To Declare a Sinner Righteous

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I want to invite you to take out your Bibles and turn with me to the book of Genesis.
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We're going to be in Genesis chapter 15 today.
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Jack, you haven't made it to chapter 15 yet, have you? It's going to be a few weeks.
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Jack's doing Genesis in his Sunday school class.
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So this will be just a little something for you all to talk about when you get there.
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Well, in the past couple of weeks we have been examining the very unpopular subject of the wrath of God.
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And today is going to be the finality of this series.
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We have noted that there are many who deny that God has the capacity for wrath.
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Some say that believing in a wrathful God is a throwback to a medieval perspective of God which has no place in our modern, sophisticated society.
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Yet we have seen that the wrath of God is purely a biblical teaching.
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Authors from both the Old and the New Testaments speak of God's hatred of sin and His willingness to punish men for it.
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He is even willing to enact the worst conceivable punishment that we could ever imagine, an eternity separated from Him in a place called Hell.
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Now last week, we looked at the subject of the penal substitutionary atonement.
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You remember those words, the penal substitutionary atonement.
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The penalty which sin deserved, which was God's wrath, was borne by a substitute who is Jesus Christ, and it atoned for our sins.
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It propitiated God's wrath.
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It satisfied God's anger against our sins.
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That is all the term means.
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It means the penalty which we deserved, Christ took on Himself and bore it completely when He was on the cross.
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That's the heart of Christian theology, by the way.
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Christ has atoned for our sins.
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He has satisfied the wrath of God for us.
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Anything other than that is not biblical theology, and it's not Christian theology.
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Because that's what the Bible teaches.
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But this leads to another equally compelling and important area of theology, and that is justification.
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Justification is our belief in how a person is made right with God.
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How a sinner is made right with God, which is why today's sermon is entitled to declare a sinner righteous.
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We know that the atonement satisfies God's wrath.
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We know that the atonement is what takes away His anger from us.
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But does that make us right with Him? Okay, He's no longer angry.
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Now what? What's the next step? What else is part of the equation? Is that all? As long as He's not mad at us, we're good? Well, that's half of it.
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Because the result of the atonement is not just that God has been propitiated or satisfied, but also that we have been justified.
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And justified does not simply mean that our sins have been forgiven.
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It means we have been declared something positive.
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It's not just that the negative has been taken away, but something positive has come.
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Sort of like, and this is just an analogy, while Aaron was singing, I had this thought in my brain.
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And I said, you know, I think this is a good picture.
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We all have kids.
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Well, not all of us, but some of us are kids.
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You tell your child, okay, you need to go get a shower and get dressed because we're going out.
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Okay, it's a two part process.
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They've got to get a shower to wash the dirt off.
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But then they've got to get dressed so that they'll be prepared to go out.
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They can't just do half of it.
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Right? I mean, it's a two part process.
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Something's got to come off the dirt and then something's got to come on to be ready.
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Well, that's sort of the same thing.
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And I know that might be a crass and silly analogy, but it's a picture.
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In my mind, I'm thinking we have been washed.
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Our sins have been washed away.
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But something else happened, too.
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We were clothed in something.
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Something was put on us.
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We were made ready.
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And that clothing is the righteousness of Christ.
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And that's the other side that must never be forgotten.
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And that's the justification to be declared righteous.
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To be clothed in righteousness is the subject of today.
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Remember last week I said John Wesley said that the atonement is the most important of Christian doctrines.
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Well, Martin Luther said something else.
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Martin Luther said justification is the very hinge upon which the church stands or falls.
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It's the foundation upon which...
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It's the article, not the hinge, I'm sorry.
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The article upon which the church stands or falls.
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Now who was right? Wesley or Luther? They were both right because the atonement and justification come together and work together.
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And understanding them together is the foundation of our faith.
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Both the atonement and justification are so closely connected that both of their words could be counted as accurate.
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So this morning we're going to look at the subject of justification.
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I'd like for you to stand with me as we read Genesis 15.
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We're going to read verses 1-6 this morning.
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After these things, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision.
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Fear not Abram, I am your shield.
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Your rewards shall be very great.
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But Abram said, O Lord God, what will you give me? For I continue childless.
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And the heir of my house is Eleazar of Damascus.
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And Abram said, Behold, you've given me no offspring.
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And a member of my household will be my heir.
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And behold, the word of the Lord came to him.
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This man shall not be your heir.
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Your very own son shall be your heir.
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And he brought him outside and said, Look toward heaven and number the stars if you're able to number them.
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Then he said, So shall your offspring be.
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And he believed the Lord.
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And he counted it to him as righteousness.
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Our Father and our God, we thank You for Your Word.
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We thank You for this opportunity to study it together as the body of Christ.
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To look at Your Word and to be moved by it.
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And I pray, Lord, that You would keep me in the very center of Your will.
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That You would keep me from error as I preach, as I am certainly capable of error.
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And I pray that You would open the hearts of the people to the truth.
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That through this ministry of the Word, Your name would be glorified and Your people would be edified.
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This is our prayer in Jesus' name.
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Amen.
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And I realize that most of you probably are at least somewhat familiar with the story of Abraham.
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And the situation which surrounded his covenant.
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But some of you may not be.
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So I just want to very quickly remind you of what is happening here in Genesis 15.
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I want to ensure that we all understand.
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Abraham was given a promise by God.
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A covenant was made between God and Abraham.
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In Genesis 12, it says, Now the Lord said to Abram, Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land I will show you.
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And I will make you a great nation.
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And I will bless you and make your name great.
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So that you will be a blessing.
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I will bless those who bless you.
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And him who dishonors you I will curse.
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And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.
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That's the promise of God.
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I'm going to make you a nation.
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And in you all the nations of the world will be blessed.
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And here Abraham is years later, still no child.
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Genesis 15, he still has not had a child.
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God promises him a blessing.
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And it seems like God's not delivering.
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It seems like, well, what's happening here? It's not coming.
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The promise of a great nation, I don't even have one.
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I know people with tons of children.
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I don't even have one.
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I only have Eliezer of Damascus.
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He's not even my child.
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See, at that time in history, a man of wealth, if he didn't have a child, would take from his servant's children an adopted child.
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And that would become his heir.
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And that's where Abraham was.
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He says, I don't even have a child.
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But here's this Eliezer.
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He's the one that's in line.
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If I were to die right now, he's the one that would inherit and become the successor to my authority.
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So Abraham had begun to doubt some.
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And God spoke to him in chapter 15.
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Told him, fear not.
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Don't be afraid.
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I am your shield.
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And your reward shall be great.
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Now, you have to imagine, after years of childlessness, after years of having his wife, who was then barren, is to say, really? My reward shall be great? What does it matter if my reward is great? I have no one to leave it to.
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I have this child of my servant.
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He's going to inherit everything.
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So what of my great reward? Then God said, this man will not be your heir.
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Your heir will be your son.
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And at that moment, the Scripture says something about Abraham that is very valuable to us as believers.
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Because it says in the text, there in verse 6, it says, And he believed the Lord.
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He believed what the Lord said to him.
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He believed his word, his promise.
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And it says, And he counted it to him as righteousness.
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He counted that faith as righteousness.
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Beloved, what does it mean to be justified? Well, it means to be declared righteous.
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That's exactly what the word means.
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It is a legal declaration of righteousness.
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Now, I want to show you, we've seen what happened in chapter 15 of Genesis.
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I want to show you how Paul interprets this for us.
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Because the best interpreter of the Bible is the Bible.
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The Latin term, analogium scriptorum.
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The Bible is its own analogy.
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It's its own interpreter.
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We are to look to the Bible to interpret the Bible.
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And Paul interprets this text for us in a Christian context.
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In Romans chapter 4.
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So, turn with me.
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We understand the story.
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We understand God has said, He has declared him righteous as a result of his faith.
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Now, let's look at what Paul says about that story.
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Romans chapter 4, verse 1.
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Now, to remind you about the book of Romans, which is such a valuable text.
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To remind you about the book of Romans.
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The book of Romans is about our justification before God.
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It starts out in chapter 1, talking about how pagans are sinners.
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And then in chapter 2, it talks about how the Jews are sinners.
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In chapter 3, it culminates in this idea that all are sinners.
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For there is none good, no not one.
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There is none who seeks after God.
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That's the point of Romans.
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If you ever really need to be brought into some level of humility.
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Your pride has gone just too far.
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Read Romans 1 through 3.
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As it will remind you of where you are.
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And where we have come from.
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And then in chapter 4, Paul, knowing that he has to explain to his Jewish and pagan audience.
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That this teaching that he's given does not come from some dark crevice of his own mind.
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But actually has a foundation in scripture.
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He chooses to exegete an Old Testament passage.
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And tell us how it explains that this idea of justification by faith is not a new idea.
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But is the very foundation of the entirety of the Old Testament understanding of how one is made righteous before God.
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And he goes back to the story that we just talked about.
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Romans chapter 4, verse 1.
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What shall we say was gained by Abraham our forefather according to the flesh? Now, just real quick.
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Paul is always at odds with those who try to find their justification in their own works.
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Paul is always at odds with those who would try to find justification in what they do.
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So he asks this question, very important question.
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What was gained by Abraham according to the flesh? What did he do that made him right with God? What did he do that made him righteous? And the answer is in verse 2.
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For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God.
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You see, the point is, had Abraham done anything that would have caused God to declare him righteous? And you might say, well, Abraham did a lot of good things.
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Yes, but those good things did not bring about his justification.
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His faith, not his works, is what resulted in justification.
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That's so important because he said if he had done anything that would have brought about a justification, then he would have had something to boast about.
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He could have said my reason for being righteous before God was because I was willing to take my son up that mountain and sacrifice him.
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That's why I'm justified before God, because I was a good man.
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My righteousness before God was because I went and saved my nephew Lot and fought a battle, a valiant battle.
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And from that valiant battle is why I'm righteous.
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And he could have boasted like many today.
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Why are you going to heaven, sir? Well, I'm going to heaven because I go to church and I give a tithe and I sing songs or I preach sermons or I do this or I do that or I do this.
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No, no, no.
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All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.
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We have to get that to our head, that the true righteousness that we have comes from Christ, not from within us.
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And all that we do that is good is good because Christ has anointed it to be good, not because we are good in and of ourselves.
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So getting back to the text.
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If he had been justified by works, he would have something to boast about, but not before God.
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For what does the Scripture say? Again, Paul appeals to Scripture.
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Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness.
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He quotes Genesis 15 and verse six here in Romans four.
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And he goes on to give an exegesis of that text.
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He says in verse four, now to the one who works, his wages are counted as a gift.
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Wages not counted as a gift, but as his due.
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On Wednesday afternoons, I teach the after school Bible study.
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This last Wednesday, we went over that important verse, Romans 6, 23.
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For the wages of sin.
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Who can figure it? The wages of sin is what? But the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
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We went over that verse and I explained to them what a wage is.
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A wage is something that you earn as a result of something that you do.
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It's your time translated into money.
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That's why we pay people by the hour.
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An hour of your time might be worth $15, $20, whatever.
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And it's translated into money and that's how we earn wages.
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Well, the Bible says the wage that we earn is death.
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Why? Because our sins earn death.
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But the gift of God is eternal life.
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And that's the difference.
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And that's what Paul is explaining here.
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The one who works, his wages are not a gift.
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If you work for your salvation.
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If you work to earn your salvation.
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It could not be called a gift.
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Because if you work for something.
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I know some of you have heard this analogy, but I think it's a good one.
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If at the end of your work week, you've worked 40 hours.
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And you go to the person who writes the checks for your company.
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And the company check writer says, here is your gift.
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You would laugh in their face.
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Because you'd say, that is not a gift.
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That is what I've earned.
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This wasn't a gift.
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I was due that.
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Because that 40 hours translates into that much money.
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And that's what I earned.
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That's why salvation is spoken of as a gift.
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Because we have not earned it.
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It is not the wage.
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It is the gift of God.
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And that's why he says unto the one who works.
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His wages are not a gift, but is due.
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But the one who does not work.
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But believes in him who justifies the ungodly.
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His faith is counted as righteousness.
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Such an important passage.
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Because beloved Paul is telling us here.
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That the one who does work.
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Gets the wage.
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But the one who doesn't work.
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In God's economy.
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But believes in the one who justifies.
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It's him who is counted as righteous.
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Now, I want to make a quick point.
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Paul is not here advocating.
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That we should not do good works.
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He's not saying unto the one who doesn't work.
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And never does anything good.
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He's not saying that.
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The Apostle Paul is saying this.
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The one who trusts in his own works.
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The one who trusts in what he has done.
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Rather than in what Christ has done.
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That is the one.
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That is the one who does not understand justification.
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If we trust in what we have done.
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If we trust in ourselves.
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For salvation.
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We have placed our faith in the wrong place.
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And people do it all the time.
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I guess, in a sense, we all do it at times.
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Because there's times when we all feel like.
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Well, I wonder if I'm saved.
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Because I wonder if I'm good enough.
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And that very question.
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Is built on the predication.
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That you in some way are going to be good enough.
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And you're not.
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Do I do enough works? No, you don't.
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And you never will.
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Do enough.
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Does that mean that we should not seek after righteousness? No, the Bible says that we seek the kingdom of God.
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And His righteousness.
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That's our goal.
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In the weeks to come.
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I'm going to be preaching on the Sermon on the Mount.
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Something I've been nervous about for a long time.
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Byron knows because I've talked to him about this.
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And I've not wanted to do it.
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Because there is no more place in all of written history.
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Wherein the righteousness that we are called to.
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Is displayed with such clarity.
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And will drive us to our knees.
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And we will be more righteous than the Sermon on the Mount.
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Because it tells us.
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Just how much God has called us to.
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What real righteousness is.
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It's fearful to me to preach such a thing.
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But it's fearful for me also not to.
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So, it's got to go with what God calls you to do.
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If it's to preach it, you preach it.
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And it's there.
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So it deserves to be preached.
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But the reality is.
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Even in the Sermon on the Mount.
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Even all those things that we're called to do.
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It's never that righteousness.
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It's never our individual righteousness.
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Which will bring about our justification.
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Because it cannot do so.
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The meat of the entire situation is this.
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Justification is God declaring us righteous before Him.
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God called Abraham righteous.
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God calls you righteous.
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He declares you righteous.
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And some people have even said.
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Well, God shouldn't do that.
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God can't do that.
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Because if the sinner is guilty.
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And God calls him righteous.
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Then God is lying.
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In fact, there are some.
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Who deny these teachings.
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And they say that this is fiction.
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It's not true.
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That's legal fiction.
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If God were to take somebody who's guilty.
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And call them righteous.
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Then God's a liar.
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Honestly, Roman Catholics do not teach this.
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They do not teach the penal substitution or atonement.
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They do not teach justification by faith.
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And they say Protestants make God a liar.
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How do we respond? The reason why God can call a sinner righteous.
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Is because God has taken the sin of that sinner.
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He has applied their sin to a substitute.
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And He has taken the righteousness of the only righteous one who has ever lived.
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And applied it to them.
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Thus it is not a legal fiction.
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But it is a spiritual reality.
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That my ledger which was deep in the crimson of my own sin.
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Has been washed white as snow.
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And that crimson has been placed on the sun.
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And He holds it.
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It is nailed to the cross as the Bible says.
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And His righteousness fills my ledger full.
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The substitute was righteous.
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And that is why God can call me righteous.
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Because He was righteous in my place.
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Those who believe in Christ by faith.
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Have had the substitution for their sins.
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And are declared righteous before God.
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I want to share with you three things this morning.
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Very quickly.
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Just by way of reminder.
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So if you are taking notes you may want to write these down.
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Number one is the grounds of our justification.
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The grounds of our justification, is the righteousness of Christ.
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The grounds of our justification is the righteousness of Christ.
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Number two the.
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The confidence of our justification is faith in Christ.
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And 3.
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The results of our justification is Christ's honouring works.
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So again, the grounds of our justification is the righteousness of Christ.
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The confidence of our justification is faith in him.
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And the result of our justification is Christ honoring works.
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So let's look at number one very quickly, the grounds of our justification.
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We've already said this.
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I've said it multiple times today, and I will say it till my dying breath.
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We are justified not by our own goodness, but by the work of Christ.
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And what gets me is this belief and this truth.
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It's something that historically people shouted and were excited about.
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And anymore, it seems that people don't even talk about it.
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But it's such an important thing to think about some of the songs, some of the hymns, the solid rock that we do solid rock today.
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We did.
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You know, that's great because it was in my notes and I don't think I told her.
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So God is at work there.
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But what does it say when he shall come with trumpet sound? Oh, may I then in him be found dressed in what? His righteousness alone.
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Faultless to stand before.
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See, the writer of that hymn understood this doctrine of justification.
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He understood that when he stands before God, he has to stand dressed in someone else's righteousness.
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Dressed in his righteousness alone.
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There are other hymns.
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I don't know if Byron will probably know some of these, but some of these I've never heard of, but they are so great and they're good stuff.
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And I only tease Byron because he he knows so many songs that he pulls out sometimes and I've never heard of the great songs, but not heard of these.
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We trust in you, our shield.
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You know, it says this is we trust in you, captain of our salvation in your dear name.
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All other names above Jesus, our righteousness, our sure foundation.
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Our prince of glory and our king of love, our righteousness is who is Christ? Oh, mystery of love divine.
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I think some of you may know that one.
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Our load of sin and misery didst thou the sinless bear thy spotless robe of purity.
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Do we the sinner wear? That's what we have on.
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It's the robe of Christ's righteousness, thy works, not mine, O Christ, by Isaac Watts, thy righteousness, O Christ alone can cover me.
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No righteousness avails except that which is of thee.
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There is no righteousness except for the righteousness which comes from Christ.
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You see, these ancient these these hymn writers, they knew their theology.
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They knew and they proclaimed it through their songs.
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The same thing that the Bible says, for our sake, God made him who knew no sin to become sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of God in him.
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This is the truth of the word.
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That Christ is our righteousness, as John Piper has said, what God required, Christ supplied.
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What God required, Christ supplied, God requires righteousness, we don't have it, we're broke when it comes to righteousness.
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We're totally full of sin.
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Christ takes the sin and he gives us his righteousness.
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And that divine transaction brings about our justification before him.
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Moving on to number two, the confidence of our salvation, faith in Christ.
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Christ's righteousness is all that can save us.
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But how do we know that we have it? How do we know that we have the righteousness of Christ? By faith in the promises of God.
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It is by faith in the promises of God.
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And the Old Testament, the Old Testament, and people get real confused about this.
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I don't understand why it's so confusing.
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People say, how do people in the Old Testament get saved? Same way that people in the New Testament get saved by faith in God's promises, which ultimately has its fulfillment in the work of Christ.
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Because somebody says, well, how would an Old Testament person know about Christ? Well, they know God's promises are being given to them.
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They have all these symbols of Christ which symbolize those promises.
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They have the lambs that are sacrificed.
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They have the animals that are sacrificed.
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They have Noah's Ark, which was a picture of Christ.
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They have all of these promises given to them.
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And by faith in those promises, it is a reminder to them that God has saved them in which the ultimate fulfillment was in the coming of his son, by which the past sins of those in the past were nailed to the cross the same way the sins of the future were nailed to the cross.
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Every sin upon him was laid on the cross.
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So it is by faith that we know that we're saved.
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It is by faith that we have confidence.
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Faith is not something we do to get saved, by the way.
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So throw that out there.
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Faith is not a work.
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And Paul makes a great much of his writing to point out the fact that some people have made it a work.
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They'll say, well, all you have to do is believe to get saved or all you have to do.
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They've changed it.
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It used to be that.
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Now it's this.
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Heard it last night, I was at a party with a group of people and there were some Christians there and they were talking.
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All you got to do is ask Jesus into your heart.
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First of all, that language you will never hear come out of my mouth.
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It's not biblical language, and I understand that some of you try to explain your children and maybe that's the way that you've used it.
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But let me let me let me give you something biblical rather than telling someone to ask Jesus to come into their heart.
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They need to repent of their sins and trust the Savior.
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That's how we know that we have salvation.
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It's not how we get saved.
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We get saved by his work.
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But we know we are saved when we have repented and trusted him, because that's the only way.
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And it's not a work.
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And that's valuable to understand that it's not something we're doing.
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It's something we're receiving.
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And even by then, it is receiving because God has given it to us.
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Very important little demarcation there.
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And finally, what is the result of all of this Christ honoring works? The result of justification is Christ honoring works.
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Turn to Ephesians 2 and we'll end here.
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And some of you guys who've been around me for a while, you've heard me talk about this before.
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But again, I cannot help but preach the truth and justification.
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I remember years ago.
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I'm not too old, so it wasn't too many years ago, but I'm starting to get longer back.
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When I say years ago, I have friends that I've had for 20 years and now that's awesome, isn't it? I know some of you are like, I have shoes that are 20 years old, but but I remember years ago.
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There's a young man that I was dear friends with and haven't talked to in years, but I would imagine we'd still be friends if you would ask him.
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But he lives out of state and we had a much different view of theology, especially a different view of justification.
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And he did not believe in justification by faith alone, sola fide, which again, Luther said, this is the article upon which the church stands or falls.
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And he just kept, you've got to do works.
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You've got to do James 2, man.
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James 2 talks about works and how works relate to our righteousness.
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And it does.
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But you have to understand James 2 in light of the whole of Scripture.
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James 2 by itself, it will confuse you without the light of all of Scripture, because James 2 does tell us that our works demonstrate that our faith is real.
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And if we do not have the good works, our faith is dead, which means it's not alive, which means it's not there.
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But I think the best place and this is the place I would always go to with him, because I think the place in the Bible, which is so clear about how salvation operates is why I'm talking about it so many times in Ephesians 2, 8 through 10.
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The operational aspect of salvation is found here for by grace, are you saved through faith? And that is not of yourselves.
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And the word that this is where he and I used to have this debate, actually, in this translation.
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And this is not your own doing.
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The word this was always the great debate, because he would say that this refers only to grace, that grace is not your doing, but faith is your participation.
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He would say by grace, you've been saved through faith and this is not your own doing.
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And he would say, well, this is only talking about grace, not the faith.
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That's your participation.
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Linguistically, he is an error because in the Greek, the this refers to all of that which is proceeding, including the grace and the faith.
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It is all of God and none of your doing.
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And that is why it says that this is not of your own doing.
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Grace comes from God and a grace enables us to believe thus grace and faith are a gift of him.
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And then it goes on to say it is a gift of God, not a result of works so that no one may boast.
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But.
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Verse 10 must never be left out.
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And this is the part I always try to point into, I say, because verse 10 is for we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works.
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You see, that's what we're created for.
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We were dead in our trespasses and sins.
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We were living as the world does and we were living in shameful sin.
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But God saved us.
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He, by his grace, brought us to new life and regeneration and gave us the gift of faith so that what we could continue to live in sin.
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You know, such a thing is repugnant.
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And Paul says so in Romans six.
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What shall we say? So we continue to sin so that grace may abound.
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Certainly not.
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What do we do then? We are saved for good works because God has prepared beforehand these which we should walk in.
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He's already prepared them for us.
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He has a mission for us to do.
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Our justification does not end with praying and asking for forgiveness and repentance.
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It starts there.
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And that is where we begin our life in Christ to do those works which are pleasing to him, knowing that not one of those works brings about our righteousness because we've already been declared righteous.
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But those works are done because that's what God has called us to do.
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Beloved, there are many views of justification out there.
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There are many views of justification, but only one which is biblical.
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The universalist believes that everyone is justified.
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I call universalism justification by death, because that's what they believe.
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When you die, you're justified.
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You go to heaven.
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The Bible knows not of such a thing.
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The legalist believes you're justified by works, you're justified by what you do.
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And that's the majority of the world.
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Because if you ask me, are you going to heaven? They will say, yeah, I'm going to heaven.
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Why are you going to heaven? Because I'm a good person.
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That person is a legalist, doesn't realize it because they believe that somehow their works are going to merit in heaven.
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You have the religionist or what we call sacerdotalism, kind of a big word.
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The person who believes that their work within the church will garner God's grace and mercy.
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This is what we see in Roman Catholicism a lot, because you have to do this.
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You have to participate in the sacraments and you have to receive absolution from the priest.
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You have to do these things through the church and that itself, too, is unbiblical.
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The Bible says that justification does not come in death.
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Universalism is wrong.
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Justification does not come from works.
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Legalism is wrong.
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Justification does not come to the church.
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Sacerdotalism is wrong.
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The Bible says justification is in Christ alone.
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So how does one know he or she is saved? If we died tonight? I know you've heard this before, but seriously, if you died tonight, you stood before God and he asked you, why should you come into my heaven? Why should you be allowed into my heaven? Well, the universalist would say everybody's good and I'm good.
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I'm in everybody.
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So everybody's going to heaven.
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I'm we're all going to heaven.
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The legalist would say, I'm a good person.
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And the sacerdotalist would say, well, I went to church every Sunday.
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But the person who is right with God will say, I don't deserve to go into your heaven.
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So I trust fully in Christ.
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Why should you go to heaven? Christ and Christ alone, Christ and nothing else.
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No other reason but Christ.
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Any other way is insufficient.
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You cannot add to his work.
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Christ alone is our righteousness.
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And the Bible says, and there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.
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Salvation is in Christ alone.
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That's right.
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Our Father and our God, we thank you for your word.
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We thank you that we've had this opportunity to hear your word preached.
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And I pray that it has been beneficial to your people, Lord, and that you've used it to encourage the believer and convict anyone here who might be an unbeliever.
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And I pray, Lord, that you'll use this time of singing now to remind us that salvation is in Christ alone.
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In him, our hope is found and he is our light, our strength and our song.
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We thank you, Lord, in Jesus name.
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Amen.
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Let's stand together and sing.
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If you have a need for prayer, please come.