Romans 4, verse 20. It says, no unbelief made him,
and him being Abraham as the subject, made him waver concerning
the promise of God. But he grew strong in his faith
as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to
do what he promised. That is why his faith was counted
to him as righteousness. But the words it was counted
to him were not written for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be counted to us who
believe in him, who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who
was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.
Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace
with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we also have
obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand,
and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Not only that,
but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces
endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces
hope. And hope does not put us to shame,
because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy
Spirit who has been given to us. For while we were still weak,
at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will
scarcely die for a righteous person, though perhaps for a
good person one would dare even to die. But God shows his love
for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for
us. This is one of my favorite places
in this section of Romans. And it's probably one of the
most popular places that we see there as we closed out that in
verse 8 of chapter 5. For God shows His love for us
that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. That is the
end cap of this great argument that Paul has been dealing with.
starting in verse 21 of chapter 3 all the way down through verse
25 of chapter 4. And when he starts there, he
begins to help us to realize just what Christ has done as
a way of reminder, as a way of teaching the doctrine, and as
a way of exposing the theology that is so important for us as
the people of God to hold to, and to embrace, and to relish,
and to have joy in and through. But there's several things in
review from last week that I want us to see. When it says in verse
20 that no unbelief made him waver concerning the promise
of God, but that he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory
to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he promised,
That is why his faith was, quote, counted to him as righteousness.
When we see that, oftentimes we get the idea, and I talked
about this last week, that Abraham was this patriarch of solidity. That Abraham is looked at in
some way, and he was by the Jews, as this incredibly obedient person. when it came to following after
the Lord. But we saw that there was 13
years between God's justification of Abraham effectually in the
context of his decree and then the birth of Ishmael and his
circumcision which began his obedience to the law as a Jew
There was 13 years there where Abraham was justified. I believe
I read to you all last week part of the Jewish writings where
they exalt Abraham as this great man that walked with God to such
a degree that he is exalted as the example to be followed. Not Christ, of course, because
they rejected Christ, but Abraham. They also worshiped Moses in
the same manner. And so we see here Abraham's
unwavering faith was not and unwavering flesh. So sometimes
when our faith seems to be weak, it's because our flesh is weak,
but our faith doesn't have to be strong in order for it to
be effectual. Jesus used the illustration with the disciples.
If you have the faith the size of a mustard seed, which is one
of the smallest things that that culture could comprehend with
any solidity, something you could hold in your hand that's so tiny
that if you dropped it, you would never find it on the ground.
So if we have the weakest of fates, it's enough because we
are trusting even in the smallest bit in the promises of God. So
Abraham's faith, though unwavering, was always weak. Abraham's flesh
was usually always weak. Abraham said to God in Genesis
17-18, that Ishmael might live before
you. We see that Abraham and Sarah
took upon themselves to create the promise of God in their own
lives. They decided that they would do something because what
God had promised them was an impossibility in their mind.
And so, though they had unwavering faith, they did not have an unwavering
flesh. And they failed to believe in
God and took it upon themselves in their flesh. And even Abraham
prayed that God might make Ishmael the son of promise. But it was
not. He was not the son of promise.
Right before that, Abraham fell on his face and he laughed. And
he said to himself, the scripture says, Shall a child be born to
a man who is a hundred years old? And shall Sarah who is ninety
years old bear a child? And so when we think about the
reality of where Abraham and Sarah were, it is an impossibility
for them to experience the promise of God in this world and in the
flesh. It was something that had to
be miraculous. It is something that had to be
divine. So keep in mind, beloved, that
Abraham's unwavering faith was not an unwavering flesh. We also need to be reminded as
we discuss this and move forward about Abraham's unwavering faith
was that he heard and remembered the promise of God. He heard
and remembered the promise of God. In Genesis 17, 19, in that
same little place where we are talking about what Abraham was
saying, God spoke to Abraham and He said, No, but Sarah, your
wife, shall bear you a son. See, Abraham in his flesh was
weak. And God answered him when he
said, Cannot Ishmael be the man before you? He said, No. Sarah,
your wife shall bear a son, and you shall call his name Isaac. I, God speaking, will establish
my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his offspring after
him. We have a song that we love to
sing called, He Will Hold Me Fast. When I fear my faith will
fail, he will hold me fast. Though the song and its orchestration
is quite contemporary, the language and the lyrics of that hymn are
quite antiquated. They're very old. And if we were
to think about that, we love to sing that truth. Why? Because
in the weakness of our flesh, it is our hope. In the weakness
of the flesh of Abraham and Sarah, their hope was that God would
hold them. Their hope was that the promises
of God would keep them in the faith. Their hope was that the
promises of God, no matter how they messed it up, would never
fail. And that is the point of what
Paul is trying to reiterate over and over and over again. If we
look at verse 21 of chapter 4 and it says, He was fully convinced. That means that He knew that
God would fulfill His promise and He believed in the fact that
God would fulfill His promise even after many failures in His
flesh. Even after many failures. in
his flesh. In verse 23 we see, but the words,
quote, it was counted to him were not written for his sake
alone. Verse 24, but for ours also. It will be counted. Listen to the word of the Lord
here. It will be counted to us who believe in him, who raised
Jesus from the dead, Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for
our trespasses and raised up for our justification. See, Abraham's
unwavering faith in the midst of failure and doubt is for our
sake. What good would it do for us
to see the annals of history of the Old Testament saints and
see this man named Moses that walked perfect and never sinned
and never doubted and never failed? And what good would it be for
God to only record the two or three times out of thousands
of opportunities where Abraham was obedient and successful in
his faith? What good would it do for us
if we saw all of the strict obedience Paul, and we saw all this great
walking of Peter and all the good-natured obedience of Andrew
and John and James and the others, but we never saw their humanity.
We never saw their depravity. We never saw their failings.
What it would do for us, it would put us into a place of legalism.
It would put us in a place of fear. It would put us in a place
of being justified by the works of the law, and we would say
our object is those men And those women who walked before us, that
we might also walk before God in the like manner, and we would
never have hope, we would never have peace, we would never have
power, we would never rejoice, even if we faked it, our smiles
would truly be fake, because we would fear that any moment,
any month, any time, on any day, we might fall into hellfire and
judgment. So Abraham's unwavering faith
in the midst of failure and doubt is for our sake. These things
were written, it was counted to him. What was counted to him?
The small, insignificant amount of faith that he had in the promises
of God was counted to him as righteousness. And it says we're
not written for his sake but for ours also. And our faith
also will be counted as righteousness before God because we believe
in Him who raised Jesus, our Lord, from the dead. who was
delivered up for our sins and raised for our justification. See, this faith that we are supposed
to have, this believing in God and believing the promises of
God would be counted as righteousness because Jesus, who is the Christ,
is our Lord. Do you see that? I want you to
understand that this phraseology here is not just ripping off
the titles of Jesus. Jesus our Lord, Savior, King.
This is not what the apostles do. They don't just frivolously
deal with just saying the name of Jesus like we do. Oh Lord,
oh God bless. We say that in a blasphemous
way in our culture. We say God bless for anything.
We say oh Lord for anything. The weather looks bad. Oh Lord,
the weather looks bad. Paul doesn't waste his ink just using words
and titles. He uses Jesus Christ as our Lord. Lord because He is the sovereign
ruler of all things. He's the master over all things.
He is the owner of all things, especially and particularly His
church. But look at that identifier.
What Lord is it? Is it the Lord of them over there?
Is it the Lord of that kingdom? Is it the Lord far off? No, it's
our Lord. So there is an intimacy there
with this expression. It's Jesus who is the Lord, but
He is our Lord. He is our Lord. There is ownership
there. We belong to Him. Jesus Christ
gave Himself for us. He died and was raised for our
justification, so therefore, the intimacy that we have with
the God of the universe is due to His love for us. He is our
Lord. Our King, our Savior, we are
His prize. We are the object of His affection.
Friends, we are the church, His bride. We do not serve a God
who stands over us in judgment. We serve a God who condescended
into us in mercy. We need to understand that that
is where our worship comes from. Paul would tell the church of
Ephesus three times to the praise of His glorious grace after he
taught the gospel over and over again. Our Lord, He gave Himself
for us. This is intimacy with God. And
it is because of God's great love for us. I want you to think
about that for a second. We know who we are. We know what
we deserve. But God loved us anyway in the
giving of the Son. He loved us anyway. And Paul
will later say over in chapter 8, There is therefore now no
condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Why in the world
do we condemn ourselves? Why do we put ourselves in that
position? Why do we take God's place as judge and say to ourselves
that we are guilty when God has said that we are clean? We need
to be very careful about not forgiving and not receiving by
faith the forgiveness that is found in Jesus Christ. He is
indeed our Savior, the Lamb of God that has taken our sins away.
See, the proof The proof of the love of God
is seen in the fulfillment of God's promises. God promised
Isaac, and He gave Isaac, didn't He? God's not a liar. God's not
one who loves conditionally. God's promises are yes and amen. They are done. Amen. They are
finished. Amen. They will take place. And so we see the love that God
had for Abraham through the giving of Isaac. But it was not only
Abraham that God's affection was placed upon. It is all the
elect, all the redeemed, all who would believe in Jesus Christ.
For it is through Isaac that Jesus comes. And it is giving
of Jesus proves the love that God has for us. Why? Well, because
that's what the Scripture teaches. That God loved the world in this
way, that He gave His one and only Son, the only one that He
had. That whoever is the believing one should live forever, but
whoever is not the believing one is condemned already, for
they are not believing on the name of the Lord Jesus. And then
we see there in that text that He was raised for our justification. In the resurrection of Jesus
Christ, we see the fulfillment of God's promise. We see the
fulfillment of God's promise in the Incarnation. We see the
fulfillment of God's promise in the Cross. Because God loves
us. And God's going to fulfill His
promises. He was delivered up for our sin. He was delivered
up for our unbelief. He was delivered up for our depravity.
He was delivered up to pay the penalty of our sin that we could
never pay in eternities of eternities. We could never make ourselves
righteous before God. But God made us righteous before
Himself through the person of Jesus Christ. And He was raised
for our justification. So that, as Paul's already said
in Romans 3, so that God would be the just and the justifier
of all who have faith in Jesus Christ. Beloved, we are the just. We are the righteousness of God.
Because Christ, who was promised, has come and died and been raised
to life. Paul understood this very deeply.
With all of the morality and all of the ethical considerations
that he had, all of the strict adherence that he had to the
law of Moses and all the 613 laws that he professed out of
his own mouth, according to the flesh, according to the law,
he was blameless. He says these things in Philippians
3. But whatever gain I had in this type of living, whatever
gain I had, I count it all as loss for the sake of Christ.
Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing,
listen to the words, surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus
my Lord. My Lord, for His sake I have
suffered the loss of all things, and count them as trash, in order
that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having a righteousness
of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through
faith in Christ, who is the righteousness from God that depends on faith."
So, when we continue to look, and see what Paul is arguing,
it flows very naturally in that little recap into chapter 5.
Look at chapter 5 verse 1, he says, Because the righteousness
of God is displayed apart from the law. Because the righteousness
of God is displayed in the giving of the Son. Because the righteousness
of God is displayed apart from the obedience to the law. Because
the righteousness of God is shown even in those people who think
that Abraham followed after God. It is not Abraham's faithfulness
that caused him to be justified. It is the faithfulness of God.
Because of all these things, we now therefore, since we have
been justified by faith, We have peace with God through our Lord
Jesus Christ. We have peace with God. Therefore,
through the work of God and Jesus Christ alone, by faith we are
justified. We have peace through God objectively,
and we have peace through God subjectively. Let's look at those
things for a minute. It's all there in the text. This
is all repeat. Paul's just repeating himself
over and over again, like a broken record. Why? Because we need
to hear it again. We need to hear it again. Beloved, let me
tell you something. When we leave out of here tonight,
your spirit could be lifted, your soul could be washed, your
mind could be on eternal things, and before you get home to your
doorstep, the devil can steal your joy. Before you trip out
in the parking lot, the devil can take your joy straight away.
He can take it. He can, and he will, and that's
why we must continually eat from the depths of the riches of the
glory of God through His Word, because there is no There is
no way that we can keep the enemy at bay. We must fight him with
the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God, and we must
invest our time diligently and disciplined in the Scripture,
lest our flesh be tempted and we fall away. We have peace objectively. The source of our peace is Jesus
Christ. Through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Intimate language again. And
this union of our peace is with God. We are at peace with God
the Father, the righteous judge of the cosmos. The product of
our peace, the outcome of our peace. Not priest, but it is
our peace. Jesus is our high priest. The product of our peace
is what? Eternal life. Joy. And the power, how is this
even possible? Because of the mercy of God.
Objectively, we all have eternal life through Christ. We have
peace with God through Christ. We have mercy in Christ. We are reconciled to God perfectly,
three Ps, here they come, powerfully and permanently. We are reconciled
to God. We are reconciled to God. Perfectly,
powerfully, permanently. Nothing else we do or do not
do matters in this issue. Nothing that we do or do not
do matters in this question. Nothing that we do or do not
do matters in this equation because God has subjectively, I mean
objectively, given us peace with Him and nothing can stand between
it. And you might think, man, I really,
I want to see that. I don't see it. But in chapter
8 verse 28 and 29 it says, for I am convinced. Paul used that
same language here just a minute. I am thoroughly convinced. that
nothing, no life, no death, no height, nor depth, nor riches
or poverty, and I'm just going to add some stuff, powers or
principalities of darkness, nothing, nothing, nothing in all of creation
can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus
our Lord. Nothing we do can separate us from the love of God. Nothing
we do to each other can separate us from the love of God. No attitude,
no sin, no wickedness, nothing. And beloved, when we preach the
gospel, and that's the gospel, nothing can separate us from
the love of God which is in Christ Jesus, because He lived as we could
not live and satisfied God's holy requirement as a human being,
and He died in our place to satisfy God's holy justice as a human
being, and He was raised from the dead for our justification,
and by faith alone we are perfect before God. That's the gospel. When we preach that gospel, it
attacks the very center of our humanity. It attacks the very
center of our desire to be like God. It attacks the very center
of the control unit of our psyche, if I can use those words. And
it makes us want to start working out our salvation in our own
power. And we're called antinomian, or we're called, you know, we
just don't believe it's grace plus works. No, it's not. If
it's grace plus works, then Christ died for nothing. That's what
Paul says. And if Christ died for nothing,
then He was raised, He was not raised from the dead. If He was
not raised from the dead, Paul would tell the Corinthian church,
then we of all people must be pitied mostly. Most of all. We're reconciled to God. So we
have peace. God's judgment is satisfied.
We have peace. So we go in peace through Jesus
Christ. Do you have peace tonight? Do
you have peace in the gospel of grace? Are you looking for
God to do something else in you, to change something else in you?
Well, if I could just get this addiction out of the way, then
I would have peace. If I could just get this anger
out of the way, then I'd have peace. If I could just get this
haughtiness out of the way, then I'd have peace. If my children
would obey, if my spouse would just straighten up, then I'd
have peace. No, you have peace right now in the midst of all
of that because of what Jesus has done. You have peace with
God, and what else matters in comparison? Nothing. Nothing
else matters in comparison, you see. Nothing. But in our world
today, let me tell you the biggest enemy of the cross. Jesse and
I were talking about this earlier this morning. The biggest enemy
of the cross of Christ in our community is not the cults. It's not the word of faith garbage.
It's not the prosperity gospel. It's evangelical Christians who
put their stamp of approval on their own way to grace. It's
evangelical Christians who profess to be in Christ, who work themselves
to the bone to prove it. It's evangelical Christians who
preach a works gospel and call it truth. How many of us could
easily say we were brought up under such teaching? Because
that is what the devil is in the business doing. When Scripture
tells, when Paul teaches the Thessalonians, when Paul teaches
them that God will send a grand delusion, listen to this. When
Paul tells the Thessalonians that God will send a grand delusion,
and if possible, even the elect would be deceived. Friends, that's what he's talking
about. He's talking about it. He's not talking about it. Nobody's
going to be deceived by some monster in the ocean. Nobody's
going to be deceived by some great glorious cult leader. Those
people are deceived already. Listen, the biggest deception
is a lie with a skin of truth on it. Satan tempted Adam and
Eve with a lie with a skin of truth on it. You'll be like God. Taste it. you'll be like God. It's a skin truth. Did God say, Beloved, where in
the world is there anything in scripture that teaches that our
assurance in this work of God comes from anything within us?
Where is it? Where does it look? Oh, I know
where it is, Pastor. 1 John. This is the message we've
received from him, that in it he is light and there is no darkness
in him. So if we say we have light, but we walk in darkness,
we lie. What's the context of that? What
darkness is he speaking of? Yeah, you're smoking and cussing.
That's it. You're not in the faith. That's nothing to do with
it. Some becoming to curse. Paul says so in Ephesians. Because
you curse or not curse, God's not more pleased with you. God's
not going, look at my little baby John down there, not cussing.
Look at that. I wish everybody would be a saint
like that. If God were a hillbilly or a redneck. No, God's not like our mothers
and grandmothers that see us put on our angelic little goody
two shoes and we go visit them. And then we act and talk and
speak like we want to when we're out with the boys. No, God doesn't
look at us and say, well, what in the world? There's a little
Jimmy Stewart coming out of there. Now, what is John saying when
you don't love your brother? That's the darkness John's talking
about, 1 John. That's the situation we see in
Galatian, the Galatian church, churches of Galatian. We see
that, what's their issue? That they're adding to the gospel
of grace. What can we do to be more like Christ? We've got to
secure ourselves. We've got to do these things.
This is what Paul is fighting against right now. Because these
Romans, so bad, wanted to walk like the Hebrew people. And Paul's like, you're killing
yourself. Literally, killing yourself. Stop it. And there's
other instruction. Like I say, chapter 6 is coming. No, we don't continue in sin
that grace may abound. But we've got to be careful not
to call sin what the Bible doesn't call sin. Objectively, we're reconciled
to God. Verse 2, through Him we also have obtained access
by faith into this grace in which we stand and we rejoice in hope
of the glory of God. This is big. I might not finish
it. I might not finish verse 2. Maybe I will. Subjectively,
Right now in our subjects, we experience peace with God. You
see that? Peace with God right now. Peace
is here now. Peace is with us. As we long for that eternal place
of peace, the eternal presence of Christ, face to face, we still
have the peace of God. How does that look? We can pray.
We can pray to God. We can live right now. and worship
God. We can express our adoration
for the grace of God, for His glorious grace. We can worship
Him. We can be free from the law, no longer bound to the ineffectual
precepts of its demands. And not only that, but we're
free. We have the peace that is ours
in Christ. We're free from the penalty of
sin and the wrath of God and His justice. So because these
things are true, then in our being we can rest in the sufficiency
of the work of Jesus Christ. We can rest as God the Holy Spirit
works in us. We can rest. I think I said this
this past Sunday. But who you are right now in
this life as a believer is who God has ordained you to be this
very moment. And if you look to me, in the good or the bad,
as your example, you have failed to see grace. You have failed
to see the gospel. And you're not content with the
person that God's made you to be. So we're to be content with evil
desires? Heck no. You're not to be content
with your evil desires. We put them to death. How can
we do that? Because Christ lives within us. We put them to death.
But are they ever really gone? If they were gone, we'd have
to put them off. See, we don't believe in a sinless perfection.
And the outcome of that is, oh, let's just do what we want to
do. That's ridiculous. Nobody in this fellowship believes that. But what we do is that we trust
that even when we strive, we know we are imperfect in the
striving. And even when we fail, go back to 1 John, We have an advocate with the
Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous, who is our propitiation. That
means the satisfaction of God's wrath is finished. It's paid. We can rest in the sufficient
work of Jesus Christ as the Spirit works in us. And He works in
us every day. He molds us and matures us in
the riches of His glory, the mercy of His love, the mercy
of Jesus Christ. So we have access, look at that.
Through Him, we have also obtained access by faith into this grace
in which we stand. Where do we live, church? With
peace. Do we live in peace with God
through obedience? No. We live in peace with God
through the obedience of faith. We believe on Jesus Christ. See
the difference that makes? You see the difference in that?
Never should we exercise the life that we live, the liberties
that we have, or the putting to death of our flesh out of
fear. We should do all of those things
by faith. We should never do them out of fear. Now some people
hear those things and they say, hyper-grace. Hallelujah. If that's what you call hyper-grace,
you stick the tag on my head. Because that's the truth of the
gospel. It is the only way to salvation. And if there's any
other way, then we're all lost. Because we've been believing
what Paul's been teaching. We've been believing what Jesus has
been teaching through the evangelist John. We've been believing. But
sadly, so many people in our culture, so many people in our
communities believe the lie of their of themselves establishing,
as they say, no, no, no, it's Christ alone, but establishing
themselves before God in a manner that the Scripture does not command.
It's dangerous. And that is the point of what
Paul is teaching here. We're at peace with God because
of what Christ has done. You see that? Doesn't it make
you feel better? Doesn't it make you feel better?
So that when, you know, we go to, let's just say we have, let's
go, let's see, like, 1 Peter 2. Put away all malice, deceit,
hypocrisy, envy, slander. Long for pure spiritual milk. Just those little things. Yeah,
man, I'm guilty. We don't have to feel guilty.
We don't have to feel guilty. anymore because we know that
we're at peace with God even when He commands us to do those
things. Because He commands us to do
those things for our good, not for His pleasure. And not to
earn us a place before Him. It's a big difference, isn't
it? It's a big difference. I used to wonder when I was a
young person how some authorities and figures in my life I hated
to obey. I hated to obey them. But there's other authority figures
in my life that I love to obey. You know why I love to obey some
and hate it to obey the other? I mean, that's a sin to hate
to obey authority. Because some people in my life loved me dearly. And they doted on me and they
gave me themselves. What can I do for you? You know
what I'm talking about? You know, you've had these people as children.
And you can never really be anything bad in their eyes, even when
you did something bad. And when you did and they looked
at you and they went... And you just were broken that you had
disappointed them. See, that's how we should approach
our relationship with God. Because of what Christ has done.
Not the other way. Can you ever get anything right?
You're worthless. You ever had somebody tell you
that? You know, I've said those things before. Isn't that terrible?
Said those things to people in my life. Possibly even my own
children. And then turn around and... Be reminded by the Holy
Spirit, wow, if God said that to you, then the gospel would
be a lie. We have peace. And we stand in
it this day because we stand in grace. We stand in the grace
of God. And because of that, what it
says there is that we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.
You see, we don't rejoice in the glory of God, though we do
because we say, woohoo! But that's not the point of this.
The peace that we have causes the rejoicing. It comes through
Jesus Christ. And our rejoicing is in the hope. See, Abraham, remember the subject
of this argument to begin with. Abraham, he believed in the hope
of the promise of God. He believed in God. We believe
also in the hope of the glory of God. We have access by faith into
His grace. And this is how we stand now
and forever, so that then we can rejoice by faith and no longer
fear. Let me say that again. We can
now rejoice by faith and no longer fear. Are you scared in your
Christian wall? Don't be. Don't be. Do not fear failing. By faith walk. That sounds odd to our ears,
but it is exactly what Paul is teaching here. How do we do that? We rejoice. You ever rejoice
when you were scared? Is that the natural outcome of
fear? No, we cower. We hide. We don't want to see
our judge face to face. Rejoicing in worship is for us
to see him and not hide from him. What is it that John says
in 1 John? What does he say? He says, love,
perfect love casts away all fear. So in this now, what? We rejoice. What do we rejoice in? In the
hope of the glory of God. The glory of God who is Jesus
Christ. We hope in Him. The glory of God. Not in self-righteousness. This is the context of Paul's
argument. It's hard because we go week
to week to week to week to week and we read through it and we
lose the sight of it. Paul is condemning self-righteous exaltation. Paul is condemning spiritual,
fruitful evidences of our lives in relationship to the gospel
of grace. These are separate things not
to be convoluted, not to be molded in like a cake mix. They're separate things. William
Hendrickson is a man I like to read. I wrote a lot of great
commentaries and exegetical commentaries on the New Testament. He says
about this particular verse right here, Quote, we do not, like
certain self-righteous people, brag about our own accomplishments,
but we place all of our confidence in God and in Him we then greatly
rejoice. Paul would say in 2 Corinthians
4, 17, for this light, momentary affliction is preparing for us
an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. See, the hope
is in what we rejoice. The hope of the glory of God. Jesus, who is our hope of glory. Remember that? What did He tell
the Colossians in verse 27 of chapter 1? The latter part of
that sentence? He says that to them God chose,
to whom? The Gentiles is the context.
To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles
are the riches of the glory of this mystery. See that? The riches
of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you who is
the hope of glory. So, we talk about faith alone
and Christ alone. This is the point. This is the
debate. And this is where it stops. What
does it mean? It means that we're forever joyful.
We're forever rejoicing. We're forever trusting. We're
forever living. We're forever striving to rest
in the sufficiency of Christ. That is the work of God. That
we believe in Christ no matter what happens outside this body
or inside this body. God will work these things out
with us. Discipline helps to correct error
and sin, does it not? Let the Lord's Word correct His
people. And let us live in the hope of
glory, who is Jesus Christ. In verse 3, not only that, you
mean that's not enough? That's enough, Paul. But not
only that. Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings,
knowing that suffering produces endurance and endurance produces
character and character produces hope. And hope does not put us
to shame because God's love has been poured into our hearts through
the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. So this furthermore,
not only that, but there's more. We rejoice in suffering. Why?
Because they produce endurance. What does that mean? The strength
to be able to maintain our faith. How much faith? Faith that looks
like it's given up, that falls on the floor and cries and snots
up the carpet and says, Oh God, where are you? What am I doing?
Am I even your child? Is there any hope for me? I hate
this life. I wish it were over. I don't
want to live another breath. Please, dear God, throw me into
hell that it might be over and I can face your justice. Who
said that? I've prayed that exact prayer
on the floor of my house before. And then four days later, go
preach. Sufferings. Sometimes the suffering
is just trying to see how in the world I can still be in Christ
with all of the internal turmoil that can be going on. But it
produces endurance which strengthens us to stay the course. It is
not us who strengthens ourselves. It is the Spirit of God who's
been poured into us by grace. You see that? given to us, poured
into our hearts. Why did He do that? Because He
loved us, see? Because God's love has been poured
into our hearts through the Holy Spirit given to us. In the world,
we rejoice in our suffering because they strengthen us to stay the
course and endure. And because that strength then
produces character. There's a lot I could say about
character. I don't want to play with words. Let's just talk about
it straight-laced as we know what it means in our own culture.
Character is how we are, it's who we are. It produces maturity,
our character develops. Little children, you know, we
can see some semblance of what they might be, but as they grow,
they develop character. They become who they're going
to be. We produce, I mean, God produces through the endurance,
through suffering, our character. We are maturing. And as we mature,
that means our faith goes from a mustard seed to two mustard
seeds. And maybe by the time we're in
our 90s, we've got like a little sack of mustard seeds about that
big, and we've got a lot of faith, and we'll never be shaken. Because
it doesn't take any more than that. And that maturity, that
growth produces what? Hope. It produces hope. You're like, Lord, I want to
have faith. I want to have hope. I want to be strong. Hallelujah. That's the recipe. That's the
cookbook for having hope and strength and maturity. What is
it? Suffering. It's suffering. Sorry, guys. God said it, not
me. Don't get mad at me. It's the
truth. This is how we're going to grow.
This is how we're going to have faith. Through suffering. Why? How, rather? I've already given
it away. God's love has been poured into
our hearts through the Spirit of God who has been given to
us. Listen, we're not alone. We're not abandoned. God doesn't
knock on the door and check on us every few minutes, or every
few days, or every few months, or every few years. God is in
us, beloved. God is with us at all times,
in us, securing our election, securing our sanctification,
securing our righteousness through Jesus Christ and the work that
He's done. There is no other way to be at peace with God.
There is no other strength that we can muster. There is no other
character that we can grow in ourselves, and there is no place
to find hope except through these things. This is a glorious truth
that God has poured His Spirit into us. The God, the Holy Spirit,
The third person of the Trinity lives within us. Why? Why would God do that? Well, do you really want to be
on your own in this journey? A lot of people do. Now, see,
none of us in the room would go, yeah, I can't wait to be
abandoned. Well, we're not going to be.
But most of us think, well, I got it. pull my pants up to my chest
and tie my boots up good, and I'm gone. I'm leaving. I'm going
to march in this way, and I've got it. No, we don't have it.
Because at the end of it all, the reason God has saved us to
begin with, what is the outcome of our salvation, is His glory. So if we can boast before God,
if Abraham was justified by works, Paul says he has something to
boast about, but not before God, It's for the sake of God. In
our weakness, He is strong. In our weakness, His power is
revealed. In our weakness, His mercy is sufficient. His grace
is sufficient. And He is glorified. If we can
secure ourselves in the faith, if we can secure ourselves in
our joy, if we can secure our own holiness, then God is not
glorified. We are. We recognize this truth when
we suffer. We're reminded of this truth when we fail. We're
gently corrected in this truth when we sin. And we are empowered in this
truth when we're broken. And the outcome is that then
we rejoice in Him. We rejoice in Him. Why? Because He's worthy of rejoicing.
He's worthy of our praise. He's worthy of our affection.
He's also proven He's proven himself to be faithful. God has
never failed. He's never lied. He makes grandiose
promises and outlandish promises that the rest of the world would
look at and go, this is ridiculous. Just like Abraham, this is ridiculous.
God, we know that you can do it, but this is how it's going
to be done. We got this, God. We got this. And God's like,
no, you can cry all you want. Ishmael is not my man. Your wife
in her 90s is going to have a son. So hold on and trust me. So we rejoice then in the Lord because He's powerful.
Hebrews chapter 7 verse 25, consequently, listen to this text. You might
even want to close your eyes and just get the picture. Consequently,
He is able to save to the uttermost. Says it again, He is able to
save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through Him,
Christ, since He always lives to make intercession for them. What is the drawing near? This
is what we do when we get to the place every day where we
recognize that we are not able. Faith is, I've just got to have
Christ. Faith is believing in Christ. Faith is trusting in Christ. And that's it. Why is it that
we, that God had to condescend and come down. Why couldn't we
just do something in ourselves? Look at verse 6 and 7 and 8,
and we'll preach these next week. But in closing, for while we
were still weak at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for
a righteous person, though perhaps a good person would dare even
to die. But God shows His love for us
in this, that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
So not only is it that we were unable and weak, it's that we
were unworthy. who are unworthy. But because
of God's mercy, we are at peace. Let's pray. Father, it feels like we just need to see
something catch on fire and hear Your voice. It's how glorious
Your Word is. And Lord, there are many of our
fellowship father who because of the holidays and other things
are not able to hear this teaching in person. I pray that they would
be driven to the website and hear it. Because I think as a
church we need to hear this. We need to embrace this very
powerful truth. Lord, that we need to pray for
each other with these things in mind. And so God, I pray that for all
of us, that we would rest in the sufficiency of Jesus, that
we would rest in the hope of Your glory, who has saved us
from Your wrath, at the cost of Your Son, who is Jesus the
righteous. And it is in His name that we
pray. Amen.