WHY DOES JUSTIFICATION MATTER?
Notes
Transcript
Good Morning
Good Morning
Good Morning and Welcome to Freedom Chapel. My name is Pastor Terry, my wife Michelle and I serve as the lead pastors here at Freedom Chapel. We exist to bring hope to our community we do that by being a Place to Belong, Church for the Whole Family.
If you are new with us this morning would you please take the time fill out that little flap on the side of your bulletin. If you put it in the black boxes by the back door we will make a donation in your name to a local charity and send you cookies. Church can we show our guests some love this morning.
House Keeping
House Keeping
Starting Point Dinner. Please Sign Up.
Work Day Next Week. We will have something for just about everyone. We want to deep clean the inside of the church as well as multiple projects outside.
Easter is Coming now is a good time to start inviting your friends. Cards at the back and you can use that cool app we keep talking about.
Let’s Pray.
Last week we took a deep look into Justification. This is an important matter that we all need to understand. Understanding Justification allows the believer to understand God’s system for salvation and to walk in a new freedom in knowing him.
SO WHY DOES JUSTIFICATION MATTER?
SO WHY DOES JUSTIFICATION MATTER?
Lets Recap from last week.
Justification is the act of God Whereby He forgives the sin of an unsaved person and credits/assigns to them the righteousness of Christ when through faith they believe.
Justification is the act of God Whereby He forgives the sin of an unsaved person and credits/assigns to them the righteousness of Christ when through faith they believe.
AT THE MOMENT OF YOUR SALVATION THREE THINGS TAKE PLACE:
AT THE MOMENT OF YOUR SALVATION THREE THINGS TAKE PLACE:
1. YOU ARE FORGIVEN
1. YOU ARE FORGIVEN
2. YOU ARE ASSIGNED CHRIST’S RIGHTEOUSNESS
2. YOU ARE ASSIGNED CHRIST’S RIGHTEOUSNESS
3. YOU ARE GIVEN FAITH TO BELIEVE.
3. YOU ARE GIVEN FAITH TO BELIEVE.
Romans 12:3 (ESV)
3 For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.
Ephesians 2:8–9 (ESV)
8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God,
9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
SO WHY DOES JUSTIFICATION MATTER?
SO WHY DOES JUSTIFICATION MATTER?
1. JUSTIFICATION PLACES THE EMPHASIS ON GOD IN OUR SALVATION.
1. JUSTIFICATION PLACES THE EMPHASIS ON GOD IN OUR SALVATION.
We live in a rapidly changing Christian culture where by many preachers and teachers are putting all the attention on the believer. This idea that we are all little Gods, let me prophesy the promise, so focused on what power we have and not on the power of the almighty.
There is so much self promotion that there is very little God promotion.
“For every look at self, take ten looks at Christ....” -Robert Murray M`Cheyne
Salvation is not about me or my abilities.
35 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it.
Salvation is made possible by anything you could do.
I am going to use some scripture from the Message version to help drive home this point this morning.
YOUR LIST OR ABILITY TO FULFILL IT DOES NOT IMPRESS GOD.
YOUR LIST OR ABILITY TO FULFILL IT DOES NOT IMPRESS GOD.
I am going to use some scripture from the Message version to help drive home this point this morning.
8 Saving is all his idea, and all his work. All we do is trust him enough to let him do it. It’s God’s gift from start to finish!
9 We don’t play the major role. If we did, we’d probably go around bragging that we’d done the whole thing!
10 No, we neither make nor save ourselves. God does both the making and saving. He creates each of us by Christ Jesus to join him in the work he does, the good work he has gotten ready for us to do, work we had better be doing.
The good things that come out of you are only there because of what God put in you.
3 How blessed is God! And what a blessing he is! He’s the Father of our Master, Jesus Christ, and takes us to the high places of blessing in him.
4 Long before he laid down earth’s foundations, he had us in mind, had settled on us as the focus of his love, to be made whole and holy by his love.
5 Long, long ago he decided to adopt us into his family through Jesus Christ. (What pleasure he took in planning this!)
What so many of us don’t realize is how much God has been at work in each of our lives. We get so caught up in…I did this…I accomplished that.....Look at what I over came..... If we are honest and we look we will see that God has been working it all out. Every twist and every detour. In every fall H has been at work to draw us to him.
8 He thought of everything, provided for everything we could possibly need,
11 It’s in Christ that we find out who we are and what we are living for. Long before we first heard of Christ and got our hopes up, he had his eye on us, had designs on us for glorious living,
12 part of the overall purpose he is working out in everything and everyone.
This why one of the core purposes of this church is to Find Purpose.
Why Did God Save you?
Why Did God Forgive You?
Why Did God Cloth You with Christs Righteousness?
Why did God Give you a Measure of Faith to Believe?
BECAUSE HE CREATED YOU WITH A PURPOSE AND HE DID IT ALL OUT OF HIS ABUNDANT MERCY
BECAUSE HE CREATED YOU WITH A PURPOSE AND HE DID IT ALL OUT OF HIS ABUNDANT MERCY
33 Have you ever come on anything quite like this extravagant generosity of God, this deep, deep wisdom? It’s way over our heads. We’ll never figure it out.
34 Is there anyone around who can explain God? Anyone smart enough to tell him what to do?
35 Anyone who has done him such a huge favor that God has to ask his advice?
36 Everything comes from him; Everything happens through him; Everything ends up in him. Always glory! Always praise! Yes. Yes. Yes.
IT IS ALL ABOUT GOD AND ALL DONE THROUGH JESUS.
IT IS ALL ABOUT GOD AND ALL DONE THROUGH JESUS.
2. JUSTIFICATION PREVENTS THE EXERCISE OF WORKS RIGHTEOUSNESS
2. JUSTIFICATION PREVENTS THE EXERCISE OF WORKS RIGHTEOUSNESS
This is where we will pick up in our text today.
If you don’t understand Justification. I am not talking about memorizing the definition. I am talking about letting it sink into you mind, your heart, con every area of your walk with God.
If you don’t understand that you had nothing to do with your salvation, with your right standing with God, or your ability to please God. Then you don’t understand Justification.
It is not about what you can do. It is a trap and the Trap is that you are righteous not Just because of what God did but because you fulfilled a list.
You are good because you read your Bible this morning, You were kind to the a person who was rude to you, You got up and came to church this morning, or you did what is ever on your list that make you right in you mind with God. Everybody has one.
This is often illustrated in those who have come out of a Holiness background…how you dress…your hair......no make up.....
NOTHING YOU CAN DO CAN MAKE GOD LOVE YOU ANYMORE THAN HE ALREADY DOES.
NOTHING YOU CAN DO CAN MAKE GOD LOVE YOU ANYMORE THAN HE ALREADY DOES.
If you believe you can then you don’t understand Justification.
You can not improve on the finished work of God.
Romans 4:9 (ESV)
9 Is this blessing then only for the circumcised, or also for the uncircumcised?
What blessing is he talking about.
7 “Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered;
8 blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin.”
The blessing of forgiveness.
He is speaking to a mixed culture that included Jews.
For the Jew Circumcision was added to salvation.
What God can do plus what I can do Circumcision/Works
We can substitute Circumcision for Human Effort or Works.
Was Abraham Justified by the things he did or the things God did.
The Jews believed Circumcision placed a new born male into the Covenant with God.
There is a Jewish belief that Abraham is standing in heaven and only those males who are circumcised are allowed in. Talk about terrible Jobs in heaven.
Romans 4:9–10 (ESV)
9b For we say that faith was counted to Abraham as righteousness.
10 How then was it counted to him? Was it before or after he had been circumcised? It was not after, but before he was circumcised.
6 And he believed the Lord, and he counted it to him as righteousness.
14 years later in Gen 17 God comes to Abraham with the command to be circumcised.
Romans 4:11 (ESV)
11a He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised.
The conversation Between God and Abraham.
“I thought you said we were friends?”
Genesis 17:9–11 (ESV)
9 And God said to Abraham, “As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout their generations.
10 This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised.
11 You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you.
This seal was to remind Abraham of what God had promised and to remind all who came after who God was and how faithful to his word he is.
Romans 4:11 (ESV)
11a He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised.
Your list doesn’t make you righteous. your list is a sign of the seal that is on your heart.
You had Devotion because it is a sign
You study your Bible because it is a sign.
You are nice because it is a sign.
You stopped cussing and using fowl language because it is a sign.
You got up and came to church this morning because it is a sign,
Your works aren’t to make you have right standing with God but out of the right standing you already have with God.
Somebody say Amen.
3. JUSTIFICATION PROMOTES THE EVANGELISM OF ALL PEOPLE.
3. JUSTIFICATION PROMOTES THE EVANGELISM OF ALL PEOPLE.
Romans 4:11 (ESV)
11b The purpose was to make him the father of all who believe without being circumcised, so that righteousness would be counted to them as well,
Genesis 12:3 (NLT)
3 “All the families on earth will be blessed through you.”
“ALL” HAS ALWAYS BEEN THE PRIMARY POINT.
“ALL” HAS ALWAYS BEEN THE PRIMARY POINT.
John 3:16 (NLT)
16 “For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.
It is not just for you it is not just for me it is for everyone.
This is why we support missions. $25 a month every family.
This is why we send missionaries.
It is why we share Jesus with our coworkers, in our city, and everyone.
BECAUSE WE HAVE BEEN JUSTIFIED, WE SHOULD WANT TO MAKE SURE EVERYONE ELSE HAS THE OPPORTUNITY TO BE JUSTIFIED
BECAUSE WE HAVE BEEN JUSTIFIED, WE SHOULD WANT TO MAKE SURE EVERYONE ELSE HAS THE OPPORTUNITY TO BE JUSTIFIED
Justification is the act of God Whereby He forgives the sin of an unsaved person and credits/assigns to them the righteousness of Christ when through faith they believe.
Justification is the act of God Whereby He forgives the sin of an unsaved person and credits/assigns to them the righteousness of Christ when through faith they believe.
Romans 4:11–12 (ESV)
11b The purpose was to make him the father of all who believe without being circumcised, so that righteousness would be counted to them as well,
12 and to make him the father of the circumcised who are not merely circumcised but who also walk in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised.
God was extending through Abraham the opportunity to know him and to walk with him just Abraham did.