This article is a sermon on Lord's Day 6 of the Heidelberg Catechism.

1999. 5 pages.

Heidelberg Catechism Lord’s Day 6

Sermon on Lord’s Day 6

16. Q. Why must He be a true and righteous man?
A. He must be a true man because the justice of God requires that the same human nature which has sinned should pay for sin.[1] He must be a righteous man because one who himself is a sinner cannot pay for others.[2]
[1] Rom: 5:12, 15; I Cor. 15:21; Heb. 2:14-16. [2] Heb. 7:26, 27; I Pet. 3:18.

17. Q. Why must He at the same time be true God?
A. He must be true God so that by the power of His divine nature[1] He might bear in His human nature the burden of God's wrath,[2] and might obtain for us and restore to us righteousness and life.[3]
[1] Is. 9:5. [2] Deut. 4:24; Nah. 1:6; Ps. 130:3. [3] Is. 53:5, 11; John 3:16; II Cor. 5:21.

18. Q. But who is that Mediator who at the same time is true God and a true and righteous man?
A. Our Lord Jesus Christ,[1] whom God made our wisdom, our righteousness and sanctification and redemption (I Corinthians 1:30).
[1] Matt. 1:21-23; Luke 2:11; I Tim. 2:5; 3:16.

19. Q. From where do you know this?
A. From the holy gospel, which God Himself first revealed in Paradise.[1] Later, He had it proclaimed by the patriarchs[2] and prophets,[3] and foreshadowed by the sacrifices and other ceremonies of the law.[4] Finally, He had it fulfilled through His only Son.[5]
[1] Gen. 3:15. [2] Gen. 12:3; 22:18; 49:10. [3] Is. 53; Jer. 23:5, 6; Mic. 7:18-20; Acts 10:43; Heb. 1:1. [4] Lev. 1:7; John 5:46; Heb. 10:1-10. [5] Rom. 10:4; Gal. 4:4, 5; Col. 2:17.

Scripture Reading:
John 6:22-40
I John 1:1-4

Singing: (Psalms and Hymns are from the "Book of Praise" Anglo Genevan Psalter)
Psalm 105:1,3
Psalm 14:5
Hymn 21:1,3,7
Psalm 103:1,4
Psalm 85:1
Hymn 54:1,2

Beloved Congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ!

Two weeks ago, with LD 4, I had us consider the discomforts of the position into which we had put ourselves through our fall into sin. We stood, I said, on the brink of the abyss. God has told us what we can see and hear in that pit; hell is the place of eternal anguish, of torment and horror, of wailing and gnashing of teeth. That horrible picture gives us an indication of how great our sins and misery are….

The fact that we’re standing on the edge of that bottomless pit with its endless horrors drives us to cast about for ways to escape. We want to run, get away from this pit…, but we can’t because we have to deal with God. His justice demands that sin committed against the most high majesty of God be punished with most severe, that is, with everlasting punishment of body and soul. God will not let us get away from that abyss unless we can make good with the God we’ve offended through our fall. But try as we might –that was the material of last- we are not able to make good with God. Instead, we daily make matters worse…, so that all we can rightly expect is that this holy and just God will push us over the edge into the eternal punishment we deserve…. So there’s no cause for us to stand tall in God’s presence, no cause for us to think big of ourselves; the only attitude fitting in our circumstance is to cry out with the tax-collector of Jesus’ parable: "Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner!"

We come today to LD 6. And see: what’s the point of the LD? This: that God has mercy! The point is that we are given escape from the horrors of hell, not on grounds of our earning it, but on grounds of God’s mercy. Escape is a gift; deliverance from the pit of hell is prepared for us from heaven! Here is a message, then, brothers and sisters, that is calculated to fill us with awe, to make us marvel at the God who gave so much to rescue you and me from the horrors of the hell we earned.

I summarise the sermon with this theme:

GOD IN MERCY SENT HIS ONLY SON TO EARTH FOR THE BENEFIT OF THOSE ON THE BRINK OF THE PIT.

who God sent
why God sent Him

Who God sent⤒🔗

The heart of LD 6 is found in Q & A 18. We ask here who this Mediator might be who is true God and at the same time a true and righteous man. The answer is this: "our Lord Jesus Christ." But we hasten to add, with reference to Scripture itself, that not we ourselves have rustled up this Mediator and presented Him to God to pay for our sins. Rather, with appeal to I Cor 1, we confess what God has told us in His Word: God Himself has put forward a Saviour in order to rescue the unworthy from the eternal anguish of the pit. This is the express message of I Cor 1: Jesus Christ became for us wisdom "from God". This is the origin of the Saviour: He comes not from man but from God. Since this message brings us from the depths of our misery to the heights of God’s gospel, I need to spend some time drawing out the significance of what this means.

The Son in heaven’s glory←↰⤒🔗

God Most High is triune, three in one: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The three Persons of the Godhead have existed together from all eternity. So Jesus, on the night in which He was betrayed, could pray to the Father like this; He said:

"And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was" (Jn 17:5).

Notice: here the Lord Jesus reminds the Father of how things used to be before He came to earth. He had, Jesus says, glory with the Father long before the world was made. From eternity, then, the Father and the Son were together in glory

At the time of Jesus’ prayer on the night He was betrayed, Jesus was not enjoying the presence of the Father, was not enjoying glory with the Father either. That’s not, though, because of friction with the Father. In that same prayer, Jesus testified of the closeness, the unity, remaining between the Father and the Son. He asked that all God’s own might "be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You…, that they may be one just as We are one" (vss 21f). A couple of verses later Jesus reminds the Father of the love there is between the Father and the Son. He says: "You have loved Me before the foundation of the world" (vs 24; cf vs 23). That Jesus could be sure of God’s continued love follows from what God Himself had said to Jesus at the time of His baptism. Said a voice came from heaven: "You are My beloved Son; in You I am well pleased" (Lu 3:22). That message was repeated some months later on the Mt of Transfiguration: "This is My beloved Son" (Lu 9:35).

The Son sent to earth←↰⤒🔗

How was it, then, that the Son was separated from the Father? Why was the Son not enjoying the glory of the Father’s presence any more? This, dear congregation, was because of a decision in the Godhead. God in heaven saw on earth the fall of man, saw that man had placed himself on the brink of hell, had to make good with the God he’d offended and could not. Triune God in heaven saw the misery of fallen man, and was moved to compassion, was touched in the very core of His holy being by the horrible plight of the man with whom He had made His covenant. So the Father in heaven sent His only, dearly beloved Son out of the glorious presence He had enjoyed from eternity, sent this Son to earth. It was not friction between the Father and the Son that prompted the Son to leave the glory of heaven; it was rather love within the Father and the Son together, love for the fallen human race, that prompted the Father to send His Son to earth.

This notion that He was sent is a central theme in Jesus’ own words. John quotes Jesus saying some 30 times that He was sent by the Father to earth. Consider the passage we read from Jn 6. The people pursue Jesus, because they are taken in by the miracles He does. But Jesus directs their attention away from the miracles ("the food which perishes"), and asks them to consider instead "the food which endures to everlasting life" (vs 27). When the people ask what they need to do to do the works of God, Jesus replies like this:

"This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent" (Jn 6:29).

That’s the key to the remainder of the passage: believe that God sent Jesus and you shall have life. Look at vs 32:

"…Jesus said to them, ‘Most assuredly, I say to you, … My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world’" (vss 32f).

Note in this one verse the pile up of terms emphasising God’s deeds. "My Father," says Jesus, "gives you the bread." He adds: this bread is "from heaven". Again, this "bread of God" is "He who comes down from heaven." Who that bread is? Vs 35: "I am the bread of life." Jesus elaborates on the thought in vs 38ff:

"For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me…. And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have everlasting life."

The emphasis of the passage is very much on the work of God; God "sent", Jesus comes "from heaven". Jesus on earth has a commission, and it’s a commission originating in heaven. Jesus is on earth by God’s sovereign will. It is through the One He sent that God would give life to persons on the brink of hell eternal. Listen to Jesus’ words elsewhere:

"… God … gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life" (Jn 3:16).

And why did God do it? Because of love. That’s what Jesus said: "God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son." What was most dear to Him He sent from heaven to earth…, because He loved.

Marvel, my brothers and sisters, at Who this God is! To send His only, dearly beloved Son out of the glories of heaven because of His compassion for persons on the brink of hell: what a God this is! Truly, Lord, there is none like You, infinite in compassion, tender in mercy, boundless in grace and love!

The Son on earth←↰⤒🔗

So the Son of God left the glories of heaven and the presence of His Father. The Son of God came to earth, and here remained what He had always been: true God. He had to remain true God because only true God can sustain the burden of God’s eternal wrath against sin (Q & A 17). He remained what He was, and became what He was not: a true man. Such too was God’s decree: God the Son would not only need to leave the glories of heaven, but would also need to take on Himself the true human nature of the people He came to save. After all, "the justice of God requires that the same human nature which has sinned should pay for sin" (Q & A 16). He became one of us, subject to all the ailments and pains and frustrations that mark our broken lives. Yet He was different in this one thing: He was without sin. For God –and the Son on earth remained true God- cannot sin. He was a righteous man, and so could enter God’s courts to pay for our sins (Q & A 16).

We marvel, congregation, at what God gave for the benefit of those on the brink of hell: His only, dearly beloved Son. We marvel the more when we realise what God gave His Son to. That His beloved Son should walk on this earth as a fallen man, that His Godhead should be hidden under His humanness, that people would not readily see His glory but see instead a man like any other – yet all of that did not hinder the Father from sending His Son to us! We would say: God the Father was not driven by thoughts of own comfort and own happiness; He was driven by compassion for sinners on the brink of hell, and so gave, freely gave His most precious possession to the humility of living with sinners on earth, gave so that sinners might hang this dear Son on the cursed cross of Calvary. Who, beloved, who, can grasp the mind of God?? Who, beloved, who can understand the way of the Almighty?! But this is God, congregation, this is the God who established His covenant of grace with you!!! This is your God! Tell me: shall you not marvel that such a God would reach out to you??

Why God sent Him←⤒🔗

That brings us to the next question we need to consider: why would God do this? Why, really, would He give so much for us? The answer breaks down into three parts.

To declare the Father←↰⤒🔗

The first reason I want to consider is echoed in Q & A 19 of our Lord’s Day. From where do we know just how much God has given for our benefit? Of course, we look in the Scriptures God gave. The Old Testament is full of the compassion and the greatness of our covenant Father. Already in Paradise the Lord God, when He gave His promise of redemption to Adam and Eve, outlined something of Who He was; sovereignly, graciously He would see to it that the Seed of the woman would crush the seed of the serpent. And when the Lord spoke to the patriarchs, and gave His instructions to the Israelites around Mt Sinai, He revealed more of Who He was and to what lengths He would go to save a people on the brink of hell. The whole system of sacrifices outlined for the tabernacle taught the notion that sin had to be atoned for, taught that sin would be atoned through the substitutionary work of another. The prophets too proclaimed more of God’s goodness, of how true God would die for the sins of man.

But it wasn’t laid out in plain language until "the time had fully come," the time when "God sent forth His Son, born of a woman" (Gal 4:4). Then, when God the Son lay in the manger of Bethlehem’s stable and the naked eye could see no difference between this baby and any other, then it was apparent to what astounding lengths God in heaven would go to save those who "in deliberate disobedience" had rebelled against Him. Then, when God the Son was hung on the cursed cross and the sins of God’s people were piled onto Him and the awful anger of holy God against our sins was poured out on God the Son, then it was apparent in boldest relief what God really meant when He promised in the beginning to crush the seed of the serpent.

How shall one know Who God is? Certainly, one can bend over the Old Testament Scriptures, and learn so very much about the identity of the God with whom we who stand on hell’s brink have to do. But remember, congregation what John was moved by the Holy Spirit to say. Says John:

"No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him" (Jn 1:18).

Tell me, congregation, who else could make known, could explain God the Father better than God the Son? If God the Son was so close to the Father’s heart so as to be in His bosom from all eternity, does He not know best Who God is? So what did Jesus do? Obediently He carried out the will of Him who sent Him. Jesus on earth knew why God in heaven had sent Him from the splendours of heaven to the squalor of earth, and that is why Jesus obediently and submissively went along the road stipulated by the Father – though that road had to end up on the cruel cross. So Jesus, by His words and His actions in the course of His earthly ministry, made clear how much God would give for sinners, made clear what kind of God there is in heaven. Jesus of Nazareth, Son of God and son of man, was walking proof of how much God in heaven would give for the redemption of the lost.

Observe then the Christ, my brothers and sisters, and learn from Him Who the God is Who has compassion on you! Then marvel, marvel without end that God would go to such lengths to redeem you from the pit you deserve!

To redeem us from the pit←↰⤒🔗

That’s the second aspect to the reason why God gave so very much in sending His only Son. Jesus says it in Jn 6:

Did you hear it? "This is the will of Him who sent Me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have everlasting life." That’s it, beloved of the Lord: God has no delight in the death of a sinner, but rather that the sinner should turn and live! God has no delight in pushing anyone over the edge of the abyss into the bottomless depths of hell, there to wail and gnash one’s teeth forever; God instead wishes the man He created to live forever in His holy courts. That is why He sent His Son from the splendours of heaven to the squalor of earth – so that persons standing precariously on the brink of that horrid abyss might be rescued! God’s justice demands that sin committed against the most high majesty of God be punished with the most severe punishment of body and soul, and no human being on the face of the earth is able to escape the righteous judgment of holy God. All, then, by God’s holy standard, must receive from the Judge of all the final push over the edge into the depths below. But God has no delight in that, and that is why He sent His Son from heaven. On this earth the iniquities of us all should be laid on Him, He should be smitten by God and afflicted by God on account of our transgressions (Is 53). In a word: He should suffer in our place, He should suffer what we deserve so that we might go free from the sentence we’ve earned. That’s the intent of holy God: to rescue us from the horrors of the pit. In Jesus words:

"For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many" (Mk 10:45).

And Paul’s words:

"For He [that’s God the Father] made Him [that’s God the Son] who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him" (II Cor 5:21).

To restore us to the Father←↰⤒🔗

There is yet a third component to the matter of why God sent His only dear Son from heaven to earth. Through our fall into sin we not only placed ourselves on the edge of the abyss so that we deserved the agonies of hell eternal. Through our fall we also made God our enemy, provoked His wrath, earned His damnation. God sent His Son not only to rescue us from the pit of hell; He sent His Son also to reconcile us once again to the Father. Listen to Jesus’ words for His people in His high-priestly prayer of Jn 17:

"Father, [He says], I desire that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which You have given Me" (vs 24).

Where was Jesus to be? Indeed, after His work on the cross He was to return to the presence of the Father, return to the glories of heaven. It is Jesus’ express wish that His people may be there with Him. That is: it is Jesus wish that those redeemed from the horrors of the pit may share in the splendours of God’s presence! We understand: none shall share the splendours of God’s presence if God’s wrath still abides on him. This, then, is the point of Jesus’ words: He came to restore sinners to the Father. John put it like this:

"But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name" (Jn 1:12).

And children belong in the house of the Father!

So, when the same apostle John writes his first letter, he says this to his readers:

"that which we have seen and heard we declare to you, that you also may have fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ" (I Jn 1:3).

Reflect on those last words, congregation: "truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ." God the Father: He’d been most angry with us on account of our sins, so that we fully deserved and should fully expect Him to push us over the edge of the abyss. But John speaks of no anger; He speaks only of "fellowship … with the Father"! What was broken by the fall is restored: fellowship with God exists again!

Conclusion←⤒🔗

Truly, congregation, can you imagine a bigger contrast between what we deserve and what we receive?! This is the glorious gospel of LD 6: the righteous and severe Judge of LD 4 Himself supplies the answer to our problem! And the answer He supplies comes at great cost – not to us, but to Himself. Sovereignly, graciously, He made His own Son to be our salvation.

Tell me now, brothers and sisters: what do you think of this message? Does this leave you cold? Is this material that sits well with the intellect –it’s dogmatically all straight in a row- but doesn’t stir the heart to thankfulness and awe? Dear congregation: where a gospel so rich as this does not fill you with gratitude, I tell you, you remain on the brink of the abyss, in danger of being nudged over the edge after all. So there’s need to consider again the horrid reality of LD 4, and then to cry out with the tax collector of Jesus’ parable: "Lord, have mercy on me a sinner!" And then embrace in faith the mercy of God confessed in LD 6: God so loved you that He gave up His only dearly beloved Son to obtain your salvation.

What, my brothers and sisters, do you think of this mercy? Does it fill you with awe for such a glorious God? Blessed are you; you may know your sins of today and your sin of Paradise - they’ve earned you the horrors of hell beneath- to be forgiven, washed away in the blood of the Son of God. And your fellowship is with the Father and the Son, forever. Amen.