I'm going to try not to wander
away from this microphone, but I might get into it and start
running around. My name is Trey Mason. I graduated
from Gramercy in 2011. I married the class of 2012's
valedictorian, Sydney. She's the eldest of House Tucky,
which makes Autumn my sister-in-law. So watch out, guys. But enough about me, because
this is not about me. It's not about who I am. It's
really not about what I have to say. But it is about what
God has said in his word. So what we're going to do today
is look at God's word and see what it has to teach us. We must
begin today by understanding the significance of what we are
about to do. I'm going to read to you and
teach to you the Word of God. We need to understand what this
means because it's incredibly easy being a student at a Christian
school to downplay the significance God's Word has for our lives.
And this isn't a judgment upon you guys. This is my experience
being, having been in your shoes for several years. It really
is an honor to come back here and teach God's Word to you,
because this is the place where God's Word was taught to me,
week in, week out. And I want you to see how important
this is and to understand what we're really doing here. It's
easy to confess that the Bible is God's Word without understanding
what we're saying or believing what we're saying, and this is
what we need to correct first. In 2 Timothy chapter 3, Paul
writes, all scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for
teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,
that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
So in this one sentence, Paul takes the Bible, and he places
it in a place of authority. He elevates it to the highest
place that it can be. And so first we see that scripture
is breathed out by God. It is God breathed. So when you
read the scripture, you are reading the very words of the God of
heaven, the creator of the universe. God has given us this word as
his own revelation to us about himself. And this alone is reason
enough to dive into this book every single day. Because God
is the creator and great sovereign over all creation, his word is
the greatest, first, and final authority on all things in heaven
and on earth. And this is the understanding
that we must approach the Bible with every time we read it. Paul
further goes on to give us some details about what God's word
can do for us. He tells us that the Bible is
profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and
for training. In teaching, the Bible tells
us everything we need to be saved. In the scripture, God has revealed
that he exists eternally as three distinct persons, God the Father,
God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. The Bible teaches us
that God the Son became a man called Jesus and that he was
fully and truly God and man. It teaches us that Jesus lived
a perfect life without sin in a human body with the same flesh
and blood that you and I have. He faced the same temptations,
the same struggles, the same trials that we faced, and yet
he did not sin. The Bible teaches us that Jesus
suffered on a cross and he died. It teaches us that on that cross
Jesus took upon himself the sins of all who believe in him, satisfying
the wrath of God's righteous justice against our sins. And
it teaches us that Jesus was buried and three days later he
rose again and is now seated at the right hand of the Father. And perhaps most importantly,
it teaches us that if we believe only this, we have eternal life. And this is the gospel of Christ. In Romans 1 16, Paul says, I
am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power
of God for salvation. This gospel is the way God saves
his people. It is God's power for salvation. And if you believe it today,
you will have eternal life. In addition to teaching us what
to believe, the Bible has much to say about what not to believe.
There are many things that the Bible does not talk about that
we are not to believe, but because they are inconsistent or contradictory
to the Bible. But there are also things that
the Bible explicitly calls out. It says, do not believe this.
Reject this teaching. One such thing is in the book
of Galatians, Paul teaches against the doctrines of what he calls
the circumcision party. This was a group of Jews in Galatia
who were either recent converts or unconverted people who were
in the church causing division by teaching the Gentiles that
they had to be circumcised in order to be saved. Now Paul calls
this no gospel at all. all because they were adding
to the gospel of Christ. They were saying that faith alone
in Jesus is not enough. You must do something else. This
is not good news. Paul says it is no gospel at
all because this is very bad news. If you believe this, then
you have not believed the true gospel of Jesus Christ. In 2 Thessalonians, Paul warns
the church against anyone who says that Christ has already
returned. He goes so far as to say that God sends such people
a strong delusion so that they may believe what is false in
order that they may all be condemned. And so the scripture tells us
what we should not believe. But that is not all. The Bible
doesn't just tell us what to believe and what not to believe,
it also tells us what to do and what not to do, right? If you've
read the Old Testament, you know that there's a lot in there about
what you ought not do and what you ought to do. We're all familiar
with the Ten Commandments. In Luke chapter 10, we see what
Jesus calls the two greatest commandments. You shall love
the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul
and with all your strength and with all your mind and love your
neighbor as yourself. In these two commands we have
a summary of the entire Jewish law. The four commands are of
the Ten Commandments are summarized in the command, love the Lord
your God. And the last six are summarized in the command, love
your neighbor. And so this is the training and the reproof
that Paul speaks of in 2 Timothy 3. The Bible trains us to act
as we should and to walk in a manner worthy of the gospel. And it
tells us what not to do. It rebukes us when we are wrong
and we are doing what we shouldn't do. And then in the last verse,
Last bit of verse 17, Paul tells us that the Bible equips us for
every good work. This book speaks to every aspect
of our lives and it equips us to live in a way that glorifies
and honors God. And so the particular good work
that we're going to use the scripture for today is actually going to
be interpreting scripture. So, obviously not everything
in the Bible is perfectly clear the first time you read it, right?
Sometimes you open the Bible and you read a passage and you
say, I have no idea what that means, I need to read it again. Well, there
are some things where you read it, you don't know what it means,
but there's somewhere else in the Bible that speaks more clearly,
that tells us what it means over here. And so that's what we're
going to do today. We're gonna Look at what it means
when Paul says that Christ is put forward as a propitiation
by his blood. But we're going to begin in the
events of Matthew 17, and we're gonna use Paul's teaching in
Romans 3 to understand the significance of these events. So if you have
your Bibles or are sitting in a pew, grab the pew Bible and
open it to Matthew 17. We're gonna begin in verse one
and go through verse eight. Matthew writes, and after six
days, Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, his brother,
and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured
before them and his face shone like the sun and his clothes
became white as light. And behold, there appeared to
them Moses and Elijah talking with him. And Peter said to Jesus,
Lord, it is good that we are here. If you wish, I will make
three tents here, one for you and one for Moses and one for
Elijah. He was still speaking when behold, a bright cloud overshadowed
them and a voice from the cloud said, this is my beloved son
with whom I am well pleased, listen to him. When the disciples
heard this, they fell on their faces and were terrified. But
Jesus came and touched them saying, rise and have no fear. When they
lifted up their eyes, they saw no one but Jesus only. Let's pray. Father God, open our hearts and
open our ears to receive this word today. Let those in here
who have ears, let them hear this word and let them believe
it for the salvation of their souls. God, we thank you and
we praise you for this gospel that you have given to us through
your holy word, and we thank you for the work that your son
Jesus Christ has done for all who believe on the cross in his
death and in his resurrection, bringing life to your people. God, be with me. Bless my voice
as my throat begins to get sore as we get through this. And God, I pray that you would
protect me from saying that which is not true. God, defend your
word before me as I deliver it to these students. God, and if
I do say anything wrong, swiftly bring me to repentance and correct
me. God, I thank you, and in your
son's name we pray, amen. So we begin. in these events
of Matthew 17, we're gonna pick them apart, see what they mean,
and understand what Paul has to say about them. So we begin
with Peter, James, and John. This is not James the brother
of Jesus, this is James the brother of John. They're the sons of
Zebedee. They were sort of the inner circle. They were Jesus' closest, most
intimate friends. And so, When Jesus asks them
to come up on this mountain, I imagine they thought they were
maybe kind of special. Now, the Bible doesn't tell us
what they were talking about as they walked up the path of
this mountain, but I can imagine that there was maybe a sense
of eagerness or anticipation in their hearts for what was
about to happen. They didn't know what they were
doing, but Jesus had called them out specifically and said, let's
go up this mountain. And so, when they reach the top,
it seems like there should be something there, but the scripture
doesn't tell us. The Bible doesn't give us an
introduction. Jesus doesn't say, I'm sure you're
wondering why I've gathered you all here today. All it says is that he was transfigured
before them, and his face shone like the sun. And his clothes
became white as light. So Jesus and these three men
get to the top of this mountain, and now Jesus is shining like
the sun. I've stared at the sun. It's
really bright. You shouldn't do it. But here's
a man standing in front of Peter, James, and John who is shining
like the sun. That sounds terrifying to me. But this is a miracle that is
meant to reveal something to us about Jesus. In Philippians 2, 7, and 8, Paul
teaches us that God the Son in some way emptied himself of his
glory as the God of heaven. And then Jesus here gives these
men a glimpse of that glory. This miracle is meant to show
us the supremacy and the glory of Jesus Christ And so I want
you to set your mind on this idea as we move on. Then in verse
three, we see that Jesus is now not alone. It says, behold, there
appeared to them Moses and Elijah talking with them. So we have Jesus, who is shining
like the sun, and then we have Moses, who just shows up. He's
the guy that wrote the first five books of the Bible, Genesis,
Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. And then we also
have Elijah, one of the great prophets of Israel, and they're
standing there having a conversation. Probably something that Peter,
James, and John have never seen before. Two men from several
thousand years ago and Jesus standing around having a conversation.
Jesus is shining like the sun. So we need to understand the
significance of these two ancient people. So first we have Moses.
I said he's the author of the law. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus,
Numbers, and Deuteronomy is the law of God. And so Peter, James,
and John are all Jewish men. And so being Jewish men, they
would have been very familiar with the law of God. Because
a Jewish man doesn't become a man without knowing the law of God. Because a Jewish man is the head
of his family, and he takes responsibility for his family in seeing that
they obey the law of God as he obeys the law of God. So I guarantee
you that All three of these men, Peter, James, and John, were
very familiar with the 613 laws in the Old Testament. So this law here represents the
righteousness of God, the righteous standard of God, and it governs
every aspect of the life of a Jewish man. So Moses represents the
authority of the law of God over these
three men, Peter, James, and John. But we also have Elijah. Elijah's one of the great prophets
of Israel, and he is particularly noteworthy because Elijah never
died. Okay, Elijah took his little
mentee, Elisha, with him out into the desert, and some men
of Israel followed them, and they came to the Jordan River,
and Elijah just parted the river, walked out into the riverbed,
And then a chariot of fire with flaming horses descends from
heaven and Elijah is just taken up into the sky. And that's where
Elijah went. He never died. He was just taken
up in a whirlwind by a chariot of fire. And then here he is
standing next to Jesus and Moses in front of Peter, James, and
John. And now Elijah represents all
of the prophets of God who spoke to the nation of Israel during
the Old Testament. So we have Moses and Elijah who
together represent the whole Old Testament, the law and the
prophets, standing together with Jesus Christ, the God of heaven
before these men, Peter, James, and John. And so to these men,
Moses and Elijah represent all authority on earth and Jesus
represents all authority from heaven. And so it seems to me
that in the presence of such great company, these dirty Jewish
fishermen would have nothing to contribute to their conversation.
The scripture doesn't tell us what Moses and Elijah and Jesus
are talking about, but I can only imagine that it's something
glorious, like, hey, how's heaven? Because Moses and Elijah have
just come from there. So I really can't emphasize enough that Peter,
James, and John had nothing to contribute to their conversation. And with that, we see in verse
four the following words, and Peter said. So we're going to
stop, and we're going to try to wrap our brains around why
in the world Peter would have anything to say in this company.
So Peter's pretty famous among the apostles, right? He's famous
for saying the perfectly wrong thing at the perfectly wrong
time. For example, you go back one
chapter into Matthew 16, we see Peter shooting his mouth off,
rebuking Jesus. Yes, rebuking Jesus. Jesus tells the disciples of
what is to come that Jesus will go to Jerusalem to die, and Peter,
who is awkwardly ignorant of the significance of the death
of Jesus, which he should have been aware of, because it's spelled
out very clearly in Isaiah 53, Peter proclaims, far be it from
you, Lord. This shall never happen to you,
referring to the death of Jesus. And Jesus promptly responds by
saying to Peter, get behind me, Satan. Jesus calls Peter Satan. And so once again, Peter has
something to say. But. Before we look at what he
says, we need to sort of put Peter into the context of this
situation, because this isn't like the last situation where
Peter said something dumb. The last situation where Peter
said something dumb, he was sort of in the privacy of him, Jesus,
and the apostles. There's no one else around. Peter
just says something dumb. Jesus corrects him. But now Peter
is standing before Moses and Elijah, and Jesus is shining
like the sun. And so we need to understand the importance
of Moses and Elijah being here in this situation before we see
what dumb thing Peter said next. And so we're gonna go to Paul,
the Apostle Paul in Romans chapter three. He does a very good job
of sort of condensing everything that Moses and Elijah have to
say about Peter, okay? So if you've got your Bible,
go to Romans chapter three. We're gonna begin in verse 10. Paul writes as it is written. And so when someone says as it
is written, it means it was already written before Paul wrote it.
He says, none is righteous, no, not one. No one understands,
no one seeks for God, all have turned aside. Together they have
become worthless. No one does good, not even one.
Their throat is an open grave. They use their tongues to deceive.
The venom of vipers is under their lips. Their mouth is full
of curses and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed
blood. In their paths are ruin and misery, and the way of peace
they have not known. There is no fear of God before
their eyes. So Paul isn't giving us new information
here. Paul is telling us what the Old
Testament has to say about the heart of man. This is what the
Old Testament has to say about Peter. And this is what the Old
Testament has to say about me and about you. Paul is putting together the
pieces and showing us who we are and who Peter is apart from
the grace of God. And so, because this is from
the book of Isaiah and the book of Psalms, this quote here, this
little poem that Paul gives us, this is what Elijah represents.
Elijah is the representative of the prophets, represents the
prophet Isaiah and the prophet David in our conversation here
on the top of this mountain. Now, Paul also tells us what
Moses means for us in Matthew 17. In verses 19 and 20 of Romans
3, Paul says, Now we know that whatever the law says, it speaks
to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped,
and the whole world may be held accountable to God. For by works
of the law, no human being will be justified in his sight, since
through the law comes knowledge of sin. Paul tells us that the
law is given so that every mouth may be stopped. But why is Peter
speaking? This is what Moses represents
here to Peter. He is there so that Peter's mouth
may be stopped. Paul tells us further that by
works of the law no man will be justified. And Peter is about
to tell us all about his works. And so, let's review. We have
all authority from heaven in Jesus Christ, shining like the
sun. We have all authority on earth and the law and the prophets,
Moses and Elijah. And so Peter says this, Lord,
it is good that we are here. If you wish, I will make three
tents here, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah. And so we must pause again to
reflect on what was just said. So it was crazy enough that Peter
had anything at all to say. And we can't miss the significance
of what Peter just said. He's standing before Moses, Elijah,
and Jesus, who is shining like the sun, and he thinks it's a
good thing that he is there because he can build a tent. Now, in order to sort of capture
how ridiculous this is, there's maybe a hypothetical situation.
This didn't really happen, but if this had happened, this would
have been on the same level as what Peter says here, okay? If
you go to John 6, Jesus is talking to a group of Jews about himself,
and he tells them this. I am the living bread that came
down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread,
he will live forever. And the bread that I will give
for the life of the world is my flesh. And then Peter says,
yeah, but have you tried garlic bread? Now, obviously Peter didn't
say that, but that is sort of the level of stupidity and absurdity
that Peter has reached here by bragging about making tents. And so we're going to continue
on in the narrative of Matthew 17, and then we're going to sort
of revisit what Peter's statement really means here, because it's
not actually the important thing. Who knew? So what we're about
to see is Peter getting put in his place in a mighty way. We're
about to hear three statements. These three brief statements
are the crux and the climax of this passage. We will see that
these three statements are paralleled perfectly in Romans 3, as Paul
gives us the deeper theological significance of what is said.
So in verse 5, back in Matthew 17, it says this. He was still
speaking when, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them. So Peter's
in the middle of a sentence, still going off about his tent
making idea, when this bright cloud materializes around them,
and then the cloud speaks, interrupting this babbling apostle, and it
says, this is my beloved son, with whom I am well pleased,
listen to him. We can't miss this because this
is the most important thing that I will say to you today. God
speaks. This is the voice of God the
Father coming out of the cloud directly from the great throne
of heaven. And we're going to allow Paul
to explain these words for us. So first God the Father says,
this is my beloved son. God the Father is identifying
the man standing before Peter. This man is the Christ, the Messiah,
the God of heaven become flesh. And up until now, we've been
focusing on Moses, Elijah, and Peter. We have seen from Romans
3, 10 through 20, who these men are. And Paul now writes in verse
21 of Romans 3, but now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart
from the law. Jesus Christ is the righteousness
of God. We saw before that the law represents
and defines the righteousness of God, but now we have the righteousness
of God standing before us in the flesh, the son of God. And we now see his glory, glory
of the only son from the father, full of grace and truth from
the words of the pages of scripture. Jesus is the perfect righteousness
of God, the spotless lamb. Paul goes on, the law and the
prophets bear witness to it. They bear witness to Christ.
The law stands to display the unrighteousness of man and it
stands to display the righteousness of Christ and the prophets stand
to point to and proclaim the coming Messiah, the righteousness
of God become flesh. Paul now goes on to make an important
distinction. We're back in Romans 3 now, if
you're following along. We saw in verse 20 that by the
works of the law, no human being can be justified, but now we
see that the righteousness of God can be had in this way. The
righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ. Paul reminds
us in verse 23, there is no distinction for all have sinned and fall
short of the glory of God. Peter sinned. Peter has fallen
short of the glory of God. I have sinned and I fall short
of the glory of God and you have sinned and you all fall short
of the glory of God and we all together fall short of God's
glory. And we see with Peter, that the
glory that he has fallen short of is standing before him. So it seems like he is in a little
bit of an awkward position, having fallen short of the glory, now
standing before him. But I tell you now that we have seen the
glory of Christ in the pages of scripture, and we have fallen
short of that glory that we sit before now as we read his word. But despite this sin, this falling
short that we have done for every second of our lives, we have
fallen short of God's glory. Despite Peter's arrogant boasting
about building a tent, Paul says, we are justified by his grace
as a gift through redemption that is in Christ Jesus. And
all of this is wrapped up in God's words, this is my beloved
son. So in God's next statement about
Jesus, he says, in whom I am well pleased. God is well pleased
in Christ. This is both an identification
of Christ's perfection and a foreshadowing of Christ's redemption. Paul
tells us in verse 25 of Romans 3, Christ whom God put forward
as a propitiation by his blood. We need to understand this word,
propitiation. Has anyone ever used the word
propitiation in a sentence? I have only ever used the word
propitiation in a sentence when talking about what Paul says
about propitiation in Romans 3. But it is in the Bible and
God used the word when he spoke through Paul to write these words.
So we need to understand it. Perpetuation means the satisfaction
of wrath. And so we saw in verse 19 of
Romans 3 that the whole world is held accountable to the law
of God. This is the wrath. Because God
is righteous and just, God must judge the world. In the first
two chapters of Romans, Paul spends a lot of time talking
about this wrath. He talks about all the different ways in which
men, Gentiles and Jews, have stored up wrath for themselves. Too often preachers and teachers
choose not to speak of God's wrath at all, but it is necessary,
even though it is uncomfortable to think that the loving God
has wrath and anger. Because God is righteous and
holy, as he says, as Paul says in Romans 1, God's wrath is revealed
from heaven against all unrighteousness. And this is where propitiation
comes in, the satisfaction of wrath. God's wrath is against
my sin. God's wrath is against your sin. God's wrath is against Peter's
sin. And you, me, and Peter, we all
owe a debt for that sin. And remember that disturbing
picture that Paul painted for us in verses 10 through 18. None
is righteous, no not one. No one understands, no one seeks
for God. That's talking about us. God's wrath is against us
for that sin. It all applies to us. except that this is the gospel. Jesus took that wrath. All the wrath, the righteous
anger, the fury of God's justice is poured out upon Jesus Christ
on the cross. Every nail that was driven into
his body, the crown of thorns pressed upon his head, the spear
that pierced his side, the beatings, the floggings, the spitting,
the mocking, and the shame is what was due to us. This is what
we owed God. But Jesus Christ took all of
it on our behalf. God's wrath was poured out upon
him for my sin and for the sin of all who believe in him. And God was completely satisfied
in it. God's wrath is no more. against
those who are in Christ because God was well pleased in the sacrifice
of Christ. This is what it means that Christ
is the propitiation by his blood. His blood was poured out onto
the earth and it washes clean the souls of those who believe
in him so that God's wrath is satisfied against us. God is
well pleased in his beloved son. And we need to understand the
necessity of this sacrifice. this pouring out of wrath, God
cannot simply forgive us. Because God is just and God is
righteous. In Hebrews 9.22, the author writes,
without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins. Without the spilling of blood,
we cannot be forgiven. Paul continues in verse 26 of
Romans 3, this was to show God's righteousness because in his
divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show
his righteousness at the present time so that he might be just
and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. So we
see here first that God passed over former sins. This is referring
to the sins of God's people, the saints of God, the nation
of Israel during the Old Testament, because they sinned too. all
the way from Adam to Jesus, every single one of them sinned. But for God's people, Jesus paid
the price for their sins. God did not pour out his wrath
upon the people in the Old Testament until Christ. And in the same way, we are saved. Every single person who has ever
been born of God has been saved in the same way, and that is
through faith in Jesus Christ. In this way, God is now just
to forgive us because he is the justifier of the one who has
faith in Jesus. So on the cross where Christ
died, two things happened. God is declared and proven to
be just, and those who believe in Christ are justified. And
then the last thing we hear from God in Matthew 17 is, listen
to him. God gives Peter this final command,
listen to him, hear the words of Christ. This is the faith
Paul speaks of in Romans three, when he says the righteousness
of God through faith in Jesus Christ, propitiation by his blood to
be received by faith. Jesus throughout his ministry
declares this gospel, believe on the son, believe on the one
sent from heaven, believe on the Messiah, the son of God,
and you will have eternal life. And so we finally see in Matthew
17, these three disciples of Jesus do what they should have
done the moment Jesus began to shine like the sun. When the
disciples heard this, they fell on their faces and were terrified. They had been confronted with
the immense and immeasurable glory of God and the shining
Christ, and they have heard the words of the Father come down
from the throne of heaven And they can no longer do anything
but fall on their faces in fear. And they have seen Peter's error. They have seen the face of God. But Jesus came and touched them
saying, rise and have no fear. Christ commands them now after
they have been humbled into the dirt of that mountaintop to rise
and have no fear. And when they lifted up their
eyes, they saw no one but Jesus only. Moses and Elijah are gone. The cloud is gone. There is only
Christ. There is only Christ. Paul says
in verse 27 of Romans 3, what becomes of our boasting? It is
excluded. There is no law to boast in because
Moses is gone. There are no more prophets to
cling to because Elijah is gone. There is only Christ. And we
can finally see the significance of Peter's boast. We can see
what it means for us. Peter boasted when he had nothing
to boast about. Do you boast when you have nothing
to boast about? I did. I boasted when I had nothing
to boast about. I made a profession of faith
when I was nine years old and I was baptized. And I thought
that was why I was saved. And so I trusted in this profession
of faith and in this baptism. I prayed a prayer and that was
good enough, or so I thought. We see here that if you are trusting
in anything other than Christ alone for your salvation, you
have believed a false gospel because as the circumcision party
in Galatians did, you have added to this gospel of Christ. There
is no prayer. There is no baptism. There is
no aisle to walk down. There are no magic words to say. There are no clothes to wear,
no school to go to, no faithful parents to have that can save
your soul. There is only the finished work
of Christ on the cross and taking God's wrath in your place. And that is it. That is all that
there is. There is only Christ. Jesus commands you now, rise
and have no fear. There is no condemnation for
those who are in Christ. Put your faith in Jesus. Put
your faith in Christ alone. There is only Christ. Let's pray. Father God, we thank you for
this word that shows us who we really are. And we thank you
so much more for this word that shows us who you really are. God, we have seen who we are. We have seen the disgraceful
state that our souls are in apart from your grace. But we've also
seen your glory in sending your son to die on a cross to take
the wrath that should have been ours. God, I pray that your spirit
would move as your spirit wills and save the souls of the people in this room. God,
we know that it's by your power, by the gospel that is your power
for salvation that we are saved. God, open the hearts of these
young people to receive this word and to believe it for their
salvation. We pray this in Jesus' name,
amen.