American Gospel #2 (8)
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Introduction
Introduction
Announcements
Prayer Requests
“It Is Finished”
What does this statement mean? More bluntly, what is “it”?
CityAlight, modern hymn writers from Australia who are in the same circle as the Getty’s and those folks have a song entitled “It Was Finished Upon the Cross” that captures this so clearly and this is one of the verses
Now the curse it has been broken
Jesus paid the price for me
Full, the pardon He has offered
Great, the welcome that I receive
Boldly I approach my Father
Clothed in Jesus' righteousness
There is no more guilt to carry
It was finished upon that cross
What is “it?” The price owed for our salvation. The penalty of our sin in the eyes of a holy God. The curse has been broken. The price has been paid. The pardon has been offered. Therefore, we can now approach our Father. There is no more guilt. There is no more shame. It was finished on the cross.
Why do some have a hard time with the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross?
Hard to understand
Why did Jesus have to die if He was innocent? Seems unjust to some.
How can one person’s death pay for someone else’s sin?
Death seems so cruel - especially crucifixion
Tonight we’re going to look at the cross of Jesus Christ as Jesus, before dying, cried out, “Why Have You Forsaken Me?” This is heavy stuff, but immensely important to understand our salvation
Lesson Video (Chapter 8)
28 Be on guard for yourselves and for all the flock of which the Holy Spirit has appointed you as overseers, to shepherd the church of God, which he purchased with his own blood.
This is a verse that I’ve reflected on often in recent years as Paul exhorts pastors/elders/overseers to shepherd the church that God has entrusted to them with wisdom and to watch out for not only themselves but for the whole flock! The reason why we are able to do this and why we gather in the first place is because of what Jesus has done for us. He purchased our pardon with His own blood. We see this language throughout Scripture and we talk about it tonight in this lesson. The death of Jesus matters!
Why do some people believe that either they have never sinned (non-Christians), or no longer do sin as Christians?
Misunderstanding of our fallen condition
Misunderstanding of the Spirit’s work in our life
This is a popular train of thinking in Methodist and Nazarene churches. It goes back to a man named Pelagius if you remember from our Church History series in the spring as Pelagius taught that we are born innocent until proven guilty to put it into modern language. This teaching of perfectionism is still widespread and was the belief of wellknown Christians such as John Wesley and Charles Finney - the originator of “revivalism.” This is a heavily concerning development and one that we have to guard against. We talked about this last week, but just because something is popular or traditional it doesn’t make it right and it certainly doesn’t make it Scriptural. Let’s look at what the Bible teaches about the idea of perfectionism. In Philippians 3, Paul is talking about how he was a pharisee of pharisees and blameless before the law, but how he considers all of those things as a loss now in view of the value of knowing Jesus. Look at what he says in verse 12
12 Not that I have already reached the goal or am already perfect, but I make every effort to take hold of it because I also have been taken hold of by Christ Jesus.
Paul is saying that he is not perfect. He has not reached the goal. This is the man who wrote nearly half the books of the New Testament. The one who God used mightily to share the Gospel and plant churches. The one who had an extraordinary testimony on the Damascus Road shares that he is what? Not Perfect! Even 30 years after his conversion, Paul says that he is still growing. He is still a work in progress. This man who also called himself the chief of sinners
15 This saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance: “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners”—and I am the worst of them.
If we’re supposed to be perfect after our salvation, Paul clearly missed the memo. The teaching that some people make is that once you repent and are saved by grace through faith in Christ, is that you immediately become perfect. This isn’t progressively dying to self, taking up your cross, and following Jesus… this is the blink of an eye and you no longer sin. But this directly contradicts Scripture!
8 If we say, “We have no sin,” we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
This is a big deal. We have to understand that we’re still a work in progress. This is how John Newton phrased it years ago, “I am not what I ought to be, I am not what I want to be, I am not what I hope to be in another world; but still I am not what I once used to be, and by the grace of God I am what I am.” This is grace and this is sanctification. Progressively growing to be more and more like Jesus. It’s not easy and we’re not going to be perfect, but we should look back and see growth.
How do we know that we are not and will not be perfect on this side of heaven?
See Romans 5, we have a fallen and sinful nature
12 Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, in this way death spread to all people, because all sinned.
The person who says that they have not sinned doesn’t understand what sin is. The so-called Christian who says that they do not sin doesn’t understand how pervasive sin is. It infects all of us. We’re all guilty! This is why Jesus had to come and this is what our lesson hit on over and over starting with 2 Corinthians 5:21
21 He made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
If we’re guilty of sin before God, what do we need God to do? 2 things
Forgive us of our sins
Give to us a perfect righteousness
This is what 2 Corinthians 5:21 tells us He does on the cross. Jesus never sinned and took our sin upon Himself to forgive us… but if He only forgave us of our sins then we would become neutral agents and neutrality isn’t good enough because we’d sin our way out of neutrality. What we see in our text is that Jesus’ death on the cross also gives to His followers a perfect righteousness that allows us to stand before God as if we had never sinned - because our Savior and representative truly never sinned! This is grace and this is the miracle of the cross! God treated Jesus as if He had sinned and treats us as if we were Jesus and had never sinned.
This requires Jesus to die on the cross and to “Drink the Cup of God’s Wrath.”
What comes to mind whenever you think of the death of Jesus Christ on the cross?
Darkness covers the ground
Temple veil tears in two
Why would these things happen?
Most commentators would say that it’s because of the pain the Father experienced to crush His Son and how He “turns His face away” as we sing about. Yet, even in this darkness, we see light breaking through. Think of the tearing of the veil in the temple, what does that signify? Jesus’ sacrifice opens a path to come to the Father as Hebrews 7:27 and Hebrews 4:14 tell us. We no longer have to go through a priest and the presence of God is no longer withheld from God’s people, as Baptists we believe in the priesthood of the believer that all Christians are priests
9 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his possession, so that you may proclaim the praises of the one who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.
Because of this, we can come to God whenever we want through Jesus Christ! This is good news. We have to remember that even in the darkest of nights and the most evil of events, God is at work and the things that God works out are for our good! The cross was the most wicked event in the history of the universe… but did the cross accomplish something good? You’d better believe so! How can Isaiah 52:10 say that it pleased the Father to crush the Son? Not because God delights in an innocent person dying, but because through the willing sacrifice of His Son, many sons and daughters are brought to glory. We see the justice and love of God on full display on the cross.
The final few minutes of this clip were interesting as some of the people were confused as to who killed Jesus. Justin Peters shares Acts 2:23 which gives us a simple but profound answer
23 this Man, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death.
Jesus went to the cross willingly and told His disciples that He must die and that this was His mission all along. It was the predetermined plan of God for Him to come and be delivered into the hands of wicked men. So, yes, it was God’s plan for Jesus to die… but there were Jewish and Roman people who are guilty for their actions and the blood of Jesus was “on their hands” if you want to say. Was this God’s plan? Yes! Were people responsible for their choices and actions? Yes! Some wrestle with this tension between the Sovereignty of God and the Responsibility of Man but we see both in Scripture. “Spurgeon was once asked if he could reconcile these two truths to each other. “I wouldn’t try,” he replied; “I never reconcile friends.” Friends?—yes, friends. This is the point that we have to grasp. In the Bible, divine sovereignty and human responsibility are not enemies. They are not uneasy neighbors; they are not in an endless state of cold war with each other. They are friends, and they work together.” We cannot overemphasize one at the neglect of the other, and this is the danger that many do in our world, even in church-life today. We don’t want to believe in a sovereign God so we overemphasize the responsibility of man and our power - but that’s not right. Some do the opposite, they don’t believe that mankind makes choices or hold responsibility for the choices that they make and they overemphasize the sovereignty of God to the detriment of our responsibility and that’s not right either. We see both in Scripture. As one pastor put it years ago, these truths are the train tracks of Scripture. Where one is, you find the other. If you look at your feet, you see 2 separate tracks… but if you look off into the distance really far away, you see 1 track. Thus it is in Scripture. God is sovereign, we are responsible. This isn’t a contradiction - this shouldn’t make us uneasy. But if we focus on feelings first, it will certainly lead to unScriptural places.
Trinity Discussion
One of the last discussions was on the Trinity and how Jesus could die because He is the Son of God and some believe that this means that we “rip” the Trinity to shreds if we believe that Jesus had to come and pay the price of our sins on the cross. So important to look to God’s Word first and to try our best to be Biblical.
17 Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.
So God cannot change. But, we also know that Jesus was fully-man in addition to being fully-God as He added humanity to His deity. He didn’t change into a man and cease to be God. Darkness covers the land in His death on the cross, God’s judgment is falling, Jesus drinks the cup of God’s wrath against sin. He is still the spotless lamb who had done no wrong, but as our mediator and in our place as our substitute, God was against His humanity while at the same time He was “for” His deity as His only begotten Son. Hard to fully wrap our heads around but we cannot say that Jesus ceased to be God and we cannot say that God died because God cannot die. While Jesus suffered and experienced spiritual darkness in drinking that cup dry, He cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” His human nature was separated from God but not His divine nature. Remember what He told the thief on the cross?
43 And he said to him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”
His body was dead, but His spirit lived on. He remained alive.
Does anyone else’s brains hurt?