From the MLJ Archive

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: I call your attention this evening to the last two verses in the ninth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, verses 30 and 32, 32 and 33.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Wherefore, because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law, for they stumbled at that stumbling stone. As it is written, behold, I lay in Zion a chief stumbling stone and rock of offense, and whosoever believeth on Him shall not be ashamed. Now, I have stumbled in reading that, so I'm going to read it again.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Verses 32 and 33 in the ninth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans. Wherefore, because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumbling stone. As it is written, behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and rock of offense, and whosoever believeth on Him shall not be ashamed.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: We come back to this statement once more, because here the Apostle is giving us the final explanation of the whole tragedy of the Jewish nation. He's dealing here not with individual Jews, but with the Jews as a nation. And the fact about them was that as a nation, they're outside the church. Whereas the Gentiles, as nations and as people, as peoples have come into the church.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Thank God, as He told us in verse 24, there are some Jews who are in. But they were a very small remnant, as He's told us later on. As a nation, they were outside. And the question He asks here is, why? Why are they outside? And He gives us here the answer to the question.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: It is, He says, for two reasons. And the first is this, which you may take if you like as a positive reason, that they had sought righteousness with God in terms of attempting to keep the law. They had sought to be righteous and right with God, by means of the works of the law instead of by faith. They were seeking a works righteousness instead of the righteousness that is alone by faith.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Then negatively, He gives us a second answer. And that is that they had stumbled at God's way of salvation. The way that God Himself had provided, He says, they stumbled at that stumbling stone. And that stumbling stone is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ Himself and His work on our behalf.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Now, here we are looking at a most important statement, and we are looking in particular at the second one. We've more or less dealt with the first one the last two Friday nights. But what we are really concerned about now is this extraordinary statement, where He says about the Jews that they stumbled at that stumbling stone. As have been prophesied of them.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Now, this is, I say, a most important and a most crucial statement. And it is an important and a crucial statement, not only from the standpoint of enabling us to understand the actual history of what happened to our Lord and the whole position of the church as it obtained at the time of the Apostle. It is a crucial and important statement for all times and in all ages and in all places.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: In other words, we are looking here tonight at what we may rightly describe as the very heart and center and nerve of the Christian Gospel. Now, the Apostle, you notice, again reminds us, as He's been doing all along, that all this had been prophesied and had been predicted.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: That is, of course, the standing enigma, the question. How it was that these people, the Jews, with the scriptures open before them, could have been so blind? All this, which is true of the church, He says, is something that had been foreseen. It had been given to the prophets to see it by God, and they'd actually put it in writing.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: So, we've noticed that each time He makes a statement, He develops an argument, He proves it and substantiates it and underlines it by giving a quotation from the prophets. We've already seen Him doing that. And He now does it with regard to this last statement, exactly as He's done it with respect to the others. And this, in many ways, is of the very essence of the tragedy of the Jews.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: They are condemned as it were out of their own mouths. They gloried in their scriptures, the oracles of God. They were proud of the prophets and the writings of the prophets. Yet it is those very writings that condemn them above everything else. "As it is written," He keeps on saying. And what has been written is that they're going to be afflicted by this blindness that leads them to stumble at their own Messiah and at the salvation that God has so gloriously provided in and through Him.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Very well, here it is. But now this prophetic reminder is again a matter of very great interest, and especially with regard to the death of our Lord upon the cross. And I'm adverting to this because here we are coming to this week in which men and women in the church everywhere will be thinking about the death of our Lord upon the cross, Good Friday, and so on.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Well, it's very good that we should keep this kind of thought in our minds as we approach this season and think again about the cross. His quotation from Isaiah here is a reminder that all this had been predicted and prophesied. Refutes completely and finally a teaching which is so common that our Lord's death came as a surprise to Him.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: And that it came as a disappointment to Him. That he'd never anticipated it. Some even go so far as to say that He died in utter disappointment and of a metaphorical broken heart. Now, that is, I say, finally refuted by this one statement, without adducing any further statements. Our Lord knew the prophets.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: He was prepared. He knew what was coming. He had come to die. He wasn't taken by surprise. It also refutes the idea that others have that our Lord's death need never have taken place at all and might never have happened. There are many who teach that. That unfortunately, it did happen because of the blindness of these people.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Because our Lord, like many another prophet and great men, was ahead of His times and was therefore not appreciated. But that it might very well not have happened. Again, I say, the lie direct is given to that. But also, and in many ways, perhaps this is more important for us who are gathered here tonight.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: It seems to me to be a final refutation of a very popular dispensational teaching which tells us this, that our Lord came into the world primarily to offer the kingdom to the Jews. And that it was only after the Jews had refused to believe the teaching about the kingdom and to receive the teaching. It was only after that and as the result of that, that the Gospel of grace by the death of Christ had to be introduced and brought in.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: But that that was an afterthought. If only the Jews had accepted the teaching about the kingdom, this would never have happened. There would never have been any need for the doctrine of the grace of God. And then they go on to say that this doctrine of the Gospel of the grace of God is only a temporary one, and that a day will yet come when the Gospel of the kingdom will once more be preached and people will be saved by either believing or rejecting that offer of the kingdom.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Well, now it seems to me, as I'm trying to say, that this one statement alone is enough. The cross was something that had been planned before the foundation of the world. There was no change in God's program as the result of what happened to our Lord when He was here in the days of His flesh.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: This notion that the prophetic clock was stopped then, and that the whole plan had to be rearranged because of the rejection of the Jews, seems to me to be a sheer denial of what we read here and in so many other places. How the cross is prophesied and predicted right away through the Old Testament. All the types and shadows, the lamb, the paschal lamb, the burnt offerings, the sacrifices, all of them.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Are proclaiming the absolute necessity of the Son of God. And here we are reminded that the treatment that was meted out to Him by the Jews was something that had long ago been prophesied by the prophet Isaiah. So, here I say, is an extraordinary refutation of any such teaching which suggests, the suggestion itself is monstrous, that God's eternal plan had to be modified because the Jews rejected the Gospel of the kingdom.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: No, no. As the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews tells us, He was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death. All this happened to Him that He might taste death for every man. He came into the world primarily to die. And that is why this had been prophesied and predicted so long before in the writings of the various prophets. And as I say, in the whole of the Levitical ceremonial and ritual.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Very well. But leaving that aside, let us now look directly and immediately at this tremendous statement, this momentous statement. What is its teaching? Well, I think we can put it in the form of three main principles. And here's the first. Our relationship to God is determined solely and entirely by our attitude to the Lord Jesus Christ.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Let me repeat that. Our relationship to God is determined solely, exclusively and entirely by our attitude to the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the stone. He is the test. It all comes to this. That's what the Apostle is saying here. Why are the Jews outside? Because they stumbled at this person. He determines everything.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Nothing else finally matters. The Lord Jesus Christ is the acid test of the value of any supposed belief in God. Very well. Now, this is why I say that this is such a crucial statement, and such a momentous one. I am asserting that He and He alone matters in this matter.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: That a man says he believes in God is of no value whatsoever, unless he believes in the Lord Jesus Christ. That a man may have very exalted views about life and living, doesn't matter at all unless he believes in the Lord Jesus Christ. That a man doesn't believe in war, or that a man does believe in doing good, doesn't make the slightest difference if he doesn't believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: That a man may make great sacrifices for the sake of others, and as he believes in order to please God, is utterly useless, unless he believes on our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Now, that is what the Apostle, you see, is saying here. What he does here is to give us two quotations from the book of the prophet Isaiah. And he does it in a way that we've already seen. He takes two quotations and conflates them into one.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: We've seen Him doing that before. Now let me read the two quotations. The first is Isaiah 8:14. Or take 13 as well. He's writing here to the children of Israel when they were in trouble, and this is His message to them. Sanctify the Lord of hosts Himself, and let Him be your fear, and let Him be your dread. And He shall be for a sanctuary, but for a stone of stumbling, and for a rock of offense to both the houses of Israel, for a gin and for a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: That's Isaiah 8:14. But look at Isaiah 28:16. Therefore, thus saith the Lord God, behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation. He that believeth shall not make haste. The Apostle, I say, takes those two statements, merges them into one, and therefore we've got this statement here. Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and rock of offense, and whosoever believeth on Him shall not be ashamed.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Now, we've already had occasion to point out the interesting way in which the Apostle handles his Old Testament quotations. And we have already deduced, as you remember, that this is the final proof of his own inspiration. No man, especially a man like this who had been brought up and trained as a Pharisee, no man who had the respect that this man had for the Word of God, the oracles of God, would dream of doing what he does here unless he was led and inspired of the Holy Ghost to do so.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: He's concerned to bring out one aspect of the matter. So he says, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone. Isaiah didn't actually say that, but when you take the two together, it comes to this, and as he's only interested here in the failure of the Jews to believe, this is the thing he wants to emphasize. And so, led and inspired by the Holy Ghost, He puts it in this particular form.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Now, this is, of course, a very familiar quotation. Indeed, it's so familiar that when I was reading at the beginning, I stumbled over it. What I actually said is what is actually written elsewhere, but not here. There's a variation in the translation. The meaning, of course, is always the same. Now, another hint at the same truth is in the 118th Psalm, verse 22. The stone which the builders refused is become the headstone of the corner.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Same idea, exactly. Our Lord Himself refers to it and makes use of it when He is finally condemning the Pharisees at the end of His ministry, and indeed condemning the whole of the Jewish nation. Here it is in Matthew 21, where we've got precisely the same idea, in verse 42 and following. Jesus saith unto them, did you never read in the scriptures, the stone which the builders rejected, the same is become of the head of the corner? This is the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: And it leads to the next statement, so germane to our matter here. Therefore, I say unto you, the kingdom of God shall be taken from you and given to a nation, bringing forth the fruits thereof. In other words, the church, taken from the Jews and given to the church. And then He goes on, whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken, but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Same idea, exactly. Then Peter uses it when he and John are arraigned before the tribunal in Acts 4. Peter quotes this very selfsame thing to them in Acts 4. You'll find it in verses 11 and 12. This is the stone which was set at nought of you builders, which is become the head of the corner. Neither is there salvation in any other, for there is none other name under heaven given amongst men, whereby we must be saved.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Then, of course, the Apostle Paul, he uses it. He says, we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling block, and unto the Greeks foolishness. There it is in 1 Corinthians 1. You're all familiar with that. The Jews require a sign and the Greeks seek after wisdom. We preach Christ crucified unto the Jews a stumbling block and unto the Greeks foolishness. 20 verses 22 and 23 in 1 Corinthians 1.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: But he's not content with that, so in the third chapter of that first Corinthians, in verse 10, he says, according to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise master builder, I have laid the foundation and other men buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereon, for other foundation can no man lay than that is laid. Which is Jesus Christ.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: The only one. And then you noticed in the reading at the beginning, 1 2 1 Peter 2, verse 6 and following. Stone of stumbling and a rock of offense. Even them which stumble at the word being disobedient, where unto also they were appointed. Well, now then, that's what the Apostle is saying here. And what it means, you see, is this.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: That the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, His life, His teaching, that especially His death upon the cross, and His resurrection and ascension, are the foundation, the only foundation, whereon a man can be right with God and righteous in the sight of God. This is the message of the Christian proclamation. That there is none other name under heaven given amongst men whereby we must be saved.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Or what our Lord Himself had said, I am the way, the truth, the life. No man cometh unto the Father but by Me. The only foundation. No other, no other foundation can any man lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. In all the glory and the wonder of His person and in all the glory and the wonder of His work. He is the stone, the foundation stone.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: The only one. And therefore, the Apostle rightly points out to us that because of that, there are only two possible attitudes towards Him. And He tells us in this one statement what they both are. Whosoever believeth in Him shall not be, shall not be ashamed. That's one reaction. That confronted by Him, you believe in Him.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: You trust yourself utterly, absolutely to Him. You rest on Him and on Him alone. Nothing in yourself but only in Him. You find Him to be a sanctuary, a place of deliverance, a place of rest and assurance, where there is no longer any fear and no possible shame. That's one. Whosoever believeth in Him shall not be ashamed.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: The other possible reaction to Him, the other possible attitude to Him is this, that we stumble at Him. That He becomes to us a stumbling stone and a rock of offense, and that it leads ultimately to shame and being ashamed and confounded. Very well, here is the Apostle's first great fundamental statement, therefore.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: And that is why I put it in that form. Our relationship to God, He says here, is determined solely, exclusively, only by our attitude to the Lord Jesus Christ. The Jews are lost, they're outside, they're reprobate. Why? Because they stumbled at Him. The Gentiles are in. Why? They believed in Him. But it's all determined, you see, by the attitude to the Lord Jesus Christ Himself and what He has done.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Very well, there's our first principle. Let me hurry to the second. The Apostle is particularly concerned here about this tragic stumbling of the Jews. So we've got to take as our second principle this. Why the Lord Jesus Christ is a stumbling stone to some. He was a stumbling stone and a rock of offense to the Jews. He was a stumbling stone and a rock of offense to many of the Greeks.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: He has continued throughout the running centuries to be a stumbling stone to many people. He is still tonight a stumbling stone and a rock of offense to the vast majority of people in this country. Why? How does it come to pass? How can it conceivably be possible that He is a stumbling stone and a rock of offense?

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Well, the New Testament gives us many answers to that question. Let me just note some of them for you. His very person has been a stumbling stone and a rock of offense. It was to the Jews. The very way in which He came was an offense to them, the very character of His birth. They were waiting and looking for the Messiah, but they didn't expect the Messiah to be born in a stable.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: They didn't expect Him to be born in abject poverty, in a lowly, humble condition. They were offended at it. They stumbled at it, at the very beginning. They, Isaiah, had notions of grandeur and of greatness and of glory. That was their whole picture of the coming Messiah. He was to be a great king, a great military personage, a great political personage.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: And He was going to come with great magnificence and glory, the very antithesis to what actually happened. And they stumbled over it. And then, I say, His lowliness as He went on. And as you read your Gospels, you'll find that His entire lack of training as a Pharisee was a great stumbling stone and rock of offense to the Pharisees and to all the religious leaders.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: How has this man learned, never having learned? Who is this fellow? Who is this man setting Himself up as a teacher? What does He know? They stumbled at that. His appearance, His whole upbringing, and His manner of teaching. He didn't belong to the elite, the Pharisees, or the Sadducees. And in the case of the Greeks, He wasn't a philosopher, hadn't been to the schools and the porches and the academies.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: This still continued throughout the centuries to be one of the grounds why people stumble at Him and take offense at Him. The thing seems monstrous and ridiculous that the one who claims to be the Savior of the world should have come in that manner. I haven't time to deal with the way in which men stumble at the Virgin Birth and its miraculous character. It's all a part of the same thing. But let me go on.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: They stumbled likewise at His claims for Himself. He kept on saying that He'd come from God. He claimed equality with God. He claimed to speak with authority. He said, you've heard it said. I say unto you. And this was something that infuriated the Pharisees. He's arrogating unto Himself, as they thought, this authoritative teaching. On what grounds? And especially these statements which He made with regard to His relationship to God the Father.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: And then another thing, of course, that really did annoy them and infuriate them and at which they stumbled most grievously, was what He didn't do. What didn't He do? Well, He didn't set Himself up as king in Jerusalem. He didn't gather an army together. He didn't announce war against the Roman conquerors and lead His army to liberate them and set them free and lift up the Jews to the supreme position amongst all the nations.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: That's what they wanted, and He didn't do it. Even John the Baptist, you remember, stumbled at that particular point. You remember how once, when they had been impressed by His feeding of the 5,000, they tried to take Him by force to make Him a king, but He wouldn't. That was a grievous source of stumbling. Why didn't He declare Himself? His own brethren, you remember, chided Him with that later on.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: But, of course, the thing that finally offended them and caused them to stumble was His death upon the cross. There He is, arrested, apparently can't defend Himself, condemned in the court, He doesn't seem to say a word, lets them do what they like with Him. He who claimed to be the Messiah who could heal the sick, make the lame walk, give sight to the blind, raise the dead, calm the raging of the sea.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Thou who savest others, they say to Him as He's on the cross, come down, save Thyself. If thou be the Christ of God, come down. Ridiculous. This display of weakness and utter failure and shame. To them, this was enough to prove how ridiculous His claims were that He's the Son of God, that He's the Savior. Hail, thou Son of God, they said, with their sarcasm and scorn and derision.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: They put a crown of thorns upon His head, and they mocked at Him, and they jeered at Him. Oh, His death was a terrible source of stumbling, a terrible rock of offense to them. Ah, but you know, there was something even worse than that. It was the teaching that came through His death. It was the implication of His death. This was the thing that infuriated them above everything else. What do I mean? Well, what the Apostle says.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: The preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness. The preaching of the cross is a stumbling block to the Jew and it's foolishness to the Greeks. Why? Ah, it's because of the implication. It's because of the message of that cross. And this is the thing that really got them on the raw and made them finally hate Him and dismiss Him. What is the message? Oh, the message is this, that that is the only way of salvation.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: In other words, as He goes on to say in the next chapter, Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. Here are the Jews trying to save themselves by keeping and observing the law. The cross proclaims there's only one who can keep the law. And He's done it. He's the end of the law for righteousness. That's the thing, I say, that finally infuriated them.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: That He and He alone can satisfy God's law. That all the efforts and the striving of the Jews, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the scribes, the very best of them, it's all useless. He's already told us that Israel which followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained unto the law of righteousness. And here comes this proclamation. You never can. You never will. He's come into the world because they've failed.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: He would never have come if they could have done it. It's because they can't, and no one can. The Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which is lost. The Son of Man has come not to be ministered unto but to minister and to give His life a ransom for many. That's the thing that finally causes them to stumble. That's the ultimate rock of offense.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: That He is the Atonement. That He is the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world. That He is the offering to which all the types had pointed forward, the great, the glorious antitype itself. It was, I say, the teaching and the message of the cross that stumbles them above all. And it still does. That is why the blood of Christ is ridiculed in the Christian church today.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: They stumble at this point. They hate it. They're repeating what was done by the Jews. In other words, you see, the ultimate cause of the stumbling and of the rock of offense is this, that by all His teaching and supremely by His death upon the cross, He condemns and finally exposes all man's self-confidence, pride and self-righteousness.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: That cross tells me that nothing that I can ever do will ever put me right with God. And that all my belief in myself and in my good works, in my righteousness, in my good deeds, in my beautiful thoughts is filthy rags, dung and manure and refuse. That's the whole trouble with them, says Paul. They being ignorant of God's righteousness and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Man, you see, and the Jew in particular, is out to establish his own righteousness. And Christ, in all His person and in all His works, says, it can't be done. I have come because it cannot be done. There is none righteous, no, not one. And all the mighty argumentation of the third chapter of this glorious Epistle to the Romans, there it is. He's summing it all up here in a phrase.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Those are the reasons then why the Lord Jesus Christ is a stumbling stone and a rock of offense to many. It hits them at their most sensitive point. Pride, pride of intellect, pride of morality, pride of good works, pride of achievement, pride of understanding. It doesn't matter what your pride is. Any pride at all, or any confidence or reliance upon anything you are or anything you can do or anything you can ever make yourself, is damned and condemned once and forever by the death upon the cross.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: And every natural man hates it. He abominates it. He stumbles at it. It's an offense to Him. He wants to glory in himself, and the cross proclaims, he that glorifies, let him glorify in the Lord. And in Him alone. Very well, there is the reason, I say, why the Lord Jesus Christ is a stumbling stone and a rock of offense to certain people.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: I can't leave it at that. I say in the third and the last place, therefore, the tragedy of such stumbling. The tragedy of such stumbling, such rejecting of the Son of God and His great salvation. Now, we must end on this note. The Apostle began the chapter on it. I say the truth in Christ, I lie not. My conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart, for I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ, for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh. He'll say it again. Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they might be saved. But they're not. The tragedy of it all. Now, this tragedy is the greatest tragedy in the world.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: And it is seen at its height, of course, in the case of these very Jews. The nation of the Jews is the tragedy of the world, the tragedy of the ages. But it's not confined to them. It is true of all who reject the Lord Jesus Christ, or to whom He becomes a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense. But one can see it with particular clarity in the case of the Jewish nation.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Listen to the Apostle as He puts it. Behold, I lay in Zion, in Zion, a stumbling stone and rock of offense. You see what that means? When the Savior came into the world, as He's already reminded us in the fourth verse of this chapter, He came amongst the Jews, rather the fifth verse. Who are the fathers and of whom as concerning the flesh, Christ came. He's told us later at the very beginning in the fourth verse.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Third verse of the first chapter, concerning His Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh. Where did He come to? When the Messiah came, when the Son of God came into the world, where did He come? Not amongst the nations. Telestine, amongst the Jews, He came into His own in Zion. Their own glorious city of which they were so proud.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: This is the tragedy, I say, that they of all people should have rejected Him or should have stumbled at Him. For they were the people who were looking forward to the coming of the Messiah. They were a religious people. They were people who were seeking after righteousness, following after righteousness, as we've already been reminded by Him. They were the people who had the oracles of God, the scriptures, not the nations, the dogs, they were God's people.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: And they'd got these precious things, and they read them, and they studied them, and on the basis of that, they were waiting and longing for the coming of the Messiah. And He came amongst them to His own people, and His own received Him not. That's the tragedy. The people who had had all these advantages that He enumerates in verses 4 and 5 of this ninth chapter, that they of everybody should have stumbled at Him and should have found in Him a rock of offense.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: My friends, I haven't time to work it out tonight. I'm going to take this up, God willing, when I come back again on the 26th of this month. But you know, we are witnessing a repetition of this very thing at the present time. Where is it that He's a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense most patently during these last weeks? Where is it? Is it out in the world? No, it's in His own church. It's amongst those who claim His name.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: The Bishop of Woolwich, in His article, rejoices in the fact that this new approach is not coming from the outside, but actually from within the church. He's glorying in the stumbling. It's but a reenactment of what happened nearly 2,000 years ago. I lay in Zion. But it is the people of Zion of everybody who stumble at Him and find Him a rock of offense. Whereas those Gentiles that are right outside have believed in Him and have come into the kingdom.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: There's no greater tragedy than this. That He came unto His own and His own received Him not. Very well, but go on. Let's see what else is involved in the tragedy. Behold, I lay in Zion. Who's speaking? The Almighty and everlasting God. If you don't believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, utterly and absolutely as your Savior, what you're really doing is pitting yourself against God and flinging back into His face His own action.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: I lay in Zion. This is God's own way of salvation. It's prepared before the foundation of the world. Intimated prophetically, as I say, right away through the Old Testament. The plain message, the central message of the Bible. This is the thing that men are rejecting. What God has revealed, so plainly, so clearly. It is a rejection of God's own plan and God's own provision.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: He'll say it again. They being ignorant of God's way of righteousness. The thing He's gloried in at the very beginning. I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ. Why? Well, it's the power of God into salvation to everyone that believeth, to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. For therein a righteousness from God, God's way of righteousness. He's been repeating it. We've seen it in chapter 3:21. But now a righteousness from God apart from the law has been revealed. You remember it. Well, that's His great theme.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: But this is what these people are rejecting. The Jews who claimed that they alone believed in God, unlike these pagan Gentiles who were worshiping dumb idols and vanities. They, the believers in God, are rejecting God's own way of salvation. But the tragedy is still worse. They are not only rejecting God's purpose and plan and way of salvation. They're rejecting God's most glorious act. They're rejecting the most wonderful thing that God has ever done.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: It's a terrible thing to reject anything that God has done, but when you reject the most wonderful thing of all, what can be said concerning it? Listen to what God said as He announced all this. I've already read it to you in the 28th chapter of Isaiah, verse 16. Therefore, thus saith the Lord God, behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation. And He that believeth shall not make haste.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: What does He mean by this tried stone, this precious cornerstone, this sure foundation? Oh, that's just a pictorial way of saying this. God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, precious. His only begotten, beloved Son. When the fullness of the times has come, God sent forth His own Son. Couldn't send more. He sends His own Son. In all the perfection and the glory of His everlasting deity. He is the one whom God sends, not a great man, not a great prophet, His own Son.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Yes, and one who is not only capable of standing all the tests but who has stood them all, a tried stone. Tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin. The devil attacks Him, brings out all his reserves, He stands, the mighty conqueror. He gave a life of perfect obedience to the law of God. Tried and tested by the law. He was made of a woman, made under the law. Yes, and He obeyed it with absolute perfection.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: But not only that. In order to save us, He was told that He would have to be made a sin offering for us. He would have to take our sins and our guilt upon Him and bear their punishment, and that would involve separation from His Father. Here's the test. Here's the trial. Can He stand this test? There He is, facing it in the Garden of Gethsemane, sweating drops of blood. And He says, Father, if it be possible. Nevertheless, not My will, but Thine be done. He stood the test.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: I'll go, He says. I'll drink, I'll drain the cup to the last dregs. And He did. He went as a lamb to the slaughter. Not only had He rendered a perfect, active obedience to the law. He rendered an equally perfect, passive obedience to the law and its every demand. And there He is on Calvary's cross in an agony with the vials of the wrath of God poured out upon Him. He that spared not, we've already discovered, you remember, in the 32nd verse of the 8th chapter. He that spared not His own Son but delivered Him up for us all and spared Him nothing of the horror of the punishment of sin. He took it all.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: He bore it all. A tried stone, a tested stone, a precious cornerstone. But He dies, you say. I know, but it isn't the end. He rises again. It is finished, He cried on the cross, and He proved it at finished by rising on the morning of the third day, manifesting Himself as ascending, taking His seat at the right hand of God. To these Jews, all that was an offense. That was a stumbling stone. That was a rock of offense.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: This most marvelous, glorious thing that Father, Son, and Holy Ghost have ever done, the miracle, the marvel of eternity rejected, dismissed with ignominy and scorn. But the tragedy doesn't end even there, because in doing all this, they're rejecting such a glorious salvation. What are they rejecting? Free grace. They're rejecting something which tells them just as you are, without one plea, you can be forgiven. If you but believe in Him. Justification by faith only. Nothing to do but to believe.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Come, come, buy without money and without price. Come to the waters. Thy grace, He has saved, through faith, that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God. The free gift, rejected. Gift of what? Gift of perfect forgiveness. Your sins all blotted out, entirely forgotten, cast into the sea of God's forgetfulness. The past shall be forgotten. Not only that. Regarded as if you'd fulfill the law perfectly. The righteousness of Christ imputed to you. You've completed the law, you've kept it, you've finished with it. You become dead to it.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: No condemnation anymore, forever, to them who are in Christ Jesus. All that's refused. New life, a new nature, strength and help to fight the battle while we're left in this world, and a hope of glory, made children of God, and if children then heirs, heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ, and the certainty of being with Him in the everlasting glory. It is all refused, though it's all offered for nothing.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: And all because the pride of men. All because he thinks he can fit himself for God and heaven and glory. All because he's too proud to admit he's a pauper, and that he's helpless and hopeless and has nothing, he rejects it all. That's the tragedy, but the end of the tragedy is this. Whosoever believeth on Him shall not be ashamed. But whosoever finds Him a stumbling stone and a rock of offense, shall be ashamed.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Whosoever does not believe in this Son of God as the only Savior and the only way of being reconciled to God, will never find satisfaction in this life, never. He'll always be striving and seeking, never arriving, never satisfaction. He will know of no sanctuary in his hour of trial and of crisis and of need. I lay in Zion a tried cornerstone, a sanctuary, said God through the prophet Isaiah, a place you can rush into and be safe.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: A sanctuary, but the man who rejects Him has no sanctuary. When his health goes, when illness comes, when death visits the family, when he's tried and tested, he's nothing. Nothing to fall back on. Nothing to lean on. Nothing to sustain him. And when he comes to the hour of his own death, and has his first glimpse of the law of God, and of the glory of God, and the glory of Christ, and all the spirits of just men made perfect, he'll see his own vileness, and he'll be horrified.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: And as he tries to stand before God, he won't be able to stand. He won't be able to stand in the congregation of the righteous. He's like the chaff that is swept and blown away. He'll not be able to stand in the judgment. He'll realize that he has not attained unto the law of righteousness. That all he'd boasted of and confided in is nothing but vile refuse in the presence of God. And he'll see it for himself, but it'll be too late. At long last, he'll realize his folly, the folly of a pride that professes to go on with a vain, useless endeavor, and rejects the free offer. He'll realize it, but it's too late.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: And he'll go on to spend his eternity in a state of useless and endless remorse. That's the tragedy of the Jew. That's why the Apostle says that I would that I myself almost were accursed for Christ for their sake. That's why his heart's desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved, that they may be delivered out of all this. The tragedy of stumbling and finding nothing but a rock of offense in God's plan.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: God's Son. God's free grace. All the blessings of salvation in this life and the endless blessings of the life of glory in eternity. My friends, let's be clear about this. The Lord Jesus Christ at this minute to every one of us is one of these two things. You either believe in Him and rest your faith in Him alone, or else He is to you a stumbling stone and a rock of offense.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: May the terrible lesson of the Jewish nation awaken even anybody who may be even doubtful in this meeting. May God open your eyes and show you the folly, the tragedy, the enormity of regarding God's own Son and His perfect, glorious work as a stumbling stone and a rock of offense. May God have mercy, but may He open all our eyes, even those of us who believe in Him. We don't believe enough, my friends. We don't glory as we should in Him. We say it. We take it for granted. Do you realize what's happened?

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: God has laid this stone, and it's His own Son. And it involved smiting Him. That you and I might be delivered. We might be forgiven and restored. We might become God's children and joint heirs with Christ, and eventually enter into the possession of the glory. Amen. Oh, Lord, our God, we humbly beseech Thee to look down upon us all with mercy and with compassion. We feel our hearts, oh God, are so cold.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Wilt Thou by Thy Spirit open the eyes of our understanding, that we may see these things with such a clarity that we shall be moved in the very depths and vitals of our beings and be filled with a sense of wonder, love and praise. Oh, God, grant that henceforth when we sing that hymn of Isaac Watts, we shall really mean it. When I survey the wondrous cross, on which the Prince of Glory died, my richest gain, I count but loss. And poor contempt on all my pride. Where the whole realm of nature, mind, that were an offering far too small. Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all. Take them all, oh Lord, God. Thou hast already purchased them. We give them back to Thee.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: And now may the grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship and the communion of the Holy Spirit abide and continue with us now this night. Throughout the remainder of this our short, uncertain earthly life and pilgrimage, and until we shall be with Him safely, eternally, in the glory everlasting. Amen.

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