Christ the Faithful Friend

As a young teenager, I used to work for a Bible publisher, and one of my tasks was to operate the front display room where we kept Bibles and tracts. This book room had several hundred tracts about Jesus, and what do you think I did in my spare time, friends? I read and memorized those gospel tracts. Oh, how as a young man I delighted in reading about the foreign adventures of jungles and sailing ships and divers that search for the matchless pearl.

Jesus was exciting to me then, and bless God, he is more precious to me now in my old age than ever before. J. Sidlow Baxter, when he was in his nineties, would tell his friends that Jesus was now more clearer and nearer and dearer than ever before. Oh, it's true, friends, for Christ is a faithful friend.

He is the friend to sinners. He is our advocate and high priest with the Father. He is the anchor to my faith and my high tower, and in a storm, he is the rock higher than I. He is beautiful beyond all others.

He is the rose of Sharon, the lily of the valley. He is chief among ten thousand, the bright and morning star. His beauty surpasses the brightness of the sun.

He is altogether lovely. Jesus is the pearl of great price, worth selling all for and losing all for. When Jesus was here in his earthly ministry, he went about doing good, healing the sick, giving sight to the blind, making the lame to walk and leap, feeding the hungry and bringing joy to the weary, and even raising the dead.

Yet what happened? Men cried out, Away with him! Crucify him! and nailed him to a cross. And on that cross the Prince of Glory died, and he never uttered a word of scorn or resentment from that cross, but demonstrated his love toward sinners. Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.

Why, how could men act so cruelly toward Jesus, who just meant them good? There's a story about a farmer, whose dog had been very useful to him, but it was getting old, so his master decided to get rid of him by drowning him, taking the dog with him to a large river near his farm. He got into a boat, and rowed out to the deepest part. Around the dog's neck he tied a cord attached to a heavy stone.

Then he threw the dog into the water, and the poor dog sank, but the cord broke, and, rising to the surface with a whine, he tried to get back into the boat to be with his master. Unmoved, the farmer pushed him off a number of times with the oar, hoping he would sink to the bottom and drown. Finally, the farmer stood up in the boat, and, intending to strike the dog a blow with the oar that would send it to the bottom, the farmer raised his arm, and the oar came crashing down.

But he missed the dog, and flipped, and lost his balance, and he was the one that fell into the water. Well, he could not swim, and would have drowned. But when the dog saw his master struggling in the water, in spite of the cruel treatment it had just received from him, it swam up to him, caught hold of his clothes, and brought him safe to land.

The farmer had a change of heart, and repaid his faithful friend by caring for it the rest of its days. O dear friends, Jesus is a faithful friend. He is a friend to sinners.

In Romans, chapter 5, it declares, But God commendeth his love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us, much more than, being now justified by his blood, we should be saved from wrath through him. The farmer had a change of heart. That's what salvation is, friend, a change of heart.

The Bible speaks of this from Ezekiel 11, in verse 19, And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you, and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and give them a heart of flesh. The grateful farmer loved his faithful friend even more for saving his life. When a person comes to Christ and is saved, that individual lives for Christ out of gratitude toward him.

In Colossians, chapter 3, we read, If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affections on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.

What that means, friends, is that, when we are born again, our lives are no longer our own. Our bodies are not our own. Our money is not our own.

Our time is not our own. Christ must be a complete master. Is this not what Paul declares in II Corinthians 5.15? And that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again.

O friends, we serve a risen Lord, who sits at the right hand of the Father, and he earned that right by way of a bloody cross. Yes, the farmer had a change of heart when his dog saved his life. Have you undergone a change of heart? Are you saved? Do you know Christ? To be saved means you were joined in a vital union to a living Lord, Christ the King of kings and Lord of lords.

The apostle John speaks of seeing the glory of the risen Christ from Revelation chapter 1, beginning in verse 17. And when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead. And he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not, I am the first and the last.

I am he that liveth and was dead. And behold, I am alive forevermore. Amen.

And have the keys of hell and death. Listen, friends, a saved person knows he's saved. He knows what he's saved from, and he knows his Savior, and he lives for him, all to his glory.

But we must keep our eyes on Jesus. Hebrews tells us to look at him and consider him. Look unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.

For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds. Consider him, friend. Will you consider Jesus? He is a faithful friend who will never let you down and never let you go.

Let us pray.