Dale Partridge - Romans 3_23-25a： The Three-Piece Plan of Salvation

00:00:00.000 In this episode of Real Christianity, today I'll be continuing my teaching through what I believe is the Yosemite Valley of the Bible.

00:00:06.680 It's one of the most beautiful and wondrous sections of scripture filled with towering truths that every Christian must understand.

00:00:14.120 Get ready for a rich discussion on the gospel of Jesus Christ. All that coming up right now.

00:00:30.000 Welcome to Real Christianity. My name is Dale Partridge. Today's episode is titled 0.72

00:00:40.960 Romans 3, 23 through 25a, the three-piece plan of salvation. Now, as you know, the show is an

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00:01:58.300 give at relearn.org forward slash donate. On that note, let's go ahead and get started on

00:02:03.680 this episode of Romans 3, 23 through 25a. Now, when you examine cosmology and astronomy,

00:02:16.800 When you think about these incredible sciences, you're going to find hundreds of points of vital

00:02:24.120 study. And you're going to find the theory of relativity, the expansion of the universe. You're

00:02:30.100 going to find out about Jupiter's moons and Saturn's rings. And you're going to find out

00:02:34.000 all this beautiful, wonderful points of study. And there's no more vital focus in cosmology

00:02:41.420 than the focus of the sun. The sun essentially is the centerpiece of our solar system.

00:02:49.740 The entire solar system revolves around the sun. And Romans 3, 21 through 26 is like the sun

00:02:57.580 of the biblical solar system. So those five verses right there are really absolute vital.

00:03:04.500 The entire Bible really rotates around those passages of scripture.

00:03:10.840 Last week, we covered verses 21 through 22.

00:03:14.640 Today, we're going to be covering, again, verses 23 through 25a.

00:03:18.340 Now, when I say 25a, what I mean by that is it's the first half.

00:03:22.340 Sometimes passages are broken into pieces because they have a comma or maybe a semicolon.

00:03:28.780 And so when I say 25a, it really just means the first half of the verse.

00:03:32.220 Next week, we'll cover 25B through 26.

00:03:36.200 We learned that the foundation for these verses on justification by faith alone,

00:03:40.480 which is what we've been talking about, were really laid out by Paul's 63 verse curated and coordinated argument

00:03:48.740 that all men are equally condemned by the law and that no man can justify himself by works of the law before God.

00:03:56.840 And so I summed up this argument that Paul was making with a simple statement.

00:04:00.660 you might remember it, a low view of the law always leads to legalism and a high view of the

00:04:06.980 law always leads to grace. Namely, when a person thinks so lowly of the law that they actually can

00:04:12.960 keep it or that they can actually meet the righteous demands of the law, they'll try to,

00:04:17.540 and they'll become a legalist in doing so. But when you realize that you can't keep the law

00:04:21.560 and it's impossible for any man to make themselves righteous or justified before God by works of the

00:04:27.260 law, you will have not a low view of the law. You'll have a high view of the law, which will

00:04:32.800 lead you to a high view of grace, a need for grace. You're going to run to the cross. You're

00:04:38.020 going to run to Jesus. And so like Jesus, Paul is a law amplifier. He is constantly reminding

00:04:44.920 Christians that they cannot keep the law. And the law is not just what you do. It's even what you 0.82

00:04:50.440 think. Beyond that, it's also original sin. We know that James 2, verse 10 talks about the idea

00:04:57.960 that even if you've obeyed the law in every aspect, but fail at one point, you become guilty

00:05:03.180 of all of the law. So even if you've had a, quote, perfect life, but if you've sinned one time,

00:05:09.400 you're essentially not meeting the righteous demands. And we know that all people have sinned

00:05:13.080 because it's not sin. Sin isn't something that we learn. Sin is something that actually is in us.

00:05:18.360 we are born in sin. We don't learn to become a sinner. We are sinners. This is really a shocking

00:05:25.000 reality, especially to the Jews who really thought that justification was by keeping the law. And so 1.00

00:05:31.080 Paul then says that righteousness that comes from God, the righteousness that we so desperately need

00:05:36.380 because we're not righteous on our own, it's been manifested apart from the law. And that's kind of

00:05:42.660 a shocking statement, again, to a Jewish culture. And that means that for sinners to attain 1.00

00:05:46.800 righteousness is not by obedience of the law, but by faith only in the one who actually did keep the

00:05:54.500 law, which is Jesus Christ. And so it's not that you can't be made righteous by the law because

00:05:59.960 Jesus Christ was made righteous by keeping the law. But we have to understand that Christ wasn't

00:06:04.900 just a person that was able to keep the law because he was really, really obedient. No,

00:06:09.580 he was actually born without original sin because he wasn't born of Joseph. He was born of the

00:06:15.100 spirit of God. And he didn't have that sin that was passed down from Adam from generation to

00:06:21.080 generation where all men had died because they were born in sin, because the sin that was passed

00:06:28.180 down from the seed of the man to the woman. And so he was born of the seed of the Holy Spirit.

00:06:34.940 This is why the virgin birth is so important. If Jesus was born of Joseph and not born of the

00:06:41.120 the spirit of God. He would have been born in sin with original sin from the fall. And that's why,

00:06:49.440 again, it makes it so essential. So his aim is to encourage people not to be better at law keeping.

00:06:55.880 That's not what Paul's doing. That's not what any of the New Testament is doing,

00:06:59.660 but to drive people to find their justification through faith alone in Christ alone, the only one

00:07:06.120 who kept the law perfectly and righteously, who can give you his righteousness by faith.

00:07:09.820 And so I also spoke on the material characteristics of faith. This was that faith is both a gift of God. It's also the antithesis of work. In fact, if faith, I would say is best characterized in rest, you know, justification by faith alone becomes essentially the perfect means for God to save man without man's involvement at all.

00:07:36.020 And so today we look at the 23 through 25a, which are really the grounds for the previous verses.

00:07:44.380 They're the cause and the support for what Paul just said.

00:07:49.120 And what I mean by that is that Paul is going to show how these verses will explain why a person can be justified by faith alone in Christ.

00:07:58.140 Essentially, these are the grounds that make faith a justifying reality and why it works.

00:08:07.540 And so Paul says here, if we just follow along here, Romans 3, 23, he says,

00:08:14.000 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified as a gift by his grace

00:08:21.800 through the redemption, which is in Christ Jesus, whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in

00:08:27.860 his blood through faith. We have to remember that Paul is speaking both to Jews and Gentiles.

00:08:34.120 So he's got this multicultural, diverse audience here. And the Jews struggle to find themselves 0.97

00:08:40.080 equally condemned as the Gentiles. 0.97

00:08:43.040 Obviously, right? 1.00

00:08:43.860 They are God's people, right?

00:08:45.700 They're God's people who think that

00:08:47.080 they're absolutely the ones that deserve to be saved

00:08:50.300 because they have the law,

00:08:51.440 they've got the mark of God through circumcision,

00:08:54.380 and they are God's chosen people, the seed of Abraham.

00:08:59.180 And they really struggle to see

00:09:00.960 that they are equally condemned before the law 0.99

00:09:02.480 as the Gentiles.

00:09:03.680 And the Gentiles struggled with the understanding

00:09:05.680 of how a Jewish rabbi had anything to do

00:09:08.560 with bringing them salvation. 0.82

00:09:10.080 And so this first statement about all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, all, every single person, it's a robust statement.

00:09:19.720 It's an echo of what Paul has been trying to say over the past several chapters, and that we're all equally condemned, that there's no impartiality to the jurisdiction of the law, that essentially all of us will fall short. 0.54

00:09:29.520 And all men, both Jew and Gentile, have equally fallen short of the righteous requirement that God revealed in the law.

00:09:35.740 Now, the term falling short of the glory of God, let's talk about that just for a second. 0.90

00:09:41.180 That means that all have failed to meet the requirements to experience God's glory.

00:09:47.280 There is a requirement to be found righteous, to be in God's presence, to see God's glory.

00:09:52.800 And so our sin does not just gain us punishment.

00:09:56.000 That's part of the consequences, the penalty for our sin.

00:09:59.780 but it also removes the eternal joy of being and experiencing God's glory. We've fallen short of

00:10:07.480 that. And we've also, we've fallen short of our own design. For something to be glorious, for

00:10:14.520 example, it is to operate how you are designed to be. And so, for example, a man is glorious

00:10:25.980 when he operates as a man ought to operate

00:10:29.740 according to God's design. 0.87

00:10:31.480 A woman is glorious when she operates

00:10:34.300 according to how God designed her to operate. 0.97

00:10:37.840 It's not a glory to a man or to a woman to operate in a, 1.00

00:10:42.120 for example, it's not glorious for a man to be effeminate.

00:10:45.520 That is not glorious.

00:10:46.760 I talked about this on Twitter recently. 1.00

00:10:48.280 It's not glorious for a woman to be an MMA fighter 1.00

00:10:51.440 because that's not what the woman was designed for. 1.00

00:10:54.460 she's designed for nurturing, not brutality. And so there's an element of glory here that we need

00:10:59.020 to understand that we don't have time to really go deep in, but falling short of the glory of God,

00:11:03.420 man is the glory of God. There's an element there of we have fallen short of that glory in our sin.

00:11:11.800 So there's a beautiful multidimensional angle of depth here that we don't have time to get into,

00:11:16.880 but I wanted to at least share those things there. I'll give you an example of kind of falling short

00:11:21.480 of the glory and not being in God's presence. You know, when you're a child and you're sent

00:11:26.440 to your room for disobedience and you have friends over, or maybe you have a dinner party

00:11:30.960 over at your house, they're not just receiving punishment because of their sin and putting

00:11:38.120 them away, but they're also losing the joy of inclusion with the other people that are

00:11:43.940 there. And so they're missing the glory of fellowship. And there's an element that's

00:11:49.120 true here with falling short of the glory of God because of our sin. And our sin is what separates

00:11:53.740 us from God. And the same is true of those who really die in their sins. And so people that

00:11:58.540 die in their sins essentially experience spiritual death, which is spiritual separation. So their

00:12:04.480 soul is separated from the very thing that gives their soul life, which is God. And so there's a

00:12:11.840 spiritual death there. It doesn't mean that they're annihilated. It doesn't mean that they are

00:12:16.740 without existence. No, there will be a eternal existence for your soul. Everybody has an eternal

00:12:22.820 soul that cannot die, but there is a lacking of life. Same today. If you have someone that is

00:12:31.260 not born again, they are spiritually dead. They're physically alive or spiritually dead,

00:12:37.760 but they're still here physically. Their soul is still existing. And so some people want to say,

00:12:44.740 oh, if you're spiritually dead, you're just, it's called annihilationism or that you just cease to

00:12:48.520 exist. And so going to hell really isn't that bad because it's just ceasing to exist. No, hell is an

00:12:53.660 existing state where you are separated from the life of spiritual life. And you will experience

00:13:01.440 the penalty of your sin against the eternal God. And so verse 24 says, being justified as a gift

00:13:10.360 by his grace, through the redemption, which is in Christ Jesus, verse 25, whom God displayed

00:13:17.220 publicly as a propitiation in his blood through faith. Now that's a pretty dense passage of

00:13:22.780 scripture right there. I mean, there are so many terms there you could just spend, you could write

00:13:26.620 an entire book on this verse alone. The whole Bible really anticipates the clarity of these

00:13:32.160 verses right here. There are three terms in this sentence that we need to talk about. So Christians

00:13:36.760 must understand justification, redemption, and propitiation. And so once you grasp these terms,

00:13:43.560 you start to see that they're kind of like gears on a clock, and they work together to make the

00:13:49.320 gospel work. They work together to make faith be a valid justifying means to bring us and reconcile

00:13:59.980 us back to God. But the only reason faith works in Christ is because of these three elements here,

00:14:08.860 justification, redemption, and propitiation. And so we need to really grasp this. If these

00:14:12.960 mechanics fail, the gospel doesn't function. If these mechanics fail, you can't be saved by faith

00:14:18.300 alone. But because these things are working, it's what is the grounds of why you can be saved by

00:14:24.320 faith. And so let's start with Paul's term being justified. We have to remember from Genesis 3

00:14:30.100 until God's revelation of Jesus Christ in his birth in the Advent season, which is upon us

00:14:38.800 right now, if you're listening to this live, the means to justify man before Christ was born and

00:14:46.600 his ministry and death and resurrection was a mystery. Now there was sure the revelation of

00:14:53.780 that in Genesis 15, 6, which we'll talk about in a second. But in the garden, man was separated

00:14:59.020 from God because of his sin. Well, I'll show you the start before that, is that in the garden,

00:15:06.680 man was right with God and he was in fellowship and in union. There was no sin that separated

00:15:12.060 them. But when Adam and Eve sinned, they were separated from God, kicked out of the garden.

00:15:16.860 And through justification by faith alone and Christ alone, they are now reconciled to God.

00:15:22.960 And so that's the good news of the gospel, that we are no longer dead in our sins, separated from God, but reconciled to God through Christ.

00:15:30.420 And so that's really the central theme of the Bible.

00:15:33.520 It's getting back to God.

00:15:36.040 And so, but again, who was the first one to proclaim justification by faith alone?

00:15:40.980 We talked about this last week in the last episode that Genesis 15, 6 says to Abraham,

00:15:47.660 and he believed the Lord and he counted it to him as righteousness.

00:15:52.100 It's kind of a hidden gem back there in Genesis

00:15:54.220 that essentially belief, trust, faith

00:15:57.020 is the justifying means to receive righteousness.

00:16:01.480 And there was, faith in God was this very important element

00:16:06.440 all the way through the Old Testament.

00:16:07.660 Faith in Christ has become the further revelation and clarity.

00:16:12.820 It's called progressive revelation

00:16:14.840 is that God progressively reveals himself over time

00:16:18.620 through the scriptures as they are revealed

00:16:20.940 as the son is revealed. And so a description of a doctrine is different than a prescription of a

00:16:28.440 doctrine. And so the Genesis passage was a description of the doctrine, but here in Romans,

00:16:33.160 we get the prescription of the doctrine. So even before Romans, we get further and further clarity

00:16:40.220 on justification alone. It was actually the angel in Matthew 121, who was the first being to reveal

00:16:50.140 Jesus's justifying capability when he spoke to Joseph in a dream. And I'm going to read that to

00:16:54.780 you right now. It says, she will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus for he will save

00:17:00.280 his people from their sins. Just take a note real quick that he's not saving everybody from their

00:17:06.000 sins, but he will save his people from their sins. John the Baptist actually became the first person

00:17:11.960 to reveal Jesus's justifying capability when he said in John 1 29, behold, the lamb of God

00:17:18.820 who takes away the sin of the world.

00:17:21.680 And so justification is a legal term

00:17:25.220 and we need to have a forensic,

00:17:27.180 a legal courtroom view of the gospel

00:17:29.940 because it's the easiest way in my opinion to understand it.

00:17:32.860 It means to be declared right

00:17:35.000 or to be declared right in relationship with God.

00:17:39.360 It's essentially to be innocent,

00:17:42.220 to no longer have guilt.

00:17:45.120 It solves humanity's guilt before a righteous God

00:17:48.800 or a righteous judge and reconciles us back into union with God as a result.

00:17:54.380 It really strips away the shadow of sin between God and man.

00:17:59.280 Spurgeon said, quote,

00:18:01.000 justification is an act of God's free grace wherein he pardons all of our sins

00:18:05.300 and accepts us as righteous in his sight only for the righteousness of Christ

00:18:10.240 imputed to us and received by faith alone, end quote.

00:18:14.180 So, you know, those who have received the righteousness of Christ through faith have been justified as a gift.

00:18:25.180 And that's important.

00:18:26.320 So this is something I want to just spend a second on.

00:18:29.320 A gift is something that's different than something that's free, right?

00:18:32.500 A gift is free to the recipient, but it's costly to the giver.

00:18:38.840 There's an expense to the giver.

00:18:41.160 Webster defines a gift as something voluntarily transferred by one person to another without

00:18:46.980 compensation. And so the freeness of justification here implies that we haven't contributed to

00:18:52.520 this gift. We haven't earned it. We haven't worked for it. It was purchased by Christ

00:19:00.520 without our involvement and given to us by grace. And that's an important distinction to be made.

00:19:07.480 I once heard that grace is an acronym for God's riches at Christ's expense.

00:19:14.360 I'll say that again.

00:19:15.360 Grace is an acronym, God's riches at Christ's expense.

00:19:20.500 Now, no gift should ever be expected, right?

00:19:24.800 Oftentimes we can feel that gifts are deserved.

00:19:27.320 We certainly can't feel that way about the gospel, but we can feel that way.

00:19:31.380 And this is not the case with this gift.

00:19:34.040 Grace means to receive something we don't deserve.

00:19:36.940 One theologian said, quote, 0.98

00:19:39.300 the harlot, the liar, and the murderer 0.97

00:19:42.080 are short of God's grace, but so are you. 0.99

00:19:45.280 Perhaps you see them standing at the bottom of a mine

00:19:48.100 and you on the crest of the Alps.

00:19:51.020 But regardless of your station on earth,

00:19:53.520 you are as little as they are able to touch the stars,

00:19:58.500 end quote.

00:19:59.200 So this is saying, hey, I don't care.

00:20:01.480 If you feel like you're at the top of the world

00:20:03.300 and you're a quote, a good person, 0.99

00:20:04.620 and you're looking down upon someone that's a murderer and a liar,

00:20:08.100 both of you are equally unable to reach the righteousness of Christ.

00:20:12.340 You're both condemned.

00:20:13.900 And that's really, I think, the message that Paul is trying to get across 0.97

00:20:16.420 to the Jews and the Gentiles. 0.86

00:20:19.800 The Jews had a step up, right? 1.00

00:20:21.680 They might be on the Alps and the Gentiles might be in the gutter, 1.00

00:20:24.820 but at the end of the day, they're both the same 1.00

00:20:27.060 because it's not enough to get them to Christ.

00:20:30.360 Another theologian said, quote,

00:20:31.900 grace is the good that you get from someone when he owes you nothing. I would say that God's grace

00:20:40.680 even surpasses these definitions that I've been sharing with you here, because not only does God

00:20:45.800 hold back the punishment, which you do deserve, which is mercy, but he actually gives you what

00:20:52.200 you don't deserve, which is grace. And so there's an element, the two-sided, right? He withholds

00:20:56.520 and he gives, which is really quite profound.

00:21:00.680 And so God's grace is multidimensional and it's deep.

00:21:04.040 And it's something we need to recognize

00:21:05.960 so that we have this beautiful grasp

00:21:08.340 and comprehension of the gospel.

00:21:10.700 Now, if you struggle to see the specialness of grace

00:21:13.960 or of the gospel, it's either because A,

00:21:17.340 you have not yet comprehended the depth of your own sin

00:21:20.680 or B, you're harboring some sense of entitlement

00:21:27.600 that might be in your heart,

00:21:30.180 you have to know darkness to appreciate light.

00:21:35.140 You have to know sickness to appreciate wellness.

00:21:38.440 That's something that I've learned

00:21:39.400 over the last several years.

00:21:40.560 You have to know poverty to appreciate riches.

00:21:45.940 You have to know valleys to appreciate the peaks

00:21:49.320 and you have to know sinfulness.

00:21:50.680 to really appreciate salvation.

00:21:54.100 And so this is something that is important

00:21:57.920 to have a proper and faithful and accurate view

00:22:01.400 of your own wretchedness.

00:22:03.740 And the way we do that is just looking at our own lives

00:22:08.020 and realizing, well, I don't just need the gospel once,

00:22:10.500 I need it every day because every day I sin

00:22:13.600 and every day I'm in need of righteousness.

00:22:17.320 And so Paul then says that justification is through redemption.

00:22:23.040 So that justification sits upon the grounds of redemption.

00:22:26.200 So you can't be justified by faith as a gift unless you're redeemed.

00:22:31.980 And so the redemption is in Christ Jesus.

00:22:35.960 And so redemption in a biblical sense is really the payment.

00:22:39.100 It's the payment price of a ransom.

00:22:42.340 That's the definition that you would see in scripture,

00:22:46.060 the way that it's being used there.

00:22:47.660 It's the release or a buyback of an individual

00:22:50.660 who can't free themselves.

00:22:52.820 And so you really want to grasp that term redemption.

00:22:56.580 Redemption is the act of God to help those

00:23:00.140 who are powerless to help themselves.

00:23:03.400 So it really is a work of sacrificial labor.

00:23:07.020 It's a blood payment price,

00:23:08.560 which we'll talk about in a second.

00:23:09.700 So the grace of justification is only made possible by the grounds of redemption paid for by the blood of Jesus Christ.

00:23:20.700 And so grace is not simply overlooking the just payment required.

00:23:26.440 God doesn't just simply overlook our sin.

00:23:29.500 No, he actually makes somebody pay for it.

00:23:32.180 And he does it himself by sending his son and paying for it.

00:23:36.120 So he can't just overlook sin.

00:23:38.040 Otherwise you have a God that doesn't have the ethic of justice.

00:23:42.920 And so God is just.

00:23:44.820 And so there is a requirement for the payment.

00:23:49.180 This is why Matthew 20, 28 says,

00:23:52.760 even the son of man came not to be served,

00:23:54.660 but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many, end quote.

00:23:58.620 So I want you to see this because redemption is one of those

00:24:02.380 three essential mechanics of the gospel.

00:24:04.900 You have justification, you have redemption,

00:24:06.700 and then you have propitiation.

00:24:08.460 And so I want to offer you

00:24:09.440 some more scriptural support for this.

00:24:11.580 So I'm going to read you a handful of scriptures.

00:24:13.240 They'll probably pop up on the screen here.

00:24:14.920 1 Corinthians 1.30.

00:24:16.840 But by his doing, you are in Christ Jesus,

00:24:19.620 who became to us wisdom from God

00:24:21.540 and righteousness and sanctification and redemption.

00:24:25.180 Ephesians 1.7.

00:24:26.660 In him, we have redemption through his blood,

00:24:29.260 the forgiveness of our trespasses

00:24:30.480 according to the riches of his grace.

00:24:32.480 Ephesians 1.14.

00:24:34.040 Who is given as a pledge of our inheritance

00:24:36.580 with a view to the redemption of God's own possession,

00:24:40.160 to the praise of his glory.

00:24:41.720 Ephesians 4.30,

00:24:43.040 and do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God

00:24:44.980 by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.

00:24:48.400 Colossians 1.14,

00:24:50.080 and whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

00:24:52.860 And then Hebrews 9.15,

00:24:54.480 and for this reason, he is the mediator of a new covenant

00:24:57.220 in order that since a death has taken place

00:25:00.280 for the redemption of the transgressions

00:25:02.620 that were committed under the first covenant,

00:25:04.140 those who have been called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance and there's actually

00:25:10.700 more those are just a few that really show the scriptural support there the 19th century hymn

00:25:15.940 writer james gray he wrote a stanza in one of his poems but really can be sung it's called nor

00:25:22.160 silver nor gold and it says quote nor silver nor gold hath obtained my redemption nor riches of

00:25:29.940 earth could have saved my poor soul the blood of the cross is my only foundation the death of my

00:25:35.540 savior now maketh me whole end quote so so justification um solves the problem of man's

00:25:42.720 guilt before god but redemption is the means by which justification is even possible because there

00:25:49.380 was a debt to be paid and that that payment was paid by the blood of jesus christ uh life for life

00:25:56.380 The death, the sentencing was death

00:25:58.380 and someone had to die for our sin

00:25:59.900 and someone had to die who had complete righteousness

00:26:03.420 in order to actually bring about full redemption

00:26:07.000 for our sins and allow us to live.

00:26:09.520 And so Paul then lays the foundation for redemption.

00:26:11.900 He says, quote, whom God displayed publicly

00:26:15.880 as a propitiation in his blood through faith.

00:26:18.900 So he's talking about, again,

00:26:19.880 you're kind of like seeing cascading waterfalls here, right?

00:26:22.680 You're seeing that you're justified by faith alone

00:26:25.180 in Christ alone and you're justified as a gift and you're justified because you've been redeemed

00:26:29.140 and you've been redeemed because there was a propitiation work that was accomplished there.

00:26:33.360 So there's kind of these coordinating arguments that are causal clauses that are represented

00:26:37.940 here. And so if justification is made possible only by redemption, then redemption is only

00:26:44.000 made possible by propitiation. So we need to know what propitiation means. And to understand

00:26:51.040 kind of the fullness of the context that's going on here in Romans, Paul tells us in Romans 6.23

00:26:56.280 that the wages of sin is death, namely that death is the consequence of sin. That's what happens,

00:27:03.580 spiritual death and physical death. And we see this as early as the Garden of Eden when God

00:27:07.720 says to Adam, Adam disobeyed, that he would surely die. That was already in the very first

00:27:14.200 book of the Bible. And the lesson that God is demonstrating is that when you sin, someone has

00:27:20.440 to die. And this was kind of modeled in a symbolic way with the animal sacrifices of the Old 0.56

00:27:28.340 Testament. Leviticus 17, 11, speaking of the animals in the Old Testament, the sacrificial

00:27:34.280 system says, quote, for the life of the flesh is in the blood. And I have given it for you on the

00:27:40.000 altar to make atonement for your souls, for it is the blood that makes atonement by the life.

00:27:46.140 So the Old Testament sacrificial system, again, it's not sufficient to take away sins eternally.

00:27:52.040 It was intended to symbolize a need for a lasting and perfect atonement.

00:27:57.560 And so this is, again, this preparing us for and pointing us to a need for a savior.

00:28:02.280 So we needed an atonement to propitiate for us eternally.

00:28:06.400 And an atonement that was essentially worthy to appease the eternal wrath of God against our sinfulness.

00:28:14.140 And so, propitiation really is the satisfaction of justice, which animals, as we saw, cannot do, but could be accomplished through Christ.

00:28:30.140 So, sinful humanity needed a worthy human sacrifice.

00:28:36.580 So, we didn't need animals to die for humans.

00:28:39.100 We needed a worthy human sacrifice.

00:28:41.660 This is why Jesus had to be fully man and fully God.

00:28:45.620 He was a human sacrifice under the law

00:28:48.280 and he would satisfy the wrath of God.

00:28:51.980 He would, in doing that,

00:28:53.560 he would maintain God's perfect justice

00:28:56.220 and atone for the sins of all

00:28:58.040 who have received him by faith.

00:29:00.940 And so this is exactly what Christ did.

00:29:04.320 This again, three-part mechanical element of the gospel.

00:29:09.300 And I want to read you Hebrews 10, 1 through 18.

00:29:13.160 And I know that's a big chunk of scripture.

00:29:15.020 So you're going to just hang in here with me.

00:29:17.380 And my poor editor, Trevor, is going to have to do some great motion graphics for this here.

00:29:22.760 So it says,

00:29:24.180 For since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come, instead of the true form of these

00:29:30.380 realities, it can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make

00:29:35.520 perfect those who draw near. Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, since the

00:29:41.800 worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have any consciousness of sins? But in

00:29:47.660 these sacrifices, there is a reminder of sins each year. For it is impossible for the blood of bulls

00:29:55.060 and goats to take away sins. Consequently, when Christ came into the world, he said,

00:29:59.720 sacrifices and offerings you have not desired, but a body you have prepared for me. In burnt

00:30:05.880 offerings and sin offerings, you have taken no pleasure. Then I said, behold, I have come to do

00:30:11.700 your will, O God, as it is written of me in the scroll of the book. When he said above, you have

00:30:17.200 neither desired nor taken pleasure in sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings.

00:30:22.400 These are offered according to the law. Then he added, behold, I have come to do your will.

00:30:27.820 He does away with the first in order to establish the second. And by that will,

00:30:34.280 we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. And every

00:30:41.520 priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never

00:30:45.640 take away sins. But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down

00:30:52.920 at the right hand of God, waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for

00:30:58.800 his feet. For by a single offering, he has perfected for all time those who are being

00:31:03.440 sanctified. And the Holy Spirit also bears witness to us for after saying, quote, this is the covenant

00:31:10.620 that I will make with them after those days, declares the Lord, I will put my laws on their

00:31:14.960 hearts and write them on their minds. Then he adds, I will remember their sins and their lawless

00:31:20.420 deeds no more. Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin.

00:31:27.760 Wow. What a beautiful passage of scripture. Again, showing how Jesus comes in and fulfills

00:31:32.280 the sacrificial symbolic system of the old covenant. And he becomes that perfect sacrifice.

00:31:37.840 So ultimately God has put together this perfect collection of mechanics to achieve salvation for

00:31:42.980 his people. He has justified them as guiltless as a gift through the workless means of faith,

00:31:48.640 that's step one, because he has redeemed them by the blood payment of a perfect sinless human

00:31:54.200 sacrifice in Jesus Christ, which has satisfied or propitiated his eternal need for justice

00:32:00.820 upon sinners. That's this beautiful three-part piece of salvation. So when we understand

00:32:07.540 this master plan of salvation,

00:32:09.700 we can finally grasp the force of beautiful verses

00:32:13.720 like Romans 8, 33 to 34 that says,

00:32:17.060 quote, who shall bring any charge against God's elect?

00:32:20.020 It is God who justifies, who is to condemn.

00:32:23.820 And so this is,

00:32:25.480 when you realize what God has done to save sinners,

00:32:29.240 you realize that there's nobody that can condemn somebody.

00:32:32.960 Only God can condemn and only God can save.

00:32:37.380 But for those that are saved,

00:32:39.280 we have absolute confidence

00:32:41.300 because of the immense work

00:32:42.640 that he's accomplished on our behalf.

00:32:44.340 I'll close with some words from Spurgeon

00:32:46.380 because that's always a good way to close, right?

00:32:49.280 Spurgeon says, quote,

00:32:50.440 being justified by faith, we have peace with God.

00:32:54.600 Conscience accuses us no longer.

00:32:56.740 Judgment now decides for the sinner instead of against him.

00:33:01.140 Memory looks back upon past sins

00:33:03.380 with deep sorrow for the sin,

00:33:04.700 but yet with no dread of any penalty to come for Christ has paid the debt of his people to the last

00:33:11.580 jot and tittle and received the divine receipt. And unless God can be so unjust as to demand

00:33:19.400 double payment for one debt, no soul for whom Jesus died as a substitute can ever be cast into

00:33:26.000 hell, end quote. Powerful passage of scripture, powerful quote right there. Hopefully this gives

00:33:31.480 you again, more confidence in a deeper theological grasp of the mechanics of the gospel that you can

00:33:38.620 rest in Christ and that your works and your obedience can be driven to please God, but not

00:33:45.120 to justify yourself. So thank you for listening to this episode of Real Christianity. Your faithful

00:33:52.300 listenership is really a blessing to our ministry. Again, this is the end of the year. And if you

00:33:57.260 would consider making a donation or supporting our ministry, we would love that. You can go to

00:34:02.900 relearn.org forward slash donate to do so. If you also haven't left a review for this podcast,

00:34:09.140 we would appreciate that. You can leave a review by going to your podcast app. You don't even need

00:34:14.400 to write anything. You just need to tap the stars. But if you do write something, I will read it.

00:34:18.220 On that note, my name is Dale Partridge. This is Real Christianity, and we'll see you next time. 0.54

00:34:27.260 We'll be right back. 0.98

Dale Partridge - December 21, 2022

Romans 3_23-25a： The Three-Piece Plan of Salvation

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