In Romans, I want to begin reading
the last two verses of Romans chapter 4. Verses 24 and verse 25 of Romans
chapter 4, and then one verse in chapter 5. He is speaking
here of the Lord giving Abraham righteousness. And he said in
verse 23 that it was an imputed and written for Abraham's sake
alone in verse 24, but for us also, to whom righteousness shall
be imputed. If we believe on him that raised
up Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was delivered for our offenses
and raised again for our justification, therefore being justified by
faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. This is the verse that I want
us to look at this morning, verse 1. Therefore, being justified
by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. There is no doubt in my mind
that this is one of the most important, if not the most important
subject in all the Word of God as it pertains to you and I as
individuals. being justified, being justified. The meaning of this word, it's
a law term, it's a legal term. It means to prove or show to
be just or conformable to law without guilt before a court
of law. The theological meaning of it
is this, to be acquitted, to be acquitted of any and all charges
before God, to be free from sin and the punishment thereof."
Now, in that definition, can you see the seriousness of the
subject to be justified? Being justified. I was reading a message years
ago that Brother Spurgeon, I thought, was rather amusing. He was telling
about the preacher who never preached from the doctrinal portion
of these scriptures. He always went to the back of
the epistles and preached from the practical things, how to
live your life and how to be a better Christian and all that.
His congregation wanted to hear some of these truths like this
text teach. And so someone stuck a little
note in his Bible that said, preached from Romans 5-1, being
justified by faith. And he was always preaching on
a person should pay their debts. Almost every service, he brought
this into his message, you must pay your debts. Spurgeon said
someone must have cheated the man out of some money and he
never could get over it. So this person left a note in
his Bible, would you please preach from this text. being justified
by faith. So he got up and he took his
text and he said, I want to preach on justification. And my first
point is this, the result of being justified, you will always
pay your debts. Well, I'm not going to preach
on anything practical from this morning. I want to deal with
the doctrine of justification. It's the most important doctrine. Those who don't know the issues
concerning this doctrine, they won't appreciate this doctrine
at all. And I mean by that this, when
you and I think of being acquitted before God, when we think of
standing before the all-seeing, all-knowing God and to be justified,
To have nothing laid to our charge? To be free from sin and the punishment
thereof? The first thing that we realize,
if we have any understanding of this wonderful subject, is
that in the light of the very definition of this, we have a
dilemma. We face an awful dilemma. And the first one is this, and
let me give you two. The first dilemma that you and
I face is this. We are sinners. There's none of us here this
morning who is without blame in and of himself. If God should
search us out, how many sins would He find in us? So the first
thing we see, this is a mystery. This is a mystery in itself,
how we can be justified without blame, without any charge being
brought against us, even before the court of heaven. I want you
to look here in chapter 3 of Romans, and I'm going to try
for the most part to stay in this book, so I won't have you
running all through the Scriptures. But look at this. Look in Romans
3, verse 9. Here is the first dilemma that
we find ourselves in. In verse 9, what then? Are we
Jews? Are we better than they, than
the Gentiles? No, in no wise, for we have before
proved, both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin. And when he says we've proved
before, he's talking about in these first two chapters. He's
already proved that the Gentiles as well as the Jews are all under
sin. Now look back on to your left
again. Look back in the first chapter
of this book and look in verse 21. Look in verse 18. Let's begin,
because here he's speaking to the Gentiles. The Gentiles was
all the nations of the world apart from the Jew. The Jew,
he had a lot of light. He had the prophets, he had the
Word of God. The Gentiles had only one thing
to teach them, and that was the light of nature. When they looked
up, they saw this vast creation. And that vast creation spoke
to them. It preached to them that there
is a God. He's a moral judge of this universe. That's where the Gentiles began.
They could go outside every day and every night, and here was
this vast universe preaching to them that there is a moral
judge. There's a Creator that you're
standing before. Now, let's look at it in verse
18. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness
and unrighteousness of men who hold the truth in unrighteousness."
They suppress it. They know it, but they suppress
it. They know the truth that there is a God, and what sin
is, it is against them. Because that which may be known
of God is manifest in them, in their conscience, and to their
conscience. for God hath showed it unto them. For the invisible
things of God from the creation of the world are clearly seen,
being understood by the things which are made, even His eternal
power and deity is Godhead. So they are without excuse."
Now notice verse 21, "...because when they knew God They glorified
him not as God, neither were thankful, but became vain in
their imaginations, and their foolish hearts were darkened.
Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools." I want you
to notice something about the Gentile world. Notice where they
started. They didn't start from the bottom.
They didn't start ignorant. They started up here. They started
with the knowledge that there was a God, because God had showed
Himself to them as the Creator. What did they do with that knowledge?
They corrupted it. They corrupted it. They said,
we're so wise, we got this God figured out. And they became
so foolish. You know what they began to do?
They began to make them idols and said, look, here's God. Worship
this idol and you can worship God. Look what they said down
in verse 28. Here's what happened to them. And even as they did not lack
to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate
mind to do those things which are not convenient. They had
the knowledge of God that He was the Creator. But they so
corrupted that knowledge, they began to worship the creature.
They began up here and they went downhill. And you begin reading
there in verse 29, being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication,
wickedness and covetousness and maliciousness and murder, and
just on and on you go. Downhill, downhill, You know what happens, and Larry
mentioned it just briefly. You know what happens when a
nation says, we desire not the knowledge of your ways. You know
what happens to that nation. You know what happens to that
individual. God finally gives them their way. But what is wrong with humanity
that has so much knowledge But instead of improving that knowledge,
it begins to go downhill and winds up on the bottom in open
and profane sins and lifestyle. We see it in our country today,
don't we? The nation that forgets God shall be turned into hell. How often have we been told now
for seven years, and we're just repeating what's going on in
the nations of the world ever since there's been a world, a
fallen world. Society begins to say, we don't
desire the knowledge of your ways. That happened in England
back in the late 1800s. They call it the downgrade controversy. When they said, we don't want
the Word of God anymore. We want our opinions. And the
downgrade started there in the late 1800s. And Charles Spurgeon
said, I tremble to think where this is going to lead us. And
you know where it's led them? You can hardly find a King James
Bible in England today. There's very few churches there.
What happened? Look at the revivals that that
nation had. But finally, God gave that nation
its way, and downhill it went. It's happening in our country
right now. Remember when they told us a few years ago, we don't
even want the commandments of God in our schools? We don't want the Ten Commandments
on our courthouse lawn? Remember that? We don't want
the knowledge of God. We don't want to hear about Him
or retain that. We want to do what we please.
How's that working out for us? Have you looked around lately?
We've lost all but lost control of our society in so many realms,
have we not? Have you been seeing those flash
mobs, they call them the flash mobs in the inner cities, Philadelphia
and Los Angeles and some of the places? They get on their tweeters
and internet, and all of these people will meet, hundreds and
thousands, will meet at certain box stores or village pantries
and so on, and they'll go in and beat people up and take the
stuff out. And there's so many of them,
they can't stop them. I wonder if we had kept that
commandment and pressed the claims of God upon this society, thou
shalt not steal. Reckon that may have helped. You read all the time now in
our papers where they said our economy, our economy here in
this particular state is dreadfully strained, and one of the strains
on our economy is this, the divorce And as single mothers and single
dads raising their children, and the state is having to support
them, it's put this large burden on our economy. Reckon it would
have helped if we hadn't have thrown the truth of God into
the mud that says, Thou shalt not commit adultery. Reckon that
would have helped. The very instant the Lord begins
to let a nation go, it never goes up. It never goes up. It always goes down. But here's
my point. Why is that? Why is that? Why does it start up here and
go down? There's a reason for that. And
you won't find a single nation that's not did it. Every nation
is guilty of it. And here's the reason why. We're
sinners. We're sinners. If God doesn't
send a revival, If God doesn't put down flesh and the will of
man, what happens? Down we go. Down we go. And look at the Gentile world.
We're going right back where we were in the New Testament
time before the Gospel came in and invaded the Gentile world.
But here's our problem. We have proved the Gentile world
is under sin. Look at it. Look at it. But He
doesn't stop there. He says this, we've not only
proved that the Gentiles, but the Jews are under sin. Look what he says in chapter
2 and verse 17. Look at this. Now, if you think
men aren't sinners, look at the Jewish nation. Man, they had
every kind of privilege and blessing that you can imagine. Look here
what they had in verse 17 of chapter 2. Behold, they aren't
called a Jew, and you rest in the law. God has given you the
law, the Ten Commandments and the ceremonial law. And you make
your boast of God that you are chosen people. He has blessed
you. He has given you prophets and
promises. In verse 18, you boast that you know His will. You approve
the things that are more excellent, being instructed out of the law.
You are confident that you yourself are the guide of the blind. You are light to them that sit
in darkness. You an instructor of the foolish,
a teacher of babes, which have the form of knowledge, and of
the truth, and the law?" Man, they were smart people, weren't
they? Some smart teachers. But look at this. You therefore
which teachest another, teachest thou not yourself? You that preach
that a man should not steal, yet do you steal? Yes, they They
stole their tithes and offerings, and I tell you something, they
tried to steal and couldn't. And that's the glory of God.
They were thieves of the highest rank. In verse 22, you that say
a man should not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? Yes,
they did. You that say a man should abhor
idols, do you commit sacrilege? Thou that makest thy boast of
the law. Though breaking the law, dishonest
thou God? For the name of God is blasphemed
among the Gentiles through you, as it is written." The nation
of Israel had the highest privilege of any nation in this world.
But what happened to them? They replaced these laws with
their silly traditions. And they were the very nation
that killed the Lord Jesus Christ when He came to this world. And
for 2,000 years now, they've stumbled along in their ignorance,
in their darkness. And they're the enemies of God,
and the wrath of God is upon them to this very day. But how
could that be? How could they start up here
with all these privileges and go to the bottom? They're sinners. They're sinners. They're sinners. See what he says in chapter 3?
Romans chapter 3? We've proved before, in verse
9, Jews and Gentiles, that they're all under sin. But let's make
it now more personal. It's easy just to jump into the
crowd and say, well, we're all guilty. But look in verse 10. As it is written, there is none
righteous, no, not one. There's no exception to this.
I am not a righteous man. God has a standard by which He
measures righteousness. I have not lived up to it. And
you have not lived up to it. There is not a single exception
here this morning. God has a law that He judges
us by, and that law says, Love God with every bit of your heart. From the time you come into this
world until you leave it. Don't you ever think low of God. Don't ever have a low opinion
of Him. Don't ever be mad at Him. Don't ever misjudge Him.
Love Him with all your heart. I ain't lived up to that standard. Have you? And what's the result
of it? We'll look here in verse 19 of
chapter 3. Now we know that whatsoever things
the law says, it says to them who are under the law, that every
mouth may be stopped, and all the world become guilty before
God." See that? Guilty before God. Are we in a dilemma of what? Being justified? You see, what
we've got to do, brothers and sisters, before we go and look
at being justified, we've got to stop and say, what kind of
condition are we in? And then we'll begin to ask some
questions, how can God justify me? If I'm in this predicament
that I'm in, how can God justify me? were guilty before God. Guilty before God. Now listen, you may stand before
the court in this land and you may truly be guilty, but you
may hire yourself a good lawyer and you may beat the rat. You
may hide some evidence The judge may not be very wise in the law,
you may deceive the jury, but it's not so when we stand before
God. We may be bold while we're in
good health. There have been a lot of fellows,
and I mean they were awful criminals until they were finally caught
and brought before the court of this land. And when they heard
that verdict, guilty as charged, I'm telling you, they broke.
Big, strong, bold men broke when they heard that charge. You're
guilty. How much more so if we stand
before God, the all-seeing eye of God, and have Him to look
at us and say, I have weighed the evidence against you. And
you are guilty. Have you ever stood there in
your own apprehensions? In your own mind, your own thoughts.
Guilty before God. That's the most horrible situation
that I ever found myself in at the time. It was necessary because
it was true. But I tell you, it scared me
to death. Because you see, it wasn't some
man-made prison I thought I was getting ready to be sent off
to. Down here, man has control of our bodies. If you go over
to visit those fellows in the prison, they control those guys. They tell them where they can
go, what time they can go to bed, what they can eat, when
they can get up. They have lost their freedom
physically, but they still retain their freedom in their souls.
They have to give them health care and food and let them exercise. They can walk around in their
little cells, but it ain't so. When we stand before God and
He says you're guilty, and now you have to receive the punishment.
He don't put us in a man-made prison, you see. He says, bind
them hand and foot and cast them into outer darkness. Not just
our bodies, but our souls. Don't fear them which is able
to kill the body, but fear Him which after He has killed the
body, has power to cast into hell. That's the prison that
you're worthy of and that I'm worthy of. We're guilty before
God. What we do sometimes, I fear,
because it's difficult to look at this aspect of justification
because we don't like this. We want to jump on to the good
part and say, tell me how I can be justified. We first have to
look at the need of being justified. Why do we have to be justified?
How in the world can we be justified? But to do that, we've got to
stop and say, I'm guilty before God. I'm guilty before God. That's the first dilemma we find
ourselves in. Guilty before God. A man may not know it. A man
may not admit it. A man may hear it and don't even
believe it. But that don't change the fact.
Every mouth will be stopped and all the world is guilty before
God. Each and every one of us this
morning. This gets so personal, doesn't it? I never thought much about
going to court and seeing you and other people going to court
until I was called to court one time. And when I was called there,
it became a reality to me. When the judge looked down at
me and said, Mr. Crabtree, are you aware of the seriousness
of what you've done? Are you aware of the consequences? I know he said they've made some
kind of deal here. He said, I'm not bound to anything but this
law. He said, this law says that before you leave here today,
you'll pay this court $10,000 and serve a five-year penalty
in jail before you're free again. I tell you what, I took it seriously
then. I had no idea what I did was that serious. And see, we
go along, we go along living our lives, and we have no idea
the seriousness of the situation we find ourselves in. Guilty
before God. Guilty before God. Here's another
dilemma. I said two dilemmas. The first
one is we're sinners. We're guilty before God. And
the second dilemma is this, and it's just as serious. It's just
as serious because it's this. We cannot renegade this awful
dilemma that we find ourselves in. There's nothing in and of
ourselves we can do about it. If the judge, if the court of
heaven leaves us to ourselves, then all we can do is stand there
and face the sentence, face the consequences of that sin. Paul said this, he said, I can
give my body to be burned, that won't profit me. I can give all
my goods to feed the poor, that won't profit me. All the works
that I could perform, all the prayers that I could pray, all
the good deeds that I may try to do, nothing can justify me. I cannot justify myself. Job
said, I could take snow water, and I could wash myself in snow
water, and make my hands ever so clean. But he says, if I'm
a wicked man, if I'm a sinner, God will cast me into the ditch. the ditch of hell, and my own
clothes will abhor me." We cannot deliver ourselves from the awful,
awful situation that we find ourselves in. Look here at what
he says in Romans chapter 3, verse 20. After he said, We are
guilty before God, therefore, by the deeds of the law, by our
work and by our merit, there shall no flesh be justified in
his sight. For by the law is the knowledge
of sin." So that is the first thing. We are in this awful dilemma.
We are sinners before God, guilty. Secondly, there is nothing we
can do about it. Paul the Apostle tried it before the Lord saved
him, didn't he? He said, if anybody has ever tried any harder than
I have, I don't know it. You think you've tried, he said,
to save yourself and justify yourself. He said, you ain't
tried near what I tried. Here's the next thing then, and
it brings us to this. This brings us to this. If you
and I are to be justified, we must be justified by the very
one whom we stand guilty before. If we are guilty before God and
we stand there with not a word to say about it, who is it then
that must justify us? It is the Judge Himself who has
pronounced our guilt that must justify. They had a law under
the ceremony of Jewish law. If you had leprosy, you had to
go to the priest. The priest examines you, and
if you had leprosy, He declared it. He looked at you and said,
you have leprosy. And then he sent you to live
in a leper colony away from society. If that man was to be healed
of his leprosy, if he miraculously was healed, you know who he had
to go right back to? The priest. The same one that
had pronounced his guilt. He had to go back to him and
he examined him again and says, you're clean. You're clean. You can go back in society. It's
the same way with being justified. The very God who has searched
us out and says, you're guilty. I've looked through the darkness,
I've looked in the corners of your soul and your mind, and
you're guilty. Now the same God must look upon
us and say, you're justified. Look at what he says on in verse
26 of chapter 3. Look in verse 26. To declare,
I say, at this time his righteousness, the righteousness of another,
that he, that God may be just, and the justifier of him which
believeth in Jesus. God is just, and yet the justifier
God is the one that must justify. And you find that again in chapter
8, in verse 30, if you'd like to read that sometime. Those
whom he called, he justified. He justified. I can live my life
before man, and it don't much matter if I'm justified before
them or not. You can live your life, you can
go on about your business, and everybody says, that man is guilty. But you know you can go on and
live your life. It doesn't make much difference. But you can't
do that with God. We've got to be justified. You
remember that old publican that went up to the temple to pray?
That old tax collector? And he started beating on his
chest? He must have been thinking about what we're talking about
this morning. Beating on his chest and saying, God, Be merciful
to me, a sinner." And the Lord Jesus says that poor man went
down to his house justified. Who justified him? The same God
that he was calling upon for mercy. The Lord Jesus told the
Jews, He said, I know your heart. He said, you're seeking to be
justified before man. That's all you're worried about.
But He said, God knows your hearts. And you may fool man, and you
may not do anything wrong to man, but you offended God. And
that ought to be your concern. Will God justify me? Now, here's
the question that comes out of that. What would move God to
justify a sinner? What would move Him to do it?
He don't owe it to anybody. Because we've just seen the kind
of sinners that we are, and there's no exception. What would move
the eternal God, the Judge of all this world, to justify a
guilty sinner? Well, we're told here in verse
24 of chapter 3. Look in verse 24. And here the
answer is in a little nutshell. Look what he says. Romans 3,
verse 24. Being justified, there it is
again, freely by His grace. Why would God justify man? Why? What would move Him to declare
a man of all the charges that have been brought against him
and let him go free? Grace. Love. Goodness. Mercy. The cause is
found in God and not man. If you are looking for a reason
for God to justify you, Don't look within. It's not there.
Look without. Look to Him. Look in His heart
of goodness and grace. There's never been a man justified
except God has done it graciously. Poor old Noah was a wretched
sinner just like everybody else. Just a wretched old sinner on
his way to a devil's hell. And God, out of grace, looked
upon him one time, and you know what he said? I'm going to justify
him. I'm going to clear him. I know he's guilty, but I'm going
to clear him of all these charges. And that's what he did. Moses
found grace. Noah found grace in the eyes
of the Lord. Grace. Grace. So we've got two
things, haven't we? We've got a sinner and we've
got a gracious God. A sinner and a gracious God. Oh, you get those two together.
Get those two together. But here's the question now that
arises. How can God justify a sinner? Because we said at the beginning,
this is a matter of justice. This is going on within the court.
And the judge, he has to be just. He can't look at a man and he
says, you know, you look like you'll probably, you're going
to be able, we're going to be able to reform you. And I tell
you what I'm going to do. I'm just going to excuse you.
I'm going to release you of these charges. You leave here and you
go on your way. That'll never work. That'll never
work. That may work here for a while,
but that'll never work with judging all the earth. He has to do right. He has to be judged. Okay. How
then can he do it? We've seen the cause of him doing
it, grace, but how can he do it? Do you believe that God can
justify a guilty person? I heard a dear man say one time,
bless his heart, he said, God don't justify sinners. I don't
know what he was trying to prove. But listen, let me ask you this
question, and this is not a quick trick question. Does God justify
the guilty? That's not a quick trick question. I'm not trying to trick you.
Does God justify an ungodly person? Can he do that? Look in chapter
4. Read this. Look in chapter 4.
Look in verse 5. Look at this. Chapter 4, verse
5. But to him, to that man that
worketh not, but believes on him that justifieth thee ungodly."
Isn't that amazing? He said, well, God justifies
and after he reforms and he does penance and makes restitution. Then God watches him long enough
and says, you've been on probation a while, now I can justify you. That's not the way God justifies.
That's not who He justifies. You know, this is the same word
that I read to you a minute ago, over in chapter 1, where He talked
about the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness. Here we have the ungodliness.
We have the ungodly and God's wrath is upon him. And now we
have this, God justifying the ungodly. Here's how he does it. Here's
how he does it. Look at these two scriptures.
Look over in chapter 5 and verse 6. Let's bring it together right
quickly. Look at this. God's wrath is revealed from
heaven against all the ungodliness, and yet God turns right around
and He's able, through grace, to justify the ungodly. But here's
the meritorious cause. Here's the grounds upon which
He can do it. Look at this in verse 6. When we were without
strength, in due time Christ died. For who? Somebody tell
me. Christ died for the ungodly. We are told in the verse, I read
to you in verse 25 of chapter 4, He was delivered for our transgressions. In the room, in the place, in
the stead of our transgressions. How can God be and justifying
an ungodly sinner. Here's the cause. Here's the
meritorious cause that he can do it. Now, can you imagine this? You can just imagine this. Get
this in your mind's eye. Here you are, standing before
the judge of all the earth. And he's seated there upon his
throne. And basically, in my experience,
and in your experience, this is exactly what happens. We're
standing before Him, He's sitting there on His throne, and we're
guilty. And we're just waiting for the
last word to come down from this awful judge of all the earth.
You take this guilty sinner out of my sight, and you put him
in that dungeon of hell. Remove him. I can't look upon
him anymore. My eyes are too holy to behold
His guilt and His iniquity. Remove Him from me." That's what
you're waiting on. But instead, instead, the Judge
stands with His robe and He lifts His hands out to you. And for
the first time, what do you see? You see Prince in His hands. And then he pulls his robe back,
and what do you see? You see a hole in his side, in
the judge's side. And then he looks at you, and
he says, You poor, guilty sinner who is worthy of the pit of hell,
I justify you. have punished your sins. I have rewarded your iniquity. I have put away your transgressions. Now I, the judge of all the earth,
can be just and say unto you, neither do I condemn you. Go
and sin no more. Can you imagine that? How can
God justify a sinner? How can He do it and yet be God? Through the cross of the Lord
Jesus Christ. That's how. He took the sins
of all His people. And if you're here today and
you're one of His, you believe on Him. And if you're here and you're
one of His and you haven't believed on Him yet, you will. You will. And He takes your sins and He
takes them to Himself. And He says to justice, punish
me. Punish me. And that's what justice
does. He goes to the pit. He goes to
the hole. He goes to the gallows. He goes
to the whip in our stead. He cries. He groans. Forsaken of God. So we would
never be forsaken of God. He bears the guilt. So we wouldn't
have to bear it. God smites Him so He can say
to us, go free. That's Bible justification. In the death of the Lord Jesus
Christ, our debt of sin was And in the resurrection of the Lord
Jesus Christ, He received their acquittal. He was risen again
for their justification. And in time, and in time, you
actually experience by faith. what it is to be acquitted, justified
from all your sins. Being justified. But it's not
only that we have been justified, what a miracle that is, but right
now we are justified. Being justified. When God justifies
a sinner, he never comes unjustified. No matter where you find the
poor man or woman being, being, being. They are in a state of
justification and they can never be condemned or accused again. Being justified by faith, by
faith, by faith. You know what faith does? It
hears this proclamation. Faith is the ears, somebody said. You need ears. You've got to
have ears to hear this truth. Faith is the ears of the soul
that hears this proclamation. Neither do I condemn thee. I
freely forgive. I justify you from all things. You've got an ear to hear that?
Have you heard the shepherd's voice? Faith is the empty hands
that reaches out and receives the receipt. One of the first
things that people want in their hands when the court has accused
them, when the state accuses you of some awful crime and that
jury says you're not guilty. You know one of the first things
they want from the clerk? I want the receipt of that. I
want to see that. I want to make sure it's legal.
I want to see it. The eyes of faith looks here
and it sees. The eye of faith looks upon the
wound, the cause of our justification. Faith can't be saved without
it, can it? We can't be justified without
it. Faith is the only way this can get into our souls. And the
last thing is this, the effects of it all. Being justified by
faith, we have peace with God. If you could believe this morning
that you're justified, knowing yourself as you do, if you could
really, really get a hold of this, that you're justified,
how would that affect you? How would that affect your mind,
your thoughts, your heart? Wouldn't that give you peace? The very one that found you guilty
now justifies you. The only way to have this peace
and to maintain it is by believing it. That's it. In this sense that I'm looking
at this morning, it's a legal term. And the only way to experience
it is to believe it. Being justified by faith. Believe what? Believe that we
have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. This peace
with God is not based upon the strength or weakness of your
faith, but it is based upon the atonement of Jesus Christ. He made peace through the blood
of His cross. Our apprehension of this peace
may vary. It may be a great peace. It may
be a small peace according to your faith. But it's not our
faith that made peace. There is peace with God when
our faith is very, very weak. Because this peace is not based
upon the degree of our faith, but it's based upon the atonement
of the Lord Jesus Christ. He made peace through the blood
of His cross. There's the grounds of peace. There are times when you and
I are so filled with turmoil in our minds, are we not? We're so full of this apprehension
of our sin, we can't do anything that God commands us to do, but
that we see sin mixed with it, and yet we have peace with God. Once you're experiencing in your
everyday life, dear child of God, has nothing to do with this
peace that has been made. Here is the way to experience
this peace and maintain it in your heart. Believe that it has
been established by someone else outside of you, by Christ Himself. I get down on myself sometimes,
and you probably do too. Do you ever curse yourself? Get
so mad at yourself? Why did I think that? Why did
I do that? What in the world? I'm acting
like a child. What's the matter with me? Oh,
I'm so miserable and wretched. Does that change peace with God? No, it don't. It don't. What's our peace? Established
by the blood of the Son of God. Do you believe it? Do you believe
it? There's the way you experience
the peace of it, by believing it. Thou wilt keep him in perfect
peace, whose mind is stayed on thee, because he trusteth, he
trusteth in thee. Perfect peace. It's been made,
but the only way I'm going to experience it, It's by believing
it. You believe somebody else made peace for you 2,000 years
ago? Ain't this amazing? While we
were lost and dead in sins, peace had already been made. And we
didn't know anything about it. Never knew a thing about it.
But peace had already been made with God. Jesus had made it. Can you believe that? Can you
believe it? being justified by faith, we
have peace with God. What a wonderful truth. Let's
pray.