Romans chapter 5. We saw this on Wednesday evening,
but we'll look at this again. The title of the message is Justification
and Peace. Justification and Peace. The Apostle says, therefore,
being justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord
Jesus Christ. I want to begin this morning
by asking a very important question. Are you justified? Are you justified? I tell you, without justification,
there is no salvation. You, personally, you must be
justified before God. Are you justified? Justified
means innocent. To be justified is to be completely
innocent before God. It means to be completely righteous
before God. Are you righteous before God? Are you innocent in every thought,
in every word, in every deed? Are you innocent and actively
righteous before God? This is what it is to be justified. And I'm not asking, are you justified
before men? That's easy to do. That's easy
to trick me. But I tell you, God will not
be tricked. God will not be tricked. Are
you righteous before God? God who sees all things, knows
all things, knows your thoughts, knows your motives, knows the
very intent of your heart. Are you righteous before God? Who even charges His angels with
folly? Our Lord Jesus Christ said, Accept
your righteousness. exceed the righteousness of the
scribes and Pharisees. Now, we have a negative idea
of scribes and Pharisees. We see them as they are revealed
in Scripture, they're self-righteous, but I tell you, they were the
most moral of men. These were the most well-studied
of the Scriptures. They knew them. They knew them. They memorized them. They wrote
them on the doors of their house. They wrote them on the sleeves
of their garments. These men were absolutely, you
and I could not charge them. We could not find fault with
them. The apostles found no fault with them. The only one that
found fault with them was the Lord Jesus who knew their hearts.
And I tell you, He knows your heart. He knows your thoughts. He knows your motives. And I
tell you, except your righteousness exceed theirs, you shall in no
wise enter the kingdom of heaven. To be justified before God is
to be without sin, without guilt, without blame, not before men,
but before God. Now I'll tell you, if any one
of us would be honest, just for a moment, just for this moment,
you be honest with yourself. If we would be honest with our
own souls, we know that we have sinned against God. We know. We know this. Our own conscience
convicts us of sin. You remember those self-righteous
Pharisees that brought that woman before the Lord Jesus who was
taken in adultery. They didn't do it because they
loved justice. They didn't do it because they
loved God. They did it because they had the motive to destroy
the testimony of our Lord Jesus. And they were ready to stone
this woman. And you remember what the Lord Christ said to
them? He said, you that are without sin, you cast the first stone.
And they of their own conscience were convicted. And they all
turned away knowing that they had sinned. All have sinned. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. So then no man can be justified
by his deeds before God. It's my desire, I pray that the
Holy Spirit convict every one of us of this. That the Holy
Spirit would take the light of this and shine in our hearts
and pierce through the darkness and show us our sin, our guilt, Pray that you are that you that
are dead. I pray that God the Holy Spirit
would show you you are dead Dead in trespasses and sin your
awful condition That you're without God without hope without life
and your only reward if God were to give you what you deserve
Eternal hell is all he would give you If you'd be honest with
yourself, you'd know that to be true. Lost sinners see that you are not
just indifferent toward God. Some people think they're just
indifferent. Well, I like God a little bit. You know, I kind
of tip my hat to God and I'm just indifferent about it. No,
you are not indifferent. You are at enmity, hatred against
God. If you hate the message of the
Gospel of Jesus Christ, if you have no desire to hear the Gospel
of Jesus Christ, if you have no love for the brethren, if
you have no love for Christ, it is because you hate God. You hate God. You despise Him. You defy Him. You are a rebel. That your whole heart, body and
soul is set on fire in hatred against the Holy God. Carnal
mind is enmity against God. Here's the proof, for it is not
subject to the law of God. Are you subject to the law of
God? Are you by nature subject to
the law of God? No, and neither indeed can the
old man be subject to God. Though you may prosper in this
world for a season, I tell you, God will take holy
vengeance against all who are outside of His Son. All of you who are not justified,
God will take holy vengeance, and your days of rebellion are
numbered. The days of everyone's rebellion
is numbered. Though wicked men prosper for
a season, Though they may defy God all the days of their life,
death is coming, hell is moving, God will have His justice against
every sin. And yet God, God in grace, has
purpose to justify many. God has purposed to justify many. You and I, if we would be honest,
we know this, we cannot justify ourselves. We are guilty. We
have sinned. The only one that can justify
us is God. God. God has purpose. This is the
gospel. This is the message of the good
news of the gospel, is that God has willed, God has purposed
to justify many. Justify guilty rebels. God has purposed from eternity
that many sons of Adam should be given a free pardon. A free pardon. I tell you, if I were to stand
here with a court document that says you are guilty before the
law of this state, many of you would be very on edge. I tell
you, you're guilty before God, and many people don't even care. They don't even care. They're
indifferent to it. They're rebels. But I tell you,
I've got to pardon. Now that's good only for the
guilty. Isn't that right? If you were
guilty, a pardon is what you want. A pardon is what you need. Are you guilty? I tell you, God
has decreed a pardon. A pardon. A free pardon. What must I do to get pardoned?
God has declared that He will pardon guilty sinners. This justification was given
only through the person and work of Jesus Christ, His Son. This
pardon that comes from God, this justification that comes from
God, decreed of God, was promised in Christ. before the world began."
Herein is the covenant of peace that God would justify His children
by making His Son their surety. If you are justified, it is because
God purposed to justify you and He purposed to do it through
His only Son. There is no other way of justification.
There is no other way to be justified before God but by Jesus Christ. And Jesus Himself agreed to be
the surety, agreed to guarantee. It is though the Father and the
Son struck hands in eternity. The Father said, I'll justify
a people, and the Son said, I'll be a surety for them. I'll be
a guarantee, Father, that they shall be saved. They will be
saved. Therefore Jesus could say, This
is the will of Him that sent Me, that of all which the Father
hath given Me, I should lose nothing, but raise them up again
at the last day. Therefore all the elect of God
were justified in the purpose of the Father, and in the purpose
and in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. before the world
began. This purpose, everything that
God purposes, He brings to pass. This purpose of justification
God has brought to pass because He has sent His Son into the
world. He has sent His Son to come and
accomplish what He purposed, to justify the ungodly. The eternal Son was made flesh
so that He would be a representative man. Do you know that you are
saved only through a representative man? No one is saved apart from
this representative man, the Lord Jesus Christ. And as a representative
man, He was not just a good man. Some people are believing that.
Some people are hoping in that kind of man that, well, Jesus
is a good man. He'll let me by. Jesus was a
good man, but I tell you, He was the best of men. And He was
not just a good man, He was not just a prophet, He was God, manifest
in the flesh. God, condescended to come down
so that He might justify, pardon freely, pardon guilty sinners. Therefore, God was in the flesh
a perfect, sinless man, so perfect that all who challenged Him were
defeated. Satan challenged Him. He tempted
Him. And Jesus said, The prince of
this world has found nothing in Me. Nothing in Me. God said, this is my beloved
Son in whom I am well pleased. Pilate said, I find no fault
in this man. Sinner, behold, if you need to
be justified, if you know your need of it, I tell you, you'll
only find it in Jesus Christ. In Jesus Christ. He is the righteousness
of God. He is the only one who magnified
the law of God, who made it honorable by His every thought and deed. And I tell you, for in order
for you to be justified, God's justice must be satisfied. Satisfied. God not willing to impute our
sins to us. There's a root of justification.
The root of it. God was not willing to impart
our sins to us. If you are justified before God,
if you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, you are justified before
God. It is because God was not willing
to impute your sins or charge your sins to you. He was not
willing! Now why was He not willing? Grace. Grace. It's the only word to describe
why God was not willing. Unmerited favor. He was not willing
to charge your sins to you. He was willing to charge them
to His only beloved Son. In 2 Corinthians chapter 5, in
verse 19, it says to wit, that God was in Christ reconciling
the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them, and
hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation. That's the
word I'm preaching to you right now. Reconciliation. Now we are ambassadors for Christ
as though God did beseech you by us. We pray you in Christ's
stead be you reconciled to God for He hath made Him. He hath imputed our sins to Christ. Made Him to be sin for us who
knew no sin. Why? That we might be made the
righteousness of God in Him. This is God's purpose for sending
His Son. And when Christ was on the cross,
the prophecy was fulfilled in Zechariah 13, 7. It says, Awake,
O sword, and smite the shepherd. And against a man, my fellow,
saith the Lord of hosts, O sinner, behold the Savior on
the cross, beaten, bleeding, dying be. not for the sins that
he had done but for my sins he died for me behold the Lamb of
God that was slain Jesus by his one offering has borne all the
guilt and shame by his one offering God imputing
our sins to Christ not willing to impute them to
us, so that God should be just and
the justifier of the ungodly. Do you not see that this is all
about Him? Your salvation is not about you,
it's about Him. It's about Him. You were saved
because He wanted you. That's it. He justified you. Now, who are these justified
saints? They are all who believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ. I ask you, are you justified?
How do you know you are justified who have truly been guilty? The only evidence that God has
given us is by faith. Faith! You who believe and only you
who believe on the Lord Jesus Christ are justified from all
your guilt and sin. Therefore, being already justified
by faith. Faith is the revelation of justification
and only faith. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.
Faith is not the beginning of our justification. Faith is not
the cause of our justification. Faith is a realization. Faith is the light bulb. It goes
off. It's the light that shines in
the heart and reveals what God has done. By faith we know that God is
the beginning of our justification, Christ's blood is the cause,
the cause of our justification. In our text in verse 11 it says,
and not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus
Christ by whom we have now received the atonement. That word atonement
is reconciliation. By faith we now receive the reconciliation
that God has already made. God has made the reconciliation. And every sinner who is justified
gives no glory to self, no glory to works, and we give no glory
to faith. I don't have faith in my faith. I have faith in the object of
my faith. This morning I am justified through
the blood of Jesus Christ alone, without anything else that I
can add. And I dare not add one thing to His blood. I dare not add
one thing to Him. He gives me life. He clothes
me with the righteousness of Christ. So that I should be dressed only
in His righteousness alone. When I die, I will be ushered
into the presence of God forever accepted because I am clothed
in His righteousness. Remember the wedding? The Lord
Jesus pictured He said there was a man there who had not a
wedding garment. Everyone else was dressed with
the same robe. Everyone else had the same garment.
But this guy said, well, I'm just going to wear my own. I've
got a better garment than that, and I've got some of those, you
know, my daughter, she likes those little frilly, sparkly
things, you know, to put on her clothes and stuff. That's what
works religion is, is they put these glittery things all over
themselves, and then they expect to be accepted of God. What happened
to that man who was dressed in his own robe? He was cast into
outer darkness. We don't dare go before Christ
in our own righteousness. We dare bring nothing because
there's nothing good in ourselves. We gladly leave off any hopes
of self and we gladly cling only to Jesus Christ our Lord. Now you who do believe Do you
feel justified? Does God ever ask you to feel
justified? Let me ask you, is that an evidence
that you're clinging to, that you feel justified? The question should be, do you
believe? Do you believe on Jesus Christ
as all your justification? In the surety thou art free,
his dear hands were pierced for thee, with thy Savior's vesture
on, holy as the Holy One. It is upon this truth that the
foundation of our peace with God rests. through our Lord Jesus
Christ. When everything seems well within
us, we are tempted to say, all is well. When everything feels
right, we think everything is right. We say I'm well because I feel
this or feel that. These evidences, they may feel
good, But we're not to rely on them at all, because many times
we feel the opposite. Many times we feel the opposite,
that things aren't right, that things aren't going well, and
we feel we aren't justified. Many times we feel this way. We feel like we do not have peace
with God. Believer, if this is your case,
fly to the cross immediately. Fly to the cross and confess
Christ by faith. Some men build great towers on
tops of mountains, and as the wind blows, their towers fall. And I tell you, if you build
your evidence of justification, if you build your evidence of
peace with God on your works, or on your faith, or on anything
you've done, it will fall. It will fall. But I tell you, just as those
foundations, those mountains were not shaken by the wind,
I tell you, Christ, His work is not shaken by how we feel. His work is sure. His work is
sure. Therefore, being justified by
faith, we have. peace with God. What's the foundation
of your peace with God? Through our Lord Jesus Christ. There's your foundation. There
you may find rest. There you may find comfort. There
you may find true peace. In this world you will not find
peace. Jesus said, I came not to bring
peace, but a sword. Have you not found that to be
true in your dealings with the lost, with those even of your
own family? Have you not found that to be
true? Our Lord said it's true. It's true. He came not to bring
peace with this world, but division. And He did. He did. There's no peace in this world
and you shouldn't expect it. You should expect a cross. Is that not against what we expect?
We expect everything to go well. Why is things not going well?
Our Lord promised you it wouldn't go well. He promised you a cross. Peace, that kind of peace comes
after. But you still may have peace
in your heart, no matter what happens around you. Let, this
is an exhortation to you who are justified, to you who believe
on Christ, you who have peace with God, let the peace of God
rule in your hearts. I believe it's Colossians 3.15. Let the peace of God rule in
your hearts. Let this reign over everything
that happens. We have peace with God through
the blood of Christ. What then could take away this
peace? What? Who shall separate us? from the love of God that is
in Christ Jesus. Who? No one and nothing. No one and nothing. Let that
rule over every circumstance. Let that be the object of your
affection and the comfort of your soul. That we are justified. We have peace with God. And all
of that has nothing to do with my works. It has everything to
do with the blood of Christ that was shed for my sins. And I'm
reconciled to God. You who believe, you're reconciled
to God. I pray that God bless that to
you.