entitled, Sin and Grace. Sin and Grace. I heard preachers
say that if there's ever a sermon preached that does not have as
its subject matter sin and grace, it's a sermon that's not worth
hearing, not worth recording, and not worth writing in a book.
And I think that that's true, sin and grace. Now, my nephew
Christian asked a question, and this is the reason that I've
chosen this title for this message. He said this in his question,
when talking to someone who believes in free will and believes that
all it takes for him to be saved is to accept Jesus into his heart,
and when he asks what I believe, what would you say besides grace? They seem to say they believe
in grace also, and they say they believe God alone saves sinners.
So how do I explain what the gospel is? I've reworded a little bit of
his question, but basically that's it. So the question really is
this, what's the difference between the truth and the error? What's the difference between
salvation according to what man thinks and salvation that God
does. And that's what I want to look
at with you today. Look at Romans chapter 5 and
verse 21, where we read just a moment ago. It says in Romans
5, 21, a very, very powerful verse. In the scripture it teaches us
much about sin and grace. It says, as sin hath reigned
unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto
eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. There's two things
mentioned in this In this verse that you see right up, sin and
grace. You see them there? Sin reigned
unto death, but now something else reigns in its place, grace.
And grace reigns through righteousness and it reigns unto eternal life
and all that is by the Lord Jesus Christ, our Lord. And so we first
need to ask this question, what is sin? Because I used to think
I understood something about sin. But God, when He shows us
what sin is, then it causes us to realize that all and the only
thing that can save us is the grace of God as revealed in Scripture. So, in 1 John chapter 3, it says
this about sin. This is a very elementary statement.
Very true, but still elementary. It says, whoever commits sin
transgresses also the law, 1 John 3, 4. For sin is the transgression
of the law. You break the law, that's sin.
That's what it's saying. If you do not love God with all
your heart, soul, mind, and strength, then you're sinning. If you break
the commandments, God says, don't steal. If you steal, that's sin.
God says, don't lie. If you lie, that's sin. It's
easy to understand, isn't it? Sin is transgression of the law. And when we understand sin at
that level, it's easy for us to put it on billboards, to put
it on buildings, to put it in our own home, and put the Ten
Commandments there, and we see that's what God requires, that
we do not do these things, and we do certain other things. Isn't
it? Isn't that what men do today? They want to put the Ten Commandments
in various places and argue for their appearance there because
they recognize that's God's law and it needs to be followed.
So sin is transgressing the law. But then there's something else
about sin that we don't understand, because everyone can understand
that. Everyone can understand what sin is in that sense. If
you tell, if God says, don't do it, and we do it, and we break
the law, we understand that's sin. Few people would deny that
that's breaking God's law, when we break God's law. But Jesus
said something, he said something else about this. And this we
find in the experience of the Apostle Paul, and we find it
in our experience if we're true believers. He says in Philippians
chapter 3, the Apostle Paul, who was undoubtedly a godly man,
God had saved him. But we listen to his understanding
of what sin was before the Lord saved him, and he says that he
had all these things according to the flesh. He said he was
circumcised the eighth day, in Philippians 3, 5. He was of the
stock of Israel. He was of the tribe of Benjamin.
He could trace his lineage back to those who were of the true
Israelites, I mean, were of the nation of Israel. He was a Hebrew
of the Hebrews, and as touching the law, he was a Pharisee. Concerning
zeal, he persecuted the church. And listen to this, touching
the righteousness which is in the law, blameless. The Apostle
Paul When he looked at the law and he looked at his own life,
he said, I've kept it all. I'm blameless before God in that
sense. I'm not, but he said he was.
When the Lord says, don't steal, don't lie, those very basic things,
I know I've broken those laws. And yet the Apostle Paul says,
I was blameless. But now, here's the thing about
sin. And this is something that we
don't know until the Lord brings it home to us. And this is how
we have to understand the first difference between truth and
error. It starts with this. What is our true condition before
God? What is our true condition? The
Apostle Paul says this. Though I was blameless, he says,
yet all those things, what things I counted gain to me, those things
I counted loss for Christ. In other words, everything that
he considered to be a plus, he considered to be an asset, things
that he thought would recommend him to God or attract God's attention
to him, he said, that in itself is worth nothing, nothing more
than garbage. It needs to be taken out to the
dunghill and dumped out, because that's what I am. Not only that,
but the Lord Jesus Christ made it clear that whoever looks on
a woman to lust after her in his heart, that man has already
committed adultery with that woman. So sin is not something
that just is on the outside. And this is where we have a shocking
realization. Look at Romans chapter 7 when
the Lord teaches us this. from his word in the gospel,
because he says this in Romans chapter 7. He says in verse 14,
Paul says, we know that the law is spiritual. You see that? The
law is spiritual. Okay, so what does it mean for
the law to be spiritual? It means that God gave it. It
means that it's after God's character. It means that it's after God's
holiness and after God's perfections. It reveals who God is. And God
has required us to keep this holy, pure law that reveals Himself
to us, His righteousness. And He's required it of us. But
He says, He goes on in the same verse and He says, But I am carnal,
sold under sin. Do you see that? Even though
the law is spiritual and God requires it of me, and knowing
the fact that the law isn't just an outward set of rules to regulate
us, but that it applies to us inwardly, the Apostle Paul says,
I am carnal, sold under sin. All that the law requires of
me, I cannot do. That's what he's saying. Look
over in Romans chapter 8. In verse 7, he says, in Romans
8, 7, "...to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually
minded is life and peace." Because, listen to these words, "...the
carnal mind is enmity against God." Paul said, I'm carnal,
and he says here that the carnal mind is enmity against God. So
what he's saying is that even though in the eyes of the law
he was blameless, in his own understanding, when the law of
God came to him, It found him as he was, as he truly was, and
revealed to him that he was nothing but a man whose mind, whose very
mind was hostility against God. Hostility against God. That's
what enmity means. Opposed to God. Hostile toward
him. Haters of God. Enemies of God. We read it in Romans 5.10. If
when we were enemies, enemies of God. And then he goes on to
say this about the law of God. He says, the law of God, he said,
I'm sorry, about those who are carnal. He says, the carnal mind
is enmity against God. It is not subject to the law
of God. Neither indeed can be. You see
that? So the carnal mind in no way
can be subject to the law of God. It cannot be subject to
the law of God. Verse 8, so then they which are
in the flesh cannot please God. You see that? When we are in
the flesh, and this is what we are by nature, every one of us
was born into this world in the flesh. None of us came into this
world in the spirit. We were all in the flesh. Jesus
told Nicodemus, that which is born of the flesh is just flesh. What we are by nature is what
we receive from our Father. And we received from our father
what Adam was after he sinned. It says in Romans 5, where we
read a moment ago, As by one man sin entered into the world,
and death by sin. By Adam we sinned. When Adam
disobeyed God, that sin, that disobedience of his, became ours. His disobedience was our sin,
and because he sinned, God pronounced condemnation on all those who
were in Adam. And who was in Adam? The entire
human race. We were all subject to the sin
of Adam, and we were corrupted in him when he fell. So that
when Adam sinned, we not only became guilty, But we became
corrupt, and when we were born into this world, David said it
this way in Psalm 51 verse 5, I was shapen in iniquity, and
in sin did my mother conceive me. And so the Apostle Paul,
realizing these things by the ministry of the gospel, He says
this in Romans chapter 7, he said, verse 9, "...for I was
alive without the law once, but when the commandment came, sin
revived, and I died." So what he's saying is that he had in
his own thoughts, he had in his own thoughts hope before God,
because he trusted in his law-keeping. He thought he was okay. We have
this natural notion, we have this natural idea that we're
actually okay. And that God, and that the reason
that we sin is because we've been tricked or tempted to sin.
That we're naturally good. And that only if we had the right
circumstances, if things were better, if the influences that
caused us to sin were taken away, Or if the teaching that we needed
to understand was put before us, then we can make the right
choice. That's what we think naturally. And so we naturally
think, and this is what error starts with, is that men are
fundamentally good, but they're tricked or tempted to do wrong.
And this is entirely false. This is not the truth of scripture.
Paul says, I was carnal. My mind was hostility against
God. I hated God. And I could not
please God. I could not be subject to the
law of God because of sin in me. Sin in me. And that sin that's
in us, we receive from Adam, we can't avoid it. It's part
of us. In fact, it is our nature. We sin because our nature is
to sin. And so, when it says in Romans
5.21, sin reigned unto death, it means that because we sinned
in Adam and received from him a sinful nature, that sin, God pronounced condemnation on us
because of our sin and the consequences of that condemnation would be
death and so when God said to Adam in the day you eat thereof
you shall surely die when Adam sinned we all died in Adam says
in 1st Corinthians 15 as in Adam all die all died in Adam 1st
Corinthians 15 around verse 22 so So sin reigned, and sin reigned
over us because we had no power over it. How is that? How is
it that we had no power over sin? Well, because it was in
our nature. It is our nature to sin. It is
our nature not to be subject to the law of God. It's in our
nature. We cannot please God. All the things that we are by
sin, we are because of what we've done. what we've done. Adam's sin was ours and we received
a sinful nature from him. But everything we do in sinning
is because that's our nature. It's our nature to sin. And so
sin is that bad. And it happens that this is the
first problem with the difference between truth and error is that
we don't understand fundamentally that we are sinful and that we're
unable to do what God requires. So this is reflected in Matthew
19 where the rich young ruler came to Jesus. He said this in
Matthew 19 verse 16. Behold, one came and said to
him, Good Master, what thing, what thing shall I do? What good
thing shall I do that I may have eternal life? He had a complete
misconception of what he was. What good thing, he said, can
I do or shall I do that I may have eternal life? What good
thing shall I do? He couldn't do good. And Jesus
responds to that in the next verse. He says, And Jesus said to him, why do
you call me good? Why callest thou me good? There
is none good, but one, that is God. And so he answers really
both questions. What good thing can I do? You
can do no good, because only God is good. And he called Jesus
good, but he would have to admit that he was God himself if he
was truly good, which he was. And so this teaches us that we
in ourselves cannot do the good required to have eternal life
because we are sinful, we are evil. And this is what we were
by birth. The truth of the matter is that We were born this way. God didn't
create us this way, but we were born this way. God saw everything
that he had made in the garden, in Genesis 1.31, and he says,
and God saw everything that he had made. which included man
at that time, the last verse of Genesis 1. And behold, it
was very good, and the evening and the morning were the sixth
day. And so Solomon picks up on this in Ecclesiastes 7.29. He says, this only have I found.
God made man upright, but they have sought out every or many
inventions. In Romans 1.30, he says, men
are inventors of evil things. That's why in Isaiah 53.6 it
says, we've turned everyone to his own way. We're inventors
of evil things. We invent our own way. We go that way because sin is
our nature. The only thing we can bring forth
is uncleanness. We can't bring forth good. Job
said, how can you bring forth a clean thing out of an unclean
thing? It can't be done. We cannot produce good. And don't blame it on God, because
James says, let no man say when he's tempted, I'm tempted of
God. God cannot be tempted with evil, and He doesn't tempt men
with evil. But listen to what Jesus told us, because this is
the answer in Mark chapter 7 and verse 20. He says, in Mark 7
verse 20, He said, because they were concerned about, the Pharisees were concerned
about all kinds of things and one of them they were concerned
about is whether they could eat this or that or whether they
washed before they ate and so on. And Jesus said to them, that
which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. For from
within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries,
fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit,
lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, and foolishness. All these evil things come from
within and defile the man. Do you see that? Where does sin
come from? from within me. It doesn't come
from the outside. If you could put me in a room,
in an anechoic chamber, where there's no sound, no light, no
influences, and all you could hear was the ringing in your
ears from your own brain, you would be full of sin. You would
generate sin, because that's what you are. It's in your nature.
It's like expecting to find good fruit growing on thorns and thistles. It doesn't happen. A good tree
brings forth good fruit, but an evil tree brings forth evil
fruit. What does Jesus say here? All
these things come from within, and they therefore defile the
man. Where does sin come from when I sin? From me. It doesn't
come from the outside. Now, it's true that when we are
in an environment where people influence us, we gravitate toward
that. And I remember, you can probably
remember the first time you ever committed certain kinds of sins.
Things that people, I mean, how many times have you heard in
society nowadays, if we could just get rid of drugs, or we
could get rid of pornography, or if we could get rid of the
political Hollywood, or we could get rid of the political corruption. All these things. If we could
get rid of sexual promiscuity, or whatever it is, then things
would be so much better. No, they wouldn't. Because sin
is within us, and sin comes out of us. We produce it. We're an
iniquity or a sin factory. We manufacture sin. Like the
sparks fly upward, sin comes from within us. And therefore,
we are under the bondage of sin. We're under sin's dominion. It's
like Paul said in Romans chapter 7. I read it just a minute ago.
I am carnal, sold under sin. Sold under sin, like a slave.
I've been sold into the marketplace of sin. How did I get sold to
sin? I sinned! I became a sinner because
I myself sinned. Yes, I was born in sin. Yes,
I sinned in Adam. And that sin was my fault. But
then I go on sinning and sinning. As in Adam, all die. But it was
in Adam that we're all made sinners. So that's our problem. And that's
the first thing that we don't understand. The Bible, when Jesus
came into the world, the nation of Israel was in a mess. People,
there was religious factions fighting one another. They were
controlled by an occupying government and an army. And there was corruption
in the priesthood, and in the scribes, and in the rulers of
the people. The people who should be teaching
them God's law were corrupt to the very core. Full of hypocrisy. Stealing from widows. Disregarding the commandment
to honor their father and mother and take care of them. Those
things were rampant in Israel. And adultery. And Jesus comes. And it was reflected in the fact
that men were controlled by devils in that day. They were blind.
They were lame. They were withered. They were
bent over. They were dying. They were dead.
And all these things that Jesus did to heal these people were
to teach us the They were full of leprosy. All these things
teach us the utter corruption and helplessness of these people
that Jesus came to save in Israel in those days in order to teach
us this is the way He finds us. He finds us with the plague,
as Solomon said, with the plague of sin in our heart. And that's,
I think, in 1 Corinthians, or 1 Kings chapter 8, or 2 Kings
chapter 8, I can't remember which, where he says, if a man pray
and recognize the plague that is in his own heart, then hear
thou in heaven. And this plague is in us. It's
in our minds. It's infected us. That's why
God, and the interesting thing is, is that God commands us,
even though we're like this, God commands us to keep his law,
doesn't he? The law doesn't lose its authority
over us because we're sinners. The law still commands us to
keep the commandments, doesn't it? God commands sinners to do
what sinners cannot do. It says here, Romans 8, chapter
8, he says, the carnal mind cannot please God. It cannot be subject
to the law of God. And yet the commandment still
holds, doesn't it? The commandment still holds.
So the first difference between error and truth is that men who
accept the error of false religion, who accept the doctrine of free
will, generally called Arminianism, is that they don't fundamentally
believe that they're sinners. Because if you're ever a sinner,
then the gospel will be good news to you. You won't have a
problem that God chooses us in order to save us because you'll
know that your choice wouldn't work. You would never choose
God. There's none that seeketh after God. There's none that
understandeth. There's none that doeth good. All these things
you're confident. I could never be saved unless
God sovereignly of his own volition chose me because I would never
move toward him. I'm like the demoniac. I'm full
of devils. Or the dead man. I can't hear.
I can't taste. I can't see. I have no interest
in God. It says this in Psalm chapter
10 in verse 4. Take a look at this with me.
This verse was bouncing around inside my brain this week. Psalm chapter 10 verse 4. He
says, Verse three, for the wicked boasteth
of his heart's desire and blesseth the covetous whom the Lord abhorreth. Verse four, the wicked through
the pride of his countenance will not seek after God. God is not in all his thoughts. You see that? That's what we
are by nature. We have no need for God. He boasts, it says, through the pride of his countenance,
he will not seek after God. Why would I seek after God? I
don't need God. I've got everything I need in
myself. I'm a self-made man. The world will say this, never
doubt yourself. Or they would say, trust in your
own heart. But the scripture says exactly the opposite. He
that trusteth his own heart is a fool. And this is the pride
of man's heart. We are naturally self-reliant. We are naturally want to live
independent of God. Why would we think about God?
God's boring. Why would we think about God?
We have no need to respect or revere or fear or call upon God. We don't need Him. I'm pleased
to do what I want to do. I have breath and life and all
these things, and I don't need God. That's the heart of man
by nature. And so it's no wonder that the
carnal mind is enmity against God, hostile to God, seeking
its own glory, claiming its own independence of God, and not
ascribing to God the glory that's due Him only. That's what we
are by nature. And so the false religion. There's only two religions in
the world. Those who trust in Christ and believe salvation
is all of grace. It's of God. And those who believe
the lie that men have some value in themselves. Men have no value. Men are negative value. God has
said so. All have sinned. All have fallen
short of the glory of God. There's every reason in man for
God to be angry at man according to his righteous justice. We
were by nature the children of wrath. The wrath of God is revealed
from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. There's
none righteous. So God's wrath is against us.
And this is what we are by nature. Man, in his arrogance, will not
receive this. We think that we are able to
pay God off by keeping a few external commandments. But the
Word of God pierces even and divides between the soul and
spirit and lays our heart bare before God. And it's powerful. And it can't be resisted. And
God lays us bare before Him. And He shows us that that when
the law of God is understood in its truth, that men are full
of wickedness. This is what Paul was saying.
The carnal mind is enmity against God. It's not subject to the
law of God. It cannot please God. None of these things can
it do. He's saying this, man by nature
is nothing but sin. Man, in his natural state, is
ignorant of God. He cannot know God. He cannot
please God. He cannot keep God's law, not
even one, let alone keeping all of them in order to inherit eternal
life. Then why could God require men to keep his law? Well, because
he's God. It's right. The law is good. The fact that my sinful nature
takes the good law And when that law comes, my sin
only is aggravated by it. When God says, don't covet, I
find all kinds of lust bringing up. When you're prohibited from
doing something by the law, that's the very thing you find yourself
inclined to do. I hadn't been thinking about
that. Suddenly, now that's all I can think about. That's the
way the law works, isn't it? Do not. And whatever that thing
is, that's the thing that becomes interesting to me. Don't touch
that plug, you say to a two-year-old. There's nothing that a two-year-old
can think about except getting over there and touching that
plug. And this is the way we are by nature. We gravitate toward
disobedience and rebellion. And our goal is to overthrow
God on His throne. Sin, if you want to understand
what sin is and what we are by nature, look at what we did when
God himself appeared in human flesh just like us. In the weakness of human flesh,
we took him who had done no wrong and we killed the Prince of Life.
That's what sin does. Sin hates God and will kill God
if it can get its hands on him. So not only can men not do anything,
but there's never a time where that's more evident than in the
area of salvation. Because this is what the false
gospels do. The false gospels say, well I
cannot keep the law. We all understand that. No one
can keep the law. It's evident. But they'll say,
well what we could do though, is we can make the law less strict,
make it easier, and then we can keep it. And so they dumbed down
the law, they reduced the law to its lower level, which says,
all you have to do is repent and believe the gospel. That's
all you have to do. If you can do that, then you
can be saved. But see, we misunderstand the
purpose for which the law was given to sinners. God's law was
given to sinners to show them their sin, to make us guilty,
to not make us, but to reveal our guilt before God. And having
shown us what we are, guilty before God, that immediately
draws down from God his righteous wrath, and also showing that
our nature is to sin, then God has designed the law to leave
us absolutely without any hope in ourselves, helpless. That's
why he says in Romans 5.10, when we were without strength. And
our lack of strength is not owing to some kind of a deficiency
because of weakness. Well, I just wasn't given the
right tools. Our lack of strength is a positive bent toward evil. So our impotency to come to God,
to be saved by Him, is not because we just weren't given the right
grace, but because we fundamentally don't want God. We hate God.
We aren't seeking for Him. We don't understand. How can
we come? How can we adore the one we don't understand? We can't
understand spiritual things. And we cannot enter the Kingdom
of Heaven unless we're born into it by God's Spirit. And so, we
fundamentally misunderstand the depravity of our heart, and that's
the first fault in false religion. Man is utterly guilty, corrupt,
and helpless before God. And until God teaches us that,
we'll never come to Him for mercy. We'll never cry to God for mercy.
We'll never seek salvation in Christ alone. Because we think
that we could somehow, if we could just get things right.
I can commit myself. I can make a decision. I can
dedicate my life. I can make Jesus Lord. I can do all these things. Give
me something to do. That's what we want. Something
to do. And we can't accept free grace. But that's where grace
comes in. Grace comes to those who are
absolutely guilty before God. Absolutely guilty. I mean really,
a real sinner. Someone who's whole life, and motives, and
thoughts, and nature, and practice, and habits, and everything. His
actions, and his words, and everything he does is sin. That's what we
are by nature. And those are the kinds of people
that Jesus saves. There's no good in us, not even
a little bit. There's none that doeth good,
and there's not... Jesus told the rich young ruler,
what good thing? What good thing? You can't do
one good thing. let alone all the good things.
And so he says, well, if you want to try, go ahead. Here's
something that you ought to be able to do. Just sell everything
you have and give it to the poor. And that covetousness was his
vice, and he couldn't get past that. He would rather have sin
opposes its own salvation. 2 Timothy 2.25 says, if God,
peradventure, would grant them repentance unto life, who oppose
their own salvation. God has to grant repentance.
He has to give faith. He has to raise us to life. And all these things only come
to us because of God's grace. So that's where we are. Guilty,
corrupt, justly condemned, and there's no hope for us. in ourselves. There's no hope for us in any
man. There's no hope for us in religion. There wouldn't even
be hope for us if God could influence us. We're so hard-hearted and
stiff-necked that our heart is so stony that even if God were
to apply influences on us so that we could somehow become
better, avoid the wrong and do what he's commanded, even that
would not suffice. Because if it could, then the
Lord Jesus Christ would not have to die. So we must be saved entirely
because God has mercy upon us. He sees our misery and he chooses
to reveal the matchless greatness of his grace towards us in Christ. And so he teaches us in Romans
chapter 5 and verse 12 through the end of the chapter how we
became sinners, because we need to understand this in order that
we can see how God will save us from our sins. He says that
we were made sinners in Adam. we were made sinners. And sin,
we became sinners when Adam sinned. And this is what the whole, all
those verses that we just read from verse 12 and following are
teaching us. That sin entered by one man that
even though there was no law from Adam to Moses, yet people
died? Why did they die if there was
no law, since sin is not imputed when there is no law? Why did
the whole world, except Noah and his family, why was the whole
world destroyed in the flood if there was not sin? Because,
remember, death is the wage that sin pays. And so why did they
die if there was no sin? They died because they had sinned. Not only did they sin in Adam,
but their own conscience testified to them of what was good and
what was wrong. And they sinned. Even though
God hadn't given His formal law, they were worthy of death. And
the entire world died in the flood of Noah's day. All the
way up to Moses, men were dying through Abraham, the king that
tried to take Sarah, all these things, God was charging them
with sin because there was a law. It's just that the law was written
in their hearts, in their conscience, and it was accusing them or else
excusing them, as it says in Romans 2. And yet, even though
we sinned in Adam, How is it that God would charge us with
Adam's sin? Well, this is the thing. God
set it up so that Adam would be our covenant head. Whatever
the head did, all those he represented Also did, just like when David
faced Goliath. Goliath said, if you kill me,
then the entire army is yours. But if I kill you, then all the
Israelites are ours. Just one man, come on, send one
man down here and we will fight. And whoever wins that battle,
all the rest of them belong to the victor. And all those who
belong to the losing side would all be losers. This is what happened
in Adam. We were all in Adam. There was
nothing wrong with Adam. God says, very good. God made
man upright, and yet Adam sinned. You can read it about it in Genesis
1 through 3. But here it is, Adam did fall,
and Adam did sin, and we fell in him. And when Adam fell, the
covenant of works was broken in our head, and we broke it
in him. All in Adam died. It's a sad thing. And if we left
it there, it would be a pitiful and a sad thing. But the angels
all sinned individually. And those who sinned as angels
fell and there was no recovery for them. God never saved an
angel who had sinned. But He kept some from sinning.
God kept them. They were called the elect angels.
And here God set up the race of humanity such that they would
stand or fall in one man. and fell, and fall they did in
Adam. But the blessed gospel news is
that because God by one man's sin entered into the world, also
it could be that by one man righteousness would come. And this is grace.
Here we are, all of us here, each one of us, fully sinners
in ourselves. Not just sinners as a group,
but sinners individually. We have individually sinned against
God. We individually stand guilty.
We individually are corrupt. We are the ones who have a mind
that's hostility against God. Each one of us. Not you or just
me, but all of us. It's universal. It's a universal
disease. We're all dead in sins. And because we're dead in sins,
we walk according to the course of this world, fulfilling the
desires of the mind and of the flesh, and are by nature children
of wrath as others. This is our state. And here we
are. It's a sad and pitiful and awesomely
fearful state to be in. And we can do nothing about it.
But the gospel comes to us and the gospel tells us everything,
everything that God requires of us has been laid on the Lord
Jesus Christ. All of the obligations that God
would have. He says in Psalm 89, I have laid
help on one who is mighty. And Jesus said in Psalm 69, I've
restored that which I took not away. So God laid help on Christ. And this is the wonder of Romans
chapter 5, the last half of the chapter, is that even though
one man sinned and many became sinners, The obedience of Christ
in that covenant head is such that one man's obedience and
all those who were already sinners, already condemned, and already
sentenced to death, now are given righteousness by his obedience,
and that righteousness is unto justification, and justification
before the law is the guarantee of life, eternal life. So Adam's
sin led to our condemnation and our sentence of death. But Christ's
obedience is our righteousness and it is our justification.
And the reward of his righteousness is life and life eternal, not
just life. And so here we stand guilty and
condemned and helpless and corrupt. And nothing can be done for us
except what God has done in Christ. And this is the gospel. God sets
beside us two things. Sin. All that we are and all
that we're bound to and enslaved to is sin. And we can do nothing
about it. And then he tells us about his
grace. All that he has done for us in Christ. And this is just
brought to us as a free gift. He says in verse 17 of chapter 5. He says, Grace would be enough, but no,
it's got to be an abundance of grace. And the gift of righteousness
shall reign in life by one Jesus Christ. So this is the second
part of the misunderstanding between false religion and the
true. Is that the solution to our problem is not to to reverse
our path out of the maze of our corruption and our sin and guilt.
We can't get out of the problem by undoing what we've done. That doesn't work. We're corrupt. We've already broken the bridge. We've already separated ourselves
from God. God is justly angry with us. Nothing can be done by us to
remove the sin of our soul, and we would have no inclination
to do that. to right the wrong. We don't
know God. How could we? We're blind. We can't see. We're not spiritual. We can't think God's thoughts.
God's thoughts are so much higher than ours as the heaven is above
the earth. But God has done something. When
we were enemies, God reconciled His people by the death of His
Son. Now false religion would say,
well, the law was replaced by the gospel, and now all you have
to do is repent and believe the gospel. Or maybe we forget about
repentance because we find that even that we can't do very well,
so we just have to believe. All you have to do is accept
Jesus into your heart. Let's make up a few catchphrases for
this. Walk the aisle, raise your hand,
accept Jesus, invite Him into your heart, and then After those
things, commit your life, dedicate your life, do these things, read,
pray, witness, and all these things, and pretty soon we have
a different law, a law that men think they can keep. Of course,
when you get it all, there's always the case where we can't
even get our kids to ask Jesus into their heart. Finally, we
get them when they're young, they ask Jesus into their heart, and then
the rest of their life, they're completely wayward, and they
go out of the way, and we say, looking back, well, at least
when he was young, or she, Ask Jesus to save them, and then
once saved, always saved, they are saved. And even though we
don't see any evidence of it, God has saved them. This is not
true. This is not true. This is sadly false. You see,
the gospel is not a smaller version of the law. The gospel still
requires perfect and full obedience to God's law. Jesus said, I didn't
come to destroy the law and the prophets, but to fulfill them.
The law has to be answered in its full requirements for justice
against the sinner and all of its requirements for obedience
from the sinner. And in God's grace, he found
a way to provide that in the Lord Jesus Christ, the head of
all of his people as their covenant head, to provide and do for them
what they could never do and would never do themselves. The
Lord Jesus Christ came, look at verse 19 of Romans 5. For
as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by
the obedience of one shall many be made righteous. Many? All those in Adam are the many
that were made sinners. Many? All those in Christ are
the ones who were made righteous by His obedience. How do I get
into Christ? God puts us into Christ, God
chooses us in Christ, and God gives us to Him. And the Lord
Jesus Christ willingly takes our responsibilities to Himself
as our surety and provides to God all that God requires in
order to save His people. That's called grace. Grace does
for us what we would never do and could not do ourselves. Grace
does what God requires. for the sinner, God reconciles
himself first to the sinner, and then because he's given grace
to us in giving his son for us to die, then he takes that same
grace and he brings the sinner to himself by grace. Grace from
first to last and everything in the middle. God chose us because
of his grace. He chose us in Christ Jesus before
the world began. We certainly weren't there then,
not in our person, but we were there in our head, our Lord Jesus
Christ, and He chose us in Him. And He chose us unto be His adopted
sons, in love as His adopted sons. He chose us as His sons.
He made us His sons by His choice of adoption. So in time, the
Lord Jesus Christ, because He was partakers of those who were
promised to Him, remember, not the seed, not the children of
the flesh are counted as the children of God, but the children
of promise. The children of promise are those given to the Lord Jesus
Christ, promised by God to Him. And so the Lord Jesus Christ
comes and fulfills everything for them. He does for them all
that's needed to save them from first to last. from first to
last. Look at Romans chapter 8 in verse
29. He says this, For whom he did
foreknow, he also did predestinate, to be conformed to the image
of his Son, that he, the Lord Jesus Christ, 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. This verse teaches
that if God ever foreknew a man, then he will be glorified in
heaven. There's no break in the chain of God's grace. Grace is
an unbroken chain from God's choice and love that He sets
on His people, which is an everlasting love, to His drawing, to His
redeeming them by Christ, drawing them by His Spirit, keeping them
in grace, and presenting them before Himself in glory. That's
what grace does. Grace does everything. Grace
does everything by Jesus Christ. That's why it says in Romans
5 21, grace reigned through righteousness, the obedience of Christ, unto
eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. Grace reigns. It reigns
like a king. It can't be stopped. This reign of grace is more powerful
than the reign of sin. It overcomes sin. It buries sin
in the death of Christ. And it raises us to life without
sin unto salvation. This is grace. From first to
last. So God tells us of His grace
in order that we might stand in ourselves, helpless, in misery,
because we know we're condemned, like Paul, unable to do the law. We know we're guilty and carnal
and all the things that God would require of us. From first to
last, we cannot produce one. Not even one. We can't do one. If God requires anything from
us in order that we might be saved, we will be lost. God has
to do it all. That's what grace is. God's riches
at Christ's expense. That's what grace is. Everything
is laid on Him who is mighty. And so we have this verse in
Romans 8, 29, and 30 that teaches us that if God ever foreknows
a man, that man was predestinated to be conformed into the image
of Christ as God's own adopted Son, in order that Christ might
be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover, those He predestinated
in time He calls And that call is an effectual, irresistible
call. And those calls He justified
in Christ when Christ shed His blood on the cross in obedience
to God to death. And those He justified ultimately
will be glorified. There's no brokenness in that
chain. That's the comfort of grace, isn't it? I'm a sinner. I know I'm a sinner. I sin daily. I see a struggle constantly in
my flesh. There dwells no good thing. And
I wonder sometimes, do I have a part in this grace? Because
I see what seems to be a dominance of sin and and in place of righteousness.
And what do I do? I take the misery of my need
to the Lord Jesus Christ and I present it to him in prayer
through his word. And I say, only you can save
me from this sin, your mercy. You are more inclined to show
mercy than I am to seek mercy. Way more inclined. God teaches
us through grace that Christ's blood and righteousness is sufficient
to cover all our sins. He teaches us that. He teaches
us that we have no righteousness to bring, so never consider bringing
anything of yourselves. Not only that, but all of our
sin cannot prevent us from being saved because His grace is greater
than our sin. His grace is greater. That's
the reign of grace. Grace reigns through righteousness,
the righteousness of Jesus Christ. And that reign will undoubtedly
be delivered to us in the eternal life with the greatest joy of
God before the throne. And it's pictured in the prodigal
son, isn't it? The father stands and sees his wayward son coming
home. God saw his elect people in the
pig pen of hypocrisy and false religion and free willism and
everything that we trusted in. Thinking that we could come to
God by these things. Eating the husks that the swine
have and never being satisfied. And He left us in an unsatisfied
state and drew us, drew us with the cords of a man, with the
cords of love, so that we would come to Him. And when He sees
us coming by the influences of His grace, He runs to His Son,
and He falls on His neck, and He kisses Him, and He doesn't
stop kissing Him. And He calls for the ring, and
the robe, and the shoes, and He kills the fatted calf because
to those that the Lord calls from their prodigal life, he
brings Christ out and he preaches Christ to them and he says, the
Lord Jesus Christ is all of your satisfaction, all of your forgiveness,
all of your hope. Isn't grace wonderful? Sin and
grace. Our sin, it leaves us dead, without
a prayer in ourselves. No hope, but grace from God,
free and rich and abundant, given to us in the Lord Jesus Christ,
saves us from the lowest and takes us to the highest place
of glory. That's what grace does. And God tells us this so that
we will magnify His mercy, praise Him for His grace. Amen.