What a glorious thought. My sin,
not in part but the whole, is nailed to the cross and I bear
it no more. It's remarkable in the justice
and the providence and the sovereignty of God, sin can't be in two places
at once. It can't be on him and on me
at the same time. As I was listening to Tom from
Greg's church in Orlando singing, I was reminded that Greg's And
the folks there are very busy at the moment. Their new building
will, Lord willing, be open, I think, for services, not this
Sunday, but next Sunday. And the other thing for your
prayer and for your encouragement is that Greg has been in touch
with a fellow in India for some years in the city of Hyderabad. And he has a little group of
people, a fellow called Gilbert Dawson. And I've had some very,
very encouraging times with him over this last few weeks. It's
a great encouragement to Greg and I trust that you might find
it encouraging as well. And it's just extraordinary to
see the Lord working in his sovereign way of rescuing his people out
of the darkness of this world and out of the religion of this
world. And Gilbert likens the religion of this world to the
grave clothes that clung to Lazarus. He was called upon, the people
were called upon to loose him and let him free. Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father, we pray
that you might be the one who speaks through your word, that
we might know your words to be life. Heavenly Father, as the
light of the world is shone upon his work and his word, and that
we might see Jesus. we might see him as he really
is, we might know the wonders of that glorious thought that
my sins not in part but the whole are nailed to the cross and I
bear them no more. Oh our father what extraordinary
sufferings your son went through that we might stand here today
and rejoice and proclaim his wonders. Bless your word to our
hearts heavenly father and bless us as we hear you speak and may
that be the case heavenly father that you alone are the one whose
voice is heard yet again we thank you for we pray in jesus name
amen one of the glories of our god is that he
is a giver and unlike the givers of this world, he's a giver who
ensures that the recipients of the gifts receive the gifts.
And so we are receivers because he's a great giver. And in this
verse that we have tried to spend some time contemplating in some
depth, we have a glorious description of the work of God The work of
God in salvation and it's his work. Jonah had to go into the
belly of the great fish at the bottom of the sea to find out
that salvation is of the Lord. The salvation is of the Lord
from eternity. Salvation of the Lord is of the
Lord in time. Salvation is of the Lord personally. Salvation is of the Lord in preservation
of his people. And the Saints, as we stand here
and sit here this morning, are singing the salvation of the
Lord. Thou art worthy. Thou art worthy. With thy blood
you have purchased us, men. But in this verse, we have a
glorious description and a glorious exposition of the finished work
of the Lord Jesus Christ. A light has come to Paul. He was a sinner in the way. He says he was in his way, as
if he was going in his way. And it so happens that when the
Lord intersects our way with his way, then there is a meeting
of the Lord with sinners. He comes, he's the one who is
the seeker. And a light from heaven shone
around him. And Paul was commissioned by
God and we have the same commission to do these extraordinarily impossible
things. but they're the things that the
Lord Jesus Christ does. To open their eyes, there's a
light that comes. Our Lord Jesus Christ is the
great prophet. He shines the light of the scriptures
on himself and he illuminates those that are in darkness. Our
Lord Jesus Christ comes as the great king to turn them from
darkness to light and from the power of Satan, one more powerful
has come. One more powerful has come. He
has bound the strong man and he's taken his captives out of
the strong man's palace where Satan was keeping them at peace
and he takes them and he brings them to himself with all the
omnipotent power of our sovereign and holy God. That they may receive
forgiveness of sins and here we have the priestly work of
the Lord Jesus Christ. To be a sinner is to be a slave
to sin. and only the complete and perfect
redemption, the putting away of sins, can set those prisoners
free. And our great God has an inheritance,
that they may receive the forgiveness of sins and inheritance among
them which are sanctified. Our great prophet, priest, and
king, brings these gifts to the very heart of his people. So
I wanted to look at that, the first of these glorious gifts
that they may receive. They may receive the same phrase
as used in the original in that they may be turned and there's
no question about the fact that this is not something that's
on offer. This is not something that's
a maybe. This is not something that has a possibility of happening
if you do something. They may be turned from darkness
to light. They may receive the forgiveness
of sins. Just to cast our mind back to
the Garden of Eden, we have remarkable overturning of all of the things
in the garden in this glorious work of the Lord Jesus Christ.
In the garden, they were takers from God. And here, in the gospel,
because of the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ, we
are receivers. They became sinners. Free will
works religion. was hatched in the garden by
Satan at the fall when his I wills became the I wills of man. We
are receivers of forgiveness of sins because in the garden
we were takers to make ourselves sinners and we earned that. And we receive an inheritance
We receive an inheritance. The people of this world and
the religious people especially are working to earn an inheritance
that's owed to them because of their good works and all of their
good deeds. Receive an inheritance. An inheritance is something you
get because of a family connection. It's something you get because
of close ties. It's something that comes as
someone else's earning. It's something that comes because
of a written testimony. It's something that comes to
you because of death. And it's received, isn't it?
We receive an inheritance. Man in the garden became, as
Satan promised him, you shall be as gods, independent, wanting
to rule and to reign and wanting to have a place of esteem and
honor above others. In the inheritance and in the
receiving we are receiving inheritance among them. We receive it all
together. Adam and Eve hid themselves. They hid themselves in a sense
from each other with their works of righteousness that they wanted
to cover themselves. But we are the children of God who receive
these things among them. They aspired to be like God. God's children are sanctified. Sanctified, he says. It's in
the perfect tense. Perfect, complete tense. You
can't add anything to sanctification. Anyone that ever says that they'll
grow in their holiness or that God will give them grace to grow
more holy has absolutely no idea of what grace is. They have absolutely
no idea of what holiness is and they have absolutely no idea
of what they are. May God rescue us from that darkness. By faith
that is in me. That they may, none of this is
left in any doubt whatsoever. That they may receive, that they
may be turned. Isaiah 35 is one of those glorious
passages that speaks. You might just turn there for
a minute with me just briefly. Isaiah 35 speaks. of this receiving
and this turning. I'd love to read the whole passage
but I'd like to start with verse 3. But at the end of verse two
says, they shall see the glory of the Lord and the excellency
of our God. And it says, strengthen ye the
weak hands that confirm the feeble knees. And say unto them that
are of fearful heart, be strong. Fear not, behold, your God will
come with vengeance, even God with a recompense will he come
and save you. Then the eyes of the blind shall
be opened. I was wanting you to see that
the May they may receive in the text of scripture is not a possibility
that might happen, it's a definite activity of our God. Then the
eyes of the blind shall be open, not if they do something. The
eyes of the blind shall be open and the ears of the deaf shall
be unstopped. Then shall the lame man leap
as a heart and the tongue of the dumb sing. For in the wilderness
shall waters break out and streams in the desert and the parched
ground shall become a pool and the thirsty land springs of water.
In the habitation of dragons where each lay shall be grass
with reeds and rushes and a highway shall be there, and a way. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
way. Christians were called followers
of the way, people on the way. A highway shall be there and
a way, and it shall be called the way of holiness. The unclean shall not pass over,
but it shall be for those, the wayfaring men. The wayfaring
men, those who wander. Wander in this wilderness, though
fools shall not err therein. This is not about the wisdom,
isn't it? You come to God as a child. You enter into the kingdom
of God as a little child. They'll not err there. We're
not going to err there because of our stupidity. We're not going
to err there because of our wandering as brothers and sisters in Christ.
This is a sovereign God speaking. No lion shall be there, nor any
ravenous beast shall go up thereon. It shall not be found there,
but the redeemed shall walk there. And the ransomed of the Lord
shall return and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy
upon their heads. They shall obtain joy and gladness
and sorrow and sighing shall flee away. It doesn't sound like a possibility.
That's my point, I suppose. When the scriptures say that
they may receive, they may receive the forgiveness of sins. The
forgiveness of sins is not something that is in any doubt whatsoever.
I love that verse in Revelation 13, seven, isn't it? Where it
says, it speaks of the lamb slain from the foundation of the world. Why were Adam and Eve not sent
to hell and cast out of the garden? Why didn't God finish creation
at that moment? Because the lamb was slain before
the foundation of the world. Their sins were put away everlastingly. Our great God. But we are receivers. The children of God are receivers. You've heard all the shalls,
and every time you read the shalls and wills of the scripture, We
know that our God, his word is pure. He's too powerful for his
words to fall to the ground. I love what John the Baptist said.
Just want to spend a little bit of time thinking about this business
of receiving. You see, in the garden we were
takers. And now we still want to be takers,
aren't we? We want to take glory, we want
to take the things of this world and we want to hold onto them.
We want to take all sorts of esteem and praise of men. And
John, when they came to John, in John 3, 26, and they came
unto John and said unto him, Rabbi, he that was with thee
beyond the Jordan to whom thou bearest witness, behold, the
same baptises, and all men come to him. And John answered, this
is a great word on receiving, isn't it? John answered and said,
a man can receive nothing except it be given him from heaven. A man can receive nothing except
it be given him from heaven. We want the children of God want
the heavenly gifts. We want the heavenly gift of
the Lord Jesus Christ. The gift is Him, it's a person.
No wonder Paul, when he was dealing with those Corinthians who were
battling each other about who was of the most esteem and who
they were going to follow, and they had people there denigrating
Paul in their midst, and they had coming there denigrating
Paul. And he says to them in 1 Corinthians 4, 7, you know
the verse well, but let's just listen to it again. For who maketh
thee to differ from another? Why are you different from someone
else? The average response of most people in this world and
the average response of everyone in their animal flesh, well I
made myself to be better than those other people because I
exercised myself and I took advantage of the grace and the other things
that I was given. I've made myself what I am. Who maketh thee to differ is
the question that God asks. And what hast thou that thou
didst not receive? What do you have? What do you
have in this world? What do you have in terms of
your relationship with God? What do you have that you didn't
receive? What have you earned? What have you earned? Now if
thou didst not Now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory? Why do you boast? Why do you
boast in your attainments as if thou hast not received
it? As soon as someone boasts, you
know that they're no longer the recipient of a gift. They're
wanting some acclamation. They're wanting some acclamation
for what they have done. In all things, in all things
spiritual, the ways of our God are the very, very opposite of
this world. The world is full of takers.
The religious world is full of takers. And God's people are
the recipients of a gift. Who makes thee to differ? God
makes a difference. You're a receiver, so don't boast
about anything you have. James says, doesn't he, every
good gift and perfect gift is from above, James 117, and cometh
down from the Father of lights with whom, and I love this description
of our God, with whom there is no variableness. He doesn't change,
neither shadow of turning. I love what Malachi said, I change
not. I change not therefore you sons
of Jacob are not consumed. Our God is a giver and God's
children are receivers. I love what the Lord Jesus Christ
said to that woman at the well. That must be one of my favorite
verses or passages in all of the scripture. What a glorious
story of the Lord coming to a sinner. What an open sinner she must
have been. She couldn't even come there
in the normal time of all the other people. She had five husbands.
She's now living with another one. You can imagine the gossip
that went around that little village. And the Lord Jesus Christ
said to her, if you knewest the gift of God, if you knew the
gift of God, and if you knew who it is that saith unto thee,
give me to drink, Thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would
have given thee living water. She was given the living water.
She was going to be given the living water. And what does she
do? She goes and proclaims and says, this man told me everything
that I ever did. If you knew, you would ask. If
you knew the gift of God, He calls on his people to be asking
people, doesn't he? Ask, and if we should be given
you, ask. God's people are beggars. They're
beggars before a giver. Even our understanding of who
the Lord Jesus Christ is comes as a gift from God. You might
recall that great question There is a question. There are two
questions, isn't it? Who do men say that I am? They're in Matthew
chapter 16. Who do men say that I, the son
of man, am? People have opinions about God.
They had a stupid advertising campaign for the Lord Jesus here
a few years ago and it's Jesus is. Have you seen them? There's
still some around. Jesus is and then dot, dot, dot.
As if your opinion about him matters one little tiny squirt.
Your opinion doesn't matter about him, his opinion matters enormously
about you. What arrogance, what arrogance
of men that we could reduce God down to a matter of debate and
discussion and discuss his character in that way. No wonder the comedians
of our land, the pagan comedians of our land laugh, laugh at the
stupidity of the God that's presented to them. What a tragedy it is
that so many are caught up in it and then turn away. But the question in verse 15,
but whom say ye that I am? Who do you say that I am? That is the great question, isn't
it? Not what other people say. They said some great things about
him, didn't they? They put him in some exalted
company, Elijah and Jeremiah and John the Baptist and one
of the prophets, and who do you say that I am? And Simon Peter,
verse 16, Matthew 16, answered and said, thou art the Christ.
the son of the living God. Well done, Simon Peter. Well
done, Simon Peter. What does the Lord say to him?
Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood hath not
revealed it unto thee, but by Father which is in heaven. Flesh and blood didn't reveal
it to him. If you have a knowledge of the true and living God in
all of his true character. It's not something that you earn
by your activities. It's not a flesh and blood activity.
You don't give back to God. Our Lord Jesus Christ is a giver. And in his giving, he receives.
I love how they mocked him and said, this man receives sinners.
This man receives sinners and eats with them. And he told us in Luke chapter
18, you receive the kingdom of God as a little child or you
won't enter in. You receive the kingdom of God
as a little child. Little child is dependent. A
little child has nothing to boast in. They're utterly and totally
dependent. My little grandson Milton comes
down on Thursdays and Jennifer brings him down and he's extraordinarily
cute. He's a very cute little sinner.
and he's completely and utterly dependent for absolutely everything. He can't feed himself, he can't
clean himself, he can't move anywhere, he can't do anything.
He's a little child. That's what the Lord Jesus Christ
is saying. If you've been reduced to being
a little child, brothers and sisters, before your God, and
he wails, doesn't he? You'd think he was going to die.
He lies to his mother all the time, screams as if his last
breath He's begging her to feed him. And as soon as she comes over, he
shows that he was lying to her because he smiles and beams at
her. You come as a little child. We've given little children this
world so we'd know a great truth about the scriptures and about
how the children of God are here. But there is a great receiving.
There's receiving the forgiveness of sins, but the receiving the
forgiveness of sins is intimately tied up with receiving the Lord
Jesus Christ. In John 13.20 he says, he that
receiveth whomsoever I send. Paul is speaking as one sent. He's talking about his commission
before King of Ripahir and these other Jews and all the others
watching on. He's saying, I'm a sent man. God has intervened
in my life. A light from heaven has shone.
I have a commission from God Almighty and I'm speaking to
you people on behalf of God Almighty. I'm a sent man, says Paul. He
that receiveth whomsoever I send, receiveth me, says the Lord Jesus
Christ. And not only do you get him,
he that receiveth me, receiveth him that sent me. God the Father
sent him. Now that's a possession to have,
isn't it? That's a gift to have, isn't
it? To have him. If you have him, you have absolutely
everything, brothers and sisters in Christ. There is no lacking
in him in any way whatsoever. He says about his departure,
he says, I go to prepare a place for you. He goes to the cross
to prepare a place for you. And I will come again and receive
you unto myself, that where I am you may be also. And all of this is received,
is by the reception of the Holy Spirit. In John 16, that verse
that I quote so often because I love it so much, it says of
the Holy Spirit, he shall receive of mine. He will receive of all
of what I am and all of what I've done and all of what the
scriptures say of me and he'll show it unto you. He'll reveal
it unto you. And the disciples were the ones
that were gonna receive power from on high. The proclamation
of the gospel requires power from on high. It's the gift of
the Holy Spirit. Peter stood up before that crowd
that had the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ on their hands,
there in Jerusalem. And he says, repent and be baptized
in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and you
shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. So just in those
few short verses I've quoted, you receive him, you receive
the Lord Jesus Christ, you receive the Father, you receive the Holy
Spirit. God indwells his people because
all of his people are a perfectly fit receptacle for God to dwell
in on this earth. Because they are as holy as God
is, they have no sin God can commune with us, we can commune
with Him. He can dwell in us and we can
dwell in Him because of His sanctification. Repent and be baptised in the
name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins. That remission
is to send them away, to release them from bondage, It speaks
of forgiveness or pardon. It's letting them go as if they
had never been committed. And they went on, didn't they,
in that power that they'd received from on high, proclaiming this
message wherever they went. Peter says in Acts 10.43, to
him give all the prophets witness that through his name, whosoever
believeth in him shall receive remission of sins. It's a reception,
isn't it? It's something that we receive
because our great God is a giver. And he's a gracious giver. Turn
with me to Romans chapter five for a moment. Verse 15 it says, but not as
the offence, so also the free gift. For if through the offence of
one many be dead, that's the offence of Adam, and all of them
died, how much more the grace of God and the gift of grace
which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many. Do you ever think of grace abounding?
John Bunyan wrote a book, didn't he? Grace abounding to the chief
of sinners. Grace abounding. Verse 16, and
not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift for the judgment
that was by one to condemnation. But the free gift is of many
offenses unto justification. For if by one man's offence death
reigned by one, how much more they which receive abundance
of grace and the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one Jesus
Christ. Our God is a generous giver. He's a gracious giver. His gifts
are abounding. His gifts come to those who are
receivers, not earners. And when the gift is given, it's
a completed gift. It's a perfectly completed gift. We read of that woman in Luke
7, didn't we, who came weeping. and kissed the feet of the Lord
Jesus Christ. What a place to be, to be at
his feet, to be in that sort of place where you just own yourself
to be a sinner. You have nothing to give to him,
but you come seeking him to give. And what's he say? He says to
the Pharisees, and he said to her, her sins, which are many,
are forgiven. Her sins, which are many, are
forgiven. And I remind you, that's in the
perfect tense. It's a perfectly completed action. There's nothing
more to be added to it. It means that all of her sins
are forgiven. If the Lord Jesus Christ forgives you one sin,
he's got to forgive you all of them. And it's in the passive
tense, which means that she is passive and he is the giver. He gives repentance. Peter declared to those Pharisees,
he stood opposed to the gospel and had been embarrassed by the
work of God in their lives, releasing them from prison and sending
them again and again back to the temple and confounding their
religious hypocrisy and their self-righteous judgment of God
and his people. And he says in Acts 5.30, the
God of our fathers raised up Jesus whom you slew and hanged
on a tree. I love the boldness of these
apostles before these men that had them in their hands to slay
them had been so allowed of God. Verse 31, him hath God exalted
to his right hand to be a prince and a savior, for to give repentance
to Israel and the forgiveness of sins. God gives repentance
and gives the forgiveness of sins. In the darkness and bondage
of Satan's captivity of men, and in particular in his darkness
and bondage that he holds people in religion. Repentance is something
that you do, isn't it? To repent of your sins is to
own them and to confess them and to promise that you'll never
do them again. That's not repentance, brothers
and sisters. Have you got one single sin that
you've ever stopped doing? You might polish up the outside
of your life and God sees your hearts and it continues there Repentance is a change of mind
regarding how God forgives sins. Repentance for the religious
person is what I have to do and they want to say, well look at
my changed life. I was an alcoholic and now I'm wandering around
sober. I did all these horrible sexual sins and now I don't do
them anymore. As one of the famous tracts says,
old habits have gone away. You've got rid of all your old
habits, and you've got new ones. You've got new good habits that
please God, and they call that repentance. It's got nothing
to do with repentance whatsoever. They might say that I've accepted
an offer. What a wicked thing to say about
our God. that the best he can do is just
offer salvation. The best he can do is offer a
gift, as long as you're clever enough and wise enough to actually
come and take the gift. For so much of the religious
world in darkness, it's all about my acceptance. It's about my
believing. It's about my walking down an aisle. It's about my
receiving and accepting an offer. It's about my using the means
of grace. As the Lord said to the man,
He says, Son, your sins are forgiven. Who can forgive sins but God
alone? You see, repentance is a change
of mind about how God forgives sins. It's a change of mind about
who God is and about who we are. As I said earlier, there were
no ifs in the passage at all. does it all. A sinner is a sacred
thing, the Holy Ghost has made him say. We receive, we are receivers
because of the work of assurity, not because of our own works.
See, there are no ifs in our passage in Acts. There were none
in Mark chapter two or Luke chapter seven. See, if you can grow in
your holiness, or if God produces graces for holy living, There must be necessarily something
incomplete in the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ. There
must be something left to be done. If I can grow, there's
more work to be done. There must be something that needs
finishing. And not only that, if I can grow,
then there must be some way I can measure my progress. We call
it progressive sanctification, don't we? And how do you measure
progressive sanctification? By obedience to the law, by the
activities of men. What does God say about that?
What does God say about his children? We began our life as a church
going through the book of Colossians Colossians 2.10 says, and you
are, right now, present tense, completed action, complete in
him. You're complete in him. So you have to have a theological
education to be able to make that say what it doesn't say,
doesn't it? To make it say something else.
You are complete in him, is what God says. How complete are you? If you go back to the previous
verse, for in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. How fully was the Lord Jesus
Christ God? That's how fully his people are
complete in him. And while you're there in Colossians,
turn over to verse 13 and see this gift of the forgiveness
of sins. It's got nothing to do with your activities. Verse
13 says, and you being dead, what does a dead person do? Well,
according to modern religion, a dead person can exercise faith. A dead person can take a gift.
A dead person can respond to an offer. Not according to God. And you being dead in your sins
in the uncircumcision of your flesh, he hath quickened, he's
made you alive together with him, having forgiven you. What's the next word, say? It's
a simple word, isn't it? All, all. There's a whole bunch
of modern religion that says that God has forgiven you all
of your sins at the time of your, from your conversion back he's
forgiven you all those sins, and now your forgiveness of sins
from here on in is a cooperative activity between you and God.
I'm so pleased, I'm so thankful to my God that that's a lie.
I'm distressed for those people that say that. But how do you
measure them? You measure them by going back to the law. How
do you measure your holiness? By your obedience to the commandments
of God. Look at verse 14 of Colossians
chapter 2. Blotting out the handwriting
of ordinances. Blotting out the law that was
against us. That blotting out words means
it's like a whiteboard, and all of the law of God is written
on the whiteboard, and all of your sins against the law of
God is written on the whiteboard, and the Lord Jesus Christ, by
his death on Calvary's tree, he has erased it. They are no
longer there. That's what it is to be justified.
He's blotted out the handwriting that was against us, which was
contrary to us, and he took it out of the way, nailing it to
his cross. And having spoiled principalities
and power, he made a show of them, openly triumphing over
them in it. Let no man therefore judge you
in meat and drink, in respect to a holy day or a new moon or
Sabbath days, which are a shadow of the things to come, but the
body is of Christ. Don't let anyone beguile you.
Don't let anyone beguile you of your reward. They come, don't
they, with their voluntary humility and worship of angels, intruding
into things which they have not seen and have vainly puffed up
in their fleshly mind. Such is Satan's activity as he
masquerades as an angel of light. We receive a finished work, brothers
and sisters, where God declares us to be holy. God, our Saviour,
to go back and turn over the page in Colossians, that verse
I quote often. You were alienated, verse 21,
you were alienated to enemies in your mind by your wicked works,
and now he has reconciled, he's joined you together with him
in the body of his flesh through death, and this is his work,
isn't it, to present you holy and unblameable and unreprovable
in his sight. To try and make that a progressive
work, is to attack the very character and the very name of our God. It's a finished work. We receive
a finished work. Sin can't be in two places at
the same time. Sin cannot be on the Lord Jesus
Christ and on me. God made him who knew no sin
to be sin for us. that we might be made the righteousness
of God in him. He was made a curse for us. The
curse cannot be on two people for the same sin and God to be
just. The Lord Jesus Christ was given
that cup in the garden and he said, if this cup can't pass
from me unless I drink it, thy will be done, thy will be done. In the garden of Eden we said,
my will be done, my, my, my, me, me, me, the Lord Jesus Christ
gave himself into the hands of his fathers. The wrath of God
can only be where justice sees sin. It can't be in two places
at once. If he puts the sin on his son
and the wrath of God fell on him, it cannot fall on me. Wrath
is not in me, says the holy one and the just one. We receive,
we receive the atonement. We receive the abundance of grace. We receive the forgiveness of
sins. Our God is a glorious giver. I love how this word that we have as
forgiveness of sins is used in the scriptures The Lord Jesus
Christ used those words out of Isaiah 61. He says, The Spirit
of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach
the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted,
preach deliverance to the captives and the recovering of sight to
the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised. It's a
deliverance. The forgiveness of sins is a
deliverance from the bondage of sin. The forgiveness of sins is to
be set at liberty, to be set free. He quoted Isaiah 61. The Lord has anointed me to preach
good tidings unto the meek. He has sent me to bind up the
brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty. Not to offer liberty, we proclaim
liberty. The gospel is a declaration and
a proclamation of what the Lord Jesus Christ has done. It's a finished work. It's a
finished work. That's why Paul could say, be
it known unto you, men and brethren, that through this man is preached
unto you the forgiveness of sins. Not offered to you. It's a declaration
of a work that's finished. We have redemption, says Paul
to the Ephesians in 1 7. In whom we have redemption through
his blood, the forgiveness of sins according to the riches
of his grace. We have redemption through his
blood, the forgiveness of sins. The forgiveness of our sins is
a gift from God. It's received by faith. It's received by a call of grace. It's received as a true sinner
is humbled as Paul was on the Damascus road. It's received
by a word. The Lord spoke a word to that
man in Mark 2 and the lady in Luke chapter 7. The Lord speaks
a word. He spoke a word to David, didn't
he, through the prophet Nathan when David had acknowledged the
fact that he had sinned. And Nathan said those remarkable
words to the sinner. The Lord has put away thy sin. Thou shalt not die. The law of
God said that David ought to die. The law of God said that
Bathsheba ought to die. And yet God says, the Lord has put away your sin. You shall not die. Why? Where's the justice in that?
For a thousand years you could have said there is no justice
in that. There's no justice for Uriah and his family until you
go outside the gates of Jerusalem and you look up at that cross
and you see the Saviour bearing their sins and bearing the way.
And a just and holy God declares it is finished. They have been
put away. The price has been paid. A righteous
and just God must say to David and to all of his children, the
Lord has put away your sin. You shall not die. Forgiveness
of sins is a gift, a gift of a glorious giver, a gift by grace
that was not earned. It's a gift by blood. It's a
gift that honours all the name of our God, the character of
our God, his justice, his holiness, his truth, his righteousness,
his substitution, his covenant surety promises. And it's complete,
and it's perfect, which is why the Lord Jesus Christ says to
Paul, you tell them, you tell them when you proclaim who I
am, you tell them that they are sanctified. Perfect tense. You tell them that their sanctification
is something that can never be added to, nor can it ever be
taken away from. You can't change perfection and
not ruin it. God's gift is perfect and the
glory of the gospel is that he makes that gift to be received. The Lord is a great giver and
he never ever, he never ever fails for the recipients of the
gift to receive the gift.