Welcome to Reign of Grace. This
program is brought to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries,
an outreach ministry of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany,
Georgia. It is our pleasure and privilege
to present to you the gospel message of the sovereign grace
and glory of God in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. We pray that today's program
will be a blessing to you. Thank you for listening. And
now for today's program. Welcome to our program today.
I'm glad you could join us. If you'd like to follow along
in your Bibles, I'm going to preach a message that is the
second part to one I started last week. And I urge you, if
you haven't heard the message last week, to go on our website
and look at that. The title of the message is Propitiation. That one word, propitiation,
this is part two. And as I explained last week,
what I'm doing is a word study. But I want to, again, caution
you about doing word studies because you have to understand
that words mean different things in different contexts. But this
one word, Propitiation means the same thing each time that
it's used in the King James Version of the Bible, where it's translated
from the Greek to the English. You find the word translated
the same way three times, and then we looked at last week another
form of the word that's found in Luke 18, where the old publican
in the parable of the Pharisee and the publican, the publican
said, God be merciful to me, a sinner. And that term be merciful
is a form of the word that's translated propitiation. The
publican would be saying, Lord, be propitious towards me. And then we looked at beginning
in Romans 3.25 where it speaks of Christ. Let me just read that
verse. I dealt with it last week and
I'm gonna go on to two other verses that use this word because
we need to understand it. He's talking about Christ in
Romans 3.25, whom God hath set forth or foreordained or predestinated
to be a propitiation, there's the word, through faith in His
blood, that's His death, to declare His righteousness, that's the
result of His death, satisfying justice, bringing forth an everlasting
righteousness, which Paul called the righteousness of God in Romans
117. And he said to declare His righteousness
for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance
of God. Now what he's saying there is
that all through the Old Testament, before Christ actually came in
time and did the act of redemption by his obedience unto death on
the cross, the Old Testament saints were under the forbearance
of God because God saved them in the same way that he saves
New Testament saints, based upon the blood, the righteousness,
the satisfaction that Christ made to God's law and justice
for the whole election of grace. In other words, God, he saved
Adam, Abel, you could go on to Enoch, go all the way through,
Abraham, all of them. based upon the sacrifice of Christ,
to them, it was in the future. But in God's mind, it was already
a done deal because it was good as done. As some of the old theologians
used to say, when the Father and the Son struck hands in the
covenant of grace, it's a done deal. And it was so sure and
certain to happen, to take place, because this is God, you see,
who never fails. It was so sure and certain to
happen, that God did not bring His damnation down upon these
sinners who deserved it, just like us, but He saved them by
His grace. He justified them. He forgave
their sins and declared them righteous based on what? The
satisfaction that Christ made for them, made for all His people
on the cross in His obedience unto death, that's the propitiation. Satisfaction. And as I said last
week, think of propitiation this way. It is a sin-bearing sacrifice
who brought about satisfaction to the justice of God so as to
ensure Not make it possible, but to ensure the salvation of
every sinner whom He represented stood for assurity and substitute
and redeemer on that cross. And this word propitiation tells
us that. There's not going to be one person
who perishes in hell, for whom Christ stood and did the work
of this propitiation. It's a done deal. And it says
in Romans 3, 26, to declare, I say at this time, his righteousness. What is his righteousness? It's
the merit of his obedience unto death as the surety, the substitute,
and the redeemer of his people. the sins of his people were charged
imputed to him, the debt, and his righteousness, the merit
of his righteousness is imputed to them. And that's how they're
justified, to declare his righteousness that he might be just, that God
might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.
You might ask the question, and this question is asked throughout
the scripture, But I think about the book of Job. One of Job's
friends asked this question, and Job himself asked him, how
can a man, now that, when he says a man, he's talking about
a sinful man. How can a sinful man or woman be just with God? How can that happen? Because
you know, God always deals in truth. God never, God never,
He's never unjust. He never does anything wrong.
He never breaks His law or perverts His law. He always deals in truth. And when He, how can He have
mercy or grace or love a sinner like me and still be a just God? Because I know this, we've all
sinned and come short of the glory of God. He said that. In
other words, if God ever gave any of us what we deserve or
what we've earned, it would be death and hell. Now that's true. And that goes for the best of
us and the worst of us, everybody in between. That's why salvation
is not by our works. That's why salvation is never
conditioned on us. That's why it is by grace. Oh, sovereign grace. And the
Bible says in Romans 5.21, that as sin hath reigned unto death,
even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life
by Jesus Christ our Lord. And that righteousness is the
result of His propitiatory sacrifice. Now, in order to save us from
our sins, God had to appoint a suitable, able, and willing
substitute, and that's Christ. Christ was made our surety. So
the first passage that we find in the New Testament where the
word propitiation is used, it means satisfaction to God's justice
for the sins of His people so as to ensure their salvation
and eternal life. There's not gonna be one person
in hell for whom Christ died. Those for whom He died, He is
their propitiation. Now, let's go to another passage
where that word is used. It's in 1 John 2, the book of
1 John. In fact, the next two passages
where that word is used is in 1 John. So go to 1 John 2. Now, this is a passage that many
people have wronged because of a preconceived notion. If you're
like me, you probably grew up hearing preachers tell you that
God loves everybody, Christ died for everybody, now it's in your
hands. But my friend, that is not the
biblical way of salvation. That is not the gospel. In fact,
it's a false gospel. Does God love everybody without
exception? The Bible says no. In fact, the
Bible says in Psalm 5 that He hateth all workers of iniquity. Now, somebody asked me years
ago, they said, well, aren't we all workers of iniquity? Not
in this sense, we're all sinners, but iniquity there means that
we do not measure up. That no matter how good we try
to be, we still fall short of the standard of perfection of
righteousness that can only be found in Christ. But here's the
point, if I'm saved by the grace of God, I have a perfect righteousness
that measures up and it's nothing that I did. It's not my works. It's not even my faith as far
as my believing. I do believe and faith is necessary
and it's the gift of God. But faith is not my right. My
believing is not my righteousness. Christ is my righteousness. And
anybody who stands before God, now listen to it this way. Anybody
who stands before God without Christ, without being washed
in His blood and clothed in His righteousness, they're workers
of iniquity. They may be religious, they may
be sincere, they may be dedicated, they may be more on the eyes
of men, but they're workers of iniquity. They don't measure
up. The only way that a sinner can
measure up is to be found in Christ, washed in His blood,
clothed in His righteousness, imputed to us. Do you understand
that? Christ is the Lord, my righteousness. I have no other. My hope is built
on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. And I dare
not trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus' name.
On Christ the solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand.
Do you understand that? Those who appear before God,
think about the final judgment. It says that the final judgment,
that those who die in their sins. Now again, we're all sinners.
We all deserve death and hell, but salvation is not a matter
of what I deserve. It's a matter of grace. So when
we all die and stand before God at the judgment seat of Christ,
those who die in their sins, in unbelief, they'll be judged
out of the books, plural, by their works, and they'll be damned
forever. But those who are in Christ,
they'll be judged. They've already been judged.
It'll be declared out of the one book, the Lamb's book of
life, that they are forgiven of all their sins on a just ground,
the blood of Christ. And they'll be declared righteous
before the whole universe. They're already righteous in
God's sight, but it'll be declared before the whole universe that
they stand in Christ. having His righteousness imputed
to them, and given the faith of God's elect to receive Him
and to believe in Him and to plead His merits alone. Everyone
else is a worker of iniquity. There's no love from God to sinners
outside of Christ. That's the hatred of God. That's
the wrath of God. That's the just wrath of God.
Well, look at 1 John 2. He says, my little children,
these things write I unto you that you sin not. Now what John
the apostle is saying to his people, I'm telling you about
the grace of God. I'm telling you about how Christ
is your righteousness. I'm telling you about how you
cannot be condemned because God cannot charge you with sin. He
agrees with the Apostle Paul, as Paul wrote in Romans chapter
eight, I think it's verse 32 or 33, I think. He says, who
shall lay anything, or verse 34, 33, who shall lay anything
to the charge of God's elect? It's God that justifies. And
upon what ground did God justify me? The propitiation that Christ
accomplished. And he said, who can condemn
us? It's Christ that died. If Christ died for me, nobody
can condemn me. God certainly won't. He said,
who can condemn us? It's Christ that died, yea rather,
is risen again, is seated at the right hand of the Father,
ever living to make intercession for us. That's what John's talking
about here, the intercession of Christ. We're going to see
that in just a moment. But my friend, think about this. This
is salvation by the grace of God. Paul wrote in Romans 4,
he said, he described the blessedness of the man to whom the Lord imputeth
righteousness without works. So he says, my little children,
John says, my little children, these things write unto you that
you sin not. Now, salvation by God's grace,
conditioned on Christ alone, does not give us an excuse to
throw caution to the wind and not fight sin. Every true believer,
every sinner saved by grace, for whom Christ was a propitiation,
has an inner battle between the Holy Spirit who indwells us and
the flesh, which is our remaining remnants of sin within us. And
we're to fight sin. Paul wrote in Galatians chapter
five, he said, walk in the Spirit and don't fulfill the lust of
the flesh. Fight it, war it against it. And John's saying the same
thing here. I'm writing to you, not to give
you an excuse to sin. I've had people tell me this.
They say, well, if I believe what you believe, I just go sin
as much as I want to. And I thought about, are you
crazy? Think about that. Think about that. You mean you
don't want to please God? You don't want to serve God?
You don't want to honor Him and glorify Him in your life and
obey His word? Well, you know what that says
about a person, don't you? It says they don't have a right
motive for obedience because their motive is not grace. It's
not gratitude. It's not love. Their motive is,
it's either fear of punishment or mercenary promise of earned
reward. And that's a low motive. That's
evil motives. But God, when He saves us by
His grace and implants that word in our hearts, He replaces that
evil motive with a holy motive, the motive of grace and gratitude
and love. So John said, I'm writing these
to you to encourage you to fight sin. And then he says in verse
one, and if any man sin, now that's not saying that we won't,
we're all sinners. We're either sinners saved by
grace or sinner lost in your sins. We have an advocate with
the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. My sins cannot condemn me. The law cannot condemn me. My
sins cannot even be charged to me. Who shall lay anything to
the charge of God's elect? It's God that justifies. Why
is that? Is it because I'm such a good
person? No. Is it because I believed? No. It's because Jesus Christ
is my propitiation and stands as my advocate, my intercessor. There's one God and one mediator
between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. And look at how
he puts it now. Here's how Christ is our advocate. Verse 2, and He is the propitiation
for our sins. Now, that means Christ died for
my sins. My sins, my sin debt was charged,
imputed, accounted to Him. Laid to His account. He willingly
took that debt upon Himself. And He said, I will repay it. And He repaid it with the blood
of the cross. That's called redemption. Job
said, I have found a ransom That's the redemption price. We're not
redeemed with corruptible things such as silver and gold and all.
We're redeemed by the precious blood of the spotless Lamb of
God. He was made sin, 2 Corinthians
5.21 tells us. How was He made sin? My sin debt
was charged, accounted, imputed to Him. That's how He was made
sin. He was not made to be a sinner.
He was not corrupted with our sins. He was not contaminated. He never had a sinful thought.
He who knew no sin, that verse tells us. Christ who knew no
sin for us, for His people, for God's elect, chosen before the
foundation of the world and given to Christ. He was made sin for
us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.
His righteousness charged to our account, imputed to our account. Now how did He accomplish that
righteousness? By being a propitiation for our
sins. He satisfied the justice of God. And then John writes this, now
this is where a lot of people go wrong on this. He says, and
not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world."
Now, the whole world there does not mean everybody without exception. The point he is making here is
that God has a people all over this world out of every tribe,
kindred, tongue, and nation. They're a remnant according to
the election of grace. It's not just Jewish people,
it's not just Gentiles, but God has a people out of every nation. You see, the word world never
really means everybody without exception. You can go over to,
for example, 1 John 5 here. Look at 1 John 5 and verse 19. Now John writes here, he says,
and we know that we are of God. Now who's the we there? Well,
that's believers. Sinners who have been born again
by the Spirit, They are justified before God based upon the propitiatory
work of Christ, the blood of Christ, the righteousness of
Christ imputed. That's their justification. And
having been justified, they are given life from the dead, a new
birth, regeneration, conversion, brought under the gospel, and
given the gift of faith. They believe the gospel. They
believe in Christ. They trust Christ. They sing
that song that I sing all the time, my hope is built on nothing
less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. That's the song of our hearts,
you see. We look to Christ as the author
and the finisher of our faith. We don't look to ourselves to
begin it, to continue it, or to finalize it. It's all of grace,
all of Christ, you see. Now, if that's your testimony
according to the Word of God, you are of God. We are of God. Look at verse 19 of 1 John 5.
We know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness,
or lieth in the wicked one. Well, does the whole world there
mean everybody without exception? No. John made the distinction. We are of God, and the whole
world. What he's talking about is the
world of unbelievers, the world of the non-elect, actually. Those who live their lives in
unbelief and die in their unbelief, die in their sins. And literally
that means they're into the wicked one, they're into the deception
of Satan. We'll go back to 1 John chapter two, verse two. And he, Christ, is the propitiation
for our sins, not for ours only, not just for sins of this particular
people here in this area, but for God's elect all over the
whole world. Again, go back to Romans 8 and
verse 33. Who shall lay anything to the
charge of who? God's elect. Who are God's elect? They are those who are brought
by the Spirit, sent from Christ, to be born again and to be given
the gift of faith. They believe in the Lord Jesus
Christ. They've repented of dead works
and idolatry, and they continue looking to Him as they are preserved
by the Lord. And that's what this means here.
He's the advocate. We have an advocate with the
Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He's our propitiation. He says
in verse 3 of 1 John 2, "...and hereby we do know that we know
Him, if we keep His commandments." Well, what is His commandments?
He's not talking about the Ten Commandments there. He's talking
about His commandments to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. to
turn away from everything else and count it but loss, as Paul
said, that you may win Christ and be found in Him, not having
your own righteousness which is of the law, but that which
is through the faithfulness of Christ, the righteousness of
God by faith. And you follow Him, trust Him,
and that's what this propitiation does. If He's my propitiation,
then there's no doubt that I will end up in glory by His grace.
Now let me show you another one. 1 John chapter 4. Now here, he's
talking about love. He speaks of false preachers. And he tells them, don't believe
everything you hear. Just because a man stands behind
a pulpit and opens a Bible and starts reading verses, Don't
automatically assume that he's sent of God, or that he's inspired,
or that he trusts Christ and leads you to Christ, or that
he's inspired by the Spirit. He said, test the Spirits to
see whether they're of God. Now how do I test them? By the
Word of God. Back over in the book of Isaiah,
when Isaiah had to deal with false preachers, lying spirits,
he made this statement. This is Isaiah 8 and verse 20.
To the law and to the testimony, if they speak not according to
this word, there's no light in them. And Satan has his ministers
all over this world. This world is infested with false
prophets, false preachers. who come in the name of Christ,
but who deny the truth, the doctrine of Christ. And that's right. And you have to get into the
Bible to understand the difference, to know the difference. I don't
want to go through my life thinking that I'm saved only to find out
in the end that I'm not. I mention this several times.
The false preachers who appeared before God in Matthew 7 verses
21-23 who said, Lord, Lord, haven't we preached in your name? Haven't
we cast out demons? Haven't we done many wonderful
works? Only to hear him say, depart from me, you that work
iniquity, I never knew you. Those are the workers of iniquity.
When He said, I never knew you, it didn't mean He didn't know
their names and didn't know their hearts. He knows all things.
He's omniscient. It means He didn't know them
in covenant saving love. I never loved you. They are objects
of His hatred, His wrath, His just wrath. You see, God's hatred
is not sinful. Ours is because it's usually
based upon our own self-worth as we claim it. But God's hatred
is His justice. So he says in verse four, this
is 1 John chapter four. He says, you are of God. Talking
about his people, little children he says. And you've overcome
them. Now what is he talking about?
He's talking about the spirit of Antichrist. That's up in verse
three. The spirit of Antichrist? What
is the spirit of Antichrist? We'll get into this next time. I hope you'll join us next week
for another message from God's Word. We are glad you could join us
for another edition of Reign of Grace. This program is brought
to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries, an outreach ministry
of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany, Georgia. To receive
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today and may the Lord be with you.