April 8, 2000

• Easter Through the Eyes of God by John MacArthur

  Resurrection: The Key to Everything

  Selected Scriptures

  
  
  
  

        It's always a wonderful challenge for me when I come to this particular Sunday in the year to know what the Lord would have me say after being here 23 past Easters and sharing so many things about the resurrection of Jesus Christ.  As I was meditating and seeking to know the mind of the Lord with regard to this Lord's day, I asked a simple question in the process of my musings and that is the question: what would God the Father desire me to say about the resurrection?  Not so much what would the people like to hear, not so much what would gather their attention and hold it, not so much what might be a nuance in regard to Easter that they've not thought about, but what would the Father want me to say?  What simple straight-forward direct message could I bring that the Father Himself would want me to say concerning the resurrection of His Son?

        Certainly many books and many articles and theses and dissertations have been written through the years on the resurrection.  There have been many lectures and speeches and sermons and discussions on the resurrection.  Most of it focuses on how to prove the resurrection.  In fact, the books that have been written on proving the resurrection would fill a myriad of library shelves.  And that's not unusual because often at this time of the year the question comes up: how can we prove the resurrection?  If it is so central to Christian faith, how do we prove it?  What is it that proves Jesus really rose from the dead?

        Well the answer to that question is very simple...the Bible.  And now that we've dealt with that question I want to move to another question.  I don't want to talk about how we prove the resurrection, the Bible proves the resurrection.  It is the Word of God and it says Jesus Christ rose from the dead and that settles it.  The issue, frankly, is not what proves the resurrection, the issue is what does the resurrection prove?  What does the resurrection prove?  And the answer is, basically, the full redemptive plan and purpose of God.  In fact, the resurrection is the key to everything. 

        If you remove the resurrection of Jesus Christ from Christianity, you don't have Christianity.  You literally take the heart out of it.  We accept that the resurrection happened by faith, faith in the Scripture, faith that is given to us by the Holy Spirit.  We have been convinced by the Holy Spirit that the Bible is true and the Bible says Jesus arose from the dead and that settles that issue.  And on the pages of Scripture there is ample convincing evidence.

        But the question is, what did the resurrection of Jesus Christ mean?  What did it verify?  What did it accomplish?  What did it prove?  Well I want us to look at several realities that are proven by the resurrection, several that are made incontrovertible and inarguable by the resurrection.  And I think you'll find them very basic to the message of Scripture.

        First of all, the resurrection proves the truthfulness of the Word of God...it proves the truthfulness of the Word of God.  That's really reversing the normal approach.  We might say, "Well, the Word of God proves the resurrection."  But let's look at it in reverse and see how the resurrection proves the Word of God. 

        Turn in your Bible to Acts chapter 2.  Acts chapter 2 takes us to a great day in the history of the church, it's first day, the day the church was born, the day of Pentecost.  The believers had been filled with the power of the Holy Spirit and now Peter stands up to preach a great sermon, the hearing of which caused 3,000 people to be saved and the church was born.

        But as he moves in to his sermon he quotes an Old Testament passage starting in verse 25 of Acts 2.  He is speaking about Christ and His death in verse 23, speaks of His resurrection in verse 24 when he says, "God raised Him up again, putting an end to the agony of death since it was impossible for Him to be held in its power."  So he is saying Jesus arose from the dead, death couldn't hold Him.

        And then he goes on to quote from Psalm 16, "For David says of Him, I was always beholding the Lord in my presence for He is at my right hand that I may not be shaken.  Therefore my heart was glad and my tongue exalted, moreover my flesh also will abide in hope because Thou wilt not abandon my soul to Hades nor allow Thy holy One to undergo decay.  Thou hast made known to me the ways of life.  Thou wilt make me full of gladness with Thy presence."

        He is quoting David.  David was the author of Psalm 16.  And David was writing this.  Now some might say, "Well David was writing it about himself."  But that's not true because David's soul did go in to Hades and David's body did undergo decay and David, the man that he was in a physical body has not returned to the ways of life.  So it could not refer to David. 

        Notice how Peter interprets it then in verse 29, "Brethren, I may confidently say to you regarding the patriarch David that he both died and was buried and his tomb is with us to this day."  In other words, Peter is saying, "Now David couldn't be referring to himself, David has been abandoned, as it were, to death.  He is still in the abode of the dead.  His tomb is still present, still known to the people...they even knew its location...David has not returned to the ways of life.  So he could not be referring to David."

        Verse 30, "And so because he was a prophet and knew that God had sworn to him with an oath to seat one of his descendants upon his throne, he looked ahead and spoke of the resurrection of the Christ that He was neither abandoned to Hades, nor did His flesh suffer decay."

        In other words, he says David was prophesizing as a prophet the resurrection of Jesus Christ.  It was Jesus Christ whose flesh would abide in hope, whose soul would not be abandoned in Hades and who as the Holy One would never undergo decay.  It was Jesus Christ who would be given back the path of life and would come back full of gladness face-to-face into the presence of God.  David didn't fulfill that.  His tomb is still sealed over there near Siloam.  But David was a prophet and David was predicting the resurrection of Messiah. 

        To sum up Peter's argument, his logic would go like this.  Psalm 16 refers to someone being resurrected.  It can't be David.  Messiah was to come as David's greater son, out of David's loins.  The Psalm refers to Messiah...Messiah will therefore be raised from the dead.  And then he concludes in verse 32, "This Jesus God raised up again."

        The Old Testament then in Psalm 16 predicts the resurrection of the Messiah.  If the Messiah doesn't rise.  If Jesus Christ doesn't rise from the grave, the Bible is not telling us the truth.  But the resurrection of Christ proves that the Bible speaks truth. 

        What does the resurrection prove then?  The truthfulness of the Word of God.  Look at Acts chapter 13 and here we find the preacher, not Peter this time but Paul, and Paul in apostolic fashion consistent with Peter is also preaching the resurrection which, of course, was the heart of the Christian faith.  And in Acts chapter 13, now I want you to notice verse 30, verse 29, of course, talking about the cross and Jesus being laid in a tomb, and then Paul says as he proclaims Christ to Jews, verse 30, "But God raised Him from the dead and for many days He appeared to those who came up with Him from Galilee to Jerusalem, the very ones who are now His witnesses to the people, and we preach to you the good news of the promise made to the fathers."  There it is.  We're preaching the resurrection.  It is good news.  We are witnesses to it.  And it is that which was promised to the fathers, the Jewish fathers, the Old Testament saints. 

        Verse 33, that God has fulfilled this promise to our children in that He raised up Jesus as it is also written in the second Psalm, "Thou art My Son, today I have begotten Thee." And he is saying when the psalmist said that he was predicting that Jesus would be raised from the dead.

        Verse 34, and as for the fact that He raised Him up from the dead, no more to return to decay, He has spoken in this way, "I will give you the holy and sure blessings of David."  That is a prophecy from Isaiah 55 and verse 3 which promises that the Messiah will not perish but the Messiah will inherit the holy and sure blessings promised to David that is all the Kingdom promise.

        And then he says, therefore he also says in another Psalm and goes back to the same Psalm 16 that we saw earlier, "Thou wilt not allow Thy holy One to undergo decay.  For David after he had served the purpose of God in his own generation fell asleep and was laid among his fathers and underwent decay.  But He whom God raised did not undergo decay."  And again you see, here is Paul and based on three Old Testament prophecies he preaches the resurrection of Christ.  The Scripture is at stake.  If Jesus doesn't rise, Psalm 2 is wrong, Psalm 16 is wrong, Isaiah 55 is wrong, any other Old Testament passage indicating the resurrection of Jesus Christ is wrong, therefore the Bible cannot be trusted.  It is not always true.  Who then can discern when it is and when it isn't?  And man is left with a hopelessly skewed confusing inadequate and inaccurate document in the scriptures.  But if Jesus rises from the dead, the prophecies are true, the Word of God is confirmed as speaking truth.

        In Acts chapter 26 we read, verse 22, "And so having obtained help from God, I stand to this day testifying both to small and great, stating nothing but what the prophets and Moses said was going to take place."  And what did the prophets say and what did Moses say even back in the Pentateuch?  "That the Christ was to suffer and that means of His resurrection from the dead He should be the first to proclaim light both to the Jewish people and to the Gentiles."  All the way back in the law, all the way back in the prophets as well as the hagiographa, the holy writings, the Psalms, we see it in the law, the prophets and the writings, the Messiah will die and the Messiah will rise.  The Scripture is at stake.  When Jesus arose then all of these prophecies and many more were fulfilled and the Word of God was proven to be true.

        Now I want you to turn to the second chapter of John's gospel, John chapter 2, and verse 19.  Here our Lord Jesus is speaking, speaking to the Jews who are asking Him about a sign.  Jesus answered and said to them, You want a sign?  I'll give you one.  "Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up."  That is a prophecy, that is Scripture spoken by Christ recorded in the gospel of John.  The Jews in their ignorance said, "It took 46 years to build this temple," they think He's talking about the physical temple of Herod, "and You will raise it up in three days?  But He was speaking of the temple of His body."  Then verse 22, "When therefore He was raised from the dead, His disciples remembered that He had said this and they believed the Scripture and the Word which Jesus had spoken."  They knew the Scripture promised a resurrection.  They knew Jesus in speaking New Testament scripture promised a resurrection.  And when it happened, they believed the Scripture.  The resurrection of Jesus Christ should affirm our faith and confidence in the veracity, the inerrancy of Scripture.

        What does the resurrection prove?  It proves that the Scripture is true.  In Luke chapter 24, a familiar scene on the road to Emmaus as two woe-begone and saddened and grieving disciples walk along thinking their Lord has perished for good, not knowing of His resurrection.  They are sad, all is lost.  And as Jesus comes alongside in verse 25 of Luke 24 He says to them, "O foolish men and slow of heart, to believe in all that the prophets have spoken, was it not necessary for the Christ, the Messiah, to suffer these things and to enter into His glory?  And beginning with Moses and with all the prophets He explained to them the things concerning Himself in all the scriptures."

        The picture of a dead and risen Messiah is all over the Old Testament.  Every time there was a sacrifice of a lamb, every time such sacrifices noted in the Scripture, it speaks of a dying Messiah.  But every time it talks about Messiah's reigning and ruling and kingdom, it speaks about a living Messiah, therefore it is obvious that the One who dies must come back to life.  It is all over the Old Testament.  And the Scripture's veracity is at stake in the resurrection.

        In 1 Corinthians chapter 15, you remember these wonderful words, "I delivered to you...verse 3...of first importance what I received that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures and that He was buried and that He was raised on the third day according to the scriptures," just as the Old Testament said He would be...just as He Himself said and the New Testament writers said He would be.

        Secondly, the resurrection not only proves the truthfulness of the Word of God, it proves the deity of the Son of God...the deity of the Son of God.  In fact, no greater proof exists for the divine nature of Jesus Christ then He rising from the dead.  That is the most monumental thing that He did to verify that He was God, for only God can give life, only God can conquer death.

        If you look in to the New Testament you will find a myriad of individuals giving testimony to Christ as God.  Some are the most amazing, others we might expect. 

        For example, demons affirm the deity of Christ.  In Mark 5 and 6...chapter 5 verse 6 and 7, I should say...the demons said, "Jesus, Son of the Most High God," even the demons, even the minions of hell, the fallen angels know of His deity, they know He is the Son of the Most High God. 

        In John chapter 9 you meet a man born blind, a man whom Jesus healed, a man who was sick for the glory of God.  And Jesus says to him, "Do you believe in the Son of Man?  And he answered and said, Who is He, Lord, that I may believe in Him?  And Jesus said you've seen Him, and He is the one who is talking with you.  And he said, Lord, I believe and he worshiped Him."  He knew he was dealing with God.  The rest of the people said, "We don't know where He's from."  And the blind man said, "You mean He's opened my eyes and you don't know where He's from?"

        And then there were the disciples who gave testimony.  Peter on behalf of all of them said, "Thou art the Christ the Son of the living God."  Thomas said, "My Lord and my God."  Nathaniel said, "Thou art the Son of God."  Matthew said, "He is God with us."  Mark said, "He is Jesus Christ, the Son of God."  Luke said, "He is the Son of God."  The Apostles, the writers of the New Testament, affirm the deity of Christ.

        There was John the Baptist, you'll remember, His cousin who said, "I saw and bear record that this is the Son of God."  There was Martha the sister of Mary who said, very affirmingly, "I have believed that You are the Christ, the Son of God, even He who comes into the world," John 11:27.  There was the testimony of a Roman soldier at His crucifixion, "Truly this man is the Son of God."  And Christ repeatedly made such claims.  He said, "If you've seen Me you've seen the Father.  I and the Father are one."

        You have the testimony of all of these individuals to the deity of Christ. But none of them is as potent as the testimony of one other individual.  Look at Romans chapter 1 and verse 4.  In verse 1 we are introduced to the phrase, "The gospel of God," Romans 1:1.  Verse 2 says, "God promised it through the prophets."  Verse 3 says, "It was the gospel of God concerning God's Son."  Then verse 4 says, "It was the gospel of God concerning His Son who was declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead."  At His baptism the Father spoke out of heaven and said, "This is My beloved Son, listen to Him."  And that was a strong word from God at His baptism.  But an even stronger word from God was that God raised Him from the dead and God was in essence saying...This is My beloved Son and He is proven to be My Son in that He has been raised from the dead, now for sure and for every reason listen to Him.

        Romans 1:4 is the testimony of God the Father.  He is the supreme witness.  In Acts 13:30 it says, "God raised Him from the dead."  And God did it to give testimony to His deity.  In Romans 6:4 it tells us as well that Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father.  The Father wanted Him raised from the dead so through His glory or His power, His attributes, His essence, He raised Christ from the dead.  Ephesians chapter 1 verse 19 talks about the surpassing greatness of God's power.  How great is it?  Verse 20, "It is the power with which He brought about the resurrection of Christ from the dead and seated Him at His right hand."

        Again, God is the one who raised Christ.  And He did it to give testimony to His deity.  He is become in His resurrection both Lord and Christ.  The resurrection, Peter says in Acts 2:36, shows Him to be Lord and Christ.

        So, the resurrection not only proves that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners, but it proves that He was God. Romans 4:25 may be the most wonderful, the most powerful verse with regard to the application of His resurrection...makes a third point, and I want you to get this third point.  The first point, His resurrection proves the truthfulness of the Word of God.  The second point, His resurrection proves the deity of the Son of God.  Thirdly, His resurrection proves the completion of the salvation of God...the completion of the salvation of God.

        Listen to Romans 4, wonderful truth, truth on which we build our lives.  "He was delivered up because of our transgressions and was raised because of our justification."  In order for God to justify us, in order for God to declare us righteous, He had to raise Jesus from the dead.  When it says His name shall be called Jesus for He shall save His people from their sins, that's exactly what God wanted.  But in order to accomplish it, He had to raise Christ from the dead.  That was indispensable evidence of the completion and efficacious value of His death.  It was the Father's way of saying...Your death accomplished its intended purpose.  It was God raising Him from the dead to affirm that what He did on the cross satisfied God's holy justice.  If He didn't rise, then all He is is Jesus Christ Superstar and His death is the death of an ordinary man and has no saving value.  But He did rise from the dead and He was raised by the Father for our justification.  He was raised in order that in the sight of God we might be made righteous, in order that in the sight of God we might be without sin, in order that our sin might be dismissed and forgiven.

        And when He was raised it was as if God said...I accept the sacrifice...I accept it.
  

        There are so many essential features in our salvation contingent on the resurrection.  I can take Romans 4:25 and split it into component parts.  The bestowing of eternal life is dependent on the resurrection.  As in Adam all died, so in Christ shall be made alive.  Because I live you shall live also   In other words, it was in the death of Christ and His resurrection that He granted to us eternal life.  If He never rose then He showed He couldn't conquer death.  If He never rose He wouldn't be alive.  If He wasn't alive He couldn't give us life.  But He did arise and He said in John 11:25, "I am the resurrection and the life, whoever believes in Me even though he dies shall live again."

        So, eternal life is dependent upon the resurrection.  That's a component in the completion of God's salvation. Secondly, the sending of the Holy Spirit.  If Jesus hadn't risen from the grave He never would have ascended back to the Father.  If He hadn't ascended back to the Father, He never would have sent the Holy Spirit.  He Himself said that He could not send the Holy Spirit until He had gone back to the Father, John 16:7, "I tell you truth, it is to your advantage that I go away.  If I do not go away the Holy Spirit will not come to you. But if I go, I'll send Him to you."  And when He comes He'll convict the world of sin and righteousness and judgment.  When He comes He'll lead you into all truth.  When He comes He'll bring all things into remembrance.  When He comes He will place you into the body of Christ.  When He comes He will become the guarantee of your eternal life.  When He comes He will take up residence in you and you will become His temple.  When He comes He will empower you for service.  When He comes He will guide you.  When He comes He will instruct you in the Word of God.  He will be the anointing that teaches you so that you need no human teacher.

        The whole full-blown ministry of the Holy Spirit was dependent upon the resurrection of Christ.  If He didn't rise He couldn't ascend.  If He couldn't ascend, He couldn't send the Spirit.  No resurrection--no ascension...no ascension--no Holy Spirit...no Holy Spirit--no church.  When you talk about the resurrection proving the completion of the saving work of God, you're talking about the heart of Christianity.  He had to rise to give us eternal life.  He had to have the life to give it.  He had to rise to go back to the Father to send us the Holy Spirit.

        Thirdly, He had to rise to forgive our sins.  If He hadn't risen from the dead then we would know the Father was not pleased with His sacrifice, His sacrifice was not efficacious, it was not successful, it didn't work, it didn't atone for our sins and therefore the Father did not exalt Him and take Him to glory because He didn't do what He was supposed to do.  On the other hand, if Jesus was raised from the dead, taken to the right hand of God, seated at the throne of God on His right hand, affirmed by God as having perfectly accomplished our redemption, then there is forgiveness of sins.  Then it is accomplished.  Then He who came for the expressed purpose of dying to put away death and sin accomplished His purpose.  He, it says, was made like His brethren in all things that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God to make propitiation for the sins of His people, that's Hebrews 2.  Later on it says in Hebrews that He has perfected forever them that are sanctified by the offering of Himself, that His sacrifice did work, our sins were completely covered and the Father affirmed it in the resurrection.

        Fourthly, Jesus must rise from the dead in order to be at the right hand of God interceding for us.  His resurrection is inseparably linked to His work of intercession as He presents His petitions on behalf of the weak and tempted Christians and intercedes for them before the throne of grace.  John says in 1 John 1...1 John 2:1 and 2, we have an advocate with the Father who is always pleading our case.  Hebrews chapter 4 and Hebrews chapter 7 says we have a merciful and faithful high priest, in all points tempted like we are yet without sin, and He ever lives to make intercession for us.  He is always at the right hand of God.  Satan is there accusing us.  He is there defending us.  He is our lawyer, our advocate, our defender.  If He didn't rise from the dead He wouldn't have ascended.  If He didn't ascend we have no defender there.  We have no one there pleading our case.  We don't have the Holy Spirit in us pleading our case with groanings which cannot be uttered because He couldn't go back and send the Spirit and we don't have Him there advocating on our behalf either.  The resurrection therefore is necessary not only for forgiveness of sins but for perpetual intercession that we might never be tempted above that we are able and that there always will be a way of escape.

        Fifthly, the resurrection is crucial to the bestowal of spiritual gifts...to the bestowal of spiritual gifts.  What are those?  Those are the divine enabling abilities that the Spirit of God gives to every Christian so that we can serve God.  In Ephesians chapter 4 it says that Christ ascended and after He ascended He gave some as apostles and some as prophets and evangelists and pastor/teachers for the equipping of the saints, for the work of service, for the building up of the body of Christ.  He went back to heaven and then He began to work through gifted men and spiritual gifts to built His church strong.  To each one of us, verse 7 says, was given grace according to the measure of Christ's gift.  And He gave us that gift when He ascended on high, when He led captivity a host of captives and gave gifts to men.  Jesus, risen from the dead, ascends to heaven, sends back spiritual gifts, gifted men, so that we can serve God.  That's all based on His resurrection.  If He doesn't rise...arise, He doesn't ascend, He doesn't send gifts, nor the enabling Spirit.

        Sixthly, the resurrection also grants spiritual power, spiritual power.  Jesus said in Matthew 28:18, "All power is given unto Me in heaven and earth."  Then in Acts 1:8 He says, "When the Spirit comes I'm passing it to you and you now are able to do exceeding, abundantly above all you can ask or think according to the power that works in you."  You have the power, Ephesians 1 says, that raised Jesus from the dead working through you.  Jesus Christ then sends us power, the enabling power and authority of the Spirit of God.

        I can give you a seventh component of the salvation of God and that is Jesus Christ in His resurrection has given to us a new position of blessing, a new position of blessing.  In Ephesians chapter 1 and verse 3 it says we are blessed with all spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ.  Christ is in the heavenlies and because He is there He pours out all spiritual blessing on us.  Chapter 2 of Ephesians and verse 7 says, "Forever He will pour out the surpassing riches of His grace in His kindness toward us."

        What immense blessing.  The salvation of God demanded eternal life, the coming of the Spirit, the forgiveness of sins, ongoing intercession, the bestowing of spiritual gifts, the granting of spiritual power and the outpouring of eternal blessing...and all of that hinges on the resurrection.  If Christ doesn't rise, none of it happens...none of it.

        The question then is not what proves the resurrection but what does the resurrection prove?  It proves that the Word of God

  is true.  It proves that the Son of God is deity.  It proves that the salvation of God is complete.

        Fourthly, the resurrection proves the establishment of the church of God...the establishment of the church of God.  Our Lord said He would build His church.  Do you remember these words in Matthew 16?  We preached on them a few weeks ago.  "I will build My church and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it."  What are the gates of Hades?  It's a Jewish expression meaning what?  Death.  I'll build My church and death won't stop it...not your death and not Mine.  Jesus was, in effect, saying...I'm going to die but I'm going to rise...death is not going to stop Me from building My church.  Ephesians 1:20 says that Christ was raised from the dead, seated at the right hand in heavenly places, far above all rule, all authority, power, dominion, every name that is named not only in this age, in the age to come.  And He's put all things into subjection under His feet and gave Him as head over all things to the church which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.  When He rose He took His seat, He became the head of the church.  The resurrection is essential to the establishment of the church.  If there's no resurrection there's no church.  Anybody that says they belong to a church that doesn't believe the resurrection doesn't belong to a church.  The true church is the church of those who have been given life through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

        John Calvin wrote, "This is the highest honor of the church that until He is united to us, the Son of God reckons Himself in some measure imperfect.  Without consolation it is for us to learn that not until we are in His presence does He possess all His parts or does He wish to be regarded as complete."  In other words, the Messiah Himself is not complete without His body. He is a head without a body, the church is His completion.  And that church was born in the resurrection.  It was the resurrection that transformed the apostles from scattered, fearful, faithless doubters and cowards into world changing apostles.  The little band of disciples maligned and persecuted grew to fill Jerusalem with their teaching and soon turned the world upside down.  Jews meeting on Sabbath for centuries and millennia all of a sudden became Christians meeting on Sunday.  Sabbath was no more the day, Sunday was because Jesus arose.  And the church has marched through time triumphant in the power of its risen Christ.

        Bill Gaither wrote, "God has always had a people, many a foolish conqueror has made the mistake of thinking that because he has driven the church of Jesus Christ out of sight, he has stilled its voice and snuffed out its life.  But God has always had a people.  The powerful current of a rushing river is not diminished because it's forced to flow under ground.  The purest water is the stream that bursts crystal clear into the sunlight after it has fought its way through solid rock.  There have been charlatans who like Simon the magician sought to barter on the open market that power which cannot be bought or sold.  But God has always had a people.  Men who could not be bought and women who are beyond purchase.  God has always had a people.  It has been misrepresented, His church, ridiculed, lauded and scorned, these followers of Jesus Christ have been escorted to the edge of the grace, accorded the whims of time, elevated as sacred leaders and martyred as heretics, yet through it all their marches on that powerful army of the meek, God's chosen people who could not be bought, murdered, martyred or stilled.  On through the ages they marched, the church, God's church, triumphant, alive and well. And the church lives today despite constant attack and corruption and counterfeiting.  It lives because it is sustained by resurrection power.

        The resurrection then proves the truthfulness of the Word of God, the deity of the Son of God, the completion of the salvation of God, the establishment of the church of God.  Fifthly and sadly, the resurrection proves the inevitability of the judgment of God...the inevitability of the judgment of God.  When our Lord came into the world the first time, He was mocked and scorned, hated, a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief.  He was humbled, He allowed Himself to be treated so terribly, the people said He was hell.  They battered Him, they spit on Him, they pushed a crown of thorns into His head, they drove nails through His hands and feet, they rammed a spear into His side, they put Him on display naked as a laughing stock.

        But that's not the last scene the world will have of Jesus.  He rose from the dead to be their judge.  They executed Him as a criminal.  He will come back as their judge.  Listen to John 8, a very, very powerful, powerful testimony.  He says to the Jews who have rejected Him, verse 26, "I have many things to speak and to judge concerning you."  This thing isn't over, He said.  Back in verse 21 He said, "Because you do not know Me you will die in your sins and where I am going you cannot come."  I have more to say to you, He says, and to judge concerning you.

        Back in John chapter 5 He speaks specifically about that judgment.  In verse 22 He says, "All judgment is given to the Son, God has made Him judge and given to Him all judgment."  Verse 21, "Just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so the Son also gives life to whom He wishes and then not even the Father judges anyone, but He has given all judgment to the Son."

        Down in verse 25, "Truly, truly I say to you, an hour is coming and now is when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear shall live for just as the Father has life in Himself, even so He gave to the Son to have life in Himself and He gave Him authority to execute judgment."  What kind of judgment?  Verse 28, "Some day the tombs are going to hear His voice, they're going to come forth, those who did good deeds to the resurrection of life, those who committed evil ones to a resurrection of judgment.  "I can do nothing on my own initiative...verse 30 says...as I hear I judge and My judgment is just."  He's coming back as a just judge.  He's coming back as judge, jury, sentencer, executioner.  And God has testified to that.  He was killed as a criminal.  He will return as a resurrected judge.

        Listen to Acts 10 verse 42, actually start at verse 40, "God raised Him up on the third day after being hanged on a cross...verse 39...God raised Him up on the third day...Acts 10 verse 40...and granted that He should become visible, not to all the people but to witnesses who were chosen before hand by God, that is to us who ate and drank with Him after He rose from the dead."  Why did He appear to the apostles?  Verse 42, "And He ordered us to preach to the people and solemnly to testify that this is the One who has been appointed by God as judge of the living and the dead."  He will come back as a God-appointed judge.  In Acts chapter 17 is preaching on the Areopagus known as Mars Hill in Athens and Paul says in verse 30 of that sermon that God has patiently overlooked the times of man's ignorance but He is now declaring to men that they just repent...verse 31 of Acts 17...because He has fixed a day, the day of the Lord, which He will judge the world in righteousness through a man He has appointed.  And how did He furnish proof that Christ was the man?  By raising Him from the dead, says Paul. 

        The resurrection then is the act of the Father by which He appoints Christ to be the judge.  Now you can see how man sweeping realities in the Christian faith are unlocked to us in the resurrection of Christ.  He is raised not only for our justification who believe, but for the damnation of those who do not believe and the Father attested to Him as Savior, as Son and as judge by His resurrection from the dead.

        I'm thinking of Romans 14:9 which says, "Christ died and lived again that He might be Lord both of the dead and of the living," and then the next verse says, "We must all stand before the judgment seat of God."  He is not only the judge of the unbeliever, He is the judge of the believer.  We must all stand before the judgment seat of Christ, Paul says in 2 Corinthians chapter 5, and He will be there to test our works to see if they're wood, hay and stubble or gold, silver and precious stones.

        The Lord Jesus Christ risen from the dead proves the truthfulness of the Word of God, the deity of the Son of God, the completion of the salvation of God, the establishment of the church of God, the inevitability of the judgment of God...and one last point, the eternal bliss of the people of God.  His resurrection is the guarantee of our eternal heaven.  Listen to these wonderful and familiar words, Jesus speaking, John 14, "Let not your heart be troubled, believe in God, believe also in Me.  In My Father's house are many dwelling places, of it were not so I would have told you for I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, receive you to Myself that where I am there you may be also."

        Right there Jesus is predicting His resurrection.  He's headed to death but He says, "I'm going right through death into the Father's house to get a place ready for you and I'll be back to get you."  If there's no resurrection, there's no place prepared for us.  If there's no place prepared for us, there's no heaven for us.  Everything depends on the resurrection.

        And again I say what I said at the beginning.  The real issue is not: Can you prove the resurrection?  The real issue is:  What does the resurrection prove?  You take out the resurrection and you have cut out the soul of the Christian faith and you have non-Christianity without the resurrection.  All of God's complete redemptive plan depends on this key reality. 

        And that brings it right down to us, doesn't it?  All of the redemptive plan of God in its fullness, completed in the resurrection of Jesus Christ will either mean to you heaven or it will mean to you hell.  He will either be back to take you to the place that He has prepared for you, or He will be back to send you to the place He has prepared for the devil and his angels.  He will be back either to gather you into His heaven, or to send you to the hell that is outside of His presence forever.  He will be back to pour upon you eternal blessing or eternal punishment.  You will arise from the dead some day to the resurrection of life in His presence, to the resurrection of damnation our of His presence.  All gospel realities hinge on His resurrection and your eternity is at stake.  You can make your choice.  It doesn't seem to me to be much of a choice, to choose heaven, forgiveness, blessedness, joy, fulfillment in His presence, or damnation, punishment, hell forever out of His presence.  But that's the choice. 

        This is resurrection day, the day we celebrate the resurrection of Christ and the day we should celebrate your resurrection in Christ.  Pray with me.

        Our Father, as we bring this service to its conclusion, we're very much aware of the fact that this is not just a message, this is a command...believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved.  The gospel is a command.  When the Father said, "This is My beloved Son, listen to Him," that was a command.  And either we obey it and respond in faith to Christ, give Him our lives, ask Him to save us from our sins and take us to heaven, or we reject it and disobey and are appointed place with the damned and the wicked.  Father, I pray that Your Holy Spirit would work in every life, every heart, every mind so that no one can shirk this message, this truth.  This is not just something that can be ignored, treated with indifference, eternal destiny turns on the issue of will I commit my life to the One who rose to be my Savior, or will I reject Him and face Him as my judge?  Lord, I pray that all across this world today as the resurrection is being preached, heaven will be rejoicing because many will be turned from death to life, darkness to light, hell to heaven, despair to hope, sin to righteousness.  Work Your work in every heart and for the glory of Christ we ask.  Amen.

  ---

  Looking at the Cross from God's Perspective

  Selected Scriptures

  
  
  
  
   

  I had on this particular trip for the last month the opportunity to be with unbelievers more than I normally would be, to be in their presence and to be somewhat disconnected from the normal circle of Christian friends in which I live and move and have my being. And it continued to make me grateful for the salvation that God has given to me, to see how people without Christ struggle through life trying to fill it with some meaning. To realize at the same time that I was so privileged, I was unworthy of that privilege and that God in His infinite grace had designed to save me was cause for great joy. And so, I have done a lot of thinking about just the simplicity and the center focus of Christianity which is the death of Jesus Christ on the cross and what it means in my own life. As one who teaches the Bible and studies it and who writes books and who gets into theology and commentaries, it's easy for me to get swept away in the waves of minutia that I deal with and it was very good for me just to be somewhat isolated and very often in a context of unbelievers and to be brought back to the reality of the simplicity of my relationship to Jesus Christ provided by His death on the cross and His resurrection.

  At the same time I'm very much aware of the fact that churches are filled with people who...who don't really understand that saving message. That is continually brought home to me. I had occasion when I was back in Maryland at a Bible conference on the Chesapeake Bay to be reminded daily by people who were there that they had attended churches for years and never come to a personal relationship with Jesus Christ until they had listened to Grace To You and heard a clear, clear message on the gospel. I continue to be astounded, I guess, that people can exist in churches over long periods of time and not know the saving truth.

  I shared with you that on one of my vacations in the past I had the occasion to read Ian Murray's book on Jonathan Edwards and I read that book with great interest because at the end of it, though he was the greatest theologian maybe this nation has ever produced, certainly one of its profoundest, and though for twenty-two years he preached at the church at North Hampton the unsearchable riches of Christ and expounded the Scripture and was God's primary instrument in the great awakening, and though he was faithful to preach the whole counsel of God, after twenty-two years as pastor his church voted him out. And the reason they voted him out was that he wanted to demand that no one take communion unless they had confessed Jesus as Lord and Savior. They thought that was excessive. And so they voted him out and there he was after twenty-two years of teaching theology and doctrine in its great profundity to that people, he realized that there were unconverted people when he came and there were still enough unconverted people twenty-two years later to vote him out of the church. Perhaps if he were to go back again he might have preached more messages on the simple gospel, lest someone somehow would miss the message that is at the heart of our faith.

  It is in the light of that that I want to ask you to turn in your Bibles to Romans chapter 3 this morning and I want to take us back to the beginning, if I might. It's been a long while since we took a Sunday-morning look at the work of Jesus Christ on the cross. The time has come for us to review that.

  Now the death of the Lord Jesus Christ can be viewed in several different ways and from several different perspectives, as you well know. Most frequently when we examine the death of Jesus Christ we do it from our viewpoint. We come to the cross and see it through man's eyes. We see the cross of Jesus Christ as that act by which Christ provided salvation for us, by which He saved us from sin and death and hell and the power of the flesh, by which He delivered us from the kingdom of darkness and put us in the kingdom of His dear Son, by which He ushered us into that place where we're blessed with all spiritual blessings in the heavenlies, by which He delivered us from the wrath to come, by which He took us who were enemies and made us friends of God, by which He granted to us eternal life and all that it involves. We see it from our viewpoint. It could be looked at that way and legitimately so.

  We also could come to the cross and look at it from the viewpoint of the holy angels. The angels, by the way, look at the cross and they are searching over the cross and they're examining it and looking into the atoning work of Christ, trying to comprehend and understand its great profound mysteries, mysteries which they cannot fully understand because they will not fully experience because holy angels need no redemption. And they see in it the wonder and the majesty and the glory of the mind of God and the goodness of God and the love of God as He provides for unworthy sinners. Theirs is a fascinating perspective.

  We could look at the cross from the standpoint of Satan and his demons. They see the cross as that point in which the Son bruised the serpent's head, that point in which the one who had the power of death, Satan, was destroyed by the One who now carries the power of death, the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end. Demons see the cross through their own eyes. They thought it was their moment of victory and in one split second Jesus showed up in the pit to announce His triumph over them and He has openly displayed His victory over principalities and powers and rulers and so forth. We could look at the cross from the vantage point of demons.

  We might even look at the cross through the eyes of Jesus Christ. We might even see it as He must have seen it. We could go through the excruciating agony of that kind of sin bearing and that rejection and hear Him cry, "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?"

  We could also see the cross as the moment of His glory for He said, "If I be lifted up, I'll draw all men to Myself." We could also see it as the verification of His word because He promised that He was going to die and there His promise came to pass. We could also see it as the moment of His greatest triumph when He indeed bruised the serpent's head. We could see it as the great demonstration of His love for He said, "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."

  You can look at the cross, as it were, through your own eyes. You could look at it through the eyes of holy angels, fallen angels, through the eyes of Christ Himself and see its glory.

  But for this morning, I want us to look at the cross in its relationship to God, to God Himself, God the Father. What did it mean to God? We know what Jesus' death meant to us. We know what it meant to the holy angels, it gave them a new verse to their great hymns of praise. We know what it meant to the demons, it was the end of their control of their own destiny. We know what it meant to Christ. But what did it mean to God? What did the death of Christ mean to God? How did it represent God? How did it glorify God? What is His perspective on that great event?

  And to understand that, look at Romans chapter 3 and follow as I read in verse 24. "Being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed; for the demonstration, I say, of His righteousness at the present time, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. Where then is boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? Of works? No, but by a law of faith. For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of the Law. Or is God the God of Jews only? Is He not the God of Gentiles? Yes, of Gentiles also, since indeed God who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through faith is one. Do we then nullify the Law through faith? May it never be! On the contrary, we establish the Law."

  Now that great text tells us what the cross meant to God. What the death of Christ, the atoning work of Christ, the blood- shedding sacrifice of Christ meant to God. Four things stand out. It declared God's righteousness, it exalted God's grace, it revealed God's consistency and it confirmed God's Word.

  We are in a worship service this morning. It is our intention to worship God. And so it is fitting that we in worshiping Him look at the cross, as it were, in relation to Him that we might worship Him for His righteousness, His grace, His consistency, and His Law, or His Word.

  Let's look at the first one. The cross revealed God's righteousness, verse 24. "Being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith, this was to demonstrate His righteousness." And we'll stop there for the moment.

  Christ died on the cross to demonstrate or to reveal or to declare God's righteousness. This is a very, very essential, a very, very important issue. Men have always struggled with this matter. Why? Because when you understand God to be a righteous God and you understand yourself to be a sinner, it puts you in a very difficult position. How can a sinful man be right with God? This is man's age-old longing, how can I know God, how can I be forgiven by God, how can I be right with God...it is that very question that has spawned religion. Religion is in every sense an attempt to answer that question, to solve the cry of the heart of man to appease whatever deity he may believe in, under whose authority he feels himself and under whose judgment he is afraid. How can I be right with God? Is God a righteous, holy, just God? And if indeed He is, then how can I appease Him? How can I satisfy His requirement for holiness, perfection, justice and righteousness and be right with Him?

  One sinner in a rather prosaic way put his musings down like this: "The one wished to dispute with Him, he could not answer Him one time out of a thousand. His wisdom is profound. His power is vast. Who has resisted Him and come out unscathed? He moves mountains without their knowing it and overturns them in His anger. He shakes the earth from its place and makes its pillars tremble. He speaks to the sun and it doesn't shine. He seals off the light of the stars. He alone stretches out the heavens and treads on the waves of the sea. He is the maker of the bear and Orion, the Pleiades and the constellations of the south. He performs wonders that cannot be fathomed, miracles that cannot be numbered. When He passes me I cannot see Him. When He goes by I cannot perceive Him. If He snatches away, who can stop Him? Who can say to Him...what are You doing? God does not restrain His anger, even the cohorts of Rahab cowered at His feet. How then can I dispute with Him? How can I find words to argue with Him? Though I were innocent I could not answer Him. I could not plead with my judge for mercy. Even if I summoned Him and He responded, I do not believe He would give me a hearing. He would crush me with a storm and multiply my wounds for no reason. He would not let me regain my breath but would overwhelm me with misery. If it is a matter of strength, He is mighty. If it is a matter of justice, whom will summon Him? Even if I were innocent my mouth would condemn me. If I were blameless it would pronounce me guilty."

  The musings of a man who fears he could never be right with God. Many suggestions are made about how man can be right with God, we call them religion. But apart from Christianity, all of them involve human achievement and works, and they don't satisfy God. They don't make provision for us and they don't make us right with Him.

  You remember Bildad, the friend of Job, echoed Job's cry? How can a man be right with God? How can he be clean? And you remember Paul on the Damascus road, "What will you have me to do?" And you remember those who heard Peter cry, "What shall we do?" And you remember those in hearing Jesus who said, "What do we do to work the works of God?" And you remember the Philippian jailor who said, "What must I do to be saved?" How can I connect up with a righteous, holy, just God? That has always been the cry of man's heart.

  Now if God were just to move down and forgive man, it would strike a blow against His justice. And someone would say...well God's justice is whimsical, and God's righteousness is capricious and He's on again, off again because some sinners He judges and damns and some He forgives and you can't trust His righteousness and you can trust His holiness and you can't trust His justice to be absolute.

  God wants, however, you to know that His nature is immutable in any attribute and that His justice, holiness and righteousness is immutable and unchanging and absolutely consistent. And so God devised a plan which would demonstrate, reveal His righteousness. Verse 24 says we are justified, we are made right with God as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus.

  Now listen, there is nothing any person can do to be made right with God. There is nothing any person can do to satisfy God's requirement for holiness and righteousness. There is nothing any human being can do to settle God's justice. And so if we can't do anything, the initiative has to be with whom? With Him. And so says Paul...we are justified as a gift by His grace. God gives us a justification, a righteousness. God gives us a right relationship with Him. We couldn't do it. We could never satisfy His righteous demands. After all, Jesus said, "Be ye perfect even as your Father in heaven is perfect." And we remember the words of Isaiah, "All your righteousnesses are as filthy rags." We could at our best only be filthy rags. We could never be perfect, therefore we could never achieve a relationship with God that satisfied God. So God had to give us a gift. He had to give us, in other words, what we couldn't earn. That's a gift, isn't it? You don't earn a gift. If you earned it, it isn't a gift, it's pay. So He gave us a gift.

  But in giving us a gift somebody might say, "God is not then a just God because it's not just to give you a gift when you don't deserve it. God is not a holy God because He's overlooking your sin. God is not a righteous God because He's tolerating your unrighteousness. God is accepting you as you are which means He's lowered His standard." That would be the accusation. And it would readily be on the lips of a Pharisee, believe me. And so says Paul, but God did give us a gift, it came out of His grace which means it was undeserved, unmerited and unearned. And He gave it to us through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus. The word "redemption" means a ransom. You know what a ransom is, somebody kidnaps a child and hauls them off somewhere and calls up and says..."The ransom is $200,000. You want to buy this child back, that's the price." Ransom means to pay a price to buy somebody back. It was used in ancient times to buy a slave out of bondage unto freedom.

  And so, God says, "Look, I'm going to give you the gift of a right relationship with Me, the gift of forgiveness of sins, the gift of eternal life, but the price will be paid." And it was paid, He says, in Christ Jesus. It isn't that God capriciously or whimsically just shoves His justice aside, shoves His righteousness aside, His holiness aside and says I'll love for a while, I'll be gracious for a while, I'll be merciful a while and I'll ignore those other things. No. God's holiness, God's righteousness, and God's justice can never be set aside. God will always operate consistent with His nature. And so whatever He does that is good and gracious and merciful will also be holy, just and righteous.

  How did He do that? He did it through the price being paid by Christ Jesus. In other words, He was so holy and just and righteous that some price had to be paid for sin. The price was set, death. But He was so loving, gracious and merciful that He gave His own Son to pay the price. Justice was satisfied and so was grace. Holiness was satisfied and so was mercy. Righteousness was satisfied and so was love. And so it says then in verse 25 that God displayed Christ publicly as a propitiation in His blood. Stop at that point.

  God displayed Christ publicly...what does that mean? Just what it says. He lifted Him up where all could see and He made Him to be a propitiation. That word, hilasterion in the Greek, means a satisfaction...a satisfaction. The criticism, you see, was that God was not righteous, just and holy if He just overlooked sin because, you see, the end of verse 25 says, "In the past God had been forebearing and passed over sins previously committed." How could He do that and be just? How could He wink at, as it says in Acts, the sins of all those generations, how could He tolerate all of that? Because somebody was going to pay the price. How could He forgive sinners? How could He just forgive them and still be just? Because the price would be paid. His justice, and holiness and righteousness would be satisfied.

  I suppose to some people it seemed as if divine justice was sleeping, as if divine righteousness had gone on a vacation, as if divine holiness had slipped into a coma. Men sinned here below and got away with it. They lived, they prospered. Where were the wages of sin? What about the soul that sins, it shall die? And then all of a sudden along come these preachers saying He's going to forgive, He's going to forgive, He's gracious and loving and merciful. He's going to forgive. And the question immediately arises...Wait a minute, wait a minute, God is holy and righteous and He can't just be overlooking sin, it has to be punished. It can't just be excused. It can't just fade away. It can't be ignored.

  No amount of optimism, no amount of love or grace or mercy can put sin aside and stop requiring its penalty. A holy God could never bypass sin and be complacent about evil. And even though He loved the sinner deeply, He cannot forgive the sinner unless His justice is satisfied. So the question is...how can a sinful man become acceptable to a righteous God? Somebody has to pay the price. And God out of love chooses not to punish the sinner but to punish His Son, therefore does He preserve the integrity of His nature and His reputation and give place to His grace as well. If the sinner were to suffer for his own sin, he will suffer eternally and even eternity cannot pay the price or eternity would end. But God is gracious and provides a sacrifice. Jesus Christ died the death that you deserved. He became sin who knew no sin. He died in our place. He is our substitute. He had to be man to die as man, He had to be God to overcome death and sin. And so the God/Man had to suffer. Jesus said, "The Son of Man must suffer and be killed." He knew it. And the early church preached why Christ must needs have suffered. The sacrifices of all the bulls and goats couldn't do it, Hebrews 10 says, "By the blood of bulls and goats has no flesh been sanctified."

  It isn't animal sacrifice that did it, that was just a picture of the sacrifice to come. It isn't human achievement, nothing you can do will satisfy God. A price has to be paid, it is the price of bloodshed and death. Christ paid it. Psalm 49:7 and 8 says, "None of them can redeem his brother nor give to God a ransom for him for the redemption of their souls is costly." The price is higher than any human being can pay, but it was paid by Christ. No sinner could atone for the sins of fellow sinners, so Christ the perfect One paid the price of divine justice and bore the sins of the whole world. The death of Christ then was not only an act of grace, it was an act of justice.

  Would you please note in verse 25 it says that He is a propitiation in His blood through faith. And at the end of verse 26, He is the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. This provision, this sacrifice of Christ is appropriated through faith--through faith, through believing. That is so very essential, so very basic to our faith. You appropriate the work of Christ by believing...true faith.

  So, God in the cross puts His justice, righteousness, holiness on display. So just and righteous and holy is He that even as much as He wants to forgive the sinner, He cannot do it unless the price is paid even if the price has to be paid by His own Son. That's how just God is. He can never be accused of being unjust or unrighteous. His justice was satisfied by the perfect, spotless Lamb who paid the perfect price. We then were not redeemed by corruptible things but by the precious blood of Christ. We see then in the cross the justice, the righteousness of God.

  Secondly, the cross exalts God's grace. The cross exalts God's grace. Verse 27...again somebody is going to pose another question, if this is all God, then what part do we have in it? And the answer is none, basically. There is no place for boasting. "Where then is boasting? It is excluded. It is excluded." Salvation is totally His work. Scripture makes that abundantly and profoundly clear, "For by grace are you saved through faith, that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of works, lest any should boast." Every component in salvation is the work of God. He even activates, quickens and livens our faith so that we can believe.

  And so, says Paul, "Where then is boasting? It's excluded." There isn't any place for boasting, it is left out all together. "By what kind of law?" verse 27 says. "Of works? No, but by a law of faith." In other words, if I don't have anything to do about this, if this isn't by works, how does it work? When he says "by what kind of law?" let me help you with that. The word "law" here means principle, not so much a fiat as we think of a law like the Ten Commandments or some law that God has laid down, but a principle, an operative principle. Used it the same way in Romans 7 and elsewhere. But he says...All right then, if this salvation isn't something that I do by my works and I can't boast about it, then by what kind of principle does it work? Of works? No, but by the principle of faith. Only the principle of faith will exalt God, glorify God because it takes all out of man's hands. The law here, or the principle, or the method by which salvation works is the method, principle, law of faith. And so when we can do nothing more than just receive the gift by faith, we know it's the gift of grace. And so God's grace is exalted here. The only one who can boast is God, for He by grace...back to verse 24...has given a gift to us which we can only receive or reject. We have no part in it except to take it. He cuts the ground out from under the feet of those who say I always do the best I can, I always live a decent life, I'm a good person, surely God will not overlook me. And he simply says it's all God's work.

  Then in verse 28, "For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of the law." The only contribution we make is to believe and even the believing is a work of God within us. Remember what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15:10, "I am what I am by...what?...by the grace of God." The hymn writer said, "My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness, I dare not trust the sweetest frame...that is anything that man can design...but holy lean on Jesus name." And so the principle, Paul says, under which we operate in terms of salvation is a principle of faith in response to grace.

  We look at the cross, what do we see? God's righteousness on display as the penalty is being paid, the ransom price. We look at the cross, we see God's grace on display, He does it all. Christ pays the price and God moves toward us in grace giving us the gift. All we can do is refuse or receive it.

  Now, this is the very heart of salvation, saving faith. And because he makes such an issue out of it, verse 24 he says "justified by grace;" verse 25, "we receive it through faith;" verse 26, "we receive it through faith;" verse 27, "it's not law it's faith;" verse 28, "it's faith not law." That's a lot of faith emphasis and because of that I need to say to you that it is faith that is at the heart of our Christianity.

  Now I want to give you a little test to help you examine your faith. I'm convinced that churches are filled with people who have a kind of faith that doesn't save them. James called it a dead faith. Second Corinthians 13:5 says, "Examine yourself whether you be in the faith." You want to be sure your faith is real.

  Now, as you look at yourself and you're asking...am I really a Christian, have I really appropriated this gift that God gives, have I believed genuinely? What do you look at in your life to discern whether your faith is real? What are the marks?

  First of all, let me show you some things that neither prove nor disprove saving faith, okay? I'm going to give you a little list of things that don't prove anything. You could be a Christian, you could not be a Christian and still have these things. They don't prove or disprove saving faith. But you need to know what they are so you're not deceived.

  Number one, visible morality...visible morality. What do I mean by that? Well some people, they're just good people. Some of them are very religious, like Mormon people who on the outside appear very moral, or Roman Catholic people or any other kind of religion. Some people are just good people. They're honest. They're forthright in their dealings. They're grateful people. They're kind people. And they have an external, visible kind of morality. By the way, the Pharisees certainly rested on that for their hope. They're loving people, some of them are tender-hearted people. But of loving and serving God, they know nothing and feel nothing. Whatever the person does or leaves undone does not involve God. This person is honest in his dealings with everybody except God. He won't rob anybody but God. He is thankful and loyal to everybody but God. He speaks contemptuously and reproachfully of no one but God. He has good relationships with everybody but God. He's very much like the rich young ruler who says, "All these things have I kept, what do I lack?" This is visible morality but it does not necessarily mean salvation. People can clean up their act by reformation rather than regeneration.

  Secondly, another thing that doesn't prove or disprove saving faith is intellectual knowledge...intellectual knowledge. This doesn't prove true faith. Knowledge of the truth is necessary for salvation and visible morality is the fruit of salvation but neither one equal salvation. You see, you can know all about God and you can know all about Jesus and who He was, and He came into the world and He died on the cross and He rose again and He's coming again, and you can even know more of the details of His life, you can understand all of that and turn your back on Christ. The writer of Hebrews writes to those in chapter 6 who knowing all of that refused Christ. In chapter 10 he says, "You're treading underfoot the blood of Christ by not believing what you know is true." There are many people who know the Scripture and who have knowledge but are bound for hell. i You will never be saved without that knowledge but having that knowledge doesn't necessarily save you.

  Thirdly, religious involvement...religious involvement is not necessarily a proof of true faith. There are people who have, according to Paul in writing to Timothy, 2 Timothy 3:5, a form of godliness but powerless, an empty kind of religion. Remember the virgins in Matthew 25 who were waiting and waiting and waiting for the coming of the bridegroom who is Christ, and they're waiting and waiting but when He comes they don't go in. They had everything together except the oil in their lamps. That which was most necessary was missing. The oil probably emblematic of the new life, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, they weren't regenerate, they were religious but not regenerate. You can have external visible morality, intellectual knowledge and religious involvement and it may not indicate genuine faith.

  Fourth, active ministry. Balaam was a prophet, Saul of Tarsus thought he was serving God by killing Christians, Judas was a public preacher, Judas was an apostle. Remember Matthew 7, "Many will say to me, `Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name and done many wonderful works? Cast out demons in Your name?' And He says to them, `Depart from Me, you workers of iniquity, I never knew you.'" Ministry activity, that's not necessarily a proof of saving faith.

  Number five, conviction of sin...conviction of sin. Lots of people feel bad about sin. Listen, this whole world is full of people that are just guilt-ridden to the core. You know, fifteen years ago we used to talk about people going to psychology, going to the psychologist and we used to say, and it was pretty true from tests, that most of the people who went to the psychologist were suffering from guilt. People used to write books about that. I remember the Meninger Clinic put out tremendous amount of material on the fact that all these people were suffering from guilt.

  Well, the psychologists of the world have absolutely no answer for guilt because the only answer is the gospel. What has happened in the last fifteen years is you don't have any people at all today who feel guilty because we've come up with a new psychology that eliminates the guilt. Now all we do is we displace the guilt on somebody else and the new therapy is to make the person utterly irresponsible for any of the guilt that they might feel inside and to free them from that guilt and you do that by making the ultimate virtue pride, the ultimate virtue self-fulfillment, self-aggrandizement, self-glory, self-esteem and that eliminates the need to feel guilty. So we really have come up with an utterly ungodly, unchristian, unbiblical psychology that has taken the guilt issue and eliminated it.

  Now what happens in the church, instead of the preacher standing up to preach freedom from guilt to guilty sinners, they expect him to preach self-esteem to ego-centric people. The whole climate has changed. And we have been skewed in our message because we have allowed the philosophy of the day to create a new kind of sinner who thinks he feels no guilt. And the most important thing you can preach to a bunch of sinners is the sin of their lives and the law of God which they fall short of and the impending judgment they await. But that message is not popular because the new philosophy and the new psychology has long ago eliminated guilt. We don't have people feeling guilt anymore because they've learned that therapy can tell them they can put that guilt on somebody who did something to them. And now I don't care who you talk to, when they go into that kind of situation of counseling they will inevitably say...I have been abused...I am a victim...I am not responsible for the way I am. And so the sinner is dispossessed of his guilt and dispossessed of a direct approach of the gospel. I liked...I liked sinners better when they felt guilty. They were much easier to deal with.

  But there are some people who do feel guilty, some people who do feel guilty about sin. Felix trembled under the preaching of Paul, but never left his idols. The Holy Spirit convicts many of sin, righteousness and judgment and many that He convicts don't respond with true repentance. Some may even confess their sins. Some may even abandon their sins and say I don't like to live this way, I want to shape up, amend their ways, but not necessarily come to saving faith. That's reformation, not regeneration and no degree of conviction of sin is conclusive evidence of saving faith. Believe me, even the demons are convicted of their sin that's why they tremble, but they're not saved.

  Number six, assurance...assurance. Some people say, "Well I must be a Christian, I feel like one, I think I'm one." Listen, just think it through. If to think you're a Christian makes you a Christian then nobody could be deceived, right? Because as soon as you thought you were a Christian you'd be one. So you could never be deceived. The whole point of Satan's deception is to make people think they're Christians who aren't. That's the whole point. Many people feel sure they're saved, they're not. I'll tell you, there are millions of Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses and Christian Scientists who believe they are on their way to heaven, they're not. People say, "God won't condemn me, I feel good about myself, I have assurance, I'm okay." That means nothing necessarily.

  Number seven, the last one, a time of decision. I hear people say, "Well I know I'm a Christian because I remember when I signed the card...I remember when I prayed a prayer...I remember when I went forward in the church service...I remember right where I was." I've heard people say, "I remember right where I was the moment I did that." Oh really! Listen, because you remember a moment doesn't mean that moment meant anything, doesn't mean that decision was valid. Nobody's salvation is verified by a past moment. People have prayed prayers and gone forward in church services and signed cards and gone into prayer rooms and been baptized and joined churches and never had saving faith.

  So those are some of the non-proofs. They don't really prove anything. You say, "Well then what does prove saving faith?" Well let me just give you quickly a list.

  One, love for God. Now you're talking...now you're talking down about the heart because Romans 8:7 says, "The carnal mind is enmity against God." The non-Christian resents God, rebels against God down inside. But the regenerate mind is set to love the Lord with all heart, soul, mind and strength, his delight is in the excellency of God who is the first and highest affection of his renewed soul. God becomes his chief happiness. By the way, there's a great difference between such love for God and the selfish attitude that focuses only on my own happiness and sees God as a means to my end rather than as me to the end of glorifying Him. In fact, Jesus said, "If you love father, mother more than Me, you're not even My disciple," Matthew 10:37.

  Do you love God, do you love His nature? Do you love His glory? Do you love His name? Do you love His kingdom? Do you love His holiness? Do you love His will? Supreme love for God is decisive evidence of the true faith. Is your heart lifted when you sing His praises because you love Him?

  Secondly, repentance from sin. The proper love for God must involve a hatred of sin. That's obvious. Who wouldn't understand that? If I loved somebody, you assume that my loving them means that I seek their well-being, right? If I said to you I love my wife but I could care less what happened to my wife, you'd question my love because true love seeks the highest good of its object. So if I say I love God then I will have to hate sin because sin offends God. Sin blasphemes God. Sin curses God. Sin seeks to destroy God and His work and His kingdom. Sin killed His Son. And if I say I love God but I tolerate sin, then you have every reason to question my love. I cannot love God without hating that which is set to destroy Him.

  So, true repentance involves confession, it involves turning from sin. I should be grieved over my sin. I should ask myself, do I have a settled conviction of the evil of sin? Does sin appear to me as the evil and bitter thing it really is? Does conviction of sin in me increase as I walk with Christ? Do I hate it not merely because it is ruinous to my own soul but because it is offensive to my God whom I love? Does it...does it more grieve me when I sin than when I have trouble? In other words, what grieves me the most, my misfortune or my sin? Do my sins appear many, frequent and aggravated? Do I find myself grieved over my sin more than the sin of others? That's the mark of salvation, true saving faith...it loves God, it hates what God hates which is sin.

  Thirdly, it manifests genuine humility...it manifests genuine humility. This obviously comes through in the Beatitudes, the poor in spirit, those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, those who in Matthew 18 are like a little child humble and dependent, those who are in self-denial, willing to take up their cross and follow Him. The Lord receives those who come with a broken and a contrite spirit. James says He gives grace to the humble. We must come as the prodigal son. You remember what He said in Luke 15, I think about verse 21, He said, "Father, I am not worthy to be called Your Son." There's no pride, there's no ego about religious achievement, spiritual accomplishment but genuine humility.

  Fourthly, there's a devotion to God's glory. True saving faith that manifests genuine salvation shows devotion to God's glory. Whatever we do, whether we eat or drink, we are literally consumed with the glory of God. We do what we do because we want to glorify Him. Oh sure, we fail in all of these things but the direction of our life is in loving Him and hating sin and being genuinely humble and self-denying and knowing our unworthiness and being totally devoted to the glory of God.

  Number five, continual prayer, humble, submissive believing prayer marks true faith. We cry "Abba Father" because the Spirit in us prompts that cry. Jonathan Edwards once preached a sermon titled, "Hypocrites are deficient in the duty of secret prayer." It's true. Hypocrites may pray publicly because that's what hypocrites want to do is impress people, but they are deficient in the duty of secret prayer. A true believer with true saving faith has a personal prayer life, private prayer life, seeks communion with God.

  Number six, another mark of saving faith is selfless love. John says if you don't love your neighbor, your brother or one in need, how are we to believe the love of God dwells in you? And also in 1 John 3 John says, "If you love God you'll love whom God loves." And we love Him and others because that's the response to Him loving us. John 13 says, "By this men know we're true disciples by our love for each other."

  Number seven, separation from the world. Paul told the Corinthians that we haven't received the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is from God and John put it this way, "Love not the world neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him." A true believer is separated from the world.

  Again I say, we fail in all these areas but these are the direction of our lives. We aren't perfect. We haven't arrived. But we love God and want to love Him more. We hate sin and want to hate it more. We have a genuine humility and want more of it. We are devoted to God's glory. We have a prayer life that is private and personal. We have a love for others that comes from God and we find ourselves disassociated from the world as a general rule.

  And then just two others, spiritual growth is another mark. If you're a true Christian you're going to be growing and that means you're going to be more and more like Christ. Life produces itself. If you're alive you're going to grow, there's no other way. You'll improve, you'll increase, you'll grow because whoever has that new work begun, Philippians 1:6, is going to see it perfected, it's going to go on, it's going to keep moving. The Spirit is going to move you from one level of glory to the next. So you look at your life, you see spiritual growth, you see the decreasing frequency of sin, the increasing pattern of righteousness and devotion to God.

  And then finally, obedience...obedient living. Every branch in me bears fruit...bears fruit, says John 15 and Ephesians 2:10 Paul says, "Look, you are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works which God has before ordained that you walk in them." That's obedience. We are saved unto the obedience of faith.

  Look at your life, do you see all those things, including selfless love, separation from the world, spiritual growth and obedience? If so, that's evidence of a saving faith.

  Now back to our text. The cross declares God's justice and righteousness. The cross exalts God's grace which is appropriated by faith. Thirdly, and just ever so briefly, the cross reveals God's consistency...the cross reveals God's consistency. Look at verse 29. What's the point here? Well, the Jews are going to say...Look, we are justified by the works of the Law, and now you're coming along and preaching to all these Gentiles that they are justified by faith. Does God have two ways? Does God require works from us and grace and faith from them? Is God a merciful saving God toward Gentiles, but a legal condemning God toward Jews? Do we have two different means of salvation?

  Of course you realize, don't you, that the Jews believed they were saved by their works so they were concluding that Paul was preaching a new way of salvation which was not consistent with God's way. Paul says, "Is God the God of Jews only?" No. "Is He not the God of Gentiles also?" Yes, and they would have to agree. Yes, God is the God of all men. Isaiah 54 says the God of the whole earth shall He be called. Jeremiah 16:19, the nations shall come unto Thee from the ends of the earth. They knew that. Zechariah 2:11, "And many nations shall be joined to the Lord and shall be My people." They knew He was the God of Jew and Gentile.

  All right then, since indeed God is one, that's the Greek order in verse 30, you see He is one at the end of the verse in the NAS, it really should go with the word God. Since indeed God is one, He will justify the circumcised...that's Jews by faith...and the uncircumcised...that's Gentiles through faith. Now here you see God's consistency.

  You look at the cross and you see since indeed God is one, if God is one God and He is the God of all men and He is the God of Jews and Gentiles, then He is one God over all men who will have one way of salvation. He will justify all by faith. God saves all the same way and He always has...always by faith, always apart from works, He is one God with one way for all men. God never changes...absolutely consistent.

  The cross didn't introduce a new way of salvation, it simply covered the sins of all the past believers and all the future believers who came by faith. How was Noah saved? Go back, way back to Noah. Genesis says Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. How was Moses saved? Go all the way back to Exodus, Moses found grace in the eyes of the Lord. How was Abraham saved? Romans 4 is all about that. Verse 3 says, "Abraham believed God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness." That's clear back in Genesis 15. Always the same, by grace through faith, by grace through faith. In the Old Testament they believed all that God revealed. They didn't have Christ yet. They believed all that God revealed. The same in the new after Christ. No one is, no one has, no one ever will be saved any other way than by faith as God graciously offers forgiveness through the sacrifice of His Son which covers the sin of sinners before Him and after Him.

  So the cross from God's perspective declares His justice, exalts His grace and reveals His consistency. Lastly, this is rich, confirms God's Law...confirms God's Law. Verse 31, some of the Jews are going to say, "Oh, all right, salvation is by grace through faith, forget the Law. There's no Law. If there's no works then the Law is useless, pointless. Just why in the world did God go through all of that? Why did He go through all of that Law stuff if we aren't saved by keeping the Law? Do we then nullify the Law?" And he says, megenita(?) in the Greek, no, no, no, no, no, may it never be. On the contrary, we establish the Law.

  What do you mean? Putting Jesus Christ on the cross to pay the penalty for sin ought to show you how serious God is about His Law. Even if it took the life of His own Son to satisfy the demands of that Law for death for sin, He would pay it. His Law is holy, His Law is just, His Law is righteous and Christ's death proves it. Nothing is more of a reflection of God's Law as holy than the death of Christ. It was God's Law that put Him there because all the violations of that Law had to be satisfied with a penalty and God couldn't violate His Law or penalty and so He put Christ on the cross.

  And so, God's Law then is established as holy, righteous, good and is affirmed as the standard by which we are to live. Its purpose was to show us sin, it did. Its purpose was to show us God's pattern for holy living, it does. Its fulfillment in terms of the demand for death was paid by Christ, its fulfillment in terms of the demand for life is made possible through salvation. What a great affirmation of the Law. Look at the cross. In it you see God's justice, God's grace, God's consistency, you see God's Law. And it's all for His glory. No wonder the Reformers said, Sola gratia, sola fide, sola deo, gloria, "By grace alone, by faith alone for God's glory alone." And the song writer said, "O what a Savior is mine, in Him God's mercies combine, His love will never decline and He loves me."

  This, beloved, is a precious treasure. Salvation not as we view it or as angels or demons or even Christ views it, but as God views it opens up to us the avenue of worship in which we appreciate, adore, express our love and affection to our great God for what He has done for us. Let's bow in prayer.

  Our Father, one man has penned it this way, "When I stand before Thy throne dressed in beauty not my own, when I see Thee as Thou art, love Thee with unsinning heart, then, Lord, shall I fully know and only then how much I owe." We worship You, we adore You, we express our love and affection to You, we exalt You for this great salvation which You have provided for us.

  While your heads are bowed for just a moment, if you do not know Christ but you desire to receive the salvation that He offers, the forgiveness of sin and eternal life, will you in the quietness of your own heart say...Lord God, I believe in Jesus Christ, I believe that He God in flesh died on the cross to pay the penalty for my sin, rose again, provided perfect satisfaction and I receive the gift of salvation in His name, turning from my sin I commit myself to follow Him. Pray that prayer and may true salvation be yours this day. Amen.

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