Daily Devotional Readings
There are some who teach that Christ was the sinner's Substitute only in his sacrificial work upon the cross. We are told that the righteous life of our Lord Jesus Christ has nothing to do with our redemption and salvation, that his righteousness as a man had no merit and efficacy for his people, but that it only made him a suitable sacrifice for sin. This doctrine is contrary to the plain statements of Holy Scripture. Paul tells us that "As by the offence of one judgement came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous (Rom. 5:18-19).
The righteous life of our Lord Jesus Christ was as necessary for our redemption and salvation as his death. In order for God's elect to be saved, accepted with God, our sin had to be put away and we had to be made perfectly righteous. In his life of obedience as a man, Christ perfectly obeyed the law of God as our Representative and Substitute. The law of God requires not only that we be without sin, but also that we be completely obedient to holiness, that we love God with all our hearts, souls, minds and beings, and our neighbours as ourselves. This righteousness Christ has performed for us as our Substitute. In him we obeyed the law of God perfectly. Christ is the end of the law for righteousness.' When God imputed the righteousness of Christ to us, he was 'made unto us righteousness'; and we have been made the righteousness of God in him'.
This righteousness which Christ performed is the only righteousness God will accept. It is the only righteousness there is, and we must have it. This is that 'holiness without which no man shall see the lord'. We delight to renounce all personal righteousness and call him 'the Lord our Righteousness'. Having established righteousness for us, Christ was 'obedient unto death, even the death of the cross', as our Substitute; and by his death he put away our sins.
'If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus; and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.' This is the one thing that is essential: you must believe in thine heart'. I urge you to 'examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith'. I would do nothing to rob any true believer of the joy of confident assurance. But I must warn all men to guard against religious presumption. It is Satan's cheap counterfeit.
False faith can be very deceptive. False faith produces good works. It excites the emotions. It reforms the outward life. It performs deeds of religion. It causes sorrow for sin. It speaks well of Christ. It does works of charity. It trembles under the preaching of the gospel. False faith gains high offices in the church. It secures peace of mind. It walks in the company of great preachers. False faith even holds out to the Day of Judgement (Matt. 7;22-23). My friend, beware of false faith! Remember Lot's wife, Judas, Simon, Demas and Diotrephes. Be not numbered among them.
True faith is the heart knowledge of, trust in and submission to the Lord Jesus Christ. God has revealed Christ to us in the gospel, by which we know our desperate need and his saving power and fairness. Trusting Christ alone as our all-sufficient Saviour, we commit ourselves, body and soul, to him. And where there is true faith, there is the submission of heart to Christ as our sovereign Lord and King. This faith comes not by heredity, nor by the logic and persuasiveness of the preacher. It is the gift of God. Christ is revealed in the heart by the Holy Spirit.
This heart faith can be known by those who possess it. Have we believed? If so, we have firmly cordially and voluntarily received Christ in all his offices. To them that believe, Christ is precious. Heart faith purifies the heart and weans it from the world. Heart faith works by love, lives in hope and rests in Christ. This is true faith. This is heart faith. F=orsaking A=ll I T=ake H=im.
This one thing characterizes every true and faithful preacher of the gospel: in declaring the good tidings of gospel truth and saving grace, he will declare unto men, 'Thy God reigneth!' Sooner or later, either in mercy or in wrath, God will make all men see and confess that "The most High ruleth!" (Dan. 4:17, 25, 32.) Any preacher who denies God's absolute, total, universal sovereignty is a false prophet. And any proud sinner who rebels against the gospel revelation of God's sovereign character does not know God. Every sinner who is taught of God will gladly confess with Nebuchadnezzar (Dan. 4:34-35).
1.The Lord Jehovah is the eternal, self-existent God: "I blessed the most High, and I praised and honoured him that liveth for ever." God alone is eternal. He is before all things and by him all things exist. God alone is independent. All things are dependent upon and affected by God; but he is not dependent upon or affected by anything.
2. The Lord our God is a God with everlasting dominion: "Whose dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom is from generation to generation." The God we worship and trust is the sovereign, reigning Monarch of the universe. He sits upon an indisputable, incontestable throne and rules over all things by sovereign right. He is God.
3. Man is nothing: "All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing." We are nothing in ourselves, only what God allows us to be. And we are nothing in comparison with God. All men together are only loathsome worms, withering grass and less than nothing.
4. God's infinite power is at work, sovereignty accomplishing his will:' He doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth.' With unexplainable, sovereign, infinite power and wisdom, God so governs all things and all beings that all either willingly or unwillingly accomplish his eternal purpose.
5. The will of God is irresistible and unimpeachable: 'None can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?' God has his way in all things.
Every believer's great desire is to see the glory of God. Almost every time we pray, whether in the public assembly of God's church or in private, we repeat the prayer of Moses: 'I beseech thee, show me thy glory' (Exod. 33:18). We do not always use his words, but the prayer is the same: 'Lord, show us your glory.' Is this your desire? It is mine. Why is it then that we seem to see the glory of God so little? Our Lord tells us very plainly, Jesus said, 'Said I not unto thee, that if thou wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of God?' This was a gentle, but firm reproof. If Martha had simply believed she would have seen the glory of God in her brother's sickness and death, as well as in his resurrection. What a reproof this is to us today! If we did but believe in God, as he ought to be believed, if we implicitly trusted him in all things, as we say we do, we should see his glory in all things.
Faith sees the glory of God in the gospel (Rom. 3:23-26). Believing God we see the glory of his wisdom and truth, justice and mercy, righteousness and grace in saving sinners by the doing and dying of the Lord Jesus, the sinner's Substitute.
Faith sees the glory of God in providence (Rom. 8:28; 1 1:36). Confident trust and assurance of God's sovereign rule over all things causes the believer to see God's glory in all things. We see his glory either in the immediate event or the prospective outcome. But in all, faith sees the glory of God's wisdom, power and grace in providence. In all that he does, (creation, redemption, providence and salvation), God's glory is seen by those who believe. And faith will see the glory of God in the resurrection.
Yet the primary force of our Lord's reproof is this: if we did but believe we should see the glory of God working in our midst (Mark 6:5-6). 'Unbelief is so vile and venomous an evil that it transfuseth a kind of dead palsy into the hands of omnipotency' John Trapp). Christ can do all things by his absolute power. But he can do nothing for unbelievers. He cannot, because he will not. May God give us faith to believe, so that we may see the glory of God working in our midst!
The law of God is holy, just and good. We love the law and honour the law, as the revelation of God's righteousness and justice. But we recognize the fact that fallen men can never fulfil the requirements of God's holy law by their own works. 'Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight' (Rom. 3:20). Yet we know also that until the law is perfectly fulfilled, no sinner can be saved. 'The soul that sinneth, it shall die' (Ezek. 18:20). God will not lessen his requirements, or bend his law, even to save his own elect. The law must be fulfilled. Both its requirements of righteousness and justice must be satisfied. The only way fallen, sinful men can ever fulfil the law and be saved is by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, the sinner's Substitute.
We fulfil the law's purpose by faith. The law of God was our schoolmaster. Its one and only purpose was to bring us to the Lord Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by faith in him. Once we come to Christ, once we trust the Son of God, as our Lord and Saviour, the law has nothing more to do with us. Its purpose has been served (Gal. 3:24-26).
By faith in the Lord Jesus Christ we fulfil the law's requirement of perfect righteousness. We have no righteousness of our own. But we trust the Lord Jesus who lived in righteousness as our Representative. And trusting him, the righteousness of Christ is imputed to us (Rom. 3:22; 5:19).
And we fulfil the law's demand that justice be satisfied by faith in Christ. Sin must be punished. The sentence of the law must be fully executed upon every transgressor. And it is done. Divine justice was fully satisfied for every believer by Christ, the sinner's Substitute (Rom. 8:1-4). Since Christ died, God is both just and the justifier of all who believe (Rom. 3:24-26). Faith in Christ does not ignore the law, defile the law, lessen the law, or make the law void. Indeed, by faith 'we establish the law' (Rom. 3:31).
This is the testimony of God himself concerning his servant job: 'There is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil.' I cannot question these facts. Job was God's servant. He feared God and hated evil. He was a perfect and upright man. These things do not describe Job's actions, but the reigning characteristics of his heart, 'for the Lord looketh on the heart'.
I know that Job was a perfect man, because God says he was. But I also know that he was not a sinless man in the flesh, because he confessed, 'I have sinned' Job 7:20). He said, 'If I justify myself, mine own mouth shall condemn me: if I say, I am perfect, it shall also prove me perverse' Job 9:20). The doctrine of sinless perfection in the flesh (and those who claim to be without sin claim perfection) is contrary to everything revealed in the Word of God. Those who boast of possessing such perfection expose both their ignorance and their corruption. Those who suppose they are equal to the demands of the law of God are ignorant of the law. And those who claim to be perfect, without sin, are vile, wicked, perverse men. They are liars, claiming what they know is false to be the truth and declaring that God himself is a liar (I John 1:8-10). What can be more wicked?
What does the Bible mean when it uses the word 'perfect' to describe those who believe God? The word is used in four ways. Usually, as in Job 1:8, it means 'sincere,'. God's people are not deceitful, hypocritical or pretentious. Sometimes perfect means 'mature' (James 3:2). That person who has learned to bridle his tongue by the grace of God is a mature believer. He is not a babe in Christ, but a man. Frequently, the word 'perfect' refers to the believer's positional holiness, sinlessness, and blamelessness before the law of God by the atonement of Christ and the imputation of his righteousness (Ezek. 16:14). And the word 'perfect' describes the ultimate glorification of all believers in Christ, when we shall be made entirely conformed to the image of Christ in heaven body, soul and spirit (Phil. 3:12).
With those four words Paul states the whole doctrine of redemption as it is revealed in the New Testament. Christ alone is our Redeemer. Christ bore our sins. Christ endured the wrath of God, Christ satisfied the claims of justice against us, as our Substitute. The work of redemption was fully accomplished. 'Christ hath redeemed us. 'Nothing is left to be done by us. Christ has done all. The blood of Christ poured out in death for the atonement of sin accomplished an effectual redemption. 'Christ hath redeemed us.' Our Lord did not provide for redemption or make redemption a possibility for all men, leaving it into the hands of man's free will to comply with his work and make it effectual. Redemption was performed by Christ alone. Redemption was accomplished at Calvary. And that redemption accomplished at Calvary was an effectual atonement for sin.
The apostle Paul also makes it plain that the benefits of Christ's atonement are designed for and limited to God's elect. 'Christ hath redeemed us.' God plainly says, regarding the death of his Son, 'For the transgression of my people was he stricken' (Isa. 53:8). The Bible nowhere states, nor does it anywhere imply, that the Lord, Jesus Christ shed his blood and died to redeem all men from the cruse of the law. I do not believe that doctrine which says that Judas was redeemed by Christ. It is not possible that our Lord died as a Substitute in Judas' place, hearing the curse of the law for him. Any who embrace such a doctrine must also embrace one of three absurd and blasphemous conclusions: (1) Either Judas is in heaven, which is to deny the Word of God; or (2) Christ failed to redeem the ones for whom he died and failed in his work of redemption as the sinner's Substitute; or (3) the justice of God his fallen to the ground, for if God punishes both the sinner and the sinner's Substitute for the same offence he would mock his own justice. This is the doctrine of Scripture: 'Christ hath redeemed us!'- all God's elect, all who believe.
Self-righteousness is like the mole: drive it out of one hole, and it will quickly find another in which to make its den. We have fairly well beaten it out of the den of good works as a ground of hope before God. But it has found another hiding place. The dark den where self-righteousness hides with little possibility of detection is called by many names: 'fitness for faith', 'conditions of conversion', 'suitability for salvation', and 'qualifications for grace'. No matter what name you hang over the hole, it is a den of iniquity. It teaches sinners that in order to have true faith in Christ there are certain conditions that must be met. The doctrine goes like this: 'Salvation is by grace alone. It is not what you do, but what Christ has done that saves you. But before you can truly trust Christ and be saved, you must be terrified with conviction, you must weep and mourn over your sin, you must desire holiness, you must repent, you must long for Christ, you must come to see yourself as a lost sinner and then earnestly seek the Lord.'
This doctrine may sound good on the surface, but it is only a roundabout way of preaching salvation by works. There are no prerequisites, no conditions, no qualifications to be met by sinners before they trust Christ. The gospel of Christ is addressed to sinners as sinners, not awakened sinners, not sensible sinners, not convicted sinners, not lost sinners, not repentant sinners - just sinners! God does not command sinners to feel a certain way, experience something or come to realize something about themselves. God commands sinners to 'believe on his Son, Jesus Christ'. The moment a preacher places any condition or qualification of any kind upon the sinner before he can trust Christ and be saved, he ceases to preach a gospel of pure grace. Repentance, conviction of sin, lamentation and sorrow over sin are not prerequisites for coming to Christ and trusting him. These things do not precede faith. They are the results of faith (Zech. 12: 10; John 16:7-14).
We do not need to form a committee to investigate the responsibility of the church in the '80s'. Our Lord has told us exactly what we are to do. He said, 'Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned' (Mark 16:15-16). The Word of God tells us exactly what we are to do and exactly how we are to do it. Nothing is left to guesswork. Neither our work nor the method by which we are to perform it is to be determined by time, place, circumstances or human opinion.
The singular purpose for our existence in this world is the salvation qf God's elect for the glory of his great name. We are on the trail of Christ's sheep. We have no other object or goal. As our Lord Jesus Christ was sent to redeem God's elect, he has sent his church to gather those redeemed ones to their Saviour John 20:21). We must never be turned aside from this great work.
The singular method of biblical evangelism is gospel preaching. When our Lord told us to go into all the world, he did not tell us to entertain the world, to change the world, to provide counselling for the world, to educate the world or to get control of political offices so that we could rule the world. Our Lord said, 'Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel.' The only method of evangelism that God will own and honour for the salvation of sinners is that which he has ordained: gospel preaching! Other things may charm sinners and console sinners, but only gospel preaching will convert sinners.
And the singular message of the gospel is Jesus Christ and him crucified (I Cor. 1: 30-2:5). Rowland Hill was correct when he said, 'Any message which does not contain the three 'R's' [Ruin by the Fall, Redemption by the blood, and Regeneration by the Holy Spirit] ought never to have been preached.' It is our business to preach the gospel with simplicity and clarity, declaring to men how that God saves sinners through the merits of his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
If I understand the Word of God correctly, Antichrist is not a single man who will suddenly appear upon the earth in the last day. Antichrist is a system of religion which is opposed to the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace in Christ. It had already begun in John's day (I John 2:18). Our Lord told us that the false religion of Antichrist would be such a cunning, crafty deception that were it possible it would deceive the very elect people of God (Matt. 24:24). And the apostle Paul informed us that, as the end draws near, God will take away his restraining hand, allowing the religion of Antichrist to spread throughout the world with signs and lying wonders, 'because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this cause God shall send them a strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness' (2 Thess. 2:3-12). Without the least hesitancy or fear of error, I warn you that the religion of modern fundamentalism, free-willism, easy-believism and decisionism is the religion of Antichrist.
It is not my desire to stir up strife and division among men. But it is my desire and responsibility to tell you the truth and to warn you of the deceptive delusion of Antichrist religion. Love for the honour of God, love for the truth of God and love for your souls constrains me to speak plainly. Any doctrine that lowers the character of God, his total sovereignty, his absolute righteousness or his strict justice, is Antichrist. Any doctrine that exalts and honours human flesh is Antichrist. Any doctrine that diminishes or adds to the finished work of our Lord Jesus Christ, his righteousness, his satisfaction, his intercession or his efficacy, is Antichrist. And any doctrine that attributes salvation in any measure to the will of man or the works of man is Antichrist.
It is necessary, because God says it is necessary, for sinners to hear the Word of God in order to be saved. In these days, since the completion of the inspired volume of Holy Scripture, God never saves men apart from the hearing of the Word (I Cor. 1:21; James 1: 18; Rom. 10: 17). If any dare argue with God, so that he may defend his system of theology, he is a brazenly foolish rebel against God. Those who defy God, I know, will not hear me, but you can be sure of this: where there is no gospel preaching there is no faith in Christ, and where there is no faith in Christ, there is no life in Christ. In his own sovereign purpose and grace God has so highly exalted his Word that he will not save his own elect without the preaching of the gospel. Yes, God's elect will be saved, but not apart from the hearing of the Word. If need be, God will have a faithful preacher stoned to death and raise terrible persecution to scatter his people, so that those whom he has ordained to eternal life may hear the Word of life (Acts 11: 19-21); but God will not save sinners apart from the ministry of the Word.
God's exaltation of his Word inspires his people in evangelism. We know that without the preaching of the gospel men will perish. We know also that God has a people in this world whom he will save. Therefore we go out into all the world, by whatever means God makes available to us, and preach the gospel to all men. We know that our labour will not be spent in vain (Isa. 55:11). This high value which God places upon his Word, and which we also place upon it, gives us a sense of reverence for the ministry of the Word. To other men, even the most religious, the ministry of the Word is a convenience. If they hear the gospel, that's good; but if they miss hearing the Word of God preached, they think they suffer no great loss. God's people know the Word is vital. It is their soul's food. They cannot live without it. They want to hear God speak, and they know that God speaks through his servants as they preach the Word.
Without question, the Word of God plainly teaches us that the source and cause of salvation is the sovereign will and pleasure of God (Rom. 9:16). The will of man is in no way the cause of salvation. Man's will has nothing more to do with the accomplishment of salvation than his works. 'Salvation is of the Lord', entirely of the Lord. Yes, man must believe. Man's will must be incurred towards Christ. The sinner must willingly repent, believe and bow to the Lord Jesus Christ. These things are acts of the human will. They are all necessary for salvation. No man will ever be saved whose will is in rebellion to God. God will have a willing people to worship him. However, man's will is not the cause of God's saving grace. The cause of grace is the will of God alone and it is the grace of God that causes his people to be willing in the day of his power (Ps. 65:4; 110: 3).'Whosoever will', let him come to Christ and be saved, and let him know assuredly that grace has made him willing to come. Otherwise he would never have the will to come.
I contend that every saved sinner gladly acknowledges the fact that the cause of, and reason for his salvation is not his will, but God's will. Paul's experience of grace was a pattern, showing forth the experience of believers (I Tim. 1:16) and it is certain that Paul's will was not the cause of his salvation. Read Acts 9, and you will see that Paul's will did not even co-operate with God's will in saving him. Paul's will was the destruction of all who worshipped Christ and the utter annihilation of the name of the Lord Jesus Christ from the earth. Grace absolutely arrested Paul. By irresistible power and grace, God made Paul fall to the ground and revealed his Son in him. Not until God had put him down in the dust on the Damascus road was Paul willing to hear his voice and trust his Son. Any man who experiences the grace that Paul experienced will gladly acknowledge what Paul acknowledged: 'When it pleased God ... he revealed his Son in me.'
We rejoice to know that God saves sinners. We rejoice to know that God saves sinners by grace through the merits of a Substitute. And we rejoice to know that God's grace is both eternal and immutable. But why does God save sinful men? He had no mercy upon the angels that fell. Why is he gracious to us? Paul gives us the answer repeatedly: 'Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ... to the praise of the glory of his grace... that we should be to the praise of his glory... unto the praise of his glory.'
1. God saves us because it was his eternal pleasure to bless us with his grace. God passed by the angels that fell; but he hath blessed us'. God passed by multitudes of fallen men; but he 'hath blessed us'. The cause of God's blessing upon us is not in us, but in himself alone. Every saved sinner knows and acknowledges that fact. We do not deserve God's favour. 'He hath mercy on whom he will have mercy.'
2. God saved us so that we might bless him. Paul is calling us to bless God who hath blessed us. We can add nothing to God's glory, happiness or majesty. God is totally independent and self-sufficient. But we can bless God, that is to say, we can speak well of him 'who hath blessed us'. We bless God by simply trusting him. We bless God by celebrating his many glorious attributes. We bless God by faith in his Son. And we bless God by entertaining great thoughts of him.
3. God saved us to the praise of the glory of his grace. The ultimate end of all things is the glory of God. He could as well be glorified in our damnation as in our salvation. Like Pharaoh, we could have been monuments to the glory of God's justice by our ruin. But, blessed be his name, God has chosen to save us, that we might be 'to the praise of the glory of his grace!' (See Ps. 106:8.) May God give us grace even now to praise and magnify his grace.
In this marvellous doxology Paul gives praise to the three persons of the eternal Trinity, (Father, Son and Holy Spirit), for the infinitely wise and gracious salvation of all the elect. In his adoration and praise to God, Paul proclaims to all men the method of God's saving grace. He tells us how it is that God saves sinners.
1. God saves sinners by his own sovereign and eternal purpose of grace (3-6). Here are five things God did for all his elect in Christ before the world was created. He blessed us with all spiritual blessings in him. In Christ all of God's elect have every spiritual blessing which holiness can require, which grace can give and which sinful men can need. He chose us in eternal election. God's ultimate end in our election is that we (the objects of his love) should be perfectly holy and blameless in his sight. He predestinated us to be his own dear children. He adopted us into his family. Having adopted us, God sovereignly predestinated all things for us, securing Our eternal enjoyment of his grace. He accepted us in the Beloved. Before the world was made, before we became sinners, God accepted us in Christ.
2. God saves sinners by a legal and effectual blood atonement (6-12). All of those who were chosen by God in eternity were in time redeemed by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. In great wisdom, prudence and grace, God found a way to be both just and the justifier of his elect. He made Christ our Substitute. Charging Christ with our sin, and punishing him for sin, God fully redeemed and forgave all his elect when Christ died in our place.
3. God saves sinners by the irresistible power and grace of the Holy Spirit (13-14). In the fulness of time every sinner chosen by God and redeemed by Christ is called by the Spirit through the gospel. All who are called believe. All who believe are sealed by the Spirit. And all who are sealed will enter into eternal glory.
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