Welcome to God's Word to Our
Nation, a weekly broadcast bringing you a message of new life and
liberty. This program is brought to you
each week by the Grace Baptist Church of Canton. We believe
that the Gospel is God's Word to this and every nation. Through
the gospel, God has shown that our deepest need, the need for
freedom from the guilt and power of sin, can be fully met by His
Son, Jesus Christ. Here now is pastor, author, and
conference speaker, Albert N. Martin, with this week's message. On our last program, we considered
together the importance of the resurrection in the gospel message. Today my topic is the relationship
of the resurrection of Jesus to what I am calling the ultimate
questions of life. I want to take the facts of the
gospel that we considered on our last program and relate them
to these ultimate questions of your life. Now these ultimate
questions are not, is it time to buy a new car or should I
get married and to whom? No, as important as those types
of questions are in their place, an ultimate question is one such
as Job the ancient patriarch asked when he exclaimed, If a
man dies, shall he live again? These are the questions that
creep into our minds when we withdraw from our frantic day-to-day
pace and begin to listen to the quiet rumblings of conscience. And standing outside of the empty
tomb, we find ourselves in a school of wisdom where we can learn
God's answers to all of our ultimate questions. And the first of those ultimate
questions is this, Can my sins be justly pardoned, and can I
be accepted as righteous before God? Can my sins be justly pardoned,
and can I be accepted as righteous before God? Once we begin to
take the testimony of the Bible seriously, And once we begin
to take the testimony of our own consciences seriously, one
of the most burning issues that the human mind will then be forced
to wrestle with is this issue. How can a holy and a just God
continue to be holy and continue to be just and do anything else
other then damn me to eternal perdition. If God is holy, the
scripture says so holy that he cannot look upon iniquity. And if he is just, so just that
he declares that he will by no means clear the guilty. And if I am the sinner that my
own conscience accuses me that I am, And if I am the sinner
that the Bible bears witness that I am, then how can God be
just and holy and ever do anything other than righteously and justly
condemn me for my sins and consign me to that place prepared for
the devil and his angels? Humanly speaking, if God could
somehow neuter the demands of His holiness in justice, there
might be room for pardon. But if He is to remain holy and
just, how can He pardon guilty sinners? If He is just and the
wages of sin is death, If he is just and he will by no means
clear the guilty, then we are caught in the jaws of his justice
and his holiness and there is no escape. That's an ultimate
question. How can my sins be justly pardoned? And can I indeed be accepted
as righteous before God while God still remains God? Well, that ultimate question
is answered in the classroom convened outside of Joseph's
empty tomb. Turn with me to Romans chapter
4. Romans chapter 4. In this section of the epistle
where Paul has been demonstrating that God has always pardoned
and accepted sinners, on the basis of his own grace and the
work of his son received by faith alone. Speaking of the fact that
it was in this way that Abraham was justified, that is, justly
pardoned and accepted as righteous before God, we read in verse
22, wherefore, Romans 4.22, Wherefore also it was reckoned
unto him for righteousness. Now it was not written for his
sake alone that it was reckoned unto him, but for our sake also,
unto whom it shall be reckoned, who believe on him that raised
Jesus our Lord from the dead. And here the fact of the resurrection
is brought into focus. Who believe on Him that raised
Jesus our Lord from the dead. Who was delivered up for our
trespasses and was raised for our justification. Now in this
text we are told that Jesus was delivered up to death for or
on account of our trespasses. If God is to righteously pardon
sinners, sin must be justly punished. And in the person of our substitute,
the Lord Jesus, God punished our sins. Jesus voluntarily assumed
the place of the substitute, and having assumed that place,
there was laid upon Him, the prophet says, the iniquity of
us all. And in that act of being delivered
up for our trespasses, delivered over to the powers of darkness,
delivered up to the justice of God, delivered over to the wrath
of God against our sins, in the midst of that transaction, Jesus,
among the several things He said from the cross, cried, prior
to committing His spirit into the hands of His Father, Ketelestai,
it is finished. It stands accomplished. I have done all that needs to
be done. that righteous pardon might be
extended to sinners. The wrath of God has been exhausted. The justice of God for a broken
law has been satisfied. Jesus exclaimed, it is finished. But now our text says the same
Jesus our Lord, who was raised from the dead, having been delivered
up for our trespasses, was raised for our justification. He was raised in order that we
might be justified and declared righteous. For in His resurrection,
there was not only the validation of all of His personal claims,
Romans chapter 1 declared to be the Son of God with power
by the resurrection from the dead, but there was the validation
of all of his work on behalf of sinners, and his resurrection
placed him in a living state so that the living Christ could
be the object of the faith of needy sinners." Commenting on
this verse, or this part of the verse, Hendrickson very helpfully
comments, He was delivered for or on account of our trespasses. This looks backwards and means
that our trespasses made it necessary for Him to be delivered up while
He was raised or on account of our justification looks forward
and indicates He was raised in order to assure us that in the
sight of God we are indeed without sin. In other words, Christ's
resurrection has as its purpose to bring to light the fact that
all those who acknowledge Jesus as their Lord and Savior have
entered into a state of righteousness in the eyes of God. The Father,
by raising Jesus from the dead, assures us that the atoning sacrifice
has been accepted, hence our sins are forgiven. And so when we wrestle with that
ultimate question of the forgiveness of our sins, the answer is not
to be found by turning inward upon our own subjective frame
of mind or spirit. It is not even to be turned inward
to see what the measure of our love to Christ is. It is to be
turned outward and over to an empty tomb in Palestine, and
to stand on this unshakable ground. He who was delivered up for our
trespasses was raised for our justification. He cried from
his cross, it is finished, and God was silent. But three days
later, the open tomb was God's thunderous, Amen! It is finished. He is raised
for the justification of all of his people. And some of you
will never come to any stability in your Christian life until
the theology of the open tomb in the face of this ultimate
question. becomes part of the working stuff
of your own conscience, of your own heart, of your own mind as
it reflects upon your sin. And whenever you are conscious
of your sin, and whenever you wonder, can it be that if I come
to God again for this sin and these sins to which I've had
to come to Him hundreds or thousands of times, Depth of mercy, can
there be mercy still reserved for me? Can my God His wrath
forbear, me the chief of sinners spare? We need to come back to
the open tomb and there take hold of this truth. He was delivered
up for our trespasses and raised for our justification. The first
ultimate question that is answered there by Joseph's empty tomb
is the question, can my sins be justly pardoned and can I
be accepted as righteous before God? But then there is a second
ultimate question, a question which every convicted sinner
must sooner or later answer. For conviction of sin never stops
with the guilt of sin, but with the power and with the pollution
of sin. When a man, a woman, boy or girl
is convicted by the Holy Spirit of his sin, he's not only concerned
about the bad that he has done, but he's concerned about the
bad that he is. He's not only concerned about
the wrongs he has done, but that he himself is wrong. And so when we take seriously
what the Word of God says about us, one of the ultimate questions
that presses in upon us is not only, can my sins be justly pardoned
and can I be accepted as righteous before God? And we find the answer
in Joseph's empty tomb. But the second ultimate question
is, can the power of my sins be broken so that I may live
a life well-pleasing to God? Can the power of my sins be broken
so that I may live a life well-pleasing to God? For the testimony of
the Bible is that I am the slave of sin. Jesus said it in John
8, 34. Whoso commits sin is the bond
slave of sin. And then in a more extensive
way, in the sixth chapter of Romans, the apostle describes
us in our natural state several times as the bond slaves, the
servants, of sin itself. For example, Romans chapter 6
And verse 17, But thanks be to God that whereas ye were servants
of sin. Verse 19, I speak after the manner
of men because of the infirmity of your flesh as you presented
your members as servants to uncleanness and to iniquity unto iniquity. Verse 20, when you were servants
of sin, you were free in regard of righteousness. The scripture
makes it plain that by nature we are the slaves of our sin. We are the servants of our lust. And when we take seriously what
the Word of God says about us and begin to take seriously the
depth of the power of sin over us, then we cry out, can the
power of my sins be broken so that I may live a life well-pleasing
to God? And the answer again is found
in that school that is pitched outside of Joseph's empty tomb. For this question is one with
which the Apostle wrestles in this entire sixth chapter of
Romans, and I ask you to follow as I read now the opening verses
of that chapter. What shall we say then? Shall
we continue in sin, that is, in the willful, deliberate practice
of sin as a lifestyle, that grace may abound? God forbid! We who died to sin, how shall
we any longer live therein? We who died to sin, how shall
we now live in sin as a lifestyle and an overall pattern of moral
existence? Or are you ignorant that all
we who were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His
death? We were buried therefore with
Him through baptism into death, that like as Christ was raised
from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we also might
walk in newness of life. And in the context, what is the
newness of life? It is life no longer lived under
the dominion of sin. It is life no longer lived in
the realm of sin as our native context and native air. When a man dies, he is radically
severed from that context in which he carried out his life.
He no longer sees the sun and feels the warmth of its rays. He no longer sees the rustling
trees. He no longer interacts with his
fellow human beings. Death severs him from the realm
in which he lived. We are told that sin was the
realm in which we lived, but we died to sin in union with
Christ that we might live in newness of life. Life lived. in relationship to the realities
of righteousness and truth and holiness. For if we have become
united with Him in the likeness of His death, We shall also be
in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old man,
the totality of what we were in Adam, devoid of the grace
of God, that our old man was crucified with Him. that the
body of sin might be done away, so that we should no longer be
in bondage to sin. For he that hath died is justified,
or released from sin. But if we died with Christ, we
believe that we shall also live with Him, knowing that Christ,
being raised from the dead, dieth no more. Death hath no more dominion
over him, for the death that he died, he died unto sin once,
but the life that he liveth, he liveth unto God. Even so reckon
ye also yourselves to be dead unto sin, but alive unto God
in that is in union with Christ Jesus. And without attempting
anything like a careful exposition of this passage, surely you feel
the overarching drift of its teaching. When it comes to this
question, can the power of my sin be so broken that I may live
a life pleasing to God, not the life of a glorified saint? but
the life of a truly transformed man or woman here on this earth. that just as truly as the realm
of sin was my native universe of reference, the standards of
sinful passions and the standards of a sinful world and the standards
of my own sinful heart dictated the use of my hands and feet
and eyes and energy and time. I presented my members instruments
of unrighteousness unto sin. So now righteousness and holiness,
the standards of God, the standards of His Word, the standard of
likeness to Christ and conformity to Christ, though not perfectly
impinging on every total motive and disposition and word and
action, become just as really the universe in which I live,
as sin was the former universe in which I live. Is that possible? Can the power of my sins be so
broken that I can live a life pleasing to God? Well, the answer
is found by Joseph's empty tomb, yes. For as surely as Jesus Christ
died to sin, As he died for sin, and having died, he dies no more,
but has risen to newness of life, the apostle says, when I am by
faith united to Christ. The dynamics The very virtue
of Christ's death to sin enters into my moral constitution. And the very virtue of the power
of the resurrection of Christ enters my moral constitution. And I am now raised to do what? To walk, verse 4, to walk in
newness of life. People say, well, this is positional
and given all kinds of names. My friends, this is real and
ethical and moral and practical. It means that I not only can
stand by Joseph's tomb and say God's amen to Christ's words,
it is finished, is to be heard in the empty tomb. I can be justly
and righteously forgiven and accepted as righteous. But I
can stand by that empty tomb and say, as Christ has exhausted
the demands of God's law against sin, sin no longer has righteous
claims over me. I am no longer its rightful slave. I am no longer its lackey and
its serf. I am no longer under obligation
to obey its dictates. In union with Christ, I've been
liberated from all of its demands by dying with Christ to its demands,
and now rising with Christ in newness of life. Am I talking
to someone who sits here tonight, who has known what it is to forge
chains that have so cut themselves, as it were, into the very stuff
of your soul that you despair that they can ever be broken.
And the great question that you wrestle with day after day is
not, is there enough grace and mercy in the death of Christ
to forgive these sins? But I know enough of my Bible
to know that a forgiven sinner is a liberated sinner. And I
have no hope that I can be liberated. My chains are so many. I have
forged them for so long. The links are so large. My friend, Joseph's empty tomb
says, there is liberty for the captives. For he was anointed
in order to do what? He was anointed, the Spirit of
the Lord was upon Him, that He might proclaim liberty to the
captives in the opening of the prison to those that are bound. As we bring today's program to
a close, I trust that if you have seen nothing else, that
you have been brought to realize that the gospel is not just a
collection of abstract theories about God and man. Rather, the
gospel is God's means to resolve all of your deepest problems. If this broadcast has begun to
raise questions for you, please feel free to contact the church
whose name and number we will be giving out in just a moment.
You will find people there who are ready to talk with you and
to help you see how your ultimate questions can be resolved by
Jesus Christ. That brings us to the conclusion
of this week's broadcast. Our speaker has been Pastor Albert
N. Martin, and you've been listening
to God's Word to Our Nation. If you would like to hear today's
message again or share it with a friend, it is available on
audio cassette. To order your cassette, simply
call 1-800-722-3584. That number once again is 1-800-722-3584. These cassettes are distributed
by the Trinity Book Service. God's Word to Our Nation is sponsored
by the Grace Baptist Church of Canton. We have made this commitment
because we believe that the only real answers to the many concerns
of our society are found in the Gospel of Jesus Christ and we
want to share those answers with you. In a moment we will be giving
you our number and we encourage you to call and let us know if
you've been helped by this program. The Grace Baptist Church is located
on Michigan Avenue two miles west of Interstate 275. Every Sunday morning we have
Bible classes for all ages beginning at 945. Our worship services
follow at 11 and again at 6 in the evening. You are warmly invited
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again is 397-2900. thank you for tuning in and please
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word to our nation