Let's open our Bibles to 1 John,
chapter 2. Book of 1 John, chapter 2. It's good to be back. And we
knew it would be warm down here, but we didn't think it would
be this warm. But it's actually warm up at our place, too. So I told Randy, I said, it's
enough to make a man believe in global warming. It's amazing,
but Debbie and I both are glad to be back with you for this
weekend and today. It's always good to come and
preach the gospel and study the word of God, and that's what
we're going to do this morning. I've entitled this message, We
Have an Advocate. And you're familiar with these
two verses, and it's that I'm going to preach from the first
two verses of 1 John chapter 2. Randy said, I'm a long-winded
speaker now. I heard that. Well, somebody
did say, he said, you can get more out of one verse, you know?
And well, this is two, so. But let's read this. He said,
John the Apostle, writing by inspiration of the Holy Spirit,
he says, my little children. And of course, he's speaking
of his role as a guide, a spiritual guide to these churches in Asia
Minor. He said, my little children,
though these things write I unto you, that you or in order that
you sin not. And if any man sin, we have an
advocate with the father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. And he
is the propitiation for our sins and not for ours only, but also
for the whole world or for the sins of the whole world. We have
an advocate. You know, in passages like this
where you see where, and I guess you could say it this way, certain
passages sort of lend themselves to people launching out on various
heresies because of a lack of understanding of the truth of
what the Bible really teaches concerning these subjects that
are brought forth just in two verses. our advocate. What is an advocate? Who is our
advocate? What does it say about him as
our advocate? And then that term propitiation
comes up here. That term is translated, that
word is translated this way three times in the New Testament. But
there are other words that are related to it translated another
way. For example, one time it's translated
reconciliation. And that's really a good, a very
good translation of propitiation because it means reconciliation.
It doesn't mean the possibility of a reconciliation, but it means
reconciliation. And then the term for the whole
world, you know what people do with that. They take that term
and they launch out on the popular, probably the most popular heresy
of the day, which is universal atonement or redemption, and
that's not what it teaches at all. How do you know that? Well,
we've got to look at it in context, and we've got to see what the
Bible says, what it really says. So let's look at this. He says,
and first of all, let's just break the verses down. He says,
my little children, these things write unto you that you sin not. Now John had said a lot about
sin over in chapter one. He talked about in verse eight,
if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the
truth is in us. He said in verse nine, if we
confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins
and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Verse 10, if we say that we have
not sinned, we make him a liar, make God a liar. God says we
have sinned. If we say we have not sinned,
we make God a liar. And he says, and his word is
not in us. So you see that if, if, if. Verse 6 has an if. If
we say that we have fellowship with him. And people take those
if passages of the scripture and they make them conditional.
In other words, these are conditions a sinner, a person must meet
in order to attain or maintain or earn or gain those blessings
that's being spoken of. And they're not conditional at
all. I'm going to deal with this a little bit in the next message,
you know, how these if statements of scripture in the gospel context
are not conditional. They're evidential. In other
words, these are evidences. It's like saying, and I've often
used this analogy, you've heard me use it, that, you know, it's
like saying, well, you're alive if you breathe. The if there,
in other words, it's not your life is conditioned on your breathing.
Your breathing is evidence that you're alive. And you say, well,
how do you get that? Well, how do I get it? It's because
of the whole covenant of grace. That's how I get it. It's because
of the gospel that teaches that all the requirements and conditions
for salvation were laid upon Christ. And he fulfilled those
conditions for his people to attain and maintain and gain
our salvation. Everything that's said here to
believers is said within the gospel context. It's under the
umbrella and on the basis of the everlasting covenant of grace. And grace is something you can't
earn and don't deserve. It's not a conditional grace. If it's conditional, grace is
canceled out. That would be what they call
an oxymoron, conditional grace. You say, well, somebody had to
meet some conditions. Yes, Christ did for his people. And that sets the tone for what
we're talking about here. We have an advocate. Now, he'd
said a lot about sin. He'd said, we're all sinners.
The Bible teaches that. We've all sinned and come short
of the glory of God. The fact, the sin and the depravity
of man goes so deep that it shows us in the Bible that at our worst
and at our best, we cannot save ourselves by our works. By deeds
of law shall no flesh be justified in God's sight. The depravity
of man goes so far, when we talk about total depravity, we're
not saying that everybody is as bad as they could be. God
does have a restraining hand in some areas, and that's according
to his sovereign will. But it simply means this, is
that man is by nature spiritually dead, so that he will not and
cannot come to God through Christ. Pride, self-righteous, we can
talk about all those things. But we've all sinned and come
short of the glory of God. The wages of sin is death, it's
here. And so John deals with that.
And so that salvation, if it comes to me, a sinner, It comes
to me freely and unconditionally, not based upon any work that
I do or anything that I choose to do, but it comes to me on
the basis upon the ground of what Christ has done as my substitute. So my works are totally excluded.
Now, even as a saved sinner, saved by grace, I'm still a sinner.
I still come short of the glory of God in everything that I think,
say, and do. That's what this is saying here.
But now, does that give me an excuse to promote sin? Does that
give me a reason to take a cavalier or a casual attitude towards
sin? Well, John says, no, my little
children, these things right I do that you sin not. There's
no excuse for it. And in fact, I'll go even further
than that. The Bible teaches Though we are sinners and though
we'll mess up royally a lot of times, it's impossible for a
true believer, a regenerated, born again, child of God, to
continue throughout their whole lives with such a casual, flippant
attitude towards sin that doesn't bring them to repentance. Now
that's it. Now why is that? Well, number
one, because salvation by God's grace in Christ not only gives
us a righteous standing before God in Christ, based on his righteousness
imputed to us, charged to us, in our justification, but it
also gives us spiritual life within. That's the new birth.
And that life is imparted. That life, that spiritual life,
consists in the revealed knowledge, the conviction of sin, that I'm
a sinner and I need salvation, I need Christ, God be merciful
to me, the sinner, that I'm taught of God along with the gifts and
graces and fruit of the Holy Spirit. It includes God-given
desires towards the obedience of faith and love and gratitude,
that's there. That's the power and the dynamic
of God's grace in the life of a believer. Still sin, we still
have those desires too. That's why we're in a warfare.
Warfare of the flesh and the spirit. Secondly, although the
works and desires of the flesh still remain within us in this
life, we also have the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit.
The Spirit of God dwells within us. Paul deals with that in Romans
chapter eight beautifully. We have the Spirit of Christ.
And God the Holy Spirit within us promotes neither works motivated
by legalism, trying to establish our own righteousness, oh no,
he promotes resting in Christ for all righteousness. Pleading
the blood and righteousness of Christ alone is that which saves
me and keeps me and entitles me to heaven. He doesn't promote
works motivated by legalism, but he doesn't promote license
to sin either, motivated by the liberty of grace, no sir. He
motivates and energizes the true child of God towards godliness.
And that's why he continually brings conviction of sin, godly
sorrow over sin. Thirdly, the obedience of faith
in which we as true believers are engaged. You know, the Bible
says that that's the foreordained purpose of God in bringing his
people to salvation, in sending Christ into the world to establish
the only ground of our justification. We read in Ephesians chapter
2 and verse 8, for by grace are you saved through faith. That's
not of yourselves. It's the gift of God. Not everybody
has that. It's the gift of God. Not of
works, lest any man should boast. And then it says, for we are
his workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which
God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. So we're
his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus. God, listen, a believer
is not a self-made or a self-willed person. He's the workmanship
of God. Salvation's of the Lord. And
we're created in Christ Jesus. That means the ground and basis
of this new creation is the work of Christ, the obedience unto
death of the Lord Jesus Christ, the God-man, what he accomplished
on Calvary. You see, salvation is not based
upon what I do for God. It's based upon what He's done
for me in Christ. And that's the key. And nothing
I do puts that into effect. Everything He did puts me into
effect. That's the difference. Now John
writes here, he says, My little children, these things I write
unto you, that you sin not. And then he says, And if any
man sin, Now, believe it or not, some people take a phrase like
that and they say, well, see there, you have the option. You
can sin or not sin. Well, we have choices that we
make every day. We all do. Some of those choices
certainly can be godly choices. Some can be sinful choices. But
this is not stated as if to imply that some may sin and some may
not sin. As if there are believers who
don't sin and there are believers who do sin. No. I heard a man
talking on the radio last week about sinning Christians. He
said, now it's impossible for sinning Christians to keep their
salvation. And that's, of course, he doesn't
believe salvation by grace. If you can lose it by sinning,
you can gain it back by obedience. That's works. That's not grace. John is not saying, well, just
in case you do commit a sin. No, no, no. You have to keep
it in its context. John actually, really the phrase
has this sense. It's, and if any man sin, as
all men do. As everyone does. Paul wrote
about that in Romans chapter seven. Listen, here's a man who's
a believer. a regenerated child of God, born again by the Holy
Spirit. And he's having a struggle within
himself. He's the Apostle Paul. And he
makes this statement. He said, the things that I desire
to do, I cannot do. Now what does that mean? What
does he desire to do? Well, he's talking about being
conformed to Christ. He's talking about being perfectly
holy in every way, in thought, in attitude, in conduct, in character. He said, I want to be like Christ.
I want to honor God in everything I think, say, and do, but I cannot. And he says, why? Because of
the remaining influence, presence, and contamination of the flesh
of sin. So does that sound like a person
who has any perfection within themselves? Absolutely not. That's
not what this is teaching. What John is saying here, he's
showing that believers have an assurance that is wrapped up
and founded upon the fact that Jesus Christ is our advocate.
I'm a sinner saved by the grace of God. If you know Christ, you're
a sinner saved by the grace of God. And what that means is this,
if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father. An advocate. Who is he? Jesus Christ the righteous. What is an advocate? Well, an
advocate here is one who pleads another's case or calls before
God. I have somebody to plead my case
before God. It's like somebody said one time
they were talking about a dream they had. And they said they
were standing before God and they didn't know what to say.
Well, I know what to say. We don't say anything. We have
an advocate who pleads our cause, our case for us. And his name
is Jesus Christ. Jesus, what does that mean? That
means he shall save his people from their sins. Christ, the
anointed one, the Messiah. He's one who pleads our case
as our mediator. The Bible says there's one God
and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.
He's one who stands in defense of another accused of a crime,
just like a defense attorney. He's one who stands alongside
of, this word advocate literally means to stand alongside of. He's one who stands alongside
of us and pleads our cause in the way of law and justice. How do you know that's the issue?
Because He's Jesus Christ the righteous. What does that mean?
Well, He's righteous in His very nature as God and man. He is
God-man. He's righteous in His deity because
God is light and in Him is no darkness. God is righteous. In
Him is no sin. He's holy. And He's righteous
in His human nature because He kept the law perfectly. He did
no sin and knew no sin. He's the perfect God-man. So
he in himself is righteous, but just being righteous in himself
would do you and me no good. He had to do something for us. So he is righteous in that he
himself kept that law perfectly in our stead as our substitute,
as our advocate. unto death to satisfy the justice
of God for us, for he was made sin. Christ was made sin. How's that? Our sins were charged
to him. The demerit, the guilt of our
sins was charged to him, imputed to him. Christ who knew no sin,
for us that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.
He's righteous in that He defends His redeemed ones in all justice
and honesty. There's no fantasy here. There's
no fiction here. There's no as if, but it's not
really true here. Somebody said that people think
that the doctrine of imputation, imputed righteousness, means
that God sees you as righteous, but you're really not. Oh no,
our advocate is Jesus Christ, the righteous, the just. And
what he says is true in the eyes of God. What does the Bible say? What does it say in Romans chapter
eight? Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?
It's God that justifies. God's not, he's not in some kind
of a fantasy, play-like world here. He speaks in terms of truth. Our God judges according to truth,
Romans chapter two and verse two. He's righteous in that he
stands for us, his people, and we all stand in him, having righteousness
imputed, charged to us. And so therefore, because he
is our advocate, there can be no charge laid to us. Who can
condemn us? It's Christ that died, yea rather
is risen again. Jesus Christ the righteous. And
verse two says, and he is the propitiation for our sins. Now
what John, you see here, John's painting a picture of a courtroom.
And this courtroom is in heaven. God the Father is the judge.
There's a great picture back in the book of Zechariah chapter
3 where Joshua the high priest or Zechariah saw in a vision
Joshua the high priest of that day standing before the court
of God's justice and Satan, the adversary, the accuser of the
brethren came along and was charging him. This person is a sinner. This man's a sinner. What does
that mean? He deserves condemnation. He
deserves damnation. That's what we all deserve. That's
why we can't be under a conditional covenant, because the main condition
of any covenant that has anything to do with a relationship with
God eternally and spiritually demands perfection, demands righteousness,
and we don't have it. There's none righteous, no not
one. There's none that doeth good, there's none that seeketh
after God. And how many times have I told
you, don't get the accept me syndrome there. Oh, accept me
now. Israel, we were talking this
a couple of days ago, about Israel under the Old Covenant. And people
will take the promises that were given to Israel under the Old
Covenant and try to apply them to the church today, and they
don't apply. You see, Israel for 1,500 years, about 1,500
years, from Sinai to Calvary, they were under a covenant, but
it was a conditional covenant towards them. All the ifs under
that covenant were conditions on the people. How do you know? Because of the covenant. Think
about the context of the covenant. And in every case, just about
every case, the nation failed to meet the conditions. And they
perished. And God wrote them a bill of
divorce. They forsook God and they committed spiritual adultery.
gave him a bill of divorcement, you see. And so when they were
charged, the charges stick. We're beginning to study the
book of Jeremiah. In Jeremiah chapter 2, he starts bringing
the charges against Israel, against Judah, the southern kingdom.
But the charges stuck. He said, my people have committed
two great evils. They've forsaken me, the fountain
of living waters. They forsook Christ. And they
hewed out cisterns, broken cisterns that won't hold water. They tried
to be saved by their works. And God brought charges through
Jeremiah, and the charges stuck, you see. That's a conditional
covenant. Every time you see any conditions laid upon a sinner,
as far as a relationship with God, what do you see? The sinner's
failure. Why was the law given? Because
of the transgression. To expose their sin. So you see
those promises that were given to them, they failed. Now, Jeremiah
said, well, there's a brighter future coming. There's going
to be, God's going to have a people and it's a brighter future and
it's coming. Now, what is that brighter future
based on? Well, it's because God's going
to have better people in the future than he had now. And they're
going to meet the conditions. No, no, no, no. It's because
there's another covenant coming that's gonna replace this old
covenant. Read in Jeremiah 31. And it's a covenant, and he said,
I'm not gonna put conditions on them. He said, I'm gonna put
my law into their inner parts. I'm gonna write my word upon
their hearts. I'm gonna put my spear within
them, and they shall be my people, and I'll be their God, and I'll
remember their sins no more. They cannot be charged. Why? Because all the conditions of
that new covenant are upon Christ, Jesus Christ the righteous. And
he's the propitiation. So here in this courtroom, Jesus
Christ the righteous is our defense attorney. God the Father is a
just judge who always judges according to truth. And as we're
all sinners, we've got to ask this question then. And this
is the question that's not being asked in religion today. And
that's this, how can we who are so sinful and who deserve nothing
but condemnation and wrath, how can we be judged righteous in
the sight of Almighty God? How is that possible? Well, here's
the ground of our defense. Jesus Christ, the righteous,
is the propitiation for our sins. There's the answer. The ground
of every believer's salvation. the ground of every believer's
justification. What is that propitiation? Well, the easiest way, I guess, or
the best way to tell you what propitiation is, is to say it
this way. It means satisfaction to the
law. We were coming down the road
to church today, And that old song, Tie Yellow Ribbon Around
the Old Oak Tree, came on. You remember that back in the
70s? Now some of you young people may not. Tie Yellow Ribbon, and
what the guy says, he says, I'm coming home, I've done my time. Now to do your time, if you go
to prison, you do your time, that means whatever the law required,
that means that law is satisfied and he goes free. He didn't have
a choice in the matter now, I'm telling you. Now, we fell in
Adam, and in that sense, we deserve nothing but condemnation and
wrath. Here's this fella, he's done his time. Well, what is
the time required of the law for sin? Well, the soul that
sinneth shall surely die. The wages of sin is dead. That's
talking about eternity. How long is that? That's forever
and ever. Well, he's done his time, the law's satisfied. Somebody's
got to satisfy the law. Somebody's got to satisfy the
justice of God against my sins. Somebody's got to pay my debt
to law and justice. Look over at the book of Hebrews
chapter two with me. Turn back just a few pages there. Show you something here. And
these words are all related. Verse 17. Here he's talking about how Jesus
Christ, the son of God, became incarnate. He took upon him the
likeness of sinful flesh, and yet without sin. In verse 17
of Hebrews 2, it says, wherefore in all things it behooved him
to be made like unto his brethren. Now that word behooved there
is the Greek word for debt. Debt. What it's meaning here
is, is wherefore in all things he became indebted to be made
like unto his brethren. In the everlasting covenant of
grace before the foundation of the world, God chose a people
and gave them to Christ and put all the conditions and all the
requirements and all the stipulations and all the debt that was owed
his justice of their sins upon Christ. He became responsible. That's what the scripture means
in passages like Isaiah nine and verse six, the government
was upon his shoulder. That's the establishment and
the administration and the victory of the government of God's grace
placed squarely upon his shoulder, not upon yours. You see, it's
not conditioned upon your faith. Must we believe? Yes, we must
believe. If we don't believe, we're not
going to be saved. But that believing is not a condition of the covenant. It's a provision of the covenant. You see what I'm saying? Christ
met the conditions. Well, look here. It behooved
him. He became indebted to be made like unto his brethren.
He had to do it because he agreed to do it. that he might be a
merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God,
that is for the glory of God, to make reconciliation, that
word reconciliation there could be propitiation, satisfaction
for the sins of the people, to pay our debt to God's justice. That's what he's saying there.
Now go back to 1 John 2. That's what propitiation means.
It means atonement. It means satisfaction. It means
reconciliation based on the debt paid. And what was the price? What was the debt? It was his
death. He had to die. That's right,
for the sins of his people. Our sins charged to him. And
out of his death comes righteousness. And that's what's charged to
us in him. It means that Christ in his person,
as the high priest of the everlasting covenant of grace, and by virtue
of his obedience unto death, established and fulfilled every
condition and requirement of God's holiness on behalf of his
people. And you know what that means?
That means in propitiation, it means he secured the salvation
of everyone for whom he died. Now let's go on, look there,
he says he's the propitiation for our sins, but then he says,
and not for ours only, verse two, but not for ours only, but
also for the sins of the whole world. Well, most people argue
that the whole world here means every person without exception. And therefore this propitiation
is a general In fact, really, it's not a propitiation at all.
It's sort of like a general amnesty that blankets everybody and is
put out there and you can take charge of it or you can take
advantage of it if you want to and you can choose not to. They
believe it's a general propitiation only securing the possibility
of salvation conditioned upon sinners believing. Well, that's
not what the word means. Propitiation means the debt's
paid. Propitiation means reconciliation
is made. Propitiation means satisfaction
to God's justice. Now let me ask you, I've used
this analogy about the debt concerning the doctrine of imputation. Let's
apply it to propitiation. If you owe a debt of money to
some company or some bank, They have a legal right to charge
you and to collect that debt. Is that not right? Now, if somebody
comes along and pays that debt, what happens to their legal right
to charge you and collect the debt? It's gone, isn't it? In fact, it would be illegal
for them to charge you and try to collect that debt when somebody
else has already paid it for you. And yet, that's what most
people think about when they think about salvation and God. But that's not the case. What
does this mean? Well, first of all, the Bible
teaches here and in other places, as referenced in this passage,
the very nature and essence of Christ's propitiation, the propitiation,
the satisfaction that he made does not make salvation possible,
but it makes it a sure thing for all whom he died. Christ's
blood atoned for all the sins of all his people. Therefore,
God would be unjust to punish them. Punish anybody for whom
Christ died. That debt's paid. Somebody says,
well, but you've got to receive it. Yes, the Bible says you will
receive it. But it's not your receiving it
that pays the debt. It's paid. Secondly, if Christ
died for all without exception, conditioned on their faith, then
this makes faith a work that secures salvation, not his blood,
not his death, not his righteousness. Christ's death then did no more
for any sinner in heaven than it does for those who perish.
It's the sinner's faith that saves him, not the blood of Christ.
That's not what the Bible teaches. But here's the third thing. You
do this on your own, but I'm not going to turn to all these
scriptures. But in the Bible, the phrase the whole world, all
right, let's talk about the whole world. It says the whole world
here. Do you know in the Bible the phrase the whole world never
describes all men and women without exception? Never. Not one time. Now I'm going to give you two
Two examples, turn over to 1 John chapter 5 and verse 19. When
you see that phrase in the Bible, the whole world, it never described
every individual without exception that ever has or will be born.
Look at 1 John chapter 5 and look at verse 18. He says, we know that whosoever
is born of God sinneth not. Now, he's not talking about that
we're not no longer sinners. He's talking about we won't forsake
Christ. But I'm not going to go into all that right now. But
he says, but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, that
is, keeps looking to Christ. And that wicked one, that's Satan,
toucheth him not. Satan cannot charge him with
sin. We plead the blood of Christ. And we know, verse 19, that we
are of God. Now there's one group of people.
We are of God. Who's he talking about? Those
who've been born of God. Those who've been, listen, those
who've been redeemed by the blood and regenerated by the spirit.
Those who have Christ's righteousness imputed, charged to them. We're
of God. And the whole world lieth in
wickedness. The whole world lieth in the
wicked one, literally. Now obviously in that verse you
would have to agree that the whole world doesn't mean every
individual without exception because he'd already mentioned
we are of God. What does that mean? It means
those who are connected to this world. And let me show you one
more. Turn over to Revelation chapter
12. And this falls right in line
with the issue of propitiation. Revelation chapter 12. Now, verse
9. This is talking about the last
days. The last days. Verse 9. Revelation
12. The great dragon was cast out.
That old serpent called the devil and Satan. When was he cast out?
Well, he was cast out at the cross. We can see that in John
chapter 12. He says, Satan, which deceiveth
the whole world. Now, does Satan deceive everybody
without exception? Every individual? Well, look
on. He was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast
out with him. And I heard a loud voice saying
in heaven, now has come salvation and strength and the kingdom
of our God and the power of his Christ. For the accuser of our
brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day
and night, and they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb.
and by the word of their testimony." Now, what is the word of our
testimony? It's the blood of the Lamb. God forbid that I should
glory save in the cross. And they love not their lives
unto death. Here you have people who are deceived and people who
aren't deceived. And that just gives you a couple
of examples, but look back here and I'll close. He says, not
for ours only, but for the sins of the whole world. What is John
saying here? Well, the whole Bible, as well as these verses,
teach that those for whom Christ made propitiation, he also stands
for them as their advocate. And the ground of their defense
is not their faith. Yes, they have faith. Faith is
the gift of God. But the ground of their salvation
is what Christ has done in propitiation. His blood, His righteousness
alone. And the whole world here is God's
way of expressing that salvation is not just for one class of
people, one group of people, one nation, one ethnic group,
but for all His chosen people out of every tribe, kindred,
tongue, and nation. This language is used by the
Apostle to combat a common Jewish prejudice against Gentiles. And
that was so prevalent. Read it in the book of Acts.
Many false professing Jews who claim to believe in Christ did
not want to receive Gentiles into their fellowship until those
Gentiles had become Jews first by their circumcision. But that's
not the case. Christ did not die just for one
nation. but for the sins of the whole
world in this sense, that he has a people, a remnant, according
to the election of grace, God's people, God's elect, out of every
tribe, kindred, tongue, and nation. Revelation 5 and verse 9, it
says they sung a new song, saying thou art worthy to take the book
and to open the seals thereof, talking about Christ, for thou
was slain, his death, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood
out of every kindred, and every tongue and people and nation. Salvation is for all without
distinction, that's what it means, who come to Christ and plead
Him, who plead His blood and righteousness as the only ground
of salvation.