GRACE FOR TODAY Radio Message #456

 

          Six Facts Plainly Revealed In The Gospel

         

          Pastor Don Fortner

          Grace Baptist Church of Danville

          2734 Old Stanford Road

          Danville, Kentucky 40422-9438

 

1. All men and women by nature, since the fall of our father Adam, are sinners, alienated from God. “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23). As sinners, we are alienated from the life of God and have become enemies unto God. The wages of our sin and enmity to God is death. Every transgression must receive its just recompense of reward (Heb. 2:2). All sin must be punished, either in the sinner or in the sinner’s Substitute. The law, being broken, accuses of sin, condemns the sinner, and demands death. Unless satisfaction is made, the sentence of the law must be executed. The sanction of the law is death. It can never be abrogated, changed, altered, or abated. God will never relax his justice! “The soul that sinneth, it shall die!” (Ezek. 18:2). But…

 

2. It is the will of God to save sinners. “He delighteth in mercy!” God has decreed the salvation of some. Christ came to save some. There are some people in this world who must and shall be saved because it is the will of God to save them; and God’s will cannot be frustrated (John 10:16). Every chosen sinner (2 Thess. 2:13-14), every predestined son (Rom. 8:29-30), every heir of the covenant (Eph. 1:3-7), everyone whose name was written in the Lamb’s Book of Life from the foundation of the world must be saved (Rev. 13:8). There is no possibility that even one of God’s elect will perish! However…

 

3. It is impossible for a holy and just God to save any sinner apart from the satisfaction of justice (Heb. 9:22). He declares, “I will by no means clear the guilty” (Ex. 34:7). I know that God is omnipotent, almighty, and sovereign. He does what he will! But God cannot do that which is contrary to his nature and character. We do not rob God of his sovereignty when we repeat the declaration of Scripture and say, “God cannot lie.” He who is the Truth cannot lie! Neither do we rob God of his sovereignty when we assert this truth of Holy Scripture - God cannot forgive sin without the satisfaction of justice. The just, holy, and true God must punish sin.

 

4. The only way the justice of God could ever be satisfied is by the substitutionary sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ (Job 34:23; Rom. 3:24-26). God could not die, and man could not satisfy; but the God-man both died and satisfied. Two facts demonstrate clearly that there was no other way for justice to be satisfied. The love of God the Father for his Son proves it. Would God almighty slay his darling Son, if there were any other way to save his people consistent with his justice? And the prayer of Christ in Gethsemane proves it (Matt. 26:39). If the salvation of his people could be accomplished by any means other than his death upon the cross, would not God the Father have granted his tormented Son the desire of his soul?

 

5. It is impossible for God, in his holiness, to punish any sinner for whose sins justice has been satisfied by the blood of Christ (Isa. 53:11 Rom. 7:14) - The law has no claim upon an executed felon! “Payment God cannot twice demand, First at my bleeding Surety’s hand, And then again at mine!”

 

6. Every sinner who trusts the Lord Jesus Christ has been chosen, redeemed, and called, and must be forever saved. It is written in the Book of God, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved” (Acts 16:31). May God the Holy spirit now enable you by his sovereign grace to trust the Lord Jesus Christ.

 

AMEN.