In our consideration of the Heidelberg Catechism, we have been considering, not for a few weeks, but up until a few weeks ago, considering our confession of faith using the words of the Apostles' Creed. And tonight we consider that he suffered under Pontius Pilate. Our Lord Jesus Christ suffered under Pontius Pilate. We turn together to Lord's Day 15, page 22 in the back of the Psalter hymnal. Page 22 there. We turn to Isaiah chapter 53 and read together that chapter that we might say classic prophecy about the suffering that our Lord was called upon to endure. And also Galatians 3. As we read verses 1 through 13, our text being verse 13 of Galatians chapter 3. Isaiah chapter 53, hear now the word of the Lord. despised, and we esteemed Him not. Surely He took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered Him stricken by God, smitten by Him, and afflicted. But He was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray. Each of us has turned to his own way. And the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth. He was led like a lamb to the slaughter and as a sheep before her shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth. By oppression and judgment he was taken away, and who can speak of his descendants? for he was cut off from the land of the living for the transgression of my people he was stricken he was assigned a grave with the wicked and with the rich in his death though he had done no violence nor was any deceit in his mouth yet it was the lord's will to crush him and cause him to suffer and though the lord makes his life a guilt offering he will see his offspring and prolong his days and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand. After the suffering of his soul, he will see the light of life and be satisfied. By his knowledge, my righteous servant will justify many and he will bear their iniquities. Therefore, I will give him a portion among the great and he will divide the spoils with the strong because he poured out his life unto death and was numbered with the transgressors. For he bore the sin of many and made intercession for the transgressors. Turning over to Galatians 3, reading together the first 13 verses. The Apostle Paul writes, You foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes, Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. I would like to learn just one thing from you. Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law or by believing what you heard? Are you so foolish? After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort? Have you suffered so much for nothing, if it really was for nothing? Does God give you His Spirit and work miracles among you because you observe the law or because you believe what you heard? Consider Abraham. He believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness. Understand, then, that those who believe are children of Abraham. The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith and announce the Gospel in advance to Abraham, all nations will be blessed through you. So those who have faith are blessed, along with Abraham, the man of faith. All who rely on observing the law are under a curse. For it is written, Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the book of the law. Clearly no one is justified before God by the law, because the righteous will live by faith. The law is not based on faith. On the contrary, the man who does these things will live by them. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us. For it is written, Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree. Again, if you would turn to page 22, Lord's Day 15, as we confess together the answers to questions 37, 38, and 39. Question 37 asks, What do you understand by the word suffered? That during his whole life on earth, but especially at the end, Christ sustained in body and soul the anger of God against the sin of the whole human race. This He did in order that, by His suffering as the only atoning sacrifice, He might set us free, body and soul, from eternal condemnation, and gain for us God's grace, righteousness, and eternal life. Why did he suffer under Pontius Pilate as judge? So that he, though innocent, might be condemned by a civil judge and so free us from the severe judgment of God that was to fall on us. Is it significant that he was crucified instead of dying some other way? Yes, this death convinces me that he shouldered the curse which lay on me since death by crucifixion was accursed by God. Beloved in the Lord Jesus Christ, misery loves company. Maybe you've heard that expression before. And what it means is very simply that when we are miserable, we want someone else to be miserable with us. Why should I be the one to suffer all alone? Someone else should have to suffer with me. But the truth is we don't like to suffer. The truth is we don't like suffering. And we also really don't like to see another suffer. When we see another suffer, we tend to pity them. We tend to feel sorry for them. But we confess, beloved, that Jesus suffered under Pontius Pilate. Jesus suffered. Yet, what does that mean to us? We read Isaiah 53 and there we read words like, He was stricken, He was smitten, He was afflicted, He was pierced, He was crushed, He was punished, He was wounded. Yet, what does that mean to you and me today? Of course, the Catechism addresses our confession that he suffered under Pontius Pilate and even, in a sense, expands on it, not illegitimately. Again, it simply says that during his whole life on earth, but especially at the end, he suffered. But again, congregation, do we really stop to think about his suffering? I mean, yes, we observe Good Friday. We talk about the fact that Christ was crucified. He was nailed to the cross. But do we really stop to think about that suffering, the significance of it, what it means, why He did it? After all, it happened so long ago. Really, what does that have to do with me today? But we are to be humbled, beloved, as we consider why Jesus suffered. Not so that we might pity Him. Not so that we might feel sorry for poor, poor Jesus. Even not so that we might wish that he had never had to go through it. But that we might rejoice because of the eternal benefit of Christ's suffering. That is what the believer confesses. And we can only understand this by true faith. And by faith then we confess that the eternal benefit of Christ's suffering is evidenced in our redemption accomplished. And it is experienced in our redemption applied. The eternal benefit of Christ's suffering is, first of all, evidenced in our redemption accomplished. There is a fact here. There is an accomplished fact. Paul says Christ redeemed us. Now, first of all, he's talking about believers. Very simply. Jewish Christians, Gentile Christians, believers from every tribe, every tongue, every nation, all those who enjoy the faith of Abraham, believers. And Paul says that Christ redeemed us. Now, to redeem, we know, has the idea of purchase. The words in the original have the idea of to buy out of the marketplace, to ransom one from slavery. The fact is, Christ redeemed us. He purchased us in the slave market and He will never sell us. He will never permit us to be sold as slaves to anyone else. In the slave business, a slave could conceivably be sold from one owner to another owner to another owner and remain a slave, to remain in bondage as a slave or, if that one was fortunate, to be ransomed, to be purchased and to be set free. We are set free from bondage to slavery. It's a done deal for this life and for the next. This redemption benefit, beloved, is eternal. Now again, all of that sounds nice, doesn't it? That's a wonderful sounding fact. Christ redeemed us. But in our day, let's be honest, we have absolutely no concept of slavery. We really have no idea what it means to be a slave. So therefore, we might respond to this nice sounding fact with a resounding, so what? So what? But you see, beloved, this only has meaning if we know why Christ did this. Why was this redemption necessary? From what have we been redeemed? Paul, we know in the book of Galatians, was combating the false teaching of the Judaizers. Very simply, those who said that we have to keep the law. We have to go back to the Old Testament regulations and keep the law, do the works of the law in order to be right with God, in order to earn our justification. And Paul very simply says, that's false. That's dangerous, deadly teaching and thinking. He says, the only thing that we can possibly earn from the law is its curse. Which includes the wages of sin, namely death. And that's for everyone. Because as Paul says in another place, all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. That's the only thing that we can earn in and of ourselves by our works of the law is its curse. Now boys and girls, we hear the word curse and the very sound of that word, curse. By the very sound of it, we know it's something bad. It's not something good. When one is under a curse, we know that that means that something bad happens to them. Think of one who commits a crime, maybe a child molester, maybe a rapist, and that one is under the curse of breaking the law, and that curse includes a guilty sentence. It includes that that one is condemned. It includes that that one is punished. And that title for that one criminal, that title always sticks with that one. You see, we're seeing that in our San Diego area lately, aren't we? Those child molesters, those rapists who have maybe paid their so-called debts to society are now being returned and the justice system is trying to place them in communities, restricted of course. And the people in those neighborhoods are up in arms and saying, we don't want them here. They're criminals. They're going to do it again. They're dangerous. You see, the title, the very title criminal in that case is part of that curse. It always sticks with them. Or even one who is not a criminal. Maybe one who is a recovered alcoholic or a recovered drug addict. The reputation is hard to escape. The curse, you see, is comprehensive. And it sticks with one in so many different ways. Paul says no one can keep God's law perfectly. Even one violation, even one sin results in the law's curse for lawbreakers. And brothers and sisters, we are lawbreakers. We are slaves to sin. God's law, which is holy and righteous and good, condemns each and every one of us as guilty and worthy of death, worthy of death eternally, worthy of the eternal punishment of God. In Deuteronomy 27 and 28, we read about the Israelites gathering around Mount Ebal and what was spoken from that mountain were blessings for obedience, but curses for disobedience. and the curses for disobedience included being kicked out of the covenant community. The curse of the law of God, beloved, means separation from God, separation from His love, separation from His grace, separation from His presence, from His favor. Well, what is God's attitude towards sin? We know this, the boys and girls know this. God hates it. It's offensive to Him. And His hatred for sin is decisively expressed by death. And with death, we know that all hope is gone. We see this most vividly when it comes to physical death. When one has died and their life is gone, we know that if that one hasn't before by the grace of God, that one certainly now in death no longer can cry out for God's mercy. Those under the curse of the law cannot redeem themselves Apart from new life in Christ, man is spiritually dead and upon physical death to this life, he will be condemned forever to eternal death. He cannot redeem himself. He cannot pay for his own sin. He cannot bear the punishment of God. He cannot satisfy the law's demands, namely perfect obedience. You see, Paul's point in Galatians chapter 3, beloved, is that satisfying God by being obedient to His law, by fulfilling the works of the law, is hopeless. It's a waste of time. It's impossible. Just as impossible as emptying out the ocean with a bucket or emptying out the ocean at all. It simply can't be done. Leaning on the law, beloved, is nothing less than leaning on yourself. And if you expect to get right with God by your own obedience, you can only fail. That's the only possible outcome. But God provided the only remedy that we need. He provided the only remedy that we'll do for you and me. It's been accomplished. You see, Paul leaves no doubt about who accomplished our redemption. It's Christ. He leaves no doubt about from what we have been redeemed, the curse of the law, but he also leaves no doubt about how it has been accomplished. This redemption, we said, has the idea of purchase. And this redemption, this purchase, has the idea that our deliverance involves a cost of some kind. You can't get something for nothing. You know that. When you go to make a purchase, they expect you to pay for it with cash, not wisdom like we said this morning, boys and girls. It takes cash. That's why money is important to us, isn't it? You can't get something for nothing. Our deliverance involved some kind of a cost, some kind of effort, some kind of suffering or loss to the one who bought our deliverance, the one who secured our deliverance. Our debt of sin was not just canceled or overlooked for nothing. It wasn't just waved off. It wasn't just let go. You know, don't worry about it. It's no big deal. God is a just God and His justice demands that He be paid in full, that He be given what is rightfully His. Sin committed against Him must be punished. And our Lord Jesus Christ paid the cost. He paid the redemption price, His own precious blood by, as Paul says, becoming a curse for us. In 2 Corinthians 5, verse 21, Paul says it another way. He says, God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. He became sin for us. He became a curse for us. Now, we cannot miss the idea of substitution here. It's part of our theological lingo, isn't it? We speak of the substitutionary atonement. And again, that all sounds nice and good, but please, beloved, we cannot miss the truth, the beauty of that idea of substitution. If we forget about it, we tend to become indifferent. If we don't think about the fact that Christ took our place, then we forget about the fact of why it was He took our place. Jesus came between us and the curse of the law that was over us. The curse that was weighing heavily upon us. The curse that had condemned us. He took our place. That which was rightfully ours became wrongfully His in the sense that He didn't deserve it. And beloved, we should be all too happy to be rid of it, especially since the only way to be delivered from this curse is by Jesus taking it from us and taking it upon Himself. And He was able to do this because of His perfect active obedience. His perfect obedience given And as he suffered, as the catechism says, his whole life long. You know, that perfect obedience of Christ was confirmed by Pilate. He said, I find no fault in him. Of course, on Pilate's part, that was an understatement, wasn't it? As far as Pilate was concerned, he was only talking about the sentence that the Jews had handed down upon Jesus. But the truth is, Pilate could not find a fault in him with regard to that sentence. He could never find a fault in our Lord Jesus Christ. Yet as Christ was declared to be innocent, at the very same time He was condemned to death by sinful man He came to save. But our Lord Jesus Christ accomplished our redemption. Again, He was the only one worthy to do that because He satisfied all the demands of the law. He actively kept all of God's commands perfectly. Boys and girls, He never sinned. He never had one sinful thought. He never had one sinful word. He never had one sinful action. We're fortunate if we can go a couple of minutes, aren't we? Without something sinful. But Jesus Christ, during His whole life on earth, never had one sin in any form. And because of that, He alone was worthy to accomplish our redemption. And He did so by paying our penalty. He took our curse. He took our sin as if it was His own. And He sustained in body and soul the anger of God against the sin of the whole human race, as answer 37 says. And He shouldered the curse which lay on me since death by crucifixion was accursed by God, as answer 39 says. His crucifixion. Again, we talk a lot about the crucifixion around the time of Good Friday. We think about our Lord being nailed to the cross, before that being tortured, being beaten, being spit upon and as He hung on the cross having words hurled at Him. Oh, indeed, we think about His crucifixion, beloved. But we need to understand that His crucifixion is proof that He took my curse from me. Paul in the catechism referred to Deuteronomy 21, verse 23. The law required that those who were guilty of some capital offense that they be put to death, maybe by stoning. And then their bodies were hung on a tree for that day suspended between heaven and earth and this was a sign to all who looked on that the offender was cursed and rejected by God. Beloved, the cross of Jesus is a sign and proof to you and me as believers that Jesus Christ removed that curse from us and He took it upon Himself. It's proof that He died my death and the result the result of which the cross of Jesus is also proof is as answer 37 says this he did in order that by his suffering as the only atoning sacrifice he might set us free body and soul from eternal condemnation and gain for us God's grace righteousness and eternal life what a wonderful gain the result he bought us back from the condemnation of guilty that the law declared us to be. And now our God, as justified believers, declares us to be not guilty. He bought us back from the punishment of eternal death. That was our sentence. This redemption result, this redemption benefit, is eternal, once removed. Once removed, beloved, that curse cannot and never again will be upon us, never ever will be upon us again. Think about that. That's got to be comforting to you and me who are repeat offenders day after day after day, once removed. That curse cannot and will not ever be upon us again. This is our joy. And this is our comfort because not only is our redemption accomplished, but it's also applied to us. You see, the eternal benefit of Christ's suffering is also experienced in our redemption applied. We experience it. For real. And that's because it's a current reality. You see, our Lord doesn't wait for the end of our lives. He doesn't make us wait to the end of our lives to make this a reality for us. He doesn't make us wallow in hopelessness and uncertainty, wondering whether or not all of this is true. We enjoy the comfort and the assurance of our redemption accomplished already today, and that's because He applies it to us today through regeneration, new birth. 2 Corinthians 5, verse 17 says, If anyone is in Christ, he is. Not will be. Not can be. But he is a new creation. In Galatians 3, verse 11, the second part of verse 11, Paul says, the righteous will live by faith. They will live, even today, by faith. Again, the righteous are those whom Christ redeemed. Those justified, made right in and through Christ and not by the works of the law. And the instrument of application, the instrument by which that redemption is applied to you and me is faith. Faith is that instrument by which we receive all of Christ's benefits. And that faith, we know, includes knowledge. Knowledge of what God's Word says. God's Word says Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law. That's what the Word of God says. But true faith is more than knowledge, isn't it? It's also believing what God's Word says. Believing that it's true. That indeed Christ did do this. He redeemed. But true faith goes a little bit further. It also includes that very personal aspect of trust. Trusting in Christ. Trusting that it's true, not just for us, but for me too. He redeemed me from the curse of the law. Beloved, we experience the application of our redemption as by faith. We are brought to understand and know our sin and misery and guilt. We are reminded daily through our sin that we cannot achieve salvation by our own obedience. We're taught that when we forgive someone, we're supposed to forget about it. We don't bring it up again. Well, this doesn't seem fair then. Why should we be reminded day after day after day of our sin and our misery? Well, the fact is, we remind ourselves, don't we? we remind ourselves through our sin and misery, and beloved, we must consider that a blessing, lest we should begin to think that we can earn our own salvation, but we are reminded through our daily sin that we cannot achieve salvation by our own obedience. Yet at the very same time, by faith, we are reminded every day that our sin is covered in God's sight. It's remembered no more. It is removed as far as the east is from the west because Christ redeemed us. It is accomplished. It is finished. We also experience the application of our redemption as by faith we are brought to know the joy of Christ's redeeming work as God's gaze of wrath is removed from me. And that gaze has been put on Christ because of me. Boys and girls, you know that when your mom or dad is angry with you, if they're disappointed with you, you can see it on their face. You can see it in their eyes that they're disappointed, that they're angry with you. And you also know how comforting it is when that gaze of anger and disappointment is removed and replaced with that look of love. You know how comforting that is. And beloved, we experience by faith the reality that God's gaze of anger and offense against us has been removed and placed upon Christ. And again, at the very same time, we are brought to know that God's look of love and mercy and grace is now upon me as He sees me in Christ, as He sees me clothed in Christ's perfect righteousness. How do I know? Again, the cross of Jesus. The cross of Jesus, that symbol of God's curse against my sin, It means that it's removed from me and placed upon Christ. Beloved, we experience redemption applied to us as we are called as well to live by faith. As believers, we enjoy by faith the peace of God that passes all understanding, knowing that in the sight of a holy and majestic God, I am righteous. By faith, as believers, we enjoy having fellowship with God through Christ in prayer, that precious gift of prayer in which God allows you and me to come to Him as a congregation to be sure, but one-on-one. One-on-one communion with our Almighty God. And also we enjoy fellowship with Him in worship, corporately, as we come together to give our praise to Him and to hear Him speak to us. As believers, we enjoy by faith the knowledge and the assurance of God's abiding presence. He is always with us. He says, I will never leave you or forsake you. We enjoy His continual protection. He is our refuge and our strength, a mighty fortress. We enjoy His never-ending provision, beloved. Nothing shall separate us from His love. And by faith, we enjoy that we know that we have been transformed from slaves of sin to servants of righteousness, as Paul says in Romans chapter 6. Congregation, there is no gift so great as being redeemed from the curse of the law. there simply is no greater gift. Imagine if you were sure to be killed by a speeding car, you were sure to be hit and killed, and maybe you didn't even know it. But it was a certainty. And another pushed you out of the way and that other was hit and killed. You would have surely died, but they did in your place. They substituted themselves for you. Jesus substituted Himself. He took our place before God because of our sin. And as answer 38 says, so freed us from the severe judgment of God that was to fall on us. Well, again, beloved, we might be tempted to look at all this and say, well, so what? So what? What's the big deal? Well, boys and girls, what have your parents taught you to say when someone gives you a nice gift or does something nice for you? They teach you to say those two words, don't they? Thank you. And we are called to say thank you to God. The law has a new focus for you and me. The law is now a tool of giving thanks. It is to be used as a rule of gratitude. As those freed from the curse of the law, we are called to thank God by striving to obey God's law, trying to please Him out of love in response to His love for us. You see, Paul is not telling the Galatian Christians here that the law is absolutely meaningless. for them, that they have nothing to do with it anymore. Don't touch it because it's dangerous. That's not what Paul is saying. Instead, he says it has a new focus. As he says in Romans 12, verse 1 and 2, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God. This is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is, His good, pleasing, and perfect will. Beloved, Paul makes clear the distinction between slaves of sin and servants of righteousness. He says in Galatians 5, beginning in verse 19, the acts of the sinful nature are obvious. Sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery, idolatry and witchcraft, hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions, and envy. drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking, and envying each other. This morning we considered for our law, we consider Ephesians chapter 4 and 5 and a couple of verses from there. In chapter 4, we read verses 22 to 24. You were taught with regard to your former way of life to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires to be made new in the attitude of your minds and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. And chapter 5 begins, Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children, and live a life of love just as Christ loved us and gave Himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. Beloved, last week in Adult Sunday School, Dr. Godfrey said, Suffering is a sign of our need to repent. And that statement struck me. I spent a bit of time thinking about that this week. Suffering is a sign of our need to repent. And he was not saying, I trust, that our suffering is a direct result of our own personal sin. It might be. It could be. But you see, all suffering is the result or the effect of sin in the world. And therefore, our suffering too reminds us of that sin in the world. It reminds us of our own sin. It reminds us of our own need to repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. It reminds us that we need to be purchased, redeemed, reconciled. And you see, beloved, Christ's suffering answers that need for redemption and reconciliation with God, which is expressed in our suffering. And the suffering of Christ is a sign that those who repent of their sins and trust only in Him for salvation, whatever suffering they may endure in this life, that suffering is a prelude to glory. And therefore, brothers and sisters, we may suffer with joy, confident that the curse of sin is gone from us forever. And even in our daily life without suffering, because let's be honest, many of us do not suffer in any way at all. Even in our daily life without suffering as we strive to live obedient to God, we don't do it worrying if we have been good enough or whether we have done enough to get saved. To get right with God. We don't worry about that. Because Christ has taken care of that for us. Instead, we go about our daily life with its tasks, whatever those may be, desiring to honor and obey God in thankful response for our Lord's suffering for us. maybe you're here tonight and you struggle with the assurance of salvation. The assurance of pardon. You hear every Sunday morning, at least in this church from this pulpit, you hear the assurance of pardon for your sins, but yet you know how miserable you are. You know how often you continue to fail. And guess what? You're in the company of misery. Because each and every one surrounding you tonight is in that same boat, whether they will admit it or not. But the point is, you must stop looking at yourself and your obedience for assurance of being right with God. You'll never find it. In the same way, those who continue to think, well, my sin is too great. How could God ever forgive me? You do nothing more than strip God of His sovereignty. And either way, whether you're looking to your own righteousness for assurance or whether you're saying I'm too terrible for God to forgive you will always be a slave to despair you are called to look away from yourself to Jesus Christ apart from whom there is no hope but in him you have the assurance that all of your sin is covered in God's sight your sin past present and future and the curse is no more and therefore Therefore, with a grateful heart, beloved, you are called to strive to live in thankfulness to Him, thankful to God for His wisdom given to you to know good from evil. Beloved, live thankfully in the comfort of Christ's work for you. Misery loves company. That may be true in this life. But you see, beloved, our Lord Jesus Christ took on our misery. He took it upon Himself so that we would no longer be in the company of that misery, ever. Praise God for the suffering of Christ. What is the eternal benefit of His suffering? Our redemption has been accomplished and it is applied to us both now and forever. Amen. Shall we pray? dear heavenly father indeed lord we are amazed as we truly think about what it is we have deserved oh lord it's hard for us to comprehend the curse that was upon us it's hard for us to think past this life and what would have been our just punishment apart from Jesus Christ because of our sin and misery. We cannot even fathom that. And in so many ways, Lord, we thank You that we will never have to know what that would be all about. But we stand amazed, O Lord, that You took that upon Yourself. Our punishment. Our curse. That we might have life and have it abundantly. O Lord, may we never take this truth for granted that may this truth be in our hearts and in our minds each and every day of life as we go forward, that we know that we are no longer under the curse. And therefore, Father, may we desire to live in a way that is pleasing to You because we are so thankful, so thankful for the precious gift of salvation through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Father, we thank You again for Your many blessings to us. not the least of which is that precious gift of salvation. In Jesus' name alone we pray. Amen.