Lesson 11b

So, did we do verse 5 last week? So verse 24, if you read it, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. And the question I ask, how would you apply verse 24 to yourself? How would you do that? I put it in past tense. I think he does here, doesn't he? In some... Being? Being would be... A constant state. Yeah, maybe perfect tense. I didn't look it up, but probably.

The point of this was that Newell said, for ourselves we should recognize the fact that God has declared me righteous without any cause in me. And he's done it by his grace and he's done it through the redemption from sins penalty that only exists in Christ Jesus. It doesn't exist anywhere else.

So it is the bold believing us for ourselves of the scripture we learn that God desires and not merely the knowledge of scripture. I think that's a really cool point. When you read the scriptures and you read a verse like this, knowing or being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, it's interesting that that's God speaking to us about what He's done. And sometimes we have a tendency to look at verses like this and think, well I don't feel it, or I'm not quite sure I understand this, but it is something God has done.

He did it. And my attitude towards what He has declared is true of me is to receive it and to trust Him. It's like I have a younger brother who kind of has a where I sense a humor and I pick up on some of his sayings and I use it on Donna all the time. She'll say something to me like, well, you know, I washed the car. Or I'll say to her, I washed the car and she'll say, you did?

And I say, when's the last time I lied to you? You know, you look at God and you say, when's the last time you lied to me? He never did. He never did. and he never will, and yet because of who he is. But sometimes our subjectivism gets in the way and we doubt him, which is like saying to him, when's the last time you lied to me God? He doesn't do that. Alright, question six.

Why should Christ have to die or why did he die? Why must he die? Why did he die? Why did he have to die? Because there had to be a sacrifice. Why? He was perfect because of sin. Blood had to be shed. There had to be a death. So the wages of sin is death. So there has to be a death.

But he didn't have any sin. That's why he didn't die. Perfect sacrifice. I've got a whole bunch of answers for this. The first one is that he is the only savior. There is no one other than him. And his death is the one saving act. That's it. There's nothing else, which includes all of your efforts. It's the one saving act.

The shed blood on the Day of Atonement, what does shed blood witness to? If I brought in a bowl from downstairs and it was full of blood, what would you say to that? Where did you get it? Where did it come from? Well, I got it out of the vending machine.

A creature has to die. Once the blood is separated from the creature, the creature dies. So the Lord Jesus shed blood and represented on the Day of Atonement, the high priest would go into the Holy of Holies with the blood. He can't go in there without it. That's the commodity for the ticket in. He can't walk in there under his own power and he's got to walk around and sprinkle the blood on the mercy seat. The blood gives him access. The person for whom the blood is shed can't approach or stand for a moment in the presence of an infinitely holy God. The pride priest that went in there He couldn't stand in there of his own. He has to have that blood, or he can't go in. We have no standing before God without the blood of Christ.

None. I know I've been harping on that point, but I think it's really critical for us to understand. We don't have any standing in ourselves. None. And that's a good thing. Because our standing is totally in who Christ is and what he's done. Our standing is there. So does this blood thing tell us that God is an angry kind of a God?

I know, I know. Did you go to the Aztec thing that was here like 25 years ago? Do you remember that? Did you go? I think I know about all the blood, the horrible things they did, trying to appease their gods. They came up with, boy, if they didn't do things right, they had to have a blood sacrifice to appease the gods. Where did that come from? I don't think the Jews texted them the Mosaic Law. And then they figured, well, if we kill virgin girls, God would be even more pleased about that. Thinking that a virgin girl would have more acceptability to God than a grumpy old guy like you. But they had an angry God. And most cultures have an angry God. Does this blood thing show us that our God is angry? And he's vengeful? Absolutely not. But would you say that his wrath against sin fell on Christ? Yes it did.

But think about what he sent his son to do this. And where did the son come from? He came out of the bosom of the father. He sent him to do this, not because he was vengeful. Why did he do it? Because he's a lover. That's why he did it. He wanted to erase the barrier between his creatures and himself. And the only one that could do it was his son.

And really when you start to contemplate that, it's unspeakably gracious of what he's done. Unspeakably gracious. Because if you happen to be an Aztec, Your God is mad. If you happen to be under any other kind of deity in the world, your God is mad. Ours isn't. He's a lover, even though the blood sacrificed.

But have you ever asked yourself the question, why death? Why death? And he told Adam in the garden, he said, look, the soul that sins, it will surely die. Why? Too hard of a question? Death is separation. Yeah? Think about it from God's perspective. From his side of the equation. He says, the soul that sins, it will die. It will be separated from me and I'm the source of life. Why? Because he's righteous. Okay, you're getting there. He's perfect. He's righteous. He's holy unto himself. And he never changes. You see that? So anything that isn't like him has to be put away. You see that?

It's because of his character and who he is. So that's why the penalty isn't a $50 fine and 40 years of hard labor. That's why it's death. Because if he creates and has a creature who has a will and that creature goes against him, that creature loses all right to be in his presence forever. See that?

We have no right in and of ourselves coming from Adam to be in the presence of a holy God. He's not going to change. So he's got to do something if he wants his creatures to have access to him. He has to do it. He's got to solve this sin, insult, death thing and he did it by putting the whole burden of it on his son. Do you see that? Does that make sense? We can't look at God as though he's a little bit offended and he'll get over it.

I was just thinking that there's no other option. If you have a perfectly righteous God, the options are annihilation. I'm offended, I annihilate. It's all gone. Back to square one, so to speak. Or square zero. So, annihilate. Or, you can buy me off. Like, you sweep it under the rug somehow, someway. Do enough with X, Y, or Z. Make enough sacrifices, whatever. I'll allow certain things to pass by so I can get bought off. Or I annihilate. Or, I come up with a totally inhuman way of separating myself from the problem and still exercising love without annihilating and without being bought out. And I do all of the solving, and I give it to you freely. It's so inhuman to think of doing it that way, but there's no other way. You know what I mean? Yeah, I do know what you mean. And you know what else?

If God said, okay, J.D., you and Mike are going to figure out how this redemption thing is going to go, figure it out and come to me with a plan, we would never have come up with that. No. We either annihilate or we take something out of the table. Yeah, that's exactly what we would do. And we would put a couple of, you got to do this and you got to do that kind of things in it, right? And J.D.' 's side of the ledger has been a lot more than I would demand. He's from Texas. I'm just laughing at you. It's not funny, Russ.

So again, just to be repetitious, it's for us to understand that without a laid down life on our behalf, we have no personal standing before God at all. Okay? So we're made near to Christ, to God, by the blood of Christ. That is the only way we can go. He substitutes for us and he fixes the way and there is peace made between a holy God and a... Did he shut that? I can feel that breeze coming in. Because the death of Christ forsakes the wrath of God, takes care of his wrath against sin. So I think that if you were to put in a capsule form the truth concerning what we call atonement. What does atonement mean? Covering. Covering. Payment.

Then we would have to say that The entire wrath of God, all of it fell on Christ. I'm pretty happy about that. And God is happy too because he's propitiated, he's satisfied. He was satisfied. That's a big word. And not a great word. And the fact that you just said it that way is really important. I mean that's what we're talking about with this question, is propitiation. That means God is satisfied with the payment. And he did it. Unto himself through his son. See, that's a necessity because of his holiness. What good would it do if it didn't quite cover it all? You know? If it just wasn't quite...

It's like the barnhouse's questions to Catholics. The last question is, The third question is, did Christ die and pay the penalty for your sins? Answer, yes, he did. Fourth question, last question, did he leave anything for you to do? If he isn't holy and hasn't been satisfied, yeah, there is something left for me to do.

I have to do something about my own sinfulness. I'm in trouble. I'm in big trouble. And it's God's holiness that has to be satisfied. Once it is satisfied though, look at the change. Now the doorway is open, access to Him. One of the things I'm working with the kids that come to me is this acceptability that they have, that all believers have before God.

Are you acceptable? In our society, depending on where you rank in the tribe, determines your accessibility to the person who's higher than you in the tribe. Well, what's your accessibility to God himself? Do you have it? Is it unfettered? Is the door always open? Can you go in anytime?

Answer, yeah, because of Christ. You know, anybody else who's up above you, you have to make an appointment. And I dare say believers think about, I'd better go make an appointment with God. I need to talk to him. Really? You need to make an appointment? What if he's busy?

And distinguish between God hating sin and hating the sinner. Did he hate the sinner? No, he hated the sin. Christ taking away our sins forever that we so constantly find in our hymns. I like this phrase, it is of first importance that God should be glorified where sin had so dishonored him. Sin outraged his holiness. Isn't that a great line? It outraged his holiness and it insulted his majesty. Isn't that something? And it defied his righteous government.

We think so little of sin. But the cross made good on all of this and it did it publicly right before the universe for everybody to see. This was first and second God could now let sinners in all their guilt turn to him and we should learn to look at the cross as the first of all things that glorify God and not solely the viewpoint of the blessed and eternal benefits accrued thereby. Back to this word propitiation.

In the Old Testament was there propitiation? Think about the Holy of Holies, the Ark of the Covenant, and in the middle of the Covenant, what was there? Called the Mercy Seat. What's the Mercy Seat all about? It was the covering. That's where they sprinkled the blood. That's where they sprinkled it. And it's a seat. Why a seat? Why isn't it the mercy throne, the mercy stand up? Why seat?

It's all been taken care of, sat down. That's exactly right. What does Hebrews 1 tell us about Christ and when he had finished the sacrifice, what did he do? Isn't that interesting? The only seat that was in the temple was the mercy seat. There weren't any other chairs. That was the only one. So there's an effect on what Christ did on the cross and it meant that Christ and God could sit down.

That their work was done. You know you read in Genesis on creation on the seventh day God rested, right? When Adam sinned did he have to go back to work? I think he did. Because now he had a problem that he had to resolve, and it was a sin issue. So he did, he went back to work. Now once he solved it, what happened? He rested again. Is he at rest about your sins? And yours? And yours? Yeah, he is. Totally at rest about them. Because they're all done. They're all taken care of. So that's probably enough on that.

Any other comments about why Christ had to die? If you look at it from God's perspective rather than your perspective, it gives you a whole new arena. By the way, I'm doing a right turn. Not very spiritual, but I'm going to do it anyway. I went to see the Mr. Rogers movie. You've got to go see it. Is it good? It is unbelievably good. Mrs. Rogers, Can't We Be Neighbors? Won't You Be My Neighbor?

It's a documentary. It is fabulous. Wow. Take the handkerchief with you. This guy was special. Regan's friend produced it. Regan flew out in the springtime to the Sundance Film Festival to see it and it won an award there. But it's only in a couple of theaters. But it is unbelievable. You know, movies are so bad anymore. This one is really cool. It's a documentary on Fred. Are the kids into it? Oh, they love it. Because it's all about kids. Yeah. It's all about kids.

I don't know who Mr. Rogers is. I don't know who Mr. Rogers is. He's unbelievable. There's that one guy who's a little... Yeah, there's that one guy. He had the same crew. his whole television career. The cameraman? Somebody on the crew. He's a little salty.

But Fred was an ordained Presbyterian pastor. He loved kids and he had such an incredible way of communicating stuff to them with his puppets and stuff like that. When Lynn was little, she'd be watching Mr. Rogers And then his show would be over and it would be like he'd be disappearing into the stars. I'll give one thing away in the movie. He was worried about prejudice in the United States. So he wanted to communicate to kids that it didn't matter what color you were.

You know how he did it? He's sitting on the set, and one of the guys that was a regular on the show was a policeman who was a black guy. So he's sitting on the stage one day, and he's got this small plastic swimming pool, and he's got his shoes and socks off, and he's got his feet in the water. And the policeman walks in, and he says, how's it going? Great. And he said, oh, I'm just soaking my feet. And the cop says, you know, my feet hurt too. He says, take your shoes and socks off and put your feet in the pool. And so here the camera is on a black pair and a white pair. So, I mean, the message went bang without saying a word.

It was really neat. So I recommend you go see it. Let's just mention one thing. When we were going through Roman Street 24. Yes. Something that really hit me to all of this teaching is I used to love the word justified and I still do because it's pre-declared righteous. But that involves redemption and forgiveness. Yes it does. And so I just thought we're justified. I didn't realize why. Redemption and forgiveness is what somehow makes that happen. Most middle class white churches never have to go to a pawn shop so they don't know what redemption is. When you pawned a TV, you had to go buy it back. And if you didn't, they sold it out for money.

Explain how God can show his righteousness and at the same time declare righteous those who believe in Christ. How can he do that? How can he declare his righteousness, which we're finding out is immovable, he's righteous, he's holy, which demanded something be done about, as I read, this offense against his holiness and his sinfulness, and at the same time, he can be the one who declares, you're righteous.

How can he do both? Because we were placed in Christ, we died with him. That's from my perspective. How about him? How can he do it? Think about it now. He can be the one, he does two things at the same time. He can declare one righteous, you righteous, and at the same time never waver on his own righteousness. How can he do both? The main place into Christ is the only way. What's that? Say that again. The Holy Spirit places into Christ and seals us in Him. We became righteous in God. It's not a conflict. Try to tell me the answer without putting you in it. He can do it because of the cross. That's exactly right.

He showed the world his righteousness by crucifying Christ. That's how he did it. He showed his righteousness by crucifying his own son. That's how he did it. So he can be perfectly righteous without any slippage and here's the demonstration of it. Now I'm going to declare people righteous. How can you do that? Because, go ahead. And his love, by doing this, he showed that he was delivering we sinners from the penalties that we were going to incur because we couldn't do anything for ourselves. That's right. That's really good. Do you see what he, I mean, he plays both roles. Yeah. And he's, it's not a problem. He demonstrates his righteousness by the cross.

That's how he did it. And that was the full, open, nothing to be hidden demonstration of his righteousness. Now think about how he had to do that. He did it by having his son openly murdered and crucified to pay the penalty for the sins of the whole world, for every offense against him. That's how he did it. And it's there for all to see.

There's no question that he didn't back off or back up one inch about the offense of sin. I'm righteous. This is what I demand. I did it. But because now I have done this, if you will believe on my son and his worth, I will declare you righteous. And I can do it on a perfectly unquestionable basis. I get to do it because I'm satisfied.

But he didn't have to, right? Do you understand what Donna is saying? Once his righteousness had been satisfied and propitiation had happened, was he under an obligation to offer salvation to us? No, it says he did it freely by his grace. The great thing about grace is that there is absolutely no obligation involved in it either by the one who is extending the grace or receiving the grace. Do you understand that? Now, if the cross of Christ didn't happen, he couldn't have been gracious. You see that? Because he is righteous. I was just thinking about this again.

Life would be just like the Old Testament. It would have to remain that way until we encountered God in man and the cross, the death, whatever that may have meant. But without that scenario, we would be offering, continuing to offer sacrifices as a temporary satisfaction to God for, you know, a year, and then we do it again. That's where we would be. That's where man was for so many thousands of years.

And it wouldn't be effective. It wouldn't be effective. It would be temporary, but it would be the only option up until something changed. Something had to be him doing it. He decided that that was going to be the remedy. We didn't temporarily come up with that idea. We would have never even thought that. He did all of that on a credit card. He did all of that knowing the payment was coming in the future. If that payment wasn't coming, we can do all the tap dancing we want and we're not going anywhere.

You can't go back to that and it was never meant to be permanent. So it's kind of just a little bit of a thought that's not based on reality, but it is interesting that without him doing the sacrificing, and him doing the perfect living, and him satisfying all of his own wrath, as well as declaring righteous those who believe in that, we are left with sacrifices that are temporary, that would never Never satisfied him, propitiated him in the first place. They were all temporary.

And so many of us live as though that's still true. That's right. We take the Old Testament system and make it a post-cross-law offering. And it's part of the spiritual DNA of Adam. That the completeness of the work of Christ, that just Adam can't quite accept that.

It's like you ask the class you're in, that you teach sometimes, ask them if you feel sorry for your sins, will God forgive you faster than if you don't feel sorry? And have them raise their hands, half the group will raise their hands. that I've got to somehow have a play in this, no I don't. You've got to give him something, just something. I mean, you feel bad if you don't give him something. I know, something. Half of them will raise their hands, the other half will consider to raise their hand, but we're afraid to. True.

So verse 25, whom God set forth in propitiation by His blood through faith, To demonstrate his righteousness, we talked about what he is doing, because of his forbearance, which J.D. talked about, he passed over the sins that were previously committed. To demonstrate at the present time his righteousness that he might be just and justifier of those who have faith in Jesus Christ. So, down to verse 27, so where is the boasting then? My question number eight is why can't a Jew now boast about his personal law keeping? Why can't he boast about that? Law keeping has no effect on salvation. It's really interesting as the Old Testament program that J.D. just described, which was looking forward to the cross, right? Well, once the cross happens, then none of that's any good anymore.

You know? It'd be like going to my favorite banker and borrowing ten bucks and I'm paying him a dollar a month. And when I got to the eleventh month, I still paid him. In the twelfth month, I still paid him. Wait a minute. Something's wrong here. I'm still taking the money. But the point is I'm paying for something that's already paid for. See that? I'm doing something that is a waste. A waste is probably the best word I can come up with. The Jew even, therefore even the Jew to whom the law had been given, had their mouths completely stopped because there was no work done. There is no ground of boasting.

What I find with contemporary denominations, and I can pick on Catholics because I came out of one, they boast about what they're doing. They do it all the time in a thousand different ways. And that's the purpose to do it. That's the motive. They're boasting. And all of these people who are working for the kingdom, They're adding to God's kingdom. Oh really?

What did you add? The amazing thing about the cross of Christ is the fact that a man is declared righteous totally apart from works. If there was anything left for you to do, it would not be a complete job. I was just reading yesterday that the reason Catholics always depict Christ on the cross is because they don't believe that he fully atoned for sin.

Is that correct? That's correct. That's correct. He's still up there paying for those sins. And they're helping. That's what the mass is. You know what the definition of the mass is? It's the unbloodied sacrifice of Christ. Wait a minute. Without blood, there's no forgiveness of sin. So we're going to do one without blood.

And I'm going to put my faith in that. And they say, well, here's what my mom used to say to me. All over the world, there's a mass going on every minute of every day. Well, I was impressed until I became a Christian. And then I thought, so? So tell me again, it's the unbloody sacrifice? That's right. What they do in the mass is they offer up Christ again. Only this time there's no blood on the altar. And they pass out the communion thing and they have the doctrine of transubstantiation which they believe that the bread and wine are actually the substance of Christ himself.

You know what the problem with that is? There's no propitiation. Which means, why even worry about the resurrection? Why care about that? So you're saying there's never any satisfaction from a Catholic perspective of God, of Christ? There's never a propitiation?

No. You know, when you're a young man and you start thinking through Catholicism in terms of your own personal safety, you find out that it's a lost cause because you can't live up to the tenets. You can't do it. And you're constantly sinning. You know, I remember telling my buddy at Revisit, my priest buddy, Fr. Hoescher, hey, Father, we all go to confession on Saturday and then we're supposed to go to Mass on Sunday morning and take Communion. I never can get from Saturday to Sunday without sinning. I'm in big trouble.

So not only can God not be satisfied with his own sacrifice in Catholicism, but you can never be satisfied about your relationship with God. That's exactly right. And that's the hardest thing for a Catholic to come to when they're being led to Christ is the permanency of the work of Christ. That it finished, it was done. And no matter what happens, after the point in which you believe in the person and work of Christ. Every one of those sins.

Because every sin that I have committed in my life was future at the time of the cross, right? Some of you are a little older than I am. But future, right? So I'm going to sin next week. Was that one included in the cross? Penalty paid. Penalty paid. Penalty paid.

And it's so difficult for someone who's in a denomination like that. Same thing with a Calvinist person. They never get the security either, because they've got to persevere. And they don't really know if they're one of the chosen ones until they persevere.

So question nine, what's the law of faith? Because we're saved by faith through grace. What is the principle of faith? How many of you were in the faith class? You can't answer. You can't remember, right? What is the principle of faith? How does it work? There are about five different kinds of faith. Four. When we did the class, it was the essence of faith. Remember that?

Hebrews 11.1. There was faith with a definite article in front of it, which could be the whole deposit of truth or one specific thing. There was the principle of faith, which this is, and then there was personal faith. What's the principle of faith? What is the principle?

The way things work. It's the way something works. It works the same every time. Every single time. Otherwise it wouldn't be a principle. Okay? How does the principle of faith work? What are the elements of it? You're going to have to repeat the class, you know. Well, okay, make it simple. How does personal faith work? Sure, but what are the elements of that? Belief. Belief in what? The object. What's the object? God. God's word, right? That's part of the principle. God's word. God says it.

Once he declares it and says it in his word, part of the principle is, what do I do about that? What am I personally supposed to do about that? What am I supposed to do? Believe him. I'm to believe him. That's the principle. He reveals, I believe. That's how it works. If he reveals and I don't believe, the principle's not working. Well, the principle would be, he reveals and a person believes. The personal thing is, he revealed and I believed. Okay. Those are so closely tied to one another in the sense that there's the principle of someone doing it, and then there's me doing it, right?

When I think about the law of faith, I think about Galatians 2.20. I have been crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live in the life I now live. I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. Could you say that's the law of faith? No, that's good. Sure. Is there anything more difficult than to live day by day, minute by minute, by faith, by trusting God when he says? I don't think so. Too much of a distraction. Okay, last question.

If God announces the gift of righteousness apart from works, why do you keep mourning over your bad works and your failures? Wait a minute, let me get my collar. Actually it's a question that Newell asked and his answer was, it's because you still have hopes in your works, the works of yours, that you are depressed and discouraged by their failure? If you truly saw and believed that God is reckoning righteous the ungodly who believe in him, you would fairly hate your struggles to be better, for you would see that your dreams of good works have not at all commended you to God, and that your bad works do not at all hinder you from believing in Him."

Isn't that cool? Okay, I'm done. Next week, Lesson 12. Let's close. Dear Father, we thank you for your graciousness and the fact that you have perfectly, perfectly taken care of everything that was between you and us. And we are so thankful that you have done it that way. And we look forward to growing continually in this grace that you've provided in the knowledge of your son. And we pray in his precious name. Amen.