What Are Its Grounds? (1)

The Damning Delusion of Self-Righteousness and the Necessity of Justification

0:03 The following sermon was delivered on Sunday morning, July 30th, 2006, at Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey.

0:13 It is a tragedy, a tragedy of unspeakable proportions, that untold multitudes live, die, and go to the day of judgment deluded by the notion that all is well with them. Well with them not because they have ever taken seriously who God is. Well with them not because they've ever cared to find out who they really are in relationship to the God who really is. Well not because they have ever gone out of themselves and into Jesus Christ to receive a right standing with God, in the only way that God himself says that right standing can be experienced. They live, they die, they go to judgment encased in the disappointing delusion that all is well with them forever, because in some way or another God is love and surely would never think of sending such relatively nice people.

1:35 Because they are into a place of everlasting punishment.

1:42 Multitudes, multitudes held in that delusive notion that all is well because in some way or another God is love and that will bring them into a place of blessedness. Well since it is the sincere passion of my heart that no one sitting under my ministry will live and die and go to the day of judgment, go to judgment encased in that damning delusion, I have given myself for some weeks to make an effort to open up to you from the scriptures what the Bible says concerning the only way sinful men and women, the sons and daughters of Adam, can be right with God, can find acceptance with the holy and righteous God of heaven. And so we have...

2:37 We have been engaged in a study of the biblical doctrine of justification. And it is this all-important doctrine, as I say, that has been the focus of our study this morning. We come to our twelfth study in that biblical truth. Having set before you the importance of the doctrine, the context or those supported truths without which we cannot begin to grasp the truth of justification, we are now engaged in seeking to open up the substance of the biblical doctrine of justification.

Review of Justification's Author, Recipients, Source, and Activity

3:16 And my method has been to take the definition of justification given to us in the larger catechism of the Westminster Standards and using it as a framework of instruction to open up the portions of the word of God relevant to the various words and phrases of that definition. The definition is this. In answer to the question, number 70, what is justification? The framers of that catechism have responded by writing, justification is an act of God's free grace unto sinners in which he pardons all of their sins, accepts and accounts their persons righteous in his sight, not for anything wrought in them, or done by them, but only for the perfect obedience and full satisfaction of Christ by God imputed to them and received by faith alone. So we've covered four facets of the biblical doctrine of justification as set forth in that organizing framework. The author of justification is God himself, and, God alone. The scripture says of him, it is God that justifies.

4:43 And that phrase alone should be enough to persuade us unless the God of heaven, into whose court we will come in the last day, unless he declares us righteous, all of our sins pardoned, received and accepted with a positive credit of righteousness in his sight, we've had it, for God alone is the author of justification. And secondly, we considered who are the recipients of justification. Justification is an act of God's free grace unto sinners. And we saw that it is sinners viewed in a two-fold light who are justified.

5:23 Sinners as they are objectively defined and described in their true standing and condition before God, but not merely sinners objectively defined as such by God. There are also sinners who are not merely sinners, but who are not merely sinners, but there are multitudes. All of Adam's sons are thus defined, but not all are justified. But it is sinners, secondly, who have come to the painful, personal, internal persuasion that what God says about them as sinners is true.

5:53 That they personally stand exposed to the wrath of God for who and what they are as sinners. Sinners in Adam. Sinners in their own experience and practice. And then thirdly, we saw the source of justification.

6:11 What is its source? Out of what does it come? What is its ultimate origin? God is its author.

6:19 Recipients are sinners. But the confession or the catechism says it is an act of God's free grace unto sinners. The source of God's justifying act is nothing in the sinner. It is free grace.

6:35 Grace for which there is... There is no reason to be found in the sinner, but only in the heart of God in His infinite love and His astounding favor to the ill-deserving.

6:49 And then last Lord's Day, we considered the activity of God in justification. When Jesus said of the publican, this man went down to his house justified, what had God done to him, or what had God declared about him, when it says he went down to his house justified? What was different about him from when he went up to the temple to pray? Well, our catechism says in justification, God does two things.

7:19 He pardons all of our sins and then accepts and accounts our persons righteous in His sight. One is the cancellation of our sins and their wrath deservingness. The other is...

7:36 is the conferral of a positive status of righteousness, accepting and treating us as though we had not only not sinned, but perfectly kept the law of God in all the extent of its demands upon the totality of life and the totality of our humanity, thought and motive and desire and impulse as well as deed and word. Injustification, God performs those two astounding acts, pardons all of our sins, accepts and receives us as righteous. He takes away the sentence of death and He imparts and gives the title to life. There is complete forgiveness of all of our sins and the permanent reinstatement to the favor of God. Well, now this morning, we come to the $64 question. On what basis, can a holy and a just God committed to maintain the integrity of His character say to hell-deserving sinners, all of your sins are pardoned and furthermore, I will accept and receive your person as righteous in my sight

The Central Question: On What Grounds Can God Justify Sinners?

8:58 by an irrevocable declaration from my mouth on what grounds? Can God do this? The scriptures clearly tell us that God is infinitely holy, inflexibly just and righteous. How then can He remain just and righteous and treat sinners in this way?

9:23 On what basis can God do this? The Bible tells us in 2 Peter 2.4 that the angels that sinned were immediately cast out of heaven put in chains and consigned irrevocably to hell. God treated holy angels in an irreversible act of pure justice and angels and redeemed sinners will worship Him when He sees angels forever shut up in hell in the day of judgment.

10:01 On what basis could God do something to a vast multitude whom no man can number out of every kingdom? To a hundred tribe and tongue and nation pardon all of their sins and not only pardon them but accept them as righteous and how can He do that and still be a God of inflexible justice? A God of absolute integrity? And remember, God would sooner damn the entire human race and send us to hell than threaten one beam of the glory of His own integrity as a whole.

10:39 So holy and a just God. Now that may come as a shock to some of you who have a man-centered perspective as though almighty man is the all-important one. No, there's nothing more important to God than God Himself. And rather than cast one shadow over one beam of all of His glorious attributes, God would sooner damn us all.

11:05 But He has not had to cast any shadow on the beam of His glory. On the beam of any of His glorious attributes. In fact, when we come to consider the ground on which God justifies sinners, we see that all of His attributes from His infinite justice and His holiness and His purity to His amazing and astounding and unbounded love rather than a shadow being cast over one beam of any one of His glorious attributes, they all burst forth in a glory not known apart from this issue. On what grounds does God justify sinners?

The Catechism's Answer: Not by Works, But by Christ's Obedience and Satisfaction

11:47 How can He be just and still the justifier of those who believe in Jesus? Well, it is that question that the framers of this catechism were concerned to answer and they have answered with astounding precision and biblical substance. Listen to the answer. Justification is an act of God's free grace unto sinners in which He pardons all of their sins and accepts and accounts their persons righteous in His sight.

12:24 Now notice, here's the grounds. Not for anything wrought in them or done by them, but, see there's the negative, not for anything wrought in them or done by them, but for, and here's the positive, the perfect obedience and full satisfaction of Christ. There is the negative, not for anything wrought in them, done by them, then the positive, but for the perfect obedience of Christ and the full satisfaction of Christ. Now this negative, positive statement is a marvelous biblical pattern by which to define truth and to insulate from error. You see it all through the scriptures. For example, in Titus 3, 4 and 5, Paul writing to Titus could say this concerning our salvation. Titus chapter 3, verses 4 and 5.

13:35 But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love toward man appeared, now look at the negative. Not by works done in righteousness, which we did ourselves, but, positive, according to His mercy, He saved us. And here the antithesis is between our works and the revelation of divine mercy. In 2 Timothy chapter 1, in verse 9, you see the same pattern.

14:09 Who saved us and called us with a holy calling, not. Negative. Not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given us in Christ Jesus before times eternal. And here the antithesis again is between works and grace.

14:30 Not according to this, but according to that. I say this is a biblical pattern and because these framers of both the confession and the catechisms were thoroughgoing biblicists, they thought, they thought in those biblical categories. And so in answer to the question, what is the ground on which God can pardon and remain just? God can receive and accept us as righteous and still remain sane.

Proposition 1: Our Works Have Nothing to Do with the Ground of Justification

15:00 The likes of us regarded as though we had perfectly obeyed His law from the moment of our conception and had obeyed it in our first father Adam in the garden. How? How in the world can God do this and remain God in the integrity of all of His attributes? Well, in the coming days, today and then the next two Lord's Days, I want to reduce to three simple propositions this matter of the grounds or the ground of our justification.

15:33 And here are the propositions. I'm going to state them. Then we'll come back and open up number one this morning. Proposition one.

15:43 Works performed by God. By us. Have nothing whatsoever to do with the ground of our justification. Works performed by us.

15:57 Have nothing whatsoever to do with the ground of our justification. Proposition two. God's work in us has nothing whatsoever to do with the ground of our justification. You see, I've reversed the order and for good reasons and I've reversed the order for perfectly biblical reasons.

16:18 The catechism says, not for anything wrought in us first nor done by us, I'm reversing them. Proposition one. Works performed by us have nothing, nothing, nothing whatsoever to do with the ground of our justification. Proposition two.

16:35 God's work in us has nothing whatsoever to do with the ground of our justification. And proposition three. Christ's work for us in his perfect obedience and substitutionary death is the complete and sole ground of our justification. So in the remainder of our time, I'm going to attempt to take up the first proposition.

17:04 Our works have nothing whatsoever to do with the ground of our justification. Now listen carefully. I did not say our works have nothing whatsoever to do with our salvation. Salvation is a broader term than justification.

17:24 Our salvation is the entire work of God in taking us out of the state of nature and condemnation and death unto glory at the coming of the Lord Jesus. Salvation is the broad encompassing term that brings within its scope everything God does to take us from where and what we are by nature to where and what he intends to make us by his grace. Justification is one of the subsets of salvation. Regeneration is a subset.

18:01 Sanctification is a subset. Adoption is a subset. Now listen carefully. People have spilled blood for what I'm going to tell you now.

18:12 Don't let mental laziness rob your soul of the glory of your salvation. I'm asserting in this proposition that our works performed by us have nothing to do with the ground of our justification though our works are a very important element in other facets of our salvation.

18:40 Ephesians 2.8 and 9 For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God not of works lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto which God has before ordained that we should walk in them.

19:06 Good works are the end for which we are renewed, united to Christ, justified. It is unto good works. And so if good works, are not flowing out of us, we have no biblical grounds to say we have been created anew in Christ Jesus or that we are justified. Or take the words of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount.

19:29 Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven. Or take the shocking words of James. You see that a man is justified not by faith, only but also by works. Where justification there is not the justification in answer to the question how can I find acceptance with God, but on what basis will there be a vindication that my acceptance has been real, that my faith is real.

20:07 So don't anyone go out with the notion, oh well, listen to that proposition. Works performed by us have nothing to do with our salvation at all. No, no, no, no, no. That's heresy.

20:19 Damning heresy. Multitudes sit in churches today deluded that without works of holiness, without works of obedience to Christ, they are still saved. When Jesus says, not everyone who says unto me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he that does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Listen carefully.

20:42 Words convey realities that are saving or are damning. We are concerned to establish our works have nothing whatsoever to do with the ground of our justification. Nothing to do with God pardoning our sins and accepting and receiving us as righteous in his sight. Now I'm going to try to open this up under two heads.

Scriptural Proof: Works of the Law Cannot Justify

21:10 The scriptural proof of this proposition and then the pastoral application of it. The scriptural proof of this proposition are there clear, unmistakable, undebatable statements in the word of God that tell us that our works, your works, my works, have nothing whatsoever to do with the ground of our justification. Yes, there are more than even, I have time even to quote, let alone responsibly to expound in any detail. But I want us to look at several very crucial passages, which unless God writes these things to deceive us, they clearly teach it.

21:52 And you say, Pastor, I'm getting the point. You keep saying it over and over again. Yes, I do. And it's not because I'm getting old and senile.

22:00 It's because as we shall see, as surely as the human heart hates God and is not subject to the law of God, Romans 8, 7, it hates grace and is not subject to the gospel of God. The human heart has as much antipathy to a gospel that says for you to be accepted, with God, what you do has nothing whatsoever to do with it. The human heart is as opposed to that as it is when God says, you shall love me with all the heart, mind, soul, and strength. Love your neighbor as yourself.

22:33 Have no other gods before me. Worship me in the way of my appointment. Don't take my name in vain. Remember the Sabbath.

22:39 Honor father and mother. Shall not kill. Shall not commit adultery. The human heart opposes God in his law and in his gospel.

22:48 And I want my hands clean of your blood. I want the youngest child who can listen with any degree of attention and understanding to know and understand in the depths of his being if I ever get my sins forgiven, if I ever have God from the court of heaven say to me, I receive and accept you as righteous, it will have nothing to do from beginning with my works, but everything to do with Christ, and his work. And that's what I'm giving myself to with all of my might and strength and powers and the help of the Holy Spirit. Now let's look at several texts that make this abundantly clear. Romans chapter 3. By now I hope many of you could teach others what is the structure and why the structure is what it is in those opening chapters of Romans. Paul's longing to open up his gospel of imputed righteousness.

23:52 That gospel, that says Almighty God has a righteousness ready to confer it upon men. But he spends three chapters demonstrating how all men need that righteousness because all are sinners. And when he comes to his conclusion in chapter 3 and verse 19, here are the words he uses. Now we know.

24:16 Now we know. Now. After all that I've laid out, meticulously demonstrating, that Gentiles who've never seen the leafs of a Bible, who've never come in contact with a gospel preacher, they are nonetheless sinners. They are justly under condemnation.

24:36 They have rejected the truth that is revealed in the world without them and the world within them. They suppress it. They hold it down. They stand under the judgment of God.

24:47 Furthermore, people who know better, who have some sense of morality, who've come in contact with the gospel and especially with the gospel, especially the Jew, they also have rejected the light of God's word. They stand condemned. And after demonstrating that, arguing, as it were, in an interlocutory manner through these chapters, Paul now says, Now we know that what things soever the law says, it speaks to them that are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped and all the world may be brought under the judgment of God because, because by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified in his sight for through the law comes the knowledge of sin. What had Paul done? We'll go back to verse 9. What then?

25:42 Are we Jews better than the Gentiles? No, in no wise. For we have before, in all the previous part of the letter, we have before laid to the charge, both of Jews and of non-Jews, they are all under sin. And he demonstrated it by showing that the Gentile rejects what we would call the internal imprint of God's law upon his heart.

26:11 The Jew has rejected the external expression of that law in the written revelation of God and therefore both Jew and Gentile are all under sin. And then he draws together, passages from the Psalms and from Isaiah, showing that that condition of sinfulness breaks out in very concrete manifestations, verses 10 through 18. Then he says, now we know, whatever God is saying in his law, it's to the end that every mouth will stop, the whole world brought under the judgment of God, because by the works of the law, by deeds that men may seek, to perform in order to conform their activity to the norms of God, by the works of the law, no matter how they are done, by whom in any situation, by the works of the law, shall no flesh be justified. That is, no man, no woman, no boy, nor girl, in any place, at any time, in any set of circumstances, no matter how sincere, no matter how devout, no matter how self-denial, there is nothing they can perform that will bring them into the justified state. Nothing they do that can precipitate from God the pardon of all his or her sins,

27:38 the accepting and receiving of his person as righteous. Why? For through the law comes the knowledge of sin. God's precepts do not become a ladder by which we climb or construct a ladder and climb to heaven.

27:56 They are a searchlight. They are God's pincer move upon the soul to show us that we are desperate sinners, that we stand under the condemnation of God. And in our sinnerhood, there is nothing we can do to reverse the state that we are in. There's nothing we can do that will cause God to cancel the death of our sin.

28:21 Nothing we can do that will earn from God the acceptance of our sin. Nothing we can do that will earn from God the acceptance of our sin. For persons as righteous, the law was never given to be the instrument of salvation, but the instrument of exposing us for who and what we are. By the deeds of the law, by our doings, even if conformed externally to God's standards, no flesh shall be justified.

28:51 No flesh, whatever. So, when he begins in verse 21, to demonstrate how it is that sinners can be accepted with God, and we'll come back to this in the third proposition, but just notice the leading lines of emphasis. But now, apart from the law, a righteousness of God has been manifested being witnessed by the law and the prophets. The righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ unto all that believe.

29:23 There is no distinction. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus whom God set forth propitiation. You see how everything now focuses on Christ.

29:41 What He has done. Redemption. Propitiation. The way in which we lay hold of what He's done.

29:48 Not our works, but faith. And only faith. And so His conclusion, verse 28, we reckon, and therefore this is our settled judgment that a man is justified by faith apart from the works of the law. Remember, God's law demands personal, perfect, and perpetual obedience if we're ever to be justified by the law.

30:17 If there were a man who from his conception, if we could sever him from Adam and his involvement in Adam's sin, if we could separate him and from his conception, fully kept the law of God, every thought, every word, every motive, personally, perpetually, perfectly, then God would declare that man righteous. He has no sin that needs to be pardoned. His person is accepted on the grounds of his personal, perfect, perpetual obedience. But no such person exists.

30:49 The law exposes us as sinners. Our deeds can never be the ground of our acceptance. Then, Romans 4, 4 and 5. After underscoring in the first three verses of chapter 4, that this was true of Abraham, the father of the people of God.

31:08 Abraham, if he was justified by works, verse 2, he has something to glory in, but not toward God. But what does the scripture say? Abraham believed God. He went out of himself and into God's provision.

31:23 And this was reckoned unto him for righteousness, what was true of Abraham, he now states in general principles. Now, to him that works, the reward is not reckoned as of grace, but as of debt. But to him who does not work, but believes on him that justifies the ungodly, his faith is reckoned for righteousness. It is the person who comes.

31:47 In the language of the hymn, we say, Nothing in my hands I bring. Foul I to the fountain fly. Naked come to thee, if there is anything we present to God, if he then gave forgiveness based on that, it would be God having put himself in debt to our works. To him that works, what he gets is wages, is not grace, but it's debt.

32:15 But you see, justification is all of grace. There is no sense that God is placed in our debt by what we can do. No, that would negate the whole spirit of the doctrine of justification. To him who works not, but believes, God justifies the ungodly.

32:37 And then the very clear statement in Galatians chapter 2. Galatians chapter 2.

32:46 You remember what happened? There in the Galatian area, Judaizers had come, told these Gentile converts, Christ is all right, but he's not enough. You need, if you're going to be, a full-blown Christian, you need to become a kosher Jew. You need to be circumcised, keep the law of Moses, and all of its facets.

33:08 And Paul is deeply distressed when he gets words of this. Verse 6 of chapter 1, I marvel, you are quickly removing from him that called you in the grace of Christ unto a different gospel, which is not another gospel. And then he calls down the curse of God upon anyone who would add to the work of Christ any works of men, even works, that God had commanded in the old covenant. God had commanded circumcision.

33:35 God had commanded the kosher laws. God had commanded all of the things in the Mosaic framework. But Paul says, if you intrude that into the ground of a sinner's acceptance with God, the curse of God be upon you. You have perverted the one true gospel that tells us we are justified not by any, any works done by us.

34:04 And so he has to demonstrate afresh to these Galatians that he was a bona fide apostle, that his gospel ought not to be replaced by these Johnny-come-lately teachers. And so he begins to make it known in verse 11 of chapter 1 that he is indeed a true apostle called by Christ, commissioned by Christ. And then in verse 18 to 23 that when he went up to Jerusalem, he was not instructed in the gospel, he had already been instructed in the gospel, he didn't need to learn the gospel from those apostles that were there in the Jerusalem church. Chapter 2, verse 1, he goes on biographically, after the space of 14 years, I went up again to Jerusalem and what happened?

34:46 The three great pillars of the Jerusalem church, Peter, James, and John, they said, Paul, we're preaching the gospel you're preaching. We're called to preach it to the Jews, you're called to preach it to the Gentiles, we've got one gospel, one savior, one ground of justification, the perfect righteousness of Christ, the full satisfaction of Christ. We're one in our gospel. Paul says, however, when I came to Antioch, verse 11, I resisted Peter to his face.

35:20 Why? Because some people had come up from Jerusalem, these people who were saying, well, if you want to be full-blown Christians, you've got to become Jews, and less people, Peter, offend them. He had been sitting and eating with Gentiles, something a kosher Jew was not supposed to do. Peter drew back and refused to have table fellowship with Gentiles.

35:40 And when Paul became aware of this, and that even Barnabas was caught up in it, verse 14, when I saw that they walked not uprightly according to the truth of the gospel, Paul had the discernment to see that if what Peter did became normative, what Peter was saying, by his actions, not his words, Christ is not the sole ground of your justification. You need Christ plus circumcision. Christ plus becoming a Jew. And therefore, I'm going to have table fellowship only with full-blown Christians, that is, those who are Jewish Christians.

36:22 Those who have had circumcision. Those who keep the dietary laws. And Paul says, when I saw this, I said, that's a negation of the gospel. Not with his words, but with his actions.

36:34 I rebuked him to his face. To what end, he says? I did this so that the truth of the gospel might be maintained. What gospel?

36:43 Verse 16. Yet knowing a man is not justified by the works of the law, but through faith in Jesus Christ, even we believed on Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ, not by the works of the law, because by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.

37:11 How could God make it any clearer? Even works that God himself had demanded of his people at a certain period in redemptive history. And if you were a faithful believer in Israel, you were meticulous about the dietary laws. You were meticulous about the laws concerning feasts, and sacrifices.

37:33 But now all those things that were pointing to Christ have been fulfilled in Christ. And now to say that they are necessary either for showing fidelity to Christ. No, they are matters of liberty. That's clear in other portions of the New Testament.

37:53 But he says when you make these essential to salvation, you're dismantling the gospel. For what is the ground of our justification? Nothing to do, with our works. Verse 16.

38:05 Knowing a man is justified not by the works of the law, but by a faith that brings us into union with Christ and his full satisfaction and his perfect obedience, which alone formed the ground of our justification. Well, we could add many other passages. Philippians 3.3 We are the circumcision who worship God by the Spirit, who glory in Christ Jesus, put no confidence in the flesh.

38:39 And then Paul tells us what confidence in the flesh would be. All of the things he was and all the things he did as a loyal Jew. He said, I counted them all, but scubala, refuse, dung, awful, I counted it as that. Why?

38:55 That I might be found in Christ, not having a righteousness of my own, which is of the law, but the righteousness, which is of God by faith. There's the righteousness. It is a righteousness of God in Christ by faith without works of any kind whatsoever. The passages are many.

Three Reasons Why Works Cannot Be the Ground of Justification

39:21 Ephesians 2, 8 and 9, Titus 3, 4 to 7. But now I hope you're persuaded or confirmed. And then you ask the question, having demonstrated from the Scripture, that our works have nothing whatsoever to do with the ground of our justification. I hope you're asking, why must this be?

39:42 Why is the Scripture so insistent upon it? Well, let me give you three reasons. Number one, because none of our works partake of that perfection necessary to the attainment of being justified by our works. That's why they can't enter in, because none of our works partake of that perfection that perfection, necessary for the attainment of being justified by works.

40:08 Romans 2, 13 says, the doers of the law shall be justified. And that's true. If there were anyone who did the law, he would be justified by the law. But there is none.

40:22 We have proved, Paul said, that both Jew and Gentile are under sin. Now we know that what things whoever the law says, it says to the intent that every mouth be stopped and the whole world become guilty before God. And that's why our works cannot enter into the ground of our justification. The law demands personal, perfect, perpetual obedience.

40:49 Think of just the first commandment. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy mind, with all thy strength, and with all thy soul, all thy heart, mind, soul, and strength. Every moment of every day, every situation, undivided, unrivaled, unchallenged, white-hot, passionate love for God expressed in every faculty of our humanity. Who among us is stupid enough to say we did that for one minute of one day?

41:22 So works cannot enter. To bring in our works before God is simply to say, God, damn me, condemn me, send me to hell for the prophet Isaiah said, all our righteousnesses, the best things we do in the best way are as menstruous cloths. The significance of the Hebrew word beginning to end in your professed possession of justifying righteousness. No, James says, if we offend in one point, we are guilty of all. That's why works cannot enter as the ground because none of our works partake of the perfection necessary to the attainment of God. The attainment of being justified by our works.

42:24 Secondly, because none of our works, even if sinlessly performed, could satisfy the demands of the broken law. We've broken the law. And could we? Imagine with me this illustration.

42:40 Here's a man in a kingdom that had real kings with righteous, reasonable laws. There's a man in that kingdom who hates the king and therefore hates his laws. And he violates and breaks them with impunity. He even violates a law, the penalty of which is capital punishment.

42:58 He's ultimately apprehended. He's placed in jail. And while he's in jail, he has a change of heart. He sees the king is a righteous king.

43:08 He now loves him. He sees all his laws and rules for the way the kingdom subjects are to treat one another are fair and good and righteous. He begins to be kind to his fellow prisoners. When opportunities arise to make things in the prison that can be given to the indigent outside of the prison, he's a model of benevolence and kindness.

43:30 And he shows this pattern for months. Now the question is this. Can his change in relationship to the king and his laws cancel his debt to the violated law? He's committed crimes worthy of death.

43:48 And nothing that he does of acts that are virtuous, has any power to cancel the debt he owes to that law. And if the king is to show that he is a righteous and a just king, committed to the upholding of righteous law, he must say, I am glad for all the changes in your life, sir. But you have done crimes worthy of capital punishment and die you must. You see, if something could occur in us that gave us the capacity here in this life, to obey the word of God at any given point, personally, perfectly, perpetually, there would be nothing in that obedience that can cancel the sentence. The wages of sin is death. The soul that sinneth, it shall die. First is every one that continues not in all things that are written in the book of the law to do them.

44:48 Do you see the folly? Children, do you see the folly of thinking? Because you obey mommy and dad with some degree of delight and joy and consistency, somehow these are things you can present to God and say, I must not be so bad as deserved to go to hell. All you need is one day when for ten seconds you feel inside resentment to mom and dad.

45:14 It's like you've broken all ten commandments. He that offends in one point is guilty of all. And the sentence of heaven comes out to you, child. The wages of sin is death.

45:25 The soul that sinneth, it shall die. Cursed be every one who continues not in all things written in the book of the law to do them. The curse of God is over you, child. And if you could perfectly obey every commandment from now until you live to be ninety, there is nothing in that obedience that can cancel the broken law and its demands for your death.

Reason 3: Works Undermine God's Redemptive Goal of Glorifying His Grace

45:49 And then thirdly, the reason why works can form no purpose and no part of the ground of our justification is because righteousness based in any way, to any degree, upon any of our works would undermine and shatter the whole goal of God's redemptive activity. What's the goal God has in ever moving in grace toward sinners, planning a marvelous scheme of redemption, sending His Son into the world, letting His Son live amongst us, suffer reproach and ultimately death, pouring out His wrath upon His Son upon the cross until He cried, My God, My God, why have you forsaken me? Raising Him from the dead, taking Him to His right hand, sending the Holy Spirit, sending forth the apostles, giving us a Bible, ultimately coming in glory and power, the Lord Jesus at His second coming, burning up this world in its works, ushering in a new heavens and new earth, filled with an innumerable company whom no man can number out of every kindred, tribe and tongue and nation. What's God got in view in all of this? The Bible tells us.

47:14 Ephesians 1.6 tells us in no uncertain terms, listen to it, speaks of God choosing us in Christ, foreordaining us unto adoption, here's the end, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. To the praise of the glory of His grace, chapter 2 and verse 7, Paul has described what God has done in quickening us from spiritual death, uniting us to Christ, raising us up with Christ, seeding us with Christ. Why?

47:54 Verse 7, Ephesians 2.7, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. Remember what grace is, the source of justification, free grace, God's favor to the ill-deserving who in no way to any degree have done or ever anything to move Him, to forgive them, to receive and to accept them. That's why works can't enter.

48:30 These three fundamental reasons revealed in the Scriptures. Our works do not partake of the perfection necessary to make them acceptable. Our works can never negate the sentence of the broken law which is death. And if our works entered one ten-thousandth of a degree, then the song of heaven would have to find a little parenthesis somewhere unto Him that loved us, parenthesis, and what we did to help ourselves to get here.

49:07 There are no parentheses in the song that is addressed to God and to the Lamb. There are no asterisks with a footnote. It is all of grace. All of redemptive kindness.

The Importance of This Truth and Pastoral Exhortation

49:23 And therefore God says, not by works which we have done. Now I had hoped to give pastoral application to this, but it's too important to gloss over so I'm going to stop right here. I've given you the biblical data. This has been concentrated teaching.

49:46 I know. But dear people, as I said earlier, our spiritual forefathers spilled their blood to maintain this truth. And this truth is one man of God said, and I will read this quote in closing. This is from a book entitled The Reign of Grace by Abraham Booth, a man born exactly 200 years before I was born.

50:14 That's how I can remember his birthday. He was born in 1734. And in his opening paragraph as he begins to treat of the reign of grace, not R-A-I-N but R-E-G-I-N, the doctrine of justification makes a distinguished figure in that religion which is from heaven and is a capital article of the faith once for all delivered to the saints. Far from being a mere speculative point, it spreads its influence through the whole body of revealed truth.

50:51 It runs through all Christian experience and operates in every part of practical godliness. Such is its grand importance that a mistake about justification has a malignant effect and is attended with a long train of dangerous consequences. Nor can this appear strange when it is considered that this doctrine of justification is no other than the way of a sinner's acceptance with God. Being of such important moment, it is inseparably connected with many other saving truths, the harmony and beauty of which we cannot behold while this truth is misunderstood. Till this truth appears in its glory, others will be involved in darkness. It is, if anything may be so called, a fundamental article of the Christian faith and requires our most serious consideration. How shall sinful man be just with God is a question of the most interesting and vital nature to every child of Adam.

52:14 On what grounds can this God who is the author of justification, who justifies recipients who are sinners, who does it out of the fullness of His grace, who, when He justifies, pardons all of their sins, accepts and receives their persons as righteous, on what grounds does He do this? The first negative, not for anything done by them. If you sit here this morning and have never known what it is to be brought by the Word and the Spirit to the place where you utterly despair of thinking anything that you have done up to this moment or anything you can ever do can contribute in the slightest way to make God or elicit God or to seduce God into forgiving your sins and receiving you as righteous, forget it! Your works now and in your holiest moments do not add one thread to the fabric of the robe of righteousness in which you are clothed if you've gone out of yourself and into Jesus Christ alone for salvation. My two favorite approach God hymns in my devotions, that is,

53:41 the hymns I sing most frequently on the front end of getting alone with God, to commune with God. Do you know what they are? One is in our hymn book, hymn number 411, No, not despairingly come I to thee, No, not distrustingly bend I the knee, Sin has gone over me. Lord, this day, yesterday, sin has gone over me.

54:09 Being a sinner is not something of the past, it's what I am in the present. Sin has gone over me, yet, is this still my plea? I've preached for 45 years, Lord, no! Still is this my plea, Jesus.

54:30 Jesus is what he's done, Lord. No other plea. No other plea. I come foul and stinking with my sins.

54:42 And I'm not going to be stupid enough to think I can rub the stains away by telling God what I've been or done that seems in the eyes of others to be a good work and may even be called by God a good work. It doesn't enter the ground of my justification. And my second hymn is not in the Trinity hymn book. Beautiful hymn by Horatius Boner.

55:05 I hear the words of love. I gaze upon the blood. I see the mighty sacrifice. And I have peace with God.

55:15 Tis everlasting peace, sure as Jehovah's name. Tis stable as his steadfast throne, forevermore the same. The clouds may come and go and storms may sweep my sky. This blood-sealed friendship changes not.

55:35 The cross is ever nigh. My love is oft times low. My joy still ebbs and flows, but peace with him remains the same. No change Jehovah knows.

55:49 I change, he changes not. The Christ can never die. His love, his blood, his righteousness, not mine. The resting place, his truth, not mine.

56:03 The tithe, oh sinner, you'll never know the blessedness of the full pardon of all your sins. And acceptance of your person as righteous till you go out of yourself entirely. Come buck naked spiritually. And God will wrap you in the beautiful robe of the righteousness of his beloved Son.

56:26 And child of God, where you begin, you continue and you end. And that's where I want to give some pastoral application next week. Some of you have yet to weave into the texture of how you manage your life of ongoing struggle with sin. You haven't yet woven this doctrine thoroughly into the fabric of how you live.

56:48 And that's why you're unstable. And you're going to continue to be unstable until you learn how to live in a vibrant confidence in this blessed reality. My works have nothing whatsoever to do with the ground of my justification. Let's pray.

Prayer for Forgiveness and Understanding

57:10 Our Father, what can we say when, in some little measure, we're privileged to gaze upon these astounding gospel realities? We pray you would forgive us those who have sought by their church membership and their baptism and by their good deeds to somehow think that they could earn brownie points that would eventually accumulate enough to give them the title of righteous, to cancel their sins. Lord, blast and wither every last vestige of that wretched lie and bring them naked, helpless, stripped, casting themselves upon Christ alone. Help us as your people. We confess, Lord, this is so contrary to what we are by nature. We confess as much as we hate your law by nature, we hate your grace.

58:13 We always want to add what we've done. We always want to add something of our own virtue. Forgive us for our folly. Teach us to live in the faith of this grand and glorious provision of a justifying righteousness.

58:31 Counting all that we are and do in ourselves as nothing but scubala that we may be found in Christ having a righteousness not our own, but that which is from you by faith. So seal your word to our hearts, we pray, in Jesus' name. Amen.