Its Implications

Introduction to Justification's Implications and the Centrality of the Gospel

0:00 The following sermon was delivered at the 2003 Southeastern Family Conference, which was held at Bryan College in Dayton, Tennessee. The preacher is Pastor Edward Donnelly from Trinity Reformed Presbyterian Church in Northern Ireland. This is the fourth and final sermon in a series entitled, Justification. For our fourth and final study of the doctrine of justification, I want to consider with you the implications of this doctrine.

0:42 The implications of justification. And to do, for the first time this series, what I am more comfortable doing, and to anchor what we have to say firmly in one particular text of scripture. I would ask you to turn in your Bibles to Romans chapter 5 verses 1 and 2. Romans chapter 5 verses 1 and 2.

1:14 Let us hear the word of God. Therefore, since we have been justified by faith We have peace with God Through our Lord Jesus Christ Through whom we have also obtained access By faith into this grace In which we stand and we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.

1:55 I was ordained to the gospel ministry in the month of October 1968 so if God spares me till next autumn I will have been a minister of the gospel for 35 years. it has passed remarkably quickly and in those years I have met with a lot of people and I've come to believe that if our people really understood justification by faith our pastoral work would be cut by at least 50% I mean that There is nothing more spiritually health-giving, nothing more transforming than this glorious truth.

2:50 Article number 11 of the 39 articles of the Church of England describes justification as a most wholesome doctrine and very full of comfort. And so it is.

3:10 And Paul begins Romans 5 by saying, Since we have been justified, or having been justified. For the pastors here, it is an aorist, passive participle. That means it is a completed act done to us by someone else in the past and now decisively finished. It is over, it is done, it is accomplished.

3:44 We have been justified once and for all. And I ask again, is that the case for each one of you? Have you been justified? Do you know that you have been justified through faith in Christ?

4:05 Is it possible that you're still looking in from the outside?

4:12 And if so, I would urge you to consider what was said yesterday evening, and indeed all three previous evenings. To consider your need, your unrighteousness, and God's provision for that need in Christ. And to listen to the gospel and to respond to the gospel, which is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes. and to call in faith to Christ that you may receive the righteousness of God.

4:43 This is Paul's starting point here for the rest of the epistle. This is his foundation stone on which he is going to build everything that he is going to teach us in this great letter. Justification by faith. the foundation of it all.

5:07 And that leads me to ask, by way of introduction, before we deal more closely with the text, are we ever in danger of neglecting this foundation?

5:22 And I'm speaking tonight to our churches. I say our churches because you have made me feel one of you and on the basis that fools rush in where angels fear to tread I am going to blunder into your concerns I am going to interfere in your affairs and I am going to be bold enough to say things that I think we all need to hear if I'm never invited back again you'll know why are we in danger of neglecting the foundations in the last 30 years

6:08 God has been raising up many faithful churches churches concerned to honor him in their life and in their teaching and truths which have been long neglected have come again into the light of men's awareness and have been re-emphasized in our day.

6:32 And in these churches, there is a genuine longing for revival.

6:39 But we are convinced also that our present duty is the reformation of our churches on the basis of Scripture.

6:49 There has been a new emphasis on the centrality of preaching. There has been much careful thinking and reformation of our approach to worship and church order and proper discipline. There has been a much needed stress on practical obedience to the law of God, the keeping of the commandments, the daily duties of life and work and family. there has been a new stress on doctrine and the importance of doctrine and all these things brothers and sisters are an enormous blessing from God for which we should be profoundly thankful we must not overvalue them

7:34 but is there a danger is there the danger of losing sight of the centrality of the gospel is there the danger of taking for granted that all our people know the gospel and are familiar with the gospel and are agreed on the gospel and devoting most of our energies elsewhere in the field of revelation so that we become known as specialists in these secondary areas I would like you to be able to learn from the history

The Danger of Defining the Church by Distinctives, Not the Gospel

8:20 of the denomination of which I am a minister the Reformed Presbyterian Church has been in Ireland for over 300 years in all that time by God's grace she has remained faithful to the gospel our statement of faith is now as it was then and I am not aware that there has ever been a case of heresy I'm not aware that a pastor has ever been charged with unbelief we have held solidly to our confession in theory but not always in practice

9:06 towards the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century there was a strange period in the history of our denomination the gospel was never denied never but it was neglected it was allowed to fade into the background and we became engaged in a fierce battle for what we called our distinctive principles.

9:40 Things that we held,

9:43 the regulative principle, especially as applied to worship, the kingship of Christ in the church and the nation and so on. We were the only people in the island of Ireland to believe these things and to teach these things. They were our distinctives. And we were ridiculed for them.

10:03 We were mocked for them. and that was a point of criticism against us that we held to these absurd picky little details and in response to that we started majoring in these things and stressing them and teaching them so that in a sense our people became more knowledgeable about our distinctive principles than they did about the gospel I remember a woman telling me that when she applied for church membership in one of our congregations in the 1920s. She was questioned exhaustively as to whether she was solid on our distinctives.

10:48 She was never asked if she'd been converted.

10:53 When our ministers went into public print, their focus of controversy was our distinctives. these were good men good men they meant well I believe what they believed I still hold the principles they held but and I'm generalizing there were many shining exceptions in general a balance was lost a balance was lost and a spiritual coldness came over parts of our church. And it took us two generations to recover.

11:42 I say two generations because the generation which followed that generation reacted to the opposite extreme and moved towards mainstream evangelicalism and were so repelled by the emphasis on the distinctives that they didn't talk about them at all. And we nearly lost them. And the pendulum swung wildly for a couple of generations before in the late 40s and early 50s it settled.

12:18 I admire you. I love you. I don't want to see you making the mistake we made I don't say that I see evidence that you are making it but it is a mistake which we are particularly vulnerable to brethren it is a mistake to define ourselves by what is distinctive that's a mistake think of a man with an unusually large nose. That is distinctive about him.

12:57 It's the first thing when you meet him, you say, In fact, there was a man, some of you remember Jimmy Durante, known as Schnuzzle Durante.

13:11 People said to him, blow your nose. He said, you blow it, you're nearer to it than I am.

13:21 he made a career out of his distinctive principle.

13:29 He was known as the man with the big nose.

13:33 Well, that was distinctive about him.

13:36 But you wouldn't like at the end of your life to have written in your tombstone, here lies the body of John Smith, the man with the big nose.

13:44 What was he like as a husband, as a father, as a human being? now that's a silly illustration it's facetious and I'm not comparing that to our distinctive principles they're applications of the word of God which we hold in conscience but if we define ourselves by our distinctives that's a very narrow definition that's a very constricting limiting definition surely we are an apostolic Catholic, Protestant, Reformed, Evangelical Church holding the great body of Christian truth.

14:28 The distinctives are important. But they're important in their place. That's not who we are.

14:39 What do Reformed Baptists stand for? what do you want at the heart of the church you belong to what do you want to be at the center of your people's thinking and worship what is to be your point of contact with the world surely it is this for I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ for it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes for in it a righteousness from God is revealed from faith for faith. As it is written, the righteous shall live by faith. And I say to you, my brothers and sisters, as I say to myself, for I face this temptation, if we are preoccupied with anything else

15:28 than what is central, if we're preoccupied with it, no matter how scriptural it may be, then we're not really a church any longer. We're a sect. That's the mark of the cults and the sects. They're identified by what makes them distinctive.

15:48 We are identified by what we have in common with the rest of the body of Christ.

Justification as Basic Identity and its First Implication: Peace with God

15:57 Let's come back to our text. Therefore, having been justified through faith. Note the connection word, therefore. it is a word which leads us forward but it is not purely chronological it's not moving us on simply to the next topic I dealt with justification now I deal with something else it not as if we would say today is Thursday therefore tomorrow will be Friday It's more than that. The word therefore is dynamic.

16:37 It's active. It governs everything that Paul is about to say. what Paul is doing here is saying in the light of justification by faith what follows what are the implications what truths do we believe what difference does the doctrine make to our lives since we have been justified by faith we could repeat that phrase in front of every clause in the next two or three verses it's the dominant thought we have been justified by faith that is the foundation that is the dominant thought and you and I need to impress this on ourselves

17:25 if you're a Christian this is your basic identity you're a having been justified by faith person that's who you are that's who you are that defines your existence that describes you you've got to let that awareness saturate every pore every fiber of your being you've got to say it to yourself over and over and over again till it becomes part of you you've got to eat it and drink it and breathe it and sleep it till it becomes part of us at the deepest awareness of our self-awareness I am a justified by faith person

18:11 that's who I am and everything I do and everything I think and every act of service and every temptation and every trouble and everything that happens to me goes through the lens of this come back to it again and again keep it in mind let it govern everything you think everything you do everything you are don't forget it therefore having been justified by faith Now what are the implications of being such a person? We look this evening at three.

18:53 Having been justified by faith, and this is the first implication, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. We have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Some manuscripts have an exhortation in the verb. It's a difference of one letter in the Greek.

19:19 They translate it, let us have peace with God. But that is not the text, that is not what Paul is saying. It is not an exhortation, it is a statement of fact. We have, at this very moment, in our hands, in our possession, as a permanent, present possession, we have peace with God.

19:44 We have it. We don't just hope for it. We don't just wait for it. We have it now.

19:51 What Paul says is we have peace towards God. That's the preposition he uses, peace towards God. I don't think he's referring here to the peace of God.

20:06 You remember how he speaks of the peace of God in Philippians 4.7. The peace of God which passes all understanding, which keeps our hearts and minds. That's a feeling.

20:20 That is a subjective experience. That is a precious sense of calm and assurance which comes in and calms us and quietens us and comforts us. The peace of God which passes all understanding. That's a great blessing.

20:39 We don't always have it. We don't always have it.

20:44 Paul's not talking here about the peace of God which we sense in our hearts. He's talking about an objective reality. The truth is that we are at peace with God. Whether we feel that or not.

21:02 Whether we realize it always or not. That is the fact. That is the truth. There is nothing between us.

21:08 There's no enmity. It's like two nations at peace. America and Japan once they were at war. Now they're no longer at war.

21:18 There is peace between them. There are no great issues outstanding. We once were enemies of God. The Creator was angry with us.

21:29 But now we're at peace. There is no enmity between us. There are no issues outstanding. God holds nothing against us.

21:38 The treaty has been signed and it is binding. The implication of justification is that between God and ourselves There is a state of permanent, unbreakable peace.

Peace with God and the Haunting Past

21:52 How relevant that is for our past.

21:58 Do you believe in ghosts?

22:02 I do.

22:05 I have met many haunted people.

22:11 Haunted by their past.

22:16 people who wake up at three o'clock in the morning and their past comes and stands at their bedside and torments them disturbs them causes them anguish they think of what they've been what they've done what they've said and thought those ghosts can be very destructive Some of you would be amazed at how apparently trivial some of the things that disturb the people of God. We had a lady some years ago who fell into an acute depression.

23:00 Eventually it emerged that she was obsessively worrying about something that had happened many years earlier, which on the scale of sin was a relatively minor thing. But this poor soul, it had just gripped her and troubled her. Sometimes the ghosts aren't trivial. Sometimes they're awful.

23:22 Some of us here may have terrible things in our past. And they haunt people. And they disturb them. And they rob them of joy.

23:34 And they beat them down. And they depress them. And the problem is they're not grasping justification. They're not grasping justification.

23:46 They're not understanding that there is peace between them and God. It's like a criminal who has served his time. He has spent his life in crime. But he has served a sentence.

24:02 The state holds no more grievance against him. And one day he's walking down the street and he sees a police officer on the other side of the street. And the old instincts take over. He jumps around a corner, his heart pounding, sweating in fear.

24:18 And he says, wait a minute.

24:20 I'm not guilty anymore. I'm no longer in that condition. And that's how Satan tricks us. He appears, you see, and accuses us.

24:30 And we respond in fear. We are forgetting that Christ has taken our sins, all our sins, on himself, and he was punished for them. And God's justice was satisfied. And our sins were taken away.

24:49 As Paul puts it in 2 Corinthians 5.19, In Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them. He doesn't count them.

25:06 Bishop Hugh Latimer was burned at the stake by Mary Tudor in 1555.

25:15 Latimer preached a famous sermon on justification. And in it he says, Our Saviour maketh our sins nothing, so that we be like as if we had done no sin. our sins be gone they are no sins they cannot be hurtful to us our sins be gone they're gone they are no sins it's amazing part of our problem is that God's grace is so amazing that we can't believe it we instinctively say this is too much

26:01 it's too good to be true or perhaps to follow on Paul's words we're ignoring what he says here we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ Martin Luther said I will have nothing to do with an absolute God Now what did Luther mean? He meant that all our dealings with God are through the Savior All our relationship with God is through Christ And all his relationship with us is through his Son Christ is the way, Christ is the channel, Christ is the mediator

26:50 We have no dealings with God, none as Christians except through the Savior who died for us and clothed us with his righteousness. And God has no dealings with us unless they come through his Son who died for us. Through our Lord Jesus Christ. If you keep remembering those words, it's always all our dealings with God are through Christ.

27:21 And that's why we peace. and that's why we have a solid objective basis for God to be righteous in declaring us righteous we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ it's so basic and yet friends how many of you forget that how many of you have come to your pastors again and again and said but pastor I did this I did this I was guilty of this I failed here I let God down we have peace with God God has dealt with that God has laid those sins in Christ that is the fact what peace

Second Implication: Access into Grace and its Contrast with Legalism

28:09 what inner peace what peace of God we have when we grasp that we are at peace with God but then there's a second implication we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ verse 2 through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand if peace with God deals with our past this implication deals with our present have you ever wondered why there are so many legalistic people

28:55 in reformed churches our churches maybe this conference I don't know good people godly people believers but there's something harsh about them there's something uptight something rigid something judgmental their characteristic phrase is tut tut their preferred expression is a disapproving frown they have a nose for heresy they give us the impression that Christianity is really hard work

29:45 that it's grim duty they dominate nervous inadequate people it's a type and we are attracting more than our share of that type of person and sometimes I confess as I see them walking in the door of my church and they're waiting to speak to me afterwards I feel a sinking of the heart and wish that they would go away or there's another type of person that we have in our churches fragile people people who are down in the depths all the time guilt ridden burdened sensitive hyper conscientious

30:31 hyper sensitive always feeling a sense of failure and unworthiness mister fearing and his daughter much afraid have you met these people with these people with these people in our churches and both these versions of Christianity and many of these people are true believers both these versions of Christianity are unattractive and they are sub-Christian and there is no need to live like this because Paul says justification speaks of grace grace Active, generous, undeserved love

31:19 Intense delight God doesn't put up with us God doesn't grit his teeth And decide grudgingly to keep us in his family God loves us God delights in us God showers his blessings upon us There is a smile on our Father's face when he looks at us. He has an unchanging heart of love towards his children because he sees us as perfectly righteous in his Son. Listen to Spurgeon.

32:03 This is a wonderful statement. when God looks upon the sinner who an hour ago was dead in trespasses and sins he looks upon him with as much love and affection as he ever looked upon his son

32:31 I don't know if I'd have dared to put it that way Thou art my beloved son My beloved daughter In thee I am well pleased That grace That the grace we been brought into Paul says we have obtained access into grace Perfect tense here We have obtained it We have gained it We have it The Greek perfect is a wonderful tense. It speaks of the present abiding effect of things.

33:17 I could say to you, I loved my wife for 39 years.

33:24 What would be the implication?

33:27 But I don't love her anymore.

33:30 I could say I used to love my wife. but if I said to you I have loved my wife for 39 years as I have 6 years before we were married and 33 years since I have loved her for 39 years the implication I still do I still do that's the Greek perfect tense we have obtained access and we still have access and we're always going to have access it's ours it's a permanent present possession you're familiar with the term access in the computer age it's become a verb instead of a noun what a revolutionary thought this was to the Jews of Paul's day we have access to God and yet the Greek word is a rare and a rich word

34:18 it's only found three times in the New Testament it's used in writing of the Persian kings in classical writers the lexicon tells us that this word access means entrance to the king's presence through the favor of another that is a technical term for somebody meeting you at the palace gate taking you by the hand through all the different corridors and courts and bringing you by the hand into the throne room and leading you right up to the throne of the king and presenting you there that's the word Paul chooses to use We have access by grace into the presence of the King through the favor of another.

35:04 Jesus Christ takes us by the hand and he takes us right into God's presence.

35:10 The other two times it's used in the New Testament, Ephesians 2.18, For through him we both have access in one spirit to the Father. Ephesians 3.12 In whom we have boldness and access with confidence Through our faith in him We have access into grace We live in grace We are citizens of the kingdom of God's grace God is permanently gracious to us And we're never going to be out of his grace and so Paul says this grace in which we stand again a perfect tense

Standing in Grace: Confidence and Stability

35:58 in which we have taken our stand permanently a favorite Pauline word he's always talking about standing and in the Bible the word stand has two meanings it refers firstly to boldness or confidence we find it that way in the Psalms in Psalm 1 the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment Psalm 130 who shall stand Lord if you should mark iniquity so Paul says we stand in grace we don't crawl before God we don't cringe before God as if he is an oriental despot

36:43 We don't come crawling across the carpet with our heads in the dust. He is the great, awesome, almighty God. And friends, we can stand in his presence as his children who have a right to be there.

37:01 Isn't that wonderful? We can stand up in the presence of God. but the word also refers not just to confidence and boldness but to stability and steadfastness it was used in Greek military language of troops in battle making a stand still is in military language an army makes a stand Paul uses it that way over and over again in Ephesians 6 in the picture of the Christian soldier we're able to stand Stand therefore Stand in the evil day Digging your feet into the ground Saying with Luther Here I stand Paul says we take our stand

37:47 Steadfast Stable Immovable We're not going to be knocked over We're not going to fall down Why?

37:56 Because it's in grace we're standing It's in grace we're standing supposing we were trying to take our stand in our own works supposing that was the ground in which we were planting our feet that would be shifting sand we wouldn't be able to stand a moment the ground would move underneath us and we would stumble and fall but we're standing in grace and I hope you won't misunderstand me when I say that nothing we did put us into grace.

38:36 That's not the bit I'm worried about, you misunderstanding. Nothing we do can put us out.

38:45 We stand.

38:49 My friends, are we hesitant about believing in the grace of God? are we hesitant about urging God's grace on people do we want to qualify it do we want to limit it do we want to be careful about it the devil doesn't want us to believe in the grace of God it's mind boggling it's stunning it's utterly amazing so magnificent that we too easily fail to believe it we forget it I don't apologize for quoting again to you that glorious question and answer from the Heidelberg Catechism

39:35 which we mentioned the other evening How art thou righteous with God only by true faith in Jesus Christ even though my conscience accuse me of having grievously sinned against all God's commandments and of never having kept any of them and even though I am still inclined toward all evil nevertheless without my deserving it at all out of sheer grace God grants and imputes to me the perfect satisfaction righteousness and holiness of Christ as if I had never sinned or been a sinner

40:24 Can that be true?

Living in Grace: Applying Justification to Church Relationships

40:29 God says in my eyes You've never sinned You've never been a sinner As if I have been perfectly obedient As Christ was obedient for me This is where God has placed us We have access into race Now, does this not say something about how we should treat each other in the church? Should our church fellowships not be communities which are soaked in grace? Which ooze grace, which exude grace? There should be no coldness

41:18 There should be no suspicion there should be no critical judgmental spirit grace means being quick to forgive quick to overlook grace will lead us to tolerate differences with brothers and sisters to welcome them to be open to their insights my dear friends we need to apply justification by faith to our relationships with each other. We need to apply justification by faith to our relationships with each other. Think of someone in your church

42:03 with whom you have had a disagreement. Perhaps it's been quite a serious disagreement. And perhaps not about a trivial matter. Perhaps about something to do with the things of God.

42:15 and you genuinely think that that brother or sister is wrong and that the course they're advocating is dangerous and you have harsh words and even as you sit here this evening there is some degree of resentment or suspicion.

42:36 Now move forward to next Wednesday evening at prayer meeting and that brother stands up in the meeting and he says I was told today that I have terminal cancer I have only two weeks to live and I hope you brothers and sisters will look after my wife and my children now what would you say?

43:03 would you go over to him at the end of the meeting and say well now there are one or two issues that I think we need to get straightened out and I want to get you before you die to admit that you were wrong no you know you wouldn't you'd go over to him you'd put your arms on his shoulders you'd say brother as long as I live your wife and your children will have a friend and he'd say well I know we've had some disagreements and you'd say shh no no don't speak about it don't speak about it Could we get together next week to talk about it? Oh no. Far more important things to think about now.

43:50 You see a greater reality comes in. And in the light of that greater reality. What you've been troubled about. Suddenly shrinks to its true perspective.

44:02 You love the guy.

44:07 But friends. There's an even greater reality. God has loved that brother in eternity and Christ Jesus has hung on the cross for him and bled and died for him and he loves him now and in the eyes of God that brother or sister who you think is wrong and who may be wrong their sins are forgiven they're clothed in the righteousness of Christ at the deathbed of an elderly man and his wife was in just a few days before he died he'd been a distinguished man

44:53 a handsome man but that was long in the past he'd been suffering from Alzheimer's and it had ravaged him and it had taken the flesh from his head and he lay there in the bed. His wife was an elderly lady. Her hand was wrinkled. She reached out her hand.

45:16 She stroked his face.

45:19 She said, oh my darling, isn't he lovely?

45:25 Isn't he lovely?

45:28 Stupid old woman.

45:32 Not lovely at all.

45:36 She saw the man she'd fallen in love with. She saw the man she'd married. The father of her children lived together. And she saw what we couldn't see.

45:49 She saw what we couldn't see. And God looks at each one of us. And he says, isn't he lovely?

46:00 Isn't she lovely? And friends The peculiarities And the sins And the failures And the oddities And the strange opinions Of your brothers and sisters In your church Are real But there's something else That's real And that's the righteousness Of Christ upon them And ten million million years From now When all these other things have faded and gone that's the reality that's the reality it's all very well to teach justification by faith and to believe it that's important

46:45 but we've got to live it we've got to live it we've got to live it we like talking about sovereign grace we've got to show sovereign grace sovereign grace means grace that extends to people who don't deserve it we disappoint our heavenly father we sin against him we strike him in the face and cover his face with spittle and our father holds on to us and through the spittle and the blows we see his kind steady eyes and he says to us

47:31 you cannot make me stop loving you you can't make me stop loving you I'm never going to stop loving you that's sovereign grace that's what it means and I want you now as you listen to me this moment to resolve in your heart about any Christian with whom you have an issue or a problem that you'll be able to say in your heart God by your grace I could go to that person and say whatever our difficulties may be you can't make me stop loving you. Isn't that what the church is meant to be? Aren't we meant to embody this as I have loved you?

48:20 Christ doesn't go off on a huff. Christ hasn't a thin skin. Christ doesn't pout with disappointment. He just takes it all.

48:30 And he just keeps on loving. And brothers and sisters, if we do this, then there will be a new spirit of grace in our churches. And the brother who disagrees with you will see your graciousness and your kindness and your willingness to yield and concede. And his heart will be softened.

48:50 And he'll get down off his high horse. and you'll meet each other as you come towards each other.

49:02 Forgiving one another as Christ, as God in Christ forgave you. We need to live in grace We need to show as an implication that we saved by grace Then we have to live as men and women who are saved by grace. Is it risky? Well of course it's risky. We've heard about that already at this conference.

Third Implication: Rejoicing in the Hope of the Glory of God

49:33 Are you going to get hurt? Of course you're going to get hurt. you're going to get your heart broken people are going to take advantage of you but that's the deal that's the deal a third and final application we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ through him we also have obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand.

50:11 And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Peace with God it deals with our past. Access into grace it speaks to our present. The hope of the glory it addresses our future.

50:32 we are living in an uncertain time the optimism of the mid 20th century is gone 9-11 has profoundly affected the psyche of your nation people are fearful about the future about the economy the environment about society and culture many of us here have personal worries and anxieties and some of them are quite serious and we're living in an age of moral decline and Christian weakness and we're affected by that too and it's easy for us to become pessimistic and downhearted and to have low expectations and this needs to be dispelled and we won't dispel it by chirpy little slogans

51:20 Paul says we rejoice we rejoice the word literally can be translated we boast It refers to a triumphant, conquering, exulting confidence. We overcome, we triumph, we rise above these things, we feel gladness and we express gladness. There's a deep spring of happiness inside us which just keeps bubbling up and bubbling up and overflowing and spilling out. We are rejoicing, boasting, exulting people.

52:01 Not pathetic, discouraged, downtrodden people. Not downcast, disheartened people. But rejoicing people, he says. We rejoice.

52:11 We're justified by faith. Our life is marked by triumph and hope.

52:19 And Paul says we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Perhaps you will know that in the New Testament the word hope has a different meaning than it has with us. With us, hope is something uncertain.

52:38 I hope that I'll pass my exam. I hope I'll get home safely. I hope it won't rain tomorrow. I'm not sure, but that's my hope.

52:46 That's not the meaning in the New Testament. The dictionary says, elpis, the Greek word, hope, refers to what is certain but has not yet happened. Something that is certain absolutely certain absolutely certain the only thing is it hasn't happened yet and hope is the expectation of what is certain it simply hasn't happened. Hebrews describes it as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul now in what hope are those who are justified confidently rejoicing

53:33 Paul says we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God what does he mean by that well we can think of it in three ways the glory of God in the world in this world we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God we know that the day is coming when there will be a new heaven and a new earth where the holy city new Jerusalem will come down from heaven like a bride adorned for her husband and we know that the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea

54:18 and that this earth will be transformed and that creation will be restored and that the kingdom will come to earth and that we shall live in this glorious new creation rich with all the beauty of God's power and kindness and provision. The glory of God in the world. This world is going to see the glory of God. This world is going to be restored.

54:44 Satan isn't going to have the last word about planet earth. God's going to beat him. God's going to undo his work this is the answer to the environmentalists and the ecologists and all the prophets of doom we rejoice in the hope the certain knowledge that in this world in this world the glory of God will be seen we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God in ourselves as Paul puts it in Romans 8.18 the glory that is to be revealed in us.

55:24 We rejoice in the hope, friends, that you and I are going to be glorious beings. That we're not going to have to live with our sins forever. We're not going to have to suffer these weaknesses and things that disturb us and upset us. God's going to change you.

55:44 He's going to make you like his Son. When you see him as he is He's going to restore you in body and in soul A radiant, perfect creature That's your future destiny That's what's going to happen to you if you're a Christian Is that not a cause for rejoicing?

56:09 The wonder of what God is going to do in us we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God in the world we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God in ourselves but supremely and thirdly we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God in himself that's the glory his servants will worship him they will see his face blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God you and I have a rendezvous with the great God himself

56:55 and we will see him we will see him and we will gaze upon him we will be enraptured with the riches of the glory the hope of the glory The hope of the glory. What a cause for rejoicing and triumphing and boasting. The hope of the glory.

Triumph Over Death Through the Hope of Glory

57:27 Death is described in scripture as the last enemy.

57:34 And he is a fearsome enemy. He has been called the king of terrors. Musicians have composed music about death. Painters have tried to paint death.

57:51 Poets and novelists have tried to describe death as a great, grim, fell warrior. With a cold light shining from his eyes. And his cruelty and his savagery and his destructive power. And the world is terrified of death.

58:11 Our society is terrified of death. And the great strong men and leaders of the world, they're frightened of death.

58:22 And our culture is death denying. People desperately trying to stave off death, push away death.

58:33 We're supposed to live in a tolerant, liberal culture where you can talk about anything. You can sit around a New York dinner table, you can talk about any perversion or filth you like. But if you sit at that dinner table and say, it's interesting to think that we're all going to die soon, isn't it? See how that goes as a conversation piece.

58:55 People are terrified of death. and a few weeks ago death came stalking scattering people in fear before his approach looking for a victim and there standing in his path was a little old lady just a wispy fragile little lady breath would blow her away And she didn't seem frightened Death stood Right in front of her And looked at her with his gleaming eyes She gave death a little twinkly smile She said you know

59:43 I'm in a win win situation If I don't die I'll go to my family If I do die I'll go to be with Jesus and death crawled away like a whipped dog oh death where's your sting? the hope of the glory the hope of the glory this is who we are justified people we're not a pathetic old fashioned minority we're not inadequate people who need a primitive crutch. We're not uptight, repressed

60:28 people who don't know how to live. We're not coming with a little optional extra for life. We are people who have a vision, a prospect, a future which is grand and glorious beyond description. And we expect to be new people in a new world in the very presence of God.

60:51 Is that how you see yourself? when you wake up in the morning and look in the mirror that's who you are by God's grace is that how others perceive us you know those people in the reformed baptist church down the road they've got peace with God and they've access into grace and they rejoice in the hope of the glory why do we complain why do we worry why do we fret why do we argue because we've lost sight of the glory and friends it's all here in the gospel

Conclusion: The Sufficiency and Wonder of the Gospel

61:36 and it is my conviction that in the gospel we have all we need and we can tinker about with superficial things all we like and we can make changes or not make changes and we can squabble and fight and waste our time and our energies when all the time all we need is for the spirit to bring home to our minds and our hearts the magnificence and the wonder of what we already know.

62:22 It's all here. It's wonderful. It's wonderful beyond comparison. And don't we all unite in that?

62:31 Aren't we all agreed on that? Doesn't every believer in this room say amen to that? It's all here for us in the gospel. Some time ago in Scotland, a couple had been living in relative poverty.

62:45 and one of these art experts was touring the country and did a dirty old painting in the attic and they brought it along to be evaluated and discovered that it was a masterpiece from the middle ages I forget how many hundreds of thousands of pounds it was worth they had owned it all the time they had been wealthy people all their lives but they didn't realize how wealthy they are and they've been living in poverty because they didn't realize it.

63:20 And really I would plead with us all that we go on our knees tonight and we just think over the gospel and we say, Oh God, open my eyes by your spirit and show me how wonderful these things are to see them truly, that I'll be excited about them and absorbed in them and that the name of Christ will be my passion and my goal. We're justified. We've peace with God. We've access into grace.

63:48 And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Amen.

63:58 Let us find prayer.

64:09 Almighty God, we pray earnestly that you will bring home to our hearts in a fresh way the glory of salvation Father may we understand more of what we have in Christ may he be more precious to us as we lay our heads on our pillows this night may we know in our hearts that there is peace between us and you. Lord, may we make use daily of the access which we have into your presence. May we be often found there. May we dwell in grace.

64:56 May we be gracious men and women. May we seek to communicate your grace in our dealings with one another that the light of grace may shine brightly in our churches that people may say, see how they love one another. And, O Lord, we thank you for this certain hope of glory for this poor fallen earth for our little damaged lives and restricted personalities that, Father, you have a future so awesome, so splendid for us and that that is certain help us to think of it more

65:41 help us to dwell in these things help us to look forward to the joy set before us and may it change us as people Father help us to witness to your world as men and women rejoice