Oh, we're good? Okay. Okay, we're
good to go. We're good to go. Good morning,
everyone. So good to be here. So very good
to be here. Open up your Bibles, if you would,
to Galatians chapter 3. We'll continue our study in the
book of Galatians. We'll be in chapter 3 here today.
Last week we finished off the section where Paul asked the
six questions to the Galatians, which, as I said, were very good
questions for us too to consider because they They will only point
us to Christ and they will only point us to the fact that salvation
is of the Lord. It's all His doing from beginning
to end. And that's a good thing for us to be reminded of and
for us to keep our eyes set upon. So we conclude from those questions
too, that salvation is of the Lord. It's not of anything we
do. And that's from beginning to
end because when Paul brings forth, You know, did the spirit
begun the work? Did you finish it with your flesh?
No, not at all, right? It's all dependent upon the Lord
from beginning to the end. As in the book of Revelations,
it says he's the Alpha and the Omega. And we know that that's
true, not just as he is the Alpha and Omega, but it's true that
even in our salvation, he's the Alpha and Omega. He's the beginning
and the end. So let's read verses 1 to 9 of
Galatians chapter 3. Today's verse will be verse 6,
but I'd like us to read the context of this verse here. O foolish
Galatians, who hath bewitched you that you should not obey
the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently
set forth crucified among you? This only would I learn of you,
received you the Spirit by the works of the law or by the hearing
of faith. Are ye so foolish, having begun
in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh? Have ye
suffered so many things in vain, if it be yet in vain? He therefore
that ministereth to you the Spirit, and worketh miracles among you,
doeth it he by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? Even as Abraham believed God,
and it was accounted to him full righteousness. Know ye, therefore,
that they which are of faith the same are the children of
Abraham. And the scriptures, foreseeing that God would justify
the heathen through faith, preached before the gospel unto Abraham,
saying, Indeed, shall all nations be blessed. So then they which
be of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham. So again, these
questions that Paul asks will hem us up, won't they? They will
literally hem us up to Christ in him alone. They will hem us
up to the completed, finished work of Christ, which Paul brings
forth in verse 1, when he says, Christ was set before the Galatians,
evidently set forth before them, clearly set forth before them,
is crucified for the sins of his people. And God sends the spirit of his
son into our hearts, doesn't he? Whereby we cry, Abba, Father. Into the hearts of his born again,
his chosen, blood-washed people, granting us faith to believe.
So we see these questions and all we can conclude as believers
is salvations of the Lord. That's all we can conclude. That's
all we desire To know more about is how our salvation is complete
in Christ, because we know we can't save ourselves at all.
So we trust the Lord, don't we? By simple faith, we trust the
Lord. We look to Christ and Him alone
as all of our salvation, as the salvation of our eternal souls.
And when we hear that Jesus Christ is the Eternal Son of God, the
Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, equal with the Father,
equal with the Holy Spirit of God in every way, when we hear
that Jesus Christ, our Sovereign Creator, became a man, and his
entire life on this earth in human body was a life of perfect
obedience to our father, then we rejoice greatly, don't we?
Because we know he's sinless. So he did that for you and I,
beloved. He did that for us. He obeyed the law of God perfectly
for you and I. And when we hear we have no righteousness
of our own, what a change that is, isn't it? Because there was
a time when we thought that we were good enough by our supposed
works to get to heaven. Until the holy spirit revealed
the scriptures to us and the scriptures clearly say there's
none righteous No, not one. There's none good. No, not one,
right? So what a shock to us then Right coming being born
again and all of a sudden seeing this by the grace of God and
in and in the father through the preaching of the gospel sets
forth the balm of Gilead the Lord Jesus Christ And we look
to Him, don't we, by God-given faith, as the only Savior from
all our sins, the only Savior for sinners. That's why we say
to folks, come to Christ, flee to Christ. He's the only hope
of sinners. There's no other hope outside
of Christ. And when we hear that the pure,
spotless Lamb of God offered Himself up as a sacrifice, our
sins and that's what we conclude from those questions isn't it
that Christ was crucified for me each believer says he's crucified
for me the pure spotless lamb of God offered himself up as
a sacrifice and that he obtained eternal redemption for us and
that his blood has cleansed us from all sin we rejoice don't
we we rejoice beloved every time that never gets old does it Tell
me again. You could just preach sermon
to me on Christ's blood taking away my sin and that is perfect
obedience to the Father. I'd be happy to hear that every
day. I'll tell you what. Tell me, as Norm and I were texting
back and forth this week and Norm said, I pray the Lord will
bless you telling the old, old story. That's what it is, isn't
it? The old, old story how Christ
died for sinners. Oh my. And when we hear that
we're now reconciled to God, we're literally reconciled to
God through Christ and Him alone. We now have peace with God. And
that, again, Christ was delivered for our offenses, and He was
raised again for our justification, which, again, we can conclude
from those questions, can't we? It's all the work of Christ.
It's all His work. And when we hear that Jesus Christ,
the God-man, is on His throne right now, right this second,
right now, what peace that can give us. It doesn't matter what's
going on in this world. Our king, he rules right now,
beloved. Right this second, and he's not
going to abdicate his throne. So when we see things going on
in the world, you know, and even if something happens on Tuesday
that we don't agree with, right, or we agree with, Christ is still
on the throne. He's still on the throne, beloved.
I've been here now, I've been here now for, since when Clinton
was president. And you know, my life hasn't
changed through all those other presidents. Has yours? Isn't that wonderful? But people get all riled up by,
oh, this and that. God's on the throne, beloved.
No one will be able to do anything unless he allows it. Hallelujah. The Lord God reigns. And so we
rejoice in that, don't we? That he's our blessed surety.
That he's our sovereign lord over all creation, everything.
There's not even a microscopic organism that moves without him
knowing. As one preacher said, there's
not a maverick molecule in this world. There's not a maverick
molecule going, I'm going to do whatever I want. It's all
under his control. The dust that we see in the windows,
right? When the sun shines, every single
one of those dust is ordained by God. to be in that place. Lord help my unbelief. Lord help me. Oh my. So Paul, after asking those heart-searching
questions, now he's going to bring forth before the Galatians
the simple faith of Abraham. Did you know Abraham just believed
God? Now we know that's by God-given faith, right? Because no man
can believe or woman can believe without God giving us faith.
But you know he just believed. You know his faith is the same
as ours. We have the same faith as Paul. Same faith as Peter
and John. It's God-given faith, isn't it?
We have the same faith. Isn't it wonderful? Look at this
in verse 6. This is wonderful. So Paul's
setting forth here, remember that justification is in Christ
alone, right? Through faith alone, in Christ,
all right? Look what he says here. Even
as Abraham, what? Believed God. The question is
right now, do we believe God? Do we believe what God says in
his word? Well, by God's grace, I do. Right? By God's grace, I believe what
this word says, and by His grace alone. And I find great comfort
in it. I find great comfort in it. You
know what? Turn quickly to Psalm 44. This wasn't in my notes,
but Norm sent me this. He goes, look at Psalm 44, verses
1 to 3. Let's take a quick peek at this.
I got a blessing reading this this morning. I want to share
this with you. Look at this. Now you talk about
give you peace. Oh my gosh. Psalm 44. We have heard with our ears.
By God's grace we have, haven't we? Right? Oh God, Elohim, the
strong and mighty one. Our fathers have told us what
work thou didst in their days, in the times of old. How thou
didst drive out the heathen with thy hand, and plantest them. How thou didst afflict the people,
and cast them out. Look at this. For they got not
their land in possession by their own sword, not by mighty works
of man. Right? Neither did their own
arms save them. Oh Our own arm didn't save us
did it look at this, but thy right hand that's Christ and
thine arm in the light of thy countenance because thou has
had a favor upon them In God had favor upon us beloved
in Christ isn't he isn't it he who saved us and Oh, he's showing
such favor to us, isn't he, in Christ? Oh, that's wonderful,
isn't it? So let's go back to Galatians
3.6. Look at this. Even as Abraham believed God,
and it was accounted to him for righteousness. So what did Abraham
do? He believed what God said. And
by God's grace, we believe what God says, right? Scripture says,
God says there's only one Savior for sinners. There's only one
way to heaven. There's not a million other ways.
There's only one. And that's Jesus Christ. By God
given faith, we believe him, don't we? I didn't believe that
before the Lord saved me. I didn't believe that at all.
I thought it was all about me. All about my supposed good works.
Boy, was I in for a big surprise, right? My goodness. But praise
God, he saved me. Now think of this too. The whole
Jewish nation, they glorified in Abraham. We see through the
Gospels where they're bringing up to the Lord Abraham, right?
They gloried in Abraham. And these Judaizers who bewitched
the saints in Galatia, they tried to persuade them to be circumcised
by using Abraham as an example. But there's a problem with using
Abraham as an example for circumcision. You know what that problem is?
Abraham believed God before he was circumcised. So there's a
problem with that, isn't there? And it says here Abraham believed
God and it was accounted to him for righteousness. That's before
he was even circumcised, beloved. So they can't use Abraham, can
they? And Paul is just going to undo their whole argument.
He's going to just undo. And he does it so plainly with
this first verse. Abraham believed God and it was
accounted to him for righteousness. Isn't that wonderful? Can you
hear them now? They'd say, those Judaizers,
well when Abraham was older he was circumcised. Yeah, but he
already believed. He already believed, beloved.
It had nothing to do with his salvation, did it? Absolutely
none. He was already a saved man. Oh
my. He believed God before he was
circumcised and righteousness was imputed to him. Just as it
is imputed to us, beloved. And God justified, we can see
here, that God justified Abraham before he was even circumcised.
Because it says, even as Abraham believed God and it was accounted
to him for righteousness, and he believed that, again, before
he was even circumcised. Oh my. So it cannot be that any
of God's children can be justified by circumcision. and belief on
Christ. No, it's Christ alone. It's Christ
alone. It's like folks that say, well,
you have to be saved by Christ and then speak in tongues. That's
a false gospel. And there's a group out there
that says you must have faith in Christ and be baptized to
be saved. We can just identify those, can't we? Right? Because the true gospel says
it's all about faith in Christ. trusting him his work was complete
his work was perfect right can you add anything to perfection
I can because if I add anything it's going to be spoiled it's
going to be messed up because I'm a sinner he's perfect I'm
just going to trust him I trust his perfect work because God
says neither is there salvation in any other man but Christ in
him alone right So who can believe, man or God? Well, I believe God. I already believed man when I
thought I could justify myself. I don't need another man to tell
me that I can be justified by something that I do, because
I already know I can't be, because I believed that way at one time.
You see how God changes our mind? Isn't it wonderful? Isn't it
amazing? He's so good to us. He's so very,
very good to us, beloved. And this faith, when it says
here, Abraham believed God, this faith is childlike faith. It's
just trust in God. It's just trust in God. Just
the way a child trusts the parents. You remember when our kiddos
were little, you tell them something, they believed it right away,
didn't they? They just believed it. They didn't even question. They said, OK, Mom. OK, Dad. Right? That's how our faith is
with our King, isn't it? God says that there's only salvation
in Christ. We say, okay, Abba, okay, Father. By God-given faith, don't we?
We believe it. And then think of what Abraham
did. He forsake his family, didn't
he? He left Ur. All his family was there. His
whole family was there. He left Ur. Right? He forsook his homeland. And
what else did he forsake? He forsook all his idols. He
was an idol. Do you know Abraham was an idol
worshipper? He came out of the land of Calvary. There were all
idol worshippers there. He was bound before rocks and
stones and wood. And God said, Abraham, you come
out of that. You're mine. Now did Abraham, the day before
God saved him, did Abraham know that? He had no clue, did he? He's just worshiping his idols,
going about his stuff, and doing his thing, and God calls him
by his grace. And he once worshiped those idols,
and now he's worshiping the one true living God. Isn't that amazing? And why? All because of God's
grace, because it pleased God to do so with Abraham. Bring
it right home to us. Why are we not serving the idol
of self? Or the idol of the religions
we were involved in? Because it's all by the grace
and mercy of God. Isn't that wonderful? Oh, it's
just so wonderful. I'll tell you why. So he forsook
all. So we've seen so far in these
questions that Paul set forth before the Galatian church, That
the only answer, again, he's hemmed them up. I remember my
brother had some cattle. When he had to do some things
to them, they'd go in this little ramp thing that would hem them
up. And then they'd shut this little
back gate. And then they'd do whatever they had to do with
them. And then they'd let them out the front. Well, these questions
do that to us. They hem us right up into that
little wee gate section. Door shuts. We can't go nowhere.
And we don't want to, do we? It's all about Christ. It's all
about him alone. So the answer to these questions
is salvation to the Lord. Now he brings in an illustration
that they can understand. Right? That they can understand. And the Jews, again, they held
Abraham in high esteem. So I imagine these Galatians
had heard about Abraham. Had heard about how he came out
of the land of Chaldees. I'd heard about how he was circumcised. Why else would they even consider
that? Except these Judaizers have been whispering in their
ears about all this stuff. And here, the very ones who the
Jews held in high esteem, Paul uses an illustration, remember,
by inspiration of the Holy Spirit of God, the true author, and
says, Abraham was saved by faith alone. Because he believed God. Well, that just upset the whole
apple cart, didn't it? You mean he's not justified by
any law works? Nope. The law wasn't even there
yet, was it? Oh. Whoops. Yeah. Oh, yeah. That certainly puts
a stop to that, doesn't it? Oh my, it's wonderful. I'll tell
you what. You know what this shows us?
This shows us that the message of grace has a divine origin. It has a divine origin. Absolutely. And that the message of the Judaizers,
or false religionists, which is diametrically opposed to the
one true gospel, is of human origin. One's divine, And all
the other religions in the world are of human origin. That's what it is. Whether people
believe it or not, it's true. It's true. You guys know I like
reading even fiction books about the Roman legions, all the different
gods they had and stuff. Oh my gosh, all these different
gods. It's just incredible. And that's
just the Romans, not including the Greeks and all the others.
all these false... you know what? God's made up
from man's imagination. And they were always mad at him.
Isn't that something? They either had to do with the
lust of the flesh, vengeance, war, all these different things. No peace though, eh? See, peace
only comes from the one true, living God, doesn't it? It only
comes from Him. And that only comes to us in
and through Christ Jesus, our Lord. Now, one might say, well, what
is the occasion for this argument, where Paul's now bringing forth
Abraham? Well, the Judaizers, again, taught
that the natural descendants of Abraham were God's children,
just by their birth. We know no one's born into the
kingdom of God, are we? None of us are born into the
kingdom of God. When I hear someone say, well, I was born a Christian,
I know right now I'm talking to someone who does not know
Christ. They don't know Christ. Because not one of us was born
a Christian. We were born dead in trespasses
and sins. So the Judaizers taught that
since the Israelites were natural descendants of Abraham, they
were automatically God's chosen. They were automatically accepted
by God because of their birth. And therefore, it meant that
circumcision was a prerequisite for salvation. They argued that no one could
participate in the blessings, excuse me, of God's covenant
with Abraham unless they were circumcised. Well, do you ever
think of this? This only includes the men. What
about the women? What about the women? My oh my. See, salvation in Christ
is for man and woman. And children, right? Who knows? Can the Lord regenerate a child?
Oh yeah. If he's so pleased, he can give him faith to believe.
Absolutely. My. But all this teaching was
based on a misapprehension of Genesis 12 and 17. And they argued,
again, that no one could participate in the blessings of God's covenant
with Abraham unless they were circumcised. Again, that just
includes the men. Oh, my. And their mistake was
in failing to distinguish between the purely Jewish and national
covenant God made with Abraham, which had to do with the earthly
ministry and destiny of the nation of Israel as a channel which
God would use in bringing salvation to the elect, right? That salvation
would come through them simply through a descendant of Abraham.
You see? The Messiah. He was Jewish, wasn't
he? The Lord's Jewish. And His name, that descendant
through Abraham's line, is the Lord Jesus Christ, beloved. So
they were set apart for that. It didn't mean they were automatically
saved. How is one saved, whether you're
Jew or Gentile? Through Christ alone, right?
It doesn't say, well, you're saved because of your nationality
here, and then the Gentiles are only saved in Christ. No, it
says both Jew and Gentile, barbarian, Scythian, bond and free, are
one in Christ, beloved. See, Christ is the common denominator.
Right? There's no salvation because
I'm Canadian. Right? It's true. And there's no salvation
because you're all American, right? It's true, isn't it? It's
in Christ. We have a common denominator
in our salvation, and that's Christ Jesus our Lord. It's wonderful,
isn't it? We rejoice. So circumcision,
what circumcision was, was a mark of separation upon the Jew, isolating
him from the myths of the Gentile world. They were God's chosen
people. That the law would come to them,
right? The prophets would go through them. That the Messiah, all because
the Messiah would come through them. You see? And God protected them, didn't
he? Showed them great favor. And remember, there was always
a remnant in that nation. There was always a remnant. were saved oh my and he might he separated them
that he might use the nation of Israel what for his own purposes
and he did didn't he he used them for his own purposes the
Messiah came through them It had nothing to
do with the acceptance of salvation by the Jew over against the contention
that Paul argues that Abraham was justified by faith, not by
circumcision. So the Judaizers are saying,
well, because they're natural descendants of Abraham, they're
automatically saved. I've heard that from people in religion,
too, say that. Well, no, it's not true. There's
salvation in no other but Christ. Right? That's why, again, we
say flee to Christ. Jew, Gentile, doesn't matter
what nation you're from, flee to Christ. He's the only hope
for sinners. There's no hope outside of Christ.
Turn, if you would, to Romans chapter 4. We're going to look
at it. We're going to go through Romans chapter 4. Because this
has great connection to this. Abraham believed God. That's
all he did. He just believed God. He just believed what God
said. My, is that not what we do? God
says there's salvation in no other. We say, well, praise God.
It's the Lord Jesus Christ by God-given faith, don't we? And
we trust our eternal souls to our great God. So Romans chapter
4 here, we're going to read verses 1 to 10 first. We see in verses
9 to 10 that Paul proves his case when he shows that Abraham was
declared righteous before he was circumcised, again, which
demonstrates that his circumcision had absolutely nothing to do
with his salvation. Look at here, it says, what shall
we say then that Abraham our father is pertaining to flesh
hath found? For if Abraham were justified
by works, he hath whereof the glory, but not before God. So
what he's saying there is if he's saved by his works, he's
going to glory, but he's not going to glory before God, is
he? Yeah, he's glorying in himself, brother. Yeah, amen. He's self-glorification,
which is what I did in religion. Self-glorification. For what
sayeth the scripture? Abraham what? Believed God, and
it was counted unto him for righteousness. See, Paul uses this second time. He's using it second time, isn't
he? This is important, isn't it? If Paul's using it multiple
times, this is very important right here. Abraham believed
God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness. Now, the
hymn that worketh is the record, not reckoned of grace, but of
debt. So if you can work your way to salvation, it's not grace.
It's not grace at all. But to him that worketh not,
but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is count
for righteousness. Look at that. Look at that. Isn't that wonderful? Look at that. I love this verse.
I'm going to read it again. But to him that worketh not,
just trust in Christ, just rest in Christ, but believeth on him. Same thing Abraham did, right?
Just believe God. believe it on him that justifies the ungodly
his faith or her is counted for righteousness my goodness that's
that's that's wonderful news isn't it you mean I have to work
my way to heaven nope it's called rest rest in Christ right look
at this saying, blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven
and whose sins are covered. Whose iniquities are forgiven?
All who trust Christ. Whose sin is covered by the precious
blood of Christ? All who trust Christ. And David
calls us blessed. Oh, we're blessed, aren't we?
We're blessed. We're blessed far above any other
person in this world. Oh my. Now here we go. So this
blessedness David speaks about. Does it come then upon the circumcision
only or upon the uncircumcision? For we say that faith was reckoned
to Abraham for righteousness. So see now he's asking a question,
another question here, right? verse 9, cometh this blessedness
upon the circumcision only or upon the uncircumcision? For
we say that faith was reckoned to Abraham for righteousness.
Now was it then reckoned when he was in circumcision or in
uncircumcision? Not in circumcision, but in uncircumcision. So he's saying right here, Paul
or Abraham was saved in uncircumcision. Isn't that wonderful? salvations of the Lord right
there in the Old Testament believe believe what God says right and
by God-given faith we believe don't we we rejoice we rejoice
now let's read verses 11 and 12 of Romans 4 Paul sets forth
this truth before the saints at Rome and he received the sign
of circumcision a seal of righteousness of the faith which he had yet
being uncircumcised. Look at that. So that we know,
just from reading this, we know then what those Judaizers were
peddling was false. It's false. Can't be saved. That he might be the father of
all them that believe. Look at that. Though they be
not circumcised, that righteousness might be imputed unto them also.
Who is that talking about? Gentiles. and the father of circumcision
to them who are not of the circumcision only, but who also walk in the
steps of that faith of our father Abraham, which he had yet being
uncircumcised." So there goes the whole argument of the Judaizers
falling, crashing to the ground. In verses 1 to 11 of Romans 4,
Paul sets forth clear that Abraham was justified by faith. Believe
God. He believed God. God-given faith.
Received from who? The Holy Spirit of God. And if Abraham was justified
before he was circumcised, then why was he circumcised, one might
ask? Well, his circumcision and the
circumcision of the Jews, again, was a sign or token of that covenant
that God had made with Abraham in his natural seed concerning
the enjoyment of the land in his favor. That's what that was
all about. It had nothing to do with the
salvation. Circumcision is also a typical
sign of Christ, and all the ceremonies of the law were of the shedding
of blood to cleanse from sin. And the circumcision of the heart,
which again we know from Colossians is an operation of God, right?
You must be born again. It's an operation of God. He
does that upon us. when we're born again by his
almighty power. So it was a seal to Abraham that he should be
the father of many nations in the spiritual sense. And the
righteousness of his faith, which he had, should come upon them,
Gentile and Jew, after the same manner. How's that? By faith.
By faith. See? We believe God, don't we? Let's look at Romans 4, 23 to
25. Now it is not written for his
sake alone that it was imputed to him, but for us also. Well, that means us, too, who
are reading this right now, right? To whom it shall be imputed if
we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead. So his righteousness is imputed
to us. By God-given faith, we believe God, right, when we're
born again. Look at this. Who was delivered
for our offenses, my sins. your sins if you're a believer,
right? And was raised again. You hear me say this all the
time because it's so important. What was he raised again for? Our
justification. God is satisfied with the sacrifice
of Christ. Praise be to God. That's wonderful. While all of Abraham's natural
seed were circumcised, it was only those who had faith in God Only those who had faith
in God who were saved in Israel only those who who were looking
to the Messiah coming Let's read now Romans Romans 4 20 to 5 1
actually 5 2 now This is a portion where the the break in the chapters
is not not really good because you're going to see how this
flows so beautiful when we read verses 20 to 5 to And this is talking about Abraham.
He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief, but
was strong in faith, giving glory to God. That's what we do, right?
Trust Christ. Now, our faith is weak. Sometimes
it's strong. Sometimes it's weak. Sometimes it's strong, right?
So was Abraham's. How do we know that? Well, he
went and lied to that one king, right? But she's my sister, right? We're all the same, right? He had fear of that king, we're
all the same, right? We're all mine. He staggered
not the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith,
giving glory to God, and being fully persuaded that what he
had promised he was able also to perform. Well, we fully are
persuaded that Christ is the only savior of sinners, right?
And that he will one day take us home, because he saved our
souls. And therefore, look at this,
it was imputed to him for righteousness, because he believed God, right?
Now, it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed
to him, but for us also, to whom it should be imputed, if we believe
on him that raised up Jesus, our Lord from the dead, who was
delivered for our offenses and was raised again for our justification.
Now look at the next two verses. Therefore, being justified by
faith, God-given faith, we have what? Peace with God. Oh, look at that. Peace with
God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Look at this also. By whom also
we have received, we have access by faith into this grace wherein
we stand and rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Take note
of Romans 5, 1 there. What a wonderful verse. We now
have peace with God through the Lord Jesus Christ. God's people,
we have that right now while we're on this earth. No matter
what's going on all around us, we've got peace with God, beloved,
through Christ. Yeah, yeah, could I only get that in my head, right?
Amen, sister. Exactly. Lord, write it to my
heart. See, we're all the same, eh?
We're all the same. Peace with God, through our Lord
Jesus Christ. And we're justified through Christ,
and therefore we have peace with God. And this peace arises from
the fact that in Christ we're righteous. We're righteous in
Christ, beloved. Our sins are forgiven. We're
holy and unblameable in God's sight, in Christ. And out of
Christ, men are at war with God, aren't they? We were. I'll not
have this man rule over me. Oh my, but in Christ, oh, peace,
peace. Now look at the wonderful verse
two. We see that by Christ we have access into grace, the grace
of God, a state of favor, sonship, acceptance, all through Christ. And notice in these two verses
that peace and grace are distinguished from one another. Peace denotes
a particular blessing. And what's being brought forth
there is we're reconciled to God. We have now peace with God.
And access into grace, that implies a state of flavor. It implies
all blessings. If we have access into grace,
then we have all blessings. In who? Christ. Isn't that wonderful? Reconcile with God and access
to all blessings. My, and have peace. And God gives
His covenant people His Spirit. That's His born-again, blood-washed
people. We're His covenant people, beloved. through the preaching
of the gospel. And the Holy Spirit gives us
faith to believe that God has justified us through the perfect
redeeming work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And we believe God just
as Abraham believed God. By God's grace and mercy. Isn't that absolutely wonderful? Absolutely wonderful. Brother
Steve, can you close us in prayer? Amen. Thank you, Brother Steve. Amen.