Lessons From the Book of Romans (06/10/2001) | NOTE: Incomplete tape

Salvation as Justification, Peace, Access, and Hope

You know, sometimes, especially around here, we study verse by verse, word by word. Sometimes it seems comma by comma. And today I'd like to get more of an overview of a certain portion of the scriptures because it's very meaningful if we see the big picture on this one.

So we're going to kind of fly over Romans chapter 5, 6, 7, 8 and look down at all of it where we can see the whole thing at once this morning, I mean this afternoon. And then we'll be praying about which book we're going to go to for Sunday evenings.

Let's have a word of prayer and we'll begin. Father, we do pray for Travis now. We thank you that the surgery went well. We pray that you would strengthen his body, that he would heal quickly. We pray for Jenny, that we would be able to find out what is wrong with her and that you would heal her and bring her back to full strength.

And Lord, we thank you for this Bible study that we have this afternoon. We ask you to bless it, that we might rejoice in the great salvation. And we pray in Jesus' name, amen. Romans chapter 5 talks about salvation.

Romans chapter 6 talks about the power of salvation, the delivering power. Romans chapter 7, at least to me, the gist of it is the weakness of the law and the flesh. And I'll show you what I mean by that as we get to it.

And then Romans chapter 8 is the power of walking in the spirit. So that's kind of the overview. Let's look at a couple of things about salvation. In Romans chapter 5, let's start with verse 1. And we're going to see four things that salvation is.

And then right after that, we're going to see some things about how it works. In other words, God has revealed to us how he has saved us. But first let's look at what it is. Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom also we have access by faith into his grace, wherein we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

Now, in that little short passage, we see four different aspects to salvation. Look at the word justified, therefore being justified. Notice that that's in the passive. It's something that's done to us, it's not something we can do.

Justified by faith, who can give me a good definition for what it means to be justified? Excuse me? At one with God, that's very good. Just as if I'd never sinned, and that's a good definition in a nutshell, because what it is, when God justifies a person, then God looks at that person as if he's never sinned and never will sin.

He's sinless. He's made just or right in the eyes of God. And that is probably not first in importance necessarily, but certainly first as we study salvation. We studied in sequence. It actually happens all at once, but we studied in sequence because we're in time and God teaches it to us that way.

So that'd be kind of the first. When a Baptist says, I got saved, he means I got justified. Because saved is a thing that's still happening and will happen until the day we're glorified. And I suppose you could say it happens for all eternity.

He keeps us saved. He won't let us go. And if it were up to us, we might lose it, wouldn't we? We would probably, we would, but he doesn't let us because he's the one that has the power and he's the one who justified us and made it as if we have never sinned.

And that's by faith. Now we're going to get to a verse in just very shortly here that's going to give us what I think is one of the best definitions of faith in the whole Bible. What kind of faith it is that you have to have in order to be justified.

But now let's go to the second thing we get. That's a part of salvation. Do you see the word peace? You might want to circle that in verse one, peace. The doctrinal word for that might be called propitiation because God is propitiated.

And so then we have peace with God. Reconciliation has to do with peace from our side. Propitiation is from God's side. Propitiation means that God had to be satisfied that his law was righteously enforced.

And Isaiah chapter 53 is all about propitiation. It says that Jesus suffered for us and that God was satisfied. And that's propitiation. So we have peace with God. Now look at this. I love this word in verse two.

Look at the word access. You might want to circle that word. Lost people don't know this and they don't have a sense of it, but they have no access to God. And when you get saved for the first time in your life, you have access to God.

Access is unbelievable. The Old Testament saint did not have access because only once a year could only one of them, the high priest, go before the throne of God and have access to God. And he could only do that once a year.

And think about that. And they were happy with what they had, but they didn't know any different. We look back at that and say, man, that's not hardly a walk. And yet we have people today who want to bring us back into the law.

Well, listen, that's not anything like what we have. In fact, we'll see a little bit the weakness of the law, but we have access moment by moment all the time to the Father, by Jesus Christ, and in Jesus Christ, to the first party.

What is it that Job called him, the daisman? Oh, that I had one who would come between me and God, and he did have one. He just was learning about it. And so we gain access because of Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ.

And then the last, the fourth thing that I see here is this rejoicing in hope. So we have a joyful hope. And remember always that the Bible word for hope doesn't have anything to do with what the modern English word means.

The modern English word means I hope I get it, but I probably won't. But the Bible word means joyful expectation of a certain event in the future. So we have this hope only once we're saved. A lost person has no hope.

He's without hope. He's without God in the world, the Bible says. So we see what salvation is there, right at the very first of this passage, as it gives us four great points of salvation. Now it begins to tell us a little bit about how salvation works.

How is it that God saves us? Look down at verse six. No, I'm sorry. Look at verse. I want to look at verse five first. Verse five and hope maketh not ashamed because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, which is given unto us.

And I just added this. I didn't really have this in my notes until this morning when I was looking over this. This is added to the four points of salvation. This joy or this hope of glory, we see down here in verse five that one of the great outstanding things about it is where it says hope maketh not ashamed.

I think a lot of people misunderstand that phrase. What this phrase means is that there will never be a possibility of us ever being ashamed of God. If you lost your salvation, you could be ashamed because God didn't come through.

He didn't keep his word to you. But this says you will never be ashamed of your salvation. The promises of God are sure. Now some of them are conditional. And where we meet the conditions, then the promises can take place if they're conditional.

Some of them are non-conditional. But the point is a saved person will never have to be ashamed. God will take him through this life. He will cause him to grow. He will bring tribulation when necessary to cause the growth.

He'll bring chastisement when necessary, as Brother Russell taught this week out of the book of James. Now let's go into verse 6 and verse 8. Let's start talking about how salvation works. I think the most important little word in the Bible about salvation is the word for.

F-O-R. Look at verse 6. For when we were yet without strength in due time, Christ died for the ungodly. And look at verse 8. That God commendeth his love toward us and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

Who is the us? That's the sheep. Now if you had a Jewish friend that you wanted to witness to, since they don't take a great deal of confidence in the New Testament, go look at Isaiah 53 for a moment and you'll see this same word for again and again and again.

And this speaks of the substitutionary death of Jesus Christ. The finished work of Jesus Christ. That work which we could never have done, that only he can do. And then when he does it, it is complete and finished and you cannot add to it.

There's nothing that can be added to it. Isaiah 53 starts off by saying who's going to believe our report? The Jews have a problem with this in believing that this is true, but it goes in and talks about the Lord Jesus Christ all through this entire chapter.

Verse 3 says he is despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief. But starting with verse 4, we start to see this word for either written out or implied. Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.

Yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted. But he was wounded. Now look at the word for, for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace was upon him and with his stripes we are healed.

All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way and the Lord has laid upon him the iniquity of us. Isn't that amazing? He's laid upon him the iniquity of us. So we go back into Romans chapter 5 and we see what it means now when it says Christ died for us.

So this word for speaks of a Bible doctrine called the doctrine of imputation and you only have to go back a few verses from chapter 5 to find it very clearly taught in chapter 4. This whole chapter for the great part is about this doctrine of imputation.

Look at chapter 4 verse 3. For what sayeth the scripture, Abraham believed God and it was counted unto him for righteousness. Imputation is an accounting term. It's where God takes something out of someone's account, puts it in another.

And what it says right here is that God, that Abraham believed and God counted it to him for righteousness. It doesn't say Abraham was righteous experientially. It says God counted him to be righteous because of his faith.

Now what's amazing is God had given him the faith. So God gave him the faith and then because he had the faith, he counts him as righteous. And this is all of God. Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace.

So if somebody tries to be saved by keeping the law, then there's no grace involved there but of debt. But to him that worketh not but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.

And that's what imputation means. God takes the very faith of Jesus and the very righteousness and purity and goodness of the Lord Jesus and he places that upon the believer. Now before that happens, or at least the way we think of it, to me it all happens at once, but the way we teach it and think of it is that before that happened, he took our sins back and placed them in Christ while he was on the tree.

And that's imputation. You see, he took our sins, placed them on Jesus, and made him to be sin for us who knew no sin. Now let me ask you a question if you hadn't thought about this in a while. But when Jesus was on that cross and he said, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

Was he really a sinner? No. Did God see him as a sinner? Yes. And it's like I asked the young people, so what's more important, what you are or how God sees you? He saw him as a sinner, therefore he killed him.

There's no man that could have killed him. And if you read Isaiah 53 very carefully, it says again and again, the Lord put him to grief. The Father is the one who did this. Why? Because he looked down at him and he saw him with you in him and he killed you and me.

He looked down and he saw you. He saw every sin you've ever done and he saw you in Christ and he killed you. He saw Christ as if he had your sins. Now why did he do that? He did that so that once you're saved, he can now look at you and see Christ.

Let me ask you this. Are you really perfect? But does God see you as if you're sinless and perfect? Yes. So what's more important, how you really are or how he sees you? How he sees you is the difference between hell and heaven.

And this is imputation. It's an accounting process. God simply took every sin you would ever do away from your account and put it in Jesus's and killed him for it. He paid the price for sin. And he took every bit of righteousness and goodness and purity and everything that pleases the father from Jesus and placed that within you at your point of salvation.

And in reality, from God's viewpoint, it all happened at one time. In our viewpoint, you can see a sequence. You can see almost 2 ,000 years in between the time when your sins were on his body and when his righteousness came to you.

But in God's mind, it all happened at once. So when he sees you, he sees you as if you're righteous and that's what justified means. There could be no justification without this doctrine of imputation.

And the doctrine of imputation is spoken of all through chapter four. Look at verse 11, and he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith, which he had yet being uncircumcised, that he might be the father of all them that believe.

In other words, Abraham received this before he was circumcised. So it's not just for the Jews. It's for all who believe. And verse 16 says, therefore, it is a faith that it might be by grace to the end that the promise might be sure to all the seed, not to that only, which is of the law, but to that also, which is of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all.

Notice it makes a distinction between the law and the faith. And that's what we'll talk about when we start talking about dispensations when we're interpreting the Bible, dispensations. There's a difference between the law dispensation and the grace dispensation.

The truth is in the law dispensation, there was the grace of God or no one would have been saved in the grace. There is the law of God. So it doesn't mean you don't have both, but it's just a different system or a different way in which God deals with men.

And we'll see that very clearly. We know that very clearly. We have it far greater. We have access to God every moment. They had it. They did not have that. So there are many differences, many dispensational differences between the law and the church age that we live in now.

Well look at verses 20 and following. He staggered not at the promise. Now you're about to see the greatest definition of faith. He Abraham staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, giving glory to God.

And here's your definition and being fully persuaded that what God had promised God was able to perform. That's what faith is. Faith is believing that God does what he says he will do. Now only God can give you that because the natural man doesn't believe anything about God.

But when God gives you faith, what he does is he gives you a belief that he does what he says he'll do. Now you think about it. Is it really all that easy? Do you think if you walked up to a natural man out on the street today and you told him this, you'd say, look, let me draw you a picture.

I'm going to play like you're lost for a minute first. I'm going to draw you a picture. Play like this is your timeline right here. Okay? He's lost. And right down here is where time started. God made everything.

Look at that. Way back. God made everything. You come down here in time and right here at the focus of time is the cross of Jesus Christ. And you see God's up here. He's not bound by time. He didn't comprehend that.

He just didn't believe it. He didn't know anything about it. But I'm showing you. So God's up here. And he can look down and he can see the beginning of all things. He can see the cross. But he can look out to see you.

Here you are in this little spot right here on the timeline. This is a black spot. He discovers it's him. You're an enemy of God. He doesn't believe that either. But here you are. So what God wants to do is he's going to take all of your sins and place them on Jesus even though he didn't do anything.

And he's going to make him to be sin and see him as a sinner and kill him to pay for your sins. Then he's going to take Jesus' righteousness and goodness and put that on you so when he looks at you, you're perfect and you get to go and have that great time.

It's told in the gospel but you can't believe that. And it's nonsense. It's foolishness. But to everybody sitting in this room just a few minutes ago when I told it the first time, it was power. You're saying, yeah, that's what happened.

It's awesome. That's why the second he does get saved, if he does, the second he gets saved, all of a sudden he says, well, that's so strange. He says, I just felt this great burden taken off my shoulders.

He doesn't know why. But it's because there is a time warp where he doesn't even realize it. But those sins were already on the body of Christ 2 ,000 years ago. And when he gets at the moment of salvation, he feels the weight removed.

Isn't that amazing? And that's imputation. And it's really a remarkable doctrine. And you look on down here. See verse 21 where it says in being fully persuaded that what he had promised he was able to perform, that's the faith.

And look at verse 22. And therefore, therefore, it was imputed to him as or for righteousness. I mean, it's not anything Abraham did. That's why this natural man down here named Virg can't believe it.

Virg, if he's not saved, you know, he's sitting there thinking, well, that's not fair. I'm a bad guy. I haven't done anything good. Why would God save me? And he's trying to figure all out how he can save himself by building a stairway to heaven and climbing it and being very religious.

And he, right now in his life, he's not wanting to be religious, you know. And that's how he's thinking. And that's why he'll reject it. And the only way he can possibly be saved is if God just turns that light on like he did Paul on that road, like he did the rest of us.

And all of a sudden, he sees it wasn't anything I could have done anyway. God imputed it to me for righteousness. And he, fortunately, also imputed my sins to Jesus. And they're all gone. They've been crucified.

Imputation, perhaps the deepest aspect of salvation as far as the workings of it. Now, this key word over back into Romans 5, verses 6 and 8 is the word for. I mean, that's the smallest word you can bring it down to, this doctrine of imputation, he died for me.

And there it is. Now, as we go on and reread a little bit in chapter 5, verse 9, starts talking about some other aspects of salvation. Much more than being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him.

Or if when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his son. So now we see two other things in addition to justification. Well, one other thing, we see this idea of reconciliation. We were brought into a right relationship with God, but it's by the death of his son.

In fact, justification is by his blood. So it's also by the death of his son. Now, what's fascinating is in verses 9 and 10, if you look at the A part of them, the first part, the first half of both those verses, 9 and 10, you will see something that has happened because of the finished work of Jesus Christ.

Think about it. On the cross, his blood was shed and so you got justification. First part of verse 10, his blood was shed, so you had a possibility of having a right relationship with God, a reconciliation.

But at part B of both verses, you see something that is not the finished work of Christ. You see something that has to do with his present work in the heavenlies on your behalf as your advocate and your intercessor.

Isn't that beautiful? Look at verse 9. The second half, it says, we shall be saved from wrath through him. Through is a kind of a living, working, present tense kind of a word. And in verse 10, the last part says, yes, it is true that we're reconciled by his death, but much more being reconciled.

We shall be saved by his life. So we see the present work of Jesus at the last part of both those verses. The first part, we see the finished work. It takes both for salvation. And so we start to see he's showing us how he saves us.

And it's by him. It is by his blood. It is by his death. It is as he died for us. And it as he lives for us and intercedes for us. It is all Jesus, all Jesus, all Jesus. And none of us. And you go down, it kind of sums it all up right towards the end of the chapter there in verse 18, verse 16.

Look at all the different places that you see the word free gift. Look all the way back at verse 15, free gift. Towards the end of verse 15, gift. The first of verse 16, gift. The middle of verse 16, free gift.

Towards the middle of verse 17, the gift of righteousness. The end of verse 18, the free gift. 19, as by one man's disobedience, many are made sinners. So by the obedience of one, shall many be made to be righteous.

How beautiful that is. Why is it free? Because it's all of him. We don't do anything to get it. And there is a great glimpse of the doctrine of salvation. Now, if what you're talking about is justification, I got saved.

I mean, verse 5 really explains it. But now you go into verse 6. Here's a part of salvation that's left off entirely by the modern church. And that's the aspect of deliverance. It's left out. Today what's taught in the churches is be saved by faith.

Pray a little prayer. And you just talk about, I got saved. And everybody says, when and where? Well, I got saved back, you know, back in 1978. My car driving on the Mahia Road. It wasn't the Damascus Road.

It was on the road to Mahia that I got saved. Boy, isn't that great? And I'm not going to talk any bit about how God saved me yesterday. Or what God took me through today. Because I hadn't been walking with him lately.

And that's the modern salvation. There is no deliverance from the power of sin today. It's just like I got saved. In other words, I got delivered from hell. And I'm going to go to heaven someday. But right now I'm living for hell.

That doesn't make sense. Because what's happening is we're leaving out all of chapter 6 of Romans. Look how it starts. In verse 3. Know ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?

Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death. That like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father. Even so, we also should walk in newness of life. This whole chapter then talks about walking in newness of life.

It talks about the old man was crucified. His past tense. He's dead. Have you ever stopped to think about this? Look back here at chapter 5 again. I'm sorry. Chapter 4. And look at verse 21. What is belief?

I am fully persuaded that he, what he promised, he is able to perform. Now, look at chapter 6 and verse 6. Knowing this, that our old man is crucified. What did God just tell you? He's telling you your old man is already dead.

Do you believe this? If you don't, you're not walking in faith. Do you believe if Satan comes and says, do you feel those urges from your flesh? And then all of a sudden you feel them? Do you really, you know, if the flesh is dead, how are you feeling that?

Because you're believing Satan. You're believing a lie. You see, but faith is, I am fully persuaded that what he promised, he's able to perform. He's promised me that my flesh has been crucified already.

With Christ almost 2 ,000 years ago. If I choose to believe that this afternoon, I will not sin. If I choose not to believe it, I will sin because I'll be walking in the flesh. Now, the only way you can walk in the flesh is to believe it's alive.

And to do that, you have to believe a lie from the enemy. Think about it. It's the truth. It's the only way this can work. And so it's the total opposite of faith. We're not believing that God is able to perform what he promised.

We're not believing that the operation of God had to do with killing our flesh so that we might walk in newness of life. And we're not believing that, so we walk in the flesh. We walk in, it's just as magical as Pharaoh's magicians when they made their rods turn into snakes.

It's just as magical when you walk in the flesh. You think about it, it's just you're practicing magic. You're believing the wicked one, the father of lies. And you're not believing that God is able to perform what he has already performed, in fact, the crucifixion of your flesh in Christ.

Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. Do you believe this? For he that is dead is free from sin. This is what we call deliverance.

You don't have to sin. The only way you can sin is to not have faith and to believe Satan rather than God. For if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him. What is living other than being connected with him?

And if you're connected, you're living abundant life because you're not sinning. And if you sin, James says, you've just severed that connection. And so then you walk and you're in the flesh and you have a death life.

But verse 9 says, knowing that Christ being raised from the dead, dieth no more, death hath no more dominion over him. For in that he died, he died unto sin once. But in that he liveth, he liveth unto God.

Likewise, reckon, this is the faith word. God's already said it's true. God has said your flesh is dead. Verse 11 says, have faith in it, reckon it to be true. Likewise, reckon you also yourselves to be dead.

Indeed, that means in fact. That means this is real. We're not talking hocus pocus here. We're talking about a fact that God said is real. Your flesh, your old man. And I'm talking about the fleshly principle.

I'm not talking about your actual body, but the fleshly principle that dwells in your body. It is dead. Reckon it to be dead. Indeed, unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body that you should obey it.

In the lust thereof, neither yield your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin, but yield yourselves unto God as those that are alive from the dead. I did this with the young people. What if we, let's take, well, Virge left.

So I can really pick on him now. Let's play like we just lay Virge out here and we kill him, okay? Mary would probably like to do that every once in a while. So we lay him out here and we just absolutely, we kill him.

And he stops breathing. And his heart stops beating and stays stopped like Rocky used to say for three seconds. He's out of here. Okay? Now we're going to bring a great, Miss B's going to bring the biggest, whatever brother O just said, is the best pie she knows how to bake.

She's going to bring it down here, hey Virge, she's going to pinch it. You think it works? Why? He's dead. You could go get the Longview Rockettes or whatever those things, the kicking girls were called.

He used to be at all the football games and prance them all right by. Virge isn't even going to look at him. He's dead. Now look at this. The Bible says, neither yield your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin but yield yourselves unto God as those that are alive from the dead.

Now when Virge dies, if he dies before the rapture, then the Bible teaches us that body laying there is not him anyway that he gets a new body and he's with the Lord instantly. Now if he came back that way and he's looking down and he's seeing the old carcass over here and he's standing over here, those things still wouldn't tempt him because he's not bound by that old flesh principle.

It's dead. And that's what this says. We are alive from the dead. We have already died. Now we're alive from the dead. Nothing can tempt us. Do you believe that? Well, if you do, you won't sin. If you don't, you will.

It's a matter of faith. Isn't it amazing? Just as we're saved by faith, we must walk by faith. Verse 14, For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under the law, but under grace. Now, it goes on and continues to talk about this a little bit but let's go into chapter 7 just for a moment.

You see that teaches, verse 5 teaches salvation and how it works. Verse 6 teaches the power, the delivering power of salvation in this life and how that works and how it's just as much a real part of salvation as saying, I got saved.

I should still be being saved. I'm saved by faith today because as I walk by faith I am dead. My old flesh principle is absolutely dead and I'm living the resurrected life and so I have power over sin because Christ of Christ in me.

Now, we go into verse 7 this is kind of an amazing thing because it starts talking about, gives the illustration of a woman who's married and he talks about the law of a husband and he said as long as that husband's alive if she were to marry another she would commit adultery but it says if that first husband dies she's free to remarry and not be committing adultery and then it uses this physical example to teach us an amazing truth.

Look at verse 4. Wherefore my brethren you also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ. Do you realize that when Jesus died on that cross you were in him you were in him and you died and when you died you died to the law and some people say well that's the moral law and the social law and so forth no it's if you want to know what it is look at verse verse last part of verse 7 first part of verse 8 you see right here where it says except the law had said thou shalt not covet.

Now tell me where that law is found that's one of the ten commandments so we're talking about the law law we're talking about the actual ten commandments. Yeah maybe we are talking about the social laws of Israel maybe we're talking about the religious laws but we're definitely talking about the ten commandments too and this is all called the law here in this passage.

And what this Bible tells me is that when I died in Christ I died to the law but when he raised from the dead I was risen also and as I walk in newness of life I'm going to keep the law perfectly because the Bible says over here way over here in verse 14 look at it for we know that the law is spiritual.

You know that's the problem with the law. It's so spiritual we can't keep it in the flesh. So it's so ironic that those who try to bring the law back and make a bunch of list of rules for us to keep here in the church are going to get into more sin than any of the rest of us.

Satan is just going to laugh at them because they're trying to revive the law. Law is nothing more than a system whereby the flesh can attempt to please God. And it doesn't work. It's impossible. Chapter 8 teaches us it's impossible to please God in the flesh.

So we're trying to please him in the flesh by thinking of all the rules that we can find both in the Old Testament and in the New. We make a big list of them. And we go about to try to set New Year's resolutions.

And then by the 15th of January we have failed because the flesh just can't do it. And look at this whole battle starting with verse 15 the whole thing is talking about the weakness of the law. Now this is Paul speaking as a brand new baby Christian who had come out of the law.