Well, let us turn to God's Word,
and we turn to the first chapter in the first epistle of Paul
to Timothy, and our text is found at verse 15. 1 Timothy 1 and
verse 15, this is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation
that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of whom
I am chief. On Thursday we were considering
the following verse and considered something of Paul
as the pattern to them which should hereafter believe as he
said there in that verse, but we also consider the longsuffering
or the patience of the Lord Jesus Christ in that 16th verse then. Paul tells us how he obtained
mercy that in me first Jesus Christ might show forth all longsuffering
for a pattern to them which should hereafter believe on him to life
everlasting. And as we look at that particular
verse, I did make some reference to the previous verse, the words
of our text this morning, where we have this summary of the Gospel,
this faithful saying, the sum and substance of the Gospel is
here, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. Now in the context, Paul is reminding
Timothy of his own ministry. He speaks in verses 13 and 14
of how he obtained mercy. He speaks there of how though
he was an arch persecutor of the church, a blasphemer, injurious,
Yet he obtained mercy. He speaks then of how God was
pleased to call him by his grace. But he doesn't only speak of
that call by grace. Previously in verse 12, he speaks
of the call that he had to be a minister of the gospel. He's
called to be an apostle. In verse 12 he says, I thank
Christ Jesus, our Lord, who hath enabled me, for that he counted
me faithful, putting me into the ministry. He wasn't a self-made
minister, he hadn't appointed himself as an apostle, as he
says in the opening words of this epistle. Paul, an apostle
of Jesus Christ by the commandment of God our Saviour and Lord Jesus
Christ. He was what he was by God's commandment. He was what he was, as he says
to the Corinthians, by the grace of God. He was a man then who
was called to fulfill this particular ministry. And remember how he
makes that abundantly plain when he writes to the Galatians. In the epistle to the Galatians,
of course, he's having to deal with the with the legalists,
those who were saying that believers, even gentile believers, needed
to come under the law of Moses and Paul is the one who is the
great champion of the Gentiles, he's the apostle to the Gentiles,
he's the great champion of salvation by grace and by grace alone without
any need of the works of the law because Christ himself has
fulfilled all that the law requires. So when he writes to the Galatians
as he has to deal with these legalists and these Judaizers,
he makes it very clear there that his authority as an apostle
is direct from God. He had been called. He had received the Gospel, not
of men, but of God. As he says there in Galatians
1.11, I certify you, brethren, that the Gospel which was preached
of me is not of the man, for I neither received it of man,
neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ. And he goes on, remember at verse
15, to say, it pleased God who separated me from my mother's
womb and called me by His grace to reveal His Son in me that
I might preach Him among the heathen. And then immediately
he says, I conferred not with flesh and blood. All he received
came immediately directly from God. And he is saying the same
really to Timothy. He speaks then here in verse
11 of that glorious gospel of the blessed God which was committed
to my trust. He was entrusted by God with
the gospel. And this is what he was to preach. This was to be the matter of
his ministry. And here I say in the words that
I read as our text, he gives us the sum and the substance
of that gospel which he was preaching. And I want us to consider this
faithful saying with the Lord's help this morning. This is a
faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation that Christ Jesus
came into the world to save sinners of whom I First of all, what
we see here is the grace of God in the Gospel. The grace of God
in the Gospel. Christ Jesus came into the world
to save sinners. That is the grace of God. In verse 14 he says, the grace
of our Lord that is our Lord Jesus Christ, the grace of our
Lord was exceeding abundant. Here then he is proclaiming a
message of grace. And what are we to understand
by grace? We often put an adjective before grace,
we speak of free grace or sovereign grace, but really It should be
unnecessary to do such a thing. Grace is grace, and grace is
always sovereign, grace is always free. What is grace? It is the unmerited favour of
God. In that sense it is obviously
sovereign. It comes immediately, directly
from God. It is also fruit. It's not something
that is in any way earned or merited by the works of men. Grace is in fact the very opposite
of works, as we're reminded in other of Paul's epistles. Remember
the familiar words of Ephesians chapter 2 at verse 8. He tells
us there, by grace, i.e. saved through faith, and that
not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works. lest
any man should boast, for we are his workmanship, the workmanship
of God, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which he hath
before ordained that we should walk in them. By grace, then,
are ye saved, not of works again. In Romans 11, verse 6, he says,
If by grace, then it is no more of works, otherwise grace is
no more grace. If it be of works, then it is
not of grace, otherwise work is no more work. It's quite clear
from what he is saying in that verse that these two, grace and
works, are mutually exclusive, the one of the other. If salvation
is by grace, it cannot be of works. If it be of works, it
is not of grace, and there cannot be the mixing of these two. It
is not partly by grace and partly by work. It is one or the other
and it is of grace. This is the great message then.
Grace, the gospel of the grace of God. That's how he speaks
to the Ephesians when he calls them to him and reminds them
of the ministry that he had exercised amongst them and he gives that
charge in the 20th chapter of the Acts. He says in verse 23, How the
Holy Ghost witnesses in every city, saying, that bonds and
afflictions abide me, that none of these things move me, neither
can I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course
with joy and the ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus
to testify the gospel of the grace of God. That was his ministry.
To testify the gospel of the grace of God. Grace. That is, the fact that God is
pleased to deal favourably with such as are only deserving of
His wrath, who only deserve the punishment of their sins, and
yet God is pleased to favour them and not to punish them,
but to forgive them, to receive them. This is the gospel then. The grace of God is revealed
here in this message that Paul is to proclaim. Later he says
to Titus, the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared
unto all men. appeared in the sense that the
apostles are now proclaiming this message not only to the
Jews but also to sinners of the Gentiles. Remember how John tells us in
his gospel that the law was given
by Moses but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. Now what do we see then in this
grace of God that is revealed in the Gospel of the Lord Jesus
Christ? Well, we see God condescending. We see the gracious condescension
of God. There is some significance here
in our text, even in the name that is given to the Lord. The usual way in which we would
speak of him is as Jesus Christ. You will observe that here Christ
is placed before Jesus. This is a faithful saying and
worthy of all acceptation that Christ Jesus came into the world
to save sinners. Why Christ Jesus and not Jesus
Christ? Paul is writing, of course, under
the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and this is how he is moved to
write. This is the name that he is moved
to give to the Saviour. Well, of course, the name Jesus
is very much the human name that we associate
with him. The name Christ, in that sense,
is the official name. He is the Anointed One. And if
we were to use the full name, we would refer to him as Lord.
And Lord, of course, is that that reminds us of his divinity. He is Lord, Jesus Christ. But here we have the official
name followed by the human name. He is Christ Jesus. And there
is a certain descending here. Reminds us, you see, of that
gracious condescension of Jesus Christ. What says the Lord descending
from above invites his children there while power and truth and
boundless love display their glories here. How the Lord Jesus
Christ is that one who has descended, he has come down from above. He is that One who entered into
an eternal covenant with His people. He is that One who was
appointed by God to be the Saviour. He is that One who is anointed
by God. He giveth not the Spirit by measure
unto Him. We read at the end of John chapter
3, and He comes, He comes in the fullness of the time. That great mystery of godliness,
how the God is manifest in the flesh. You being in the form
of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, says Paul,
but made himself of no reputation, took upon him the form of a servant,
and was made in the likeness of men. And being found in fashion
as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death,
even the death of the cross. His humiliation, His descending. He knows the grace of our Lord
Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes
He became poor, that ye through His poverty might become rich. And where is it that He descended
to? Where did He come? Well, we are
told, here are we not, He came into the world. Christ Jesus came into the world
now that is true of course when we think in a terrestrial sense
he came into this world the world in which we are living he became
a real man and he lived 2000 years ago there in Palestine But we're not just to think here
in a terrestrial sense. That is a truth of course, he
was a real man. But more than that we are to
think here surely in an ethical sense. What sort of a world was
it that he came into? Well John tells us the whole
world lies in wickedness. It lies in the wicked one. He
exhorts love, not the world, neither the things that are in
the world. For all that is in the world is not of the Father,
but is of the world. We are not to follow the forms
and the fashions of this wicked world, and yet this is the world
into which the Lord Jesus Christ descended. This is where He came.
This is the grace of God in the Gospel, that He came to sinners. He came where the sinners were.
And it is interesting again here to observe the word order, the
syntax as it appears in the original. It's somewhat different of course.
In the translation we have our English syntax. So it reads, Our the Christ was
the one who came into the world. That's how it's expressed. Christ
Jesus came into the world. But in the original it reads
like this, Christ Jesus came into the world sinners to save. Not a great difference and yet
a very significant difference in that word order. Christ Jesus
came into the world to save sinners, it reads here, in our authorised
version, but it is literally that Christ came into the world,
sinners, to save, and there is surely some significance in the
juxtaposition of those two words, world and sinners, how they stand
side by side, you see. He came into the world of sinners,
It came into a world that was sunk in sin. It's that sin, is
it not, the world of man's rebellion against God. That world that
we read of in the opening chapters of the Bible, that world that
God made very good, and alas, there is that sin wherein we
see sin entering into that world. the rebellion of our first parents,
the fall of Adam and Eve. It is that sinful world, the
world where sinners dwell, to which the Lord Jesus Christ came,
because he came to rescue them, he came to save them. For here
we see, do we not, the grace of God in the Gospel, that abundance,
that exceeding abundance, of the grace of God in the gospel. But also here, with regards to
this grace, we need to take account of the simplicity of that gospel. In the context, there is clearly
a contrast being drawn with those legalists. As I said, it's in
many ways the epistle to the Galatians. that is altogether
taken up with those Judaizers who wanted to introduce the law,
who wanted to bring Gentile converts to Christ under the authority
of the law, as if there was some work of the law that they had
to perform in order to salvation. But it's not just to the Galatians
that Paul deals with these matters. He left Timothy in Ephesus for
a very particular purpose. As he says here at verse 3, I
besought thee to abide still at Ephesus when I went into Macedonia
that they might as teach, or charge some that they teach no
other doctrine. There were those who would teach
another doctrine. What was the other doctrine?
Well, they were legalists. As we see from what follows,
verse 4, He says, neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies,
which minister questions, rather than God ne'er defying, which
is in faith, so do. Now the end of the commandment
is charity out of a pure heart and of a good conscience and
of faith on faith, which some, having swerved, have turned aside
unto vain jangling, desiring to be teachers of the law, he
says. understanding neither what they say nor whereof they affirm. They don't understand the real
significance, the true ministry of the law. The law is good,
he says, if a man uses it lawfully. But the law is not made for the
righteous man, that is the justified man. What is the ministry of
the law is to bring the sinner under the conviction of his sins
is to make him see what he is before that revelation of God's
holiness and God's righteousness. But these people are wanting
to bring believers back under the law and it's only bringing
confusion. He says later in chapter 4 6. If thou put'st the brethren in
remembrance of these things, thou shalt be a good minister
of Jesus Christ, nourished up in the words of faith and of
good doctrine whereunto thou hast attained, but refuse profane
and old wives' fables, and exercise thyself rather unto godliness. So he refers to these legalizers,
you see, as profane and teachers of old wives fables. Again in the end of chapter 6, he says, Oh Timothy, keep that
which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings,
and oppositions of science falsely so caught, which some professing
have heard concerning the faith. He speaks out then quite clearly
against those who were bringing in doctrines that were only leading
to confusion. There is a blessed simplicity
in the gospel as we've already intimated. It is the gospel of
the grace of God. It speaks of salvation by grace. Salvation that is altogether
the free gift of God. Salvation that doesn't demand
of men that they do any works of their own. As we said, grace
excludes any idea of works. There is then a simplicity here
in the Gospel. It is simply a matter of trusting
in the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember what Christ himself
says in the Gospel. verily except ye be converted
and become as little children. You cannot see the Kingdom of
God. To be converted you have to become
as a little child, says the Lord Jesus. The simplicity of a child
is what is required. There's nothing complex or complicated
then with regards to that salvation which is by the grace of God.
Let us be careful here that we don't confuse that simplicity
with easy believism. We're not saying that faith is
an easy thing. When God begins to deal with
us, we realise how impossible a thing saving faith is. Of ourselves
we cannot produce that faith. We have to be brought to the
end of ourselves. We have to be brought to see that faith
is truly the gift of God, that faith can only come by that gracious
working, those operations of God in the soul. It's not easy
believism that we're contending for. There is a difference between
that and that simplicity which is in Christ Jesus, the simplicity
of the way of salvation that we see in the Gospel of the grace
of God. Besides God's grace in the Gospel,
in the second place in this verse we are also reminded of the faithfulness
of God in the Gospel. The grace of God and the faithfulness of God.
This is a faithful saying, he says, and worthy of all acceptation,
that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom
I am chief." Now, you're probably aware that there are five of
these faithful and true sayings, and they're all in the pastoral
epistles. That's in Timothy or in Titus. We have this one that we're considering
this morning. We find another one, of course,
in chapter 3 and verse 1. Again in chapter 4 and verses
8 and 9. And then in 2 Timothy 2 and verses
11 to 13. And then finally in Titus 3 and
verses 4 to 8. But this is the one we are concerned
with this morning. In 1 Timothy 1.15 And what is the significance
of this faithful saying? Well, it reminds us, does it
not, of the certainty of that salvation which is in the Lord
Jesus Christ. It's a faithful saying that we
have in the Gospel. The Gospel is a faithful Gospel. There is salvation here. And
there is salvation nowhere else. Neither is there salvation in
any other. For there is none other name
under heaven given amongst men whereby we must be saved, says
Peter. The Gospel is faithful. It's
that that we can depend upon, that we can rely upon. Or the truth of it, as Christ
He is indeed the One who has not just come to make salvation
a possibility, rather as He made salvation a
certainty. He has not just come, as some
would say, to make it possible that all men might be saved. He has come to make salvation
sure and certain for those that the Father gave to him. This is the comfort, is it not,
of the doctrines of grace and the doctrines of sovereign grace.
Because there we see that the gospel is not dealing in anything
that is uncertain. Christ is able to save them to
the uttermost that come unto God by Him. All that come to
Him are saved to the uttermost and saved so as never to be lost
again. All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me. And he that cometh to me, he
says, I will in no wise cast out. Oh, there is faithfulness here
in the Gospel. And we see that faithfulness
in a threefold sense. First of all, we see it in the
great promise of God. And in many ways, we can best
define the Gospel by saying that it is the promise of God. It
is the promise of God. And there is a sense in which
the Greek word for Gospel and the Greek word for promise that
these words are synonyms the gospel is promise and that
promise is in the Lord Jesus Christ and remember what Paul
says in 2nd Corinthians chapter 1 for all the promises of God
in Him are ye and in Him are men to the glory of God by us
God is glorified by us as that promise in the Lord Jesus Christ
is fulfilled in us. But besides God's promise, we
also, in the second place, have God's oath. This is the faithfulness
of the Gospel. God has not only given a promise,
God has confirmed the promise with an oath. Abraham, remember,
is the father of all them that believe. The great example of
faith. And in Hebrews chapter 6, Paul
reminds us of the promise that God made to Abram, that is the
gospel. When God made promise to Abram
because he could swear by no greater he swear by himself. Wearing God, willing more abundantly. to show unto the heirs of promise
the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it by an oath, that
by two immutable things in which it was impossible for God to
lie, we might have strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lie
hold upon the hope set before us, which hope we have as an
anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast. Oh, this hope,
it's a sure hope, it's a steadfast hope. Why? Because of the faithfulness
of God. He has given His promise, but
He has also confirmed His promise. He has sworn by Himself. In that
sense, He has exalted His word above all His name. If His word
should fail, God must fail. This is the Gospel, you see.
It is a faithful sign. It is the promise of God, it
is the oath of God, and then thirdly, it is all sealed by
blood, by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the testator. Hebrews chapter 9 and verse 16,
where a testament is, there must also be the death of a testator. And the Lord Jesus Christ is
that testator or that mediator. One and the same. It's the same
word that's used, sometimes translated one way, sometimes the other.
He is the mediator of the new covenant. He has shed his blood.
The covenant that was made with him from eternity
is now enforced. His testament stands. And we
sang it, did we not, just now in that hymn of Isaac Watts,
the gospel bears my spirit on. Faithful and unchanging God lies
the foundation of my hope in oaths and promises and blood. There we have it, you see. That
threefold guarantee of the faithfulness of God in the gospel. Oaths,
promises, and like. This is a faithful saying and
worthy of all acceptation that Christ Jesus came into the world
to save sinners of whom I am chief. The gospel then here is
said to be worthy. It is a faithful saying, it's
worthy, but the sinner is unworthy, is he not? His gospel is worthy
of all acceptation, but the sinner refuses it, doesn't want to know about it.
The natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God,
they are foolishness to him. That's how he accounts them,
they are foolish things. or the carnal mind, the mind
of the flesh is enmity against God, it's not subject to the
Lord of God, therefore, neither indeed can be. But what we see
in the third place here, surely, in Paul, is the experience of
that grace of God in the Gospel. We have the grace of God in the
Gospel, we consider that in the first place, We have the faithfulness
of God in the Gospel and now we see Paul's experience, his
experience of grace, his experience of God in the Gospel. In this man Paul we see so clearly
the sovereignty of the grace of God. He refers to himself
here in our text as the chief of sinners and yet He is a saved
sinner. He is a saved sinner. As he says
in verses 13 and 14, who was before a blasphemer and a persecutor
and injurious, but I obtained mercy because I did it ignorantly
in unbelief and the grace of our Lord was exceeding abundant
with faith and love which is in Christ Jesus. At the end of verse 13, when
he says, because I did it ignorantly, in unbelief, Paul is not pleading
extenuating circumstances. Paul is not excusing himself
in any sense. In fact, commenting on that clause,
John Gill says ignorance is not an excuse but an aggravation
of sin. Ignorance is an aggravation of
sin. Paul isn't saying, oh well, there
were mitigating circumstances in my experiences when I was
a persecutor and a blasphemer. I was ignorant. And that's an
excuse. He's not saying that at all.
He considers himself to be the truth of sinners, does he not?
here at the end of verse 15, of whom I am chief. Ignorance then only aggravates sin. We see in
the Old Testament that there was that provision made for sins
of ignorance in the Levitical law. In chapter 4 of Leviticus
they were to make sin offerings for sins of ignorance. In the
first three verses there, the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, If a soul shall sin through
ignorance against any of the commandments of the Lord concerning
things which ought not to be done and shall do against any
of them, if the priest that is anointed do sin according to
the sin of the people, then let him bring for his sin which hath
sinned a young bullock without blemish unto the Lord for a sin
offering. Here is that provision for sins of ignorance again at
verse 13, if the whole congregation of Israel sinned through ignorance.
and the thing be hid from the eyes of the assembly, and they
have done somewhat against any of the commandments of the Lord
concerning things which should not be done, and are guilty,
they are ignorant but they are guilty, when the sin which they
have sinned against it is known, then the congregation shall offer
a young bullock for the sin. There is that provision made,
ignorance is no plague, And what does Paul say here at the end
of verse 13? He says he did it ignorantly,
in unbelief. It's unbelief you see. It's the
ignorance of unbelief. And what is unbelief? It is the
chief of all our sins. It's at the root of all our sins.
It's the sin that we see in our first parents there in the Garden
of Eden, unbelief. embracing the lie of Satan, believing
what the serpent, the instrument of Satan says, sooner than believe
what God had said. God had said concerning the fruit
of that tree of the knowledge of good and evil, in the day
that they eat us thereof they shall surely die. And the serpent
says they shall not surely die. And they sooner believe that
than believe God's truth, unbelief. Remember how in Hebrews, the
beginning of Hebrews 12, Paul speaks of it as the seal which
thus so easily beset us. Oh, it's so bound up with our
nature, our fallen nature, the natures that we've received from
Adam and Eve, we're unbelievers, in our very nature. Newton says,
oh, could I blaspheme then all would easily I would but cannot. Lord relieve my help must come
from the earth. Say again that this man Paul
you see, who was a blasphemer, persecutor and injurious. Why?
Because he was ignorant, he was in unbelief. And yet, what a wonderful example
is this man of the sovereignty of the grace of God. For this
cause I obtain mercy, he says, that in me first, not first in
the order of time, he was not the first to be saved, of course
he was not. Multitudes were saved before him throughout the Old
Testament. The other apostles were saved before him. In fact
the word first is the word, the Greek word from which we get
our English word prototype. He is the prototype in a sense. He is the typical believer. He
is the pattern. The pattern of the sovereignty
of God's grace in salvation. That in me, first Jesus Christ,
might show forth all longsuffering for a pattern to them which should
hereafter believe to life everlasting. Or the grace of God in the Gospel
then. The faithfulness of God in the
Gospel. Thou pour yourself having experienced
His grace of God Himself. He will make it known, He will
proclaim it, He will declare it to others. This was the commission
that He had received from the Lord. All that glorious gospel
of the blessed God had been committed to His cross. And He will proclaim
it. This is a faithful saying, He
says. And worth of all acceptation
that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of whom
I am chief. May the Lord bless this Gospel
to us for His name's sake. Let us conclude as we Sing the
hymn number 89. When Adam, by transgression,
foul and conscious, flared his maker's face, linked in clandestine
league with hell, he ruined all his future race. The seed of
evil once brought him increased and filled the world with sin.
We'll sing from the second verse, number 89. Bear with me while I try to get
the tune. But lo the second Adam came,
The serpent's subtle head to bruise, He cancels his malicious
claim, And disappoints His devilish use ransoms poor sinners with
His blood And brings the sinner back to God To understand these
things are right This grand distinction should be known Though all are
sinners in God's sight There are but few so in their own To
such as this our Lord was sent their lonely sinners to repent. What comfort can a Saviour bring
to those who never felt their woe? A sinner is a sacred thing
The Holy Ghost has made him so New life from him we must receive
Before foreseeing we rightly grieve This faithful saying let
us know Well worthy it is to be believed That Christ came
to the world, came down That sinners might by Him be saved
Sinners are high in His testing And sin is tinier than you think