InPerspective

Harry Reeder: The question is not is what we're confessing today biblical, it is, but what in the world are we actually confessing? I pray God all that those of you who don't yet know him will be drawn to him today and those of you who do know him, there's no way the next time we do the Apostles' Creed in worship you can mumble through this. You just can't. You gotta say it. I believe in Jesus Christ, his only son, our Lord.

Guest (Male): Putting life in biblical perspective with Dr. Harry L. Reeder. This is InPerspective, a radio and internet ministry of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals.

In the hymn, "Praise Him, Praise Him," we sing, "Jesus, Savior, reigneth forever and ever. Crown Him, crown Him, Prophet, Priest and King." Different people filled the Old Testament offices of Prophet, Priest and King with decidedly mixed results.

But only Jesus Christ perfectly fulfills these three offices that were foretold and foreshadowed in the Old Testament. Stay with us now as Dr. Reeder takes us to John, Chapter 3 and verse 16, as he brings us today's teaching, part two of his message, "I Believe in Jesus Christ, His Only Son, Our Lord."

Harry Reeder: I believe, number one, I believe in Jesus. Now, that's a word that if you had lived in the Old Testament times, the Hebrew word would have been transliterated Joshua. It literally means Jehovah saves, Yahweh saves. Now you see how appropriate that is because who is Jesus? Emmanuel, God with us, God has come to save us.

That name came from heaven directly through the angel, Matthew 1:21, you shall call his name Jesus, Yeshua. Why? For he shall save, Yahweh is saving his people through his only son. I believe in Jesus of Nazareth, born in Bethlehem 2,000 years ago, sojourned in Egypt, raised in Nazareth, son of a carpenter.

At age 30, baptized in obedience to the word of God as he begins his messianic ministry. Goes into the wilderness, teaches in Galilee. I believe he went to the cross, died for my sins. The grave was empty on the third day. He's ascended. All that I'm about to confess in this next paragraph, that's Jesus, a true historical person in time and history.

I believe in Jesus who bears the name appropriate to why he came, Yeshua, God saves. Secondly, not only is this Jesus, but secondly, it's the Christ. Jesus Christ. Now, Christ is not his last name. It wasn't that Joseph and Mary Christ had Jesus Christ. That's not the way this works. This is a title. In fact, it's really interesting when Paul writes about the risen Savior's triumph, he reverses them, calls him Christ Jesus.

But this is Jesus Christ. That's his title. Messiah in the Old Testament. It means anointed one. Between God and man, by God's grace, so that we can have a relationship with him, God has established three mediatorial offices: prophet, priest, and king. In the Old Testament, you have multiple prophets as types of the Messiah. You have multiple priests as types of the Messiah. You have multiple kings as types of the Messiah.

In fact, in the Old Testament, you have one prophet above all the other prophets that points to Christ. His name is Moses, who says there is a prophet coming greater than me. And you have all of the priestly Levitical priesthood, but they stand in submission to the eternal priesthood of Melchizedek. Jesus is the fulfillment of the eternal priesthood of Melchizedek.

The greater prophet, the greater priest, and he is also the greater king. The one greater than David. A Messiah's coming who's going to be king. He will come through Israel, through the tribe of Judah, and he will be greater than the line of David and David himself. And that's Jesus. Number three, he's not only Jesus Christ, he is also God's son. So now we just went from the historic Jesus to the eternal son of God.

You see, because Jesus is the historic Jesus, he's the Son of Man. In fact, Jesus loved that title. Jesus used that more than anything else from the book of Daniel, "I am the Son of Man." But he's also the Son of God, who has become man. 100% God and 100% man. This Jesus who is the Christ is the Christ because he doesn't come from Adam. He is another Adam. This is God having come in the flesh, Emmanuel, God with us.

And because this is God with us, this is God's son. And God let you know that in that Jordan River as he comes up out of the water. The spirit of God, not water, not oil in the anointing simply, but the spirit of God is poured out upon him. And the father says, "This Jesus, this Jesus is the Christ. This Jesus is my beloved son." The eternal begotten, not made, begotten, eternally begotten Son of God.

This is my son in whom I am well pleased. The deity of Christ. Do y'all get the idea that when we do this Apostles' Creed, we're not only swimming upstream in the culture, we're swimming upstream in much of professing Christianity that denies the historical mainline churches, theological liberalism, which is not a subset of Christianity, it's a whole other religion. It denies a historical Jesus. It denies that he is the Christ. It denies that he is God's son.

And number four, God's only son. "This is my son in whom I am well pleased." By the way, he not only did it there, he did it and then sent him into the wilderness. There came a time when he's on his way to Jerusalem, but first in the Galilee he goes up to the Mount of Transfiguration. And there is Moses, the law, pointing to him. There is Elijah, the prophets, pointing to him.

There he is lifted up and Peter, James, and John who are about to witness him humiliated and say, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" They're being prepared for that moment by hearing from heaven, "This is my son, my beloved son. Listen to him. Hear him." This is God's son, God's only son.

This is Jesus, Son of Man, historical reality, who has come with the title "The Christ," which he's able to accomplish because this isn't another son of Adam that needs his own savior. This is the new Adam, God's son that has come. And this is God's only son, which means he is the only one that can be Jesus Christ Savior. The only one as the only son, eternally begotten.

Number five, he is our Lord. Again, I don't want to bore you with the original languages, but again, just like Yeshua goes back to the Old Testament Joshua and means Yahweh saves, and just like Christos goes back to Messiah and it means the anointed one, and this is God's son and God's only son, but here, this one who is our Lord, there's two words for Lord in your Bible.

This is the careful use of the word Kurios. And Kurios in the New Testament or Kyrios, you can say either one, but as you would take a look at it, its Old Testament counterpart would have been Adonai. And it's in your Bible in places like Psalm 8. Remember how we sing that? "O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth." O Lord, Yahweh. O Yahweh, our Adonai, our Lord, our king, whom we surrender to.

That's the word that's here. Now this would have been a very common word because if you lived in that day, you were under Roman rule, and under Roman rule, whether you're a citizen or just one that is being ruled, when a Roman magistrate had come in front of you and they would greet you, this is the way they would greet you: "Kurios Caesar." Caesar is Lord.

And this, now listen carefully, this I believe is the birthplace of the Apostles' Creed. Because the apostles would give the first creed. Their answer was Jesus is Lord. At the risk of their life, and many would lose it. Jesus is Lord. That apostolic doctrine gets distilled so this second affirmation now brings us to "I believe in Jesus Christ, his only son, our Adonai, our Lord." That's the one whom we confess.

Now what are the implications of this? Well, I've got a takeaway for you and I'd like to share it with you from all the passages I quoted for you that undergird this statement, the ones we read. I would like for you to have this as a takeaway. I confess, I know it doesn't fit on the bumper sticker, I'm well aware of that, but this is what I want you to reflect on.

I want you to think about please as you walk away, and every time you say this opening statement of the second affirmation of the Apostles' Creed, this is what you're saying. You're saying in the second affirmation of the Apostles' Creed, you are saying that this declares the historical Jesus of Nazareth is the, not a, is the Christ and the only redeemer of any and all who receive him as Lord and Savior by faith and repentance.

That's what you're saying. You're saying and obviously what word is it that stands out? What word is it that is so confrontational in our day and time? It's that word only, isn't it? Can I make this point? And I hope I make it appropriately. I don't want to make it harshly and I don't mean it harshly. And I know why we do this. We talk about, well, have you offered them the gospel? Have you invited people to Christ?

I know why we say that and I know why we do that and I know how it's done and that's exactly what I'm doing now for any here that don't yet know Jesus, I offer you the Savior. But the fact is that when you look in the Bible, here's what Paul says about what Jesus has said. That God has given us a redeemer and furnished proof by raising him from the dead.

He has been gracious in the times of man's rebellion and ignorance. But now he commands all men everywhere to repent. I know why we say offer, I know why we invite, but sometimes I think we've got to be clearer this is a call, a command. This isn't an option on the menu. This is it. This is who he is and what he's done. Now is he your Lord?

Do you remember Thomas when he finally saw Jesus risen, what did he say? "My God and my Lord." What did John say? "I write these things to you that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ and Lord." Do you? There's nothing more important for me to ask you than that. Absolutely nothing more important for me to ask you.

Why is there a disproportionate amount of material on Christ in the creed? Because he has been sent by the Father, and the Father has so revealed the preeminence and the prominence of the Son as creator, redeemer, and sustainer. And if you want to get to the Father, you've got to go through the one whom the Father has sent. He is the way, the truth, and the life, and no man can come to the Father but through him.

That's how you get to the Father through the one whom the Father gave for you, and that one he gave for you, Jesus of Nazareth, was God's only son. And he gave him for you, not because he needed you. Not at all because he needed you. He didn't need you. Have you ever had one of your kids ask you, "Daddy and Mommy, before God created everything and before he decided to save people, what was God doing?"

What was God doing before everything was created? God's eternal, what was he doing? I'm going to quote Sinclair Ferguson on this one. And I'm saying I'm going to quote Sinclair Ferguson because it's right, but when you first hear it, it doesn't sound like it ought to be right, but it is right. Why is it what was God doing before there was me and you and this creation? God was having the time of his life.

There was nothing lacking. He didn't make us because he needed us. He made us for his glory and that we could have joy in his glory. There was nothing lacking between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Eternity is their life, and there was nothing lacking in it. This is the God who has given his only son. He had no obligation to do it. He had no need to do it. He loves you.

My favorite word in John 3:16, God so loved the world. He gave his only son. He is the way, the truth, and the life, and no man can come to the Father but through him. When I was married, saved, Christ brought me to himself. Cindy got finished with school. I went back to East Carolina. I hadn't been called to the ministry yet, and I was struggling with what I was going to do, and then I really got excited about law.

But I wasn't so excited about being a lawyer, but I got really excited about law enforcement, and East Carolina had a criminology, a very well-known criminology department, so I changed my major to criminology when I went back to East Carolina. And my counselor said to me, "Well, now by the way, I changed back when I went to Covenant, came to my senses and went back to history and theology."

But then I took this criminology and the counselor said to me, "Well, you got to take Psychology 101, that's basic." I did not want to take Psychology 101, and there's a couple of reasons why I didn't want to take Psychology 101. But one of the reasons I didn't want to take Psychology 101 was when you go to a university of 25, 26,000, 101 classes and Psychology 101 in particular have somewhere between 3 to 500 students in this massive room.

And you don't get taught by a PhD, you get taught by a graduate assistant who is trying to impress the PhD that's sitting out there evaluating them. And that's exactly what happened. I don't know which class it was, I just remember sitting there with the hundreds around me and the graduate assistant said this: "There is nothing more arrogant, more manipulative, and more oppressive than religions with truth claims. There are no truth claims, truth is relative."

Now doesn't that kind of resonate because you live in a society that believes in pluralism, right? Everyone has the right to believe what they want to. Now what is then stated next? Yes, everyone has the right to believe what they want to. That does not mean what everyone believes is right. But in that class, everything was right and if you said something is right and something is wrong, you are a manipulative, arrogant oppressor.

And then he said, "And there's no religion more oppressive than Christianity, which says that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life and you can't be saved unless you come to Jesus, and I'll promise you you're not going to get out of this class believing that." Well, what do you do if you're me? Number one, I was afraid my mother and daddy might find out I didn't speak up.

Number two, I did not want to displease the Lord who's going to confess me, I want to confess him. But I'm not really equipped for this thing and I was intimidated. But finally my little hand went up and said, "I just want you to know I don't agree. Jesus is my Savior and Lord and I believe that's the biggest decision you'll ever make in your life as to whether he's telling the truth or not."

Well, the avalanche fell. And I was the personification of manipulation, oppression, and arrogance. Thankfully the bell rang and I went out. And some days I still go to this place, psychology building still there, the fence where I was after the classroom is still there. I'll go to that spot and stand and remember that moment as the hundreds came around me.

And I was Mr. Manipulation, Oppression, and Arrogance. Oh, how I prayed for Josh McDowell to ride over the hill on a horse or something. But he didn't come. And oh, how I wish years later after I took Van Til I would have known what Van Til would have taught me, which is to say back to that professor, "Now wait just a minute. That anyone who makes a truth claim of objective truth that something's right and something's wrong, anybody that does that is manipulative, oppressive, and arrogant. That's what you want me to believe. Yes, that's what I want you to believe. And anybody that does that is arrogant."

Then my next question would have been if I had already taken Mr. Van Til was, "Is that a truth claim? And right now, are you being manipulative, arrogant, and oppressive of me?" I just wished I had been trained that, but I wasn't. But I'm going to help train you. And I wished I'd had RC and the way he answered a similar situation as he told his professor, "I'm not saying that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life because he's my way. I'm saying he's the way, the truth, and the life because he said so and he did so and he is so."

It's not because he's my way, it's because he said so. He did so and he is so. And because if he's not the way, then there's no way and we're lost forever. But he is the way and he made that way under no obligation because he loved you. You can't say our Lord until you first say my Lord and Savior. Is he yours?

Then rejoice. The only son has saved you because the Father sent him and the Spirit brought you. And if you haven't, I call you to him alone who can and will save you. If you've come seeking today, that's because he sought you, and he sought you that you would seek him. And he says to you, if you seek me you'll find me. He just showed up for you today. Now will you come to him who will never cast you out?

Guest (Male): You are listening to InPerspective, featuring the teaching of Dr. Harry L. Reeder. Our current sermon series, "I Believe: The Apostles' Creed in Biblical Perspective." For additional teaching by Dr. Reeder, visit inperspective.org.

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