Now, if you'll hold your place
there in Romans chapter 4, where Brother Randy just read, I want
you to go back into the Old Testament, into the book of Proverbs. Proverbs
chapter 17 is where we're going to start. The title of the message
this morning is, The Greatest of All Problems Solved. The greatest of all problems
solved. If I were to ask you or someone
were to take a survey of people, what do you think our greatest
problem is? You'd get all kinds of answers, wouldn't you? Some
people say, well, we've got a lot of economic problems. We've got
a lot of health problems. A lot of moral problems. And we could go on and on, political,
whatever. But what I want to do is to deal
with this morning what is the greatest problem of all as presented
in the Bible concerning the salvation of sinners. It is truly the greatest
of all problems and it deals with the most fundamental issue
of the gospel. And one of the problems with
dealing with this problem is that it may sound so complicated
to people. I mean, I've had people, you
know, every preacher, Randy dealt with it last week and the week
before. Brother Mark dealt with it. Brother Jim dealt with it
on his message on the righteousness of God. It is the heart of the
gospel. It really is. And it's the, it's
really one of, it's the most neglected issue of what people
call today evangelism. and really turns what people
call evangelism into a false evangelism. Now we all know the
scripture teaches that God saves sinners. There's no question
about that. We know that God is a merciful
God. He is a loving God. And most
people don't understand issues of God's love, what it really
involves, what it really means. But God is love. You know, the
Bible doesn't just simply say God loves. It says God is love,
and He is. Well, people don't understand
that His love is only to be found in the Lord Jesus Christ. And
outside of Christ, there is no love from God. And I'm going
to show you why. God is a God of grace. He saves
by grace. That's what Brother Randy read
in Romans chapter 4, as the Apostle Paul was inspired by the Holy
Spirit to use Abraham as an example. You know, the unbelieving Jews
would invoke the name of Abraham as proving them to be true children
of God, to be saved. They would say, we have Abraham
as our father. And so the reason the Holy Spirit
inspired Paul to use Abraham as an example is simply to say
this to them, say, well, that doesn't mean anything. Just because
you're a physical descendant of Abraham doesn't cut any slack,
doesn't get you anywhere with God. And the proof of that is
how was Abraham himself justified before God? How was Abraham saved? By grace. And that means he did
not earn it, and he did not deserve it. Can you mark that in your
mind? That's what grace is all about.
You don't earn it, and you don't deserve it. I don't earn it,
and I don't deserve it. If it's by grace, you say, well,
I did this, and then God responded to me. Well, that's not grace. Or, I decided this, and God responded. That's not grace. That's reward
based on works. So, what I want us to see here,
go back to Proverbs 17, we'll start there, verse 15. And listen to what it says. Now,
you know the book of Proverbs sometimes just lists laws, truths,
axioms, and things like that. Well, here's one that stands
out. That goes all the way back to Genesis. When Adam fell, when
God laid down the law to Adam in the garden, remember He told
him of every tree of the garden you can eat except this one tree,
the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And he said, in
the day that you eat thereof, you shall surely die. That's
justice. That's what that is. This is
God's law. This is God's sovereignty. This
is God's right as sovereign creator. God is the creator. We're the
creature. And he laid down the law to Adam. You cannot be God. You cannot
take the place of God. You cannot aspire to be God.
You cannot set your own standard. You didn't create this world.
You didn't create yourself. And God said, this is my prerogative,
Adam. In the day that you eat thereof,
you shall surely die. Justice must be satisfied. God
is a God of justice. And what is stated here in Proverbs
17, 15 is just another statement of that fact. Look at verse 15
of Proverbs 17. It says, He that justifieth the
wicked, and he that condemneth the just, even they both are
abomination to the Lord. Here's a person, a judge let's
say, and here's a wicked criminal, guilty of the crime, and the
judge lets him go, scot-free. That's an abomination to God. And then here's a judge and a
just person stands before him, not guilty of the crime. And
the judge condemns him. That's an abomination to God. And abomination is pretty much
the strongest word that can be found in the scripture to show
how detestable that is to God. It's against the nature of God.
It's against who God is. You know, the Bible says this,
God is a just God. No matter what God does, He must
be just when He does it. He must be righteous. He must
be true. The Bible says God's judgments
are always according to truth. He will not pervert judgment.
He will not pervert righteousness. He will not tell a lie. Let God
be true and every man a liar. And it is the nature of God.
It's who He is now. You see, this is not God just
being mean or being too strict or being too stern. or having
a temper tantrum. No, it's who God is by nature. If God were to be unjust in any
of His purposes, any of His works, any of His actions, even in the
salvation of a sinner, if God were to be unjust, He would cease
to be God. His glory would be out the window. And think about that. Here's
the problem presented in Proverbs 1750. He that justifies the wicked
and condemns the just, they're both an abomination to God. But look at Romans chapter 4, that brother Randy read. He's
talking about a man named Abraham. Who was Abraham? The first time
that we're confronted with this man Abraham is back in the book
of Genesis. And he was an idolater who lived
in Ur of the Chaldees, modern-day Iraq. And God saved Abraham. And how did he do it? Well, he
says in verse 2, Look at Romans 4 and verse 2. Well, if Abraham
were justified by works, Abraham has a reason to glory, to boast. Now, there's no question the
Bible tells us God justified Abraham. Well, what did Abraham
do to be justified before God? Do you know what it means to
be justified? Well, let me give you some things
to think about on that. First of all, you know, I've
heard these things, and let me tell you what it does not mean.
Justified does not mean God treats me just as if I had never sinned. That's not what it means. You
know what a Christian is? Well, we could talk a lot about
that, couldn't we? A Christian is a justified sinner. That's what he is. You know what
a saint is? A sanctified sinner, saved by
the grace of God. So justified does not mean that
God treats me, they say, just as if I had never sinned. That
may rhyme to some people, but it's not true. Justified does
not mean that the moment I believe in Jesus, God declares me to
be righteous. Doesn't mean that. Justified
does not mean that when the Holy Spirit regenerates me, quickens
me, born again, that God imparts some kind of a new divine righteous
nature because if that was the case, I'd never sin again. Only
two types of people on this earth, sinners saved by the grace of
God and sinners still lost in their sins. You see, it's not
the work of the Holy Spirit within a person that makes a person
righteous, justified. What does justify a sinner? To
justify means this. It is God's legal declaration
and decree from God that a person is not guilty. And what we're talking about
there is the legal guilt that brings condemnation. In other
words, God looks at Abraham, a sinner, who deserves nothing
but condemnation, who deserves nothing but wrath and damnation.
You say, well, I don't believe that. Well, don't ever quote
Romans 3.23 again. The wages of sin is what? Death. You know why it's called the
wages of sin? Because that's what we earn. What did Abraham do to earn The
sentence from Almighty God, who knows everything about Abraham,
who knows everything about me, who knows my heart. I've told
you the story about the man who tried to convince me that he
was no longer a sinner. Said he was a Christian, he's
no longer a sinner. And I said, well, if I could
take a movie or film or DVD of your thoughts just for one whole
day, and say, now this Sunday I'm going to play them on a screen
in front of everybody. Would you stay in the audience? My friend, even believers, sinners
saved by grace, we're plagued with sin every day. It's a warfare,
the scripture calls it. At no time, as a saved person,
Can I look to God and say, now I've made it, now I've earned
it, now I deserve it? At no time. But to be justified. Here's Abraham. And if you're saved by the grace
of God, you're in the same boat with Abraham. God looks at this
man Abraham, a sinner, an idolater, and declares him legally not
guilty, not condemned. That's what it is to be justified.
And it's not just some kind of a fictional view of things. If God says that it's real, somebody said, well, you don't
look justified to me. That doesn't matter. This is
in God's sight. But it goes further, this matter
of justified. Not only did God look at Abraham,
and legally in the court of God's justice, in God's sight, declare
him not guilty, this sinner now, this one who deserves nothing
but condemnation and wrath in himself, God says not guilty,
God also declares him to be righteous. This is a righteous man. Now, I can go back in the Old
Testament. First of all, I've already told you about how God,
when Abraham first appears on the scene, Abraham, listen, Abraham's
not sitting in a prayer meeting. Abraham's not seeking the Lord.
He's an idolater in the Ur of the Chaldees. Abraham had nothing
to recommend him unto God. That's what Paul's point is in
Romans 4. What can you say about Abraham
according to the flesh? What did Abraham deserve? What
did Abraham earn? Nothing but wrath. And yet God
justified him. God declared him not guilty.
God says, here's a righteous man. You say, well, he don't
look righteous to me. It doesn't matter. God said it.
God sees everything as it is. God does not deal in fiction. God deals in reality. in God's sight. Now, go on and
look at Romans 4. He says in verse 3, well what
says the scripture? Now if Abraham were justified
by works, he'd have room to boast, but not before God. Before God? Do we have anything to brag about?
Before God. I'll tell you what we have to
brag about before God. If we're saved. God forbid that I should glory,
boast, save in what? The cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. That's what we brag about. That's
what I'm up here to do. I'm not here to brag about me.
I'm glad you're all here today, but I'm not gonna brag on you.
I'm here to brag about Christ. You see, my salvation is wrapped
up not in who I am, where I come from, it's wrapped up in who
He is and where He come from. The God-man, His name shall be
called Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sin. His
name is Emmanuel, God with us. I'm not here to brag about what
I've done or what I try to do. I'm here to brag about what Christ
accomplished on Calvary's cross to put away my sin. Well, verse
three, what sayeth the scripture? What does God say about this
thing? Abraham believed God and it was counted unto him, imputed
to him. If you don't know what the word
impute means, write it down and make it your life's goal to find
out what that means in the Bible. It means to charge. It means to account. It was counted. It was charged. It was imputed
unto Abraham for righteousness. Now what is the it there? Well,
Brother Randy read it. Righteousness. Abraham believed
God. Well, what did God promise Abraham? He promised Abraham that Messiah,
the Christ, would come in the future and die for his sins and
work out a perfect righteousness that would be charged to Abraham's
account. That's what Abraham believed.
How do I know that? Well, Christ himself said it.
John chapter 8. He said, Abraham rejoiced to
see my day and he saw it. He rejoiced. He was glad. So
he says in verse 14, now to him that worketh is the reward not
reckoned or not charged or not imputed of grace, but of debt. Now, if you work for it, it's
not grace. That's what he's saying. Paul
deals with that over in Romans chapter 11. He said if it's of
works, it's not of grace. If it's of grace, it's not of
works. You can't mix the two. I've heard people say, well,
that preacher, he preaches a mixture of works and grace. No, he doesn't. He preaches works. There is no
such thing as a mixture. Salvation is never part grace
and part works. It's all of Grace, isn't it? And it's based on the righteousness
of another, the Lord Jesus Christ. So he says in verse 5, now look
at verse 5, but to him that worketh not, now listen to this, but
believeth on him that does what? Justifieth the ungodly. His faith. What was Abraham's
faith? He's not talking about Abraham's
believing here. Abraham did believe. That's a
gift from God. But his faith. What is my faith? My faith is salvation by God's
grace in Christ. His faith is counted for righteousness. Now salvation involves by the
grace and power of God Believing in Him who justifies the ungodly. You see that? Justifies the ungodly. But wait a minute. Didn't we
just read back in Proverbs 17 and verse 15? That he that justifieth
the wicked, or you might say the ungodly, and he that condemneth
the just, even they both are an abomination to the Lord. There's the problem. You know, the moment that any
of us say that God saves sinners, there's a problem. The moment
we say that God is merciful to the wicked, there's a problem. And it's a problem man cannot
solve. You know, man has been trying to solve that problem
since the fall. For example, Adam and Eve tried
to solve it. How? By covering their nakedness
with fig leaves. Wouldn't do. Why? God must be just. He can't just
ignore or... You can't hide your sin from
God. And He cannot ignore it. He must punish sin. He must punish
sinners. Cain tried to solve it, this
problem. How did he do it? He brought
the works of his hands. Won't do. Our works are not good enough
to wash away our sins. What can wash away my sins? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. Our works are not good enough
to make us righteous before God. What is it to be righteous before
God? It's to be perfect, isn't it? I told a man, I was eating lunch
with him, he was talking about, he wanted to know what gospel
we believe. We got to talking about that, what God requires.
And I said, well, God requires perfect righteousness. And he
looked at me, his eyes got real big. He said, well, nobody can
do that. And I said, well, that's why salvation is by grace, friend,
not by works. There's a problem, you say. At
the tower at Babel, they tried to solve the problem by building
a tower to God. Didn't work. Man cannot ascend
unto heaven. We have nothing to recommend
us unto God. And you could go on and on through
the history of religion and you see man's futile efforts to solve
this problem. If we are justified before God,
isn't it the case that God, in our case, justified us when we
were ungodly? Well, he says, he believeth on
him that justifieth the ungodly. Let me give you another aspect
of this problem. The Lord Jesus Christ, God in human flesh, in
himself, was and is sinlessly perfect. He never knew sin, He
never did sin, He never committed sin, He never thought sin, His
motives were pure and perfect, His goals, His purposes, He never
had a thought of sin. Can you imagine what that's like?
I can't. Jesus Christ moved and lived
among sinners, yet He did not become contaminated by sin. He did not become corrupt. He
ate with publicans and sinners. Yet he never became a sinner. And yet when he went to the cross, the Bible teaches that it pleased
the Father, God the Father, to bruise or to crush him. So when
Jesus Christ went to the cross, Did God condemn the just? The Bible says He suffered the
just for the unjust. How can that happen? So here's the issue. How can
a holy and just God justify the wicked and condemn
the just and not be an abomination to Himself? How can God be both
a just God and a Savior? That's the issue. Now I want
to tell you something. Now that may all sound complicated
to you. I hope it doesn't. But here's the thing. That's
the most important question and issue of the Gospel and the matter
of salvation. Right there. In the book of Job. That question
is raised. It is said in Job chapter 9 and
verse 2, listen to this. I know it is of a truth, but
how should man be just with God? Sinful man. How can a sinful,
wretched person like me be just with God? And he goes on to say
in verse 3, if he will contend with him, he cannot answer him
one of a thousand. In other words, if I stood before
God in court and tried to defend myself, contend with God, for my one answer, trying to
justify myself, God has a thousand charges against me. And you know what the number
thousand means in the Hebrew idiom? It means a number you
can't count. In other words, countless charges
against me. If I had one thing to say in
my defense, oh Lord, I'm an American. It's pretty much like God saying,
well big deal, that counts for nothing. Not in God's court. Or I'm a Baptist, or I'm this,
that, or the other. I got baptized, I did this, I
did... One in a thousand. Over in the book of Job chapter
25 and verse 4, the question is posed. How then can man be
justified with God? Or how can he be clean that is
born of a woman? Behold, even to the moon, and
it shineth not, yea, the stars are not pure in God's sight. How much less man that is a worm. The word worm there is maggot.
Boy, that's just not flattery preaching, isn't it? Dale Carnegie left that out of
his book, didn't he? And then he says the son of man
which is a worm. That's a different kind of worm. There are some who claim based
on Proverbs 17, 15 that God cannot justify the ungodly because he'd
then be an abomination to himself. But they fail to consider the
glorious revelations of the mystery of God's grace found only in
the grace of God through the glorious person and finished
work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Why? Why is it? Consider human
courts. If a human judge justifies the
wicked, why is that such an abomination to God? Let me give you these
reasons. Number one, it denies and dishonors the justice of
the law. The law is perverted. What if we had no law? Well,
what's the opposite? Anarchy. Seems to me sometimes we're just
about getting there, aren't we? Secondly, it fails to require
due compensation for the way that a lawbreaker dishonors the
law, dishonors God. The wages of sin is death. The
punishment must fit the crime. Isn't that what the law says? And I'll tell you something,
under God's perfect court, it does. And then thirdly, to justify
the wicked releases a person into society who will continue
to be a lawbreaker and a bad influence on society. You say,
well, if we show mercy and let him go, he'll reform. There's
no guarantee of that. And in the case of sinful human
beings, there's no doubt because as long as we're in this world,
we're going to sin against God. You see, here's the issue. Is
there a way? Let me give you these things.
Look back at Romans 4. Here's your answer. Look at verse
5 again. Here's the answer now. Verse
5 says, But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that
justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.
What does that mean? Look at verse 6. Now he's going to talk
about King David. Ever read in the Bible about
King David? The sweet psalmist of Israel? Most of the beautiful psalms
that we enjoy, many of them that we quote were written by King
David. Psalm 23, the Lord is my shepherd. Psalms like that. Have you read
about David? Was David a perfect man? And David himself knew that.
He said in Psalm 51, he said, Against thee and thee only have
I sinned and done evil in thy sight. Here's what he says about David.
Verse 6, Even as David also describeth. Listen here, here's your answer.
The blessedness of the man unto whom God imputes, accounts righteousness
without works. That's how God can justify the
ungodly and not be an abomination to Himself. It's the imputed
righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. Look at it, verse 7,
saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven and whose
sins are covered. That covering there is not covered
over like Adam and Eve's fig leaf aprons. It's the covering
of the mercy seat. Remember over the Ark of the
Covenant, the mercy seat? And what did the high priest
do one time a year on the Day of Atonement when he came into
the Holy of Holies and he saw the mercy seat there? What did
he do? He sprinkled what? The blood
of the Lamb. Verse 8, Blessed is the man to
whom the Lord will not charge impute sin. How can God do that? He charged the sins of His people,
the debt of their sins, to the Lord Jesus Christ. You see, Christ
is the appointed, God-appointed representative of all of God's
chosen people. Christ willingly became their
surety. What does a surety do? He takes
responsibility for the debts of the people whom he represents.
That's what Christ did before the foundation of the world in
the everlasting covenant of grace when God charged the sins of
his people to Christ. And he did not charge them to
them. And that brings us to the doctrine
of imputation. That's how God can justify the
ungodly and not be an abomination to Himself. Because Christ took
our debt, the debt of His people, upon Himself. He said, put it
to my charge, I'll pay the debt. And what was the debt? Here comes
the doctrine of substitution. Christ had to go under the law
and pay that debt with the price of His own blood. You see, God
justifies His people. based upon the righteousness
of Christ. Because Christ in His death,
you know what He did? He satisfied the full claims
of God's justice and God's law. When God justifies His people,
His nature, His justice, His law is not perverted. It is not
destroyed. It is not broken. It is fully
honored by Christ. as the substitute and the surety
of his people. That's the glory of God's grace.
That's the glory of the gospel. That's how Abraham was justified.
That's how David was justified. And every sinner who is brought
by the power and grace of God to believe in the Lord Jesus
Christ can claim the same justification. that honors God. God is both
a just God and a Savior. He's a righteous judge who condemned
my sins in the person of Christ, and yet He's my loving, merciful,
gracious Father. He saved me by His grace. So that we can say as Romans
5.21 says, that as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace
reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ
our Lord. Now, that's why every sinner
who hears this message is commanded by God to believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ, to rest in Him, to put all your hopes, all of
your salvation, all of your life in His hands, by the grace of
God alone. Isn't that right? Amen. Okay.