It Is Finished # 5 (and others)

It Is Finished # 5 (and others)

It wasn't the Greeks that put Him there, it wasn't the Romans that put Him there - they were all there, I thank God for that. The Greeks were there, their day was over, they were coming out of their glory, they were fading out. They were the past generation. The Romans were there, they were the ruling generation at that time. And who else were there? Well, the black folk were there, a future generation.

So, you see, the past, the present, the future, all were at the Cross. If you lay a cross on the floor it points North, South, East and West. If you stand the cross up it embraces - as Wesley says, "The arm of love that compass me do all mankind embrace." If you stand it up it points to a topless heaven and to a bottomless hell and the arms are outstretched to save.

We are mutilating all the hymns and we are mutilated that gorgeous hymn we sing so often, "Beneath the Cross of Jesus." A stanza of it says this, listen,

"The darkness of an awful grave
That gapes both deep and wide;"
"And there between us stands the Cross,
Two arms outstretched to save,
Like a watchman set to guard the way
From that eternal grave."

At the other side of that Cross there is an eternal grave, and the only obstruction to that eternal grave is the finished work of the Lord Jesus. You see, it is finished, the law and the prophets they've no... at least the Old Testament economy, as we say, has no power. Sin, if we obey God, has no dominion over us. Death has no dominion over us. The power of satan has been broken. Heaven has received Christ. And the next thing is not only "It is finished," but "He is Risen" which will be superseded with "I will come again."

We shouldn't put our tongue in our cheek and say this in a whisper. We ought to shout this from the house top. To a world that is groping in darkness we ought to proclaim with a trumpet voice, "It is FINISHED, you can't buy salvation, you can't crawl on your knees through the holy city, you can't go on a pilgrimage, you can't offer your righteousness, there is nothing you can do, but bow in humility and confess and accept it."

It is finished. That is the language of earth. Why? Because in heaven they never say, "It is finished." Because it is never going to be finished, for all eternity. Oh, redemption is finished, sure enough. All that I said is finished. But you see, this never finishes. We are going to live and reign with Him for ever and ever. And Gabriel isn't going to blow the trumpet one day and say, "Hey, you've been living in this super millennium for four billion trillion years and it's over." NO SIR. I like that part of the Messiah where it goes up and as they sing "And He shall reign for ever and ever. King of kings." Nobody wants it to finish in eternity. We are going to be with the eternal Bride Groom. But wait a minute. They never say it in hell either.

There will be people in hell today and people in hell a billion years from now. No messenger will come from another world and say, "It is finished. Your judgment is passed. You've no more suffering for your sin. The wrath of God doesn't abide in you anymore." No. If we are going to escape that eternal judgment, if we are going to enter that eternal rest, it must happen now. Isn't it amazing that people withhold their petty little lives from Him? That they love their sin enough to get the anger and wrath of God? Rather than repent, and believe, and be saved?

Christ's love is, "so amazing and so divine,"

That He bore our sins in His body,
That He took the curse and the wrath of God upon Him.
That He took our sins and His heart was broken that ours might be healed.
He was an outcast that we might be brought in.
He suffered without the gate that we might enter into heaven and said....

"IT IS FINISHED!"

~Leonard Ravenhill~

(The End)

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His all-seeing Eye!

There is nothing too hard for God" (Jeremiah 32:17).

There is nothing too difficult for God to discover. His eyes are in every place - beholding the evil and the good.

Nothing can elude His notice, or escape His all-seeing eye!

All things are naked and open before Him with whom we have to do. He approves or disapproves - of every motive, word, or action which passes before His omniscient eye.

He discovers the true state of every HEART - though the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. Every heart lies naked and exposed before Him. He fathoms its depths. He turns over its intricate folds. He analyzes its dismal contents. He is fully acquainted with every principle which influences it, with every thought which arises within it, with every word and work which proceed from it.

No one can hid his heart in secret from the Lord!

"Search me, God, and know my heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.
See if there is any offensive way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting." (Psalm 139:23-24).

~James Smith~