Untitled Sermon (3)

Christ Preeminent

3/20/2022

I have something of a confession to make here this morning. Ever since I took my first lung full of that dry New Mexico air in Albuquerque, NM, I have had a struggle. It is a struggle that has remained with me from that first day of my life more than 49 years ago to this. It is a struggle that I have noticed as recently as this morning, and I’m even aware of it right now.

What is my trouble? I think about myself too much. In any given moment—because I think of myself all the time—I can tell you if:

I’m hungry

I’m tired

I’m thirsty

In pain

Discouraged

Depressed

Happy

Overwhelmed

Unmotivated

Downcast

Excited

Expectant

Sorrowful

Disappointed

I can tell you these things about myself because I’m always checking in on myself. My struggle is that I think too much about myself. I am tempted to live a me-centered existence.

And I think, maybe, possibly, I’m not the only one in this room with this struggle.

Now, Admittedly, this is not all bad—I realize I have legitimate, basic needs to tend to. Granted. The challenge we continually face is that we can take our me-centered approach and existence to our relationship with Jesus.

What do I mean?

It is good, right and correct that we each think and talk and sing about what Jesus has done for each of us personally. We should be grateful for our new life, constant forgiveness, and future in heaven. Yet, if I ONLY think about what Jesus has done for me, what Jesus is doing for me, what Jesus will do for me—and if you ONLY think about what Jesus has done for YOU, what Jesus is doing for YOU, what Jesus will do for you—It is insufficient.

Insufficient, why?

Because if we only process who and what Jesus is to ourselves, we will not REALLY understand who Jesus is and what he is about.

You see, Jesus is preeminent—NOT

Just over:

ME

YOU

Center Church

East Valley

Arizona US

World

But the entire created order.

You see, Jesus is preeminent—NOT

Just over:

Yesterday

Today

Next week

This Year

This century

This Millennium

But over all time. And the time before time.

In these five weeks leading up to Easter we are going to explore the preeminence of our Lord over all things. We are going to attempt to remove ourselves—as hard as it is—from the center of existence and explore WHY Christ is preeminent.

After all, Jesus is NOT just the most important figure in your life—BUT

In WHOLE universe and ALL of history.

We need to see Jesus as preeminent over more than just me and you. So, we are going to interrupt our 1 Timothy series and zoom out to attempt to glimpse the panorama of the preeminence of our Jesus. My goal for me, for us, is not to stop thinking of ourselves (impossible) BUT to expand our view of Jesus and what he is about.

To see him as he is—preeminent over all things.

“Learn much of the Lord Jesus. For every look at yourself, take ten looks at Christ. He is altogether lovely. Such infinite majesty, and yet such meekness and grace, and all for sinners, even the chief. Live much in the smiles of God. Bask in His beams. Feel His all-seeing eye settled on you in love, and repose in His almighty arms. . . . Let your soul be filled with a heart-ravishing sense of the sweetness and excellency of Christ and all that is in Him.” Robert Murray Cheyenne

Why?

We need to see Jesus as he is—not just the center our lives—but the center of all history.

We need to see Jesus as he is—not just that he holds your life together—but that he holds the entire fabric of the universe together.

We need to see Jesus as he is—not just that he holds our future in his hands—but that he holds all time and history in his hands.

We need to see Jesus as he is—not just that he helps us fight against our sin—but that he has defeated sin and will one day finally defeat all evil.

We need to see Jesus as he is—not just that he is daily changing us—but that he will one day renew all of creation.

We need to see Jesus as he is—Preeminent over all.

OUR Jesus is about MORE than US.

Today, we are going to think about how his preeminence was expressed in his first coming. We are going to try and answer the question—

Who is this Jesus who came to earth?

PROP: Christ the Preeminent came to LOVE the outcasts.

We will find that Christ uses his preeminence to display his love for the unworthy. When you put Jesus at the Center of all things—and see him for as mighty and majestic as he really is—then we will be able to understand his otherworldly love.

Christ the Preeminent came to LOVE the outcasts.

Galatians 4—Different sermon today—we usually go verse by verse.

“But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, [5] to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons (and daughters).” Galatians 4:4–5

PRAY

Who is this Jesus who came to earth?

Son of God

God the Son

1. Son of God

Galatians 4:4 says-- God sent forth his Son. He did this at the fullness of time. OR at Just the right time. It is important to see that Jesus’ arrival to earth did not make him the Son of God. This is who he has always been. Jesus is and has always been a Son.

There is only ONE God who is triune. This means God is one and together (complete unified) God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Jesus Christ has always been God’s Son.

This is one of the reasons that Jesus called God—His Father. One theologian says, “the name Father is not merely a simile (as if God is simply like a Father) or even a metaphor (an unusual use of language drawing attention to God’s nature in surprising and odd terms), but it is a definite personal name.”

What to know who God is? Father.

Our fathers are to be measured by the Father, not vice versa.

Similarly, that Jesus was the Son is not merely what Jesus was like, it is who he has always been. From all eternity, Jesus had been a Son.

How does a Son respond to a loving Father? He submits, obeys and serves that Father. You aren’t going to understand Jesus if you don’t first understand that Jesus is God’s very son.

Why does this matter?

It has been common even in Christians to imagine God as an angry, vengeful, unreasonable ogre. And that Jesus goes on a rescue mission to rehabilitate mankind so that God is not so angry. But that is not the case. Rather, the Father sent the Son as the supreme example of his love for our rebel race.

“The glory of God the Father’s loving initiative is the greatest theme in the New Testament. The supreme manifestation of that love is the giving, sending, and sacrificing of his Son: but it depends for all its force on the special relationship between Christ and the Father.” Gerald Bray

What is the force of the relationship between Christ and the Father?

Would we be able to count on the deep and abiding love of the Father if he just sent some guy from heaven to come and live and die and rise? Would it be meaningful if Michael the archangel came to God with a photo of all the candidates for incarnation lined up and God says—lets send that guy in FOURTH from the left in the TWELFTH row.

What is his name again? Jesus.

What would the guy fourth from the left in the twelfth row mean to God? Nothing.

But—Jesus is FAR from the guy fourth from the left in the twelfth row. He is the Father’s beloved Son. This is the Son he loved and cherished before time was set into motion.

Before the stars were hung in space.

Before the solar systems spun on their axes.

Before the foundations of the earth were laid.

Before the formation of all things.

BEFORE—the Father had anything else, he had his Son. His beloved Son. The Father, The Son, and The Holy Spirit were together.

Who is this Jesus who came?

A Son. A beloved Son of the Father.

Understanding Christ as preeminent means you must understand that Jesus was a beloved Son before he came to earth. There was NOTHING greater to the Father than this son.

And yet—what does our passage say?

“But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, [5] to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons (and daughters).”

God sent his beloved son.

He gave the best he had to gain (redeem), adopt wayward sons and daughters.

The Father gave the Son to bring many sons and daughters to glory.

How is Christ Preeminent?

He is and was and will away be Son of God. Meaning there is NO one and NOTHING more beloved to the Father than the Son. The Father loves the Son with an unbreakable bond of love. And yet, God sent his beloved son.

Not just the guy FOURTH from the left in the TWELFTH row.

This is where it is helpful to think just a moment about the love the Father has for the Son before we think about the love he has for us.

How confident would you be in the Father’s love if he just sent some guy?

The Father gave his BELOVED son so that Christ the Preeminent might bring many sons and daughters to glory. To adopt other sons and daughters.

In love he gave his son, so that his son might show his preeminence by displaying the love of the Father for outcasts like you and me.

Also, Christ is Preeminent because he is—

2. God the Son

The Son of God was also God the Son. This is what we see clearly throughout the whole Bible, and one place it shines forth the brightest is in John 1.

[1] In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. [2] He was in the beginning with God. [3] All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. John 1:1–3

The Father and the Son are and were always EQUAL.

The Father, in love, sends the Son and the Son in turn reveals the Father. But John mysteriously says in verse 18,

[18] No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known. John 1:18

It is worth quoting Michael Reeves at length to help us see Christ as God the Son and therefore preeminent—

“Had he left it there (no one has ever seen God), his Gospel would have been laughed out of every synagogue, for you don’t have to read the Old Testament very carefully to see that thousands did see God. Jacob, after wrestling with him, exclaimed, “I saw God face to face” (Gen 32:30); we read that the LORD would regularly speak with Moses “face to face, as a man speaks with his friend” (Ex 33:11), and at Sinai, with his brother Aaron, his nephews and seventy elders of Israel, he “saw the God of Israel” (Ex 24:10); Samson’s parents cried, “We have seen God!” (Judg 13:22), as did Isaiah, who wailed, “Woe to me! . . . [M]y eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty” (Is 6:5). Sometimes the sight was described as seeing “the glory of the LORD,” as when Ezekiel “got up and went out to the plain. And the glory of the LORD was standing there” (Ezek 3:23). And this sight of the glory of the LORD “appeared to all the people” of Israel in the exodus, a people who numbered many hundreds of thousands (Lev 9:23; Ex 16:10).”

He goes on…

“It was important, then, that John went on: “No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known” (Jn 1:18 NIV 1984). Who had they all been seeing? Not God the Father but God the One and Only: the Word, the Son, the Glory of God.” Michael Reeves

In other words—

Who did Jacob, Moses, Aaron, the elders, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Shadrach and the boys, and the whole nation of Israel see?

Who? The Father?

No. Another figure.

The Son, the one we call Jesus.

The ministry of God the Son did not begin in Bethlehem, it culminated there, but the Son had always been revealing the Father to the people of God. Jesus does not just pop up randomly throughout the OT in various cameo roles.

NO—the Father always revealed himself through the Son.

The Son was the one who rescued the people from slavery to Egypt, the one who guided them through the wilderness. He is the one who provided manna each down. The Son protected the people against the Egyptian army at the banks of the Red Sea.

The Son was always the one who—

Rescued

Protected

Delivered

Dwelt Amongst

Forgave

The people. This has always been the ministry of God the Son.

The God of all became so very small by becoming a baby. He entered into the womb of a woman that he created. In coming at the fullness of time, Jesus did what he had always done—revealed the Father to the people.

But in these last days—one thing has changed.

God the Son has only lately put on flesh.

Jesus was the divine son before he became the incarnate son. In other words, the SON did not become divine rather the divine one became a man to reveal God to mankind.

If Jesus were created by God as the ancient Arians and modern Mormons assert, the Father would only love the Son because he did good. Because he came to earth and did a good job.

Because Jesus obeyed he got in good with the Father by how he obeyed and what he did.

We must push deeper. The Father has always loved the Son and the Son was forever at the Father’s side. Jesus was no hired hand. He is and was God the Son.

He is Christ Preeminent.

What does all this matter?

_______

You might say—Excellent—Christ is Preeminent that is great. But what does that mean to me? I told you we all have that struggle—yet it is not wrong to ask that question.

What does it matter that Jesus was

Son of God?

God the Son?

How does the Son of God and God the Son use and leverage his preeminence?

By showing his love for an unworthy people.

In the Son (and his preeminence) we see the Father (and his love).

Do you wonder what God is like? Wonder no more. Look to Jesus.

“There is in fact no God behind the back of Jesus, no act of God other than the act of Jesus, no God but the God we see and meet in him. Jesus Christ is the open heart of God, the very love and life of God poured out to redeem humankind, the mighty hand and power of God stretched out to heal and save sinners. All things are in God’s hands, but the hands of God and the hands of Jesus, in life and in death, are the same.” T.F. Torrance

When we say we are fixed on Jesus—we are not ignoring God the Father (quite the opposite)—the way you know what the Father is like is through the Son. The Son has always revealed the Father. You cannot know what the Father is like if you do not know the Son.

Some of you might be wondering about the Holy Spirit. Good question. The Holy Spirit is the one who works on your to WANT to be fixed on Jesus. But we will talk about the Spirit’s role later in the series.

The Son of God shows the love of God most clearly.

Do you wonder if God loves you?

Do you think you might be unlovable?

Before you look at yourself and wonder if you are lovable—look away. Look instead to the Son of God. The Father loves the Son and yet he gave him for us. To die.

Do you see the mystery?

Do you feel the tension?

When we see the love the Father has for the Son—and at the same time understand that the Father gave up the son for us—does that not drive you to your knees? Saying, why? Why me?

Why is it that the Father gave his best for the worst?

Why is that the Son willing came for rebels?

Why is that we see this palpable love the Father has for the Son and yet he sent him to die?

Why would Christ’s preeminence be measured in the power of his love and NOT the strength of his might?

I don’t know. No good answer.

We can only shake our heads in wonder. We can see that the Father was/is committed to the Son and LOVED the Son.

And we can also see that the Father and the Son want to share that love with us.

When we see the love they shared—we understand and begin to taste just a bit of the love the Father has for us. He is sharing with us the love he has with the son. He is not stingy, but generous.

And his generosity knows no bounds.

How do we measure Christ’s preeminence in coming?

By his love.

When you see that the Father shares his son with us—we begin to understand the depth of the love that he has for us. This is why we need to see Jesus as he is—

Not just the center our lives—but the center of all history. Yet he shares love with you.

Not just that he holds your life together—but that he holds the entire fabric of the universe together. Yet he shares love with you.

Not just that he holds our future in his hands—but that he holds all time and history in his hands. Yet he shares love with you.

Not just that he helps us fight against our sin—but that he has defeated sin and will one day finally defeat all evil. Yet he shares love with you

Not just that he is daily changing us—but that he will one day renew all of creation. Yet he shares love with you.

Who is the Jesus who came?

The one who shares the Love of God.

In his coming, We see the love of Christ preeminent.

PRAY