James Merritt - Trading Places
Well again, Good morning. Thanks for joining us here at our campuses online, those watching by TV thank you very much for being a part of our service. Sometimes you don't have to say a lot to say a lot. And I'm sure some of you wish I'd take my own advice sometimes on Sunday morning. But anyway, in just a few words, you can say something that will stand the test of time, something that will be repeated, and it will be reproduced. It will be remembered for hundreds, if not thousands of years and can make a tremendous impact. It can change the world for example, four words, "I have a dream" lit a fire in our nation for civil rights.
"Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country". probably the most memorable line in any inauguration address ever given by any president. "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself". Something that motivated us to go out and win World War 2. "A government of the people by the people for the people shall not perish from this earth". Probably the greatest speech ever given by any president. "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall", totally changed the whole tenure of the Cold War. "When they go low, we go high". Something we need to practice more and more today and "Don't count the days make the days count".
Memorable remember them and just kind of stick with you. And by the way, here are two or three that might bring a smile to your face. "When you come to a fork in the road take it" I love that by Yogi Berra. "You don't need a parachute to go skydiving. You need a parachute to go skydiving twice". True. "You know you're ugly when it comes to a group picture and they hand you the camera". They're just some things that you never, ever forget. And in just a few words in a little pithy powerful sentence or two can make the memory Hall of Fame because it's not the quantity of what is said. It is the quality of what is said. And that is so true about the passage of scripture that we're going to look at today. We're in a series where we're answering the question, "Why, Jesus"? Of over the 4200 religions in the world, it's a fair question.
Why do we as Christians believe Christianity is the only faith anybody should follow? Why would we say in the 21st century, that Jesus Christ is the only one that everybody should trust in and obey? And what we've been saying is there are three things that set Jesus apart from not just every religious leader who's ever lived, but from every person who has ever lived, his life, his death, and his resurrection. Now, last week, we talked about how Jesus lived in an equaled life. Nobody's ever lived a life Like Jesus, because as of today, he is the only person who ever claim to have lived a flawless, faultless, perfect, sinless life. And nobody disputed that his friends didn't dispute it. His family did not dispute it, his foes did not dispute it. And today we're going to look at his death, because Jesus really did die a unique death.
Now let me just be playing. Death in and of itself is not unique, right? Everybody dies, one out of one people die. Death is universal. Death is inevitable. Medicine can't prevent it. It can only postpone as matter of fact, what we call living, we really ought to call dying, because from the moment we came out of our mother's womb, we started the dying process is why we all call it death insurance, not life insurance, because you don't collect it as long as you're living you collect after you die, and the truth of the matter is, we start dying, the moment we start living, and at the end of Sunday, we will be at the end of all of our days.
So death in and of itself is not unique. And for sure, every person who's ever lived at one point or another has asked the question, is there life after death? But nobody has to ask the question is there death after life? Because we all know the answer to that question. Even little children learn when their dogs die or their cats die or their parakeets die, even little children learn there's such a thing called death and everybody dies. So what was it that made the death of Jesus so unique? Well, it wasn't even the way that he died I know he was crucified, but 30,000 Jews got crucified. So we can't say well, crucifixion and of itself. That's what made his death unique. But it was why he died. And the results of his death, the reason for his death, the result what his death accomplish that was unique, because the reason that he died, and the result of his death is unlike any other death that's ever been experienced in the history of the world, past, present, and future. They say big things come in small packages.
And I wanna show you today how just a few words can be absolutely life changing. Because today, we're not even going to look at an entire verse of scripture. We're gonna look at one half of one verse, and it tells us all we ever need to know about what made Jesus's death so unique, and what made him unlike any other person who has ever lived. So if you'd like to look all with me, I am in a book called First Peter is an easy book to find. Watch this I'm right now in the maps. I'm in the weight and measures, I'm just turning to the left, I'm gonna go about five books. And I'm gonna be First Peter chapter three. And we're answering the question, why should everyone only look to Jesus and look to Jesus only to have a relationship with God? And why is Jesus the only one that can make a relationship like that happen? And a man by the name of Peter helps us to answer that question, cause it's not just in the way he lived, that makes him so unique. It is also why he died. And Peter says, we should look to Jesus and Jesus only to find three things.
Number one, I look to Jesus as my permanent sacrifice, I look to Jesus as my permanent sacrifice. Now, let me just tell you who Peter was, Peter is one of the 12 disciples but he wasn't just one of the 12 he was a part of the inner circle. Jesus had three best buds, Peter, James, and John. So Peter is writing the Scripture, and he's taking us all the way back to the cross. And he says, "I want you to look at the cross in a way you probably haven't thought about it before. I don't want you to see what just happened physically. I want to see what happened spiritually".
So here's what he says. For Christ also suffered once for sins, that Jesus died for sins, as we're gonna see, not just his sins, but our sins. But he didn't die as a martyr. He didn't die just to set an example. He didn't just die just to say, Okay, this is how you die. He died as a sacrifice because even though crucifixion was horrific physical suffering, the real suffering that Jesus experienced, was not in the nails. It was not in the blood that he spilled. It was not in the painful agony. The real suffering was that he died for sins. But the operative word here is that little word once. I'm gonna teach you a little Greek language today because it's kinda of cool I think, the Greek word for the word, once is the word Hapax. We actually use that word in English Some of you may remember, if you studied English Lit, when you were in high school or college, there's a thing called a hapax legomenon.
If you don't know that, that's fine I'm gonna teach you something. There's a thing called hapax legomenon that is a word, or a phrase that is used only one time in a book, or an essay or an article. So when I was taking English Lit, there was a test. And we were told, be reading this article very carefully. There's a word that's only used one time, and I'm gonna ask you what that word is. It was a hapax legomenon it was only used once. Peter said that "when Jesus Christ was sacrificed for our sins, he only did it once. It was the last time anybody had to be sacrificed. It was the final time that a sacrifice ever had to be made".
Now, if you were a Jew, and you read that they were taking your breath away, they would have absolutely been mind-boggling to you. Because in your religion, Jewish people for thousands of years had slaughtered animal after animal after animal. As a matter of fact, millions of animals had been slaughtered day after day after day, week after week after week, month after month after month, year after year after year to atone for the sins of the people during the Passover, they would slaughter 250,000 lambs in one week, one week to try to atone for the sins of the people then Peter comes along and says "You better eat more chicken cause we don't have to kill no more lambs". And the lambs said Amen. Because Peter said, no more sacrifice. This is the sacrifice of all sacrifices, he died the death of all death, because he did something nobody else could do He permanently took care of the world's same problems.
One of the last things Jesus said on the cross was, so if you remember this, he said it is finished right? He said, It is finished. That is one word in the Greek language, it literally means paid in full. Here's what was going on back in the days of Jesus, if you were convicted of a crime, and you were thrown in prison, they would take a piece of paper, and they would nail this piece of paper to the door, listing all the crimes that you had committed, everything you had done, what your punishment was, how long you'd be incarcerated and what penalty you had to pay.
Now once you paid your debt to society, once you finished your term, they would then take that sheet of paper, they write down on that piece of paper that one word that means paid in full. So for the rest of your life, when you went to apply for a job, or you needed someone to help you out or do something for you, if they found out you'd been in jail, they would say to you, Hey, don't worry, paid in full. My debt been totally paid to society. That is the word that we're talking about here. So when Jewish priests were making sacrifices, day after day, go back thousands of years ago, every day, Jewish priests, they work around the clock, they'd be sacrificing at the altar, they'd be burning incense, then the high priests once a year would go into the Holy of Holies. And he would make the sacrifice for sin.
And there was one thing they all had in common. You never sat down with your own duty. Not even for lunch break you always stood up. You never sat down, because your work was never done. You never stop. Then the author of Hebrews comes along and he wrote this, he said, but When this priest that is Jesus had offered for all time, one sacrifice for sins, He sat down at the right hand of God. You don't sit down until the job is done. You don't sit down until the work is finished. And the author of a Hebrew said, you know what, that's exactly why Jesus sat down because once he died on that cross, he made the final payment for our sins. Now why is that such a big deal? Here's what that means cause a lot of people don't get it. We don't have to make any installment payments for our salvation. We don't have to leave a tip. There's no one paid bill. Jesus did not make a down payment for our sin. He was for all paid for all our sin. So we look to Jesus as our permanent sacrifice.
Number two, I look to Jesus as my perfect substitute, not just my permanent sacrifice, my perfect substitute because listen carefully, Jesus died, but he did not die for himself. He died for you. He died for me. He died for all of us. He died for anybody who has ever lived ever will live. So Peter keeps writing for Christ also suffered once for sins by permanent sacrifice, the righteous for the unrighteous my perfect substitute. Now, you've probably don't know this, and you probably never thought about it but can I tell you one big reason why you ought to read this book? Why you wanna look into this book. I don't care whether you believe this book or not. I don't care if you think it's a bunch of fairy tales and myths I don't care if you think it's just a bunch of religious gobbledygook. Let me tell you two reasons why you ought to read this book.
Number one, some of the manuscript some of the words and some this teaching they're 5000 years old they go back 5000 years. But here's the good news for a lot of you, I'll tell you while somebody's gonna start reading this book, cause your egos just big enough when I tell you this, you're gonna go read I'm gonna read that you're in it. You're in this book. As a matter of fact, you are almost named specifically on several occasions, and this is one of them, because this is a verse where you and I could sacrifice our name. Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous, that's Jesus for the unrighteous that's us. So for example, Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for James Merritt. For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for, Teresa Merritt. Christ also died suffered once for sins the righteous far Jim Perry.
So you can just put your name right there, cause we're talking about us. We're talking about you, were talking about me see the unbelievable thing is, Christ suffered for us on the cross He traded places with us, He died for us, He died in our place. Now, some people still don't understand. I don't understand how that all works. So let me just tell you how it works. The reason why we all die is because we're all sinners. And I want you to get this this is important. We think people die because of cancer or they die because of heart failure or they die because of diabetes or they die because they get old. That's not the reason why we die. Those Symptoms that's not the cause the cause of all death is sin as a matter of fact, a prophet by the name of Ezekiel wrote these words, "The one who sins is the one who will die".
So who dies everybody? Why does everybody die? Because we're all sinners. And apostle by the name of Paul wrote these words later, "The wages of sin is death". I used to believe the wages of eating at the is death I was wrong. The wages of gluttony no, the wages of diabetes, no, the wages of heart disease no, the wages of sin is death. Before Adam and Eve sinned, death was impossible. But after Adam and Eve sin, death was inevitable. Why? Because there's only one cause of death and that is sin.
Now, here's the problem. We just said last week that Jesus was sinless. What's it saying is the only cause of death he shouldn't have died? Yet He did. He should have been crucified and yet he was He need not have die because he was innocent of any sin and yet you read the New Testament, he's flogged, He's beaten, He stripped naked. He spat upon, He's nailed to a cross and He's crucified. Raises a big question wait a minute, okay I don't get it follow the logic. Sin is the cause of death. Jesus never sinned, Jesus still died. Well, if death is seen as the cause of death, and Jesus never sin, but yet Jesus still died. There can only be one explanation we're the cause of his death we're the ones that nailed him to that cross.
It wasn't the Jews that crucified Jesus. It wasn't the Romans that crucified Jesus. It wasn't Pharisees that crucified Jesus. It was a that crucified Jesus, we crucified Jesus. Your sin, my sin, our sin, were the ones that crucified Jesus, because the only explanation for his death is he died on our behalf in our place for our sins. He was our substitute. But wait a minute, not just any of substitute will do is not just because he stepped up to the plate said, Well, hey, let me give it a shot. We needed the perfect substitute. All right, I want you to listen. If you've not heard anything else I say, and you don't want to say anything else I say, Listen to this next statement. Only someone without sin can die for sin. Only someone without sin can die for sin. We can die in our sin we can't die for our sin. Only someone without sin can die for sin.
Jesus didn't die because of his sin because he had no sin, He died for our sin. That's why he's called righteous because only the righteous can die for the unrighteous only the just can die for the unjust. Only the sinless can die for the sinful, only the perfect and die for the imperfect. That's why when you read the Gospels, it's kind of interesting when you start reading the Gospels, it's almost like you're going to warp speed for about, two thirds of the book, to pick out any gospel, you want to, you know, Jesus is born and then I mean, just as soon as he's born boy you're off to the races. And He's teaching and He's preaching. He's doing miracles. He's feeding people. He's helping blind people see and deaf people here and Lame people walk and I mean is just like you're going to warp speed and you are cause you're covering three years of his life.
Then you get to the last week, and it's like all four gospel writers just put the brakes on this okay, now we're gonna slow down, we're gonna get off the rocket, we're gonna get on a tricycle. We're gonna quit running. We're just gonna kind of walk through this week and they go into all this detail, and they give us all this information. You ever wonder why they do that? Because the last week of Jesus's life actually focuses on the last three days of his life. It begins with the Lord's Supper, it moves to the crucifixion, then it comes to the resurrection. And Jesus was crucified during Passover. Now, Passover was the biggest holiday festival celebration and the Jewish. It was kind of like their Christmas back in the day, they take a whole week off to celebrate Passover. Passover celebrated back when the Jews were in bondage to Egypt and God parted the Red Sea and they were able to get out of Egypt.
You may remember that God sent a death angel to Egypt. You had to paint the blood on the doorpost, so the death angel would pass over your house. Well, that's the festival every year they would celebrate this Passover. But that's why they would kill all these lambs because you had to have the blood of the Lamb painted on your door. So dear down in the shepherds fields will be there next month, down to the shepherd's fields in Bethlehem. You had these Levitical priests, they had one job. They did it all year long. They raised lambs, and not just ordinary lambs. These were special lambs. They weren't gonna be taken to market. They weren't gonna be sold for clothing. They were not gonna be eating in restaurants. They were raised for one purpose to be sacrificed during Passover. And every lamb had to meet this rigorous test. They had to pass this meticulous inspection before they were deemed worthy of sacrifice.
So there was a battery of priests, they were specially trained to do this. There were a battery of priests and every lamb had to be inspected by these priests. It was almost like an annual physical exam. They take one little lamb, they started at the crown of that lambs head they would go all the way to the soles of his feet. They would look inside of his mouth, they would then through the fleece, they'd be looking for any mark any sore, even like a flea bite. They would survey the hooves, the eyes, they look under the eyelids. They were looking for anything they could find. If they found one flaw, one blemish, one blot, one spot, one scratch, one little bump lamb would be rejected can't use him cause in the eyes of the priest, that lamb had to be absolutely perfect, because God had given his instruction and said, the only lamb worthy of a sacrifice, the only lamb that I will accept must be a totally perfect lamb.
Now you understand what a big deal it was when John the Baptist was hanging out one day with some of Jesus's soon to be disciples. Jesus comes walking by and John the Baptist said guys, "look at that man right there. Behold, the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world". What John was saying was, get a good look at that guy. Cause you've never seen a man like him. You will never know a man like him. You'll never be around a man like him. Because that virgin born baby that came out of Mary's womb, Mary's little lamb was as white as snow. He was a sinless sacrifice. Therefore, I look to Jesus as my perfect substitute. Now, what why is all of that a big deal? Because now we get to the best part I look to Jesus as my permanent sacrifice. I look to Jesus as my perfect substitute. So I look to Jesus as my personal Savior.
Now, why do you and I need a permanent sacrifice? And why do you and I need a perfect substitute? Well, Peter tells us watch this "For Christ also suffered once for sins, permanent sacrifice, the righteous for the unrighteous perfect substitute to bring you to God". Now, let's just see how politically incorrect I can get. You need somebody to bring you to God. I need somebody to bring me to God. You cannot we cannot own our own in our sin, come to God. We cannot get to God by ourselves you know why? Because every time you get to God, you keep bumping into this wall and it's called sin. You keep walking into this barrier called sin. You keep hitting these iron bars, you're called sin and on your own and own bone. You can't just waltz into the presence of God, you can't do it as a matter of fact, that word to bring described someone who has the authority to introduce you to a king or ruler and give you access to him it's an official term.
I've been to London I've been to Buckingham Palace. I've seen the palace it's cool but I can't just walk into the palace and go "Queenie what's happening"? You can't just walk even a day you can't just walk into the office of the king. Or a president, or a ruler number one, you gotta be invited if you want to meet them. Number two, you gotta have access. You've gotta have someone who's has the authority to take you into that person presence. I've told you before that one of the greatest honors I've ever had was when I got to meet with President George W. Bush the week after 9/11. I got a call from the White House on over the weekend. And they said, Hey, we're inviting 26 religious leaders to Washington Thursday, would you be willing to come they've all kinds of religious faith, all kinds of religious leaders, and we're gonna develop... We're gonna write an ecumenical statement on prayer. We'd love you to come be a part of that group. We want you to meet with the President I flew up there and we're gonna all meet with the President in the Roosevelt Room.
So I'm in the Eisenhower building and we're some guys were at the table are drafting the statement on prayer. Tim Goeglein used to work for the White House, kind of the liaison for religious affairs. He comes walking in he says, I need to see the following seven people and of all seven names my name is one of the names Franklin Graham was one the names with me. We walked out we didn't what he wanted so we walked out. You read our names off he knew me met me before and he said that gentlemen the president wants to meet you in the Oval Office. And the only Godly biblical word I could think of words. I'm going to the Oval Office and he said, yeah, so you mean we're really going to go the Oval Office meet the president he said, yeah, we are. And also, wow, that's just unbelievable. So we're walking across the lawn I said, Tim, can I call Theresa my wife's yeah call her.
So I called Theresa said, Honey, you're not gonna believe this I'm gonna meet with the President. So I know you meet with the presidents I said no, no, no. I'm going to the Oval Office. He has called me to the Oval Office to meet him she goes, What have you done? I said, I don't know what I've done. I just know he's calling me I'm gonna meet with him. So we go to the Roosevelt Room, we sit there. Now I did not know we sat there about 40 minutes waiting to meet with the President. I did not know sitting in that Roosevelt Room that if you just walked out the door, turn left and walked about eight feet. You're at Oval Office I didn't know that. I want any more than 15 feet from the president. But I may as well been halfway around the world. Because I could not go out that door on my own unless I wanted a new belly button with a bullet hole in it Or if I wanted to be escorted out in an orange jumpsuit, and you just can't walk out there, it's like, excuse me, I'm going to see the president.
We had to wait until Karl Rove finally walked in and said, "Gentlemen, the President will see you now". And he escorted us into his office. That's the word that Peter is using here. He says you just can't get to God on your own. You don't have the moral authority to go to God on your own. You don't have the spiritual ability to go into the presence of a holy God on your own. Somebody's gotta bring you to Him. And the only one that can do that is a personal savior And the only one that fits that bill is the one who is a permanent sacrifice and a perfect substitute. So Mohammed need not apply And Confucius need not apply and you put any name of any religious leader you want to in there need not apply.
So that leads me to tell you one of the most incredible, true stories I've ever come across in my life that perfectly illustrates what we've been talking about. I didn't even know about this story till about six weeks ago myself, so I want you to do me a favor we're just about done and the master still has about eight rounds to go so just cool your jets. and listen to me. So put your pens down, close your pads up. And might give me a full attention just for a minute. I promise you this will be worth coming to church for. Marcel Sternberger, lived in Long Island, New York. He was originally from Hungary. Every single morning he took the 9:02 he was a creature of habit. He took the 9:02 Long Island Railroad train from his home in Woodside New York, where he would go and catch a Subway into the city where he worked downtown. Clockwork every single day, year after year, he was gonna be on the 9:02 train well on this one particular day, he found out that a friend of his had really kind of gotten really, really sick.
And he wanted to go visit within to see how he was doing. So he decided he would take a later train into the to the subway to catch to go down into the city. So he stayed with his friend for a while, and then he went over to the train station to catch the 12 o'clock train that he had never ever ridden before. When the door open, the car was crowded. There were no seats available anywhere. He thought you have to wait to catch the next train just before the doors closed I mean, just before they closed for some reason. One man jumped out of that train and left one seat available Sternberger jumps into that train just before the door shuts and he sits down on this train.
Sitting next to him was a man in his early 30s. And he was reading of all things a Hungarian newspaper this guy's from Hungary remember, he's reading a Hungarian newspaper so he thought, this man know Hungary and Hungarian. So he said to him in his native Hungarian, would you mind if I also read your paper? We'll the young man was shocked to hear that this man was speaking to him in his native tongue, and they struck up a conversation. And so Sternberger said to this, man, tell me your story. Well, the man said My last name is Paskin. He said I was a during the war I was a law student in Hungary, but the Nazis came, and they forced me into a German labor battalion. But he said and they sent me off to the Ukraine. But he said while I was there, I was captured by the Russians, and they put me to work burying dead German soldiers.
Well, when the war was over, he traveled hundreds of miles by foot back to his hometown of the Debrecen, which is a large city in eastern Hungary. The first apartment he came to was the apartment of his mom and his dad, and I think a brother and a sister, but they were not there so he left there and went on into the straight city to an apartment where he and his wife both lived. She wasn't there either there were just some strangers living there. He said, excuse me said my wife and I, we lived here. And I just wanna know, do you know where she might be? So we don't know who used to live here. We've lived here for a couple of years and we don't know when you think about your wife. So he was just kind of walking around the city while he was walking around the city, he meets some old friends and he says, Hey, so you know, we're so glad to see me. I'm looking for my family I can't find my family.
Well, they began to weep and they told him the sad story that his entire family had been taken by the Germans to Auschwitz which is one of the concentration camps, and they were all dead. But he's just devastated by the news I mean, he's just collapsed. It just his whole world was gone. So he figured that look, there's nothing here for me in Hungary anymore. I don't wanna stay here anymore. So he decided he would immigrate to the United States. We'll he went to Paris he immigrated the United States in October of 1947.
This young man is telling Mr. Sternberger the story while he is telling Mr. Sternberger the story, Sternberger remember that three days before he got on this train he'd been in a cocktail party, and he had met a Hungarian woman who told him she was from the Debrecen she had been sent Auschwitz and she survived because the Germans sent her to work in a German munitions factory. She had been liberated by the Americans and brought to New York on the first boatload of displaced persons in 1946 but she was so lonely. She was all by herself, she didn't know anybody. And she didn't really speak very good English. And Mr. Sternberger was so stirred by her story, that he wrote down her name, her address and phone number on a little piece of paper, so he could invite her to come and visit his family and kind of befriend her a little bit because she was so lonely.
So while this man is telling him the story, he pulls out his wallet because he remembered he had put the paper in his wallet. So he pulls the paper out, where he'd written this lady's name down and on that paper, she'd written down her last name, and her last name was Paskin. He begins to think to himself, could this be this couldn't be more than just a strange coincidence. So he looks at this young man and he said, Sir, I know we've just met I know you don't know me that well and I know you don't have any reason to do this. But I need you to trust me the young man said what do you want me to do? He said, I need you to get off at the next train stop with me just please trust me and do this.
Well, he was reluctant, but he decided to do it. So Mr. Sternberger goes over to a payphone and he tells his friend, he said, would you just please stand over there? I don't want you to hear this conversation he just goes what's going on? He said, Please just stand over there. It may be something it may be nothing. So he gets on the phone and trembling hands he calls this number when she answered, he said Mrs. Paskin she said, Yes. He said, this is Marcel Sternberger. She said, Who? He said, you remember we met a few days ago at a party. Do you remember me? She said, Oh, yes, Mr. Sternberger I remember you. She said, why are you calling? He said would you mind telling me the address of where you live in Debrecen Hungary and she did. He put his hand over the phone and he said, Sir, would you mind giving me the address of the place where you and your wife lived in the Debrecen?
And he said, I will and it was the exact same address where she gave him he then said to the young man, what is your first name? He said, Bela, he said, excuse me. He said, Marya, what was your husband's first name? She said, Bela, why do you ask? He put his hand over the phone he said, Bela, was your wife's first name, Marya and the man began to tremble and he said, Yes. How did you know that? He said, sir, something miraculous is about to happen. I wanna watch it I want you to come here and talk to your wife he said he stepped back and he said they both again to scream into the phone at each other at the same time, calling each other's names. They were weeping hysterically.
Mr. Sternberger put Paskin into a taxi cab gave the taxi cab driver, his wife's address, paid the fare and said goodbye of course later on, they met up and they had a wonderful union and they did live happily ever after. Now you say it was a miracle that man who normally rode the 9:02 train took the 12 o'clock train. Yeah, it was and it was a miracle that he sat next to a man reading a Hungarian newspaper it was. And it was a miracle that three days earlier, he had met a woman named Marya and had written down her name and her address and her phone number and yes, it was. And it was a miracle that the only man on planet Earth, got to bring those two people together. Was on a train he wasn't even supposed to be on.
Well, I got news for you. That is nothing compared to the miracle of when God sent His son, Jesus Christ, who was the only man in the universe, the only man in history, get to take the hands of a sinful person and take the hands of a holy God and join those two together. No miracle like that has ever taken place. And you know why he's the only one that could do it. You know why he's the only one that can do it. You know why he's the only one that will do it. Because He alone is our permanent sacrifice. He alone is our perfect substitute. He alone is our personal Savior. And he alone could trade places with us. So he could bring us to God. And you ask why Jesus 'nuff said.