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'll be starting in the book of Mark, the gospel
according to Mark chapter one. And we'll begin at verse 14 of
Mark chapter one. And this is the third message
in a series that I've been preaching on what it is to believe. And
what I'm talking about is what it really means to believe the
gospel, to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved. But what does that
mean? And so if you haven't heard the first two messages, this
is the last in that series that I'll be preaching on that subject. But I always talk about it in
every message. But if you haven't heard the
first two messages, I urge you to call and get them or look
them up on our website. and you can download them or
listen to them because they'll all be posted. All of our messages,
the ones I preach at our church and our worship services and
our Bible studies and then our TV program here. And so I urge
you to get that but what does it mean? You know people say
well I believe or you believe or they believe Well, what do
they believe? What does it mean to believe
and what I want to stress today in? Concluding this series look
look at Mark chapter 1 in verse 14 It says here now after that
John was put in prison now. That's John the Baptist John
who was the last of the Old Testament prophets and who pointed sinners
to Christ for salvation. And he says, John was put in
prison, Jesus, that's the Lord, he came into Galilee preaching
the gospel of the kingdom of God. Now the kingdom of God refers
obviously to the rule of God over all things sovereignly but
also the good news of salvation for God's people, God's elect,
a people chosen before the foundation of the world and given to Christ,
and the establishment of that kingdom in the form of the church. Now, that's the true church,
which is the pillar and ground of truth. And then in verse 15,
it says, here's what the Lord said, saying, the time is fulfilled,
and the kingdom of God is at hand, repent ye, and believe
the gospel. Now, repent ye and believe the
gospel. Now, what is it to believe? What
does it mean to believe the gospel? Well, I've talked about it in
the last two programs concerning the message of the gospel. The
gospel, the word gospel, as you know, means good news. And it's
good news of salvation. from our sins by the grace of
God that is totally wrapped up in the work, the qualifications
and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ as the surety, the substitute,
and the redeemer of his people. And so when we think about the
gospel, we have to understand that there is an absolute objective
truth that must be heard and believed by the power of God.
I've talked about this, how faith is not in us naturally, but it
comes as a gift of God. By grace are you saved through
faith and that not of yourselves. It's the gift of God, not of
works lest any man should boast. But faith, if I have true faith,
if I really believe unto salvation, than I believe the objective,
absolute truth of the gospel. Now, there are many false gospels.
And today, it's really bad because so many people have so many different
ideas. And they think, well, you can
believe what you wanna believe, and I'll believe what I wanna
believe, and we'll all get to heaven in the end. And that's
not true. In the book of Galatians chapter
one, the apostle Paul wrote, if we or an angel from heaven
preach any other, any other gospel unto you, which is not another,
another gospel, another of a different kind, let him be anathema. And what false gospel were they
preaching in Galatians? Well, the false preachers were
preaching salvation conditioned on sinners. Sinners keeping the
law, sinners going under the law. And they really, what they
tried to do is an impossible thing. They tried to mix grace
and works. They'd say you're saved by Christ,
you're saved by grace, but you have to do this, do that, not
do this, not do that in order to be really saved and righteous
and to be right with God and to stay safe. So in other words,
what you have to listen for, when you go to church on Sunday,
or Wednesday, excuse me, you have to listen to what the preacher's
saying. And if the gospel he's preaching
puts salvation at any stage, to any degree, in any way, upon
the sinner, conditioned on the sinner, then that's a false gospel. You see, the gospel, the good
news, preaches that salvation is conditioned on Christ, God
manifest in the flesh. You see, it's wrapped up in the
glorious person of Christ. And so it preaches salvation
conditioned upon this glorious person. He's the surety of his
people. My sins were charged to him,
and his righteousness is charged to me. And that's the good news
of the gospel. And so it's conditioned on Christ,
and that Christ fulfilled those conditions. And what were those
conditions? He had to die, he had to be obedient
unto death, even the death of the cross, to secure and guarantee
the salvation of every sinner for whom he died, not all without
exception. You see, if you say he died for
all without exception, conditioned on their believing, Then you're
making salvation conditioned on the sinner and you're making
it a total failure. The Bible says that we will not
come to him. It tells us plainly that the
natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God,
neither can he know them. We have to be born again and
given faith, knowledge and faith to come to Christ. No man can
come to me except the Father which has sent me draw him, and
I will raise him up at the last day. John 6, 44. So think about
these things. There's not many gospels. There's
only one gospel, and it's an objective truth. And so the Apostle
Paul wrote in Romans 116, for I'm not ashamed of the gospel
of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone
that believeth, to the Jew first and the Greek also, the Gentile.
Verse 17, for therein, in that gospel, is the righteousness
of God revealed from faith to faith, as it is written, the
just shall live by faith. Now what is the righteousness
of God revealed in the gospel? It's the entire merit, value,
worth of Christ's work, his obedience unto death, as the surety, the
substitute, and the redeemer of his people, his sheep. The
good shepherd gave his life for the sheep. So what is Christ
as our surety? He's the one upon whom who took
responsibility to pay my sin debt and satisfy the justice
of God. by His own death. And as my substitute,
as God in human flesh without sin, He came to earth and united
with sinless human flesh. Walked this earth, God manifest
in the flesh. And He obeyed the law and went
to the cross and substituted Himself in my place. and died
for my sins, satisfying the justice of God, bringing forth that righteousness,
the righteousness of God, which is imputed, charged, accounted
to me. And he bought me lock, stock,
and barrel. He redeemed me with the precious
blood that he shed, his own precious blood. and he died, he was buried,
he arose again the third day because he satisfied justice,
he brought forth righteousness, he got the job done, he finished
the work, completed it, perfected it, and he arose the third day,
he was raised again the third day, and he's now ascended unto
the Father, seated at the right hand of God, ever living to make
intercession for his people, everyone who truly believes,
this gospel. Now over in the book of 1 Corinthians,
chapter 15, listen to this. Paul writes to the Corinthians,
he says in verse three, this is 1 Corinthians 15, three. He
says, for I delivered unto you, first of all, that which I also
received, how that Christ died for our sins. Now don't stop
there. Listen to the rest of the verse.
According to the scriptures, In the last few messages on this,
I talked about the record that God had given. It's the written
word of God. It's not just that Christ died
for our sins. It's that he died for our sins
as the scriptures say he died. Who he is and what he did and
why he did it and where he is now. He died as the surety. He died as the substitute. He
died as the redeemer. The scriptures do not teach that
Christ died for all without exception if they will do certain things
to seal the deal. That's not what the scriptures
say. Now, I know a lot of preachers say that, but that's not what
the Bible says. The scriptures do not portray
Christ as one who redeemed everybody
without exception, but that redemption is no good unless sinners do
their part and cooperate by believing. The scriptures relate Christ,
portray Christ, as the one who died for his people and who was
raised again on the third day, seated at the right hand of the
Father, and he gives them life from the dead in the new birth
and brings them to faith in Christ. He said in John 12, he said,
if I be lifted up, I will draw all unto me. Now, who are the
all there? Well, it's not all without exception.
because all, without exception, are not drawn to Him, but all
for whom He died, for whom He was lifted up on the cross, they'll
be drawn to Him. Now, how will they be drawn?
Under the preaching of the gospel, that objective, authoritative
message, absolute truth, God the Holy Spirit gives them life,
and knowledge and brings them to believe in the Lord Jesus
Christ. He draws them unto him. We read
in John chapter one about those who receive him, which were born
not of blood, nor the will of the flesh, nor the will of man,
but of God. You must be born again. Well,
here in 1 Corinthians 15, he goes on in verse four, says that
he was buried, which means he really died, it was no hoax,
and that he rose again the third day, and again the phrase, according
to the scriptures. That's the issue. So when Christ
over here in Mark 1 verse 15, he says, repent ye and believe
the gospel. He's talking about a particular
message wherein Christ is revealed in the glory of his person, God
manifest in the flesh, Emmanuel, God with us, God and man in one
person, because that's the kind of person that it took to save
sinners. Had to be both God and man. Mere
man couldn't do it. And God alone could not do it
in the sense of saving sinful men. Because the Savior, the
Bible tells us, that in order to satisfy the justice of God,
Someone had to die. Well, God cannot die, God is
life. And so God cannot die, but this
person, Jesus Christ, who is God, did die, and that's attributed
to his humanity. Now that's what the Bible teaches.
I've heard a man say one time that God didn't have to send
his son here to save us. He could have just snapped his
fingers. No, he could not have done that because he's a just
God. He cannot deny himself. He must be glorified. And if
you look, somebody brought up to me one time the elect angels.
Well, the elect angels are not saved. They're kept by the power
of God. But they were never fallen sinners.
But see, that's Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners
and sinful men and women. And in order to do that, he had
to become man. He had to be the word made flesh
and dwelt among us that he might die for their sins and satisfy
justice. So the gospel, it involves the
glorious person of Christ. Who is Jesus Christ? And then
it involves the success, the accomplishment of his work as
the surety and substitute and redeemer of his people. What
did he accomplish on that cross? Did he make you savable? Or did
he just make salvation a mere possibility if you would do your
part? If that's the case, first of all, he's a failure. Secondly,
that's not what the scripture teaches. He shall, his name shall
be called Jesus for he shall save his people from their sins.
Now he says here in Mark 1 15, repent ye and believe the gospel.
Believing the gospel, what is it to believe? What does it mean
to believe the gospel? It means repentance. You cannot
believe the truth without repenting from the lie. Now that word repentance,
what does it mean? Most people today, they think
of repentance as somebody just feeling sorry for their sins.
And my friend, listen, we should, we certainly should feel sorry
for our sins, sorrier than we are many times. But as sorry
as we can feel, that is not repentance. What is repentance? Well, repentance
is a change of mind. Now, when I say mind, I'm not
just saying that it's just a mental thing that does not involve sincerity
of the heart. In real heart faith, it does.
The heart in the Bible, in salvation, God's word tells us that he gives
us a new heart. Well, what is that heart? Well,
the heart is described in many ways in the Bible. But basically,
it comes down to the mind, the affections, and the will. If
you have in your mind that the heart is simply emotions or feelings,
you're not thinking biblically. Now certainly emotions and feelings
can be involved, but that comes from knowledge, it comes from
the heart, that is the mind, the affections, and the will.
And in repentance, in salvation, when God brings a person to faith
in Christ, He gives them the gift of repentance to turn away
from sin, turn away from self and self-righteousness. And it
brings about a change of mind. Whereas I thought salvation was
conditioned on me, I now know that salvation is conditioned
on Christ and on Him alone. And I repent of thinking such
self-righteous thoughts that salvation was conditioned on
me. Repentance does not necessarily involve what many religious people
view as a moral change. Now they can be involved. You
look in the Bible, you see men like Zacchaeus, you remember
the publican, the tax collector, he was a very immoral man, he
was a cheat, he was a thief. And when he was brought to Christ
by God-given faith, he repented of that. And he said, I'm gonna
return all that I stole and all of that. But many times it doesn't
involve a moral change as far as what man sees. And I'll give
you a good example if you'll look with me over in the book
of Philippians chapter three. I believe that here we have one
of the best examples of what it means to believe in Christ
and what it is to repent. The Bible speaks of, for example,
repentance of dead works and idolatry. And think about it
this way. Before I knew Christ in the glory
of his person and in the power of his finished work, what was
my idea or my view of God? Well, I believed in a God who
would accept me based upon my faith or based upon my works. Well, my friend, that's not the
God of the Bible. That's an idol. Until God brings me to see that
Christ alone fulfilled all the conditions of my salvation to
secure me unto glory. and that His righteousness imputed
to me, charged to me, is the only ground of my right relationship
with God. Until I see that God, I worship
an idol. I may have been sitting in a
Baptist or a Methodist or some kind of church. Doesn't matter,
as long as my view of God was not biblical. The God who is
sovereign, the God who justifies the ungodly based upon the righteousness
of Christ. I'm worshiping an idol. The Apostle
Paul dealt with that in Romans chapter 10 when he talked about
the Israelites. He said, they have a zeal of
God, but not according to knowledge, for they being ignorant of God's
righteousness, God's justice, which means this, that if God
were to judge me based upon anything I do or anything I don't do or
try to do, I would be damned forever. So being ignorant of
God's righteousness and going about to establish their own
righteousness. These were religious people.
They've not submitted to the righteousness of God. Well, what
is the righteousness of God? Romans 10, four, for Christ is
the end, the fulfillment, the finishing, the perfection of
the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. And
then it goes on to say that with the heart man believeth under
righteousness. What does that mean? That means
with the heart, with the mind, the affections, the will, the
new heart. Sinners believe Christ, they trust Christ, they rest
in Christ. Well, look here in Philippians
chapter three, Paul writes in verse three, he says, for we
are the circumcision, now there he's talking about spiritual
circumcision, not physical, circumcision of the heart, which worship God
in the spirit, means two things, it means we worship God as he
reveals himself in this word, not just our idea of God, and
then we worship God from the heart. And then, and rejoice
in Christ Jesus. The word rejoice means to boast
or to glory. We glory in Christ Jesus. I'm
gonna brag, every time I preach, I brag, I boast, not in me, not
in our church members, but on Christ. I'm gonna brag on Christ,
who he is and what he did. And then he says, and have no
confidence in the flesh. To glory in Christ is faith in
Christ. To have no confidence in the
flesh is to repent. Now what was it that Paul was
repenting of? Verse four, he says, though I
might also have confidence in the flesh, if any other man thinketh
that he hath whereof he might trust in the flesh, I more. Now
he's talking about works of the flesh, and what is he saying?
Verse five, circumcise the eighth day of the stock of Israel, of
the tribe of Benjamin, and Hebrew of Hebrews, as touching the law
of Pharisee, verse six, concerning zeal, persecuting the church,
touching the righteousness which is of the law, blameless. Now
all of those things are religious efforts, what they would call
moral efforts. Even persecuting the church,
what Paul's saying there is that when he was a lost, unbelieving
Israelite, he sought to stamp out what he saw as blasphemy. which at that time was the church.
You remember when he was on the Damascus Road, he was headed
to Damascus to arrest Christians, bring them up on charges because
he looked at that as blasphemy. But look at verse seven. Now
here's a good understanding of faith in Christ and repentance.
Look at verse seven. But what things were gained to
me that I thought gained me a good standing with God. gained me
blessings from God, gained me access to God, all those things
that he listed, those I counted loss for Christ. I used to put them in the prophet
column when I was an unbeliever, when I was an idolater. I thought
God was pleased and happy with those things. But now when I
see Christ, the glory of his person, the power of his finished
work, His blood to wash away all my sins, His righteousness. Now I count all those things
that I was so proud of, loss for Him. He goes on in verse
eight, yea, doubtless, I count all things but loss for the excellency
of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I've suffered
the loss of all things and do count them but dumb that I may
win Christ. Verse nine, and be found in Him.
not having mine own righteousness which is of the law, but that
which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which
is of God, my faith. You see that? Everything that
he was so proud of in his religion, everything that he thought before
he knew the true Christ, before he knew himself. See, Paul thought
all those things were good, now he sees those things as evil
because they denied the glory of God, they denied Christ. He
thought that they were highly esteemed. You know, the Bible
says in Luke 16, I believe it's verse 15, that which is highly
esteemed among men is an abomination to God. Well, what's highly esteemed
among men? Religion. Their efforts to be
righteous. Now think about this. Should
we be moral? Yes, we should. Should we be
obedient? Should we make an effort? To be good people, yes. But here's
the point. If I think that my efforts to
be a good person is my righteousness before God or gains me access
to God, it's dead works. And the God who accepts those
things is an idol. But when God shows me that I'm
a sinner and that if he were to judge me based upon my best,
doesn't the Bible say man at his best state is altogether
vanity, worthless? Doesn't it say that all have
sinned and come short of the glory of God? What is the glory
of God? It's Christ and His righteousness. And no matter how good I try
to be, I always fall short and miss the mark of that. Well,
what does that say? You say, well, that's an unfair
God who would expect me to be perfect. No, He's provided the
perfection that He requires for His people in Christ. What are
you to do? What am I to do? Repent and believe
in the Lord Jesus Christ. salvation. That's what it means
to believe. It doesn't mean to say, I believe
I make the difference. It doesn't mean to say that I
believe that I contribute to my salvation. It means I believe
that Christ is all my salvation, all my righteousness, His work
alone. I plead His righteousness alone,
His righteousness imputed, charged, accounted to me as my only ground
of right standing with God. My only right and title to eternal
life and glory. Looking unto Jesus, the author
and the finisher of our faith. 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
a copy of today's program or to learn more about Reign of
Grace Media Ministries or Eager Avenue Grace Church, write us
at 1102 Eager Drive, Albany, Georgia, 31707. Contact us by
phone at 229-432-6969 or email us through
our website at www.TheLetterRofGrace.com. Thank you again for listening
today and may the Lord be with you.