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So, Matthew 27 verse 1, so things that Jesus gave or became so we could gain is the title of the sermon. And point number one is Jesus became bound so that we could be free. It's found in Matthew 27 verse number 1 where the Bible reads, When the morning was come, all the chief priests and elders of the people took counsel against Jesus to put him to death. And when they had bound him, they led him away and delivered him to Pontius Pilate, the governor. You see in verse number 2 there where they bound Jesus and obviously the whole picture of salvation, Jesus went through a lot of different things. He died a brutal death, he was mocked, he was spit upon, but they also put him in prison. They bound him and then they were just shuttling him back and forth, it's like he was going from county to the city to the state pen and basically they were mistreating him the whole time that that was happening and so they bound him and led him away after they had pronounced death upon him. And he was, like I said, he was sent to Pilate, then Pilate sent him to Herod, then Herod sent him back to Pilate and he was being mistreated, he was being mocked, he was, you know, when he didn't do magic tricks for Herod, Herod got upset and then they started to mock him and put the kingly robe on him and all those things, but they bound him first and led him away. Now turn to John chapter 8 verse 31, but see everything that Jesus did for us, he did it so that we could gain something in this life and in the life to come. So look at John chapter 8 verse number 31. So they bound, Jesus became bound so that we could become free. John 8 31 says, then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, if you continue in my word, then are you my disciples indeed and you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. So Jesus said the truth will make us free. What's the truth? Well the fact of the Bible, well the Bible is true, we know that and, you know, the fact that Jesus came to this earth, he was born of the Virgin Mary, he was born of, you know, he was the son of God and he came into this world to give light to this world and he is the way, the truth and the life and when we know the truth, which is Jesus Christ, then that truth will make us free. Look what it says in verse 33, they answered him, we be Abraham's seed and were never in bondage to any man. How sayest thou, ye shall be made free? Jesus answered them, verily, verily, I say unto you, whosoever committed sin is the servant of sin. See, we are bound also as human beings, bound with our sin. The sin, it makes us a servant of that sin. And so when you're serving something, you're a servant of that particular thing. So like if you have a job, then you are serving at that job under that boss or whatever. And so whatever you're doing, you're serving that thing, but if you're a servant, if you're committing sin, then the Bible says, Jesus says, then you are the servant of sin. It says, and the servant abideth not in the house forever, but the son abideth forever. If the son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed. And that word indeed, it basically kind of puts an emphasis on what was said before. So true freedom only comes through the Lord Jesus Christ. True freedom only comes from being a Christian. You're like, well, I'm not free. I have bills to pay. The government's taxing me. You know, I got all these different responsibilities. But you're free in Christ. You're free from the bondage of sin. You are no longer a servant of sin. You have the new man. The new man is, you know, Jesus Christ in you, the hope of glory, right? So number two this morning, not only did Jesus become bound so we could be free, but number two, he became sin so that we could be righteous. He became sin so we could be made righteous. Look at 2 Corinthians chapter five in our verses where we first started out, where Brother C.J. read. 2 Corinthians chapter number five, verse 21. It's a great verse here. It says, For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. So he became sin. Now I want to explain this just for a second. Jesus was not a sinner. He actually became sin. He became a curse for us when he was on the tree. The Bible says curse is anyone that hangs on a tree, right? So that verse, you know, when Jesus was on the cross, he became sin for us. All the sins of all the world, from Adam and Eve to the last person that was born on this earth before the end, all the sins of those people were put upon him. The sins of all the most wicked things, the most wicked people in this world, came upon a man that never sinned in his whole life. And he lived to be 33 years old, which was a very short life, but I mean the burden that he bore for us was so great, it's just, you know, sometimes we just got to stop and remember what he actually did for us because for someone that's not sinful, it must have been a pretty bad burden to put upon him. So much that God the Father turned away from him and refused to look upon him. And Jesus Christ said, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Well he has to forsake sin, that's why. And he became sin that we could be made righteous because without that sacrifice that was made for us on the cross, we could never be saved. And so God has to look upon us and see righteousness in order for us to get to heaven. So when he became sin, he gave us the opportunity to be able to be saved and to have his righteousness imputed upon us. And that's the only way, God looks down and he sees the blood of Christ on the believer and he says, I'm going to pass over that person. That's what the Passover is all about. In Exodus it's a picture of that perfect lamb being slain for us so we could have that blood applied to us, to our account, and when God looks down he sees the blood of the Son of God and he allows us to have that righteousness imputed upon us. It's not our own righteousness, see a lot of people think that their own righteousness is going to get them to heaven. Every single person in that parking lot across the street in that church over there they probably thought if they don't go to church today they're going to lose their salvation. And that's an unfortunate way to look at things, I mean I would love to see our church completely packed out like that too, but you know our church doesn't believe, you know we're like well I'm not going to lose my salvation if I'm late, you know I'm not going to lose my salvation if I'm not on time this morning, that's obvious, no I'm just kidding. But I was early for the first, you know when I'm early then I get all high and mighty right so anyway, I'm only teasing. But seriously there are a lot of people that think that if they quit going to church, if they quit living a righteous life that they would lose that righteousness, but look the righteousness was never yours in the first place. All our righteousness is filthy rags to God. If you try to bring your filthy rags you're not going to get in. You have to have the blood of Christ that cleanses us from all sin applied to you or you will not be righteous. So number one this morning Jesus came, became bound so we could be free. Number two, he became sin so we could be made righteous. Number three, he died so we could live. He died so we could live. Let's look down at verse number 13 so actually look up to verse number 13 in the same chapter there. It says, for whether we beside ourselves it is to God or whether we be sober it is for your cause for the love of Christ constraineth us because we thus judge that if one died for all then we're all dead. So Paul uses some tricky wording in here, but if you just think about it Jesus Christ is the one person that died for everybody. So in order for that to make sense then that means everybody is already dead. So Jesus had to die so that everybody could live. Look at verse 15, and that he died for all. What does the scripture say? The scripture says he died for all not for his just only his special chosen ones, not only you know just for the you know because Calvinists will say well he died for he didn't die for all he just died for the people that would get saved. Well he did die for the people to get saved but the Bible is very clear that he died for everybody. He died for the sins of the whole world and really it kind of lessens the fact that Jesus Christ died for all if you try to say that he only died for certain people. Now is it true that not everybody is going to be saved? That's true. Not everybody is going to be saved. But that doesn't mean he didn't die for everybody because God is a fair God. God is a just God. God is equal. Our ways are unequal, but God's ways are equal. He offers salvation to everybody, right? He's not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance. Now that's his will, but see he gives man free will. And so that's another term that Calvinists don't like is the term free will. Even though the term free will is in the Bible multiple times, they just don't believe that people have free will. That you have to be drawn by God, which I believe that, but that he has to give you the gift of faith, that's not true. That is something that you have to have on your own. You have to look at the Scriptures, you have to have somebody teach you what the Bible says so you can be saved. Jesus died so that we could live and it says he died for all. Doesn't it say that right there in verse 15? And that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves. So you know we're supposed to live for God, but look at that word should. You see that word should? That means that's something you're supposed to do, but should is a lot different than have to isn't it? So a lot of people say well if you are really saved then you're going to do the works. And if you don't do the works then you're not really saved. That's another heresy that's out there. Obviously we should not live unto ourselves. We should live for God, he did so much for us, but it's not a free gift unless it's free. So you can literally do no works and you're still saved. It says which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them and rose again. So yes we should serve God, but the word should is a lot different than have to isn't it? So let's read on here verse 16. It says wherefore henceforth we know man after the flesh, yea though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more. Therefore if any man be in Christ he is a new creature. Old things are passed away, behold all things are become new. And you're like well Pastor Thompson you're wrong because it says all things are become new, you're a new creature. That's true, but we still have the old man living inside of us. We still have the flesh that wants to do what it wants to do. It's a constant battle between the spirit and the flesh, but yes we do have a new creature, we do have a new man that can't sin, but that doesn't mean you're going to be sinless because if that's what is expected is sinless perfection then we're all doomed. Nobody has repented of all their sins, nobody can repent of all their sins, that's impossible. Jesus had no sin, he's the only person that that label falls under. Now some people are more sinful than others, I'll give you that, but everybody sins. Everybody sins, and I would say that everybody sins every day. And people that like will go to their door and they'll be like oh you know I don't really sin, you know I used to lie but I don't lie anymore, are you a liar? You still lie? You're lying just telling me that you don't lie right now. I mean anybody that tells me that they don't lie anymore, they're full of it. They're full of beans as my kids would say. But anyway, it says all things are of God who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation. So he's given us something to do. So should we work for him? Absolutely. Should we live for him? Absolutely. And the other thing he's given us besides eternal life, he's given us a ministry. What's the ministry? Reconciliation. Now you might recognize that term reconciliation and it's used a lot in like marriages. You know being reconciled to your spouse if you're fighting or maybe you're separated or something's going wrong in your marriage. Well most of the time most people that are married in here understand reconciliation because we do it sometimes don't we? We have to be reconciled to each other. We can be in a big fight and then you know just you think the marriage is over and then you reconcile. But see when God's talking about reconciling there's something between mankind and God and that's sin. And if that person does not believe on Christ then the wrath, the Bible says the wrath of God abideth on them. You're already done. So unless you get reconciled with God you're going to die and you're going to go to hell. The Bible says in verse 19 to wit that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself. So God was in Christ. He's the son of God reconciling the world unto himself. What was the mission? The mission was to come to the world and reconcile us unto himself. He created us. He made us for his joy, for his enjoyment, for his pleasure. He wants to have a relationship with us. He does love the individual. He loves every single person in this room and he wants to have a reconciliation with you and if you're saved today you are reconciled unto God. It says not imputing their trespasses unto them and have committed unto us the word of reconciliation. What's it talking about? He wants us to go win people to him and to help us reconcile. We're like the mediator of some kind of divorce that's gone on. God is divorced from us until someone goes and reconciles God with that person. And yes, we do have a part in helping people get saved. People will say, well you don't save anybody because we'll be like well we got such and such people saved today. You didn't save anybody, God did. Did God come down to their room and say, hey I want you to be reconciled unto me. He doesn't do that, does he? See because salvation is by faith. He doesn't appear to people the way that people think that he does. He says he's never going to do that. The way he's going to appear to you is through his word. You have to have faith in the Bible, you have to have faith in God's word, you have to believe that that's true, you have to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and the Bible says thou shall be saved. It says now then we are ambassadors for Christ as though God did beseech you by us. We pray you in Christ's stead be reconciled to God. So we are the ambassadors. What's an ambassador do? Don't they go to other nations and try to make peace between those nations and try to maintain the peace? Well that's what soul winners are supposed to do when they go out into the community and preach the gospel and we're supposed to go and reconcile people to God. And so obviously reconciling means making things right between people, right? So now turn to John chapter 5 verse 23, John chapter 5 verse 23, John chapter 5 verse 23. The Bible says that all men should honor the son as they honor the father. He that on earth not the son, on earth not the father which hath sent him, verily, verily I say unto you, he that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting life. So what do you have to do to be saved? What's it say right there? It says believe on him that sent me hath everlasting life. That means you have it. You have everlasting life. It's not something that you have to wait for. We wait for the redemption of our bodies but we right now where we are, we're seated in heavenly places, explain that one. But that's what the Bible says. But it says that we hath everlasting life and shall not come into condemnation. Can you lose your salvation? What does shall not come into condemnation mean? You can't lose your salvation. You can't lose it even if you try to. It says you shall not come into condemnation but is passed from death unto life. The moment you believe, you are passed from death unto life. You were a dead man. You were a dead woman until you put your faith in Jesus. And you know what? If you haven't done that this morning, if you haven't believed on Christ and trusted him only for your salvation, then you're not saved. If you're counting on your own works in some way, shape or form, you're not going to go to heaven. You need to believe what the Bible says. You need to believe the truth. And the truth is not that you could lose your salvation. If you believe that, you're trusting in your own works. You're like, well, how's that? Well, because you think that if you do something wrong or you want to walk away, you stop going to church or whatever, that you'll lose your salvation. That's not what the Bible teaches. And people are like, well, what about these one verses? You mean the verses that are obscure? Maybe you just don't understand those verses. But I'll tell you what's clear. If you believe on him, you have everlasting life. You have it. And you shall not come into condemnation. God didn't stutter here. He says, verily, verily, I say unto you, the hour is coming and now is. When the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, they that hear shall live. So even if you die, your mortal body dies, one day you're going to, Jesus Christ is going to come back and you're going to hear the voice of the Son of God. And anybody that hears that voice is going to live. That's going to be pretty cool to actually hear that voice. If I'm already dead and buried, I'm going to be waiting for that voice. Obviously we go, our soul goes to heaven and everything, but that's a sermon for another time. Number four, this is my last point, is that Jesus became finite so we could be infinite. Jesus became finite so that we could live infinitely. Turn to Galatians chapter four, I'm going to read Genesis 3.15. Genesis 3.15 says, and I will put enmity between thee and the woman, between thy seed and her seed, it shall bruise thy head, thou shalt bruise his heel. So in Genesis 3.15, God makes this promise that the seed of a woman, it says her seed, it doesn't say his seed, it says her seed. So the seed of a woman is going to crush the devil and crush death. This is the first prophecy of the Messiah coming. And so the Jews were always looking for the Messiah to come and when he came they couldn't even see what was plainly in front of their face. And Jesus was the Messiah, he was the seed of a woman, and so God became a man. Man is finite, our lives only last a certain time because of the curse. So Jesus came and he died, didn't he? He really died. It wasn't just that he was only dead for a couple minutes, he was dead for three days and three nights. And when he was dead, the Bible says that he was in the center of the earth, he was in the heart of the earth. What's in the heart of the earth? Hell. Jesus Christ died, was buried, his soul went to hell for three days and three nights. And people always get upset when I teach this, but just look at Acts 2.31, what's it say? It says his soul was not left in hell. People are like, well that's the, in the Greek that means such. Hell means hell, everybody knows what hell means. Don't try to play word games with me. You know what hell means, if someone says go to hell, what are they saying? They're cursing you, right? Hell is the curse of all the undead, or the dead, excuse me, the dead, they're dead, twice dead if they're going there. Because look, Jesus when he went to hell, he made sure that none of us will ever have to go to hell for one second. Not one hair on our head is going to have a twinge of smoke on it. Our, you know, obviously, you know, I don't know about the clothes, but whatever, I don't think we have clothes there, I don't know how that works, but we're not going to go there. You know, people that are going to hell, they're going to be in hell for all eternity. And you know what, people that are in heaven are going to be in heaven for all eternity. There's only two places you can go, okay? Galatians 4, 4 says, but when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth his son, made of a woman, made under the law. So he became a man, and he died. He was mortal at the same time, and then when he died with the sins of the world upon him, when he was in hell, he called out to God, and you know, the Bible says that the Father raised him from the dead, the Spirit raised him from the dead, and he rose himself from the dead. Well, how does that make sense? Well, because all three are God. One God, three persons, okay? Now look at Romans chapter 5 verse 12, Romans chapter 5 verse 12, Romans chapter 5 verse 12, the Bible says, Wherefore, as by one man sin entered in the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned. So death is sure for every single man because we've all sinned. Now that one man that it's talking about that sin entered in the world through is Adam, isn't it? Verse 13 says, For unto the law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed where there is no law. Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgressions, transgression, excuse me, who is the figure of him who was to come. Because when Adam was made, he was not sinful, was he? But Jesus Christ is the figure, or he was the figure of Jesus Christ who was to come. The works were all finished from the foundation of the earth, try to figure that one out. Light was in the world before the sun was made. Figure that one out because he is that true light, Jesus Christ. I'll preach about that in the afternoon. But it says in verse 15, But not as the offense, so also is the free gift. See, salvation is a free gift, folks. It's free. That means you don't have to do anything for it. For if through the offense of one many be dead, much more the grace of God and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many. Not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift, for the judgment was by one to condemnation. But the free gift is of many offenses unto justification. So we're multiple offenders, aren't we? We're multiple sinful offenders. It says but the gift, the free gift is of many offenses unto justification. The gift is grace. Grace means that you're getting something that you don't deserve. And God is the one that gives it to you and he makes the rules about that. What's the rule? You have to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you're saved, right? Verse 17, For if by one man's offense, death reigned by one, much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one Jesus Christ. So the gift of righteousness, I was just talking about this, that righteousness is not our own righteousness. So we have to get it from somebody, don't we? How do you get it? Well, it's a gift. Isn't that what it says? It says, Therefore as by the offense of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation, even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. Whereas by one man's disobedience many were made sinners. So Adam's one disobedience and many were made sinners. When the Bible uses that term many in these passages it's talking about all. Because all were made sinners, right? So it says, Moreover the law entered in that offense might abound, but where sin abounded grace did much more abound. So people say, well you can't just sin and live however you want after you're saved. Well what does the Bible say right here? Where sin, I'm not saying that we should sin, I'm just saying that because of what grace is, even if it abounds, even if you're the most sinful person in this room and you're saved by grace, that means where sin abounded, grace will much more abound. It's going to cover all those sins, okay? So it says, that as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. Grace reigns, okay? That's the way that we're going to make it into heaven is because of grace, it's not because of something we've done. So look at 1 Corinthians 15 and this will be the last place I have eternal will be done, okay? 1 Corinthians 15, this is obviously known as the resurrection chapter where Paul really just goes down to the details and explains the resurrection, but I'm just going to look at a few verses here, it says in verse 45, and so it is written, the first man Adam was made a living soul, the last Adam was made a quickening spirit. What's the difference between Adam, Adam was made a living soul, but Jesus Christ was the second Adam and he's the quickening spirit. So that means he's the spirit that makes people alive, okay? How be it, that was not first which is spiritual, but that which was natural, and afterward that which is spiritual. That's how the order is going to be for us too. We're naturally born into this world, your parents, you know, made you through the marriage and whatever happens after that process, and you're born into this world as a natural way, but the second birth is what? It's a spiritual rebirth. It's not a natural thing, so, and then our bodies now are natural bodies, they're bodies that will die, they're bodies that will go into the ground, but afterward we're going to get a spiritual body that can never die. So the first, you know, Adam was sinful, he was sinless, became sinful, made it to where we're all sinful, but Jesus Christ made it so we could all be spiritual, so we could all be saved. And it says the first man is of the earth, earthy, the second man is the Lord from heaven. So is Jesus Christ the Lord from heaven? So what does that mean he is? It means he's God, doesn't it? So explain, you know, God made Adam the first man, but the second Adam was the God-man, Christ Jesus, who was the seed of a woman, but also the seed of the Holy Spirit, right? He was made of the Holy Spirit, he was, so he was God and man at the same time. So it says, as is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy, and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly. So we're going to bear that image. What's the image? It's going to be that we are a heavenly being like Jesus Christ is. Jesus Christ has a body that cannot die. Jesus Christ is still alive today. The Bible says he's at the right hand of the Father, okay? So Jesus Christ has a body that can never die. He made it so we could have a body that would never die. So he became finite, a regular man, obviously not just a regular man, but, you know, the man Christ Jesus so that he could die and that we could have an infinite life, okay? So the points this morning, the last point was he became finite so we could be infinite, and point number three, he died so that we could live. He became sin, number two, so that we could be righteous, and number one, the first point was Jesus became bound so that we could be free. So I just wanted to exhort you, you know, if you're already saved today, just remember, you know, it's great to remember what Christ did for us. It's great to remember all the things that he gave to us so we could appreciate those things and we should appreciate the fact that Jesus Christ was born in the world because without him, we'd be doomed. This whole planet would be doomed. We'd have nothing to look forward to, but you know what? We have everything to look forward to. You might be tired today, but there's gonna be a time when you're never tired. You'll never have to sleep. You might have had to put deodorant on today, but there's gonna be a time when you never have to put deodorant on because you're never gonna stink. You might have had to put dandruff shampoo in your hair today, but you're never gonna have to have dandruff shampoo in heaven because there's nothing corrupt there, and we're not gonna be corrupt either, and you know, maybe you had some chewing gum. I had some chewing gum when I forgot to, you know, throw it out before I came up here. It was to cover my corrupt breath, but we're not gonna have corrupt breath in heaven. We're not gonna have, you know, there's gonna be no corruption, and that's a great gift for us that Jesus Christ paid for with his perfect life, his precious blood, and the fact that he bore all of our sins, he became sin for us so that we would, as sinners, would be made righteous. That's a gift. You know, think about all the gifts you've gotten, and maybe you already opened up your presence, maybe you're waiting until I shut up, tell you, you know, open your presence later on, but the best present you'll ever get is the gift of grace that God gives us. And today, if you're not saved, maybe some of the things I said, you're just like, I don't really know if I believe that, I don't really know if I understand that, I think you can lose your salvation. Well, I would invite you to just have one of our church members here open up the Bible to you and show you what the Bible says it takes to be saved because, you know, you have to believe the record that God gave of his son. And this is the record, eternal life, and this life is in his son. He that hath the son hath life, he that hath not the son hath not life. Okay, you're not going to live to see that second, that coming of Christ, you're not going to hear his voice. You're going to hear the voice that says, depart from me that work iniquity, I never knew you. So if he says, I never knew you, where are all the people in there that said that they lost their salvation and got it back again? If Jesus said, I never knew you, that means you were never saved to begin with. So think about that because that's a big proof text against being able to lose salvation and get it back again. You don't lose it and gain it and lose it and gain it. You either have it or you don't. Okay? Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you, Lord, so much for this great church and for all the people showing up. I pray that you bless the meal that we're about to partake in. And I pray that we would have a great fellowship and, Lord, that we'd be thankful today for all the things that you did for us so that we could gain on this earth and a life to come. And we thank you, Lord, for coming here and dying for us so that we could be saved. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.