Alright, if you'll reopen your
Bibles to Romans Chapter 8. Romans Chapter 8. We'll pick up reading where Brother
Eric left off at verse 31. What shall, what then shall we
say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be
against us? He who did not spare his own
son, but gave him up for us all. How will he not also, along with
him, graciously give us all things?" The gospel as a message is designed
not only to seek and find the sheep of God and bring them within
the fold of the Great Shepherd, Jesus Christ. It is also designed
to give us sheep absolute confidence or certainly the right to have
absolute, unshakable confidence of the certainty of our salvation
from sin. Now, the gospel of Christ is
expressed in many different ways. And I mentioned in the adult
Bible class that one reason the Bible is such a thick book is
that God expressed his gospel, his truth, in many different
ways, such that there is a way of expression that is suitable
to each of his people. Not all of us hear things the
same way. Some of us are more attuned to
very plain, shall we say, doctrinal statements of truth. Others,
their minds are more captivated, I suppose is an appropriate word,
when the gospel is expressed in illustrations and stories. And there's other ways that it
can be expressed. And while any of us might be
able to discern the truth by any of these means, each of us
has a way of looking at things that's going to be most powerfully
effective or most powerfully applied by one of the certain methods
that God uses or the certain means. But there is one thing that underlies
every way in which God has expressed his gospel. And it is this singular
aspect of the gospel which is apparent in every way that it
is revealed. This aspect of it that can give
us unshakable confidence. In the gospel, we are taught
that none less than God is for us. It is God himself who is our
Savior. It is God with all the privileges
and power of absolute divinity that is engaged in the work of
our salvation. So Paul says, if God before us,
who can be against us? Now, one of the reasons that
we still suffer fears and doubts is because we are still possessed
of a fleshly way of thinking, a natural way of thinking. God
has not yet put that to death. He will. But until then, we're
going to be of two minds. One mind is saying that our salvation
is somehow dependent on what we do. And it is that aspect of natural
human thought that creates the fears and doubts, because to
whatever degree we think that our salvation hangs upon our
actions or reactions or whatever, we're going to have doubts. And
why is that? Because we know that none of
our actions or reactions have been good enough to earn us the
eternal blessing of God. It is simply impossible for us
to turn our eyes inward and then not be brought to a state of
fear and doubt. Paul says, in me, that is in
my flesh, dwells no good thing. A story I've told you several times
will work here. I told you about that time and
it was within the first year or two after I lived here, me
being the curious sort of fellow I am, when I'm confronted with
something new, I want to investigate it, and there's been a few times
having investigated, I wished I hadn't. One of them was when
I was walking through town here, and I got by, we used to have
a locker here in town, and there was a truck parked beside it.
And I couldn't see what was in it, but I could see that the
back door wasn't locked. So, you know, and I don't know
why in the world I thought I had to open up the back of that truck
and see what's in it. Good thing it wasn't full of
grain. I'd have had a lot of shoveling to do. I opened it
up, and it turned out that was a rendering truck. I didn't know
there was such a thing. I found out there is such a thing,
and you don't want to see what's in it. And we keep opening up that rendering
truck of our flesh. And there's nothing in there
but rotting, smelling, decaying, dead flesh. And we keep looking
for life in it. There isn't any. They didn't
throw live animals in that truck. Everything in that truck was
dead. But even though in our flesh
we keep looking in there, hoping to find something good, the gospel
is not even founded on our perfect ability to believe God, because
our faith is not perfect. From our spirit, yes, it's perfect. It's holy upon the Lord Jesus
Christ. But we're not just born-again
spirit. We're also old flesh that has
not been changed. And it's still looking for something
good in itself. And we have this struggle. But,
thanks be to God, faith is not what saves us. Now, I know that
there's arguments about that, and it depends on the context
in which you say that. Because, you know, James talks
about faith without works, and I'm not going to get into what
he means by that, but then he says, can that kind of faith
save? So obviously, there is a sense in which faith saves.
But faith is not the Savior. And it's not the strength of
faith or the purity of faith or anything like that that actually
does the saving. We've got to realize the Bible
is not talking as though it's a systematic theology book, where
every time you see a particular word it means exactly the same
thing as every place else you find that word. Words have shades
of meaning and ways we use them. that do not fit the very strict
mold of its definition. When the Bible talks about faith
saving, it kind of means the same thing or is used in the
same way as when Paul says, I'm all things to all men that by
all means I might save some. Paul never saved anybody. in
the ultimate sense of the word. He's just talking about being
an agent of God in the work of salvation. It's God who saves.
It's God who justifies. It's God who gives life. As the
preacher of our day, one preacher of our day is saying, God saves
you by himself, from himself, for himself. God's the one we need saving
from, and the only one equal to the task of saving us from
God is God Himself. But such is God that if He is
what stands between me and destruction, God is an impermeable shield. God's work, whatever it is, God's
work, whatever it is, cannot fail. If I am behind Him, so to speak,
if He has been dropped as a shield between me and eternal death,
I may stand behind that shield, and I may be standing there with
complete confidence, or I may be trembling. I may be scared
to death back there. But my safety is not affected
by that, because it's not my state of mind that's saving me,
it's God Himself And friend, I have often said
I take such comfort in the promises of God. But remember this, when
I say I take comfort in the promises of God, it's not the promises
themselves. Then I could say, just simply
say, I take comfort in the promises. Why can't I take comfort in the
promises? Why am I able to read the all
the many promises that God has given and find comfort in them
because they're the promises of God. That's why. One of the things that I try
to be careful of, I make an effort at when I'm preaching, that I
don't get up here and get kind of taken away by whatever emotions
may be worked up in me by what I'm trying to say or whatever,
and go beyond the promises of God and promise something that
God has not promised. I have no authority to do that. But I've heard a lot of preachers
make promises that God never made. And I can't say with certainty
that God won't do what the preacher said, but we cannot authoritatively
make a promise unless God made the promise.
The promise of Joe won't give you any comfort. It won't bring
you any salvation. It guarantees you absolutely
nothing regarding spiritual things. And some of my promises on natural
things are pretty doubtful, because I often think I can do much more
than I can really get accomplished. But when God makes a promise,
the power of the promise is not contained in how wonderful the
promise is. The power of the promise is contained
in the fact that it's God who made it. Don't just get caught up in the
wonder of the promise and forget that that promise is good only
because God made it. When God made promise to Abraham, he assured Abraham by two things. And the law says in the mouth
of two or three witnesses, every fact shall be established. For when God made promise to Abraham,
He gave two testimonies of it. And the interesting thing is,
while it's two testimonies, it's two testimonies of the same thing.
It says that He promised Abraham on two things, and what were
those two things? His promise and his oath. And the book of Hebrews says,
he promised him in two things in which it's impossible for
God to lie. Now we take comfort in the promises
because they are made by a God who cannot lie. And when it says
God cannot lie, it does not mean that there's simply one aspect
of things that are possible to do that God's simply not up to
it. Do you know why it's impossible
for God to lie? Because whatever God says becomes
the truth simply because He said it. In the beginning, God created
the heavens and the earth. And the earth was without form
and void, and darkness was on the face of the deep. And God
said, let there be light. And I love those next words.
And there was light. Why was there light? Why did
God say there is light? Did He look on what He created
and say, hey, there's some light down there. Wow, I learned something
today. There's light in my creation.
Well, I can't ever lie about that again. The only reason light
was there is because God said it was there. God's Word creates
reality. Consequently, in His promises,
it's impossible that we would discover that His Word of promise
does not come true the very fact he made it causes it to come
true. I remember my philosophy professor
illustrating this principle. Our Lord Jesus says, that God knows the very number
of the hairs on your head. And he says, now, don't think
that our Lord meant that God has an angel assigned as a hair
accountant who's keeping track, okay, he was born with this many
hairs, okay, he grew five more today. Keep this balance sheet
going, you know, and you get to about your 50. Okay, we've
got to subtract some for today, and eventually you get the lower.
God's not keeping track of it as an accountant would, and that's
not how he knows how many hairs are on our heads. He knows how
many hairs are on our heads because he's the one that decided how
many would be there. It's not that he knows, and I
read it's anywhere from 10,000 to 30,000, depending on how thick
your hair is and whether it covers your whole head. But he knows how many hairs are on
your head right now, not because he's counting them or he's all-knowing. He knows how many are there because
he's the one that put them there. He's the one that lets them fall
out at the appropriate time, if we would call that time appropriate.
But whenever He determines, you start to lose them. If God is for us, who can be against us? God is our Savior. By what means? By the power of what? What individual
or collection of individuals and powers? How could we ever
be unsaved? I grew up in a conservative fundamentalist
church. They believed the doctrine of
eternal security. Once saved, always saved. Well,
that's true as far as it goes, but they were missing the point.
Now the Calvinistic scheme of things talks about the perseverance
of the saints. That's true also. The saints
do persevere. But do you know why the saints
persevere? There's only one reason. And
we ought to change the name of that doctrine for this reason.
It's not the perseverance of the saints, it's the perseverance
of God. He that began a good work in you will perfect it till
the day of Christ. He perfects it. He keeps it going. Not us. Do we persevere in the
faith? Well, it sure looks like we're
persevering in the faith. But faith is the gift of God,
is it not? So why do we persevere in it?
Because God, who is the author of faith, who is the author of
the spiritual life that expresses itself in faith, He keeps giving
that. So if God be for us, who can be against us? God in
human flesh approached the tomb of a man named Lazarus, been
dead four days. And according to Jewish tradition,
if you've been dead four days, you're dead and not coming back.
They thought, you know. Well, they had opinions about
all kinds of things that weren't written in scriptures. Just like
many Christians today have some very strong opinions about things
that are not addressed in the scriptures. The Jews had their
traditions as well. That was one of them. And the
Lord, in order to accommodate what their beliefs were and assure
to them that the resurrection of Lazarus was going to be truly
a work of God, he waited to go to Bethany sufficient time so
that when he got there, Lazarus has been dead four days. Corruption
has set in to the point, there's no bringing him back. And he came to that tomb and
he told the people there to do the one thing they could do,
roll away the stone. And then he did what only God
can do. He spoke into the halls of death
and said, Lazarus, come forth. Do you think that there was any
power in heaven, earth, or hell that could have prevented Lazarus
from coming out of that tomb? Not even Lazarus could prevent
it. You say, why? Well, it's the
nature of living people to not want to be in a tomb. I mean, I've never been in a
tomb like that. Because the way they used to
chisel out, you know, inside of a hill, and they would make
kind of shelves in it. And they would simply lay the
body on that for a certain period of time, long enough that all
the flesh had decayed off of it. Later, they would go in and
collect the bones and put the bones in a box so that they could
use the shelf for someone else. Would you want to go back in
a place like that? You're dead people and the only
thing covering them up is a sheet, so to speak. It's a creepy place
to be. No living person wants to be
in a tomb. And as soon as he said Lazarus
came forth, with the command to come forth, went the power
that enabled Lazarus to do that, and once he was conscious and
alive again, realized where he was, he said, I've got to get
out of here. And even though he was bound
in grave clothes and probably couldn't take nice long strides,
he comes out of there, I suppose he's kind of wrapped up like
a mummy, you know, and comes out of there, little steps, I've often wondered if you couldn't
hear behind the, you know, get me out of here! You know, get
me out of here! And what did the Lord then say to the disciples,
to the ones around that saw it? Unwrap his grave clothes. Now
brethren, that's what I'm trying to do this morning. I can't give
you life, but there's some of you that have it, but you're
wearing grave clothes. All of us got some on. Just trying
to unwrap them. How do you unwrap grave clothes? With a word of life. But God spoke into that tomb.
Who could stand an opposition to Lazarus coming out if it was
God that spoke life to him? is appointed unto men once to
die, and after this to judgment." We know the truth of it. We feel it. There may be some people
who truly have been so deluded by the God of this age, they
believe that there is no God. But I think that for most who
claim to be atheists, their claims of unbelief are simply an attempt to yell
it loud enough that it drowns out the innate knowledge that
everyone has there is a God. We're going to die and we're
going to face Him. and it's not going to go well. But you know what? What if on
the day that you are judged, the one who judges you is for
you? What if the One to whom all judgment
is rightfully committed, God the Judge of all, and it says
He's going to do this through Jesus Christ, He's going to judge
the world in righteousness through the One He has appointed, the
Lord Jesus. What if the One, the only One,
who has the right, the authority to condemn you for you what if the judge is not only
the judge he is your defense attorney what if the one who has every
right and certainly the knowledge and certainly the power to bring
up every sin you've ever done Bring forth the proof of it so
that there's no way you could defend yourself. Who has the
right to pronounce a just verdict and the power to carry it out?
What if that one is desirous that you be spared what you deserve? Who is going to stand up in court
against Him? It says in verse 33, who will
bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? Who's going to do that? These
are rhetorical questions. Now, notice the next line. It is God who justifies. The word justify is a courtroom
word. It simply means to declare righteous. It is one and the same as a not
guilty verdict in our court system. It's exactly what it is. So Paul's rhetorical question,
who's going to bring a charge against one of God's elect. I
like this, it doesn't say, who shall bring a charge against
them that believe? Now, that would have been a good
question, but that doesn't anchor everything
in the works of God. So he identifies God's people
by this noun, The elect. The chosen. Why? God's the one
that did the choosing. That's why. So God chose them. God justified them. Who's going to come in His court
and bring an accusation against them that's going to stick? How
are you going to undo God's declaration that this person is not guilty? Now, part of the gospel is an
explanation of how God can declare us to be not guilty and remain
a just God while He does it. But at this point, we don't need
to deal with that issue. Rather, we deal with this issue.
God's the one who does the justifying. Who in heaven, earth, or hell?
can bring a charge against someone that God, the judge of all, has
declared to be righteous. Is there a sin that someone can
bring out that God didn't know about and deal with? Not a chance. Not a chance. Or I'm losing my... This thing says
it's still on, but I hear the sound going off and on a lot.
Well, verse 34. Who is He that condemns? You know who condemns? You know
who condemns me? I ask you here, you who believe,
don't you condemn yourself? All your sins, they lay upon
your conscience and you know the truth about you and the truth
about your heart, the truth about your flesh, the truth about your
actions, you know what it is. And you still have that old fleshly
conscience that condemns. But you know what stands in the
face of our self-condemnation? Christ Jesus, who died. More than that, who was raised
to life, is at the right hand of God and is also interceding
for us. So he says, who's going to bring
an accusation? God's the one who justified him.
Now if you bring up an accusation in heaven, you're bringing it
up before God. And if you bring up an accusation
against one of God's chosen whom he has justified, you're wasting
your time. Who's going to condemn? Once again, Paul makes no reference
to faith or repentance or anything that we have done. For our confidence
cannot be founded upon those things. You say you've repented? Really now? Oh, there's times
you feel bad about what you are, and there's times you feel pretty
good about what you are. There's times that you are defeated
by sin, and... That Southern Ephesians, bless
your heart, there's times you think you've made a victory over
it. We still got the old way of thinking
rattle around up there. Faith and repentance are not
a good ground of assurance. You know who He is? Christ died. More than that, He's raised from
the dead. More than that, He ascended to
the right hand of the Father. And you know what He's doing
there? He's making intercession for His people. Who is going
to be able to undo the intercessory work of Jesus Christ? Who can
overcome that? You say, well, I thought you
said that it's all about God. Who do you think the Lord Jesus
Christ is? Unto you is born this day in
the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And as I
explained a week or two ago in a message, when that angel said
the Lord, he was merely accommodating a common practice of the day.
They wouldn't speak the name of Jehovah. Instead, they would
say the Lord. And that's why you look in your
Old Testament, wherever the word Jehovah is, you'll find the word
LORD in capital letters. And in all the Old Testament
quotes that you find in the New Testament, wherever you would
have come up with the name of Jehovah in the Old Testament,
it puts the Greek word kurios, Lord, the Lord. So that angel,
here's what he's saying, this Savior who was born, He is the
Christ, He is Jehovah. That's what he was saying. And
our intercessor, it's God. How does he intercede? Does that
mean he's in a constant state of talking with God, the judge
of all, and saying, do you see that sin? Okay, I pay for it.
Do you see that sin? I pay for it. No! His presence there is
our intercession. Is that hymn? We sang it as a
hymn of the day here a few weeks ago. Arise, my soul, arise. One
stanza begins, five bleeding wounds he wears, received on
Calvary. They pour effectual prayers. They strongly plead for me. Forgive,
forgive, they cry. Nor let that ransomed sinner
die. The Father hears Him pray. His
dear anointed Son, the dear anointed One, He cannot turn away the
pleadings of His Son. We all sin. Sin stains everything
we do. Some of our sinning affects us
more powerfully than others, because in our way of seeing
sin, there are some sins that are worse than others. As Brother
Mahan used to say, there is no such thing as a small sin, because
there's no such thing as a small God to sin against. Our sins have different levels
of destructive power within this world, but they're all equally
sinful. And these continual sins weigh
heavy on us. But here is our continual confidence. Christ is at the right hand of
the Father. And He's there because He died
under the penalty of all those innumerable sins we committed. And He's at the right hand of
God because such was His death that all the sins that He bore
were put away. Covered. Erased. Cast in the
depths of the sea. Cast behind God's back. Lots
of ways it's described in the Old Testament. I like that one where God says,
I've cast your sins behind my back. Why? Well, if we're standing
facing God, if our sins are behind His back, He can't see them.
We can. And that's the state we're in now. We see our sin,
don't we? They're behind God's back. He doesn't see them. That's
the issue. He doesn't see them. If He doesn't see them, I don't
have to worry about them. Our Lord Jesus Christ died. The
only person in history that ever really died. Everybody else is
still dying. When Moses and Elijah met with
our Lord Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration, it says they
talked with Him about the death that He would accomplish in Jerusalem. Not the death He would die, the
death He would accomplish. I like what Brother Tim James
said, whoever considered death an accomplishment, there's only
one who can call it accomplishment, our Lord Jesus Christ. He experienced
within Himself everything that it means to die. such that he
could say, it is finished. I've brought death to its goal.
I have filled it up. There is no more death to do.
And having died such a death, he
was raised from the dead, for the sin that was laid upon him
was gone. And the tomb is for sinners,
not for the righteous. And our Lord came forth from
the tomb a man without sin. Paul says he died unto sin once,
but now that he lives, he lives unto God. He came out of the
tomb as the firstfruits from the dead. And the reason he's the first
fruit from the dead, he's the only one that actually ever got
the dying done. Consequently, as the scripture
said, he that is dead is freed, and the word is actually justified,
from sin. And if you're justified from
sin, then you live, and you live unto God. You live in the presence
of God. You live as one acceptable unto
God. And Paul says, when He died,
we were in Him. When He rose from the dead, we were in Him.
When He was seated at the right hand of the Father, we were in
Him, we are in Him. And His presence there is the
certainty of our presence there. And while within the framework
of space and time, you and I haven't experienced that, within the
framework of the timeless existence of God, it's done. His presence there is our intercession. And if our God in the person
of Christ is there for us, who in heaven, earth, or hell can
be against us? Verse 35, Who shall separate us from the
love of Christ? Oh, isn't this wonderful to read
all this, and there's nothing in here about what we've done,
except sin. That part's in there. But there's
no praiseworthy act of us recorded. Whose love? Love of Christ. Shall trouble, or hardship, or
persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword, as it is
written, for your sake we face death all day long, we are considered
as sheep to be slaughtered. No. In all these things, we are
more than conquerors through him who loved us. My first year
of Bible school, they would have visiting lecturers in. Most of them were pastors of
various churches. And they were each assigned a
book. And I recall the guy who was assigned the book of Romans
to teach us. And, you know, I'm not real good at
keeping my mind on what's being said. And when I'm listening
to someone, my mind kind of gets in there for a little while,
and then it's off on something else. But when it came time to
take the test on the series of lessons he'd done on the Book
of Romans, he says it was a true-false section. And one of them says,
the Book of Romans tells us that we are conquerors. Through him
who loved us. Oh yeah, it says that. I put
true. I got that question wrong. It
was a trick question. And I hate trick questions. But I learned something. I got it wrong on the test, but
I haven't forgotten it since. Paul says we are more than conquerors. You know, he who conquers today
can be defeated tomorrow. but he whose victory has been
given to him. Thanks be to God who gives us
the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. When you're given
a victory, accomplished by God, you're more
than a conqueror. You can never be defeated again.
For I am convinced, verse 38, that neither death nor life,
neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor
any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all
creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that
is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Now, it is popular to say in
our day that God loves everyone. Well, if that's true, then nobody
will be lost. Because no one can be separated
from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus. If there's another
kind of love that's outside of Christ Jesus, I can't say anything
about that. but the love of God that's in
Christ. Anyone who has that, has had that love since before
the foundation of the world. As God says, I believe through
Jeremiah, I have loved you with an everlasting love. Therefore
have I drawn you with tender, with loving kindness. I didn't
love you because you came to me. Because I loved you, I drew
you to me. I love that hymn, oh love that
will not let me go. It can be tough to pick up a
kid that wants to get away, can't it? And the only reason we parents
were able to do that, because we're bigger than them. But they
can squirm in your arms and make it even a little bit of trouble,
a little bit of trouble to keep them from getting away without
hurting them. But our God, we can squirm all we want, and we
do. We ain't getting away. And no one's going to be able
to snatch us away from Him. Why? Because He loves us. And the same can be said concerning
the death of Christ. Is it for everybody? Well, if
it is, then we can't claim any real confidence in it. We can't
say who shall bring any, or who is he that condemns Christ Jesus
died. Well, if he died for everybody,
then nobody can be condemned. The fact is that our Lord's work
was for a specific people. And say, well, that's not fair.
Okay, but it's not unjust. Nobody deserved that God should
make a sacrifice in their behalf. So that leaves him free to make
a sacrifice, make a way of salvation for one, two, a million, everybody,
no one. It's all up to Him. And Christ
died for those whom God chose, and His intercession for them
is effective. God's love is upon those He's
loved from the foundation of the world. It's expressed through
Christ, and there's absolutely nothing, nothing in this creation
or in the timeless, uncreated existence of God. that can separate us from that
love. Oh, but I'm such a sinner. You show me in here where it
mentions that as an obstacle to God's love. Yes, but even
since I said I believed I've sinned so much, you show me where
in this scripture or any other scripture that the sin of God's
people ever proves to be a hindrance to the living God to save them. The only hindrance that sin can
create in the salvation of a person, the only way it can be a hindrance
is if the goodness of that person has something to do with whether
or not they're saved. But God took that out of the
equation. And every variable in the equation of God's salvation
is a variable concerning His work. All the X's and Y's and
Z's and that, if you remember your algebra classes, they are
all filled in by something that God has done. And after the equal
sign is redeemed, justified, glorified, saved. And there's nothing that can
stand where that equal mark is. Nothing can erase it. Nothing
can draw a line across it that makes it mean not equal. This
is God's equation. And since the only one who writes
it and fills it in is God, nobody can change it. That's the gospel. One of Martin Luther's church
members once asked him, why is it that every Sunday you preach
the gospel to us? And he says, because every Sunday
you come in here looking like you need it. Did you need the gospel this
morning? Had the knowledge of your sins
cast a shadow over the promises of God and over your participation
in them? You don't have to answer out
loud, because I already know the answer. That's the life of
a believer in this world. Not the way we want it, but it's
the way it is. Oh, how blessed it is then to meet like this
and open this book once again and be reminded salvation is
of the Lord.