September 28, 2003
Morning Worship
Text: Romans 5:1-11
Subject: The Effects of Justification
Title: Look What the Lord Has Done
I went to apply for a job one time. It was a job that I knew I was not qualified for. It was a good job that I did not deserve. But because I knew someone, who put in a good word for me, I was hired. I was so thankful to be able to get my foot in the door in carpentry. That’s not all. Not only was it a job at a time when I needed work, it was a good paying job. And it had medical benefits. I was paid to go to school for training. There was a pension plan. And to top it all off, they withheld $1.00 for every hour you worked from May 1 to April 30, and then gave it back to you in a lump sum so you could take your family on vacation if you wanted. And all this, not because I was deserving, but because someone spoke up for me.
This morning we are going to look into something very similar to the story, I just told you. It is the story of our salvation, but it is more than that. We all know that we are saved by grace and we don’t receive the penalty that is due to us. We know we have an advocate that will stand up for us before the judge and we will be declared “not guilty!” That is called justification. Because we have trusted Christ, we now stand as justified before God. No guilt is laid on us any longer, for Christ died for our sins. That justification is just one of the things that happens to us the moment we accept Jesus.
Now justification has its benefits as well. Paul wrote in this passage in Romans about all the marvelous benefits we receive from justification – all because we have taken the step to accept Christ. As we look at Romans 5:1-11 today let us rejoice in the many blessings God pours out through justification.
I. We Have Been Justified by Faith.
A. We have peace with God. To fully understand the concept of peace let’s look at how the dictionary defines it. According to Webster’s lexicon of the English Language peace is, “the condition that exists when nations or other groups are not fighting / the ending of the state of war / freedom from noise, worries, troubles or fears…” Now notice that Paul does not say hear that we have the peace of God, but that we have peace with God. Philippians 4:7 says that we will have the peace of God. Now we are concerned with being at peace with God. When we are justified we no longer are at war with God in our bodies but we come into rightful relationship with Him James 4:4 says, “Whoever wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.” It is only when we go to the cross and find salvation that we can ever hope to have peace with God. As long as we are of the world, we are mortal enemies with God, yet He still loves us. When we come to have peace with God, then and only then can we find the peace of God – the peace that passes all understanding. Once we gain that peace, are we good to go? The bible never indicates that the Christian walk is easy for once we have peace with God, it is then that we become mortal enemies with the enemy and his world system. Who would you rather have as your enemy, the one who can kill the body but not the soul or the One who is able to destroy both body and soul in hell? (Matthew 10: 28) I would rather be at peace with God.
B. Because we are justified by faith, we have access to grace. The word that is translated access here can also mean admission. We have admission into the throne room of God. The cost of our admission was great. We couldn’t pay it on our own. We have access into grace… We are saved by grace but we are also kept by grace. We are kept from the evil one. We are kept holy. We are kept faithful. All of these are not by our own works – of course we love God and want to please Him – But He gives us the grace in which we stand. I want you to turn over to Ephesians 6:13. Pay close attention to what I am going to say here. In the original Greek text there was no punctuation. The bible interpreters place punctuation where they thought it should be. Now watch as I read through the text. “Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.” Now I’m going to change it a bit very subtly. “When you have done everything to stand, stand.” In other words, it seems that Paul was saying that whenever you have done everything that you can do to stand, stop relying on yourself and stand in God’s grace!! It is then that we can begin to rejoice.
C. We rejoice in the hope of God’s glory. I love the comparison between hope in the world and hope in the life of Christians. For the non – Christian hope is just a shot in the dark. I hope I can make ends meet this month. I hope I don’t get this virus that is going around. I hope I get to go to heaven. But for the Christian hope is totally different. Hebrews 6:11-12, “And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope until the end, that you do not become sluggish but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.” For the Christian, hope says, “My God shall supply all my needs… I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me… seek first the kingdom of God and all these things shall be added unto you… I go to prepare a place for you and if I go to prepare a place I will come back and receive you to myself that where I am you may be also.” Faith and hope stand in confidence to believe and not doubt. Hope is knowing that whatever happens, Jesus is with you to deliver you through all tribulations.
D. That is why we can glory in our tribulations. Tribulation produces perseverance. What a difference a life in Christ makes for it is not so with those in the world. For the world, tribulation produces anger, frustration, distress and the results are violence, drugs, suicide. But for the Christian who knows whose strength he stands in tribulation produces perseverance; perseverance produces character; and character produces hope. The more we go through with the Lord, the more we realize that He is everything that He claims to be and that in Him there is nothing that we cannot do. Romans 8:18 states it this way, “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.”
II. We Are Kept By Hope.
A. Hope never lets us down. The Greek word translated “hope” means “to anticipate, usually with pleasure; expectation or confidence.” Flip back one chapter to 4: 16. Faith and hope are closely related. Faith means to be fully persuaded of something. Paul writes here, “Therefore, it is of faith that it might be according to grace, so that the promise might be to all the seed, not only to those who are of the law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all (as it is written, ‘I have made you a father of many nations’) in the presence of Him whom he believed – God, who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did… who contrary to hope, in hope believed, so that he became the father of many nations, according to what was spoken…” Where do we derive our hope from? If we are the seed of Abraham by faith, we receive it from the word of God. God told Abraham what would happen and he hoped – anticipated with pleasure, expectation and confidence – Verse 20, “he did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief … and being fully convinced that what He had promised, he was also able to perform.”
B. We have God’s love poured out on us. It has been poured out into our hearts, the seat of our emotions. We often say that if we don’t feel anything from God that it is OK because our emotions can deceive us. The prophet Jeremiah even said that, “The heart is deceitful above all things…” Yet, when the Holy Spirit who was given to us pours out the love of God into our hearts we can always know that we are the objects of His affection, even if we do not feel like it. The idea of God pouring out His love on us by His Holy Spirit is also a reflection of the anointing that we can have when we are baptized in the Holy Ghost. Jesus said, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me for He has anointed Me…” That same anointing is for you and me. Look at the difference between God’s love and the love that man knows. God pours out His love as in Aaron’s anointing when the oil ran down into his beard. Man’s love is rather like our anointing when we put a little oil on our finger and anoint someone’s head.
C. We receive strength when we receive the Holy Spirit. Before we trust Christ, we are without strength. What man considers to be strong is weakness in God’s eyes. It is when we recognize our deficiencies in our own strength, in our own righteousness, and in our own wisdom and we call on the name of the Lord, then we gain real strength. “And it shall come to pass that whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”
III. We are loved by God.
A. How much does God love us? He created us in His image. He gave us the freedom to do whatever we chose. And then after we totally botched everything up He still loved us so much that He gave His only begotten Son, so that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. I love Him, I love Him because He first loved me. And purchased my salvation on Calvary’s tree. Not only has Jesus saved us from our sin but has given us the promise of eternal life. That is in direct opposition to what the world has to offer. All the pleasures that we could ever receive from this world are temporal. But God promises us eternal life with Him. If we try to understand it with unspiritual minds, we could never understand why God would send His only Son to die in our place. Verse 7 indicates that rarely would a man die for someone who looks good on the surface and maybe they would die for one who is full of good works, maybe! But Christ died for us while we were sinners. He has commuted our death sentence.
B. So, we are now saved from God’s wrath. How could a loving God be a God of wrath? That doesn’t make any sense. God has given us the chance to become new creations in Christ. But for those who refuse – John the Revelator wrote, “Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away. And there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, standing before God, and books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged according to their works by the things, which were written in the books… And anyone not found written in the Book of life was cast into the lake of fire.” When this group is thrown into the lake of fire people think, so what? When you get into the fire that’s the end. Not so. They will live forever in the fire. But not those who trust Christ. When we look at verse 9 we tend to skip over the first part, “Much more then…” We have been justified by Christ’s blood sacrifice. If that is true, then how much more will we be saved from wrath through Him?
C. We have been reconciled to God by Christ’s death. The cross of Calvary spans the gap between God and His creation. We, the creatures, now have the opportunity to be reconciled to God. Because our sins are taken away. And if our sins are taken away, then much more will we be saved by His life. Paul wrote to the church in Corinth, “And if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins… If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most pitiable.” We are also saved by His life. If there is no eternal life, no judgment, no heaven or hell to be reckoned with, if Jesus died for our sins for this life, then all our hope becomes despair. “We shall all be changed – in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.” Glory be to God!!!!!
D. We rejoice in God. All of the benefits of justification that we have seen – peace with God, access to grace, glory in tribulations, the love of God, strength, saved from wrath, reconciliation - all these things should lead us to one conclusion. God alone is worthy of our praise. We rejoice in Him. We worship Him. We exalt Him. We give Him glory. We trust in Him for eternal life. If we received these benefits from Him, then we act as though we did receive, by bowing before His throne in humility, knowing that we are hopeless on our own, but with Him, nothing is impossible. When we fully understand all the benefits we receive through justification, we can – let me rephrase that – we will rejoice.
The great bell of St. Paul’s, which tells Londoners the hour, has inscribed upon it these words: "Richard Phelps made me, 1709." It is a huge bell, nearly seven feet in diameter and unusually musical. A hammer connected with clock work strikes the hours and tolls the bell on funeral occasions. The clapper of the bell is used for tolling upon the death of a member of the royal family, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishop of London, the Dean of St. Paul’s, or the Lord Mayor of London. There is an interesting story of how this bell saved a man’s life. The story goes that a sentinel on duty at Windsor Castle was accused by the guard who came to relieve him of sleeping at his post. This sentinel was a soldier in the reign of William and Mary. He was tried by court martial and condemned for sleeping at his post upon the terrace of Windsor. The soldier denied the charge and insisted that be had not slept at his post. As a proof that he had been awake while on duty, he declared that on midnight on that particular night he heard the great bell of St. Paul’s strike 13 times instead of 12. The Court did not believe that it was possible for the soldier to have heard the bell of St. Paul’s so far away. However, while the poor fellow was under sentence of death, it was proved by many who heard it that at midnight on the night referred to the clock actually did strike 13 times instead of 12. The mechanism was out of order. The king pardoned the soldier, who lived to be 100 years old. What music St. Paul’s bell must have always been in that man’s ears, for by it he was justified after being condemned! Yet, how much sweeter is the sound that peals forth in the soul of him who has been guilty, but still has become justified freely by the redemption that is in Christ Jesus! --King’s Treasures
