Turn with me to Genesis 15. I want to read for you the first
six verses of Genesis 15. 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. And Abram said, Lord God, what
wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless, and the steward of
my house is this Eliezer of Damascus? And Abram said, Behold, to me
thou hast given no seed, and lo, one born in my own house
is mine heir. And behold, the word of the Lord
came unto him, saying, This shall not be thine heir, but he that
shall come 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, if thou be able to number them. And he said unto him, So
shall thy seed be. And he believed in the Lord.
And he, that is, the Lord, counted it to him for righteousness. Now, I want to talk to you out
of these verses tonight about justification by faith. But before we get into the message,
I want to lay a little bit of groundwork. There is in the scripture,
if you go front to back in the scripture, reading this word,
studying this word, justification, you are going to find a fourfold
application concerning the term. And they are not all going to
necessarily mesh because they are talking about this thing
from different aspects of it. There is an eternal justification
which is accomplished in the mind and purpose of God who predestinated
the end from the beginning. He said this is one of the things
that he said that made him alone stand out as God. He said, I
declare the end from the beginning and from ancient times the things
that are not yet done saying my counsel shall stand and I
will do all my pleasure. If you read carefully the subject
of Romans 8.28, that chapter that we all go to, and we like
to talk about all things working together for good to them who
love the Lord, to those who are the called according to his purpose. After verse 28, in these next
several verses, is an explanation of this purpose and some of the
things that are included. or under these headings are included
all of these things. He begins in verse 29 by saying
this, whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed
to the image of his son, that his son might be the firstborn
among many brethren. Moreover, whom he did predestinate
Then he also called, past tense, called. And whom he called, then
he also justified, past tense. And whom he justified, then he
also glorified. And if you care to read Hebrews
chapter 9, there is another verse of Scripture in there where he
talks about the blood of Christ in justification being sprinkled
upon your conscience. And that conscience purged, which
is what we are going to be talking about tonight in this justification. And immediately following that
statement of that purged conscience, serving the living God, bowing
before the living God, living a life of resurrection before
the living God. Let me just read it to you over
here in Hebrews. It won't take us long to find
out. Over here in Hebrews chapter 9. Immediately following that, he
says, and for this cause, he is the mediator of the New Testament
that by means of death," now watch this, "...for the redemption
of the transgressions that were under the first testament," talking
about Old Testament believers, "...they which are called might
receive the promise of eternal inheritance." And then, of course,
Romans chapter 3 deals with that same thing, Old Testament believers
who were justified before the coming of Christ. So there is a justification. And these things, this calling,
this justification, this glorification, he spoke of these things in Romans
chapter 8 in those several verses following Romans 8. He speaks
of these things as already being accomplished. already being accomplished. And actually, that calling there
is not the effectual calling, but he calls us by name. You have a child born to you,
a son declared to you. You're going to give him a name.
He's not just going to be nameless. You give him a name. And that's
the sense in which this is being used. We're all called by his
name. And he did that in eternal predestination. all accomplished in God's mind
and purpose and predestination before the world began. He comments
on this again over in 2 Timothy, chapter 1. Paul said, Who saved
us, who hath saved us, and called us with a holy calling, not according
to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace which
was given us in Christ Jesus. before the world began. And then
secondly, we are justified by the death of Christ at Calvary.
That is the foundation of justification. There is no justification apart
from the righteousness of Christ. There is no justification. We
are not just before God. Job asked that question, how
can man who drinks iniquity like water, how can he be just before
God? He can't. We're just before God because
of the righteousness of Christ and because of his death and
his obedience. Justified by the death of Christ
at Calvary, everything that God purposed and decreed from eternity
will come to pass in time. One time, the Scripture said,
in the end of the world hath he appeared. He didn't have to
appear many times like earthly priests. He appeared one time.
and accomplished what he purposed from the beginning. That's not
difficult, is it? That's what the scriptures teach. Thirdly, every true believer
is justified by the declaration of God's Holy Spirit in conversion. He's justified. He alone applies
the blood to the conscience and sets the prisoner free. No man
is free until The Spirit of the living God purges that conscience. I don't care what kind of doctrine
you have. I don't care what it is you believe.
The sign and seal of true redemption is when the Spirit of God comes. He is called that Holy Spirit
of promise and purges that conscience and sets that prisoner free.
And then fourthly, all who have true saving faith Justify that
faith before men by a life of godliness and good works. And
faith without works, James said, is dead. It's alone. It's just
dead. And even Abraham, the very father
of the faithful, was set aside as an example by James and says,
Was not our father Abraham justified when he offered his son Isaac
upon the altar? Didn't Abraham justify that faith?
How did he do it? God told him, take his son, his
only son, the son of promise, and you take him and you offer
him up on that altar. You know, and I've told you many
times, we stand up and we say, I believe. You better not rush
up before God and make these kinds of confessions. You better
not rush up into his presence and say, I'm this and I'm that,
when you're not, because he's going to try you. You're going
to pass through the fire. That faith is going to be tried.
And if it's not pure gold, it's going to get consumed in the
fire. It's going to get revealed for what it is. But what I want
to deal with tonight is this third one of these four things,
this justification of God's elect by the Holy Spirit in conversion.
Now, in the very first verse here in chapter 6 of Genesis,
There are two things that are necessary to the faith of God's
elect, and they are both stated right here in this very first
verse, and that is life and light. The Word of God came to Abram. It came to him. In declaring
the person of the eternal Word of God that would soon be made
flesh and dwell among us. John said this at the very beginning
of his declaration of this gospel. He said, in him was life, and
this life was the light of men. Now, faith is an
evidence of life. It's not how life comes, it's
the evidence of life. In John 5, verse 24, I'm just
going to move quickly through these verses. He said, Verily,
verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth
on him that sent me, hath everlasting life. It's the only way he could
believe it. Nobody else believed it, but there was a handful who
did. And he shall not come into condemnation,
but is passed from death unto life. In John chapter 3, verse
36, he said, He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life. And he that believeth not the
Son shall not see life. He not only don't have it, he's
not going to be able to perceive it. He's not going to be able
to see it. But the wrath of God abideth on him. It's not the
reason for it, but it's the very proof of it, the evidence of
it, the results of it. And as sin is the evidence of
our fall, faith is the evidence of our resurrection. And faith
comes as a revelation. That's how it comes. We were
talking about that earlier this evening. I'm opposed as a church, as a
local body of Christ, I'm opposed in trying to direct our energy
and our money and our efforts toward reform. That's not what
we're trying to do here as a church. That's not their problem. If
man was just down and ignorant, then we could build schools and
educate. If it was just a matter of doctrine,
we could teach. It would be okay. I could go
over here to any church and we could just scatter out as individuals
into these churches and work our way into the Sunday school
classes and begin to put a little honey in the milk, so to speak,
and just a little medicine in there, and give it to them a
little bit at a time. And many people have spent a
lifetime thinking that they were doing that. Man's dead. He's dead. He don't need reformed.
He needs born again. And faith comes as a revelation.
He don't dig in here and figure it out. He don't add it all up
like you would your account at the end of the year and figure
out what the totals are. That's not how you arrive at
this thing. It's a revelation. It's a revelation. The word of the Lord came unto
Abram in a vision, something he perceived and saw in his mind
and heart, something mysterious and contrary to nature. Listen
to how Paul describes faith in Ephesians chapter 1, verse 17. He began to pray for these people
ever since he heard about them. He heard about their conversion
from the pastor there at the church. He heard about their
conversion, and he heard about their good works, and he heard
about how they came to the Lord. And he began to thank God, and
he said that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory,
may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the
knowledge of him. the eyes of your understanding
being enlightened, that you may know what is the hope of his
calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance
in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of his power
to usward who believe, according to the working of his mighty
power, which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead,
and set him at his own right hand in heavenly places. And
you, Happy Quirkin, chapter 2, who were I definitely see it. You were dead. You were dead
in trespasses and sins, dead in your daily walk and conversation,
dead in submission to God, dead in our loyalty to God, dead in
our natures being the children of wrath even as others. But
we were quickened together in Christ, having obeyed the law
in Christ, having died for sin in Christ in a substitute, and
having risen from the dead and were received into glory and
now sit with him in heavenly places. And you see that little
italics he put in there? By grace ye are saved. When did that take place? When
God raised him from the dead and set him at his own right
hand. That is what he said. That is what he is saying there
in those verses. And he did that, now watch this, he did that in
order to show in ages to come, by the grace of faith, that work
of God determined from the beginning. That's life and light. And he's going to bring it to
the believer. And we can't have one without the other. To have
knowledge without life would be like a body with no soul.
You go down to funeral home. We just had one here recently.
But you can go down there. They have some semblance of the
person you knew. They look like them in their
outward appearance, don't they? Same thing with people who profess
religion. They look like believers in their
outward appearance. The Lord said, outwardly you
appear righteous, but inside you're full of dead men's bones. And all they do to those corpses,
they paint them up and prepare them for burial, and there they
sit and there's no life in them. Not just light, but there has
to be life. There has to be life. And man, spiritually speaking,
he's just an empty shell. He has a bodily appearance of
things, but no life. Now, watch this. It says, The
Word of God came unto Abram, the Word of the Lord. Now, the
Word of the Lord has been around since the beginning. All the
way from the beginning. What we have before us tonight,
what I've opened up and read to you from, we call our Holy
Bible. It consists of an Old Testament
and a New Testament. And these two Testaments comprise
what the Church and those who have written about the Church
testifies the whole canon of scripture in this book. And the whole, what Paul said
he preached, before this New Testament was written, the whole
counsel of God. But this Bible we are reading
tonight was not around in Abraham's day. It wasn't around. So that is not what he is talking
about. There was no canon of scripture. Moses wrote the first
five books 400 years after Abraham died. The word of the Lord is
the testimony of God concerning his son. That is what the word
is. You can go over to the book of 1 John, chapter 5, and you
can see it right there. He testified in this world through
this book. It's God's testimony of his Son. That's what it is. And that testimony
of his Son has been here from the beginning. Did they write
it down? I don't know. There's nothing
in here to tell us if they wrote it down. I can't even, Old Job,
most of them believe Old Job lived back in the days before
the flood, and he may have. I don't know. There's no reference
in the book of Job to any of the other prophets or anything
that was going on in their day. And most of them believe Job
to be the oldest book in the Bible. But whether that's so
or not, I don't know. But my point is this. From the
very beginning, God gave testimony of his Son. He gave it in the
garden. He enlarged on it at the altar
of Abel. And he continued to enlarge in
it all down through time with the flood, with the Tower of
Babel, with all those things that we've been looking at and
studying, with creation, with all of those things. He begins
to enlarge on this subject, this testimony concerning his son,
all down through time. And it's the testimony of God
concerning his son. And this testimony, whether written
or passed down, from generation to generation, or maybe even
given privately to him, I don't know. It talks here in Genesis
15, in that very first verse, about talking to Abram in a vision,
appearing to him in a vision. He appeared to a lot of his prophets
that way, in a vision. So maybe before Moses, maybe
before that time, that's how it was done. He'd select a man
in a generation or in a certain country and come to him in a
vision his instruction and give him his message, burn it on his
heart, and then he'd go preach it. I don't know. I don't know. We're not told. But writing these
things in a book does not make them any more the word of God
than if they were only spoken. That's my point. The word of
God came to Abraham. How did it come? Well, it came
in a vision, he said. It came in a vision. And then
millions upon millions have the written word of God and do not
discern its message or even the fact that it is the word of God
and cannot find any personal connection between the promises
of God in this book and themselves. I'm not making any sense to you,
am I? I'm trying to hammer on this point that the word of God
must come to that individual in justification. There must
be an understanding. There must be something personal
between God and that individual. It doesn't just go out the way
the universal gospel goes out. It doesn't just go out and land
wherever it lands. It goes to an individual. It
goes to your heart. If it doesn't come to your heart,
you don't have it. It didn't say it came to everybody
in Abram's day. It came to Abram. it came to
Abraham. The Jews had a Bible. To them
it was a book of instruction, details about ceremonies, a book
of laws and punishment, a book of moral lessons and disciplines.
And they were children of Israel, and therefore within these sacred
scrolls, they assumed that these things all had to do with them
and nobody else. The Lord told them, he said,
you search the scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal
life, and they are they which testify of me, and you won't
come unto me that you might have life. The Word of God, as it
is in the revelation, the Word of God as it is in relation to
faith, is vitally connected to the gospel, which is what the
Word of God testifies front to back in this book. Do you know the Jews and most
religious people today would fight you over the fact that
this book is the Word of God? They'd fight you over it, but
they don't believe anything in it. They don't read it. They don't understand it when
they do read it. They find no connection between themselves
and these promises. Most of them are very superstitious
of Israel. Saving faith rests In the weight,
when a man rests the weight of his soul upon Christ, God comes
to him. There is a persuasion involved.
There is a convincing, a convicting of the Spirit involved in this
thing. There is a new birth involved in this thing. And these things
are open to him. He begins to see them. He begins
to understand them. He begins to appreciate them.
He begins to see what they are there for. He begins to have a personal
interest in these things. Saving faith risks the weight
of its soul, the promise of its future, the condition of its
life, and all that it must bear as a believer into the hands
of the Christ of God. And I tell you this, what was
true of Philip was true of Abel. You go over here and read about
Philip and how he was converted. Go back and apply the same thing
to Abel. He was converted the same way. Not one Old Testament
gospel and then one in the New. If you will, turn with me to
Romans chapter 4. Romans chapter 4. Let's begin reading here in verse
16. He said, therefore, it is of
faith that it might be by grace to this end that the promise
might be sure to all to see, not to that only which is of
the law, not just to the Jews, but to that also which is of
the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all. As it is
written, I may be the father of many nations. before him whom
he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things
which be not as though they were, who against hope believed in
hope that he might become the father of many nations, according
to that which was spoken, so shall thy seed be. And being
not weak in faith, he considered not his own body, now dead, when
he was about a hundred years old, neither yet the deadness
of Sarah's womb. He staggered not at the promise
of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, giving glory
to God, and being fully persuaded that what he had promised he
was able also to perform. Therefore," you see that? "...based on these things, therefore
it was imputed to him for righteousness." Now, listen to this. It was not
written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him, 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
and was raised again for our justification. God come to Abraham
and revealed the gospel to him. Told him that I'm going to be
your shield and I'm going to be your reward. And I'm going
to bless all the nations of the earth through your seed. And
Paul tells us who that seed is over in the book of Galatians.
He said he wasn't talking about seeds as of many. He's talking
about one seed, which is Christ. That's how these blessings were
going to come. And these six verses here in Genesis chapter
15 were written recorded, preserved for all those who would after
be called of God to saving faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now,
listen close to what I'm going to tell you. I want you to understand
these things. Justification, when we're talking
about justification before God, is a legal work. It's a legal
work. Justification is the imputation. or legal charging of Christ's
righteousness to us. God charges that righteousness,
if you have one, to you. It's a legal work. Justification
before God is not an experience. Justification is conducted in
the courts of heaven, not here, there. And Paul argues for the
elect in Romans 8, verse 32, and listen to what he says. And
this actually has to do with those arguments that I read to
you at the very beginning, where he's talking about things contained
in eternal predestination. But listen to what he argues.
He says here in verse 33, "'Who shall lay anything to the charge
of God's elect? It is God that justifies. Who is he that condemneth? It
is Christ that died, yea, rather, that is risen again, who is even
at the right hand of God.' This justification was purposed of
God from eternity. It was ordered in its terms in
the everlasting covenant of grace. It was agreed to by the mediator
of the covenant, and it was treated as a work finished before the
world began. That's why the scriptures often
refer to Christ as the Lamb slain before the foundation of the
world. These things were treated as though they were accomplished.
Why? Because who is going to thwart his will? Who is going
to turn him aside? Who is going to prevent him from
doing it? And it is in this sense that
Christ is called the Lamb slain. Now, here in Romans chapter 3,
Paul says in verse 24, listen to this. Romans 3.24, "...being
justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is
in Christ Jesus, whom God has set forth to be a propitiation
through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for
the remission of sins that are past through the forbearance
of God." Go all the way back to Adam. All the way back to
Adam. I know we like to view things
in time, but God is eternal. And everything God does in time,
he determined to do from eternity. And the very basis of our election
was a justification that would make us without blame. Ain't
that what he said? He chose us in Christ that we
might be made in that day holy, without blame, before him in
love. It is to the glory of his grace
that we have been accepted into beloved. Ephesians 2, 7, in whom
we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins
according to the riches of his grace. Now, watch this. I quoted that verse to you where
he chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world that
we might be holy without blame before him in love. We are accepted
in the Beloved. We have redemption in him, the
forgiveness of sins. We are in, verse 8, Ephesians
1. He hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence, having
made known unto us the mystery of his will according to the
good pleasure which he purposed in himself." What are you saying? I'm saying that faith is not
the justifying element in salvation. Christ is. Christ is. His righteousness, His death,
His substitutionary sacrifice. What faith does is reveal those
for whom he died. It reveals those he justified. That's what he does. It says, The word of the Lord
came to Abram. And it came to him because God
chose him in salvation before the foundation of the world,
appointed for him a substitute. and provided in that substitute
a perfect righteousness both of his obedience and of his death,
when I'm talking about his righteousness. He was delivered for our offenses
and raised again for our justification. And faith is the hand that receives
these promises. It's the mind that perceives
it. It's the heart that's convinced of it. It's the heart that rejoices
in it. It sees these things. It is convinced
of it. Winston and I were talking about
a scripture. Where is that at, Winston? In
Philippians 1, where he talks about being fully
persuaded, Paul does, that he which had begun a good work in
him was able to perform it unto the end. Now, that is what happens
in this conversion. We receive the promise of the
Spirit through faith, Galatians 3.14. And in those verses there,
he is talking about this justification of Abraham. Now, listen to me. Why go into all this? Because
if I view faith as a justifying work, then it ceases to be the
gift of God. Am I making that clear enough? It ceases to be the gift of God,
and it becomes a righteousness in itself. Faith is not your
righteousness. It is counted for righteousness. What faith does is like a hand.
It takes hold of it. Why does it take hold of it?
Because God gives it to you, and you take hold of it. That's what's going on over here
in Genesis chapter 6. The word of the Lord came to
us. What word? This word of justification. The word of the Lord, this promise
of Christ. Don said this, listen to this.
When the scriptures declare that we are justified by faith of
Christ or in Christ, The meaning is not that our faith justifies
us, but rather that the object of our faith, which is Christ,
justifies us. Faith receives the blessedness
of peace with God by the justifying righteousness of our substitute.
Therefore, there at the end of that chapter 4 in Romans, when
he said he was delivered for our offenses and raised again
for our justification, he says, therefore, we are being justified
by faith. Therefore, based on that, we
are justified by faith. That is what that justification
has to do with. Let me read this to you over
in 2 Corinthians, chapter 5. 2 Corinthians, chapter 5, verse
18. All things are of God, who hath
reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ and hath given to us the
ministry of reconciliation, to wit," now watch this, "...that
God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself," now
listen, "...not imputing their trespasses unto them." Why not? Because God was in Christ doing
the reconciling. God was in Christ doing the justifying. God was in Christ doing the redeeming. But what about these scriptures?
He that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath
of God abideth on him. Paul said in Ephesians 2, we
were by nature the children of wrath, even as others. Don't
these scriptures speak of a wrath yet present in them concerning
sin? Does not the believer, when he
fears the gospel, does not he consider himself, is he not convinced
that he is a sinner before God? Absolutely. Absolutely. But a man can be in prison. Let's say a man is locked up
and he is wrongfully accused, and he is in prison. And an advocate
goes before the judge and justifies him. And the judge says, absolutely,
he justifies him. Yeah, but he's a prisoner, and
he's locked up in a jail cell. So why is he so miserable? Because
he don't know about this justification. That's why he's so miserable.
And in his mind, he's just like all the rest of them in there.
Well, in your mind, that's where you were, too. That's what this
preaching of the gospel, when this justification by faith comes,
it's a pride. That's what it does. It's a pride.
It's a pride to your heart and a pride to your conscience. Now,
I can't do that to every individual. I can't throw that out there
like bread on the ground. I can't do that. I have to preach.
In a general sense, I preach the gospel. But what I'm trying
to tell you is, to be justified, God has to bring it to you. That
blood has to be sprinkled on your conscience. It has to be
applied to your heart. You have to be set free. And
the Holy Spirit of God, like the bailiff, comes down and sets
you free. He takes the things of mine,
Christ said, and he shows them unto you. These things do, insomuch as
we are yet in an unregenerate state. But the fact of a legal
work does not change what you are by nature. To perceive this
justification, a man must be called out of darkness, giving
life. He has to be given life from
the dead. He has to be given wisdom and understanding. He has to be given these things. The word of the Lord came to
Abram. And it came to him, and it was
recorded what took place there with Abram. before any canon of scripture
was ever written. Here is this old man, a man that God called out of
Mesopotamia, this old rebel, still in his own circumcision.
He knew nothing about circumcision, yet he didn't know anything.
And the word of the Lord came to Abram. And it didn't just
come for him alone, but for all those who shall believe in him
that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead. Paul said these
great and precious promises of God, they come to us. They come to his elect. That's where they go. I may stand
up here and preach to everybody in this room, but he's going
to take it to the hearts of his. That's what I depend on. That's
why somebody calls me and says, well, I'd like for you to come
up here and preach. If I'm able, I'm going to go.
I'm going to go. Because this is what I believe
we're here for. That's what I believe this church is all about. I can't
find any other reason for us to be in this world, can you?
There is no other reason. We're justified before God. We
have a perfect righteousness. Why don't he just take us on
to glory? Because he has an elect and he's purposed to call them
to the preaching of the gospel. And I want you to see this, this
fallen nature of man. Listen to this. Paul argues this
over in Romans, chapter 5. These great and precious promises,
they come to us, they deliver us, and they come in power, and
it comes in the Holy Ghost, and it comes to those who shall be
heirs of salvation. Now, listen to how Paul argues
this over here in Romans, chapter 5. He's talking about these two
representatives. He's talking about Adam and he's
talking about Christ all through this chapter. He's using these
two representatives. He said, "...as by the offense
of one judgment came upon all men the condemnation, even so
by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men under
justification of life." So then, the fallen nature of men comes
by legal judgment of Adam. Ain't that how it comes? God
judged him. It was a legal work. He judged him, and that condemnation
of nature was the result of it. The faith of God's elect comes
by justifying righteousness that justifies God in his justification
of all those that do it. And as sure as that judgment
was in Adam, even so shall that justification of life be absolutely
certain. Why? Because they are justified.
They are justified in Christ. And so then they must be called.
In John chapter 6, this is what the Lord said. He said, All that
the Father giveth me, they just murmured and murmured and murmured.
But listen to what he says. He said, All that the Father
giveth me shall come to me, and him that cometh to me I will
in no wise cast out. Not going to cast him out. Life and light. The Word of God
comes. It comes to us. It comes to us
as individuals. And it goes out from us to other
individuals. I want you to think on this verse. He believed in the Lord. When it comes right down to it,
ain't that where your confidence is? I have an understanding of what
Christ did. I have an understanding of his
death. I have an understanding of his resurrection. I have an
understanding of all those things. But in those things, I'm persuaded
of God's ability and willingness to save my soul. And that persuasion
is what he's talking about here. He believed in the Lord, and
the Lord handed it to him for righteousness.