I'm bringing a message this morning
I've titled, No Manner of Work. No Manner of Work. It's taken
from verse 31 of chapter 23. We'll be looking at verses 23
through 32. And in this passage, God commands
Moses, under the Mosaic economy, that old covenant, to have the
people of Israel observe an annual day of atonement. And that's
what we're going to be looking at, that which would ceremonially
and civilly cleanse them from their sins, but more importantly,
that would point and picture our high priest, Jesus Christ,
and the sacrifice that he made of his own blood. And so just
look with me beginning in verse 23. It says, And the Lord spake
unto Moses, saying speak unto the children of Israel this was
for that nation Israel for them alone and he was to speak to
all of them saying in the Sabbath month in the first day of the
month shall you have a Sabbath a memorial of blowing of trumpets
and holy convocation and ye shall do no servile work therein but
ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord That is,
they were to do no work of servitude. That would be, in our day, we
would call that employment, so to speak. So they could prepare
their food to eat and take care of their basic needs on that
day. But that's in contrast to the Day of Atonement, as we'll
see. Verse 26, And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Here's another
precept. We have that interlude. And he
says, Also on the tenth day of this seventh month, that is,
of this same month, There shall be a day of atonement, and it
shall be in holy convocation unto you, and ye shall afflict
your souls and offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord."
So once a year on this tenth day of the seventh month, here
the expression of the truth of atonement for sin reached its
highest expression. And on this day he told them,
ye shall afflict your souls. Now that afflict your souls means
they're to humble themselves. They were to deny themselves.
They were to fast on that day. And he goes on in verse 28 and
he says, and ye shall do no work in that same day. you shall do
no work." Now he had said on that day they are to offer an
offering in the previous verse made by fire. But to the nation,
to the people, for whom an atonement was to be made, they were to
do no work. And I thought that was, that's
what struck me when I studied this passage was the contrast
between on that Sabbath that they were to observe on the first
day of the month, they were to do no servile work. But here
on this day of atonement, we're going to see an emphasis on the
fact that they were to do no work in that same day. And he goes on and says, For
it is a day of atonement to make an atonement for you before the
Lord your God. For whatsoever soul it be that
shall not be afflicted, shall not be humbled, shall not deny
themselves in that same day, he shall cut off from among his
people. In my study of that, the implication
there is that they would actually meet an untimely death at the
hand of God. And this is how serious he is. See, he's telling them that nothing
on this one day of atonement each year, nothing is to rival
their attention to that blood sacrifice that was to be made
by the high priest. And it says in verse 30, for
whatsoever soul it be that doeth any work." So he's repeating
himself again. There's to be no work done on
that day. "...whatsoever soul it be that doeth any work in
that same day, the same soul will I destroy from among his
people." So we see how he's likening this afflicting of their souls
to the doing of no work. They meet the same end that he'll
destroy them as well. Nothing is to rival their attention
to this blood sacrifice. And he says in verse 31, one
more time, ye shall do no manner of work. It shall be a statute
forever throughout your generations and all your dwellings. That
is, as long as I keep you together as a nation here under the under
this old covenant until it's abolished by the true high priest
whose picture and typified here. Christ who said he didn't come
to destroy the law and the prophets, but these ceremonies would be
done away with as he abolished that by way of fulfillment. And
it says, look at verse 32, it shall be unto you a sabbath of
rest, and you shall afflict your souls in the night's day of the
month that even, or evening time, the night before, Even from even
unto even that's evening to evening shall you do what celebrate there
to celebrate? Your Sabbath this Sabbath of
rest Will be turning to Hebrews chapter 9 as I say this is a
picture its significance is its greatest significance to us Is
what is pictured and typified here in this ceremony of the
old covenant as they observed the Day of Atonement. If you
want to learn more about that, I would encourage you at home.
We don't have time today. Go back and read Leviticus 16.
It talks at length about that Day of Atonement and all that
was to take place on that day. How the priest was to lay his
hand on the scapegoat. That symbolizing the transference
of sins. to that innocent animal, and
then that animal was to be taken out of the camp to bear away
the sins symbolically. Of course, that's pointing us
to how Christ bears away sins. Christ, who knew no sin, who
had sins put upon him by God's reckoning them to him so that
he would bear them away. And then it talks about how the
high priest and only the high priest could go into the holiest
of all, the holy of holies. and offer that blood sacrifice
and he couldn't go in without blood. And there too in Leviticus
16 it emphasizes that the command of the people on that day was
that they were to do no work at all. Well here in Hebrews
chapter 9 if you look down in verse 7 Just so you see that,
in fact, this is where the significance lies is in that which was pictured.
It says, but into the second went the high priest alone once
every year. That second was the second veil.
That means into the holy of holies. Not without blood, which he offered
for himself and for the heirs of the people, the Holy Ghost
thus signifying that the way into the holiest of all was not
yet made manifest, while as the first tabernacle was yet standing,
which was a what? Figure. That is, it was a type. It was a pattern. It was a figure
for the time then present in which were offered both gifts
and sacrifices that could not make him that did the service
perfect as pertaining to the conscience, which stood only
in meats and drinks and diverse washings and carnal ordinances
imposed on them until the time of reformation. That is, until
that which was pictured comes, arrives on the scene and fulfills
that which was being typified. But Christ, being come, and high
priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect
tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building,
neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood
he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal
redemption for us." For who? For all those for whom that sacrifice
was made, for Israel. God's chosen people out of all
the world, every kindred, tribe, tongue and nation, spiritual
Israel. For if the blood of bulls and of goats and the ashes of
an heifer sprinkling the unclean sanctify or set them apart to
the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of
Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without
spot to God, just like that scapegoat, He didn't, that scapegoat committed
no sin, and neither did our Lord and Savior. It was put upon him. He offered himself, it says,
without spot, yet he died for sin, sin that was imputed to
him. How much shall the blood of Christ
do what? Purge your conscience from dead
works to serve the living God. You see, again we see, no manner
of works. by the very blood of Christ that
merits for us spiritual life. You see, righteousness demands
life, eternal life and our very spiritual life so that we look
to Christ and that sacrifice he made of his own blood and
thereby what happens? We repent of dead works. of imagining that there's any
manner of work when it comes to this whole issue of how I
might be eternally blessed, accepted by God, how I may stand pure,
clean, holy before him. And he goes on and says, for
this cause he is the mediator of the New Testament, that by
means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were
under the First Testament, they which are called might receive
the promise. It hadn't happened for them under the old covenant
yet. Christ had not come. It was only pictured in the ceremony
that they might receive the promise of what? Eternal inheritance.
I love that word inheritance. You can't earn an inheritance.
Again, no manner of works. Well, you'd be turning over to
Romans 11 now. Romans chapter 11. And while
you turn, let me introduce the message this way. As I said,
I was struck by this contrast of no servile work on that day
of Sabbath that they were to observe on the first day of the
seventh month. And then here's such a great emphasis. on no
manner of work on that day of atonement, nothing that would
take their eyes off that sacrifice. And then we see in the account
of that which is pictured in Hebrews 9, likewise we see that
based upon that sacrifice that was being made, it causes sinners
to in time actually behold how there is no manner of work as
their consciences are purged from dead works that they might
serve God. Basically, for me anyway, perhaps
the most encompassing distinction between the true and the false
is in this issue of works and grace, grace being its antithesis,
grace being no manner of work. And we talk about that often. Based upon the religion of grace,
true grace, not what most men call grace, but true grace, that
is, salvation truly conditioned, all its conditions, all its requirements
met by Christ alone, with no contribution from the sinner.
You see, it points us to what took place there at the cross
of Calvary. His blood sacrifice and nowhere
else. You see, we can't find any refuge
anywhere other than in that righteousness. And think of how much of the
Bible, the epistles in particular, are spent warning us, don't be
deceived, that where are false prophets that come in sheep's
clothing? It's written to religious people. And the scriptures tell
us that if it were possible, it's so deceptive, religion is
so deceptive that even the very elect Those for whom this sacrifice
was offered, spiritually, that they too would be deceived. Well,
why is it not possible that they will be deceived? You see, because
he merited for them by his very offering of sin, a standing before
God that as a fruit and effect, they in time would be given life,
the spiritual faculties, to see something that otherwise they
wouldn't see. And so they come, they can't be fooled because
their salvation is sure and it's certain. And so they won't be
fooled. The scripture is clear. You know,
most of Christendom, they have no problem with agreeing with
this phrase, salvation is by grace and not by works. for the
first 30 years of my life before I ever came under the sound of
the gospel wherein the righteousness of God is revealed. I too sincerely
and honestly would have told you, oh no, my salvation is not
by works, it is by grace. And that's why we can't take
this lightly. If you'll think about that, Mark
explained last week how we all begin on the broad road that
leads to destruction. Every one of us. The Bible calls
upon us to repent. That without repentance, there
is no life. There's no evidence of life.
God calls on men everywhere to repent. Now what that tells us,
it says that the way that seems right to us is the way that ends
in death. That's what Solomon wrote in Proverbs. So what it
tells us is that if we come into this life spiritually dead, wicked,
evil, alienated from God, then in fact we are, there must be
a change. And as we're going to see here
in Romans, there's really no mixing of this grace and works.
There can be no manner of works. And since there's no mixing,
we're going to see that you're right now participating in the
religion of grace and religion of works. Well, most would be
like me for the first 30 years of their life. If you'd ask me,
Randy, have you always believed that salvation was by grace?
Now, I might say, well, I'm not saying I was always saved. I
knew that you had to be born again. And so I would point to
a time when I felt convicted of sin or I felt something took
place that God was working in my life and causing me to receive
Him or accept Him. So don't get me wrong. But I
would have said, oh, no, I never believed salvation was by works
because I was raised to believe this Bible. And it's so clear.
It says salvation is by grace. It's not by works. 2 Timothy
1.9 says, God, speaking of God, said, who have saved us and called
us within holy calling. What? So clear. Not according
to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which
was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. You see,
over and over again, we could go on and on with scriptures
that set that forth. So how can that be? It's because,
you see, I didn't recognize that what I call grace, actually had
a manner of work, an element of works in it. Why is that? Why didn't I see that? Was I
just stupid? No. You see, a blind man can't
see, and a deaf man can't hear. And that's what the scripture
describes all of us. We come into this world with
no spiritual faculties. Oh, we can understand we have
a mind, but we don't have the mind of God. We can see with
our physical eyes, but we can't see God's truth. And so we're
blinded. And we're blinded to imagine
that what God's way of salvation is consistent with that which
we would naturally imagine. And it always has an element
of works. Now why is that important? Because
if you can't identify how at some point, some place in your
life, you too And listen, that broad road is a road of religion
now we're talking about there. I'm not talking about indifferent
people. I'm talking about people, a broad way that leads to destruction
is when people are getting serious about, I want to go to heaven.
I want to find out how I can be saved. And that first natural
question is, well, what do I have to do? It's just as natural as
breathing. And yet, we don't see that. So unless you've seen and can
identify a time when you too believed that salvation was by
works, then isn't it clear that it just hasn't been revealed
to you yet? Because we all start out that
way. And so that's why this is so
important, that we all examine whether we can find just any
element of works so that and pray that God would reveal it
to us that we might repent. And so in Romans 11, I brought
a message from this passage years ago. I won't spend much time
on it today, but I've always liked these verses, verses 5
and 6. Paul wrote, even so, then at this present time also there
is a remnant according to the election of grace. There's a
choosing by God of a people unto salvation in Christ, and he calls
it an election of grace. And he says, and if it's by grace,
then it's no more of works. Otherwise, grace is no more grace. In other words, if it's grace,
there's no works involved in it whatsoever. And otherwise,
don't call it grace. But if it be of works, if you
can search and find any element, any manner of work, In that which
you call grace, see, then it is no more grace, otherwise work
is no more work. It's clear here. Paul makes it
clear. You're in one or the other. You imagine you are eternally
blessed and accepted by God based upon the religion of grace or
the religion of works. And yet most of religion tries
to combine these two things that will not mix. It's like oil and
water. It's not that way. It's one or
the other. So right now, you're an active
participant in one or the other. And so, based on that, I wanted
to revisit something that our former pastor, many years ago,
brought to us in a message that I've always liked this characterization. He talked about how, and I'm
hopeful that in revisiting it, we might just look at some examples
of how men inject works into their body of faith, their doctrine,
so as to be able to cling to just some little strand, some
little vestige of work that will allow us to still control and
imagine that something good about us, done by us, something done
through us controls our destiny, that it's not out of our hands,
so as not to be brought low and really in desperate need of the
mercy of God. And the way he described this,
again, there's only two religions, grace and works, but he described
four categories or ways of characterizing religious thought. And three
of those belong to the religion of works. And the last one was,
of course, the God's gospel, the religion of grace. And they
were this. He described it as a work of
man for God. That men might imagine they're
eternally blessed and accepted by God based upon a work of man
for God. Or they might imagine it this
way, that it's a work of man with God. And Paul just told
us in Romans 11, there's no mixing. It's either works or grace. But
men imagine differently. Or thirdly, it's a work of God. but with man. Now what's the
difference? The only difference being a greater emphasis, see,
on God's involvement. So we're going, now we're talking
about a greater degree of subtlety. And it is indeed subtle. And
it's so subtle that apart from spiritual life, none of us will
see it. And then finally, of course,
the religion of grace, a work of God for man. Well, let's look at those. Let's
consider for just a moment The thought that we can be eternally
blessed by God, accepted based upon a work of man for God. Well, most who believe that,
or who we would put into that category, they wouldn't call
it that, you see, because the Bible says it's not by works.
But how does that shake out? I want to tell you up front,
you could probably come up with thousands of examples, and I'm
only going to just pick a few in hopes that God will use that
to trigger in our own minds, cause us to see like ways in
which we or whoever hears this message may be imagining that
salvation is still by their hand. Listen, fallen man, we've got
some imaginations. We'll do anything we can to cling
to controlling our own destiny and not falling down at the feet
of Christ. And here you might have a guy
who says, well, I don't go to church much. But I believe there's
a God, and I hear people talking about Him being good and merciful,
and God is love, and they hear John 3, 16 quoted. And so they
assume that it's kind of like this. If you remember the statue
that is there at the Supreme Court of Lady Justice, she's
got on the blindfold and she's got some scales. And they say,
yeah, God's like that. He's impartial. He's blinded.
He has no respect. Or he's just judging. He judges
right. And so they imagine, if I do
more good than I do bad, I'm probably going to be all right.
Or they look over here at someone that the community considers
to be religious. If that's not a man of God, I
don't know who is. And they say, but I know that
man. And I know his character. And you know what? If he's getting
into heaven, I am too. And they say that in spite of
the fact that in 2 Corinthians 10, I believe it is, Paul said,
men measuring themselves by themselves, whether it's their good against
their own bad or others, are not wise. And yet our Lord is,
and I won't ask you to turn there because we've looked at it often
in the past, in Acts chapter 17, he told us what we were going
to be weighed against. You see, a person's right in
thinking that way in a sense. They're right in this sense and
only this sense. And that is that to make a judgment,
there's got to be something to measure against. There's a standard.
You don't make a judgment without a standard. But God tells us
what it is. He tells us that he's called
on men everywhere to repent, you see, because we all first
imagine that our salvation is a manner of work in some way.
And why, he says, because I'm going to judge the world because
here's the standard. I'm going to judge the world in righteousness
by that man whom he ordained and by whom he gave assurance
in that he raised him from the dead. He's speaking of his son,
Jesus Christ. So if you imagine that I think
I'm going to be okay, then here's what you need to have. You better
have a righteousness that equals that of the humanity, the sinless,
impeccable perfection of the Lord Jesus Christ. For that's
what His righteousness is. It is His perfect satisfaction
to God's revealed will in perfect conformity to the will of His
Father He is obedient even unto death, whereby justice is satisfied. That is, a penalty is extracted
that suits the crime. And you see, sin, transgression
against a holy God, oh, that's an infinite crime. Sinners are
banished to hell, and their banishment from God is everlasting. Why? Because, you see, no suffering
they can do can ever pay the debt that's owed to God's justice.
It took the death and the infinitely valuable blood of the God-man.
Now, that's the righteousness I need. I need the perfection
of Jesus Christ in His life, and I need a sacrifice made before
God that I can't offer. So if you want to be weighed
in the balance here, that's what you need. And so we see the folly
of one who thinks like that. It reminds you of Belshazzar
and Daniel 5 when God wrote on the wall and Daniel went to Belshazzar
and he said, Belshazzar, you haven't been humbled before God. The language of Leviticus 23
would be your soul has not been afflicted. You haven't denied
yourself so as to forsake all manner of work and see no unworthiness
in you." And so God had written on the wall, and it's interpreted
there for us in Daniel 5, and one phrase of that is, to Belshazzar,
thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting. And that's
what it's to be, to approach God for acceptance based upon
anything other than that righteousness which Christ wrought out. Well
how can I get that? The same way that sins were put
upon that scapegoat symbolically, how they were literally put upon
Christ by amputation. By God's reckoning of that, and
he's going to do that for his people spiritual Israel. Well. The next category would be what
he characterized as a work of man with God. Again, Romans 11
makes it clear. You see that won't do. It's either
grace or works. But that's not what most believe. Probably the most popular notion
in so-called Christianity today is that God loved everyone and
Christ came and lived and died for everyone that ever lived.
And it is almost always called grace. But as Paul said, if we
can find an element of works in it, it's not grace. It's no more grace. And I sadly
belong to that number for some 30 years or so of my life. You
see, they imagine that Christ merely met a prerequisite of
sorts. They don't put it that way. They
spend a lot of time talking about Jesus and talking about the cross
and how he died. I had very little idea of really
what took place at the cross, but I was told he took away sins.
And yet I imagine he took away the sins for people who ended
up in heaven, rightfully so, but also for people who ended
up in hell. What was the difference? The difference was, I made a
decision. Oh, you have to believe. I received
Christ. Just this past week I was at
a funeral where an excellent speaker was satting forth and
he belonged to the same religion that I once did. And at the end
of the message he appealed to his audience saying, you too
can be with the deceased in heaven. He said, if you'll just reach
out your hand. Now, in his mind and in my mind
in years past, that wasn't works. Why Jesus did so much more than
just reach out his hand, but you see the deciding factor,
the determining event, the crowning issue that made the difference
of whether I went to heaven or hell, it wasn't what Christ did.
Whatever that is, that's your savior. It was my act of faith,
my decision to follow Jesus. Well, he said, listen, if in
Leviticus 23, when he's talking about a ceremony that was to
be a figure, to point to the work of Christ, but based on
that ceremony, he was going to take the people out if they did
any manner of work when all of their attention was supposed
to be on that sacrifice. Don't think God, when the real, when
it comes to the true high priest, And the eternal cleansing for
sin don't think he's going to allow or put up with or tolerate
any who come approaching him imagining that some decision
they make, some work of their hand is going to get the job
done. No, it's a dreadful and it's an eternal separation then.
Well, thirdly, there's a work of God with man. Now, what's
the difference? Really, none. It's just another
way. We're just looking at it from
that standpoint because it's just a higher degree of subtlety.
You see, there are men who understand clearly that God only offered
the sacrifice of his son for Israel, spiritual Israel, a chosen
people, but a people chosen out of all the world. And there are
even some among them who understand that what Christ accomplished
on the cross was in perfect satisfaction to God's law and justice. He
established a righteousness. And they understand the picture
of him of imputation that took place there in the Old Testament
and understand that we as sinners must possess that righteousness
And the only way we can get it is by imputation. Now, everything
I've said up to now sounds just like grace. And here's where
the subtlety comes in. And this is where I ask those
who hear this message, look, forget the words, and just plow
down, peel the onion back, and get right down to the basics
of what your thoughts are. You know, what is it that really
makes the difference in whether you're going to heaven or hell
and you're being accepted by a holy God? And you see, here's
how some people do it. They imagine that man meets a
prerequisite of sorts. I guess you could put it that
way. They imagine that God looks down through time and he says,
Randy, I knew when a quote unquote gospel message came your way,
some good news about Jesus. And it could be whatever they
imagine it to be. He says, when it came your way,
I knew you wouldn't be quite so stubborn. You'd be a little
more pliable. You would be willing to receive
it. And based on what I knew that you would do, I chose you. And I sent Jesus to come to do
all those things. What a travesty. Think about
the dishonor. It's to place all that Christ
did in His humiliation and death in subordination to a goodness. If you understand righteousness,
it's even to talk about a perfection, a righteousness that you must
have all based upon a goodness that he presumably foresaw in
the sinners. Well, God did look down from
heaven. Turn to Psalm 53. Psalm 53, verse 2. He did look down from
heaven. There we read it. It says, God
looked down from heaven upon the children of men to see if
there were any that did understand, that did seek God. Well, surely
he must have seen some that did because I know that long before
I heard this gospel I thought I was seeking God. Surely I wanted to go to heaven.
No, this is truly seeking the God. God as He is, not as we
imagine Him to be. Were there any that did understand
that did seek him? Well, here's what he saw. Every
one of them has gone back. They are all together become
filthy. There's none that doeth good, no, not one. Now, that's what God saw. That's
why we're called to repent. You see, there's none that understand. There's none that can, none will
see that they're approaching God based on their own work. And they won't see. Listen, these
people who believe that they're believing grace, they mean it.
They're sincere. They don't understand it takes
a work of grace in the sinner based as a fruit and effect of
what Christ accomplished for them to be able to see it. Turn
to Psalm 65 now. God doesn't choose sinners unto
salvation because he knows they'll choose him. The only ones who
will ever choose Christ and rest in Him are those that He draws
to Himself. Christ said, no man can come
to Me except the Father draw him. Look at verse 4 of Psalm
65, Blessed is the man whom thou choosest, speaking to God, David
the psalmist. And because you knew He would
approach unto thee? That's not what it says, is it?
Blessed is the man whom thou choosest and causeth. to approach
unto thee, that he may dwell in thy courts." Now, you see,
as subtle as that may seem, God says there's going to be no manner
of works. You know, another way that men imagine that it might
be a work of God, but with their involvement, as in the previous
case, that God met the prerequisite, so to speak. And they may imagine
that that prerequisite is, in fact, a true and right understanding
of a righteousness that Christ established at the cross of Calvary
and that God must impute to them. And yet, as we witnessed here
in our church, they conclude that it's not completed, that
there's a work remaining to be done. And they do that by twisting
passages that deal with the marvelous work of God the Holy Spirit.
In the work of the Holy Spirit, Christ said, He'll come and speak
of me now. He's going to point you to me.
He'll cause us to forsake all manner of work and look to Jesus
as the author and the finisher of our faith. Yet they'll say,
they'll take that indwelling of the Holy Spirit and they will
use those passages to suggest that it's actually another righteousness
put inside of you. That it is the very righteous
nature of Christ. And yet, they will conclude,
they'll agree, they know enough about themselves to say, there's
no perfect work that proceeds from that nature. That it's all
tainted by my sin nature. My sin nature cannot overcome
the righteousness of God. Don't profane the perfect righteousness
by which I stand holy before God. by imagining that it can't
overcome my sin. It put it away. It took care
of it. You see, that's nothing more,
and it's a subtle thing, because you know, they'll say, oh no,
that's not works, because it's not my righteous nature, it's
actually His put in me. But Paul said, God forbid that
I should glory save in the cross. It's to cause me to look in here
for what they would say is a completion. Turn to Colossians 1. In other
words, there's a fulfillment, a completion that they credit
God with doing, but it involves this sin-tainted body of flesh. Now, you see, nothing can atone,
nothing can redeem except That one appointed by God, and that
was that high priest, Jesus Christ. And he, nobody else could go
in that holy, holy. And that's what that, you know
what, it's akin to that. It's to imagine that I can enter
in now into that based in my sin nature, with my sin nature.
No, I can't do that. I'm only can enter in based on
the righteousness that's outside of me. Colossians 1. Verse 19, Paul wrote, For it
pleased the Father that in him, in Jesus Christ, should all fullness
dwell, and having made peace through the blood of his cross,
by him to reconcile all things unto himself. By him, I say,
whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven, and I think
that is speaking of the Old Testament saints. And he says, and you
that were sometime alienated in enemies in your mind by wicked
works. That's that road we all start
off on, isn't it? We believe there's some manner
of works. You better be able to identify that or else it hasn't
been revealed to you yet. You that were sometime alienated
in enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled
in the body of his flesh through death to present us how holy
and unblameable and unreprovable in his sight. It fulfilled it
at the cross. It got it all done. And he goes
on and says, "...if ye continue in the faith, grounded and settled,
and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel which ye have
heard," that's the gospel of grace, "...and which was preached
to every creature which is under heaven, whereof I, Paul, am made
a minister." Now that verse there, if you continue, some would imagine
that means that you will be reconciled to God by Christ's death if you
continue and hold fast to it. Well, that makes no sense in
context if you think about it. Something that took place 2,000
years ago for me, it either reconciled me to God or it did not. And
if it reconciled me to God, okay, there's nothing I can do to undo
it. There's nothing I can do to add
to it. The if there is not a conditional if, but an evidentiary if. It's telling for us whether you're
one of them or not. Who is the you in verse 21? You who were alienated, who were
reconciled to God. I'll tell you who they are. They're
the ones that are brought to God-given faith as a result of
what happened at the cross, so that they continue in the faith,
grounded and settled. You see, listen, if it wasn't
that, I would be moved away from it. I'm a sinner. I'd go back
to work. That's my nature. Oh, no, but
I can't be moved from that, you see, because of what happened
at Calvary. And as a fruit and effect of that, God sends His
Spirit and He keeps us. You see, God, all of salvation,
all of it, even our preservation, it's all of grace, no manner
of work whatsoever. And thirdly, I won't go into
that in great detail given our time constraints, but, you know,
there's some, I think, may even imagine that correctly, and this
just goes to show you could imagine this, I don't know that any do,
but it shows how subtle it can be. You can't imagine that righteousness
has to be established, and that Christ established it, and that
it was imputed to God's chosen people, spiritual Israel. And
yet, when it comes to the acquisition of it, instead of seeing that
as a fruit and of that righteousness that was established for me.
They imagine that, and it might, and the misleading part might
come in statements like this, God can't do the believing for
you. And so you say, oh, so I still
got to get it. You see, it's another righteousness
because it's another condition, if that's the way you view faith.
To get the cause and the effect mixed up is deadly. You see,
no, faith is the gift of God. You see, if we imagine that the
procurement of our righteousness, and we do, we end up, we acquire
one, do we not? We acquire one at the cross of
Calvary, and in time, we acquire in our minds an understanding
of it. But if it's by the sinner's hand, if the sinner's hand has
a causal role in it, and that's the key The only way I know to
put it, look there are other elements of salvation other than
the justification at the cross of Calvary. We're chose before
the world began. We're justified at the cross
of Calvary. Then in time we're regenerated, we're converted
and we act in faith. We actually believe. We're involved. There's an element. But if you
imagine that those other elements, anything other than what took
place at the cross has a causal role. Anything involving us the
sinner has a causal role or a meritorious role. It's to inject a manner
of works. And God says, I won't have it.
No manner of works whatsoever. So whether it's a work of man
for God or a work of man with God or a work of God with man,
all three of these, imagining that salvation at any stage is
conditioned on what takes place in me or by me or through me
or some distinction about me, a sinner, it's not God's way
of salvation. You see, God will not share his
glory and Christ will have no rival. We are to look at that
offering just as those Israelites were to look and to have no manner
of work on that day. Their souls were to be afflicted.
Well, the last category is the gospel of grace. It is the work
of God, not with man, but the work of God for man. It's salvation
conditioned on Christ alone. When I say that, I'm not saying
salvation is conditional in the sense that it may or may not
happen. No, the angel told Mary, he said, you shall call his name
Jesus, for he shall save his people. Christ said, all that
you gave me, Father, I'll lose none of them. It's sure and certain
to happen. But, oh, there were some conditions to be met. And
our Lord and Savior met them all. And that is the gospel of
grace. And when our souls are afflicted,
to use the language of Leviticus 23, under the sound of the gospel,
we see that that perfect righteousness was accomplished by Christ alone.
But we also see that that, His finished work, that righteousness,
that it is the only causal element in our salvation. There are other
elements, but don't get mixed up with the fruit and the effect
with the cause. Well, in conclusion, God commanded national Israel
to afflict their souls, that their souls would be afflicted.
When I think of that, I'm reminded, I think the parallel to that
is when Christ told his disciples, deny yourselves, take up your
cross, and follow me. Now, before God was pleased to
put me under his gospel, that sounded like an awful lot of
drudgery to me, and I took it that way, and I took it seriously.
You're right, I need to get busy for Jesus, see? And that cross
was awful heavy, And I needed to go down that road. And it
does speak of our servitude. It is speaking of our service.
But it's also speaking of this, to afflict your souls, to deny
yourself and to follow Jesus. It's not work in the sense that
it has anything to do with my gaining salvation, attaining
it, or maintaining it. No, it is a forsaking of work. You see, to do that is to enter
into the Sabbath of rest, Christ resting. When he got the job
done, he sat down, pleased with a completed work. And he is our
Sabbath, and that's the rest we're to enter into. So I pray
today that God will, through his word, bring some to repentance,
that they might forego and forsake All manner of work, if God is
pleased to reveal it to them, and look to Christ and His shed
blood alone for all of their salvation, there is to be no
manner of work.