to John all that Jesus had meant to her, all the sweet communion about Jesus that must have ebbed and flowed between the two of them. John has certainly sat at the feet of Mary as a mother in Israel and Mary has set at John's feet as together with Paul, one of the two most deeply led theologians of the New Testament church.
Oh the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord that passes all understanding. May I close by asking you this question. Will you pray with me for grace to stand daily close to the cross. That's where we learn the attributes of God better than any place else in our lives or in the world. It's when our soul is encamped by the cross where the attributes of God, His justice, His peace, His mercy, His love, His grace becomes the most pregnant.
Especially in the next word from the cross, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? At the cross, we receive deeper insight into our sin than anywhere else at the cross we become sin haters and Christ lovers and holiness pursuers at the cross there are greater stirrings of love than anywhere else There's no better place to be than to have our souls in camp at the cross and at the Father's right hand under the intercessions of Jesus. Will you come with me as you taste and grow in knowing the attributes of God to the cross. Will you come now with a full New Testament revelation, now with a complete understanding that the cross was entirely substitutionary for poor sinners like you and me, to save us 100% by the blood and obedience of Jesus Christ, is no end to the benefits of Calvary for needy sinners. Nothing shall be impossible with God.
Let it be your prayer and mine that we may know the attributes of God through the prism of the cross, his love, his will, His justice. Amen. Let's pray. Lord, we're so grateful for Mary's submission, obedience, and for the third word from the cross. And yet we're even more grateful for thy amazing grace in revealing thyself to her, in the splendor of thy attributes.
Do it for us as well, Lord, whatever providential leadings thou hast in store for us in our lives. We pray that thou would sanctify every sorrow through our prophet, priest, king, and forgive our every sin through him, and help us to ever stand at the cross, to learn there not only how to get saved, but also how to live as a follower of the Lord Jesus, how to live out of thy attributes of God, in which peace and righteousness and mercy and truth at the cross kiss each other. Grant us rich measures of the Spirit of Christ so that the words and deeds of priestly love may flow out of our lives as believers to others and that unbelievers may learn to know the love of Christ that passes all understanding we pray in Jesus name amen well as I as I always do at this conference I want to speak to you just about three minutes in closing about a few book opportunities So we we have Reformation Heritage books and other good book vendors here. There's lots of good new stuff For you this year Strange new world how thinkers and activists redefine identity and sparked the sexual revolution by Carl Truman.
It's critical for you as parents to know what lies behind the age in which we live and this is a very helpful book, Strange New World, to give you insight to this on a layman's level. Dustin Bengi, the man who wrote Gentle and Lowly, which I'm sure almost all of you have read, has just come out with a new book called The Beauty and Glory of the Church. I read it a few weeks ago and it really does lift up the church as the bride of Christ in a wonderful way God and me this is this is a pack of four books that my wife and I have written in our illustrated about the way of salvation for children of three to six very very simple on Faith hope and love loving God and loving our neighbor the basic way of salvation We were compelled to write this series because so many of the books for very young children, as you no doubt know, teach a moral or two, but don't teach the way of salvation. Simonette Takar, these books that you've been buying for years at this conference, She's come out with a few more from RHB.
This one is on Charles Spurgeon. It's a very moving biography. And then we came out with the largest collection of Puritan quotations filed by subject and giving you the references called Or From the Puritan's Mind. It's compiled by Dale Smith. And you'll find this extremely helpful.
I use it sometimes just as a daily devotional. I just read the quotations under one subject heading. They're really, really rich. But if you're in church leadership at all, or quotations like these put fizz in the coke of your sermon. A radical comprehensive call to holiness.
I wrote this book with my colleague, one of the best Old Testament scholars I know of in the world, Dr. Michael Barrett, and we look at how to define holiness, look at different Old Testament texts, New Testament texts, then how do you practice it, how do you test it, how it gets distorted, and we end with three chapters on holiness? Consummated in heaven, so if you want to grow in holiness, I Think you'd find this book book helpful Teach them to work. This is my wife's new book. It's called Building a Positive Work Ethic in Our Children.
It's very practical, simple to read, to teach children how to have a positive attitude to work in the Lord Jesus Christ. And then I'm not sure if This was offered last year or not, but we still have some sets left of an entire course on the Puritans, which is in this package for 50% off. All of our books, by the way, are 50% off for nonprofit, so you get them cheaper at conferences than anywhere else. This gives you an intro book on the Puritans. It gives you 35 DVD lessons it gives you a two-hour movie with a lot of the Puritan this people around America who really loved the Puritans and so it's an entire course for you on the Puritans and a workbook as well and then finally following godfully by Michael Reeves and myself this is an intro book to the Puritans if you just want a book that gives you a basic intro that can be read by anyone 12 years or older, this would be a good one for you.
And then family worship Bible guide, which many of you have, which helps you fathers every day when you do family worship and it gives you the main takeaways for each chapter with a question at the end of each takeaway of each bible chapter that's been out of print for a while we just brought it back into print with a imitation leather edition that's really beautiful and the regular blue cover one is back in print now as well. You do want to have this book for family worship, and you do want to use it, and your family will greatly benefit from family worship when you follow this book. Now, many of you have said, actually at this conference, said to me that that book on family worship has really helped you especially for children 10 and over and I've always said to you well just try to simplify it then and make it for the younger children but enough of you have spoken to us that I have now entered into a contract with RHB to write nine volumes with Nick Thompson, an OPC minister, nine volumes of family worships walking from Genesis to Revelation for children three or four to nine.
And so this is the first volume that came out. The second volume's at the printer right now. This volume is called Beginning, Family Worships in Genesis. 90 family worships walking through Genesis. What it does, it gives you a review, two questions to ask your kids from yesterday's family worship, then it gives you two to five verses to read, then it gives you three questions to your children on those verses, Then main reflection, it's a two paragraph thing that enters into their world and applies this scripture to them.
And then three questions on the two paragraphs. And then a prayer point for you to remember in prayer. And Thousands of families are using this for their young children, and we're very encouraged by the response so far. If you don't have it and you have young children, do get it. Do try doing family worship.
It only takes six minutes or so to go through a family worship in this book. And finally, I've been working, well, all my life in Systematic Theology, but teaching it for 30-some years. And as my career is coming to a bit of a close in Systematics, I decided while I was still young enough to write out all the lectures in full with the help of my TA, Paul Smolley. And so we have a four volume set. Three volumes are now available.
Volumes one and two are here. Volume three was supposed to arrive today and UPS failed us. So we're going to just send it to you anyway. No postage costs. It'll be 50% off.
This is very important set of books, I believe, for you fathers to teach your children doctrine. This will be just a little bit above their level, but it will be at your level and you'll learn a great deal from it. Presently, Paul and I are, he's taking my lecture notes is what he's doing and improving them and footnoting them and so on and it comes back to me and we go back and forth until we have it ready for print. And what we do, presently, we're in volume four, we've got two chapters to go, so we'll finish next month, the last two chapters on heaven. So we're almost there after nine years of writing.
But what each chapter does, it looks at five things. First it looks at what does the Bible say about this particular doctrine? Then it looks at what does church history say? Then it looks at how do you experience this doctrine for your own soul? How does it become precious?
Then it looks at fourth, what are the major practical takeaways from this doctrine that you can use in your Christian life? And then it ends in doxology with a poem or a hymn. And the goal is that you will never, ever, ever say of any doctrine in the Bible again, this is boring. These books are written in a way that make you realize, as Martin Luther said, doctrine is heaven because by these things men live. So thank you so much and God bless you all.
