Revelation, or God’s Truth Unveiled

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[Prayer] Father, we are grateful to Thee again that we have the opportunity to study the Scriptures. We pray that Thou will give us direction and guidance, and enable us to grasp the basic doctrines that we need to know in order to have a clearer comprehension of the faith that we are called to represent. Enable us Lord to be the kind of testimony to the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and to the message of salvation that would make us pleasing instruments in Thy hands. We commit the hour to Thee. We ask Thy blessing upon it and upon those that follow in the institute. For Jesus’ sake. Amen.

[Message] Now, last week in the beginning of the series the subject was “How Do We Know That We Know?,” and in the light of the fact that I did not quite finish that hour, I wanted to take just a minute or so and conclude what we were talking about. You may remember that we began by discussing the Faith Presuppositions, the question of Faith Presuppositions and Knowledge. We said a few words about the Nature First Principles, and then the Range of Presuppositional Axioms, only having time to touch, of course, upon the Presuppositions of Reason, such as Empiricism, Tradition, and Irrationalism. We mentioned only those. And then we discussed the Presupposition of Revelation. We tried to point out that scientists, in fact all men, have presuppositions. And that the Christian should not be ashamed of presuppositions. We cannot think or talk without presuppositions.

We discussed, specifically, the Christian Faith Presuppositions which grow out of the fundamental one that the Bible is the word of God. That is our presupposition. But that involves certain particulars which are simply expansions of the Bible is the word of God. And we discussed them. I listed seven of them for you. And then we discussed briefly the Scientific Method and Knowledge, and I sought to show that science was not neutral, not infallible, but it has its faith stance just as Christianity has its faith stance. And I tried to critique the Scientific Method scientifically and then theologically, essentially pointing out the limitations of the Principle of Induction, and then from the theological stand point, the limitations of human sin which prevents us from truly and fully understanding the truth of God.

Now, we came to the last part of our outline in which we were to discuss the New Birth and Knowledge, and I did not have an opportunity to say too much about this, and I would like to at least say something about it tonight. The New Birth, of course, is fundamental to life, and we must not hesitate to accept the offense of the cross in so far as the New Birth is concerned. I made reference to this last time. Pointing out that when the new birth takes place, the result is that there are two kinds of people, those who have been born again and those who have not. And that even in the practice of science, there then comes to be two kinds of science, that practiced by those who are the sons of the new birth and those who are not. And I think it was about at that point that we stopped, and I did not say anything about the New Birth and theology, and I didn’t say anything about the New Birth and spiritual understanding and that was really the climax of the title, “How Do We Know That We Know.” So, I want to say just a word about that.

Theology alone is called to study the beginnings of the new birth and the development of the new birth. It is the work of theology to study the new life that we have in Christ. And so, consequently, it’s the task of the theologian to discuss the new life. John Calvin has said, concerning the theologian, “That the theologian’s task is not to divert the ears with chatter but to strengthen conscious’s by teaching things true, sure and profitable,” and the things that are true, sure and profitable are the things that have to do with the new life that is given us when the Holy Spirit regenerates us. There are three principles, three fundamental principles that belong to theological prolegomena or the introduction to theological thinking.

First, incidentally, this word “principia” is a neuter plural form from principium, and that is something that means something like, “our first principle.” So there are three first principles referred to here. They each have certain aspects of one fundamental principium set forth. One is that God is the principal of being, that is that all life proceeds from God, that he is the source of all of human existence. Special Revelation, we’ll talk about that tonight. Special Revelation in the Bible is the external principle of knowing, that is, it’s by the special revelation of the word of God that we have insight into spiritual things. The Bible is the external principle of knowledge. What we know about God comes from the Bible. And then faith is the Principium Cognoscendi Internum, that is, the internal principal of knowing. It is by the exercise of faith and trust given by the Holy Spirit that we are brought into the relationship to the Lord God which enables us to understand the external principle that is the Bible.

Now, we began our study last week by saying there were three great questions. Is there a God? Well that is answered by the first of these principia. God is the principal of being, or he’s the source of human existence. Yes, there is a God, and he’s the source of all existence. The second question was, “Has he spoken?” Yes, he has spoken. He has spoken in Special Revelation which is the external principle of knowing. We cannot know if we do not have a revelation of God. We’ll develop that in a moment. How do we know? Well that is the question of epistemology or the question of the Science of Knowledge. And we know by virtue of the exercise of faith. Faith is the internal first principle of knowledge. So is there a God? Yes. Has he spoken? Yes. How do we know? Well we know as we, in faith, listen to what he says to us through holy Scripture.

One final thing, how can we be sure that we know? Now, that’s really the question. How do we know that we know? And I want you to turn now, if you will, to 1 Corinthians chapter 2. And will you just listen as I read verses 1 through 5? It would be nice if we had a lot of time to discuss this, but we don’t. But I think we’ll have enough, and we should get this point. Now, the apostle was writing to the Corinthian Christians, and he was explaining some of the things that happened when he first came there. And 1 Corinthians chapter 2 verse 1 through verse 5, now listen to what Paul writes,

“And I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God. For I determined not to know any thing among you, except Jesus Christ, and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling. And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power: That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.”

Now, what takes place when a man comes to the knowledge of divine truth? Well in the Bible, the Bible tells us that we are blind. The Bible tells us that we are unable to understand the Revelation of God. The Bible says that our wills are rebellious against God, and the Bible says that our emotions are corrupt. The Bible says, therefore, that by virtue of the fall and the resultant effects of that fall in the human person, there is no way in which we can, of ourselves, understand divine truth. We cannot know, Paul says in 1 Corinthians 2:14, we don’t want to know, Paul says in Romans chapter 8. It is clear then that something must happen to us from outside of ourselves, and the Bible sets it forth very plainly. It is through the preaching of the Gospel that the Holy Spirit works. And the Holy Spirit takes the word of God and, through the preaching of the word of God, brings new life to the individual so that the first act of this new life is to believe the words that are being brought through the ministry of the individual and the convincing ministry of the Holy Spirit. So, it is the work of the Holy Spirit to bring conviction of the divinity of holy truth, the majesty of the Bible, and then to bring new life and repentance and faith.

Now, if a Christian should be asked why a person responds, he, of course, cannot reply by saying, other than to say, “We respond because the Holy Spirit has brought conviction and persuasion of the truth.” If he were to try to respond with something else, then, of course, there would be something beyond the work of the Holy Spirit. In the final analysis, the faith that is given us by God is something that is given by the Holy Spirit. It is intuitive. It is given by God with such power that we cannot refuse to believe. So that it is the work of the Holy Spirit to bring this conviction.

Now, that’s what Paul is talking about when he says he didn’t come with fancy speech because if he had come with fancy speech and with great logical scientific arguments and you had believed because of his speech and his scientific arguments then, of course, your faith would not be in the wisdom of God. It would be in the wisdom of men. And if it were in the wisdom of men, then it is not only possible, but likely, that someone would ultimately come along a little wiser, and they would say it just a little better, except say something different, and you would fall prey to them. The apostle said that he spoke as he did his speech and his preaching, not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, verse 5, “In order that your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.”

Now, there is no way in which a Christian can say why he has faith. Other than to say God has testified to me through the Scriptures and has brought the assurance that the Bible is the word of God and that it’s truth is the truth of God. Now someone says, “Well, my goodness, you mean the only testimony you have is the testimony of the Holy Spirit?” Is there any higher testimony? Is Einstein’s testimony higher? There are people who say, “Well this is subjective.” It’s not subjective. It’s very objective. It is something that’s come from outside of us. It is objective. Now the fact that it is internal does not mean that it is subjective unless you have some definition of subjective that demands that. It is objective. It is the Holy Spirit that has brought this conviction in the heart of a Christian.

One of the greatest of the Southern theologians has this to say, “But in no case is reason the ultimate rule of faith. No authority can be higher than the direct testimony of God, and no certainty can be greater than that imparted by the Spirit shining on the word of God. An accredited revelation, like an oath among men should put an end to all controversy.” So what happens when a Christian believes is that God brings faith to him, convincing him of the truth of the Scriptures, the truth of the revelation of God, brings in his inmost being a conviction of the truth of Scripture so that his faith rests in the power of God?

Now, you can often see this in individual Christians who have very little understanding of how to defend the Christian faith. But at the same time, their faith is absolutely sure and certain. You cannot shake it because God has spoken. And the testimony of God, the Holy Spirit, is the greatest testimony that could be given to anything. And he is pleased to testify in the heart of his saints.

This afternoon I participated in a funeral of a woman who was eighty three years of age when she died. She was a very lovely Christian woman, has had many years of Christian service in the city of Dallas. Many people are the beneficiaries of her financial help and in many other ways as well. I also had the funeral of her mother who lived to be one hundred years of age. She, too, was a Christian woman, and her husband, who was a former employer of mine when I was going through seminary in the insurance business. And this woman was a woman, who did not have a great understanding of the Bible intellectually, but she had the firmest of faiths, and nothing could shake her because God had really spoken to her and through the internal testimony of the Holy Spirit had brought certainty concerning the majesty of holy Scripture, the divinity of the word of God. And that testimony is the final testimony that can be given. “How do we know that we know?” Well, we know that we know when God, the Holy Spirit, has testified in our hearts concerning the truthfulness of the word of God and the message that is found within it.

Now, tonight we want to turn to another subject. I just put down here at the bottom, “The highest testimony is God’s testimony. It’s greater than Einstein’s. It’s greater than Dr. Johnson’s too, incidentally. [Laughter] And the highest certainty comes when the Holy Spirit shines upon the word of God and brings conviction. That results in an accredited testimony. That’s what Paul is talking about when he says, “That your faith should stand in the power of God.”

Now, tonight we want to talk for just a little while about revelation, and it will be just a little while. “Revelation, or God’s Truth Unveiled,” now in the preceding study, just to review for one moment, we tried to set forth a Christian Theory of Knowledge, resting on these first principles. All human knowledge is derived from God. He is the first principle of being. That the knowledge of God can only come by divine revelation, especially the Scriptures, they are the external first principle of knowing. And faith, as in science, is the internal principle of knowing. It’s by faith that the Holy Spirit enables us to comprehend the Revelation of God.

Now, in this study we want to study the Doctrine of Revelation. Revelation is the activity of God that is made necessary by the finiteness of man and the sin of man. It is because we are finite beings and God is an infinite being that we must have revelation. A finite person cannot understand an infinite person by the nature of his being. Finitum non posit corpora infinitum,” is the way theologians have often put it in Latin. The finite is not able to take hold of the infinite. Remember the first astronaut of the Russians that went up? A man by the name of Titov, and if you remember he managed to get up in space, and when he came down he wanted to put in a word for atheism and communism. And so he said when he came down, “I saw no evidence of God or angels.” Now, of course, some people might have been impressed by that, but I was not impressed and I’m sure that ninety-nine point nine percent of you were not impressed because you knew immediately that he only displayed his ignorance of the infinite God because it would be impossible for us to grasp the infinite God since we are finite individuals. Of course, he didn’t see any evidence of God or of angels.

Emil Brunner, the well known Swiss theologian, once asked the question of Scripture and then gave an answer. “Canst thou by searching find out God?” Job said. And then professor Brunner added, “to man’s proud, ‘not yet’.” The Bible replies, “Not ever.” Man can never understand God of himself for he is a finite being. So, Job’s question finds no answer except through the divine activity.

Modern men have located revelation in man’s growing enlightenment, for example. They have said that’s revelation, the fact that we are gaining in knowledge as the years go by, scientific knowledge, and other forms of knowledge. That is revelation. Now the Bible does describe man’s developing experience, but that’s not what is meant by revelation. Others have said the Bible, when it speaks of revelation, is simply referring to the events of history. And in the events of history, we understand God. Now the Bible records the events of history that are important for salvation history, but when we talk about revelation we’re not talking about the events of history. Events of history may reveal something about God, but it’s only by virtue of the Special Revelation that we are able to understand them. In fact, an historical event is an equivocal event until there is a word given to explain the significance of it.

And still others have said, in modern times, that revelation is found in the living personality of Jesus Christ. Well the Bible does say that we have revelation of God through Jesus Christ. A text we’ll refer to in just a moment, “No man hath seen God at any time, the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, and he has declared him.” It’s true. The Lord Jesus Christ is the revelation of the Father. But when we say that the living personality of Christ is divine revelation, we must also go on to say we don’t know anything about the living personality of Christ, except that which is found in the Bible. So it is the Bible that reveals to us the living personality of Christ and tells us that divine revelation did come through the living personality of Christ.

Augustine crystallized historic Christianity’s position when he put into God’s mouth the words, “Indeed, old man, what my Scripture says, I say.” “Indeed, old man, what my Scripture says, I say.” Now that’s a very good statement. “What my Scripture says, I say.” That has a great deal to say about revelation, and it has a great deal to say about inspiration as well.

Let’s turn quickly to Revelation in the Bible and a brief summary. Most of you here have, at one point or another, been exposed to aspects of the Doctrine of Revelation. Let me define revelation first. If you look in the Bible and look at the words that are used to describe divine revelation, I think that you would come up with a definition very similar to this. Revelation is the unveiling of God’s truth to men, and it is the truth unveiled. In other words, in the Bible the term revelation is used not only of the process by which truth is unveiled, or revealed, to us, but that which is the product of the process of revelation is also itself called revelation. So revelation is the unveiling of God’s truth to men, and it is the truth unveiled.

Revelation is like one work with two volumes. We all know theological, other works that are one work, but nevertheless, composed of more than one volume. God’s revelation is one work, but there are two volumes, and volume one is his revelation in nature, in the human conscious, in history, and in providence. There are certain things that we can know about God in nature, if we could see plainly. For example, in Romans chapter 1 and verse 19 and 20, the apostle Paul writes,

“Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them. For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and divinity; so that they are without excuse,” (notice the 20th verse) “For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen.”

Now, what Paul is saying is that in nature there are certain things we can know about God. We can know his eternal power, and we can know his divinity. We can know that he is the all powerful being who has created the universe. We can know that he is a divine being. But now, unfortunately, we’re not able to look at the Divine Revelation very clearly. As Calvin says, “We need spectacles,” because we don’t see clearly on account of our sin. And consequently, what we see is very confused. We look at nature and we have some comprehension of a deity, but we do not see clearly enough to understand exactly what we, the effects of what we, find in nature. We see enough to be responsible. We see enough to be guilty. But that’s as far as it goes. Therefore, we need something else. General Revelation or the Revelation of God in nature is addressed to man as a man, but unfortunately, he doesn’t have the capacity for fully understanding.

Incidentally, in one of the theologians, there is a story about LaPlace, the famous astronomer. LaPlace in one of his comments makes the statement that he took his astronomical instruments, his telescope, and he took it and looked across the skies, and he, too, saw no evidence of God by the use of his instruments. But President Sawyer said with him, he might just as well have swept the kitchen with a broom, looking for God, because you can just as easily find God in your kitchen, sweeping, as you can using human scientific instruments. Neither one is sufficient for the object. There are certain things that we can know but we can only know them as a result of the Bible. So that General Revelation is revelation addressed to man as man but we do not see clearly because we are sinners. Therefore, General Revelation, which was suitable for Adam in the Garden of Eden before he fell, is not suitable for us. For Adam’s progeny something else is needed.

And the Bible sets that forth as Special Revelation. Special Revelation is revelation addressed to a man as a sinner. Now there are many ways in which God revealed himself in Scripture. For example, he revealed himself in face to face confrontations with Abraham, with Adam, with Moses, and with other men in the Old Testament. That raises the question of the theophanies of the Old Testament. It was God the Son most likely, but nevertheless, it was Special Revelation. He also gave the men of the Old Testament visions. He gave them dreams. He spoke by means of miracles. The aim of Special Revelation is to bring the knowledge of salvation to men. General Revelation is addressed to man as a man, but Special Revelation, to man as a sinner, in order that he might be saved. In fact, the Special Revelation is ultimately directed toward the salvation of God’s elect. Paul in 2 Timothy speaking about Scripture speaks of the Scriptures as those that make a man wise unto salvation. So it is the work of holy Scripture to bring men to salvation, and that holy Scripture wielded by the Holy Spirit is directed toward the hearts of God’s elect individuals.

What is human religion? Well human religion is the product of man’s attempt to ignore Special Revelation. So in ignoring the Bible, in ignoring what the Bible says about us that we’re sinners, that we need to be saved, that Christ has provided the salvation, it’s the work of religion to build up systems of thought by which a man may reasonably, in the minds of men, he may reasonably ignore the Divine Revelation. The first manifestation of religion was the denomination of the fig leaves in Genesis chapter 3, and when Adam and Eve covered themselves with fig leaves, they were, in effect, attempting to set up something by which they might ignore the effects of Special Revelation which revealed to them their nakedness. It’s the part of the preacher, through the Holy Spirit, to reveal to those who listen to him the nakedness of men in the sight of God, that they are sinners, guilty under divine condemnation. And so human religion, the idea of salvation by work or salvation by the exercise of our free will, this kind of religion is man’s attempt to ignore Special Revelation. It manifests itself in all forms of legalism. And those forms may be rationalism, asceticism, or whatever, but they all ultimately are attempts by man to save himself apart from Divine Revelation.

Now, just for a few moments, I’d like to ask you to take a look at Revelation in Johanan thought for this reason. That in the Gospel of John Revelation, in fact in the Johanan literature, Revelation is one of the greatest of the emphases of the Apostle John. In fact, all Johanan literature is intimately concerned with Revelation. Wherever you turn in the Gospel of John, in the Epistles of John, you are likely to run across the idea of Revelation.

Now, if you have your Bibles, I’d like for you to turn to John chapter 5. Since Plato, some men have believed that the puzzle of the soul of man is solvable in the belief that man may somehow reach the infinite. But it cannot be grasped how man, even in the next life, could reach the infinite. One of the philosophers, whose book I read some years ago in Brittan, had a little paragraph which I copied out. I thought it was very good for a philosopher. He was not a Christian philosopher, but he said this, “Plato once said that the final answer to this question could be given only by God, by revelation coming from the next world. This is, however, no longer philosophy, but religion, as in so many other realms, philosophical thinking here poses the question. It leads us to the borderline from which man silently looks into the eternal darkness.” That’s put very well because that is true. When we talk about divine things and infinite things then we are like men who look off silently into the eternal darkness because we are unable of ourselves to understand divine truth.

Now, turning to John chapter 5 and verse 39, let me just read verse 39, and then let me read verse 46 and 47. John 5:39, the Apostle John writes,

“Search the Scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.” (Let’s read verse 45) “Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father: there is one that accuseth you, even Moses, in whom ye trust. For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me; for he wrote of me. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?”

Now, this is revelation in Johannine thought and specifically, revelation in the Scriptures. And this is the normative text in the Johannine literature. When we say normative text we mean the text that most fully expresses the particular theological idea. The Latin expression is sedes doctrinae; that is the seat of the doctrine. Now, this passage in John chapter 5 is in the third of the discourses of the Gospel of John. It’s a formal systematic statement of the complete unity of the Lord Jesus with the Father, his divine commission, and his Messiahship, and in this little section beginning at verse 39 through verse 47, our Lord makes these points. First the Scriptures are fulfilled in him. “Search the Scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.” The second point he makes is that the Jews have perverted them. And the third point he makes is that the Scriptures are going to judge them.

Now, the first one is the most important for us. The Scriptures are fulfilled in him. Notice that 39th verse, “Search the Scriptures.” Now this is probably an indicative rather than an imperative. I don’t know if you have a New American Standard Bible, maybe they have the indicative. I forgot to look at it. But it probably should be rendered, “Ye search the Scriptures.” In other words, he’s talking about the rabbi’s and their exemplary approach to the Bible. That is they study the Scriptures. You, “search the Scriptures, for in them ye think that ye have eternal life.” Now, what he means by that is that they really think that those Scriptures themselves are the source of life. That, of course, was their mistake.

Now I want to make just a comment here, well you notice he says, “Search the Scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life.” Now, it’s evident from what he’s saying here that it’s in there written form, not simply in the events portrayed that they point to the Lord Jesus. He’s not talking about the events here. He’s talking about the Scriptures. He says, “And they are they which testify of me.” Scripture testify of me. It’s not so much the things that I did, but it’s the Scriptures that testify of me. It’s not the things that were done in the Old Testament times. It’s the Scriptures that testify to the Lord Jesus. And notice that he puts that in the present tense. He says, “Search the Scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.”

Now here’s the Scriptures right now are testifying concerning the Lord Jesus Christ, he says. And he does not tell them to cease their study of the Scripture since he has come along. Some might think that he ought to have said that. He doesn’t say that intensive study of the Old Testament is to take a subordinate place in the lives of those who are his disciples. But he says that the Old Testament studied properly actually will lead men to come to him and tell men more of himself. In other words, he is exhorting men to study the Scriptures. So you, “Search the Scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.”

Now in verse 45 though verse 47, the same essential thought occurs. He says, “Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father: there is one that accuseth you, even Moses, in whom ye trust.” Isn’t that interesting, “In whom you trust.” The one in whom they trusted is the one who was pointing them to him. They trust Moses, but the one they trusted pointed their trust to the Messiah. They obviously did not read Moses correctly. How should you read Moses? Well they read Moses as if Moses was giving a long series of legal pieces of advice. They found great numbers of commandments. Some have counted 613, so many negative, so many positive.

But it’s obvious the Lord doesn’t support that kind of reading of Moses. When it’s said that Moses wrote of the Lord Jesus, he doesn’t mean that Moses wrote and gave a merely superficial prediction of my coming. What he means when he says that Moses wrote of me and pointed toward me, he means that if you had read Moses properly you would have seen the law of Moses, and you would have responded to the law of Moses by seeing you couldn’t keep that law, and therefore, you were condemned. And then you would turn to the other aspects of revelation of Moses in which the Gospel was unfolded and you would have trusted in the redeemer who was to come. That’s the way to read Moses. To read him is to read him morally, and to see your need, condemnation, guilt, need, and that which is provided in the prophetic teaching concerning the Lord Jesus Christ. So when he says, “He wrote of me,” he doesn’t mean simply prophetically, he means soteriologically. They would have come.

I wish it were possible for us to explain further what I mean by, what I mean by the use of the Old Testament, or what is meant by the many things in the Gospel of John concerning the Old Testament and the Revelation concerning Jesus Christ found there. For example, there is a rich use typical terms. There is reference made to the tabernacle, the temple, the Lamb of God, Jacob’s ladder, the brazen serpent, the manna, the smitten rock, the fiery pillar, all of these things are mentioned in the Gospel of John. It’s our Lord’s unfolding of what he meant when he said, “Moses wrote of me.” All of those things were unfolding the character of the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Revelation in Johanan thought, Revelation in the Son, let’s turn back to chapter 1 and verse 18. Revelation in the Son of God is the primary revelation. In the word of God, we have the product. But we should not neglect the Bible. Augustine said, “What my Scripture says, I say.” It’s in the Scriptures that we learn facts concerning Christ. Listen to this verse, “No man hath seen God at any time, the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has declared him.” This is the normative text on Revelation in the Son, and the text, we expounded this about six or eight months ago, so I’ll just review. When he says, “No man has seen God at any time,” he speaks of the limitation of man. “The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father,” he speaks of the qualifications of the Son in the revealing of the Father.

I remember illustrating this by the use of biography. A son is the one who is best able to write a biography of his father because he knows his father most intimately, and he lives in the next generation, and thus is able to communicate. The Lord Jesus, we read here, “is in the bosom of the Father.” Luther says, “Is and ever is.” He “is in the bosom of the Father.” That’s his qualification. That’s why he can unfold the Father. He dwells on the breast of God. So that when the Lord Jesus came down here and lived and moved among men, what was he doing but laying open the breast of God for us. So, if you really want to know what God is, what he’s like, what he does, listen to the revelation of his opened breast in the revelation in the Lord Jesus Christ. And then at the conclusion of the verse he says, “He has exegeted him.” He has interpreted the Father.

When you see the little children coming to the Lord Jesus, you have a revelation of the breast of God. When you see the tears of our Lord Jesus by the side of the grave of Lazarus, you have the unfolding of the significance of God. That is the laying open of the breast of God. God is like this, and in Jesus Christ, he has been fully explained. There are other texts. I have mentioned them here. So, God’s truth is unveiled in the Scriptures and in the Son. Our time is up. Let’s close with a word of prayer.

[Prayer] Father, we are grateful to Thee for the revelation of the Father that is contained in our Lord Jesus Christ’s life and ministry. We recognize, Lord, the great benefit that has been bestowed upon humanity in that the second person of the trinity has come and has walked the paths that men have walked. And we thank Thee that this Special Revelation is addressed to men as sinners, for we are sinners. We are guilty. We are under divine condemnation, and we need deliverance. We thank Thee for the blood that was shed, by which we have everlasting life. We thank Thee for the unfolding of heaven so that we now know certain things about Thee. And we thank Thee that we know them, and we know that we know them by virtue of the…

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