United to Christ, through Faith, by His Spirit | 1 John 3:24

ThornCrown Covenant Baptist Church

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Okay, turn with me now to our text for today. 1st

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John chapter 3. We'll start in verse 21 again. 1st

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John chapter 3, beginning in verse 21. Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God, and whatever we ask, we receive from Him, because we keep

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His commandments and do the things that are pleasing in His sight. And this is His commandment.

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That we believe in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another, just as He gave a commandment to us.

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And the one who keeps His commandments abides in Him, and He in Him. We know by this that He abides in us by the

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Spirit whom He gave us. Amen. So, you can see from the sermon title for today that the focus is going to be on union with Christ, which

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I didn't get a chance to really cover fully last week. I just barely dipped our toes in the water last week.

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So, it's covering what specifically verse 24 describes, how we are united to Christ through faith and by His Spirit.

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And last time we covered a good deal of verse 23, which says again that this is

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His commandment that we first believe. We first believe in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, and consequently love one another, because with an informed faith, informed faith comes first.

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We first believe in good law and proper law and gospel order. Right? So, keeping

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His commandments likewise is not just about doing right and not doing wrong.

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It's first and foremost about believing in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ.

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We must understand and believe the truth, the gospel of God, and of our salvation, because the gospel is the power of God unto salvation.

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So, keep this in mind as we now start to focus on union with Christ, because it's all related.

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All of this is related in the system of God's truth revealed in the Scriptures.

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So, we also saw how union with Christ by faith in Him and being accepted as individuals through Him and in Him, and our abiding in the anointing of His Spirit and of the truth, makes our good works pleasing in God's sight.

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Despite the reality that they may be accompanied by many weaknesses and imperfections, we are not perfected yet in this life.

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But our works, our good works, are accepted before God because He looks upon them in His Son, in His Son, by virtue of us being united to Christ for that reason.

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And we saw, too, how there is typically no difference between believing in the name of Christ or believing in Christ or believing

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Christ Himself, because they all essentially mean to believe His words,

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His message, His doctrine, His teaching. Even though, with the one exception of when you believe in someone, it can mean that you always believe them, now and in the future, kind of like the faith of Abraham, where he believed

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God in spite of the circumstances that appear to contradict

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God's promise to Abraham. So, speaking of Abraham, how we saw that he was a prime example of a true, informed faith in the

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God of the impossible. Abraham believed God, he believed the impossible because he believed in the

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God of the impossible. Abraham did not doubt God, even when he was commanded to sacrifice

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Isaac, his only son, of the promise through which his descendants will be multiplied as the stars in the sky.

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Right? Because he knew that God is faithful and never fails. In some sense,

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Abraham's faith was much more prominent or exemplary than the faith of the apostles, because the apostles, you see, that they kept doubting.

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Something bad would happen and their faith, they would just collapse in doubt. But that wasn't the case with Abraham, because he considered, remember, that he considered that God is able to raise people even from the dead, because he had an informed, knowledgeable faith in the one true

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God, like Hebrews 11 tells us. And all of this, consequently, informs our faith and our understanding of union with Christ.

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Right? So, buckle up with me here, because we're going to do a deep dive, and I'm going to need you to, once again, gird your minds for action, because I'm going to cover a lot of important material here, and so just make sure that you're following through with me here.

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So we left off, we closed last Lord's Day with union with Christ, and what exactly does that mean?

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Verse 24 in 1 John chapter 3 tells us, once again, that, and the one who keeps his commandments abides in him, and he in him.

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We know by this, that he abides in us by the spirit whom he gave us.

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Right? So, the one who keeps his commandments abides in him, and he in him, because of him, because we are in him, because of our union with Christ, and of the anointing of his spirit and truth.

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And we know this, that he abides in us by the spirit whom he gave us.

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He gave the spirit to us freely by faith, not by anything we did, and I need to clarify something that I said last time as well, that we are, we are united to Christ, but not in a universal sense, because I use the word universal, but that's, that could suggest that we are all, everybody's united to Christ, including unbelievers.

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That's not what I mean. It's not universal as in all men, but in a corporate sense, a corporate sense, a bodily sense of all the people of God, is how we are united to Christ, as members of his body, like several letters explained to us, that mystical reality.

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And so, we are, we also have a particular union with Christ, a, which is a personal union.

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Each one of us as individuals is personally united to Christ through faith, through faith by his spirit and his anointing of the truth.

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That's why we know by this, that he abides in us by or from the spirit whom he gave us, each and every one of us through faith, through regeneration and faith.

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Now, this personal union of ours is evidenced or manifested by our obedience to his commandments, to God's word.

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That's how it's, that's how we see evidence of us being united to him, because the one who keeps his commandments abides in him, and he,

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Christ in him. So, that's another, another important thing to understand about this text.

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The abiding in this verse, remember, if you recall, it is mutual as well.

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It corresponds to Christ and to us. He abides in us, and we abide in him.

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And this is, that's why it is a doctrinal unity, unity of mind.

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It is a doctrinal abiding in the same truth, because we believe the same things that Christ taught.

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It is intellectual knowledge of the truth that we accept and grow in by faith, by faith.

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So, that being said, is that all there is to it? Is that all there is to our union with Christ?

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Well, I thought you might never ask, because there just so happens to be a lot more than that.

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We're going to go deeper today, much deeper, because the reality is that the doctrine of union with Christ can be complex.

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It's not a, it's not a simple doctrine. It can be complex. There's lots of facets, parts, and pieces to it.

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Part of the reason is that it's a big picture doctrine that encompasses several other doctrines, much like covenant theology is the same way.

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It's a similar way. It's challenging because it's high level, but it's also, it requires knowledge and properly relating several other doctrines together.

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It's a big picture way of looking at several things in the Bible, and consequently, there are many different views and debates about union with Christ, even within the same faith persuasions, like in the

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Reformed tradition, which is the where we hold to. Much of which, the debate centers around emphasis and priority of certain doctrines.

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It's how do we, how do we, how do we ground things? How do we order things properly so that we understand what

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Scripture is emphasizing, emphasizing for us, and how Scripture is putting things together, and logically as well, which is fundamentally important.

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So, and it also centers around identifying what types, what type of union is being expressed in Scripture and by historical theologians like the

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Reformers, because everybody loves to claim that, oh, well, I hold to Calvin's view.

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I say, well, is that true? You can't just take people at their word. You have to examine the evidence and see what, if what they're saying lines up with the views of the past.

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So, and if you dig into this yourself, you will find that some prominent schools of thought come, tend to come from the

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Westminster seminaries. Westminster East, or Philadelphia, which is the bad one, the not so good one, and then there's

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Westminster West, California, which is the better, generally the better school of thought.

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And it's important to identify these schools because they're saying different things, and some are more consistent than the other, okay?

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And I, as I was preparing for this message for the past few weeks, I, you know,

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I was kind of disappointed in a way or frustrated with the fact that some of these professors and academics tend to complicate and confuse things unnecessarily.

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Even though this doctrine is complicated, they just make it more complicated because they're not properly putting it together, and it creates more problems.

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And they also sometimes make arbitrary distinctions that are not, again, they're not necessary in order to make their own views stand out, but in doing so, it becomes idiosyncratic.

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It becomes just sort of their own view that nobody else really held to, even though they claim at the same time that, oh, this is

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Calvin's view. This was the view of the reformers. So it's some, we have to wade through some not -so -clear waters here that we have to watch out for because that's not very helpful.

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And so I want to help guide us through some of that confusion. And so, like I said, there's many, many different views of union with Christ and emphases and what's the most important view or union and all of those things.

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And so some, to give us a broad survey here, some take union with Christ to be more ontological or literal, a more literal view, or also mystical, mystical but in a bad sense.

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The term mystical has been used by sounder theologians to refer to mysterious in the sense that there's something going on that we may not fully grasp in the fact that we are, how is it that we are in Christ and Christ is in us?

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Yes, we understand that that's doctrinally, that our minds are aligned with each other.

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We have the mind of Christ and yet we are also members of the body of Christ in a spiritual sense, in a spiritual sense.

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So, but we have to be careful not to overuse that word mystery because the word mystery in the

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Bible is something that was hidden previously, specifically in the Old Testament that is now revealed in the

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New Testament, right? So we have to, we don't, we got to be careful. It's not because people tend to love to embrace paradoxes and mysteries and it's like, well, that's the oftentimes that's just an excuse to not really study the issue and understand it like we should, right?

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So that's something important to bear in mind.

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And we, so there's that mystical in a bad sense, this sort of deification, sometimes also called theosis, that involves a loss of self and merging ourselves with God, which is a problem because that's more like what

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Hinduism teaches. You just get lost in the great soul, the big dharma, I think it's called, the

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Brahma or something like that. But that's not what Scripture teaches. We don't get lost in God or swallowed up in God.

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That's not what that verse means in 1st John. But mystics and some

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Eastern Orthodox views hold to this type of a union, which is not biblical.

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Others have a more sacramental union in view, of emphasis.

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It's more substantial, specifically in the sacraments of the church, being baptism specifically in the

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Lord's Supper. Or sometimes there are other sacraments that some churches add to it, like the

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Roman Catholic Church, which has seven of them. Again, that's not biblical, but you find these sacramental views prominent in Lutherans, for example, and Roman Catholics, Roman Catholicism.

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And this union can also be conditioned by our participation in those sacraments.

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So there could be more of an emphasis on our participation in that union. Others still take a more filial, what's called a moral or a filial union.

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Filial. And this one is just, this one is probably the worst one of all, because it tends to refer to liberals who deny the supernatural union that we have in Christ and just kind of make it a moral example.

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That Christ is just sort of a moral example and not actually anything beyond that.

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And still others, so it's quite a list here, as you can tell. There's a lot here that we have to plow through, but hopefully things will start to make sense.

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Now there's still another view of emphasizing a covenantal union or a legal union in Christ.

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And this is the good stuff, okay? This is the good stuff. This is where you want to live, okay?

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This is where you want to do your plowing, because this understanding is generally what the

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Reformed theologians in the faith describe and emphasize throughout history, and which tends to best explain what

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Scripture teaches about union with Christ. And it also refers to salvation in general.

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It's not that union is some particular event in time where we could become united, even though that does happen, but union with Christ more generally refers to salvation, all of salvation, and covenantal union in Christ.

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And finally, to top it off, there are still others who emphasize a more experiential or vital union, vital meaning like life -giving union in Christ.

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And this school tends to treat as a more discreet step in our salvation, that union with Christ is a step in our salvation, just like justification is or sanctification is.

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Union with Christ is another step distinct from the other steps. So there's lots of things here, lots of things to consider, and you will find that true union with Christ actually encompasses many of these different views.

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So it's not necessarily this or that or either or. In many respects, it can be most of these components that build on the understanding of union with Christ, not exclusively, but encompassing many of these emphases that certain schools or churches or denominations have.

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And in order to study this doctrine yourself in the

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Bible, you'll want to look for prepositional phrases tied to Christ.

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Prepositional phrases tied to Christ. What do I mean by that? Whenever you see the phrase, in Christ, in Christ, that is expressing a union with Him, in Him that we have.

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In Him. In Him is another phrase. Through Him. With Him.

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Okay? So these phrases that you find in Scripture, these simple two -word phrases, prepositional phrases, are oftentimes jam -packed with a bigger reality, a bigger doctrine and picture of union with Christ.

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And those phrases all tend to point to different things in Scripture. Sometimes it's not always very explicitly clear what type of union it's pointing to, and a lot of times you will find some of these professors or these academics assuming that it's when it may not necessarily be the case, and therefore overemphasize the wrong view, the wrong type of union.

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So that's another important matter to bear in mind.

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Now, I appreciate what one of the academics from the

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Westminster West School has to say about this. This is a quote from Michael Horton's Systematic Theology.

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Generally, it's a very good overall theology that we, by and large, would agree with.

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He says, "...union with Christ is not to be understood as a moment in the application of salvation to believers.

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Rather, it is the way in which believers share in Christ in eternity."

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So, in eternity past by way of election, our election.

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In history, in the past, including

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Old Testament saints, and by way of redemption, often called the historical redemptive unfolding of Scripture and the covenants, which is the work of Christ in history, that He came, lived, and died for us.

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So, in eternity, there is in past history, in history, and in the present as well.

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So, in the present time, by means of our effectual calling and our regeneration, the

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Spirit coming in us and regenerating us, justifying us by faith and sanctification.

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That's a present reality that we all have in Christ right now by virtue of being united with Him through faith and His Spirit.

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And there is also, finally, in the future union.

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There's a future union as well that will be manifested in our glorification. Our glorification, our perfection, where we are perfected, both in, not just in spirit, but also in body.

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So, this is very important to understand.

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Again, it's not, this isn't something that's just very simple and clear -cut. There's a lot of facets to this, as you can see.

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A lot of different facets here that we have to not lose sight of or overlook because Scripture talks about all of these things.

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And we need to make light of all of them together and relate them properly, logically, and with the proper order, the proper order of things.

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So, the important thing, first, one of the first things to understand is that our union with Christ was established before the foundation of the world.

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Before the foundation of the world. Why do I say that? Well, turn with me in your

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Bibles to Ephesians 1, verse 3. That phrase might ring a bell.

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Before the foundation of the world. Ephesians 1, verse 3.

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God's Word speaks, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

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Note this. Who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.

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How? Note that. In who? In Christ. In Christ.

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Just as He chose us. In who? In Him. He chose us.

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The Father chose us in Him. In Christ. Before the foundation of the world.

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That we would be holy and blameless before Him in love. By predestining us to adoption as sons.

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Through who? Christ. Notice the prepositional phrase there again.

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Through Christ. And consequently, by you being united to Him.

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To, through Christ, to Himself. To God the

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Father. According to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which

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He graciously bestowed on us. In who? In the

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Beloved. With a capital B. Christ. Wow.

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Can I get an amen? That is powerful stuff. This is pointing to, you see how so much unpacking here.

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And tied to our union with Him. With Christ. And with the

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Triune God as well. Because Christ is the bridge that connects us to God. To the

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Triune God. This is known, this is what I like to call our elective union in Christ.

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Because God chose us first. Before we had any say. Before we even existed in creation.

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God chose us. Elected us in Christ. It's also known as predestinarian union.

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Which I don't like. That sounds a little pedantic. So I prefer elective union. Rolls off the tongue a little easier.

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Now God's predestinating choice to save us is in one sense, is one sense of being united to Christ.

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Like Horton says in the in the quote that I read. We are united.

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We share in Christ in eternity. In eternity past. We are united to Him all the way from Him choosing us.

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Before the foundation of the world. Amazing, amazingly powerful stuff.

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So we are, that's one sense.

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And that's a very important foundational sense. So what's more, now notice something else here in this passage.

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Every, notice the word every, every spiritual blessing, every spiritual blessing and benefit that we have in the heavenly places is because we are in Christ.

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In Christ. United to Christ. It is in Him.

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In the fullest sense, okay. We are united to, not just the, not just any one sense, but in the fullest sense of being united to Him.

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Not just in the election, elective sense, but also in the redemptive sense and in the future sense.

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All of these different senses combined. This includes, obviously then, all of our salvation up to our glorification.

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The entire order of salvation. The entire order of salvation.

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And you will find when you dig into this, you will find a very, this is a theological term.

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Order of salvation. The Latin phrase is ordo salutis. This is how do we make sense of these doctrines in salvation?

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How do we logically order the doctrines of salvation? Regeneration, justification, sanctification, glorification.

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How do we put them together properly, logically, with the right foundational ones in place?

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Because there are differences here, right? Our Arminian friends, they would say that faith comes first and then regeneration follows.

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In order to be born again, you must first believe. But that's not what Scripture teaches. And that's not what we hold to.

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We believe that God's Spirit has to first give us life in Christ, raise us to regenerate us into a new mind in order for us to believe.

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So that's why this is important. It's how we understand the order, the logical, and also priority of the doctrines of salvation.

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Repentance and faith. That's another big set of pair of doctrines that ties into this, all of this as well.

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So there's many, and like I read the survey, many aspects of union with Christ also pertain to those things.

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There is a sacramental union with Christ. When we partake of the Lord's Supper, which we will do today, we understand that we are partaking of the body and blood of the

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Lord. Why? Because we are united with Him by faith.

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We are united to Christ, sacramentally. That is a very true thing as well.

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There is such a thing as a sacramental union with Christ. There is such a thing as a covenantal union with Christ, an illegal union with Christ, the imputation of Christ's righteousness that he earned on our behalf.

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There is, and there is also an experiential union with Christ, a vital union with Christ, in which we enjoy the benefits of sanctification, regenerating faith, regeneration, conversion, repentance, faith.

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All of those things are things that we receive as blessings of being united to Christ in an experiential way, in a vital union with Him.

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And of course, there is the corporate union as well that we enjoy, in addition to the personal union of being members of the same body, the same body of Christ.

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We are all members, mystically, of the same body of Christ as well.

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So the Bible has many biblical illustrations and analogies to describe this union that we have in Christ.

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They include the union of a vine and the branches, right? Jesus says, I am the vine, you are the branches.

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They include the head and the members of the body, right? Christ is our head and our husband.

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The body is the church, the bride of Christ, the wife, the bride.

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Consequently, a husband and a wife is in the bond of marriage. The union of marriage is another illustration of that union in Christ.

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And the foundation, a building and the cornerstone.

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Christ being our chief cornerstone, right? And we being parts of that building, that edifice.

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And theologians of the past have also noted that scripture also compares the union of Christ and His people to the bond between the

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Father and the Son, right? Remember Jesus' high priestly prayer in John 17.

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He says, let them love one another. Let the body of Christ have this love that I have with you,

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Father, that Christ has with the Father. While distinguishing, of course, that this analogy does not infer or necessarily mean the deification of believers or being swallowed up into God.

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Because that's not true. So we must get the biblical foundational priority straight here.

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We need to make sure we understand what's the priority, what is foundational, and order it properly according to God's Word.

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And with that, we'll get some help from another theologian, a

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Reformed theologian. And just bear in mind as well, when

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I quote somebody, I don't mean that I fully agree with everything that they say, okay? Because that's not always the case.

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And some of these men, they may have made some more serious errors in other areas, okay? So just be aware of that.

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And we can talk more about that if you'd like after service. But Gerhard is

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Voss. He says something very helpful to help us understand the priorities in Scripture of these doctrines.

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Paul consciously and consistently subordinated, subordinated meaning submitted.

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He submitted the mystical aspect of union with Christ, the subjective aspect of union with Christ to the forensic one, to the objective one, to the legal one.

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Paul's mind, he's talking about the Apostle Paul, Paul's mind was to such an extent forensically, which means legally, legally, covenantally oriented that he regarded the entire complex, the entire complex of subjective or inner spiritual blessings,

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I mean, I'm sorry, spiritual changes that take place in the believer and of subjective spiritual blessings that enjoyed by the believer as the direct outcome of the forensic work of Christ applied in justification.

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The mystical is based on the forensic, not the not the other way around, not the forensic on the mystical.

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And this is very important that we understand this, very important to understand this.

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What is the foundation? Do we have the right foundation?

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My foundation rests on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness, right?

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That blood, how is that blood applied to us? It's forensic, it's legal, and the foundation for everything else that we enjoy in Christ is that legal foundation, covenantal foundation.

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So the legal and logical priority that grounds all of the benefits that we receive and enjoy in Christ, in our personal union with him, our subjective union with him, is

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Christ himself, is Christ himself, his life and death, his active and passive obedience, another set of theological terms, active obedience, meaning his perfect life that he lived, earning righteousness on our behalf, and his passive obedience, meaning passive in the sense of subjecting himself to death on the cross, to satisfy the wrath of God in the propitiatory satisfaction of the

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Father's wrath, like Isaiah 53 and other Romans, countless other passages say.

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That itself, it is what grounds what our union with him, nothing else but the forensic life and death of Christ, legally reckoned to us, and it is applied to us on time, in time, temporally, when we believe, when we receive the gift of faith, but it's the foundation for everything, everything that we receive in him.

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Christ himself is our legal reckoning, our foundation, or like the

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Bible says, our chief cornerstone, right? Turn with me to the amazing letter of Ephesians.

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I recommend a great follow -up to this sermon is to read the letter of Ephesians. It is an amazing letter.

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When you read it in light of union with Christ, you will see just these verses jump out at you.

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Turn to Ephesians chapter 2, here starting in verse 13. I'm going to read a good chunk of this chapter up to verse 22.

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Ephesians chapter 2, verse 13. God's word says, but now, there you see again, in Christ, in Christ Jesus, you who formerly were far off have been brought near, have been brought near, by what?

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The blood of Christ, by the blood of Christ, for he himself is our peace.

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It's Christ who is our peace, who made both, who made both groups, sorry, who made both groups one and broke down the dividing wall of the partition by abolishing in his flesh the enmity, the animosity, the hostility, the law of commandments contain in ordinances, so that in himself, in Christ, he might create the two into one new man, making peace, and might reconcile them both in one body to God.

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How? How might that be? Through the cross, through the cross, through the historical redemptive work of Christ, the passive obedience and active obedience of Christ.

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Having in himself put to death the enmity, the hostility, by means of his death on the cross, and he came and preached the good news of peace to you who were far away, and peace to those who were near.

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For through him, again, through him, we both have our access in one spirit, in one spirit to the father.

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So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, there you see again, corporate union with Christ, and are, and are of God's household,

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God's body, members of his body, his household, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets,

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Christ himself being the what? The cornerstone, the chief cornerstone, in whom the whole building, which is us, the whole building, being joined together, is growing into a holy sanctuary, a temple in the

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Lord, in whom you also, in whom, in whom, in Christ, you are also being built together into a dwelling of God in the spirit, in the spirit, amen.

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This is amazing stuff, and this shows us again, this is one of several passages that shows us consequently then, that there is a logical priority, and a forensic priority, a legal priority, a judicial priority, that is more foundational.

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It is the foundation, and therefore the objective legal forensic benefits that we have and receive in Christ, especially justification, especially justification, and things like adoption as well, another legal benefit, particularly justification.

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The forensic benefits are logically prior, logically prior, though not necessarily historically prior, but they are logically prior to the subjective, or transformative, or renovative benefits and blessings that we receive in Christ.

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What are those? That would be regeneration, when God changes us, and gives us a new heart, and gives us faith.

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Sanctification, the progressive process by which we are sanctified in Christ, by the truth, working in us, and applying it, growing unto holiness, and unto the mortification of sin.

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So, and finally, glorification. That's another transformative or renovative benefit that we receive in Christ, but all of those renovative benefits are grounded in what?

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They're grounded in the forensic work and benefits that we have in Christ.

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Those are logically prior. Some, however, claim that there is no priority between any of these, between any of the salvific benefits that we receive in Christ, in our salvation.

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This is where it can get confusing, so you have to be careful when you're studying this thing. You might run into somebody who says, well, there's no, there's no, there's no priority between sanctification and justification.

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There is no priority. It's all the same, and it all, it all equally stems from our experiential or vital union with Christ, but is that really the case?

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Is that really the case? And is there historical precedent that can inform our understanding of how to make sense of this in light of previous, current controversies, and previous debates and controversies, including the one that the

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Protestants had with Rome? Okay, this is not insignificant matters, but these, there's certain men claim that there is no, there's no chronological priority, no, no, no real historical priority, no logical priority between things like those forensic benefits and the vital, the renovative benefits between like justification and sanctification, and two examples of that are

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Lane Tipton and Richard Gaffin, which not surprisingly, they belong to the, the

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East, the Westminster East School of Thought here. Not, not as, not very good, not good.

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Be careful there. This causes them, this causes them to overemphasize the vital union with Christ, that personal subjective union that we have with Christ as the sole source for all of our blessings, the sole source.

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But this contradicts scripture itself, because we just read, what did we just read in Ephesians 2?

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Some of these benefits were accomplished before we believed. They were accomplished on the cross.

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What kind of benefits were that? That was the forensic benefits that we receive by the blood of Christ.

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That what, that is what forensically establishes and grounds the other benefits that follow.

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It flies in the face of those passages, and not to mention Romans chapter 5.

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You might as well take Romans chapter 5 out of your Bible, if you want to say that. If I'm getting excited here, it's because of what this says.

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Turn with me to Romans chapter 5, so you can get excited with me. Romans chapter 5.

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Hope y 'all are enjoying this, and I hope this is making sense in light of the fact that it is, this is heavy duty stuff, but it's important that we work towards understanding these things, because it's going to bless us, and help us to grasp the

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Word of God as a whole, and in its particulars better. Now Romans chapter 5, verse 8.

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Let's read this precious truth from God's Word. But God demonstrates

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His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, while we were still sinners,

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Christ died for us. Christ died for us.

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Christ chose us, and died for us, while we were still sinners. Much more than having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him.

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For if while we were enemies, while we were still enemies, we were what?

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We were reconciled to God. We were reconciled to God while we were still enemies.

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Through what? Through the death of His Son. Through the death of His Son.

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Much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. We shall be saved by His life.

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All of this is communicating to us a forensic priority of Christ's benefits.

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We were, this is hard to even fathom, we were reconciled at the cross while we were still sinners and enemies of God, because that reconciliation is not fully applied until we receive it by faith.

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And yet God pronounces a legal declaration that that redemption is accomplished at the cross.

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Our reconciliation was done. That's what Jesus meant. It is finished.

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It is done. Reconciliation has been accomplished already, and it is received.

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It is simply received by faith. That is why there's no, it makes, this sheds light on the fact that all of these schools, these other religions, like Eastern Orthodoxy being another example of this, they completely minimize the legal aspects of all of this.

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The fact that God is a judge, that justification is a legal term. It's a forensic term, and that we are legally pardoned and justified.

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We are justified by the virtue of, we were reconciled already by His death.

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So what is there left for us to do? That's why it makes no sense though to be, to claim that you're saved by faith and works, because the reconciliation was done.

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We simply receive it with the empty hand of faith. We believe it and receive it, the finished work of Christ.

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Amen? Amen. That's why I'm getting excited. So, and this is also helpful from a document which was a report on justification from the

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Orthodox Presbyterian Church. I generally don't like some of the things that the

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Orthodox Presbyterian Church does and says, but this I think was very helpful for us to understand how to make sense of the forensic versus the renovated.

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Justification versus sanctification, okay? In addition to the doctrine of union with Christ, so in addition to that doctrine, this, the idea of the ordos salutis, the order of salvation, makes clear that justification is prior to sanctification.

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Why? This is not priority in the sense that one is somehow more important than the other.

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Neither is it a temporal priority, strictly speaking, for there is no such thing as a justified person who is not also being sanctified.

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Listen this, listen here, but while justification is the necessary prerequisite, it's a necessary requirement of the process of sanctification, that process is not the necessary prerequisite of justification.

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So it only goes one way. It doesn't go the other way. If you go the other way, that's going to take you to Rome.

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That's going to take you to salvation by faith and works. That's why this is important. That's why it's dangerous to misunderstand this.

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So it is true to say that one must be justified in order to be sanctified.

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You must be justified first. You must be legally rectified first. In order to be sanctified.

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But it is not true to say that one must be sanctified first in order to be justified.

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Okay? Because what does the scripture say? While we were enemies, unsanctified, ungodly enemies,

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Christ reconciled us at the cross. Amen? That's why it's prior.

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Justification and sanctification bear a relationship to each other that cannot be reversed.

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One must come first, and that is the legal, the forensic. I hope that's clear.

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But to make it just a little bit clearer, I want to read a little bit more here, because this is good stuff. This is going to tap into history now.

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Some historical views. Beyond this minimal perspective, however, scripture and the

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Reformed tradition have made a stronger affirmation. It is not simply that justification is compatible with sanctification, but also that justification is necessary.

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It's not just that it comes first. It's that it's necessary for sanctification. Reformed theologians have expressed the conviction in various ways.

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John Calvin, for instance, when explaining why justification, the principal ground on which religion must be supported, like Luther also similarly said, the hinge on which all religion turns is the doctrine of justification by faith alone, must be given such great care and attention.

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Calvin says, unless you understand, first of all, what your position is before God legally, and what the judgment which he passes upon you, you have no foundation on which your salvation can be laid, or on which piety towards God can be reared, can grow.

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It can't grow without the fertile ground of the legal benefit of justification by faith.

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Turretin likewise similarly comments, justification stands related to sanctification as the means to the end, because justification must be prior.

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Must be prior. This might sound a little bit familiar a few weeks back when, because there's also the, there's another problem where others who do prioritize the benefits of Christ, but they prioritize them in the wrong order, right?

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I just mentioned the, previously mentioned the example of the Arminian understanding, where they say that no, faith has to come first.

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You have to first make the choice to believe in order to receive regeneration, which biblically is contrary.

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It's opposite, right? So they give the wrong priority to certain salvific benefits over others.

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I also mentioned the, like I said previously, Todd Friel, where he turned the foundational relationship between justification and adoption upside down.

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Even though adoption itself is a legal benefit, you are declared legally an adoptive son of God, but why?

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Because you've been justified and reconciled. So that's why justification is more foundational still.

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That's why the Reformation happened. It, because it pinpointed the crux of the issue of salvation, centering on our justification stemming from the sole righteousness of Christ and blood.

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So, so then, man,

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I wish I could keep going. I, I'll stop here for now.

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Let me just finish this up real quick. I'll wrap up this section here. This is why similarly, the subjective, okay, the subjective, our subjective experience is based on the objective.

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It is based on the objective, on God's truth, not the other way around.

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Just like Voss says, right? This is where we need to be careful to avoid the errors of pietism, because the pietists tend to say, well, no, you, you're, you measure your spirituality by your emotional output, by how you feel.

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That's not what you're supposed to ground your faith in. That's not what you're supposed to ground yourself in.

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You're supposed to ground yourself on Jesus' blood and righteousness, on the objective promises of God.

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That's the solid foundation. Any other foundation is sinking sand. So we can't prioritize the emotional or the experiential over the objective of the forensic benefits of Christ.

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We cannot make that mistake, because you will suffer. You will become miserable, depressed, and despair in the dungeon of despair, just like Christian and Hopeful did.

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It will happen. It's only a matter of time. Unless you have the right, you have to have the right balance here.

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I want to just leave us with this thought here, because just to clarify, if God regenerates us before we believe, before we believe, because we must be first made alive in order to believe, and therefore be justified by faith alone, right?

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That's what we believe. We are justified because we receive that justifying benefit by faith alone.

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By faith alone, then how is it that all of the subjective inner spiritual changes that take place in the believer, including regeneration, and of the subjective spiritual blessings enjoyed by the believer are the direct outcome or result of the forensic work of Christ applied in justification?

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That's what Voss said, right? How is it that everything is grounded in justification, but justification doesn't come until we are first regenerated, which is a regenerative benefit.

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So even though, in a sense, historically, the renovative comes first, and then that justifying benefit is applied by faith, that nevertheless doesn't change the reality that it is because our subjective transformation by the

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Word and Spirit of God in our union with Christ are nevertheless still forensically and legally grounded and established in the redemptive work of Christ.

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Never forget that, beloved. It is in the work of Christ that everything is grounded.

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So the life and death of Christ culminating at the cross, where he said, it is finished.

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And our confession, our London Baptist Confession, very helpfully explains this as well.

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In the chapter on justification, chapter 11, paragraph 4, from all eternity, remember?

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From eternity, God decreed to justify all the elect because of our elective union in him.

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And Christ, in the fullness of time, died for their sins. That's pointing to the redemptive historical union that we have in Christ, because we are also buried and died with him.

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That's the redemptive historical union. And rose again because of their justification.

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Nevertheless, okay? Nevertheless, they are not justified personally until the

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Holy Spirit, in due time, actually applies Christ to them by faith.

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By faith, okay? So then, the best, that's very important to understand.

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It is applied to us by faith, even though the objective justification and reconciliation with God has already been established.

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It's already been settled. But it's subjectively or personally applied, not subjectively, that's not a good word, because it's still objective, but it's applied by faith to us.

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So the best definition of union with Christ, then, is the one that fully embraces and encompasses all that it means.

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And as you can see, it means a whole lot. It means a whole lot of different things.

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And there's different kinds of union that we also have to make sure we understand and balance properly.

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All of its doctrines, because it's really a shorthand that encompasses the entire doctrinal system of salvation.

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All of it. The Ordo Salutis, in other words. And more. All the way from regeneration to glorification and on.

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So all believers, like the confession also, as our confession also says, are united to Jesus Christ, their head, by his spirit and by faith.

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By his spirit and by faith. That's the experiential union. Although this does not make them one person with him, therefore they have fellowship in his graces, sufferings, death, resurrection, and glory.

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All of it. All of it. Being united to one another, each other in love.

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That's the corporate union, right? The corporate union in Christ that we have. Because Christ is our head and we are all his body.

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They, or we, have fellowship in each other's gifts and graces and are obliged to discharge their duties, both public and private, in an orderly way so as to ensure the mutual good in both spiritual and temporal matters.

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So we're united to Christ and to each other, and therefore we should live accordingly in light of those dual realities, those dual unions that we share, that we all share in Christ and his body.

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Union with Christ, to finish up here. Union with Christ is also a shorthand for the new covenant itself.

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Union with Christ is a shorthand for the new covenant itself because that's what in Christ means in many places in Romans 5 and in Corinthians as well.

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In Christ. Because that also means that Christ is our new covenant head.

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He is our new covenant mediator or federal head, covenantal head.

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He is, that's why I mentioned earlier that the covenantal union, legal union, that's what needs to be prioritized in our understanding because that's what it means to be fundamentally in Christ.

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We are covenantally in him. We were translated from being covenantally in Adam and dead in Adam and condemned in Adam to now being saved by virtue of being translated in Christ in the new covenant of grace.

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But particularly, the union refers to the various relationships that we as believers have with Christ as well.

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As individuals and as the church, the body of Christ. That's doctrinally, spiritually, objectively, legally, all of these things.

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Subjectively, experientially, practically, all of these things. Union with Christ also includes all of the benefits that we receive and enjoy from Christ, with Christ, in Christ, through Christ.

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All of those prepositional phrases, all of these truths, these precious promises and truths that we receive, all the way from access to God, from access to God, because the

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Bible tells us that, to salvation and onward. Remember, beloved, that our

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Father knows best and has given us everything already. How?

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In Christ, in union with him, through our heavenly inheritance and our union with his beloved son.

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He who indeed did not spare his own son, but delivered him over for us all. How will he not also with him graciously give us all, all things?

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And God's people said, Amen. Let's go ahead and bow our heads in a closing word of prayer. Our precious

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Lord and heavenly Father, we thank you for these precious, wonderful, and amazing promises,

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Lord, and truths and the doctrines of your word, Father, that are so comforting and reassuring of union with Christ, Lord.

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We thank you for this blessed union that we all share with each other and with your precious son and with you and the

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Spirit as well, Father. We thank you so much for this amazing reality that we all have and can experience by your grace and mercy, solely by your grace and mercy, legally and forensically by your grace and mercy, which helps us and establish and grounds us in the reality that we now are truly in Christ.

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And therefore, live a life of gratitude and of increasing obedience to your word, because you have saved us and united us to him by the perfect life and death, the blood of your son,

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Christ Jesus. We thank you, Father, and we gratefully receive these blessings by faith and experience them and enjoy them further in the blessed sacrament of our

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Lord's Supper. Father, we ask that you bless that as well, and in Jesus' mighty name, the very foundation that is the foundation for everything that we enjoy, in his name we pray.

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Amen. Thank you for listening to the sermons of Thorn Crown Covenant Baptist Church, where the

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Bible alone and the Bible in its entirety has applied to all of faith and life. We strive to be biblical, reformed, historic, confessional, loving, discerning

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Christians who evangelize, stand firm in, and earnestly contend for the Christian faith.

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If you're looking for a church in the El Paso, Texas area, or for more information about our church, sermons, and ministries such as Semper Reformanda Radio and Thorn Crown Network Podcasts, please contact us at thorncrownministries .com