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. Now the
message today is taken from John chapter 17. The book of John
chapter 17. And the title of the message
is, This is Life Eternal. This is life eternal. And this
message is taken from John 17 which is what we might refer
to as the high priestly prayer of Jesus Christ for His people,
His high priestly prayer. And what happens in this as we
see the Lord Himself praying to His Father on behalf of His
people is He is interceding for his people. The Bible teaches
all throughout the intercessory work of Christ. Christ, Jesus
Christ, who died for his people, his sheep. I mentioned that last
week in John 10. He said, he's the good shepherd.
He gives his life for the sheep. He laid his life down for the
sheep. And his sheep are the ones whom he came to save. He
said, I know my sheep. He said, they hear my voice.
I know them and they follow me. I give unto them eternal life.
Here in John 17, as well throughout the scripture, the Bible teaches
the intercessory work of Christ. There's one mediator between
God and men, the man, Christ Jesus. And this message is one
of a series that I've been preaching on the truth, the doctrine of
the eternal security of the saved. Showing that once a person is
truly saved, and I want to emphasize the word truly saved. Now there
are a lot of people who claim salvation. There are a lot of
people who, to the minds and eyes of men, look like they're
saved. You know somebody who's gone
through a great change in their life. Maybe from great acts of
immorality to being religious and being very moral and responsible.
And you may conclude in your mind, you say, well I know that
that could not have happened unless that person was saved.
Well, I'm going to tell you something now. That is a wrong judgment
that you're making. Now, I'm all for people who are
immoral and irresponsible changing their lives and becoming moral
and responsible. I preach against immorality.
Obviously, any true preacher of the gospel does. And I want
people to be moral. I want them to be responsible.
I want them to be dedicated. I want them to be kind and charitable.
All of these things. But you need to understand if
you read and understand the Bible and know anything about salvation,
that it is possible for a person to go through changes like that,
great reformations of life, and still not be saved. The Pharisees
of old were very moral, dedicated, sincere men, and they went about
to get converts out of the Gentile nation, and Christ, in other
words, get them to be moral and dedicated in the Jewish religion,
and Christ told them, He says, now, as far as salvation goes,
you're just making them two-fold more the child of hell than you
are. Because they believe salvation is based upon their reformations,
their works. So you need to understand that.
Now you may not agree with me, and I'm sorry if you don't, but
the Bible tells us that. Man at his best state is altogether
vanity. Because his best is not good
enough. Man's best will not equal righteousness. You see, righteousness can only
be found in the Lord Jesus Christ. Whatever you do in improving
yourself, in your life, that's okay, and that's fine, but it
will not save you, it will not make you righteous, it will not
wash you clean from your sins. That takes the work of Christ,
that takes the grace of God, that takes the blood of Christ,
His righteousness. So understand that. Salvation,
Salvation now, true salvation, is a permanent, eternal thing.
It cannot be taken away. But there are people who can,
to the minds of men, look like they're saved or they've been
saved or gone through some great moral reformation. There are
people who claim to be saved, but they're not. So understand
that when people say, well, you know, if you're going to argue
against the doctrine of eternal security, A lot of people they'll
say, well I know so and so back then he went through this and
I know he was saved but now he's not going to church or he's not
doing, that has nothing to do with biblical evidence of what
we're talking about. Now understand that. You cannot
judge the truth of the Bible by people, by self, by experience. You have to judge them by the
truth of the Bible. So the eternal security of the
saved. Well, one of the main reasons that those who are truly
saved are eternally securely saved without any danger of ever
being lost is this very intercessory work of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Christ interceding on their behalf. And I could show you a multitude
of scripture. Now my text is John 17, but I want to go over
to Hebrews chapter 7 to begin with. And I want to read you
this passage here beginning at verse 24. Hebrews 7, 24. Listen to this. It says, but
this man, now man is in italics there, probably it would be better
to translate it this person. Because he's talking about Jesus
Christ. And he's talking about the better priesthood of Christ
over above the high priesthood of the Levitical priest in the
Old Covenant. And he says, but this man, this
person, because he continueth ever, Jesus Christ, hath an unchangeable
priesthood. In other words, this priesthood
that Christ has is unchangeable. Verse 25, now listen to this.
Wherefore, or for this reason, he, Christ, is able to save them
to the uttermost. That is, to the nth degree. Evermore,
as one translation puts it. To the uttermost, not partially
now. not just temporarily but to the
uttermost, he is able to save them to the uttermost that come
unto God by him, and here's the reason, seeing he ever liveth
to make intercession for them. Now what is the intercessory
work of Christ? Well, it is the fact that Christ,
in His intercessory work as the high priest of His people, as
the mediator, as the advocate, as John says in 1 John 2, is
ever their substitute, their surety, pleading the merits of
His blood, the merits of His righteousness forever on their
behalf, whereby God is just to justify them. Now that's what
he's talking about in his high priestly prayer in John 17. Look
at verse 1 of John 17. It says, These words spoke Jesus
and lifted up his eyes to heaven, and he said, Father, the hour
has come. Glorify thy son, that thy son
also may glorify thee. Now that's what salvation is
all about. It's about the glory of the Father and the Son, the
glory of the Godhead, Spirit included, the Holy Spirit included.
Because, you see, each person of the Godhead is glorified,
honored, magnified, you see, through the Son, the Lord Jesus
Christ, in the salvation of His people. The eternal security
of the saved, therefore, is grounded upon the glory of God. And it
says something like this. If God were to fail to save even
one of his chosen people through Christ, he would be dishonored. Christ would be dishonored. He would have more to lose than
what any sinner who lost their salvation law would lose. But
he's not going to lose. It's His glory. And wherein does
His glory lie? Well, look at verse 2 of John
17. He says, As thou hast given Him power over all flesh, given
Christ power over all flesh, that's His mediatorial glory.
You see, as God, the Son, eternally, He always had all power over
all flesh. But this is Christ as the mediator,
Christ as the intercessor, Christ as God-man who successfully met
all the conditions of the salvation of His people. He was made both
Lord and Christ. So He says, as thou hast given
Him power over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to
as many as thou hast given Him. You see, the glory of God and
the preeminence of Christ and the eternal security of the saved
is not conditioned on me or you. It's conditioned on the glory
of God in Christ who gives eternal life to as many as the Father
had given him. And who is that? That's his elect. That's his sheep. And then verse
three, listen to what he says here. He says, and this is life
eternal. that they might know thee the
only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent." Last week
I dealt with this in John 10. He said, my sheep hear my voice. What happens when they hear his
voice? He said they know the only true God and Jesus Christ
whom God has sent. To know God, to know him as both
a just God and a Savior, to know him in light of our sinfulness. Think about that. I mentioned
this last week. When God the Holy Spirit brings
a sinner under conviction of sin through the preaching of
the gospel of Christ, what does he show us? He shows us our total
inability, our total depravity. Meaning that we have no righteousness. That we, by our best efforts
to keep the law, cannot work righteousness. And meaning that
we have no will for God unless he makes us willing in the day
of his power. We're sinners. Salvation, eternal
life, and even our security, cannot and is not based on anything
we do or don't do. We're sinners. If God were to
leave us to ourselves at any stage in salvation, to any degree,
what would happen? We would perish. But as Christ
said in John 10, they shall never perish. And here he says, this
is life eternal. This is a quality of life. It
does last forever. It can never be taken away because
Christ earned it and gives it to his people. And he says in
verse four, he says, I have glorified thee on the earth. I have finished
the work which thou gave us me to do. Now whose work is the
salvation and the security of God's people based on? Well,
look at it again. Verse four, I have glorified
thee on the earth. I have finished the work which
thou gave us me to do. What work is he talking about?
Well, he's speaking in anticipation of his going to the cross. You
see, he speaks of it in past tense. It hadn't happened yet
in this historical time period. Here he is in the upper room
speaking to his disciples. And he's about to go to the cross.
But he speaks of it in past tense, and you wanna know why? Because
it's the purpose of God, it's the plan of God, it's the promise
of God. It is sure and certain to take
place. God is the one who speaks of things that are not as though
they were, because nothing is gonna stop it. It's a done deal. And you know when this became
a done deal? Before the foundation of the world. When Peter stood
at Pentecost in Acts chapter two and preached, he talked about
how we as human beings with wicked hands crucified the Lord of glory,
but we in essence, unknown to us and having nothing to do with
our evil motives, sinful motives, we did no more than what God
determined to be done beforehand. That's right. You say, well,
God's the author of sin then, oh no. No, no, we meant it for
evil, God meant it for good. Well, how can God do that? I'll
tell you how God can do that, He's God. That's why I tell people
all the time, when you try to reconcile the sovereignty of
God and the responsibility of man, you always come out with
a paradox. You can't figure it out. So what
do people do? Well, they either deny the sovereignty
of God and elevate the will of man, which is ungodly, which
is not scriptural, or they elevate the sovereignty of God to the
point where man is nothing but a robot. And that's not right
either. You say, well, how do you figure
something like that out? You don't. You simply bow to
the truth of scripture. That's what you do. God is God. The secret things belong to the
Lord. The revealed things belong to
us. The moment I try to relegate my, or try to live my life according
to what I think God in His sovereign purpose has not revealed to me,
I'm trying to play God, and I'm not. So what I'm saying here
is this. Here's the work that Jesus Christ
did. And he did it for his people.
And all of their salvation and security is conditioned on him,
not them. Now, what am I to do? Well, the
only thing I know to do and know to tell you to do is seek the
Lord. Seek the Lord, my friend. Seek
him in his word. Not as you think him to be, not
as the public opinion is. Not as just somebody tells you.
And listen to gospel preachers, but don't seek Him just because
I say it. Check me out with the Word of
God. Read the Word of God. Listen to it. Pray that the Lord
will reveal it to you. And seek Him as He's revealed
in the Scripture. Who God says He is. He's a holy
God. He's a just God. Oh yes, He's
a merciful God. He's a loving God. He's a gracious
God. But my friend, understand this
now. He cannot and will not show love, mercy, or grace apart from
His holy law and justice, His truth being honored and satisfied. God must be just when He justifies
the ungodly. So that begs the question, how
can God be holy and just? In my case, because I'm a sinner,
I deserve nothing but, if God gave me strict justice, just
bare justice, I would be damned forever. And I'm talking about
myself today, not as I used to be. But I'm talking about right
now. If God were to give me what I
deserve, it would be eternal damnation. Lord, if thou, Lord,
shouldest mark iniquities, who would stand? Psalm 130 and verse
3. So, understand this. If I'm going
to seek the Lord, I can't seek Him to try to find out what He
owes me or what I deserve, else I'll find nothing but damnation.
But seek Him as He is. Seek Him as I am. I'm a sinner. And I'm gonna tell you something.
Now listen to me very carefully. I don't deserve anything good
from God. I haven't earned anything good
from God. I'm a sinner. The only hope I
have is to throw myself at His mercy and say, God be merciful
to me, the sinner. That's right. And then seek Him
in the Lord Jesus Christ. Listen to it again, John 17,
verse 4. He said, I have glorified thee
on the earth, I have finished the work which thou gavest me
to do. Christ went to the cross, having my sins, the debt of my
sin, imputed, charged, accounted to Him. He was made sin, the
scripture says. And He became guilty. Jesus Christ,
the perfect Lamb of God, who knew no sin, who did no sin,
who never had a sinful thought, a sinful motive, or a sinful
desire. He died on that cross as a guilty
person. How was he guilty? By an act
of divine imputation. God charging him with the debt
of my sin. I'm the sinner. Christ was made
sin. I'm the sinner. Christ is my
surety and substitute. And he died. That's the work. You remember he said in John
19.30 as he was hanging on that cross, he said, it is finished. That's the work that the Father
gave him to do. And he drank damnation dry and
he was buried. He died, he was buried, and he
rose the third day. Why? Because in his death, righteousness
was established. And righteousness demands life
for the ones for whom he died. Do you understand that? You see,
the death of Christ on the cross did not make sinners savable
if they would do their part. First of all, the Bible tells
us if we have any part to do, we won't do it. We won't cooperate. You say, well, I did. You better
read the Bible again. The Bible says that we won't
cooperate. That's right. Left to ourselves,
we will not believe. Oh, we'll get religious. We'll
get baptized. We'll get baptized a thousand
times. We'll join a church. We'll do
anything that people tell us to do except one thing, and that's
what God says to do, and that is submit to the righteousness
of Christ as the one and only ground of salvation. Submit to
His sovereign will and way in salvation. So we can do that. But the righteousness of Christ,
the death of Christ, did not make sinners savable. The righteousness
of Christ, the death of Christ, did not make salvation a mere
possibility if one would cooperate. The righteousness of Christ demands
and secures the salvation of His people. He ever lives to
make intercession for His people. And when He talks about it, He
talks about it, all of this, He says, He will give eternal
life to as many as the Father had given. This is life eternal. This is not a temporary life.
This is not provisional life, conditional life, or security. This is life eternal. Do you
know Jesus Christ? Do you know the Father through
Jesus Christ? Paul said in 2 Timothy 1 and
verse 12, he said, I know whom I have believed and am persuaded
that He is able to keep that which I've committed unto Him
against that day. That is, against the day of trial,
against the day of judgment. Did you hear that? He is able. Christ is able. I'm not able.
Even Paul the Apostle was not able. But Christ is able. And He's able to do what? Not
only to save me, but to keep, preserve that which I've committed
unto Him. Now, what have I committed unto
Him? My whole salvation, my whole preservation, my whole existence
in eternity is committed to Christ. And I'm committed to Him. You
see the difference there? Everything that I want in salvation
is committed to Christ. And once I know that He fulfilled
everything to acquire everything that I need, then I can say,
I know Him. This is life eternal. That's
what it is. And I'm committed to Him. I cling
to Him. Now somebody says, well, what
if you all of a sudden let go of Him and reject Him? Well, the Bible teaches that
if that happens, you never knew him to begin with. You never
were saved. And I've told people, I'm gonna
deal with passages of scripture that deal with that. And some
of the what ifs, you know, people say, well, what about this passage?
And I'm gonna deal with those. But look at it again. This is
life eternal. Life eternal is to know the Father
through the Son. And it comes down to this, as
we talk about the intercessory work of Christ. Just like the
Apostle Paul wrote in the book of Romans when he was talking
about security, that was his subject. The security of the
saved and how Jesus Christ has met the conditions that's required. And he says in verse 31 of Romans
8, what shall we then say to these things? If God be for us,
who can be against us? He that spared not his own son,
but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also
freely, unconditionally give us all things? The all there
refers to his sheep, his people, his elect. How do you know? Verse
33. Who shall lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? God's elect cannot be charged
with sin. Why? Because it was charged to
Christ. God's elect can only be charged
with righteousness. Why? Because Christ died. Look
at it. Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?
It is God that justifies. Now look at verse 34. Who is
he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather
that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who
also maketh intercession for us. You see, it's all based upon
the high priestly work, the intercessory work of Jesus Christ. And once
you know Him, that's eternal life. And then Paul wrote there,
he said, who shall separate us from the love of God in Christ?
God's true children, chosen before the foundation of the world,
redeemed by the blood of Christ, justified by His righteousness
imputed, regenerated, converted, born again by the Holy Spirit
and called to Christ. My friend, they can never lose
it. They can never be lost again, basically because of what Christ
has done for them and what Christ does in them by the power of
the Holy Spirit to cause them to look to Him, to rest in Him,
submit to Him, bow to Him, believe in Him, and follow Him forever
and ever. I'm persuaded, I'm persuaded
that He's able to keep that which I've committed unto Him against
that day. Whatever day it is, whatever
trial comes my way, whatever, and even unto judgment, I'll
stand before holy God in Christ. Not having my own righteousness
which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of
Christ, the faithfulness of Christ. You see, I'm not even going to
stand there on my faith. I'm going to stand there in faith,
believing in Christ, and resting in Him for all salvation, for
the forgiveness of all my sins, For being justified, my righteousness
is Christ. For eternal life and glory, security
in every way, this is life eternal, that they might know Thee, the
only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent. Sent to
do what? Sent to establish the only ground
and security of salvation. 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
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.