The Exalted Christ #2

Listen, listen, listen. Jesus Christ has full, undiminished glory, full, undiminished honor, and full, undiminished power at the right hand of God. That is who He is. Welcome to the Truth Pulpit with Don Green, founding pastor of Truth Community Church in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Hi, I'm Bill Wright. Last time, Don focused on our Father in Heaven's response to the incredible humility Jesus displayed when He gave His life for the sins of the world. Today, as we bring our series called The Glorious Person of Christ to a close, we'll see what the response of all mankind should be to such an amazing display of love and humility. Friend, open your Bible now to Philippians chapter 2 for the second half of a message titled Exalted Christ.

Here's Don Green in the Truth Pulpit. God the Father, in accordance with the eternal plan of redemption that was established before the foundation of the world, the Son having completed His work in heaven, God the Father honored Him in accordance with that eternal promise and exalted Him in this way. These are magnificent realities. These are the most noble things that a human mind could ever consider. To look and to consider and meditate on these truths and to meditate on them with a repentant, believing spirit, these are the truths that change your life and transform you. These are the truths that teach you not to love the world but to love Christ instead, to love Him more than the things of this world, because you see the surpassing value, the infinitely greater magnificence of Christ as compared to our paltry existence here on this sin-cursed earth. And so, God the Father granted this to Christ as a response to His humiliation. And so, beloved, think about it. Before His incarnation, Christ dwelt in glory.

That's magnificent. That deserves worship. He humbled Himself and condescended Himself to come to earth in His incarnation to the point of death, even death on a cross bearing the wrath of God for His people, in utter shame and rejection at the cruel cross of Calvary. That's a whole other dimension of incomprehensible glory for which we would worship Him. God's exalted Him and it's even more fully revealed and engrossing than it was before. You could look at any aspect of this and be lost in wonder, worship, and praise when you realize that the fullness of it all is true and resonant in Christ.

You see how magnificent He truly is. Well, that breathtaking exaltation has vast and universal consequences. And that brings us to point number two, the response of creation. The response of creation. I'm delighted, I'm grateful to God for the different ways that His providence plays out in the preaching of His word over time. Sometimes it's quiet and below the surface and you're not really aware of it. Other times, the timing is magnificent, such as when we were preaching on the Reformation on October 31st, 2017, the exact 500th anniversary of Luther nailing his 95 Theses to the door at Wittenberg.

How does that happen? That's magnificent. There's all kinds of things like that that have happened over the course of Truth Community Church. But today I'm thankful and I'm grateful that we have the privilege together to consider the exaltation of Christ when the rest of our fellow countrymen, or most of them, are preoccupied with something far lesser and agitated and concerned over passing earthly things that are going to be forgotten soon enough. What a blessing for us as a new man has received the support of the American people. What a blessing for us to contemplate an infinitely greater one and an infinitely greater office than that. We are privileged to recognize that there are greater universal realities at play regardless of how human events play out in our lives. And every one of us ought to grasp onto that, love it and adore Christ and let it change the perspective that we have on what transpires in the course of human events. And so to be able to preach on the exaltation of Christ, to me, I thank God for the privilege. I thank God just for the privilege of belonging to Christ, don't you? Just to know Him, to be His, whatever earth takes away, to belong to this Christ, to be the object of His redeeming love, to know that He'll never leave me nor forsake me.

That's true for you too if you're in Christ, that this exalted One cares for you, He condescends to care for you and your individual problems. You just get lost in it all, the majesty of it. And so point number two, the response of creation. What's the response of creation? There must be shattering consequences to something like this, and there are.

Here it is. The response of creation is this, every personal being in the universe who has ever existed, who exists now, and whoever will exist, every one of them, without exception, will confess this exalted Christ as Lord. That's how great Christ is. Philippians 2.10. Philippians 2.10. God exalted Him in response to His humiliation, and He had a purpose in that exaltation that we see expressed in verse 10. So that, an expression of God's purpose in it, so that at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.

Verses 10 and 11 express the purpose of this exaltation, and it's staggering, astonishing, wonderful. It says that every knee will bow, every tongue will confess. To bow the knee is to, watch this, is to express conscious recognition of the sovereignty of Christ and to submit to it, and everyone will comply. Oh, for now, we see rebels going about doing their rebellious things in their rebellious ways, mocking the name of Christ, falsely claiming to be atheists and all of that junk, and it's just junk. It's just the lying heart of a man who won't receive the revelation that God has imprinted on his own inner man. All of that stuff one day is going to be over, and there is coming a time where every knee will bow and express conscious acknowledgment of the sovereignty of Jesus Christ and submit to it.

Look at it. That's what Paul couldn't be more clear. He doesn't simply say every knee will bow and then move on.

He expands on what he means. Those who are in heaven, those on earth, those under the earth, those who are in heaven, meaning the angels and the departed saints as we speak here today, they'll comply. They'll gladly confess Christ as Lord. Those on earth, in other words, the people who are alive when Jesus returns, they'll comply. They will acknowledge him as Lord. Those under the earth, the departed dead, demons, those now in hell, they'll comply. They'll acknowledge Christ as Lord. Look at Isaiah 45. Isaiah 45. This is a repeated theme in scripture, that of which we speak right now. It's glorious in a way that makes you soar on eagle's wings.

It's sobering in a way that bows you low in the dust. Isaiah 45 verse 21. You'll see where Paul drew upon this language. 45 verse 21. Declare and set forth your case.

Indeed, let them consult together. Who has announced this from of old? Who has long since declared it? Is it not I, the Lord? And there is no other God besides me. A righteous God and a Savior.

There is none except me. Turn to me and be saved all the ends of the earth, for I am God and there is no other. No other God, no other Savior.

No one comes to the Father except through Christ. Verse 23, I've sworn by myself, the word has gone forth from my mouth in righteousness and will not turn back, that to me every knee will bow and every tongue will swear allegiance. Stated in the Old Testament, you see Christ speaking there in Isaiah. In Romans chapter 14, you don't need to turn there. You can be turning back to Philippians while I read this text to you. Romans 14 in verse 10 through 12. Paul says, why do you judge your brother?

Why do you regard your brother with contempt? And then listen to this. For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God. For it is written, as I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me and every tongue shall give praise to God. So then each one of us will give an account of himself to God.

That's what the Bible says. You and I, every one of us, every one of us, we're marching as it were on a determined path and the destination of that path is the throne of Christ. Those of us that know Him will joyfully bow the knee at that throne and the confession that we have made here on earth will be expanded and with fuller knowledge somehow in a fuller vision, in a fuller way with unhindered lips will say, you are Lord, just as we confessed on earth. Praise be to your holy name.

May I please kiss your feet in humble adoration of who you are. That's what believers will do. Unbelievers will do it in a different way. They will confess under coercion.

Though they do not want to admit it, they will bow down. Conquered enemies will acknowledge Him as Christ and then they will be sent away into eternal destruction as the just punishment of God for their sins. You know, when we talk about who's a believer and who's an unbeliever and we're talking about the things of great eternal consequence, these are not trifling matters. Now, Jesus Christ is and was always God. There was never a time where He was not and He was always God. He did not graduate into becoming God. He was always God.

I just refuted Mormonism and what I said there. The exaltation of Christ of which we speak here, it did not add to His essence. It did not give Him something that He did not already possess in His being. But what His exaltation does, the exaltation in His resurrection of which hundreds of men were direct eyewitnesses, what His ascension did as men looked on, what now in His Word is revealed that He is at the right hand of God and we know that by faith. When He returns in glory at His second coming, this is all, watch this, it's all a visible manifestation of that pre-existing reality. It manifests, the exaltation of Christ manifests what was always true that He is above all created beings. And as that full manifestation takes place in that coming day for which we long and look forward to as our blessed hope, when that day comes, the entire intelligent universe will be united around one common confession.

Jesus Christ is Lord and it will not be denied. That universal confession is coming upon us all. All men will bow at Christ at judgment and give an account for what they've done with Him. Believers will joyfully confess this reality and enter into heaven. Unbelievers, those of you that are unsaved here today, let me warn you about the consequences of this for you if you don't repent.

It's too frightening and awful to speak of. But what waits ahead for unbelievers is that they will confess the lordship of Christ under coercion and then they will be sent to hell. The final words out of their mouth will be, you are Lord, and Christ will say, depart from me, I never knew you.

What's the purpose of all of this? Nothing less than the glory of God. Look at Philippians 2.11. Philippians 2.11, every knee, heaven, earth, under the earth, every tongue will confess. Every one of them.

It's just staggering. Every one of them will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord for this ultimate purpose, to the glory of God the Father. To the glory of God the Father. You see, to honor Jesus Christ and to recognize Him as full deity is to honor the Father who sent Him. It's to honor the Father who shares that one essence with Him. And so to honor Christ is to honor God the Father. Jesus Himself said this in John chapter 5, He said, the Father has given all judgment to the Son so that all will honor the Son even as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him. There's no point in claiming that you worship God apart from Christ.

That's a demonic fiction in the polluted imaginations of many men. I have my own God. You don't have any God if you do not have Christ.

And if you are not honoring God in reliance upon Jesus Christ and His redeeming work, you are not honoring the Father at all. And so the exaltation of Christ just makes the lines exceedingly abundantly clear. Who is Lord?

Who is King? It is Christ. That is clear and undeniable. And whatever earthly vestments or earthly prerogatives are given to any earthly man at any given time does not diminish that fact. It's all subordinate and infinitely below our exalted Lord. Charles Spurgeon said it well. And for those of you whose lives up until this point have been indifferent to Christ, you've played with religion, but you've never been earnest in your heart.

I can't imagine how many are in that miserable position. Some put a theological spin on it and say, I'll accept Christ as Savior, but I'll wait to consider Him as Lord. That's not true.

It does not work that way. Charles Spurgeon said it well when he said this. It is not possible for us to accept Christ as our Savior unless He also becomes our King. A very large part of salvation consists in our being saved from sin's domination over us. The only way in which we can be delivered from the mastery of Satan is by becoming subject to the mastery of Christ.

End quote. You see, my friends, when Christ says, follow me, He's placing a spiritual demand on your heart that says you must leave the world behind. You must leave your love of self behind and come utterly and humbly to me and confess me as Lord like all of creation is one day going to do. And implicit in saving faith, implicit in the work of God that He does in a heart when He draws someone to Christ is a recognition of that lordship and a glad, uncompromised submission to that lordship. Now we understand that no one understands the full implications of that at the moment that they believe.

We understand that. We're not talking about people doing works before they can be saved. We're talking about what kind of faith is it that God works in the human heart in order to bring someone to Christ. And if the purpose of saving faith, the purpose of the confession of Christ as Lord is to recognize Him for His exalted position, and this is the goal of God, then it's obvious that the work of God is going to produce a confession of Christ as Lord in the hearts of those that He truly saves. And someone that wants to try to split hairs and deny that Christ is Lord, but claim Him as their Savior, they're miserably deluded. That is not saving faith. They're still in their sins.

If they are consciously rejecting the lordship of Christ, they are perpetuating and building, they are building the lining to their own spiritual tomb as they do that. And so, my unsaved friend, I plead with you. Come to Christ humbly. Confess Him as Lord. Bow your knee before Him in reliance on the promise of Romans 10-9 that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you'll be saved. The saving confession is Jesus as Lord.

That's not an abstract construct that you separate from your own heart. You confess that meaningfully, earnestly, and you receive Him and submit to Him as Lord to be saved. And the ones who make that confession enter into the wonderful reality of His redemptive work.

The blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin. My Christian friend, I call you to worship your exalted Christ. And in a day like today, I call you to obey your exalted Christ. And in a day like today, I call you to trust your exalted Christ. If He's conquered death, if He's ascended up to heaven, if He's coming back to conquer the earth, I think that He can probably deal with the issues of life that we face. And while they're hard and difficult and even frightening for some, underneath it all are the everlasting arms of the exalted Christ who will certainly carry out His purposes to perfection and will not lose one of His children in the process. He will deliver you safely home to heaven. You can trust Him for that.

Everything else is details. So you see, the exaltation of Christ has consequences for us all. With the Apostle Paul, I pray that the Holy Spirit would open your eyes and your hearts to all of them, that you would give Him the trust, praise, and worship of which He is so preeminently worthy. That's Don Green bringing our series called The Glorious Person of Christ to a powerful close. Well, if you've been moved by this series and you'd like to hear it again or maybe share it with a friend, simply go to TheTruthPulpit.com. There you can listen again at your convenience.

Again, that's TheTruthPulpit.com. Well, Don, this series has covered some very weighty topics, including the role of prophet, priest, and king that Christ plays in our lives as believers, also the incredible humility He displayed by giving His life for us, and the Father's response to that unimaginably selfless act, not to mention how all of mankind should respond to such an amazing display of love. Well, Bill, you can certainly see why Scripture says that God highly exalted Him. Jesus Christ is the King of the universe.

He is most sovereign over all, and one day all men will bow the knee to Him. And so, my friend, as we close today's broadcast, I simply want to ask you this question. Do you know the biblical Christ, and do you know Him as your prophet, priest, and king if you are lost in sin? Let me just encourage you to do this. And if these things seem unfamiliar to you, I invite you to read the Gospel of Mark. And as you do, to pray to Christ and ask Him to make Himself known to you. Oh, my friend, don't miss this person who is at the center of God's plan for the world and who is your one and only Savior from sin. Thanks, Don. And friend, I'm Bill Wright inviting you back next time for more, when Don Green returns from the true hope.