It's a blessing to me to study
the book of Genesis and just so. Boy, I see myself in Abraham
and I see in God's dealings with Abraham, His dealings with me
in mercy, in sovereign, free grace. And in Genesis 15, 1-6,
we'll see the same message we always do. After these things,
the word of the Lord came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Fear
not, Abram, I am thy shield and thy exceeding great reward. I can come to you and say, Don't
be afraid. And you know, that might be an
encouragement to you. But I'm not your shield. You
need to hear from him, don't you? And I do, too. And Abram said, oh, look at this.
He knew who he was. God said, this is who I am. Don't
be afraid. And Abraham knew. He knew who
he was. Lord God. Oh, Lord God. What wilt thou give me, seeing
I go childless? And the steward of my house is
this Eliezer of Damascus. And Abraham said, behold, to
me Thou hast given no seed, and lo, one born in my house is mine
heir. Now this is not a complaint,
this is not unbelief. We'll talk about that a little
bit. But think about this. We talked recently about how
Judas, he walked with the Lord of glory. He walked with the
Son of God and was taught, just like the other apostles were. And he went to the enemies of
Christ and said, what will you give me? But here Abraham's asking
the right one, isn't he? What will you give me, Lord?
Whatever you give me will be good. Whatever you give me will
be right. Oh my, that's what I want to
do. I want to come to the giver of all good things. Every good
and perfect gift comes down from him. What will you give me? And
this is just so This is the right attitude, I
believe, to come before God. What will you give me? Verse
4, And behold, the word of the Lord came unto him, saying, This
shall not be thine heir, but he that shall come forth out
of thine own bowels shall be thine heir. And he brought him
forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the
stars. Can you picture God? See how
tender He is. Abraham is concerned. He's worried,
just like we are. I don't have any heir and you've
promised that a great nation would come through me and I don't
understand. I don't understand how this is
going to happen. So the Lord takes him by the hand, so to
speak, and takes him outside and says, look, look at those
stars that I made. Tell this if you be able to number
them start counting see if you can count them and he said unto
him so Shall thy seed be not only am I going to give you a
child? I'm going to give you a whole bunch of them What a
gracious gracious god He is And he believed in the lord there's
god's grace, too And that's not abraham's ability. We can't do
that. Christ said you can't come to
me unless my father draw you and that we know that God gave
Him faith in His Son, and He believed in the Lord, and He
counted it to Him for righteousness. How often the Lord Jesus Christ
comes this way to His people, saying, fear not. Fear not. And this was a reminder
to me as I saw this, right in the first of this chapter, It
reminded me of the instruction that God gives to all of His
prophets in Isaiah 40 and verse 1. Turn over there with me. Let's look at it together. Isaiah
chapter 40 and verse 1. The Lord comes saying, fear not. And then He speaks to His prophets
and He says, when you speak for Me, when you talk to My people
on My behalf, Like Paul said, we're ambassadors for Christ,
as though God did beseech you by us. And God said, when you
do that, when you speak for me, when you talk to my people, comfort
them. Comfort them. Look at Isaiah
40, verse 1. Comfort ye, comfort ye my people. Sayeth your God, speak ye comfortably
to Jerusalem. Well, what's going to comfort
them? What will give you peace? What would help you tonight to
rest? Well, cry unto her that her warfare
is accomplished. The war is over. But I didn't
do anything. You didn't need to. Somebody
else did it for you. Your warfare is accomplished.
What do you mean? Your iniquities part. That's
the war we're talking about. Not a physical war. Not an earthly
war. He said my kingdom is not of
this world. Your iniquities. are forgiven. For she hath received
of the Lord's hand double for all her sins. It's not that God
has just forgotten about your sins. It's not that He can just
sweep them under a rug. He can't just let them go. He got to punish them, doesn't
He? That's what He did. That's what He did. You didn't
have to pay for them. Somebody paid double in your
stead. Would that comfort you? Your
sins are gone? The cause of every problem you
have, gone away forever, behind God's back, as far as the East
is from the West, if that won't comfort you, there's no comfort
for you or me. We're just not gonna have any
if that won't do it. And if he came saying, fear not,
then should not come the same way. Comfort you, my people,
don't be afraid. It's your father's good pleasure,
little sheep, little flock, to give you the kingdom. Does that
help? That helped me. That helped me.
Don't I have something to say that'll comfort you? And ease
your mind. Don't be afraid. Your sins are
paid for. Don't be afraid. Your iniquities
pardoned. Fear not. The war is over. You won without
ever fighting in the thing. You won. The victory is ours
through our Lord Jesus Christ. Be still, my soul, the Lord's
on your side. Bear patiently the cross of grief
or pain. Leave to thy God to order and
provide. In every change, he faithful
will remain. Be still, my soul, the waves
and winds still know his voice who ruled them while he dwelt
below. Rest. The Lord's enabled me to
some extent to a wonderful Extent to rest in his son I'm grateful
for it. May we rest ever more fully every
day as we grow in his grace Because I tell you this the one that
said fear not I'm your shield We can rest in him he's worthy
of us believing in him like Abraham did and just flat and resting
in him And then Abraham makes a request And this is interesting
because Abraham, knowing now that God had promised him that
he would make of him a great nation and that through his seed,
all the nations of the earth would be blessed. Isn't that
what he covenanted with Abraham? That's the way he spoke, wasn't
it? I'm going to make of you a great nation. And Abraham hadn't
forgot. You reckon Abraham had forgotten
that? He left everything because of that. He hadn't forgotten
this. So what does Abraham pray for?
Lord, give me a son. How is what you promised going
to come to pass unless I have a son? Lord, give me a son. You see the beauty of that? His
prayer is for that which will further God's purpose in the
earth and redound to God's glory. Our Lord said, pray this way,
thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven. That's what
Abraham's prayed for. Thy will be done. You said you'd
make of me a great nation. Give me a son. Give me an heir. Bring that to pass. Don't we
do that? We pray for what God's already
said he's gonna do. Of course we do. We don't pray to
change God's mind. We pray that he'll bring to pass
what he said he would. That's what Abraham's doing here.
And he's promised to be with us. We talked about this, the
men, we talked about this this morning. The Lord has promised
to be with us. Listen to the language of Matthew 28, 18. He
said, it says, Jesus came and spake unto them saying, all power,
all authority is given unto me in heaven and earth. Go ye therefore
and teach all nations. That's what we do in that. We
still obey in this commission. We're teaching in our corner.
He's not saying everybody go everywhere. But go where I send
you, go where you're able, go where there's somebody that wants
to hear it and teach. And that'll happen all over this
world as God sends preachers and causes his sheep to gather
together, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the
Son and of the Holy Ghost, in the name of God and all three
of his glorious persons. Because you see, baptism is an
outward symbol of the salvation that God has wrought in your
heart. He killed me and gave me life. I'm buried with Him,
I'm risen with Him, and all three of the persons of the Godhead
are responsible for that. God the Father chose us in eternity
in sovereign love and mercy. God the Son came down here and
bought and paid for us, paid double for all of our sins, didn't
He? Redeemed us with His precious blood. And God the Holy Spirit
came where we were one day and said, live. So when we baptize,
we do it in the name of all three of the glorious persons of the
Godhead. Of course we do. Teaching them
to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. And oh,
this is my favorite part, I guess. I don't know. How can you have
a favorite part, really? But listen to that. Lo, I'm with
you always. I don't want to go unless that's
true to you. I don't want to preach unless he's with me. What
good will it do? It's got to be mixed with faith
in those that hear it, or it won't profit them anything, and
he got to do that. I can't do that. But he said,
lo, I'm with you always, even unto the end of the world. The
world didn't end it yet, so I reckon he's with us, don't you think?
And that doesn't mean he won't be after that. That just means
you can rest assured if this world's still going on, if it's
still revolving on its axis, turning on its axis, The sun's
still coming up in the mornings and going down in the evenings.
God's with us in this thing. We're not doing it alone. We're
not doing it alone. And so, like Abraham, we pray
this way. God, you promised. You'd bless
us. You'd be with us. If you sent us, if we went in
your name, you'd be with us. You'd take care of our needs.
Just like Abraham, Lord, do what you promised. Bless us. Use us
for your glory. Give us grace to preach with
clarity and boldness. Bless us, meet with us, teach
us, cause us to grow in your grace. Be with us. That's what Abraham's doing here.
Lord, you said he's going to make a great nation and you're
going to use me somehow in that. Give me a sign. Give me a sign. May we not lean on the arm of
the flesh. But ask the Lord, the One who promised that He'd
be with us, to bring to pass right here in our midst what
He promised He would. In His Word, He promised it.
And that's what Abraham did. What do you pray for? I ask myself
that. What do we pray for? Does it
have anything to do with God's glory at all? May it have everything
to do with His glory. And God promises not only a son,
but He took him out and said, look at the stars. Look at the
stars. What a God our great and gracious
God is. He deals so tenderly and He comforts
His child. Ephesians 3.20, listen to this
language. Now unto Him that is able to
do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according
to the power that works in us, The one who can do as he pleases,
the one that Job said, you can do anything and no thought of
yours can be hindered. Nothing you set out to do. If
you have will to do something, Lord, nobody can stop you. Nobody
can hinder you. Nobody can question you. That's
the one that works in us. That's the one we're praying
to. He's able to do, we can't ask big enough things compared
to what he's able to do. Unto him be glory in the church.
by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen, amen, Paul said. So God had already promised to
make of Abram a great nation, but he graciously reminds him
in this powerful way, look at the stars and count them. That's how many children I'm
gonna give you. That's how many heirs you're gonna have. And
doesn't the Lord do that for us by His gospel? He reminds
us what He's promised and what He's going to do. 2 Peter 1.12, Peter said, Wherefore
I will not be negligent to put you always in remembrance of
these things. You know everything I'm going
to say to you tonight. Not going to be anything new.
Got nothing new to say. Peter didn't either way back
then. He said, I'm just going to remind you. This is the way
God does it. This is God reminding us of His
promise and how He's going to fulfill that promise. It's already
accomplished in His eternal purpose. He's the great God. He said,
I'm your shield. I'm your comfort. I'm your protector. I'm God Almighty. I declare the
end from the beginning. And Peter said, I'll just put
you in remembrance of these things, though you know them. and be
established in the present truth. Yeah, I think it is made as long
as I'm in this tabernacle, as long as I'm in this body, as
long as I'm in this world to stir you up by putting you in
remembrance. I think it's good to do that.
And that's just the way that God's God reminding his sheep. Don't be afraid. I've paid for
your sins, your iniquities are pardoned. What are you scared
of? What are you scared of? How is it that you have no faith? And I'm sure every time Abraham
looked up at night, don't you imagine after that, if God Almighty
took you by the hand and walked you outside and said, look at
those stars. Have you ever seen them when there wasn't anything
to keep you from seeing them right? Oh, you can just sit there
and gaze at them for a long time and see the falling stars and
just the brilliance of them, the beauty of them. And God said
to Abraham, look at that. Look what I did. And here's what
I'm going to do. I'm going to make a nation of
you just like those stars. It's going to be such a great
nation. Like those stars, they're going
to be beautiful with my comeliness. They're going to shine like my
son. What a promise, what a glory. And his gospel promises, they're
the same way. He teaches us things in the gospel
and everything we see almost sometimes reminds us, doesn't
it? We saw the snow recently. You're
gonna see some more probably, it'll look like pretty soon.
You drive through these hills and see those snow-covered hills
and just the beauty of it. And I remember his promise. Though your sins be as scarlet,
they'll be white. That'd be white. And he's so
gracious to remind us, isn't he? Even in nature, he shows
us the stars and he gives us peace. He shows us the truths
of his gospel again. He shows us how that his precious
blood is almighty and effectual. He reminds us, like he did this
morning, of his tender, eternal, electing love for his sheep.
We sang it just a while ago. He came and chose His bride. Isn't that what we're saying?
We talked about that this morning. From heaven, He came and sought
her to be His holy bride. He reminds us of these things. We can rest. We're at peace.
We're comforted. And look at verse 6. Paul refers
to this Scripture in his letter to the Romans. He believed in
the Lord and the Lord counted it to him for righteousness."
Turn to Romans chapter 4. This whole chapter begins with
that passage right there in Genesis 15. And it's so instructive concerning
that. God doesn't accept our faith
in lieu of righteousness, but it's through the means of faith
that we're connected to Christ who is our righteousness. And
so the righteousness of Christ is imputed to us. And that's
so clear in this chapter. Paul starts with a question here.
What shall we say then that Abraham, our father, as pertaining to
the flesh, hath found? For if Abraham were justified
by works, he hath whereof to glory. If God came, you know,
to Ur of the Chaldees and Abraham was the only one there worshiping,
you know, and praising the Lord and thanking God for all of his
goodness and, you know, serving God. And God said, well, boy,
I believe I'll use him. then Abraham could have gloried
in that. It didn't happen that way, did it? He was an idolater.
He was a wretch, just like his family and everybody in the whole
nation, apparently. If Abraham were justified that
way, but he can't glory before God, none of us can. For what
sayeth the scripture, verse three, Abraham believed God, and it
was counted to him for righteousness. He wasn't righteous, but his
savior was. And when we believe God by faith,
by grace through faith in Christ, Christ becomes our righteousness.
He always has been as far as God's concerned, but then we
find out about it. He's my righteousness. Now to
him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of
debt. If you do anything now to earn God's favor, then it's
a debt God's paying you. And he don't save sinners that
way. He saves them by grace. But to him that worketh not,
verse five. That's what we talked about this
morning, too. We're not responsible for the
law, and it's a good thing we're not. We work not. Our Lord did
everything necessary to please God as our representative, as
our substitute, and we don't add anything to that. But to
him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly. He's gonna have to justify the
ungodly if he's gonna save me, because that's what I am. Everything
I do is ungodly. That's why I can't be saved by
my deeds. They're ungodly. But he justifies
the ungodly. And his faith is counted for
righteousness. Even as David also describeth
the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness
without words, saying, blessed are they whose iniquities are
forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to
whom the Lord will not impute sin." And then he just goes on
and on in this chapter. He asks this question, was Abraham,
was he righteous because he obeyed God, because he was circumcised?
That hadn't even been instituted yet. The law hadn't even been
given by God from Mount Sinai yet. And so it didn't have anything
to do with that. It was just the mercy of God.
It's not of him that run him. It's of God. And that's what
Abraham found. And look at the end now. Look
at verse 20. He staggered not at the promise
of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, giving glory
to God. And that's what God will do for
you. If he saves you, he'll cause you to glorify him. He'll cause
you to get to attribute salvation to him. He'll cause you to praise
Him for His sovereign grace, instead of bragging on yourself
and what you did for Jesus and the decision you made. You'll
give glory to God if He saves you, being fully persuaded that
what He had promised, He was able also to perform. He said,
come to Me and I'll give you rest. Can He do it? Will He do
it? I'm coming. I'm going to find
out, aren't you? I believe he can. He said to
those two sinners, do you believe I'm able? And they said, yea,
Lord. I do, too, by his grace. I do. I believe he's able. I'm persuaded that he's able
to keep that which I've committed to him against that day, aren't
you? That's grace, my friends. And therefore it was imputed
to him for righteousness. Verse 23, now it was not written
for his sake alone. God didn't just save Abraham
that way, he saved everybody he's ever saved that way. It
wasn't just written for him that it was imputed to him, but for
us also to whom it shall be imputed if we believe. That's why the message is believe
on the Lord Jesus. What must I do to be saved? Believe
on him. That's what, these are written
that you might believe on the name of the son of God and that
believing you might have life through his name. Abraham believed
God, not just that there was a God and not just that he did
some things, but he cast his entire soul upon the mercy of
God. He invested himself. Paul said,
I've committed everything to him, everything. but for us also
to whom it shall be imputed if we believe on him that raised
up Jesus our Lord from the dead who was delivered for our offenses,
delivered into the hands of wicked men and crucified and slain and
was raised again so that I might be not guilty before God for
my justification." Isn't that glorious? Fear not. Fear not, little flock. The war's
over. God's been pleased to give the
kingdom to you. The vilest of the vile, because
that's how he gets glory. You can worship that guy. And
we will if we ever see him. Now look back at our text, verse
seven, and I'll hurry. Verse seven, and he said unto
him, I am the Lord that brought thee out of Ur of the Chaldees
to give thee this land to inherit it. And he said, Lord God, whereby
shall I know that I shall inherit it? Now here again, it sounded
like unbelief, doesn't it? But Paul, we just read where
Paul uses this very passage of scripture to show the faith of
Abraham. It's not that Abraham doesn't
believe God. Let me ask you this. When you come to hear the gospel,
why? You've already heard it. We come for reassurance, don't
we? I want to hear it again. I want God to show me again.
I want him to teach me again. I want a token of the truth that
he's promised. I want to hear it in his message
again. I want the Lord to show me again,
remind me, reassure me, give me tokens of his love for me. That's what Abraham's crying
out for here. This is not unbelief. Tell me
again. Show me again. Peter said, I'll
remind you. I think it's neat as long as
I'm here to remind you of his love for us, of his sufficient,
effectual, sin-atoning death. Tell me again how he died for
me. Tell me again how my sins are gone because he washed them
clean in his precious blood. Vicki knows that I love her.
She still likes me to show it every once in a while, don't
you think? And then notice how God reassures Abraham. Look at
verse 9. And he said to him, take me an heifer of three years
old, and a she-goat of three years old, and a ram of three
years old, and a turtle dove, and a young pigeon. And he took
unto him all these and divided them in the midst the way the
Lord had taught him to do it, and laid each piece one against
another, but the birds divided he not, And when the fowls came
down upon the carcasses, Abraham drove them away." Now God reassures
and confirms Abraham's faith. How? By receiving a sacrifice
from him and accepting it. He shows Abraham just what we
read when God said, comfort my people. What's going to comfort
them? Tell them that I've already received double for their sins. And that's what God's showing
Abraham here. bring a sacrifice. And God's gonna accept that sacrifice
and then he's gonna make the promise again in a little different
language. We're gonna see that in a minute.
What gives us comfort and reassurance? How do you sleep at night in
this wicked world? I have an offering. I have a
sacrifice to bring to God that I know he'll accept. He's already
accepted on my behalf. That's how. That's exactly how. And nothing else really. You
can't rest in anything else except Christ and Him crucified. And that's what these birds and
all these carcasses represent here. What else could they represent?
And Abraham's driving away of the fowls here is instructive
in a lot of ways. The offering made by faith to
God is as precious to Abraham here then as the gospel is to
us now. That's how God was worshiped
then, by sacrifice. And the way we worship him now
is in the gospel. That's as precious to him as
this is to us. We don't worship God by exactly
the same means, but we worship him exactly the same way in Christ. Exactly the same way. And we're
jealous over that. Aren't you? Abraham was, and
we are too. We're violently, if necessary,
protective of the worship of God, which has everything to
do with the offering. Abraham was worshiping God by
that offering, and he wasn't about to let some fowls come
down there and pick at it. Are you? Are you willing to let
that happen? Christ in him crucified is our
gospel. The accepted, satisfactory, effectual
sacrifice is our comfort, our reassurance, our rest, just like
it was Abraham's. And anything or anyone that comes
to molest that is unwelcome, to say the least. Should we dwell
here for a little while? I think maybe we should. What
are the fouls? Well, we could think about that
for a long time and think of a lot of things. I'll tell you
this, anyone saying anything contrary to the gospel that we've
preached that comes in here, drive them away. We had a little
bit of that in Texas one time, a couple of different times. There were these two fellows
that came, and Vicki will know who I'm talking to when I remind
her that I referred to them as dumb and dumber, and they were
all pious and, you know, putting on a show of being religious,
and all they did was stir up trouble and question what Jack
was preaching. And they did it very subtly.
They were very Calvinistic in their doctrine, but they came
from the devil. That's where they came from.
And you've got to drive them away, if that happens here or
anywhere. Anything that disrupts the worship
of God in the preaching of Christ and Him crucified. That's what
that sacrifice is here to Abraham. That's the way he worshipped
God, by blood sacrifice. And that's what we're doing here,
just in a different way. Because Christ has come and fulfill
that typical sacrifice. He is the burnt offering. His
blood is the blood of the covenant. So we don't offer animals anymore,
but we're still worshiping the same one Abraham did. And it's
precious to us, the worship. So whether it's disagreements
among ourselves, how many times did Paul deal with that in his
letters? Strive to keep the unity of the faith. Don't bite and
devour one another. Think on the things of others,
not just about yourself. How many times did he have to
deal with that? Disagreements, arguments, trouble, drive them
away. Drive them away now. Paul had
to deal with that. Now, any kind of fleshly behavior
that distracts from him, we come to recognize and worship and
honor him. And for no other reason, really,
to learn of him, to honor him, And so we're not going to recognize
everybody else. We're just not going to do that.
That's of the flesh. We know that we're all sinners and that
we're of the flesh and that we do bad things. And we don't condemn
one another. We all stand and fall to our
own master, don't we? But when it's a disruption to
the worship, drive it away, whatever it is, doesn't matter what it
is. Prideful displays of the flesh of any kind. Pledging,
you know, that's been thrown in my face more than once. Let's all tell how much we're
going to give, you know. What happened to not letting
your left hand know what your right hand is doing? That's the
flesh is what that is. Drive it away. Don't be religious
in front of people to put on a show. Drive it away. It's disruptive
to the worship. like these fowls that tried to
devour the sacrifice. And then in verse 12, look at
verse 12, And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell
upon Abram, and lo, and horror of great darkness fell upon him.
God showed him something dark. He said to Abram, Know of a surety
that that seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs,
and shall serve them, and they shall afflict them four hundred
years. and bondage in Egypt, and also that nation whom they
shall serve will I judge, and afterward they shall come out
with great substance, and thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace.
Thou shalt be buried in a good old age." Now, the Lord showed
Abraham that there was gonna be a dark time. There's gonna
be some years of bondage and just cruel, cruel affliction. But you know, we're reminded
here that that's true here. Didn't he say to his disciples,
in this world, you shall have tribulation? He doesn't hide
that from us. He graciously tells us we're
going to have trouble in this world. But he said, be of good
cheer. I've overcome the world. And
in this message to Abraham here, he said, there's going to be
bonding. There's going to be some trouble.
There's going to be affliction. There's going to be trial. There's going
to be dark times. They're going to come out. My
people are going to come through it with great substance. And
then look, I'll have to hurry. Look at verse 17. And it came
to pass that when the sun went down and it was dark, behold,
a smoking furnace and a burning lamp that passed between those
pieces. God came down and by fire, he
consumed the sacrifice. You remember he did that when
Elijah called on him? He rained fire down that consumed
the sacrifice and the water that was around the altar and all
of that. And some say that every time
that there was an offering offered like this back then, that God
did that, that that's how that God showed that he accepted Abel's
sacrifice and not Cain's that he, he sent fire down from heaven
and consumed it. That may be true. I don't know.
It's not mentioned there, but it's mentioned in other places.
But a burning lamp, you can just see the fire working through
those pieces, can't you? And the Lord showing Abraham
that this is acceptable to me. Isn't that great? And in the
same day, the Lord made a covenant with Abraham saying, unto thy
seed have I given this land from the river of Egypt unto the great
river, the river Euphrates. Now he'd already made that covenant
with Abraham, hadn't he? But I want you to look at it
in chapter 13. Look back at chapter 13, verse
14. And the Lord said unto Abram
after that lot was separated from him, lift up now thine eyes
and look from the place where thou art northward and southward
and eastward and westward for all the land which thou seest
to thee will I give it and to thy seed forever and I
will Make thy seed as the dust of the earth, so that if a man
can number the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be numbered.
Arise and walk through the land in the length of it." Don't you
imagine he enjoyed doing that, just walking around through the
beautiful country that God had said, this is yours now. I'm
giving it to you. There's some people living in
it now, but they won't always be. I'm giving it to you and
your seed. And he walked through the length
of it and the breadth of it. He said, for I will give it unto
thee. I will do that. And then Abram removed his tin. He built an altar there and worshiped
God. That's what God's people do.
Now, did you notice the difference in the language? There he said,
I'm going to give it to you. And two chapters later, he said,
I've given it to you. What happened in between? God
accepted the offering. That's what happened. The accepted, sufficient, satisfactory
blood sacrifice. God has accepted the offering
when Christ made his soul an offering for my sin. He said
it's finished, and it is. It is. Paul said in Romans 8,
1, there is therefore now. I've given it to you. I've given
it to you. Not I'm going to, not I'm going
to make you. Holy, you're holy. There is no
condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus. You see what
made the difference between I'm going to and I have? Christ shed his precious blood
for me. That's what made it right there.
And he did that in eternity as far as he's the lamb slain from
the foundation of the world. But what makes God's promise
a reality is what Christ did for me. Isn't that right? No
condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus and they don't
walk after the flesh, they walk after the spirit. Why not? Why
isn't there any condemnation? Verse three, for what the law
could not do and that it was weak through the flesh, God sent
his son to do it. There's the difference. He laid
help upon one that is mighty. And in the likeness of sinful
flesh and for sin, my sin, my Lord Jesus condemned sin in the
flesh. He came down here in a body that
the Father prepared for him and condemned sin instead of condemning
me. Because Christ came into this
world and did for me what I could not do for myself, all of God's
promises are yea and amen in Christ Jesus right now. He hath, three Ephesians one
again, he hath blessed, E.D., blessed us with all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Because of him
and what he did for me, Christ in him crucified, all things
are mine. Fear not, I am thy shield. and I'm your exceeding great
reward. Is that enough for you? Let's bow in prayer.