Thank you, Brad. I know that
text of scripture is difficult to read because I don't know
about you, but when I hear it read, I realize that I'm so far
from being a just man in all these things. You can go down
the list if you want to, but as Brad mentioned the scripture
in Romans 3, The law was given to shut every
man's mouth, and so this particular scripture here in Ezekiel 18
does just that. But I want to look at this in
the light of the scripture that we're going to be reading from
this morning in Colossians chapter one, and I've entitled the message
today, Reason for Hope, Reason for Hope. So if you want to turn
to Colossians. chapter one with me. We're going
through this book, and I very much love this book of Colossians. There's some scriptures in here
that we all, I think, go to frequently, not only when we listen to sermons,
but when we're trying to give a reason for our hope. And the
book of Colossians has several of those kinds of key scriptures
in it. And I think maybe perhaps the Lord did it that way because
the Apostle Paul, in writing to the Colossians, was writing
to a people he had never seen, for the most part, as far as
I know. And they had heard the gospel somehow. And he was praying
for them and he wrote this letter to them as those that he loved
and those that God had given him to minister to. And it's
like the book of Romans, which was written to a people by Paul
that he had not yet visited. And so in that sense, the gospel
is more clearly and systematically laid out in those two epistles. Because Paul is writing to give
them the gospel that they had believed and yet give it to them
authoritatively from God as the apostles sent by Christ. So that
I think is why there's so many texts of scripture in the book
of Colossians that are so key and pivotal. And many of them are right here
and one of them is in the text we want to look at today. the
reason for our hope. And we've been reading the first
two verses, and so let's read through the first six verses. I'm sorry, the first five verses
here in Colossians chapter one. Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ
by the will of God, and Timotheus, our brother, to the saints and
faithful brethren in Christ which are at Colossae. Grace be unto
you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. And I encourage you never to
read through those kinds of greetings in the epistles quickly, but
let the words soak in deep to your soul. This is God the Father
and the Lord Jesus Christ sending grace and peace. to those who
are described as saints, obviously made so by God, faithful, given
faith by God's grace, brethren, made so by the redeeming blood
of Christ and the predestinating work of God the Father and the
regenerating work of the Spirit of God in Christ, again by God's
electing purpose, and God sends them grace and peace, grace unmerited,
grace that brings God's eternal inheritance and sonship and eternal
life and glory to them out of their sin by the blood of the
Lord Jesus and peace with God, peace with God from God. And
this is all by the will, by the word, by the promise of God our
Father and by the work and the prayers and the preparations
and the reigning lordship of Jesus Christ our Lord. Those
first two verses, we could just go over those over and over again,
couldn't we? But here we have in verse three,
we give thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
praying always for you. See the love that Paul had for
them, always praying for them, and he's giving thanks in his
prayer to God the Father because it is to him ultimately that
all thanks is due. He says in verse four, since
we heard of your faith, Obviously, giving thanks to God for their
faith, therefore a gift of God, since we heard of your faith
in Christ Jesus, that's what true faith is, it's faith in
Christ, and of the love which you have, because faith works
by love, the love which you have to all the saints. And then in
verse five, he also gives thanks for this, for the hope which
is laid up for you in heaven, whereof you heard before in the
word of the truth of the gospel. All right, so that's what I want
to consider today, the hope which is laid up for you in heaven,
what you've heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel.
Now, there's a few things about this I want to point out at the
outset by way of giving you an outline. And the first thing
is, is the hope that's described here is something that's laid
up in heaven. It's not a hope that we have
in our heart, but it is a hope in heaven. And so in that sense,
it's a hope that is not something we experience, not yet. But it
is a hope that's future that will be given to us by God himself
and yet has been laid up by God the Father for us and that's
why the apostle is giving thanks to God the Father for the hope
that he laid up for his children in heaven. So it's an objective
hope. It's a hope that's outside of
us. It's a hope that's in heaven. It can't be altered. It was set
in heaven, fixed in God's eternal purpose. And it was established
there. It can't be changed by man. It can't be reached by man. It
can't even be known by man until God reveals it to us. So that's the first thing we
want to look at is the hope that is laid up for us in heaven,
our objective hope. And the second thing we want
to look at here is this hope that we are given here now in
our experience, which is a subjective hope. It's a hope that we experience,
a hope that is given to us by grace, which we hold in our hearts
by the Holy Spirit given to us, a hope of an expectation of that
hope laid up for us in heaven. And so we wanna see that, this
hope that's given to us that's in heaven. And then I wanna look
at the reason for this hope, the reason for these things.
The reason for the hope laid up for us, the reason for the
hope given to us, and these things which are given to us by God
the Father are given to us because of and in the Lord Jesus Christ. But first thing I want to do
is I want to make sure that you hear this as a sinner. I want
to make sure that you hear what I'm about to say next as a sinner. As someone who has no hope. Someone who has no hope and needs
a word from God. Someone who is sinful and they
are not able to stop their sin or remove the guilt of their
sin. Someone who is, without God's deliverance, a slave of
sin. Someone who needs God to speak.
And that's why grace is so important to us, and that's why peace is
so important to us, why this is so essential that God the
Father himself make us his set apart holy ones, and give us
faith, and make us his children in Christ, as it says in verse
two. This is what we depend upon him to do. We need him to give
us this as sinners, which is that our hope is an objective
hope. and it is a hope given to us
in spite of our sinfulness, in the context of our sinfulness,
lifting us up out of our sin and placing us among the people
of God and in glory itself at the right hand of the Lord Jesus
Christ. What is a sinner's hope? What
is a saint's hope? What is a believer's hope? What
is the hope of every child of God? And that's what I want you
to see here. This is the objective hope. This
hope was established by God and laid up in heaven for us. And
this hope therefore is eternal because it's as eternal as God. It is fixed because whatever
God establishes can't be altered. And it is unchanging because
God himself is unchanging. And so what is this hope? As
a sinner now, what do you hope in? What is your hope? Look with
me at the book of First Timothy. First Timothy, we'll be looking
at a lot of scripture today. First Timothy chapter one and
verse one. He says this, Paul, an apostle
of Jesus Christ by the commandment of God our savior and Lord Jesus
Christ our hope. You see that? Now you're a sinner,
I'm a sinner, and I especially am a sinful person. I think when
I say this with an if and I say this with a when. When I stand
before the Lord as we sang, Jesus paid it all. Dressed in beauty
not my own, when we stand before the Lord and praise him with
unsinning heart. and see Him as He is, then I
will know, above everyone else, that I am a trophy of His saving
grace, given to me in the Lord Jesus Christ. I won't have any
other claim. I won't have any other boast. I will have nothing that God
can recognize in me. My only hope is Jesus Christ. As a sinful person, that gives
me comfort. That gives me peace. And now
let me also take you to another scripture that's like this one.
Look at Colossians right there. He says this in Colossians 1
and verse 27. And we'll read the mystery, he
says in verse 26, this mystery that God gave to the apostle
to give to the Colossians and to all those God sent him to
preach. He said, the mystery which hath
been hid from ages and from generations, this is Colossians 126, but now
is made manifest to his saints. God has openly disclosed it now. To whom, the saints, God would
make known, notice, what is the riches, this is the pinnacle
of it, the riches of the glory of God. of this mystery among
the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Christ in you, the hope of glory. You see, this hope we have is
an objective hope. It is Christ. He is our hope. And it is Christ in you, the
hope of glory. So God has given us Christ himself. He is our life. He is the hope
of eternal glory. So in short, we could say this,
that our hope is the Lord Jesus Christ. And so we don't have
to look within for our hope. We don't have to look for anything
to take comfort in except what we have in Him by God's own promises. Look at Isaiah chapter 32. In
Isaiah 32, he tells us where our assurance and our peace rests. Isaiah chapter 32, he says this, The work of righteousness, this
is verse 17, Isaiah 32, verse 17, and the work of righteousness,
Isaiah 32, 17, shall be peace. So the work of righteousness
produces peace. Now we know that we ourselves
did not produce this righteousness. As Brad quoted from Romans 3,
there is none righteous, no, not one. And then he goes on
to... List those things that prove
our unrighteousness. There's none that doeth good.
There's none that understandeth, none that seeketh after God.
All gone out of the way. There's none righteous. But there
is one who is righteous. There is one who did righteous.
There is a just man. Jesus Christ, the righteous. First John chapter two, verse
one. He's Jesus Christ, or Christ Jesus, the righteous. But here
he says, the work of righteousness. So that would be Christ's work,
wouldn't it? He is the end of the law for righteousness. Of
Him, of God the Father, are you in Christ, who of God is made
unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. So that, as it is written, he
that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord, not in ourselves. And so the work of righteousness
shall be peace. When you understand what Christ
has done by the Spirit of God given to you because of His righteousness,
that life given to you. And the spirit who gives that
life, given to you because of Christ's righteousness, the effect
of it is peace in your heart. Peace with God and objective
peace, peace felt in the heart. And he says, and the effect of
righteousness, the effect of righteousness, believed, is quietness
and assurance forever. So you see how Jesus Christ is
our hope? This is an objective hope. And
you see how that the objective accomplishments of the Lord Jesus
Christ, our righteousness produced this peace between us and God,
and this felt peace, the effect of it is quietness and assurance
forever. What a blessing that is, isn't
it? To know that the Lord Jesus Christ himself is our hope. Now, The other thing about hope
that we want to see is that this hope that is laid up for us by
God the Father in heaven, which is the Lord Jesus Christ, includes
something called eternal glory. So, associated with Christ, also
laid up for us in Christ, in heaven, is, by God the Father,
is eternal glory. Eternal glory. Look at 1 Corinthians
chapter 2. In 1 Corinthians 2, he describes
it to us, and it really is beyond description. He says in 1 Corinthians
2, verse 7, we speak the wisdom of God. 1 Corinthians 2, 7, we
speak the wisdom of God in a mystery. God's wisdom to us is unknowable. It's mysterious until it's revealed,
and that's why it's called a mystery, something only God knows and
must be disclosed to us by God himself. We speak the wisdom
of God, this is the gospel, in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom
which God ordained before the world began. As he told the Colossians,
it's been hid, but now it's revealed, it's openly made known to the
saints through the gospel, which God ordained before the world
unto our glory. So within the gospel, God has
ordained that we should receive glory. He's ordained it for our
glory. And then he says, which none,
meaning the wisdom of God disclosed in the gospel, which none of
the princes of this world knew, For had they known it, they would
not have crucified the Lord of glory. That's Jesus Christ. Verse
nine, but as it is written, notice the description here given by
God. Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into
the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that
love him. But God has revealed them to
us by His Spirit. So even though we can't know
them because they're spiritual, they're in glory, they're in
heaven, yet the Spirit of God in the gospel revealing Christ
to us. And all that God would bless
Christ with because of His work for His people and bless them
in Him because of that work, that's revealed to us in the
Gospel. He says, God has revealed them to us by His Spirit, for
the Spirit searches all things. Yea, the deep things of God,
these things are deep. hidden, mysterious, and yet revealed. For what man knoweth the things
of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so
the things of God knoweth no man but the spirit of God. Now,
we have received not the spirit of the world, but the spirit
which is of God, that we might know the things that are, note,
freely given to us of God. There you have it. This is the
glory, ordained by God the Father before the world, laid up for
us in heaven in Christ, and given to us freely, and made known
to us by the Spirit of God through the gospel. That's what he's
saying here. This is an eternal hope. This
is part of that objective hope. What God the Father laid up for
us in Christ is eternal glory. How do you describe it? The Apostle
Paul said, I know a man once, whether he was in the body or
out of the body, I don't know. But this one thing I know, he
heard things which were unlawful to be spoken. Things were heavenly,
they could not be described. He was talking about what he
saw when the Lord Jesus Christ took him up into the third heaven
and revealed these things to him. And he couldn't speak about
that because God prevented him from doing so, and it wouldn't
be understood. And even now we see this in people,
they talk about heaven. Denise and I were listening to
a song we heard a long time ago, and the song was Pearly Mansions,
Pearly Mansions. And we have a tendency to earth
down heaven. meaning we think the best that
heaven can be is the best we know on earth, which is so far
demeaning to this eternal glory. We're talking about the very
best that God could even imagine and purchase promise and purchase
at the price of the blood of His own Son. And then He, having
purchased it, took possession of it for us. And He is now where
He deserves to be by God's appointment. And He is now where we ought
to be with Him. And we shall be. And so that's
the glory laid up for us in Heaven. It's eternal. It has always been
ordained by God for us. It was a kingdom, according to
Matthew 25, 34, prepared before the foundation of the world by
the Father and given to us. A kingdom, the kingdom of heaven. Eye hasn't seen, ear hasn't heard,
it hasn't even entered into the heart of man the things that
God has prepared for them that love him. This is eternal glory.
God has ordained this for us. Look at Acts chapter 13. Acts chapter 13, who was this
ordained? To whom was this declared? Well,
to the saints. How was it declared to them?
In the gospel. But how do they know it? By the
Spirit of God. He just said in 1 Corinthians
2, we know this by the Spirit of God given to us. And notice
in Acts 13, he said in verse 46, Paul and Barnabas waxed bold
and said it was necessary, speaking to the Jews who heard the gospel
but didn't believe it, he said it was necessary that the word
of God should first have been spoken to you. But seeing you
put it from you and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life,
lo, we turn to the Gentiles. For so hath the Lord commanded
us, saying, I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles, that
thou should be my salvation unto the ends of the earth, Christ.
Notice, and when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and
glorified the word of the Lord, and as many as were ordained
to eternal life believed. Those who believed were previously
ordained to eternal life. That's why they believed. And
this is the ones to whom God predestined or ordained eternal
life and eternal glory for them. He ordained it. He predestined
them to it. He prepared it for them. He gave
it to them before the world in Christ Jesus, and here they believed
on him. They are the saints. So we see
that. Now look also at 2 Timothy. 2 Timothy with me. This is this eternal hope. this
hope we have, laid up for us by God the Father. And so, since
those who were ordained to this, the gospel is sent to them by
the will of God, by the sending of Christ, I must bring my sheep. Remember John 10, 16? These also
I must bring. And so here we have it in 2 Timothy,
just like Acts 13, 48. As many as were ordained to eternal
life believed. Here he says in 2 Timothy 2 and
verse 10. In verse 9 he says, wherein I
suffer trouble, meaning for the gospel, I suffer trouble as an
evildoer, even unto bonds, but the word of God is not bound.
Therefore, notice verse 10, I endure all things for the elect's sake,
that they may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with
eternal glory. Now, you can see that there's
a connectedness here. is connected to the eternal glory,
which is salvation. And those who receive it are
God's elect. And the way they're going to
receive it is that the apostle Paul and the apostles suffered
in order to bring the gospel to them, in order that they would
hear it. And by the hearing of the gospel,
the spirit of God would give them this grace of faith to see
and to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, their eyes being opened.
and they would see Christ and they would see that this was
prepared, God prepared for them salvation in Christ, eternal
salvation and eternal glory with that salvation. Those who receive
salvation receive eternal glory. There's no difference between
these two groups. Look at 1 Peter, 1 Peter chapter
five. In 1 Peter chapter five, he says
this, about this. Glory. Verse Peter chapter 5. This is a very important verse.
Notice. This verse conveys to us not only that this is what
we were given, but also the one who gave it and the reason. Notice. But the God of all grace, who
gave it? God. Why? Because He is God,
the God of all grace, who have called us unto His eternal glory
by Christ Jesus. After you've suffered a while,
make you perfect and establish and strengthen and settle you.
To Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. Truth, let it be so. All praise
to Him, all thanksgiving to Him who is the God of all grace and
who called us unto His eternal glory by Christ Jesus. After
we've suffered a while, we receive eternal glory. It's always after. Look at Romans chapter eight.
In Romans chapter 8, that great chapter of scripture that explicitly
states that we have now in the Lord Jesus Christ no condemnation,
no condemnation. He says in verse 22 of Romans
8, for we know, this is something we know, that the whole creation
groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. All of creation
is under the curse because creation was subjected to man, man fell
in sin, and creation was cursed for man's sake. And so they groan
and travail in pain together. And not only creation, but ourselves
also, which have the first fruits of the spirit. This is so important. This is Christ in you. the hope
of glory. We have the first fruits. If
you have the Spirit of Christ, then you have the hope. You have
the certainty of what is laid up for you in heaven. You have
in your own experience a hope in what God has laid up in Christ. When you look to Christ, you
know that your only hope, your only salvation is in Him, and
all that goes with salvation, eternal glory is in Him. So you
have the first fruits of that, which is the Spirit of God, which
is how you live. You have spiritual life by Him,
and you have faith in Christ by Him, and you have hope by
Him, and love in every grace. all through the gospel. So not
only creation, but ourselves also, which have the first fruits
of the spirit, even we ourselves grown within ourselves, notice,
waiting for the adoption to it, the redemption of our body. So
there's something coming. Our body is going to be redeemed
for we are saved, it should say in hope, it says by hope, but
the word is in. We are saved in hope, in looking
to Christ, who is our hope. Because of Christ, who is our
hope. But through this God-given grace, we look to Him and we
expect to receive from God because of Him. So that's the hope. We are saved in hope, but hope
that is seen, which we don't have it yet, we can't see it
with these physical eyes. That's not hope. For what a man
seeth, why does he yet hope for? You don't wait for something
you already have. But if we hope for that we see
not, then do we with enduring patience wait for it. And he goes on to describe that
we don't even know what to pray, as we ought to. So the Spirit
Himself makes intercession for us according to the will of God.
And Christ, who searches the hearts, knows the mind of the
Spirit, and He, at the right hand of God, makes intercession
for us. He's our hope. He's taken possession
of it. He purchased it according to
God's promise. and is given to us and the first
fruits of that eternal glory to which we were ordained and
which was prepared for us by God the Father before the foundations
of the world was given to us when he gave us his spirit under
the preaching of the gospel. That's significant, isn't it?
A hope laid up and a hope known in the heart of us who are given
this hope. There's something in Romans chapter
15 I want to look at too with you. Romans 15, it talks about
this hope, it talks about the spirit of God, it talks about
how we are given this hope and it's important that we understand
this. So look at Romans 15 and verse 13. He called God the God
of all grace and first Peter 5 10. But here he calls him the
God of hope. Notice first Romans 15 and verse
13. He says now the God of hope. So our God is the God of grace.
He's the God of truth. He's the God and father of our
Lord Jesus Christ. He's the God of hope. All things
are of him. Now the God of hope. Fill you,
fill you with all joy and peace in believing. The only way we
can be filled with joy or peace is in believing, looking to Christ. If we consider ourselves and
we seek recognition for ourselves as the Pharisees sought recognition
from God and from men, and they intend to appear before God and
Christ in judgment, and they're going to ask for recognition
from Him even then for what they've done and who they are. But the
believer is taught by the Spirit of God to take no confidence
in the flesh, in what we are by nature, but to only look to
Christ and what He is. That's what faith is. It's finding
Him to be all of our confidence in salvation and hope for glory. So he says here in Romans 15,
the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing,
in looking to Christ, that you may abound in hope, in the expectation
of eternal glory through the power of the Holy Ghost, you
see? So this hope we have in our souls, this subjective hope,
is in the objective hope, which is the Lord Jesus Christ through
his redeeming blood. Now, these things are fantastic,
aren't they? What is the reason for our hope?
What is the ground for it? How do we know that we have this
hope, that we have this hope laid up for us in heaven? What
is the basis of this hope? Well, we've already touched on
much of this, but the first reason for our hope is in God. God himself
is the reason for our hope. He's called here the God of all
hope. the God of hope, the God of grace. The reason for our hope is because
God in his character is the God of grace, the God of hope. God
in his character is God, he is called, God is love. So we know these things and we
have these things because first and foremost, this is who God
is. And God is our God. The first basis, the first reason,
the first cause for us to have quietness and peace and assurance
is because this is who God is. This is our God. And when we
see him, we're going to rejoice in our God. Look at Titus chapter
two. In Titus chapter two, it talks
about this expectation and our current anticipation of it with
confidence. Confidence is part of this hope. In Titus chapter two, it says
this in verse 13. He says, I should read from verse
a little before this. He says in verse 11, he says,
for the grace of God, that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all
men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts,
we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world."
Notice, here's what the believer does. Looking for that blessed
hope and the glorious appearing of the great God The word and
isn't necessary there. The glorious appearing of the
great God, our Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for
us. You see that? The one who gave
himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and
purify to himself a peculiar people, zealous of good work,
is Jesus Christ, our great God and Savior. God the Father won't
come. in appearing, but the Lord Jesus
Christ will, and that's why he calls him here our great God
and Savior. He will appear, the Lord Jesus
Christ, who is God. And there's nothing about God
that he's not. He is the fullness of the Godhead
bodily, God in a body. He's going to appear in all of
his glory. and we look for Him. We're looking
for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of our great
God and Savior, Jesus Christ. That's what we're to be doing.
That's what faith teaches us. You see, because God is the God
of hope, and because He is the God of grace, He has ordained
for us eternal glory and laid it up in Christ, untouchable,
even unknowable until He reveals it to us by the Gospel through
the Spirit of God. And implants that in our hearts
by the Spirit of God so that in this life that we have Christ
in us, we also know that our hope is because of Christ only. And that gives us the greatest
peace and assurance and quietness of soul and heart and joy in
believing Him. So hope flows out of faith. Faith is the substance of things
hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Look at Hebrews chapter
11 with me. So the hope we have is in us.
But it is because of the Spirit of God in us, who is the Spirit
of Christ, who died and gave Himself for us, and He who now
dwells in us by His Spirit, teaches us to look for Him and His appearing,
the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.
And we think of that with some measure, I know in my own mind,
some measure of reluctance or intimidation that He would appear
in His glory and I would be unable to contain that sense of fear,
that this is God over all, and here I am, a man, a sinful man. But you see, faith teaches us
that the basis of our hope is not found in us, but in Him.
And so, in Hebrews chapter 11, I want you to see this also.
Abraham, Abraham, notice in, Verse 8 of Hebrews 11. He says, By faith Abraham, when
he was called, to go out into a place which he should after
receive for an inheritance, obeyed, and he went out, not knowing
whither he went. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise
as in a strange country. So that's important. So he was
in the land of promise, but he was sojourning there as a stranger. as in a strange country dwelling
in tabernacles, tense, with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him
of the same promise. For Abraham looked for a city
which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God." So
even though God promised him a land, what Abraham lived in
was a strange land. He looked for a city which has
foundations, and the one who builds this city, the maker of
it is God. He's the one who promised it
to him. So Abraham wasn't looking for Israel, the land of Israel,
was he? He was not. He lived there as
a stranger. And this is something that boggles
the mind that nowadays evangelical freewill works religion preaches
that Abraham and his physical descendants are going to receive
this land as an inheritance. Not so. Not so. Because the Lord Jesus Christ
said the children of Abraham are those who believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ. And the land that Abraham looked
for, who was the father of believers, was not that land. That's what
it says here in plain black and white. So he says he looked for
a city which had foundations, whose builder and maker is God.
And then also, it says in verse 11, through faith Sarah also
herself received strength to conceive seed, Isaac, and was
delivered of a child when she was past age because She judged
him faithful who had promised, you see. That was her confidence. She knew she couldn't have children.
First of all, she was barren naturally, but secondly, she
was too old. She was 90 when Isaac was born.
Therefore, because she judged him faithful who had promised
sprang there even of one and him, Abraham, as good as dead,
so many as the stars of the sky in multitude and as a sand, which
is by the seashore innumerable. He's not talking about the people
of Israel born through Sarah. I'm born through Abraham and
Sarah, like the children of Jacob physically. He's talking about
the the nation, the holy nation. which is the Israel of God, the
elect of God, those chosen in Christ who is Abraham's seed. But here he goes on, he says
in verse 13, notice, these all died in faith, all these that
were spoken of before and who were referenced here in this
innumerable number, these all died in faith, not having received
the promises. But having noticed, seen them
afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and
confessed they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For
they say such things declare plainly, they seek a country.
And truly, if they had been mindful of that from whence they came
out, they might have had opportunity to a return. But now they desire
a better, that is, an heavenly. Wherefore God is not ashamed
to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city. You see, this is not an earthly
possession. This is heaven laid up in heaven
for you. Turn to Galatians chapter three.
Galatians three. What? Are you saying that Abraham
was not thinking about the physical land of Canaan? Yes, I'm saying
that. When God spoke to him and said
in Genesis 2, 12, verse three, that in you all the nations of
the earth will be blessed, wasn't that talking about how the people
of the world will be blessed because of that nation of Israel?
No. No, it was talking about the
fact that Christ would come through those people and the nations,
meaning God's elect throughout the world, would be saved by
the blood of Christ who were ordained to eternal glory and
therefore believed when they heard the gospel because the
Spirit of God and life was given to them. In Galatians 3 it says
so. Look at Galatians 3 verse 5,
he says, He therefore that ministereth
to you the Spirit, this is the apostle Paul and the apostles
preaching the gospel, and worketh miracles among you. Does he do
it by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith? Even
as Abraham believed God, he didn't work, he believed God who had
promised and who was able to call those things which be not
as though they were and raise the dead. give life to the dead,
as Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness.
Christ, the one he believed, was counted to him as his righteousness. Know ye therefore that they which
are of faith the same are the children of Abraham." That's
black and white, isn't it? And the scripture foreseeing
that God noticed, this was the promise, that God would justify
the heathen through faith preached before the gospel to Abraham
saying, in thee shall all nations be blessed. That was the promise.
But go on, he says, so then, they which be of faith are blessed
with faithful Abraham. And Abraham wasn't looking for
Physical land was he he was looking for heaven notice in verse 13
Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law being made a
curse for us for it is written Curse it is everyone that hangeth
on a tree. This is the justification This
is how we're justified how? Christ substituted himself for
us He substituted himself before God He took our sins, lifted
them from us, confessed them as his own as the high priest
in Leviticus 16 laid his hands on the scapegoat and confessed
over that goat all the sins of all the children of Israel and
transferred them to the goat and then sent him out. by the
hand of a just man to a land uninhabited and a land of forgetfulness
and that goat was released there and that man came back this is
the Lord Jesus Christ confessing the sins of his people upon himself
and owning them and saying as he says in the Psalms mine iniquities
have gone over my head as a heavy burden they were too heavy for
me And here he's saying that he bore the curse, he bore our
sins, he took them, he lifted them from us, he bore them as
his own and then he bore the wrath due to us because of our
sins. The justice of God was poured
out upon him and justice was satisfied. And God was pleased
because His righteousness was exalted. And the Lord Jesus Christ,
in His obedience of laying His life down for His people, fulfilled
their righteousness and washed them from their sins. And He
says here that that curse, the curse of the law, because Christ
was made a curse for us, we're redeemed from that curse. We're
set free, we're bought out of it, and we're set at liberty
now from the curse to the blessing. He says in verse 14, that the
blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus
Christ. And then, don't forget this next
part, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through
faith. You see, not only did the Lord
Jesus Christ purchase us out from under the curse by bearing
our sins, paying God in just compensation, the debt, to pay
off the debt that we owed because of our sins, a debt that incurred
our eternal death. And yet he paid it and purchased
us out from under the curse and the bondage of the law and set
us free to live, free to live with eternal life in us by the
Spirit and to know our redemption in Christ and believe. But that
Spirit was given to us also according to the promise God made to Abraham. You say, well, when did God ever
promise the Spirit to Abraham? Ah, that's the key, isn't it? You see, that was the mystery
that was hidden in the gospel. And it was revealed here in Galatians
3, when he spoke, in thee shall all nations be blessed. and that
he would be blessed with a faithful Abraham. You see, when God made
this promise to Abraham, he said, Abraham, in Genesis 15, verse
1, I am thy shield and thy exceeding great reward. Christ, our hope,
the hope of glory. You see, God not only promised
that he would justify Abraham, by the righteousness of Christ,
which he would work out, in which he would deliver us from the
curse of the law, but that he would also give to Abraham the
eternal inheritance of heaven and glory. And so when the Lord
spoke to the Sadducees, he says in Matthew 20, he says, or actually
Matthew 22, he says, he's not the God of the dead. God is not
the God of the dead. He's the God of the living. He
said in Exodus 3 15, the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. God is not the basis of our hope. The reason for our hope is not
only because God is gracious and is the God of hope, the God
of all grace. The God of peace, but that he
himself made promise to Abraham that he himself would be Abraham's
reward and therefore he could not die. Because if God is our
God, then we are the God of the, we are the children of the God
of the living. And we're not going to be dead.
And so Abraham had to be given life. And not only that, he had
to be given life and eternal glory. And how could these things
be given to him? How does life come to us? Jesus
said, the flesh profits nothing, just like Abraham learned. It
is the spirit that gives life. The words that I speak to you,
they are spirit, they are life. So life comes by the spirit.
And why is the spirit of God and life given to us? Because
of righteousness. Look at Galatians chapter five.
He says this in chapter five. In verse four of Galatians 5,
Christ has become of no effect to you, whosoever you are justified
by the law, whosoever of you are justified by the law, you're
fallen from grace. If you think that by what you
do, you're going to earn what is unearnable, which is eternal
life and glory and justification before God, then you've fallen
from grace. But notice in verse five, but
we, we, through the Spirit, wait. for the hope of righteousness. You see, the eternal glory is
the reward of righteousness, but it's not the righteousness
we worked out. It's the righteousness that was given to us by God the
Father, a free gift of grace, that Christ worked out. Christ,
our hope. Christ, the one who occupies
the possession that he purchased and was promised us. And is it
an eternal glory so that when He comes again, He's going to
come to receive us to Himself, that we might be with Him forever?
That's the eternal glory. That's what we wait for. And
He says, through the Spirit we wait, enduring under all of the
trials, whether they be outside or inside, we wait for the hope
of righteousness by faith, looking to Christ, not to ourselves,
like Abraham. So Abraham was promised justification
in Christ and eternal glory. Christ was his shield, his eternal,
his great reward, his eternal and great reward. And he looked
for Christ and he looked for eternal glory, which he had to
have now by the life given to him by the Spirit of God. He
believed just like we do. He was given the Spirit of God
from God in order that he might have this life in his soul. And
it was because of righteousness. That's the reason. It's what
God has done. It's who God is. Look at one
more verse and we'll stop here. Look at Hebrews chapter six.
This eternal hope is significant, isn't it? It's so significant. Look at Hebrews chapter six and
verse 13. It's talking about the same thing
here. This is part of the promise. This eternal life and eternal
glory was promised to Abraham when God promised him that Christ
would justify him by his righteousness and therefore give him his spirit,
the spirit of life. This life is in his son. And
this life is in us because Christ is life and Christ is our life
and he is in us and therefore our hope of eternal glory. We're
to look for him, the blessed hope and the glorious appearing
of our great God and Savior. But here in Hebrews chapter 6
verse 13, when God made promise to Abraham, because he could
swear by no greater, Notice the reason for our hope, he swear
by himself saying, surely blessing I will bless thee. This is grace,
isn't it? God promising and he himself
performing what he promised. Blessing I will bless thee. Multiplying I will multiply thee. And so after he had patiently
endured, this is his life of faith in Christ. he obtained
the promise. For men verily swear by the greater,
and an oath for confirmation is to them an end of all strife.
That's the way it works among men. If they swear by something
greater than themselves, okay, he swore on his mother's grave
or whatever, he swore on a stack of Bibles, wherein God, willing
more abundantly to show to the heirs of promise, See, it was
given to certain people. Heirs of promise, the immutability
of His counsel, can't change, confirmed it by an oath. So for
our sakes, God swore. And who could He swear by that
was greater than Himself? None. So He swore by Himself.
He staked Himself as God to perform what He promised. that by two immutable things,
first, in which it was impossible for God to lie, and then his
oath, we might have a strong consolation who have fled for
refuge. Notice, we have fled for refuge. You're a sinner.
You have no hope. You have nothing in yourself
to bring. You have only your sin to condemn you. And your
own conscience cries out against you, and you wonder, how could
I be one of the Lord's? There's only one way, if Christ
is all your hope. He said, we have fled for refuge,
to lay hold upon the hope set before us, yet to come, but certain,
because God staked himself in the Lord Jesus. Which hope we
have, as an anchor of the soul, in all of the turbulence of life,
the ups and downs, like Jonah, cast into the sea, or whatever
it was, though the earth be removed and the mountains be carried
into the midst of the sea, we will not fear God as our refuge.
which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast,
and which entereth into that within the veil. Our anchor holds
within the veil where Christ has entered for us, wither, the
forerunner, Jesus Christ, the righteous, has entered for us.
He stood for us in our place at the cross before God with
our sins, and now he stands with God at his right hand for us
in our place, because that's our place. Our forerunners for
us entered there, even Jesus, made a high priest forever after
the order of Melchizedek, that one who appeared in Scripture
to reflect the Lord Jesus Christ, who is eternal. Life unchanging. Isn't it amazing that even from
the beginning God promised these things and fulfilled them according
to His will. He purchased it at the price
of Christ's blood. Christ has taken possession of
it. It's according to His promise and it is according to the will
of God. His nature, His name is staked
to this. Do it for the Lord's sake. That's
what we pray. Pardon mine iniquity for thy
name's sake, for my iniquity is great. Let's pray. Lord, we
pray that you would be glorified in performing all of your will,
all of your heart's desire, all that you've promised, all that
you have deposited in the Lord Jesus Christ, and all that he
purchased by his precious blood, his infinitely precious, meritorious
blood that earned for us Not only the lifting up from the
dunghill of our sins, but the placing of us in Himself as children
of God in glory to receive all that you give to Him with Him.
Amazing grace, the hope laid up for us by God our Father. Thank you, O our Father. Thank you for the Lord Jesus.
Thank you for this hope. In Jesus' name we pray, in Him
we trust. Amen.