Excuses of the Guilty (Rom. 1:18-21)

Excuses of the Guilty

(Rom. 1:18-21)

Last week, we dealt with what the wrath of God is and what that means in relation to mankind; that our holy God hates sin and because he is holy and just He must punish sinners. God has revealed to the entire world through the scriptures His wrath and His salvation from the condemnation of sin. Because of this knowledge God has pronounced judgment against sinful man. This verdict of His wrathful judgment against lost mankind has indicted all those who reject God and His remedy of mercy and grace found in His Son, Jesus Christ. The high, holy court of Heaven has called three defendants, representative of mankind, to stand and receive their day in court to answer for their sins. These 3 defendants are here in chapters 1&2 and they are the heathen man, the moral man, and the religious man.

Introduction: God’s indictment (v.18)

God’s fierce wrath is revealed against all ungodliness (sins against his Person) and unrighteousness (sins against his will). The first category is vertical (faulty relationship towards God) while the second is horizontal in nature (faulty living & faulty relationships with fellow man due to our faulty relationship with God). Because of our sinful nature we are unable to have a right relationship towards God and if we are unable to have a right relationship we certainly cannot live according to the righteous standards that God has set forth in His divine, moral Law. Because of our sins we are indicted under the wrath of God. The indictment against mankind is specifically listed in verses 18, it begins by saying they, mankind, “hold (or suppress, smother) the truth in unrighteousness”; in other words, men suppress the truth of God by steadfastly clinging to their sins. Man’s sinful nature desires to naturally oppose God and his truth. The truth that they are sinful and unable to not sin and need God to save them from themselves and the end results of their unrepentant hearts. All of humanity is under God’s condemnation and they are found guilty by two things: 1. God’s Law (2:12 – “For as many as have sinned without law will also perish without law, and as many as have sinned in the law will be judged by the law”; 2. their own deeds (2:6 – God “will render to each one according to his deeds”). You could say that ‘God’s Law’ and ‘their deeds’ are their jury. So let’s begin with our defendants.

I. Defendant #1: The Heathen or Pagan Man (vv. 19-32)

The heathen or pagan man is representative of those who claim ignorance of the knowledge of God. They are in different religions or they could be atheists or they just reject the Christian concept of God. The generation coming up today could be counted among these. They have decided to call this generation the “Y” generation. They are called this because they always say “why should we believe in God, especially the Christian God”. They have been brought up in homes that don’t go to church or read the Bible and have been brain washed in our public schools to believe only in themselves and whatever propaganda the TV and internet says is true. They are thought to question and be skeptical of whatever Christianity says is true. This “Y” generation is truly the ‘pagan’ generation that has forsaken the only true God of the Bible. This generation has chosen to serve a ‘god’ of their own choosing or even not to believe in anything at all. There has never been a time in our nation that we have had such a large percentage of people not in church of some kind. The percentage of people in the USA today are ignorant of what the Bible says and the real gospel message of salvation in Christ. In Amos 8:11-12, the Bible spoke of a famine of God’s word in the land. Here in our nation there seems to be a “famine of God’s word in the land”. There is a generation that does not know the Lord. A generation that wants to be ignorant of God’s truth and a desire to only smother their guilty conscious with false religion and in vile sins. They have chosen false religions and vain philosophies absent of the truth of God’s word. They have exchanged the holy glory of the one true God with the spiritual darkness of false gods and the giving of themselves over to evil desires and gross sexual sins. Verses 21-32 show their regression to viler and viler sins. The verses in 1:21-23 says, "although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man; and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things”. We see through history and even today people have chosen to serve a ‘god’ of their own making. Today, the New Age religions and atheists have chosen to worship themselves and the efforts of mankind. The ancient Greeks and Romans worshiped a pantheon of gods that were just as depraved as or worse than men. Ancient peoples like the Egyptians, had gods and goddesses that had features of animals and even considered certain animals sacred. Hindus even today worship animals. Our generation today considers themselves ‘spiritual’ but not specifically believing in any one religion. Modern man finds whatever spirituality that condones their sins and relieves them of the fear of consequences. They deceive themselves to believe that because of their supposed ignorance of God and His truth that He will acquit them of His judgment. Verses 1:19-20 refute their excuses. God’s twin witnesses of 1. Conscience (v. 19 – “what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them”) and 2. Nature (v. 20 – “For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead”; they witness of the existence and God’s law, “so that they are without excuse”. No matter how much they deceive themselves or numb their conscience with gross sin, it won’t stop His judgment.

II. Defendant #2 – Moral Man (vv. 2:1-16)

I like to call this 2nd defendant the ‘good ole’ boy’. The reason that this 2nd representative of judged man thinks he is not deserving of God’s judgment is because he’s not as bad as other men. Most of the time, he is a decent, moral person and not too sinful in his eyes and mostly law-abiding, hard-working, relatively moral person in comparison to the thief, murderer, crack head, or low-life of society. His excuse is that in comparison of his life to others that he is not as bad as society’s criminals (ex. - kid’s grade on a test-not as bad as Billy). I’m not as bad as others so I’ll be alright with God because God grades on a curve. But God refutes their excuse by they do the same things but in a refined way (hide their sins, etc.). God does not judge them according to man’s best but according to His own standard of righteousness and holiness. But they will not escape God’s wrathful judgment (2:1-4, “Therefore you are inexcusable, O man, whoever you are who judge, for in whatever you judge another you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things. But we know that the judgment of God is according to truth against those who practice such things. And do you think this, O man, you who judge those practicing such things, and doing the same, that you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?”).

III. Defendant #3 – The Religious Man (2:17-3:8)

The religious man Paul used as an example were the Jews. The Jews claimed to be the “people of God” solely on the fact that they knew the law of God and taught it, in other words they were righteous because they were religious (2:17-20 – “Indeed you are called a Jew, and rest on the law, and make your boast in God, and know His will, and approve the things that are excellent, being instructed out of the law, and are confident that you yourself are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes, having the form of knowledge and truth in the law”). They were outwardly religious but inwardly in the same condition as every other lost man. They did belong to those who had head knowledge about God but no heart knowledge (no personal saving relationship with God). But God refuted their feeble excuse by plainly telling them, “You don’t practice what you preach” (2:21-23 – “You, therefore, who teach another, do you not teach yourself? You who preach that a man should not steal, do you steal? You who say, "Do not commit adultery," do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? You who make your boast in the law, do you dishonor God through breaking the law?”). Instead of trusting God to save them from their sins they trusted in their own good works of their religion (ex. RCC, baptismal regeneration, etc.).

What is seen through all these defendants is this simply this that all people regardless of race, creed, color, or social status, that all are under sin and in need of a Savior. God has graciously extended His hand of grace through His Son, Jesus Christ and He is not willing that any should perish in their sins but come to repentance.

The Grace in Which We Stand (Rom. 5:1-11)

The Grace in Which We Stand

(Rom. 5:1-11)

The work of salvation has been accomplished only by Jesus Christ, by His death and resurrection. It is our faith in Christ, what we know and believe about Jesus from the scriptures, that has changed us from sinner to saint. That salvation that God chose to reveal to us, has changed our condition from the condemned nature of a sinner to that of an accepted child of God. It is Jesus Christ alone that has made this possible. It is nothing we have done, it is awesome power of God through Jesus Christ that has saved us. It is God's grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone that has saved us. Today, we will explore “the grace in which we stand”.

I. Justified (declared righteous) v. 1a - “Therefore, having been justified by faith”.

The term “justification” means to be declared righteous. How is it that we who are unrighteous (sinful) can be declared righteous? Well, a good clue to this is that it says here that we are declared righteous by faith. We are declared righteous by our faith in Christ as our Lord and Savior. The reason I know this is that the word “therefore” here in verse 1 is referring to something that Paul has already mentioned previously. And if we look at chapter 4, in the final verses we can understand how we are justified by faith. The whole chapter talks about how Abraham was justified (declared righteous) by his faith in the promises of God (Rom. 4:3 - “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness” and 4:9 - “For we say that faith was accounted to Abraham for righteousness”). Abraham put his faith into the revealed plan of salvation God showed him in the person and work of Jesus Christ (Gal. 3:8 - “And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel to Abraham beforehand”). We just like Abraham are justified when we put our faith in the person and work of Jesus Christ. If we look at the final verses of chap. 4 we can understand that better, 4:20,22-25 - “He did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God; And therefore “it was accounted to him for righteousness.” Now it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him, but also for us. It shall be imputed to us who believe in Him who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was delivered up because of our offenses, and was raised because of our justification”. Jesus Christ paid the penalty for our sins by His death on the cross and resurrection from the dead. Is 53:4-5 says this about Christ, “Surely He has borne our griefs And carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, Smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed”; this shows the work of justification by Christ's death. Dr. John MacArthur wrote in his commentary on Romans, that through the work of justification by Christ: “God credits the believer's sin to Christ's account, He can credit Christ's righteousness to the believer's account. God could not have justly credited righteousness to Abraham had not Abraham's sin, like every believer's sin, been paid for by the sacrifice of Christ's own blood. Before the cross, the believer's sin was paid in anticipation of Christ's atoning sacrifice, and since the cross the believer's sin has been paid in advance”. This is how we are justified (declared righteous), by faith in Jesus' finished work of salvation. “Faith is never the basis or the reason for justification, but only the channel through which God works His redeeming grace. Faith is simply a convicted heart reaching out to receive God's free and unmerited gift of salvation”. ---John MacArthur.

II. Peace with God. v.1b - “we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ”.

Because we are justified by faith, we can now have peace with God through Jesus Christ. This peace is something we possess at the very moment we put our faith in Christ. This peace comes from the fact that we are saved and justified in Christ. The fact of the matter is that when we were lost sinners, we were hostile and against God; we were enemies (Rom 8:7 - “the carnal (sinful, fleshly) mind is enmity (hostile) against God”. Because we have been justified by Christ, we now have peace with God. We are now reconciled to God by Jesus Christ, v.10 - “when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life”. Jesus took upon Himself the full force of God's fury on the cross, that we as sinful humanity should have deserved. Because of our sinfulness we were against God, we were His enemies and undeserving of His grace and mercy he showed us through His Son. All of us who trust in Christ as Lord are no longer enemies of God and under His wrath, we are now at peace with Him through Christ (Col. 1:19-22 - “For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross. And you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight”). Being reconciled to God will bring peace with God. Because we are justified by faith, the immediate consequence of that justification is peace (reconciliation) with God. This peace or reconciliation has been made forever between the believer and God. We are eternally at peace with God. We cannot fall out of favor with God because we're saved, justified, and reconciled because of what Christ has done in our behalf, by His death and resurrection.

Christ not only brings peace to the believer but “He Himself is our peace (Eph. 2;14)”. The knowledge that we have peace with God should strengthen our assurance that we are eternally secure in Christ.

III. This grace in which we stand. v.2 - “through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.”

from what we have looked at, we can understand that because we have been reconciled to the Father through trusting the Son we have access into that grace in which we stand. Before we put our faith in Christ, sin denied us access to God. Sin would prevent us from ever enjoying the presence of God, from ever hoping to have salvation, and from ever having a true relationship with Him. The believer can now approach God because of what Christ has done for us. Our standing (our position) with God has changed through Christ. Once unrighteous but now righteous in Christ (2 Cor. 5:21 - “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him”). This standing in the grace of God never changes even though our circumstances on this world change daily our position of salvation in Christ does not change. Nothing can change it, nothing can take us out of God's hand of salvation (John 10:28-29 - “And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father's hand”). The grace in which we stand shows us the completeness and fulfillment of Christ's salvation (Phil. 1:6 - “being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ”). The act of saving us, of keeping us saved, and completion of salvation is solely in the hands of the One who has provided that salvation. We are incapable by our strength or our will power or by our good works to save ourselves; we do not have the strength or power to do so. It says in 5:6, “when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly”. We are utterly and totally and completely dependent on Christ to save us and to keep us saved. Once we are standing in the grace we can never leave that place. What we can do is begin to live and operate in grace. Another thing we can do is to “rejoice in hope of the glory of God”. The hope that we receive from being in God's grace is not a wishful hope of this world but that know so assurance of hope in God. Knowing that once we are in His grace through faith in Christ, we are eternally in His hand of grace. It says in Col. 1:13, “He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed (transferred, translated) us into the kingdom of the Son of His love”. By awesome power of God through the saving power of Christ we are now declared righteous in Christ, reconciled to the Father, and permanently standing in God's grace. Now that should be grounds for us to glorify and rejoice in our God. But the question I want to leave you with today is this, are you standing in grace today? Do you have the joy of knowing the God of this universe through a saving relationship with His Son Jesus Christ? If not, today you can enter into His grace through faith in Christ.

How We Become Children Of God.

How To Become A Child Of God
(Gal. 4:4-7)

Today we will look at an aspect of salvation maybe we don’t give much thought to at all and that is adoption. There are many different aspects to our salvation in Christ but let us consider our “adoption as sons”. This word adoption gives us a wonderful understanding of our position we now have in Christ. It should make us aware of our relationship we now have with Father God. Let’s explore our relationship with God by understanding what “adoption” means and how it applies to us.
I. Adoption in Paul’s time (Eph. 1:5 – “having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will”).
First thing we want to do is have a good understanding of what adoption was in Paul’s day and age. Adoption in the time of Paul was known by the standards of Roman law and as we look at adoption in the natural we will see some analogies in the supernatural. Adoption was the legal action by which a person takes into his family a child not his own with the purpose of treating him as and giving him all the privileges of his own natural child. An adopted child was legally entitled to all rights and privileges of a natural-born child. An adopted child could not be disinherited by the adopting parents. According to the Roman legal system the person who was adopted into a family gained all the legal rights of a legitimate son in the new family, but he lost all the rights, privileges and responsibilities in his old family. By becoming a member of the new family he gained all the rights of his new father’s estate. He was now an equal with the other sons and daughters in his new family. He was a co-heir with them according to the law. He was regarded as a new person who had a new life in a new family. Another wonderful thing about the Roman law was that the old life of the adopted son was completely wiped out. All of his debts were cancelled. His past now had nothing to do with him. He was in a new relationship with a new family. I don’t know about you but reading about the adopted child gave me some fresh insight onto the truth of our relationship with God and it blessed my soul. Adoption is a beautiful analogy of God’s amazing sacrifice to save a lost and dying, sinful people and save them and by the process of salvation make them His own children with the rights and privileges that belong to those who are His children. We need to see what great lengths He did to make us, who have been saved through faith in Christ, into children of God.
II. Christ is our means of adoption (Gal.4:4-5 – “when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.”)
The Bible is very blunt about the relationship of mankind to God. According to Scripture we are mere creations of God and because of our sinful depravity of our souls we are seen as enemies of God. It says in Rom. 8:7, “…the carnal (sinful) mind is enmity (hostile enemy) against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be” and Col. 1:21, “And you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works…”, our sinful nature was at war against the holiness of God. So then we can see we were the sinful, hostile enemies of God not desiring to seek the things of God but our minds set on sinful living and pleasures of the flesh (Rom. 3:10-12, “There is none righteous, no, not one; There is none who understands; There is none who seeks after God. They have all turned aside; They have together become unprofitable; There is none who does good, no, not one.”). But in spite of our First Parents fall and the sinful condition of our souls, God provided a way of salvation through Jesus Christ. Verses 4 and 5 tells us that in God’s perfect timing and perfect will sent His Son to redeem us from the curse of sin and bring us into right relationship through Christ. God foreordained the plan of salvation in Jesus knowing full well that mankind would become sinful and fallen even before the world was created but Jesus, the Eternal Son of God, willingly purposed to become our one and only sacrifice for sin by His suffering and death on the cross. We can even see that in Rev. 13:8 where it calls Jesus the “Lamb slain from the foundation of the world”. We have now in Christ have become the sons and daughters of God. We are now in a special relationship as the family of God through adoption. But we are only recognized as being His children through Christ and by nothing else (Gal. 3:26 – “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus”).
III. Privileges and responsibilities of adoption (Gal. 4:6-7, “And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying out, "Abba, Father!" Therefore you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ.”)
Our new relationship of being a child of God allows us to cry out to God as Father, the particular term Paul uses here is Abba, and this is a term of endearment. I never called my father, ‘father’, I called him dad. Abba is like saying daddy, it shows a close personal relationship with your Father. What a privilege it is to call out to God and call Him “Daddy”. Because of our position in Christ, we are accepted, we are heard and we are recognized as His children. We have become heirs of God and co-heirs with Jesus (Rom. 8:17). The rights and privileges in being a son and daughter of God are awesome. As I mentioned before, an adopted child did not have to worry about being disinherited they would always be that persons son or daughter. For the Christian once we are saved, adopted into the family of God, we are always saved, forever a child of God. If we are adopted, we are adopted for ever. If we are saved, we are saved for ever. If you are really saved, you are saved eternally. Our salvation and our adoption as the children of God is eternal and no one can break the bonds of adoption. So we belong to the family of God, and we are raised to the status of an heir of a son. No longer fearful of being lost in sin ever again and forever assured of our eternal salvation in Christ because we are forever accepted as a son or daughter of God. Another blessing of adoption was that upon being accepted into the new family that the adoptee was considered a new person with a new life and all that was in the old family was forgotten and gone. Any debt was forgiven and any part of their old life erased because of their acceptance into the new adoptive family, the adoptee’s identity was now with their new family and the old family ties were completely cut off. We when receive Jesus by faith as Lord and Savior, we become a new creation in Christ Jesus and our old life is forgiven and forgotten by the power of God (2 Co. 5:17 -Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.) I am also glad that all my sin debt was forgiven, the penalty that I had incurred was what I deserved, but Jesus Christ took the penalty for me and by His sacrifice paid the price (Col. 2:13-14 - And when you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us and which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross .). The great love and grace God has shown us through our Lord Jesus, our adoption made possible only through the Son. Because we are accepted as children by that heavenly adoption in Christ we have these great privileges and rights because they are ours by our Father’s will. But we must be led by the Spirit of God because we are the sons of God. We have a responsibility to show the world around us we are his children. Being led by the Spirit means we are obedient and willing children. We are to be obedient to His Word and living out the Word and His Will in our lives.
If we are thankful for our salvation and grateful for the acceptance as sons and daughters of God then we will represent our Father and show that we are truly His Children.

Sermons from Galatians - Justified by Faith: The Faith of Abraham (Galatians. 3:6-9)

Justified by Faith: The Faith of Abraham

(Galatians. 3:6-9)

6/7/09

The theme of Galatians might be summed up this way: we are justified by faith in Christ. Because Paul over and over again tells us in Galatians it is by faith we are saved and not by works. We are saved, justified, reconciled and redeemed by faith in Christ alone. There is no religious works, good deeds, or any human effort that can save us. In this passage today we will see from the scriptures how that we are saved through faith in Christ and not through any external works of the flesh. We will see that the Old Testament saints were saved and justified through faith just as the New Testament saints were. Today we will see that we are only justified by faith.

I. Spiritual Children of Abraham (Gal. 3:6-7 – “just as Abraham "believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness." Therefore know that only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham.”) – Paul uses Abraham as an example of a relationship with God through faith. The Judaizers were trying to use Abraham as an example that the Gentiles needed to be circumcised, to take this outward sign, to share in the blessings of Abraham. They were in effect saying that unless they were participating in the religious rituals of the Jews then they were not of the “sons of Abraham”, that they did not have a relationship with God and not truly saved. Just what was the promised blessing God made to Abraham? Genesis 12:2-3 – “And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed” and Gen. 22:18 – “"In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed”, through the promised seed, Christ, will all peoples, all tribes, all tongues, and nationalities can be blessed. The Bible says in Gen. 15:6 that Abraham “believed in the LORD, and He accounted it to him for righteousness”, this verse is what Paul is quoting to the Galatians 3:6 to refute the false teaching of the Judaizers. Paul was saying that Abraham wasn’t seen as right standing with God because he was circumcised, but that Abraham was justified by his faith in God. It was 14 years after Gen. 15:6 that Abraham was circumcised and that just shows that the external sign of circumcision was not what justified Abraham in the sight of God. Paul in Romans 4:3, 7-10 says this about Abraham being found righteous, 3- “What does the Scripture say? "Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness."; 7-10- "Blessed are they whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord will never count against him." Is this blessedness only for the circumcised, or also for the uncircumcised? We have been saying that Abraham's faith was credited to him as righteousness. Under what circumstances was it credited? Was it after he was circumcised, or before? It was not after, but before!” From the O.T. scriptures Paul shows us that Abraham was found righteous before God because of his faith in God. The Judaizers, like many of the Jews, confused the outward mark of circumcision as a means of salvation. Circumcision was only a sign established by God to identify His chosen people with Him and show their separation from the pagan and idolatrous world around them. Circumcision was only an outward sign and had nothing to do with the spiritual work of salvation and justification. It is almost the same with water baptism is only an outward sign of identification of believers with Christ and not a means of salvation. It only has meaning if you have a salvation relationship with God. The Jews were very proud of that they were the racial offspring of Abraham and because of their physical descent it made them acceptable to God. When the Pharisees made claim that they were the offspring of Abraham to Christ in John 8, He told them that they were of their father the Devil. They had put their trust in the racial heritage and the religious works of Judaism and did not put their faith in God. Jesus put it into perspective just like Paul did, it’s not the result of your physical lineage (family or race or nationality you’re born to) or your religious works, if your faith is not in God then you’re not in the spiritual family of Abraham. Abraham is the spiritual father to anyone who by faith receives Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior that’s what Paul is saying here in Galatians 3:7. Just as Abraham was the example for justification by faith (Rom. 4:3 – "Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness”), so we must be like Abraham and believe God by faith to be justified (Rom. 4:5 - But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness).

II. Gospel to Abraham (Galatian 3:8-9, “And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel to Abraham beforehand, saying, "In you all the nations shall be blessed." So then those who are of faith are blessed with believing Abraham.”) Let’s look at verse 8, it says that the Gospel was preached by God unto Abraham. That’s an unusual statement that Abraham heard the gospel. You see when God revealed Himself to Abraham, He revealed to Abraham the complete fulfillment of that promised blessing, Jesus Christ. For we see that in Gal. 3:16 it says, “Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, and to seeds, as of many; but as of one, and to thy seed, which is Christ.” God revealed Christ, the crucified Savior, to Abraham and he believed God. If that is hard to believe then let’s look at the very words of Christ in John 8:56, “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad”. You see the O.T. saints and the N.T. saints all had to put their faith in Christ. The promise God made in His covenant to Abraham was fulfilled in Jesus Christ and one can only be a partaker of those promised blessings by putting their faith in the One who fulfilled the covenant. If you look at Heb. 11 you will see that all the O.T. saints put their faith in Christ, 11:4- By faith Abel, 11: 5- By faith Enoch, 11: 7- By faith Noah, 11: 8- By faith Abraham, 11: 20- By faith Isaac, 11: 21- By faith Jacob, 11:22- By faith Joseph, 11: 23- By faith Moses, etc., we see all these O.T. saints were justified by faith, Heb. 11: 6 sums it up nicely- “But without faith it is impossible to please him (God)”. It doesn’t matter which side of the cross we are on even if it’s before or after Christ came to earth, salvation is found only in the Cross of Calvary. Even though the O.T. saints might not have known the specifics about Jesus, there was enough revealed to them to put their faith in the future sacrifice of Christ on the cross. The O.T. covenant looked forward to the cross while the N.T. covenant proceeds from the cross. Their faith pointed to the cross while ours points back to the cross. It was said of the O.T. saints in Heb. 11:13, “These all died in faith, not having received the promises (fulfillment in their lifetime), but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them (believed what God revealed and promised in Christ), and embraced them(faith in Christ produced salvation)”, this verse speaks of their faith in the promise of Christ’s work of salvation and because of this they were justified. We who are under the New Covenant it is said of us in Eph. 2:8-9, “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast”. We are saved, justified, reconciled, and redeemed only through faith in Christ alone. Whether it is from the perspective of looking forward to the cross or whether looking back to the cross, the only thing that matters is that there is the finished work of Christ on the cross. The shed blood of Jesus Christ covers both sides of the Cross. That is what saves us and nothing else.

By looking at the accomplished work of Christ on the cross we that no matter if it was Abraham by faith looking forward in anticipation of Christ or all of us looking back in faith to the Cross, it doesn’t matter where we are at but that we by faith believed in the only One who can save us. Because of Christ being the fulfillment of the promise to Abraham and Abraham believing and putting his faith in God for the future fulfillment by his obedience to the command and word of God we can share in the same spiritual blessing with Abraham. That blessing is a personal relationship with God through Christ. And just like Abraham, we are justified by faith.

Crucifixion of Christ

The Crucifixion Of Christ

(Matt. 27:26b-37)

We often are thankful for Good Friday to be off from work but are we thankful for the meaning of Good Friday? The crucifixion and resurrection of Christ is the foundation of our faith and we must be worshipful to remember the great work of salvation achieved only by the person and work of Christ not just on Good Friday and Easter but everyday of our lives. It shows the great love, grace, and mercy God has shown to us through Christ. The horror, the suffering, the blood shed, the cruelty, and death Christ endured to cleanse us from sin shows the great depravity that man had to be saved from. For all of us that have received Christ by faith as Lord, we must remember it was for us He died and rose again. Let's look with fresh eyes again at the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ.

I. Before the Crucifixion

A. The Garden (Matt. 26:36-46)- we see here in passage in Mt. 26 that Jesus has come to the Garden of Gethsemane (means ‘Olive Press’) with the disciples. He has come to pray and enters further in the garden with Peter, James, and John. This passage mentions in verse 37 that Jesus is ‘sorrowful and very heavy’, this means that he is grieved and distressed and even verbalizes that fact to these three. He is feeling the immense stress and when He prays, He asks the Father, ‘O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt’ and later prays in v. 42, ‘O my Father, if this cup may not pass away from me, except I drink it, thy will be done’. Jesus is not fearing death, the cup is not the cup of death but it represents the wrath of God against sin. In that moment, the sin of the world was being ‘poured’ on Jesus. He was going to bear our sins on that cross and die for our sins in our place; He took the punishment and penalty for our sin for us. 2 Co. 5:21 says that, ‘For he hath made him to be sin for us’, Jesus took our place and took the wrath of God for us.

   The taking on of the overwhelming weight of the sin of the world was a great stress on our Lord because we see that in Luke 22:34 it tells us that, ‘And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly: and his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground.’; now this is actually a known medical condition called hematidrosis. It is caused by great psychological stress which causes a release of chemicals that breaks down the capillaries in sweat glands which results in a small amount of bleeding in the glands and when sweat is released it is tinged with blood. We see our sinless Lamb taking our sins on Himself and the great weight causes our Lord great stress. He was the only One who could do it.

B. The betrayal and arrest (vv.47-68)- we all know the Judas betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver and they came and arrested Jesus and took to the High Priest Caiaphas. The disciples had fled away into the night and Jesus was before the Sanhedrin council and they charged Him with blasphemy for they rejected Jesus as the Messiah. They also pronounced a death sentence, beat, and mocked Him.

C. Before Pilate, the crowd, and the scourging (Mt. 27:11-31)- in chapter 27:11, we see Jesus has now been brought to Pilate. He is questioned by Pilate and Pilate says in the passage from John that he could find no fault in Him. When the crowd was given a choice to release a prisoner by Pilate, he gave them a choice between Jesus and a criminal named Barabbas. The crowd there cried out they wanted Barabbas and when Pilate asked what they wanted to do with Jesus and the crowd cried out ‘crucify him!’. This was probably a lot of the same crowd that had cried out only days before ‘Hosanna’ and ‘Blessed is He that comes in the name of the Lord’ when Christ rode in on that donkey when He entered Jerusalem.

   When Pilate expressed that he felt Jesus was innocent it says in v. 23 that the crowd cried out even more, ‘Let Him be crucified’. Pilate washes his hands before them and says that he is innocent of this man’s blood and the crowd answers and says, ‘His blood be on us, and on our children’; the fact of the matter is that we are all guilty of the death of Jesus Christ and none of us are innocent of His shed blood, it is because of our sins that He came, suffered, and died on that cross. Barabbas is released and Jesus is then scourged and delivered over to the Roman soldiers to be crucified.

   Scourging was a practice used by the Romans that involved a whip of braided leather thongs with metal balls and sharp pieces of bone woven into them. It was usually consisted of 39 lashes but depending upon the mood of the soldier chosen to give the lashes it most likely was more. Needless to say the flogging would be from the shoulders down the back and buttocks to the back of the legs. It would rip and tear skin and muscle down to even exposure of the spine and bowel. It was a horrible thing to be scourged and many would die just from being scourged and the loss of blood. Then the soldiers mocked him, spit on him, and drove a crown of thorns upon His head.

II. Crucifixion (vv.32-44)

   We now come to the place of the crucifixion; as horrible as the scourging was crucifixion was even more horrible. When one was crucified, they had to carry the cross beam part of the cross called the patibulum to the place where the execution was to be carried out. When they would arrive the vertical part of the cross would already be placed in the ground. They would take the condemned and nail him to part he carried. The 5-7 inch spikes and nailed him to through the wrists. Note that the wrist was considered part of the hand in the language of the day. If it was through the palms, the skin would have torn and would have fallen off the cross; the spike through the wrists lock the hands in place and was a solid place to secure the condemned. Part of the torture involved in nailing through the wrists is that the nail would go through the place where the median nerve runs to the hand. It would crush the nerve and cause intense pain; it like the feeling of hitting your funny bone but this pain is constant and it would be like taking a pair of pliers and squeezing and crushing that nerve. The pain would be unbearable and Jesus was feeling that pain. The pain was literally beyond words to describe; in fact they invented a new word for it and that word: excruciating. Excruciating means ‘out of the cross’. They had to make a new word for that intense anguish and suffering felt on the cross.

   The cross beam was raised and attached to the vertical beam and then a spike was driven through the feet also hitting a nerve with a similar intense pain as the others. Upon being raised on the cross the arms would be stretched at least 6 inches and the shoulders would become dislocated. Once hanging in that vertical position, crucifixion was a slow painful death caused by asphyxiation. Because of the position of crucifixion, Christ had to push Himself up by His feet to exhale and relax back down to inhale. Eventually a person would die do to being to exhausted to push themselves up to keep breathing. This is the great physical pain and agony endured by Christ out of His love for lost and sinful mankind. And we see in the Garden and at the cross the great psychological and physical suffering Jesus faced for our sins.

III. His Death (vv.45-53)

   It talks in v.45 that there was a great darkness over all the land. This was not an eclipse, because they knew what an eclipse was and there is no record of any eclipse at this time period. This was a supernatural occurrence performed by God the Father. But what was the reason? At His death there is darkness from the sixth hour until the ninth hour. The Jews begin to measure their day from 6 A.M., the sixth hour is noon. From noon to three it was dark. Mark 15:25 says, “He was crucified at the third hour,” 9 A.M. So the first three hours He was hanging there visible, naked before the watching people in the light. Those three hours passed. Soldiers had nailed Him there. They had placed the sign over His head. He is suspended there in the horrific indignity as the passers-by, the soldiers, the curious, the religious leaders watched and mocked and insulted Him.

   During that three hours He only broke the silence three times. Once He said to the soldiers, of the soldiers to the Father, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” The second time He spoke to a penitent thief at His side and said, “Verily, this day you will be with Me in paradise.” Once more He broke the three-hour silence looking down at Mary and John, He said to His mother, “Woman, behold your son,” pointing to John. And to John, “Behold your mother,” thus giving her into the care of John. In the light He said three things. All three of them were demonstrations of mercy, mercy toward the soldiers, mercy toward the thief, mercy toward Mary. Each was a revelation of the light of His grace, the shining beauty of His compassion. Darkness in the Scripture is a symbol of judgment; God’s salvation is always seen as light. God’s judgment is always seen as darkness and God was saying by the darkness that the cross was a place of judgment. This is not an indication of a judgment to come in the future, this is a judgment in itself right then and there. And God only judges one thing, what is it? Sin. God turned out the lights because this was a judgment on sin. And yet, the One receiving the judgment was sinless, a Lamb without blemish and without spot, holy, harmless, undefiled and separate from sinners, Hebrews 7:26 says. “In all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin”. Second Corinthians 5, “Him who knew no sin.”

   What is happening there then is a judgment on sin being borne by an innocent sacrifice. Isaiah 53 verse 4, “Surely our griefs He Himself bore and our sorrows He carried, yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted. He was pierced through for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The chastening for our well being fell on Him and by His scourging we are healed. The Lord caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him.” It further says, “The Lord was pleased to crush Him, putting Him to grief, rendering Him a guilt offering He will bear their iniquities and justify many.” Paul put it this way. Romans 4:25, “He was delivered for our offenses.” First Corinthians 15:3, “He died for our sins.” First Peter 2:24, “Who in His own self bore our sins in His body on the tree.” First Peter 3:18, “He died the just for the unjust.” First John 4:10, “God sent His Son to be the atonement for our sins.” Galatians 3, "He was made a curse for us.” And in Matthew 20:28 it says, “He came to give His life a ransom for many.”

   Mt. 25:46, “And about the ninth hour, three o’clock in the afternoon, Jesus cried out with a loud voice saying, ‘Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?’ that is, ‘My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?’” As the darkness came to an end, as the darkness reached three o’clock from noon, the life of Jesus is almost at an end. The fury of God is almost spent. Judgment is almost over. But Jesus can contain the pain no longer and it’s not the pain of nails and it’s not the pain of a crown, and it’s not the pain of wounds of scourges rubbing against a ragged wooden beam, it is the pain of separation from the Father. And with great strength, He cries out where the real agony comes from, and it doesn’t come from the physical pain, the real agony comes from His soul, the realization, the reality, the agony that He is separated from His Father. I don’t think Jesus in the garden was agonizing over the physical pain that He was about to suffer, He was agonizing over the reality of the sin-bearing and feeling the wrath of God because Christ came to be "a ransom for many" which means He had to come and die in our place, and He knew He would feel the fury of God’s wrath. This is a supernatural separation, impossible and yet it happened. And while Jesus was not separated from the Father by nature, He was separated from the Father by fellowship. As a sinful child does not cease to be the essence of his father, but by his sin loses the intimate fellowship with his father, so Christ did not cease to be God but lost the intimacy of fellowship with His Father which He had eternally known. He had never been anything but loved by His Father. In fact, it was His Father’s perfect love for Him that caused the Father to put the whole redemptive plan in motion and to redeem lost humanity. It was the Father’s perfect love for the Son that made it all happen. And now, having been loved by His Father perfectly for all eternity, He is treated as if His Father hates Him and His Father turns His back on Him. Why does He do that? Because "He is of purer eyes than to behold evil and cannot look upon iniquity", Hab. 1:12, 13.   2 Co. 5:21 says it in a nutshell, ‘21 For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him’. He took upon Himself the penalty for my sins and your sins and suffered and died in our place. What great love and mercy that He has shown to us the undeserving. As we read that He cried out, like it says in John 19:30, ‘it is finished’, He said that not because He was dying but because the work of salvation was finished and complete. Heb 10:10, ‘…we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all’. The salvation of our souls that we receive through faith in Christ is an eternal salvation because Jesus gives us a complete work of salvation that was accomplished by the suffering and death on the cross for those who are the sons and daughters of God, once for all. There is nothing else to do, no good works, no religious effort on our part because it is only through the redemptive work of our Lord Jesus on the cross.

   Because of the suffering and death on the cross by our sinless Lord Jesus, we are now partakers of His salvation. It is only through Jesus we have salvation, the forgiveness of all our sins. Let us, this week especially remember and give God thanks for the awesome work of redemption by King Jesus.