All right. I do appreciate your tolerance
of my ways. I appreciate that scripture you
read yesterday, Kevin, from 2 Corinthians chapter 4 verse 5, if you remember
that. It says we have this treasure
in earthen vessels. I think when people want to stash
something in their house, they probably put it in a most obscure
place, like in their underwear drawer, or in a sock, or something
like that, maybe in the dirt. In other words, they hide the
treasure in something the most unlikely places. That's the way
I feel. God has given us the gospel and
put it in the most unlikely people. Don't you find that to be true?
Amen. I also appreciate that verse
you read last night, John, in Acts 13.30. If you remember,
it says, but God raised Him up from the dead. Men arraigned
Christ. They brought Him into their court.
They charged Him with crimes. They judged Him guilty and sentenced
Him to death. And they judged the Lord of glory
to be worthy of death. But though men held their court
and made their charge and gave their sentence, that Jesus Christ,
the Son of God, the Prince of Life, should be worthy to die,
and though men unjustly and cruelly and mercilessly afflicted the
Son of God, and openly mocked and slandered
Him and put Him to the most shameful death as a criminal, because
they envied and hated Him without cause. Yet God held court in
truth and in pure justice. And that's what I want to talk
about today. I've entitled this message, it's going to be too
long of a title. One of the people in our church
remarked, you must be a Puritan preacher. They had these long
titles. I've entitled this message, The
most difficult scripture, or the most difficult truth to understand. That's an interesting thought.
I'm sure you're expecting me to talk about something obscure.
1 Corinthians 15 talks about people being baptized for the
dead. I'm not going to talk about that.
Sometimes we wonder how God could create man upright, and yet man
would seek out every invention, every evil invention. As it says
in Ecclesiastes 7.29. I'm not going to try to explain
that either. I think that there are very many
complicated things in Scripture I don't understand. Or I certainly
can't explain. Jesus wept over Jerusalem. He's
the Son of God. Why couldn't He save them if
He wept over them? I'm not going to explain that
either. I think when we want to explain something complicated,
we usually spend the most time on it, don't we? So I know this
is the most complicated thing to understand because God spends
the most time on it in His Word. This is the most complicated
thing. I was, several years ago, I had a couple over to our house,
and the man was telling me how in his church they had done a
study on elders and leadership in the church. I kind of scratched
my head, and I thought, yeah, that's something I've never really
studied. It seems important. And after
we talked for a while, I said, you know, I'm still trying to
figure out how God saves a man. I didn't realize it at the time
that that was the right answer, because that's a complicated
thing. And I'm sure that that's the treasure that God has put
in the vessels that we find obscure. So I'm not going to explain elders. I'm not going to, you know, a
lot of people say, I can't believe the Bible, there's so many contradictions
in it. If you only knew half of the
challenges from the Scripture. If you only knew a little bit
of those things that seem problematic in Scripture. But see, by God's
grace, He teaches us that if God is small enough to get our
minds wrapped around Him, that He can't be God. But here He has spent, He has
stooped so low to give us something so utterly unfathomable, immeasurably
incomprehensible, that we look at it, and we look at it, and
we look at it, and we think we begin to understand it. And we
just have to step back and say, wow, I really don't know yet
how God saves a man. I'm going to lay a little foundation
here before we get into the text of the scripture. And I do these
things for the weakness, the weakness of our flesh, because
we need these introductions, I think, at least I do. As children,
I used to appreciate a preacher giving an illustration. God has
given an illustration of what I'm about to preach about, and
we're going to look at that. But I want to ask this question
before I do, because if we don't have this question in view, I
don't think we can appreciate what's being said here in this
text of scripture. And here's the question. What
makes anything necessary? Have you ever thought about that? We always think of cause and
effect. When you're little, Mom said to, it's necessary, right? Yeah. Dad told me to, that's
why. What are you doing here? Dad
sent me out here to get this or he told me to do this. It
became necessary for you, didn't it? Why do you get up every morning
and go to work? Well, because I want to earn
some money. But why do you need money? I
have to live, I have to eat. Why do you need to eat? Because
I have to live. Why do you need to live? You
see, there's always something we can go back and ask the question,
what made that necessary? And that's something that romantic
novelists and others write about. We might read a romantic story,
and the storyteller might say, there's no greater motivation
than love. For the love a man has, he'll
spend his life for his wife and his children. For the love of
country, a soldier will give his life. For the love of a child,
a mother will rush into a burning building. For love, a wife and
family, a wife and a man of a family will spend the labors of their
life. So we understand that love is a powerful motivator. For
love, Adam turned against his God and plunged his race under
condemnation for the love of his wife. Why? Because love made those things
necessary for them. So we see there's something that
makes things necessary for us. Now, if you would turn with me
to Romans chapter 4, I want to look at something here that's
complicated and necessary. In Romans chapter 4, we find an illustration, an example of
this amazing truth that God spends so much time in Scripture answering
and explaining to us, something we can't understand. We can begin
to understand it, it seems, by grace we can understand it, but
not fully. As it says in 1 Corinthians 13,
verse 12, we see as through a glass darkly. So when we look at this,
we're going to be looking at this Although with eyes of faith,
there's still so much more that we can't see. But when we see
Him, then we'll know, even as we're known. Look at Romans chapter
4 and verse 25. This is the last verse in the
chapter. It's speaking of, if you look
at the verse before, it says in verse 24, But for us also,
to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on Him, that raised
up Jesus our Lord from the dead. Him is God the Father. Jesus
our Lord was raised up from the dead. Raised to life again, which
means He obviously was dead. In verse 25, Who, the Lord Jesus
Christ, was delivered for our offenses and was raised again
for our justification. What made this necessary? Why
was this? Why did this happen? Well, if you look at Ephesians
chapter 1, I'll read this verse to you. It says, In Ephesians
1 verse 5, speaking of God the Father, He says, having predestinated
us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself, and
here's the answer, according to the good pleasure of His will. So what made it necessary? Well,
it seemed good to God. It pleased Him. Now, we just talked about these
situations where a mother rushes into a burning building because
of the love for her child. What compelled her? Her love. Something from within her moved
her to do that, even though it cost her, perhaps, her life. Here, in Ephesians 1, it says
that according to the good pleasure of His will, And it goes on in verse 6, "...to
the praise of the glory of His grace." And then, going on further,
he says in verse 9, "...having made known to us the mystery
of His will according to His good pleasure, which He hath
purposed in Himself." And verse 11, in whom also we
have obtained an inheritance being predestinated according
to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel
of his own will. So what makes it necessary? What
makes anything necessary? Ultimately, because it seemed
good to God. And if it seemed good to God,
then it came out of God's own nature, and character, and mind,
and heart. So when we look at what God purposes
and determines to do because it's necessary, it pleases Him,
what are we looking at? We're looking at God, you see. We're looking at pure God here
in Romans 4.25. Look at this again in Romans
4.25. Who was delivered for our offenses? Who delivered? Whom? God the Father delivered His
Son. If you look at, or maybe you
know it so well I can just read it to you. In Acts 2 verse 23
it says this. Who delivered His Son? Let me
read this to you. He says, Him, Christ, being delivered
by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, you have
taken and by wicked hands have slain. Christ was delivered by
God the Father. It was His determinate counsel
that did it. His foreknowledge. Who was delivered? Christ. Who delivered Him? God
the Father. What did He deliver him to? It says He was delivered for
our offenses. Look at Romans 8, a couple of
pages over in Romans 8. He said in verse 29, for whom
He did foreknow, this is God the Father, there were those
in all of creation born to Adam that God the Father loved before. He foreknew them. To the others,
Jesus will say in the last day, I never knew you. But to these,
of these, God says, he foreknew them, he also did predestinate
them to be conformed to the image of his son, that he might be
the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover, whom he did predestinate,
them he also called, and whom he called, them he also justified,
and whom he justified, them he also glorified. What shall we
then say to these things? This is what we have to say.
If God be for us, who can be against us? And now listen to
this next verse very carefully. He that spared not his own son,
but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also
freely give us all things? What did He deliver him to? He
delivered him up to the curse. In Galatians 3 through 13, you
know the verse. It says, Christ hath redeemed
us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us. God didn't spare His Son. He
delivered Him up. Back in Romans 4.25. What moved God to do this? When
did it happen? Well, in time, it was at the
cross. But there was a time before the
cross when God delivered His Son up. He says this in Revelation chapter
13 verse 8. You know that verse well. Those
whose names were not written in the book of life of the Lamb,
which was slain, From the foundation of the world, or before the foundation
of the world, those whose names were not there worshiped the
beast. And in 1 Peter, in chapter 1,
where he talks about the precious blood of Christ by which we are
redeemed, he says this, who verily, the Lord Jesus Christ was foreordained
before the foundation of the world, what was manifest in these
last times for you. God the Father determined before
to deliver up His Son. Well, when was this? Before the
foundation of the world. Well, which creature then was
there to inspire God or counsel, give him counsel, or to influence
him? Well, there was none yet because
the foundations of the world weren't even laid. Well, if there
was no creature, then who was there? Who was there without
creation? God was there. Only God was there. The eternal God was there, because
there's none eternal but God. So He, God, found it in Himself. He found a reason in Himself. It pleased Him. In His determinate
counsel to deliver up His Son, and to deliver him to the curse
of his own law, to death. What moved him? Whatever God
is moved him. Amen. What is God? Well, we see it
in this, don't we? Why would God deliver up his
son? Had his son done something to
deserve this? No. No. He says so. He says what it is
right here in Romans 4, 25, who was delivered for our offenses. I don't know if you've ever offended
somebody before. Especially I have. I do it all
the time, it seems like. And sometimes I do it when they
may not even be aware of it. And I cringe to think what's
going to happen when they find out what I've done. So foolish
was I. But here we openly offended God. We offended our Creator. Our own breath and life are in
His hands. We offended Him. If you're someone who is in a
place of authority, maybe a mother or father, and someone offends
you, you have a right, don't you, to be justly offended by
that? You're being insubordinate. You
need to stand down. And it goes on, year after year,
arguing, pushing back, trying the boundaries. And there comes
a point where you say, okay, I'm going to bring some consequences
here. You've offended my place, my
authority. But imagine now, that you've
been offended like that. Let's say you're the father of
the prodigal son. Your son comes to you and says,
Father, give me what's mine. I'll take my leave. You give
him your part of your inheritance. He didn't deserve any of it.
You give it to him. He goes out and he wastes it on riotous living,
harlots, spends it unwisely, completely wastes it. He comes
back. Now, you're the offended one.
You have a right to hold him accountable, and it would be
good for you to do so. He deserves it. But you, in the
place of the offended one, you take the initiative. You yourself
take the initiative to make a reconciliation, to go out and recover the offender,
and that offense that He made in you, you find a way to resolve
it. That's what He's saying here.
God found it in Himself to lay the full responsibility of our
reconciliation on Himself before we were ever created. And what
moved Him to do this was His own goodness. in his own love,
eternal love, and in his own grace, undeserved, because we
weren't there, and because we would offend, God put himself
in the place of the reconciler. And he couldn't do it unless
he upheld his nature, his character as God. He is holy and just. He cannot look upon sin. God
wouldn't allow one aspect of his character to be amplified
and compromise the other part of himself? Could he? We do that. All right, I'm going
to overlook this this time. You know, this happens all the
time in government. Justice just goes by the wayside
for promotion or whatever. God does not compromise. It says
in Scripture, He is no respecter of persons. It doesn't matter
who you are. If you have offended God's justice,
justice will be served. God will see to it. Every one
of us will give an account before God. And what are we going to
answer? Well, here, God Himself has revealed
the most difficult perplexity in all of Scripture. How can
God be holy and just? And look back at the same chapter
in verse 5. Look at these verse carefully.
This is God now. He is writing these words. His
own spirit is breathing them out. Revealing His own way, His
truth. The way God sees things and does
things. This is the laws of His own mind
and heart. And this is the way things work.
He says, But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that
justifieth the ungodly. Now, what description of God
does this give us? Him that justifies the ungodly. How? How in the world can he
do this? God who is holy and just. He
can't compromise. He can't look upon sin. He will
not. It has to be perfect to be accepted with God. No compromise. No fixing of the books. He openly
makes known the truth. Everyone can inspect it. The
universe will look on and God will be true and just. And so when we look at verse
25, who was delivered for our offenses, we see here something
holy. I underscore that for us. We
are looking at purely God's work. Therefore, it has to be holy. We're looking at the very heartbeat,
the nature and character, the attributes, the mind and the
will and the counsel and the work and the glory of God. Why would God, out of all of
eternal ages, decide when there's no other motivator to deliver
up His Son for our offenses. This is holy, isn't it? This
is very, very holy. We don't need the words very,
very there, because only God is holy. But it makes us stand
still. And it causes our scalp and the
hair on the back of our neck to tingle, doesn't it? God would
be moved out of his own nature to make himself known. He had
a desire to make himself known, but not so much... When we think
of that, we can't help, because of the infirmity of our flesh,
to think that there's some... What's the word? Some self-centered
view of things, because we're sinners. But if God doesn't have
a self-centered view of things, then we won't see his selfless
humility. You see? He has to make his glory
known because he's the only one who has such grace and mercy
and justice and truth. He delivered up his son. Before
the foundations of the world, he determined to deliver up his
son for our offenses to death. Who dies? Who dies but sinners? Are there any that die but sinners?
The Lord Jesus Christ was not passive in this. He himself took
our... Look at 1 Peter chapter 2. I
want to read this to you. This is a great mystery, isn't
it? But it's revealed. It was a mystery
because we could not have imagined it had it not been revealed.
1 Peter chapter 2. I just want you to look at these
words with me. He says in verse 24, speaking of the Lord Jesus
Christ. In fact, let me go back in verse
22. 1 Peter chapter 2. Who did no sin. Neither was guile found in his
mouth, who when he was reviled, reviled not again. When he suffered,
he threatened not, but he committed himself to him that judges righteously,
who his own self bear our sins in His own body. This was the
Lord Jesus Christ. This was willing. This was voluntary. Why did the Lord Jesus Christ
have such a heart to give Himself in this way, to bear our sins?
If you've seen me, you've seen the Father. The heart and the
mind and the will and the work of the Father and the Son are
the same. What was in the heart of the
father was in the heart of the son. He entrusted, the father
entrusts everything to his son. Because he's, there's no possibility
that he won't do what's very best according to God's will.
How can we even put that into words? I only do my Father's
will, because that's all I want to do. Here, He bear our sins
in His own body. Our sins in His body on the tree. This is what He was delivered
to. That we, notice, He did that. He hadn't sinned. But our sins
were charged to Him. And He owned them. They became
His, voluntarily. And He confessed them as His.
Mine iniquities are gone over my head. In Psalm 40 verse 11,
but here he says that our sins, he bare our sins in his own body
on the tree that we, notice, he did something, he bore our
sins, and he bore them on the cross and died, that we, being
dead to sins, but we didn't die, he died. He didn't sin either,
but our sins were made His, and His death was credited to us. Because when God the Father was
pleased to adopt us and predestinate us to the adoption of sons, He
chose us in Christ. Which means that He, from then
on, from eternity, viewed us in Christ, joined to Him. It
became the foundation of the imputation of our sins to our
Savior, and the imputation of His obedience and righteousness
to us. His death was my death, if I'm
in Him. His burial, I was put there.
God remembered my sins no more because they were put away and
forgotten. And His resurrection, was my
justification. You see, He bore our sins in His own body
on the tree. He had no part in the committing
of our sins, but He owned them. We had no part in His obedience,
but He owns us as having obeyed God in Him. Can you understand that? This
is the most complicated thing in all of the scripture, in all
of the universe. How God could be just and justify the ungodly. Notice he doesn't say in verse
5, God who justifies the ungodly, as if he first makes us somehow
better, and having arrived at some level of improvement, then
he goes on and says, okay, now you've reached that, you're just
now. Not at all. He justifies the ungodly. Period. This is an impossibility
to reconcile, except that God would do it. So back in verse
25, who was delivered for our offenses, we offended God, we
were the rebels, we offended Him. As Pastor Fortner used to
say so much of the time, we stuck our fist in God's face and he
removed our offense to his holy justice and his holy law because
he delivered up his son to bear our sins in his own body on the
tree that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness. And so he says in verse 25 again,
he was delivered for our offenses And he was raised again for our
justification. Men held their court, and God
held his. And he found the Lord Jesus Christ
charging him with our sins guilty. He was counted among the transgressors. That's why there was a thief
on either side. He was counted among the transgressors, and
he bare the sins of many. That's why he was there. That's
why he died. No one ever died who was not
a sinner. But there's a flip to that too.
No one ever lived who wasn't righteous. Why does anyone live? Only the righteous live. And
so when God raised up Christ from the dead, what was He saying?
He's righteous. He is so righteous. Death could
not hold him. And the resurrection was the
pronouncement of God that he was righteous. Justified. It says in 1 Timothy 3.16, great
is the mystery of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh,
justified in the spirit. He was justified. God the Father
justified Him when He raised Him according to the Spirit of
holiness. By the resurrection from the
dead, He was justified, declared to be the Son of God with power. And this all happened because
God found it necessary. He found His own nature required
it. His own purpose of grace and
His justice Look at Hebrews chapter 2. It sort of sums up that point. He says in Hebrews chapter 2, in verse 10, For it became Him,
speaking of God the Father, it became Him. It seemed right to
Him. And what seemed right to Him
compelled Him to do what pleased Him. I've heard, in fact, I could
give names and I would, except I don't want to try to seem better
than others, but there's a very, very famous modern day evangelical
preacher who says that God wants to do things that he doesn't
do. Is that possible? No. Is that
possible? That God would really want, desire
something, and then not do it because, well, the preacher would
say because, well I can't really explain why, but because man
wouldn't cooperate. I want to read a couple of verses
of scripture to nail that that down in Isaiah chapter 14. It might be good for you to turn
to these, Isaiah 14, so that you'll know where they are. Listen
to these words. God makes these things clear.
Abundantly clear. Isaiah 14, 24. The Lord of hosts
has sworn. Now when we swear, I was just
looking at something the other day. Sign here. I swear so and
so. But what good is that signature
better than my own character? No better. Here it says, "...the
Lord of Hosts has sworn, saying, Surely as I have thought, so
shall it come to pass, and as I have purpose, so shall it stand."
There's not one thought that God thinks that doesn't happen. Acts 15, 18 says, known unto
God are all his works from the foundation of the world. What
happens at the end? We're going to find out one of
these days, won't we? There'll be people in heaven.
And we'll look at that person. We'll say, you know why you're
here? Because God, before the foundation of the world, decided
you to be here. That's right. Amen. He put you
here in his own eternal counsel. And he knew that work before
the foundation of the world. In Ephesians 1.11, we just read
a minute ago, he says he works all things after the counsel
of his own will. What is the guideline? What is
the necessaries that drive God? His own will. His own character.
His nature. And so, What we see here in Romans
4.25 is that God did this. He delivered up Christ for our
offenses. He raised Him again for our justification. He declared Him to be righteous,
obedient in all things. Now look at Philippians with
me if you would. Philippians chapter 2. So it became him for
whom are all things, I didn't finish reading that in Hebrews
2.10. And by whom are all things to bring many sons to glory by
making the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings. Look
at Philippians chapter 2. In verse 6, speaking of the Lord
Jesus Christ, he says in verse 5, let this mind be in you which
was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, thought
it not robbery to be equal with God. We sometimes quote that, we don't
stop and pause and think about what that means. It means that
Jesus Christ, as the Son of God, did not consider it to be robbery
to be equal with God, because He is God. John 13 verses 2 and
3 says, when Jesus knew that the Father had put all things
into his hand and that he was come from God and that he was
going to God, he arose from supper and he laid aside his garments
and he took a towel and he began to wash the disciples' feet. From the position and full knowledge
of his place as God and mediator and the heir of all things, what
did he do? He laid aside everything. He
laid aside his garments. And he says here in Philippians
2, the next verse, he made himself of no reputation and he took
upon him the form of a servant. And he was made in the likeness
of men. And verse 8, and being found
in fashion as a man, he humbled himself. What a stoop. It's one thing to be made man. That's a stoop we can't fathom.
But he became a servant and he humbled himself and he became
obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. And God looked
upon his death Did the law require that? Well, in type it did, but there's
nothing in the Ten Commandments that a man has to give his life
for another, is there? I might be misreading it, but
isn't it true that when the Lord Jesus Christ gave Himself, when
He was holy and harmless and undefiled, And He gave Himself,
when nothing required it, but the will of God, that eternal
will, and that love that compelled Him to love His Father and love
His people, that God had given in trust to Him, to bring many
sons to glory. And He obligated Himself entirely. He alone took full responsibility
to save them. God laid our sins upon Him. He
took our debts. He became the ransom price paid
to compensate God's justice so that God could be just and the
justifier. And this was an obedience that
super fulfilled the law. I don't know
how else to say it. It was a righteousness so complete
that God called it an everlasting righteousness. In fact, he calls
it the righteousness of God. He humbled himself, he became
obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. And you know
what happened when God saw that righteousness? After he went
through the process of dying and being buried and our sins
as the scapegoat being put away and God remembers them no more,
having received full compensation, an atonement was made, already
made, when he had by himself purged our sins, we were cleansed. Then God raised him from the
dead and declared him to be righteous. He became obedient to death.
And this was in God's heart from eternity. And it was in Christ's
heart to do this. But he didn't do it just for
himself. In fact, he didn't do it for
himself. He laid down his life for the sheep. Back to Romans
8.32, he says, He who spared not his own son,
but delivered him up for us all. He delivered him up for our offenses. It was substitution. That word
that I think John used last night that summarized the whole gospel,
isn't it? The surety stood before the judge
in answer for his little brother. that he had committed to his
father to bring back again. And he answered with himself,
and he said, let the lad go up free to his father again with
his brethren, but take me instead of the lad. That's what the Lord
Jesus Christ did. He himself bore our sins in his
own body on the tree that we, being dead to sins, should live
unto righteousness. We were raised We were declared
just because he didn't act alone. As by one man's disobedience
many became sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be
made righteous." Romans 5.19. One man's sin plunged all of
his race under the guilt of sin and brought the condemnation
of it and the death of that condemnation. One man's righteousness brought
justification on all for whom he stood and life because of
justification, the justification of life. And until God makes
us know it, until the Spirit of God reveals the heart of God
in shining the light of the Gospel into our hearts, we won't know
it. But when He does, He raises us from the dead. Why? Because
we were justified. We were raised in Christ. And
having been raised by the Spirit of God, He gives us faith. so
that our faith is not the cause of our justification. It's the
view of it. It's the convincing of it. It's
the entering into the peace of it and the joy of it. And we
see God purely and wholly in Himself doing this because this
is who God is. When you've seen me, you've seen
the Father, He says. God has in these last days spoken
to us in His Son, hasn't He? All God has to say, He said in
His Son. And He didn't just say it in
His person, in just His character, but He worked it out. He gave
us a living Fulfillment. Not just an illustration. This
is love played out. This is eternal purpose and delight
of God to show mercy. He had to make His justice so
high that even the death of His Son would be required to satisfy
it. He didn't have to make it that
high. That's how high it is. But He brought such satisfaction
to it that God justifies us. God's justice. He stands in the
court. He's received full payment. A
full righteousness. Satisfaction to the nth degree. A fulfillment of righteousness.
Jesus said, I did not come to destroy the law and the prophets.
I came to fulfill it. Amazing, isn't it? Amazing grace. Amazing grace. We often think,
and it's probably inbred in our nature to think right along these
lines, that we're justified because of what we do. We see the whole
matter of salvation as a transaction. If I believe God, God's going
to justify me. And we think of it that way.
When did God justify Abraham? Well, we know in Genesis 15-6
He declared Him to be righteous because He says He believed God
and God counted it to Him for righteousness. So we know He
was at least then. But what about before? Remember
in Hebrews chapter 11? It says that by faith Abraham,
when he was called to go out into a place which he should
after receive for an inheritance, obeyed and he went out. Why did
he leave the land of idolatry? Why did he leave his father's
house? Because God came to him, and God spoke to him, and God
promised him. And a promise doesn't depend
on our conditions we meet. A promise depends on the one
who promised. And so when Abraham heard God
speak His promise, You know what happened? Faith came by hearing,
and hearing by the Word of God. Did the promise depend on the
faith that He gave to him? No. The faith that was given
to him was part of the promise. And so, the justification of
the believer comes because of God's assessment of
His own Son's obedience, and not because of the assessment
of our faith. Is your faith ever perfect? Don't you pray with
the disciples, Lord, increase our faith? And don't we also
cry with the Father, I believe, help thou mine unbelief? We would
be dishonest to say anything else, wouldn't we? In fact, it's
grace that teaches us to come to God for grace to believe.
And yet we come in believing, and so we are admitting it. But God says in Galatians 3 verse
8, The Scripture foreseeing that God would justify the heathen
through faith preached the Gospel to Abraham, saying, In thee all
nations shall be blessed. So the promise to Abraham was
concerning the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the only way all nations
could be blessed in Him. When they believe Christ as He
did. The promise God gave to Abraham was made before Abraham
believed. And the promise attended with
it the qualification given to Abraham to enable him to believe
God. And in so believing, God says,
that one is righteous. Not because of his faith, his
own act or subjective act of faith, but because of the one
he believed. He's aligned now with God's view
of things. It says in Romans 4, that when
Abraham was now dead, he couldn't bear children, his wife couldn't
bear children, his body was dead. If you look back at Romans 4, He says in verse 19, Romans 4,
and being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body,
now did. When we come into the presence
of God, when God has given us faith, grace, to come to Him,
how do we come? Well, think about how you come
to your dad after you've just done exactly what he told you
not to do. You come, I wonder what dad's going to think. Will
he think, He's my son. Yes, he totaled the car. And he did it while he was drunk.
But he is my son. And so we go through these thought
processes. Or maybe we think, I know what
I'll say. Dad, I'll never do it again. I'll never do it again.
I'll never do it again, right? And so we're thinking what our
father would think of us when we're coming to him and we're
considering what he considers. How does he see things? God had
made this promise to Abraham, and Abraham's body was now dead. The promise was about the Lord
Jesus Christ coming, and bearing the curse for His people, and
giving them His Spirit in order that they might live and believe
on Christ. As we read in Galatians 3, 13, 14. But Abraham's body
was dead. He did not consider his own body
now dead. What is that teaching us? As
believers, we do not consider our own selves. We come into
God's presence considering only one thing. Whatever God thinks. And what does He think? He thinks
of His Son. He raised His Son from the dead
because He was righteous. And God has promised that He
imputes to us the righteousness of His Son. He has made Him to
be sin for us. who knew no sin, that we might
be made the righteousness of God in Him. The Lord our righteousness. Of Him are you in Christ Jesus,
who of God is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification,
and redemption. So Abraham considered only one
thing. God's promise. He considered
Christ. Abraham rejoiced to see my day. And what was the object of his
faith? God who justifies the ungodly. God who raises the dead. God who delivered his son for
our offenses. And God who raised him up again
for our justification. The believer doesn't just believe
in God. I believe in God. I call him by all sorts of names.
Or he doesn't believe in God just as the Creator. Though we
do believe God is the Creator. But we believe in God who justifies
the ungodly because He delivered up His Son for our offenses and
raised Him again for our justification. Because God, in His wisdom, found
someone, His own Son, the only one who could be found, to stand
for us and do all for us. And God will look upon Him forever
and see us in Him. So we come to God in the full
confidence that it's not what He thinks of me, it's what He
thinks of Christ that matters. Isn't it? God did this. pure God. We know something about what
we see of God. You know, it's only when we worship,
it's only by looking upon Christ and Him crucified that we know
God, isn't it? It's only by what He's done that
we actually know Him and can worship Him. But it actually
produces in us This response of worship, you know the Father
seeks such to worship Him. How does He find them? He creates
them. We're created in Christ Jesus
unto good works. Aren't you thankful?