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 the second session
of our eight-part series of studies on the topic, What is Salvation? Now, in this and the following
lessons, we're going to examine from the Bible what I call the
four realms of salvation. I call these realms because the
salvation God freely and fully provides for His people involves
a kingdom. a kingdom of which Jesus Christ
is king, and in which those who are saved are his subjects, subjects
of the king, and citizens of the heavenly spiritual kingdom. Now, these four realms are, number
one, the eternal realm of salvation, and then number two, the legal
realm of salvation, Number three is the spiritual realm of salvation. And finally, number four is the
glorified realm of salvation. Now there are three things true
of all four realms. All four realms of salvation
are of the Lord. You see, it is all the work of
God and all conditioned on the Lord Jesus Christ. No part of
salvation, no realm of salvation is conditioned on sinful man.
It is all of God's grace in Jesus Christ. Salvation or any part
of it conditioned on sinners is doomed to fail. The second
thing that's true of all four realms is this. All four realms
are necessary for the salvation of God's people. One realm does
not cancel out, deny, or even diminish the necessity of the
others. You see, God has freely and fully
provided all aspects of salvation to accomplish His purpose in
Jesus Christ for His glory. And then the third thing that
is true of all four realms is this, All four realms of salvation
are founded upon and centered around the Lord Jesus Christ
as the salvation of His people. You see, every aspect of salvation
exalts Christ and gives Him the preeminence that He has earned
as the effectual and successful Savior of His people to the praise
of the glory of God's grace. Now we'll begin today by examining
the first realm, the eternal realm of salvation. When we speak
of the eternal realm of salvation, we have to realize that we're
delving into the eternal mind and purpose of Almighty God And
we also need to be aware that we can only go so far as we're
limited and cannot fully conceive the infinite nature and mind
of God. We can only know what God reveals
of himself and his mind. And we will not be able to understand
it all or make it all fit into our human way of reconciling
truth, but we have to submit to God's revelation of these
things. The tragedy is that people have
a tendency to reject or even deny things they cannot understand. The issue here is not what we're
able to comprehend. The issue here is what does the
Bible say? For example, the Bible makes
it clear that before the world began, before Adam fell by disobeying
God and brought the whole human race into sin and death, provision
had already been made for the salvation of God's people who
are called in the Bible His elect. And this provision for their
salvation would be consistent with the divine claims of holiness
and justice. All the details and results of
the plan of mercy had been arranged and settled from the beginning
by divine wisdom. And this provision of grace,
which God made for His people before the foundation of the
world, was founded upon the appointment of God's own Son to become the
mediator, substitute, and surety of the covenant of salvation,
the everlasting covenant of grace. Now this everlasting covenant
was the determination and agreement that existed between the persons
of the triune Godhead, God the Father, God the Son, and God
the Holy Spirit. And it was all settled in the
eternal mind of God based on the great work of redemption
that Jesus Christ would come in time and accomplish for his
people. This great work of redemption
required His incarnation. That means the Son of God, the
second person of the Trinity, taking into union with His deity,
the nature of His deity, a perfect, sinless, human nature, body and
soul. And this great work also required
the offering of Himself as a sacrifice for sin. And as the reward of
his accomplishing that great work, he would be exalted in
himself as God-man to the right hand of God and be given supremacy
over his church and over all things for his church. And the
blessings which he is empowered to dispense and the extent to
which his work should be made effectual in saving all the souls
for whom he lived and died and arose. He's given a name which
is above every name. Now these were all matters of
definite and certain arrangement agreed upon between God the Father
and God the Son in the terms of the everlasting covenant.
The apostle Paul wrote of God, who hath saved us and called
us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to
his own purpose and grace, Listen to this, which was given us in
Christ Jesus, when? Before the world began, but is
now made manifest by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ, who
hath abolished death and hath brought life and immortality
to light through the gospel. Now that's recorded in 2 Timothy
chapter one, verses nine and 10. The eternal realm of salvation,
Involves this it is the origin and cause of salvation it is
salvation purpose and planned Let me direct your attention
to a passage of scripture in the book of Romans this is Romans
chapter 8 and verse 28 which says and we know that all things
work together for good to them that love God to them who are
the called according to his purpose and And then verse 29 says this,
for whom he did foreknow, which literally means foreordained,
he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his
son, that he, his son, might be the firstborn among many brethren. And then in verse 30, listen
to this, moreover, whom he did predestinate, them he also called. and whom he called, them he also
justified, and whom he justified, them he also glorified. That's
the whole realm of salvation in the eternal mind and purpose
of God. So salvation in the Bible is
shown to be God's eternal purpose all along. Salvation is the work
of God in the trinity of his persons, Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit. So when dealing with salvation
as revealed in the Bible, we're dealing with matters both of
time and eternity. Now we know about time as we
have seen things unfold in history and in the present, but we only
know what God tells us of eternity. And I'll tell you, it's in essence
mind-boggling. But we cannot deny the truth
simply because our minds are limited in understanding. We
must receive and submit to what God reveals to us in His Word. Now, why study the eternal realm
of salvation when you consider that it's so high above us and
that we can't really comprehend all of the workings of it? Let
me give you these reasons. Why study the eternal realm of
salvation? Number one, because it's in the
Bible. It's in God's Word. Don't fall
into the trap of ignoring or even denying scriptural truth
simply because you cannot make it all reconcile with your human
logic and understanding. When God reveals something to
us of himself, rest assured it is needed for our understanding
of salvation and our understanding of the glory, the majesty, the
wisdom, and power of Almighty God. So we need to study the
eternal realm of salvation first because it's written in the Bible.
Secondly, we need to study the eternal realm because it tells
us something of the glorious character and nature of God himself. Now this is so critical in salvation
because if a person is brought by God to truly seek salvation,
In reality, what that person is doing is seeking the Lord,
calling upon His name. And the one who is truly saved
comes to know the true and living God as He's revealed in the Bible,
and not merely as people imagine Him to be. We don't want to be
fooled by idols or counterfeit messiahs. The Lord Jesus Christ
over in John 17, his high priestly prayer, makes this statement
in verse three. He says, and this is life eternal,
that they might know thee the only true God and Jesus Christ
whom thou hast sent. So we need to study the eternal
realm of salvation first because it's written in the Bible, secondly
because it tells us something of the true character and nature
of God himself. The third reason we need to study
the eternal realm is because it seals in our minds the reality
of salvation totally by the power and grace of God in the Lord
Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ has always been
and always will be the surety of his people as their sins were
always Imputed that means charged or accounted to him and his righteousness
imputed charged or accounted to them his people and and this
seals in the minds of God's people that salvation is not by our
works in any way to any degree at any stage but only by the
work of the Lord Jesus Christ the eternal Son of God. His redemptive
work on the cross has always been preeminent in the eternal
mind of God When we consider the eternal realm of salvation,
we see from God's word that all salvation in time and eternity
is fixed and grounded upon the glorious person and finished
work of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Lamb slain from the
foundation of the world. Now this is clearly written in
the book of Ephesians chapter one. Let me read you several
verses from that chapter, beginning at verse three. It says, blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed
us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. And verse four, according as
he has chosen us in him, when, before the foundation of the
world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him
in love, and listen to verse 5, having predestinated us unto
the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself, according
to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of
His grace wherein He hath made us accepted in the Beloved, in
Jesus Christ, in whom we have redemption through His blood,
the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of His grace. So
we need to study the eternal realm of salvation first because
it's written in the Bible Secondly, because it tells us something
of the true character and nature of God Himself. Thirdly, because
it seals in our minds the reality of salvation by the power and
grace of God, based solely on the Lord Jesus Christ, the eternal
Son of God, and His redemptive work on the cross, as always
viewed in the eternal mind of God. The fourth reason we need
to study the eternal realm of salvation is because it reveals
the glory of God in salvation. Now, I've already said some things
about that in the third reason, but I want to continue that.
I want to expound upon it. And here's what I'm saying. All
things in salvation are for the glory of God. None of it glorifies
the sinner in his works or in his person. The glory of God
refers to the honor and majesty of God as He reveals Himself,
who He is, what He is like, and how He works. So in discovering
the eternal God of salvation, the one true God who saves by
sovereign grace through the Lord Jesus Christ, those who are truly
saved gain the assurance they are commanded to have in Christ,
seeing that God's glory demands their complete salvation. The
Apostle Paul called this the glory of God in the face of Jesus
Christ, as he wrote it in 2 Corinthians chapter 4 and verse 6. So we
need to study the eternal realm of salvation first because it's
written in the Bible, secondly because it tells us something
of the true character and nature of God Himself, thirdly because
it seals in our minds the reality of salvation by the power and
grace of God based solely on the Lord Jesus Christ, the eternal
Son of God, And his redemptive work on the cross is always viewed
in the eternal mind of God. And fourthly, because it reveals
the glory of God in salvation. Now the fifth reason we need
to study the eternal realm of salvation is that it establishes
the hearts of believers with grace in Jesus Christ. In the
eternal realm of salvation, we're shown the absolute certainty
of the complete salvation of every sinner who comes to God
through Christ, pleading Christ, pleading His blood and His righteousness. And this assurance of faith in
Christ is the motivation for all Christian service and all
Christian obedience. Consider the words of the Lord
in John chapter 6 and verse 39. He says, And this is the Father's
will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me
I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last
day. And this is the will of Him that sent me, that everyone
which seeth the Son and believeth on Him may have everlasting life,
and I will raise him up at the last day. Consider how the Bible,
which is God's revelation of Himself, describes God as eternal,
immutable, that's unchangeable, invincible, all-wise, all-knowing,
all-powerful. We must not separate salvation,
which is of the Lord, from His nature, His character, and His
glory. Salvation, then, is part of the
eternal mind and purpose of Almighty God. All this is the product
of what the Bible calls the everlasting covenant of grace. Over in the
book of Hebrews chapter 13 and verse 20, we read, Now the God
of peace that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus Christ,
that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting
covenant, there's the condition met, Verse 21, make you perfect,
complete in every good work to do his will, working in you that
which is well pleasing in his sight through Jesus Christ to
whom be glory forever and ever. Amen. Now this shows that the
salvation of sinners was always conditioned on and founded upon
the redemptive work of the Lord Jesus Christ, the second person
of the Godhead. The redemptive work of Christ
is described by the word blood. That means his death on the cross
as the surety and substitute of his people. It's the equivalent
of the righteousness of God revealed in the gospel. You see, the gospel,
the good news, is the preaching of the terms and the fulfillment
of the everlasting covenant of grace. You see, Jesus Christ
is the surety of the everlasting covenant of grace. A surety is
one who guarantees payment of a debt. And the payment of the
debt of sin demanded His death in the place of all who God the
Father had given Him in the everlasting covenant of grace before the
foundation of the world. The Apostle Peter preached at
Pentecost that even though it was evil men who murdered Christ,
and that's humanity and sin, us included, that he was delivered
by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God. Acts chapter
2 and verse 23. In other words, this was God's
mind and purpose all along. And because Christ was and is
the surety of his people, God was able to justify them even
in the Old Testament before Christ actually came in time to redeem
them. Someone may ask, well, are we
talking about predestination here? Many people without hesitation
stop listening and they reject this without thought. But do
you realize that the word predestinate, predestination, is taken directly
from the Bible? Predestination in the Bible teaches
us that salvation is not an afterthought with God. It's not God's plan
B as if he were taken by surprise when Adam sinned so that God
had to come up with some way to save mankind. Nothing takes
God by surprise. Salvation was and is God's eternal
wisdom, plan, and mind all along, even before the foundation of
the world. Well, does that mean God planned and determined the
fall of man in the Garden of Eden and the death of His Son
on the cross, even the salvation of His people? And the answer
from the Bible is this, yes it does. But God did it in such
an infinitely wise and good way that He cannot be charged with
sin or folly. God is not the author of sin,
but He does overrule and dispose of all things, including sin,
so as to accomplish His glory and the salvation of His people
through Jesus Christ. How else could we believe that
all things work together for good to them that love God, to
them who are the called according to His purpose, as recorded in
Romans 8 and verse 28. Our understanding of salvation
must be in tune with what God reveals in His Word. And He reveals
that Christ is the one and only surety of the salvation He purposed
before the world began. We see in all this that the eternal
realm of salvation includes election unto salvation. The Bible tells
us that he's speaking of the elect of the Lord, known as the
election of grace. The Bible teaches that we're
all by nature fallen in Adam, and that if left to ourselves,
none of us would choose God or come to Christ for salvation.
Right after the Lord Jesus Christ said, all that the Father giveth
me shall come to me, he said in John 6, 44, 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. The word can there speaks of
power or ability. Man by nature has the faculties
he needs to respond positively to the gospel, but he's spiritually
dead and has no desire for the things of God in Christ. He has
physical ears to hear the gospel, but no spiritual ears to hear
it with humility and faith. He has physical eyes to see and
understand these truths with his intellect, but he has no
spiritual eyes to see them with the eyes of faith. The Lord Jesus
said that in order to see and enter the kingdom of heaven,
we must be born again. We must be regenerated by the
Holy Spirit and given a new heart, new spiritual ears and eyes,
even the gift of faith to receive Christ. So don't ever imagine
if you hear and believe the gospel of God's grace in Christ, that
it was because you were better, less stubborn, less obstinate,
less rebellious than one who refuses. Don't ever think that
it was because of your so-called free will. Man's will is not
free. It is subject to his sinful human
nature and desires. Man has no will to believe God,
and his works are not good enough to save him. We have to remember,
however, that it's not the doctrine of election that bars sinners
from salvation and entering heaven. It's sin that does so. Anyone
who desires salvation God's way, by grace through the Lord Jesus
Christ, will receive it. The Bible is clear. For whosoever
shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Romans 10,
13. In the next lesson, We'll continue
studying the four realms of salvation by looking at the legal realm
of salvation. And I hope you'll continue through
this eight-part study. And if you would like a free
copy of today's program or the entire eight-part study entitled,
What is Salvation? It's available upon request in
an attractive package set along with a complimentary booklet
of the same title. I hope you'll join us next week
as we continue exploring this vital subject, what is salvation? 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 1-1-0-2 Eager Drive, Albany, Georgia 3-1-7-0-7. 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.