Put on The Lord Jesus Christ

Introduction: The Mandate to Put on Christ

0:02 The following message was delivered on October 18, 1981, at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey. This is the second in a series of five messages by Pastor Albert N. Martin on Romans 13, verse 14, entitled, Putting on Christ.

0:23 Surely there are few petitions more appropriate as we stand on the threshold of the ministry of the Word than that expressed in the last stanza. Come with unction and with power on our souls, thy graces shower. We are not asking God for just a trickle or a drizzle, but that God would shower the graces of illumination and power in the revelation of Christ. Let us seek with one heart to make this our prayer as we come to the preaching of the Word.

1:01 Let us pray. O Lord, we do confess. We do confess that the little we have known of your unction upon us as a congregation in the past, the little we have known of your graces coming upon us as a gentle shower, has indeed made us thirsty for a mighty deluge. And, O God, grant that upon preacher and listeners tonight may come a copious measure of the spirit of power.

1:38 Amen. Making the things of Christ and making them real and powerful to our hearts. O God, we thank you that your Word gives us grounds to believe you are not weary when we come and come and come and come again, for our need is so constant. We cry, come with unction and with power during this hour of ministry.

2:10 Amen. Now, would you turn with me, please, to the thirteenth chapter of Paul's letter to the Romans, Romans chapter thirteen, and follow in your Bibles as I read the concluding paragraph of that chapter, verses eleven through fourteen. Romans chapter thirteen, beginning with verse eleven.

2:42 And this, knowing the season, that already it is time for you to awake. Romans chapter thirteen, beginning with verse eleven. Verse eleven. For now is salvation nearer to us than when ye first believed, than we first believed.

2:58 The night is far spent, and the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light. Let us walk becomingly, as in the day, not in reveling and drunkenness, not in bedding around. and sexual impurity, not in strife and jealousy, but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh to fulfill the lusts thereof.

3:36 We return tonight to our examination of this text with which the paragraph closes, namely verse 14. Now, in our initial study which last Lord's Day evening I designated as an introductory study, I likened this text to a magnifying glass. And as a magnifying glass takes the more diffusive, gentle rays of the sun and bends them to a burning point, so this text takes the rays of truth found scattered throughout many portions of the Bible. reference to living the Christian life and brings them into a very burning focal point in this very graphic language and imagery of putting on the Lord Jesus Christ and making no provision for the flesh. Now, I was very conscious last Lord's Day that because of the long weekend, a number of you were absent, and because I see some of you at least here tonight, I will review a bit more extensively than would be appropriate and necessary as we work our way through an introductory acquaintance with this text last Lord's Day.

Review of the Context and Structure of Romans 13:14

5:00 So follow with me as in the next five minutes I try to reduce an hour's exposition. We considered first of all the recipients of this word of direction. They are addressed in chapter 1, verses 6 and 7 as the beloved of God, the called ones, God's saints who lived in Rome. And so this word comes not to sinners directing them to put on Christ in conversion, though that is a biblical truth, Galatians 3.27, but rather it is a putting on of Christ which has reference to a people who are already called into a state of grace. Who are set apart unto God and who are seeking to live in that seat of pagan religion and pagan licentiousness, the city of Rome. Then we considered the general setting of the text that it comes in a section that is marked by its density of practical exhortation and direction for the people of God. And in the paragraph that I read in your hearing, there is a climactic...

6:11 statement of the directives of chapters 12 and 13. Then we considered the immediate context which had great practical and pastoral relevance for us as a congregation. The immediate context is one in which the people of God are called to live out their Christian lives in the church and in the world. In the light of God's law epitomized by the mandate of love, they are called to live out such a life with an eye to the consummation of their redemption. The apostle reminds them that the final day of salvation is nearer than when they first believed. They are therefore to walk in a manner that befits the sons of the day. They are cast to cast off the works of darkness and of the night. They are called to live out such a life with an eye to the consummation of their And then he singles out three categories of sins that in a very peculiar way characterize the nightlife of sin. He picks out the category of excesses of food and drink, not in feasting and

7:23 in drunkenness. Then he singles out excesses of sexual activity, not in bedding around and licentiousness. He picks out the category of excesses of food and drink, not in feasting and licentiousness. Then he singles out the category of excesses of food and drink, not in bedding around and licentiousness. He picks out the category of excesses of food and drink, not in bedding around other forms of sexual lust and deviation. And then the third category, those sins of the heart in interpersonal relationships, not in quarreling and in jealousy. And it is in the context of underscoring the fact that Christians can be overcome and fall into any one or all of these sins, these aggravated expressions of pagan law, and they are called to live out such a life with morality that our text comes with unusual force and power. Having directed the people of God to a

8:12 lifestyle not characterized by these categories of sin, the great means to fulfilling that directive is to put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make not provision for the flesh. Now let me underscore again what I asserted last week. Though the Bible makes a bunch of things that are not abundantly plain, that no one can lay claim to being a Christian who lives in any one of these sinful lifestyles, the Bible makes equally plain that any Christian can fall into one or all of these categories of sin. And so the mandate is not a luxury, it is a necessity, particularly for the beloved called saints who live in Rome. And we certainly live in the Rome of the people of God. And we certainly live in the Rome of the people of God. And we certainly live in the paganism and the sensuality of our own society and in this particular part of the country and how desperately we need this directive. And then we concluded our study by considering the obvious

9:18 structure of the text. There are two imperatives, one a positive, put on the Lord Jesus Christ, one a negative, do not make provision for the flesh. And as we looked at that structure, we noted that the Bible makes a lot of sense. And so we concluded our study by considering the distinctiveness of each of these imperatives. One is not the other. One does not swallow up the other. They are two distinct gospel duties. We looked at the order, and there is significance to the order. Putting on Christ must precede in the psychology of the Christian life this non-provision for the flesh. And then we noted in closing the inseparability of the two things. And we will make

10:03 little, if any, progress against those aggravated expressions of remaining corruption living in a sinful society unless we learn how to join in our experience what God has joined in His Word, putting on the Lord Jesus Christ and making no provision for the flesh. Well then, we come now tonight to look at the positive word of direction, that which I am entitling the divine mandate to put on the Lord Jesus Christ. The divine mandate to put on the Lord Jesus Christ. And I am going to attempt to open up this mandate tonight. And when I say attempt, I am not speaking out of false humility, but I speak out of the sense of frustration that has come in living with this text for several weeks. The imagery is bold to the point of almost appearing irreverent and blasphemous.

Meaning of the Words: 'Put On'

11:15 The imagery is so bold. The duty is so sweeping. The privileges and the responsibilities involved so all-encompassing that as one preacher has said, all I can hope to do is to preach around the text, hoping that somehow, God will enable us to grasp something of its power and its magnitude. And as I make the attempt, I shall do so along the following lines. First of all, direct your attention, I will direct your attention to the meaning of the words of the mandate. And then secondly, I will try to give you a working description of the mandate. And then thirdly, some essential means to the fulfilling of the mandate. First of all, then, the meaning of the words of the mandate. And then secondly,

12:03 the meaning of this mandate to put on the Lord Jesus Christ. The words are obviously divided into two categories. The action commanded, and then the object of that action. Now, the action that is commanded is bound up in the verb, in the imperative, to put on. And the word which the apostle uses by the direction and inspiration of the Spirit is the common word in the New Testament for putting on. And the word which the apostle uses by the direction and inspiration of the Spirit is the common word for what we would call getting dressed or to be dressed. It's the word used in Mark chapter 1 and verse 6 with reference to John the Baptist. And you children remember, the thing that was distinctive about John the Baptist, among other things, was his funny clothing. John was clothed

12:53 with camel's hair and had a leather girdle about his loins and did eat locusts and wild honey. The word, John the Baptist, is the word which the apostle uses by the direction and inspiration of the The word, John the Baptist, is the word which the apostle uses by the direction and inspiration of the John was clothed. That's the word. John was dressed in camel's hair with a leather girdle or wide belt about his loins.

13:17 It's the word used of our Lord in Mark 15, 17. They dressed him in purple. And in the Greek translation of the Old Testament, it's that word in the familiar incident recorded in Genesis 3 and verse 21, that God made him made clothing of animal skins and he clothed Adam and Eve. Same word is found there.

13:40 So, it is the common word in the language in which Paul wrote to describe the act of getting dressed. Now, our English usage of the word can be used figuratively. We speak of someone who was clothed with modesty or a child that came home caught doing something he shouldn't. And we say, he came home clothed.

14:03 with shame. Well, the same way it's used in the Bible. It means not only, or is used not only to describe the literal actual putting on of garments, but in the figurative sense of putting on certain characteristics, putting on certain attitudes. And so in Colossians 3 and verse 12, the apostle admonishes the people of God as the beloved of God to put on, therefore, as God's elect, holy and beloved, a heart of compassion, kindness, lowliness, meekness, long-suffering.

14:40 Here these graces, so essential to peace and harmony in the interaction of the people of God, are likened to a beautiful garment, or to a set, a whole wardrobe of garments, which the people of God are to put on, so that when they appear in each other's presence, they are clothed with the graces of kindness. Now, in this particular verse, Paul uses a form of the verb which directs the action towards the person himself, and so we could render it, put on for yourself. Now that's the action commanding. It is an activity likened unto dressing oneself. Now then, notice, the object of that action or that activity.

Meaning of the Words: 'The Lord Jesus Christ'

15:35 But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ. The object of this action commanded is nothing less than the Lord Jesus Christ himself, who is by the believer to be put on in his warfare against sin. Now, whatever you find our Lord's full title given to him, there is significance in that. He is often referred to as the Lord Jesus or our Lord, or as he is often referred to in the epistle we are studying Lord's day morning, as Christ. But here we have His full-blown designation. We are to put on the Lord Jesus Christ. And though it would be difficult to to prove that in every instance that has the significance that it does in this context, it is often a pointer to us to stop and to reflect upon all that is bound up in that combination which constitutes the full designation of our Savior.

16:53 We are to put on that one who is called the Lord. And this title, the Lord, points on the one hand to the dignity of his person as nothing less than God. The Jehovahism of Jesus is bound up primarily in the use of the title Lord. For again and again, Old Testament prophecies which spoke of Jehovah are picked up and directly said to be fulfilled in him.

17:30 Who is the Lord? And so we are called upon to put on him who is nothing less than God. God by virtue of this designation as Lord. Pointing on the one hand to the dignity of his person as God, but then on the other hand to the exaltedness of his position as supreme ruler and king.

17:57 In this sense he was made Lord. Acts 2.36, God has made him Lord and Christ. As to his deity he ever was Lord.

18:09 Unto you is born a Savior who is Christ the Lord.

18:17 Now with respect to his position in the outworking of redemptive purpose, he is constituted Lord in a unique sense after his resurrection and ascension. And so Peter can say, God has made him Lord. Or in the language of Ephesians 1, God has exalted him to his right hand and put everything under his feet. Now I say this is no little part of the great mystery and the majesty of our text.

18:51 And why one feels he can only preach around it and not penetrate the heart of it. How do creatures put on the Creator? How do dependent worms put on the majestic Lord of glory? How does man put on God?

19:16 How does the servant put on the sovereign?

19:21 And yet the text says, Put on the Lord Jesus Christ. We are to do something with respect to our Lord that bears some analogy to dressing ourselves, and we are to do it with reference to him, self-consciously reminding ourselves of who he is. He is the Lord. But then, bless God, he is Jesus.

19:49 Wonderful name given to him at the incarnation. You remember the incident recorded in Matthew chapter 1. When the angel comes to a troubled Joseph and says, Joseph, do not fear to take unto you Mary, your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost, and she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus. For he it is that shall save his people from their sins.

20:18 And again, there is a two-fold emphasis in the name Jesus. On the one hand, it points to the glory of his person as true man, as the incarnate Jehovah. And throughout the Gospel records, again and again, the Gospel writers speak about, about Jesus. This is the name that predominates in the Gospel.

20:41 It underscores the reality of his humanity. Emmanuel, God with us. Jesus, which as to his person points to his true humanity, and yet at the same time it points to the glory of his mission as our Savior. He is our Joshua, our great deliverer.

21:05 Jehovah is our Savior. Our salvation, Jehovah Jesus, is our great deliverer. Now do you see the mystery deepening? We are called upon then to put on him who is not only the Lord, but we are to put on him who is the deliverer, the one who came on a mission of deliverance, the one who came to deliver his people from their sins, and yet his people are called, and yet they are called upon to put him on.

21:39 They are to put on the Lord Jesus. They are to put on the Lord Jesus Christ. The name which identifies him, or I should say the title which identifies him as God's anointed one, the long-promised Messiah. And here we have an indicator of the glory of his divine equipment for his task.

22:08 He is Lord and he is Jesus as the anointed one, the one upon whom the Father poured the Spirit and to whom the Spirit was given without measure. And in the majesty and power of his Messiahship, he is God's final prophet to teach us, priest to forgive and intercede for us, and king to rule over us and defend us. And all...

22:36 All of that, and that's in summary form, is bound up in the object of this action commanded. We are to put on the Lord Jesus Christ. Hence the object of the activity of this spiritual dressing and clothing ourselves is none other than Christ himself in the plenitude of that which God has revealed about his person, and about his work. And you see, this imagery is perhaps the boldest in the entire teaching of the Bible on this analogy pressed into service to give instruction concerning the Christian life. In this very context, Paul said in Romans 13, 12, put on, same verb in the original, put on the armor of light. In Ephesians 6, 11, he says, put on the whole armor. God, in 1 Thessalonians 5, 8, he says, putting on the breastplate of faith.

Summary of the Mandate's Meaning

23:44 But here, the admonition goes beyond any of these individual things and includes all of them and much more. And we are commanded to put on the Lord Jesus Christ himself. So what do we say in summary with respect to the meaning of the words of this mandate? Well, we are warranted in saying that in our agonizing battle with sin, and in particular, with those aggravated manifestations of remaining corruption, our responsibility is both clear and striking.

24:27 We must self-consciously take to ourselves the Lord Jesus Christ as our dress and our armor, and little or no, no progress will be made in the life of holiness unless this becomes our constant practice. Now, in seeking to penetrate the mind of God in this text, I have not only spent many hours reflecting upon it, but I have read almost every commentary within my grasp on the text. I have talked with Professor Darlington about the basic significance of the text, and yet everything that I read left me unsatisfied that any of the commentators was really coming up to the measure of the strikingness of this imagery until I found one of my volumes that I hadn't dusted off for a long time. And I found that old Bishop Moole was willing to let the text speak in all of its stark realism, and its almost, as I intimated earlier, its almost blasphemous, analogy. As it were at our feet is laid the Lord Jesus Christ in all that He is, in all that He has done,

25:55 in His indissoluble union with us in it all, as we are one with Him by the Holy Spirit. It is for us to see in Him our power and victory and to put Him on in a personal act, which, while all by grace, is yet in itself our own. And how is this done? It is by the committal of the keeping of our souls unto Him, 1 Peter 4, 19, not vaguely, but definitely and with purpose, in view of each and every temptation.

26:30 It is by living our life in the flesh, by faith in the Son of God, that is to say, in effect, by perpetually making use of the crucified and living Saviour, one with us by the Holy Spirit, by using Him as our living Deliverer, our peace and power, amidst all that the dark host of evil can do against us. And it was that striking statement that seems to me caught something of the striking impact of the imagery. It is as it is. It is as it is.

27:10 The Lord Jesus laid at our feet in all He is and all He has done to be put on in our conflict with sin.

Working Description: How to Put on Christ Practically

27:25 Well, I have attempted to be honest with the words of the text. Now, let me seek to lay before you a working description of this mandate. As I was going over this material in brief on the way to church, the first question, my practically-minded wife asked is, well, that's what the words mean, but how do you do it? And I said, well, I hope to give a working description of the mandate.

27:53 The mandate is to put on the object of that which we are to put on is the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, putting that in the concrete, what does that mean? Well, let me suggest that if we will remember the point at which this mandate comes in the Roman letter, we perhaps have the key to what it means in a practical way to put on the Lord Jesus Christ. For you will remember if you're acquainted with this letter at all, that the opening chapters all the way through chapter 11 are an unfolding of the gracious, saving acts of God with respect to needy sinners among Jews and Gentiles, and in the light of all that has been unfolded concerning the mercies of God in Christ to sinful men, now the apostle says, put on this Lord Jesus Christ and make not provision for the flesh. Well, what does that mean then in the light of the contents of the Roman letter? Well, let me just suggest, and I'm only suggesting at least three or four lines, first of all, it means a remembering and an appropriating, a taking to oneself the privileges

29:21 of our acceptance in Him. In the great conflict with sin, even sins of gluttony and drunkenness, sins of bedding around in other forms of sexual deviation, sins that claw at the souls and passions of sin, and hang, as it were, to the hull like barnacles from their past life. In dealing with the sins of jealousy and dissension, we must put on the Lord Jesus Christ if we are to make progress in warring against those sins. But how do we do it?

30:02 I suggest it does involve at the very elementary level constantly remembering and appropriating the privileges of our acceptance in Him. For you remember that in this letter Paul has expounded the great doctrine of justification by faith. He has instructed us that there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. Being justified by faith, we have peace with God.

30:33 Well, what does that have to do with those who are wrestling with gluttony and excesses of physical appetites, with sexual sins, with sins of the heart and mind, jealousy and bitterness, and a piety spirit? What does the remembrance of what we are in a justified state in Christ, what does that have to do with the warfare? It has everything to do with that. Because one of the most difficult things for a Christian in the midst of conflict with any sin, but with aggravated sins of this nature in particular, is the discouragement and the cripplingness and the power of discouragement that comes when we fall into any one of those sins.

31:18 And having fallen, we say, what's the use? How can I be a Christian? And we go to doubting our justification and when we do, our joy is gone. And when our joy is gone, the nerve of desire to pick up again and go to the throne of grace and find fatherly forgiveness, the nerve of all of that is cut and we become paralyzed and discouraged.

31:42 And often discouragement becomes the mother of further sin.

31:47 And that's why in our battle with the sin, we must put on the Lord Jesus Christ, constantly remember and appropriate the privileges of our acceptance in Him. You must start there, child of God. And some of you have made so little progress because though this principle is preached, and thundered out, and amplified, and pressed home, you have yet to lay hold of it. And you must.

32:21 You must. Or you will make little progress in your Christian experience. But then surely putting on the Lord Jesus Christ must also involve remembering and appropriating the implications of our union with Him in death and resurrection. The whole teaching of Romans 6, He says, Don't you know that as many of us as have been baptized into Christ were baptized into His death, we were buried therefore with Him into death?

32:54 That like as Christ was raised up from the dead, even so should we walk in newness of life. Then He goes on in verse 11 to say, Reckon, count it to be a fact that you have been crucified with Him. You have died with Him. You have emerged to newness of life.

33:12 Verse 13, In the light of it, present yourselves unto God and your members as instruments of righteousness unto Him. What is He telling us to do? He's saying remember, and appropriate, and live and act in the light of that which derives from your union with Christ. When He died, you died with Him.

33:33 When He was buried, you were buried with Him. When He was raised from the dead, you too were raised with Him. Put on the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember, Christian, and appropriate the implications of your union with Christ in death and resurrection.

33:51 Sin is a usurper. And when it comes strutting, as it were, in the form of some passion or lust or temptation, and barks orders to your members, says to an empty stomach, or not to empty stomach, fill me and gorge me. Master, does Christian say no? I die to your mercy.

34:17 I die to your mastery. I am a new woman over my belly. That's Romans 6, 11 and 13. Reckon it to be so, because it is.

34:37 Sin shall not exercise lordship over you, for you're not under the law. In an unblessed, condemned state, separate from Christ, you're under the reign of grace. And when sinful sexual passions appeal, you're tempted, in the language of this text, and I'm just giving a colloquial expression of the Greek word, to bed around and to indulge in licentiousness of any kind of thought or action. And the appeal is so powerful as past associations of past temporal pleasures from indulgence in sins of that kind make the pull so strong, and lust in that area stands before you as it were as a master, demanding the presentation of the members of your body. Face him in the name of the Lord Jesus and tell him who your true master is. Remember and appropriate the implications of your union with Christ in death and resurrection. That's putting on the Lord Jesus Christ.

35:50 That's taking him to yourself as your clothing and your armor. And then surely it must involve in the third place remembering and responding to the implications of our submission to him. In Romans 6 we are described as the servants of God. Paul will go on in chapter 14 of this epistle to describe the Lord Jesus as the one who died and rose again, that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living.

36:20 And when he's arguing, developing his argument as to why Christians should not judge one another, he says when you judge a brother, you become his Lord and you're not his Lord. Jesus died to be his Lord. Well, what does it mean to put on the Lord Jesus Christ? It means in the situation of temptation and sin and prior to it, self-consciously to remember and to respond appropriately to that fact.

36:47 I'm not my own. I've been bought with a price. I am my master's. All that I am is his.

36:55 My feelings are not mine to run out in jealousy and bitterness, the sins he talked about at the end of verse 13. My feelings are not mine to indulge in such sins. My sexual organs are not my own to indulge in petting around. My eyes are not my own to be the inlet of mental adultery.

37:22 My stomach is not my own to gorge with food. My stomach is not my own to fill with drink to excess. Put on the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember and respond accordingly in the light of your submission to him as your Lord, in the concrete realities of what his Lordship means.

37:48 And then fourthly, it must involve at least this remembering and appropriating of his present activities in us by the Spirit. In Romans 8, 9 and 10, there is that wonderful conjunction of the work of the Spirit, the work of Christ and Christ himself. Look at the language. Romans 8, 9 and 10.

38:12 You are not in the flesh but in the Spirit. If so be that the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, the Spirit of God dwells in you. If any man have not the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.

38:30 And if Christ is in you, you see the progression, Spirit of God, Spirit of Christ, Christ himself. Christ is in me by the Spirit. The Spirit of God given to me in regeneration. The Spirit of God self-consciously appropriated as the crowning gift of adoption.

38:56 That Holy Spirit who dwells in me is the bond of my very union with Christ. Put on the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember and appropriate the reality of that relationship. My body is a temple of the Holy Ghost.

39:14 And in a way I cannot fathom but is clearly revealed. Christ dwells in me by the Spirit. And to put him on is to give myself up to the implications of that. That's the whole argument of 1 Corinthians 6.

39:31 And 2 Corinthians 6. What fellowship hath the temple of God with idols? Shall I take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? He says because I'm indwelled by the Spirit.

39:44 The Spirit is the bond of my union with Christ. The Spirit is the Spirit of Christ. And he says you Corinthians, when you consort with a harlot, you take Christ into your fornication. That's the bold language.

39:58 That's the language of 1 Corinthians 6. What is putting on the Lord Jesus Christ but saying when I am tented to the sins particularly articulated in this passage, no, I cannot, I dare not. I am united to Christ. I am indwelled by Christ.

40:18 I shall not make my Lord a party to such actions. Put on the Lord Jesus Christ. I have looked at the meaning of the words. I've tried to at least suggest what the direction of the answer to the question is.

Essential Means: Consistent Prayerful Attendance on Public Means of Grace

40:40 How do we do that in a practical way? And I am fully conscious that the suggestions are not exhaustive, but I hope they point the way. But now, let me conclude tonight by underscoring some essential means to the fulfillment of this mandate. Ascertain the meaning of the words of the mandate.

41:05 If we have grasped something of this working description of the mandate, now then our great concern should be how can I actually put this mandate into practice? What are the essential means to the fulfillment of the mandate? And the first is this. There must be a consistent prayerful attendance upon the public means of grace.

41:35 A consistent prayerful attendance upon the public means of grace. Now why do I say that? For this simple reason. God has ordained that in the activities that we commonly call the public means of grace, and I'll describe some of them shortly, that in those means, by the Spirit, Christ himself should be set before us.

42:07 The public means of grace, such as gathering for worship, is the means, the gathering for worship is one of the means by which the truths about Christ are expounded. The truths about our relationship to him are expounded. In psalms and hymns we celebrate who Christ is, what Christ has done, how we are related to him, how he is related to us. When we come to his table, we vividly remember who he is and what he's done.

42:44 Now you see, these are institutions of God calculated to set Christ, who is the bread of life, before his people, that they might feed upon him. To use the imagery of our text, the public means of grace are God's showcase to display the glory of Christ as the dress of his people. And if we are to put him on, we must see him. If we are to see him, we must be where God has appointed to display him.

43:21 And you can't be wiser than God and appoint your own place to display him. Where two or three there am I. That doesn't mean when two or three people who can't get along with anyone else get together and say, Lord promised it now. No, no.

43:47 You read the context. That's talking about a small church, but a church operating by the order of Scripture with proper discipline, with proper government. That's the whole context in Matthew 18. He who despises the public means of grace despises Christ, who is displayed in those means.

44:10 And the reason some of you are not making as much progress in dealing with some of these very sins is your cavalier treatment of the public means of grace. One of the marks of our age is self-indulgence, love of ease, and covenant breaking. Self-indulgence, love of ease, and covenant breaking. When you became a member of this assembly, you covenanted to be faithful to the public stated means of grace unless providentially hindered.

44:46 And some of you have broken that covenant in a cavalier, light-handed way times without number. And God is letting your soul wither because of your sin. A little ache, a little pain, a little distraction, and you're all too willing to seize upon it and find an excuse not to be present. Sunday morning, Sunday night, midweek.

45:08 Ah, you say you're just trying to whip up the troops so things look good. My friend, don't you think evil thoughts like that. I'm concerned for your soul, not concerned for my reputation. In terms of how many people come to hear me preach, I could care less.

45:27 But I am concerned that you put on Christ. That you be in your life that which God intends you to be. A monument of the power of Christ to make saints into true saints even in the midst of this Rome in which God has placed us. But then the second essential means, of course, you've already anticipated that there must not only be a consistent prayerful attendance upon the public means of grace, but there must be a disciplined engagement in the private means of grace.

Essential Means: Disciplined Engagement in Private Means of Grace

46:06 A disciplined engagement in the private means of grace. You see, it is in meditation upon the word of Christ that Christ himself comes to his people. It is in the engagement of secret prayer that Christ draws near. It is as we pray and give vent to the struggles of our souls that the Lord himself visits us with his presence and power.

46:35 We are enabled to say with day that I have set the Lord always before me. Dear people of God, don't look for some new exotic key to progress in the Christian life. There is none. It's the old path of some measure of disciplined engagement in the private means of grace.

46:59 And surely from this pulpit we do not rub the consciences of the people of God raw. Particularly we think of the young mothers with a schedule that is so unstructured in many ways because you can't structure little kids' teething and belly aches and sicknesses and earaches and all of the rest. And we do not say unless you've had a half an hour quiet time every day, you're unspiritual. That's never said from this pulpit.

47:27 But if too many days go and there are not even five minutes seized by the forelock to be alone, something's wrong. The most pressured, distraught, busy mother who can't find five minutes several times every other day to be alone and to reflect, something's wrong. Something's drastically wrong. You may have to have your times of quietness as my dear mother did with her brood of ten with her iron in her hand late at night when we were all tucked in bed.

48:11 And that's when she had her best times of intercession. But her ironing board was her altar and she longed to get to her place of communion with God. So you see we're not imposing a non-biblical legalism upon us. God forbid that we should ever do so.

48:27 But you let your conscience answer honestly in the presence of God. Is there any disciplined engagement in the private means of grace? If not, you wonder why some of you make no progress struggling with the problem of excessive appetite. You just know your conscience screams at you, something must be done and yet you pick, pick, pick and you add a pound, pound, pound.

48:53 And you feel so helpless and so defeated and guilty and you rationalize and it doesn't work and you make... Here's the problem with some of you.

49:03 You're not putting on the Lord Jesus Christ. And why aren't you? He's so distant to you because you've neglected perhaps not so much the public means of grace but the private means of grace. And then the third means is this.

Essential Means: Growing Understanding of Christ and Our Identity in Him

49:18 There must be a growing understanding of who Christ is and what is ours in Him. There must be a growing understanding of who Christ is and what is ours in Him. It's interesting, isn't it, that this mandate didn't come in chapter 2 of Romans or chapter 4 or chapter 7. It came in chapter 13.

49:40 He first of all laid out, as it were, a large showcase of who Christ is and what He's done. Then He says, put Him on and put on all of it. And if you want to know what I mean, go back and read the whole letter. Now who was He writing to?

49:59 To a bunch of professors. Slaves. Ordinary people. Artisans.

50:05 Common people. For God has generally chosen His elect from what Fox called that five-ranked army of descending human weakness. 1 Corinthians. Not many mighty, not many noble.

50:19 God has chosen the foolish, the weak, the things that are not. God's five-ranked army of descending human weakness. Pride amidst the church of Christ is the most incongruous thing in all the world. You're in the midst of a bunch of nobodies as a nobody.

50:36 Not many mighty, not many noble are called. That's why this artificial sophistication of the middle class is such a stench in God's nostrils. Or the upper class, or the upper upper, wherever it's found. My friend, if you have a little more of this world's goods or a little more of this world's learning or a little more of this world's standing, you ought to be the most humble of all people because God broke His general rules to get you in.

51:08 God has chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith. Not many mighty, not many noble. That's Bible. And I didn't put it there.

51:21 So instead of struggling, you ought to be of all people the most humble. Oh God, why when you bypassed most of the upper crust did you lay hand upon me? When you bypass most of those who've got more than 135 IQ, you may know that you've got 145 or 150. You say, Lord, why did you break your normal rules with the likes of me?

51:49 It ought to humble you. It ought to. You of all people ought to be marked by humility. Well, you see, I got a little sidetracked there, but I'll come back.

52:03 I haven't forgotten where I am. There must be a growing understanding of who Christ is and what we are in Him. And what He is and what we are in Him is open to the ordinary believer. That's how I got sidetracked.

52:15 So I'm back on track. And so, you see, the church that gets restive under doctrinal preaching is cutting the nerve of its own progress and grace. For what is doctrinal preaching but a setting forth of ever-increasing dimensions of who Christ is and what He's done and what we are in Him? That's doctrinal preaching.

Essential Means: Appreciation of Conscious Endeavor in the Christian Life

52:41 And if we're to put on the Lord Jesus Christ, we must know Him as He's revealed in the glory of His person and in the magnitude and wonder of His relationship to His people. We're to grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior. And then, fourthly, there must be, there must be a growing appreciation of the legitimate sphere of conscious information in the Christian life. There must be a growing appreciation of the legitimate sphere of conscious endeavor in the Christian life.

53:24 Now, I tried to reduce that to a shorter statement, but I couldn't. You see, the text does not say, and if the ordinary writers on the so-called higher life were writing the text, this is the way they would have written it. Let the Lord Jesus Christ clothe Himself with you. You see, the higher life teaching is that we become passive and so yield ourselves up that Christ clothes Himself with our humanity and lives His life through us.

53:58 Now, that's not a caricature. That's a distillation of classic higher life teaching. But you see, the text does not say, let the Lord Jesus clothe Himself with you. It says you clothe yourself with Him.

54:12 Now, if ever there was a text where you'd find a heavy emphasis upon the part of Christ in our sanctification, it's one in which He is described as our dress, right? But in that very text, we're told to do something. It's an imperative. You put Him on.

54:33 It doesn't say let God put Him on for you or let God or let Christ put you on Him. It says you put on the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, I trust it will ever be true that this assembly of God's people will take second place to no assembly in asserting not with pride but with joy and wonder that salvation is all of God and all of grace from beginning to end. That if we're His, we're His because He loved us in eternity, marked us out, gave us to the land before the world's had any existence.

55:12 That when our Savior died, He died to redeem us. And when the Spirit came and quickened us, He did it on purpose. And having begun a good work, He's going to complete it. We're not embarrassed to confess our faith in those precious truths.

55:29 But there is nothing in the Bible that teaches those truths that teaches that in the outworking of the Christian life we are to be passive. And we must come to a growing appreciation that if we're to make progress in grace, we must be stirred up to every activity to which God directs us. And this text tells you and me to do something. Put on the Lord Jesus Christ.

55:53 You must do it. And though the desire and the ability is all of God, then that's the mystery. We still must do it. And you say, I can't make sense out of that.

56:07 Don't try. Just do it. And in the doing, though the mystery will not be resolved, you'll know the blessedness of obedience. Well, I've preached a round text.

Exhortation to Put on Christ and Augustine's Example

56:21 And I hope God, by the Holy Ghost, has shed a little light on it. And that this week, we'll meditate upon it. Pray it in. Ask God to help us as His people in our struggle with sin to put on the Lord Jesus Christ.

56:38 Don't wait until you're in a situation of specific temptation. No, no. Put Him on. Decisively, radically, continually, put Him on.

56:47 Seek by the grace of God to bring to remembrance who He is. Seek to bring to remembrance what it is to be accepted in Him. In all the struggle, with all of its defeats and its triumphs, to remember that there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ. Put Him on as your righteousness.

57:11 Put Him on as the one in whom you died and rose again to newness of life. The mastery of sin has been broken. Put Him on as your Lord and sovereign, the possessor of all that you are, purchased at the price of His own precious blood. Put Him on as the one who dwells in you by the Spirit, the Spirit being the very bond of your union to Him.

57:35 Put Him on in all of those ways and then give yourself to every means appointed of God to help you in that task. Consistent prayerful attendance upon the public and private means of grace, growth in understanding of the truths about Him and our relationship to Him. And then a growing appreciation that we must work in the outworking of God's gracious dealings with us. And if you are here as one who is not in Christ, then there is a sense in which you must put Him on.

58:15 Not the sense of this text, but the sense of Galatians chapter 3. As many of us as were baptized into Christ did put on Christ. And that's the putting on of Christ in conversion. And some of you are familiar with the incident from the life of Augustine.

58:34 And I'll close by just reading this incident in what to me was a refreshing translation or account of it. Augustine was a man who lived back many, many years ago. And he was bound by his sins. Sins particularly of lust.

58:53 And he had his paramour from whom he could not withdraw himself. And yet he knew he had to if he was to be a Christian. And Augustine in his Confessions wrote the following. I flung myself down how I know not under a certain fig tree, giving free course to my tears.

59:14 And the streams of my eyes gushed out an acceptable sacrifice to Thee. I sent up those sorrowful cries. How long? How long?

59:25 Tomorrow and tomorrow? Why not now? Why is there not this hour an end to my uncleanness? I was saying these things and weeping in the most bitter contrition of my heart when, lo, I heard the voice as of a boy or girl, I know not which, coming from a neighbouring house, chanting and oft repeating, Tole lege.

59:49 Tole lege. Take up and read. Take up and read. Take up and read.

59:55 Take up and read. Take up and read. Maybe the kids were playing school and one of them was playing the teacher and was saying to the little pupils, Take up your books and read. Take up and read.

60:02 Take up and read. And the sound of this reached the ears of Augustine. In his conviction, in his dejection, in his sense of brokenness, immediately, Augustine says, my countenance was changed and I began most earnestly to consider whether it was usual for children in any kind of game to sing such words. Nor could I remember ever ever to have heard the light, so restraining the torrent of my tears, I rose up, interpreting it no other way than as a command to me from heaven to open the book and to read the first chapter I should light upon. I grasped, opened the volume of the apostles, and in silence read that paragraph on which my eyes first fell. Not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying, but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh to fulfill the lust thereof. No further would I read, nor did I need, for instantly as the sentence ended, by a light, as it were, of security infused into my heart, all the gloom of doubt vanished away, and Augustine was dead.

61:23 As a new man, he put on Christ, and the chains that bound him to his sin were broken. O dear sinner, there is a putting on of Christ that is for you. It is a putting him on as your righteousness, as your hope of acceptance, as your great deliverer, and you put him on by taking him as he is offered in the gospel. Let us pray.

Closing Prayer

62:00 We confess in your presence that there are times when we are staggered and brought to a shrunken state before things that are too high, too lofty, too expansive, too glorious for us to consider at any great length. As we have sought to contemplate your words through the apostle, to put on the Lord Jesus, we confess our amazement. That you would command us in language that shocks us, that you would set your Son before us as our all-sufficient dress and armor, and give to us, little worms of the dust, the privilege of clothing ourselves with him. O may we not despise so glorious a privilege, nor be indifferent to so vital a commandment. Teach us as your people in this constant warfare with sin, how to put on our blessed Lord Jesus Christ. O may we learn how to do it, our Father, and then continue to teach us as we further meditate upon

63:21 this text, as we move on to consider what it is to make no provision for the flesh to fulfill its lusts. Lord, help us. O help us. Teach us of your ways. And for those who are still in the rags of their native Adamic filth, who have never repented and fled to Christ, O may they, like Augustine, put on the Lord Jesus and find the shackles that bind them to sin broken. And may they come to the knowledge of the forgiveness of their sins in him. Amen. We thank you for this day. We thank you for your appointment to meet with us, your people, in the

64:08 gathering of the saints. We worship you. We praise you. We ask that as we face the coming week, in all the multiplicity of its demands, in all the variety of its temptations, O God, bring to remembrance the word preached, that we may feed upon our Savior, that we may feed upon our Savior, that we may clothe ourselves with him. And may significant progress in grace be made by all of your people, because you have met with us today. We ask these mercies with thankfulness through our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.