Okay, all right, well. Well, it's great to be in the house of the Lord tonight. And it's a pleasure to be able to open God's word to you. So let's pray prior to beginning this time of whatever it is we're gonna do. Let's pray. Dear Father in heaven, we do thank you for the opportunity to be in your presence again. We thank you that we are part of your church, part of your body, that we are following in the footsteps of other saints who have gone before us. We have now We've been a church of Jesus Christ for over 2,000 years, and we are amazed at what has transpired, the great battles of truth that have been fought. And we thank you that we are recipients of great doctrine and great history and a lot of understanding of your word, original languages that have time and time again proved to be accurate, proving the accuracy of your Holy Scriptures, how you've preserved that great body of truth, that we can go to it knowing that you have preserved it, we can find true truth there. Please make the words of my mouth tonight. and the meditations of my thought pleasing to you, dear Lord, I pray that you would give unction to your word and that you would bring our prayers before your Father this evening. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. All right, well, tonight we are going to look at questions 32 and 33 in the Baptist Catechism, and I will read them in your hearing Just now, if you all have that in front of you, that'd be great. And of course, it's on the back of your prayer sheet. Question 32, how are we made partakers of the redemption purchased by Christ? Answer, we are made partakers of the redemption purchased by Christ by the effectual application of it to us by the Holy Spirit. In question 33, how does the Spirit apply to us the redemption purchased by Christ? The answer, the Spirit applies to us the redemption purchased by Christ by working faith in us and thereby uniting us to Christ in our effectual calling. By way of introduction, I want us to see that our redemption is a Trinitarian endeavor. When we think of the redemption of our sins, we naturally think of Christ. We think of the redemptive history, meaning that focal point of all God's dealing with mankind since the fall. And we see Christ Jesus taking center stage. He is the one who crushed the lying serpent's head. He is the long foretold Messiah, the son of David. Emmanuel, God with us, and Jesus is the very revelation of God, the radiance of the glory of God and the exact representation of his nature we see in Hebrews 1.3. And Philip said to Jesus, show us the Father and it will be enough. And Jesus said, haven't I been with you long enough and you still don't know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say show me the Father? And in question 32, we see the redemption wrought by Christ is applied by the Holy Spirit. With this transition from the work of Christ to the Holy Spirit's activity, our attention is drawn to the fact that our salvation is a Trinitarian endeavor. All three persons of the Trinity work together to redeem the elect from the curse of sin. And this is true because they are one in essence. The Father is God and the Son is God and the Spirit is God, yet the Son is not the Father and the Spirit is not the Son. It's important also to see that each one of the beings of the Godhead, if we can use that language, plays a unique role in our salvation. Williamson, in his exposition of the Shorter Catechism, which is the mother of our Baptist catechism, says, the only redeemer of God's elect is Jesus Christ. And this is true because he accomplishes our redemption in all his messianic work as prophet, priest, and king. It is also true because he applies this redemption to his elect by the operation of the Holy Spirit. Our salvation is, in other words, the consequence of the mighty power and grace of the three persons of the Godhead and not Jesus Christ alone. Questions 32 and 33. begin to expound the several components of man's salvation based on the accomplishment of Christ's redemption on the cross. Question 32 is somewhat of a general statement, and question 33 begins to describe the particulars of our salvation. Our catechism shows this process begins and ends with the sovereign, unaided, irresistible work of God. This is referred to as the order of salvation. We see it in the London Baptist Confession in chapters 10 through 13 and in the Baptist Catechism loosely presented in questions 34 through 41. Many theologians, for the sake of understanding this work of grace, have tried to put the invisible activities of our salvation in some kind of order. Bavinck has a tome on the subject in his volumes. John Murray in his beautiful study of the atonement, Redemption Accomplished and Applied, has the order described like this, calling, regeneration, justification, adoption, sanctification, and glorification. And he says each step is distinct and cannot be defined in terms of the other. But we should point out that it is all one total work, which is once begun is effectively and definitely finished by the work of God. As Paul said, for I'm convinced or I'm confident that this very work, this very thing which has began I'll get this right. For I am confident of this very thing, that he who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Jesus Christ. Philippians 1.6. So we have a five point outline. And that is redemption is a supernatural work. Redemption is purchased by Christ. Redemption is applied by the Holy Spirit. Redemption unites us to Christ, and redemption begins with the preaching of God's Word, or begins with preaching. And I'll try to repeat those, just like our pastor does so effectively when he preaches. So the answer to question 32 says, we are made partakers of the redemption purchased by Christ by the effectual application of it by the Holy Spirit. And this is not the effectual calling, which I figured out about halfway through working on this, so I took all that and pushed it aside for John to do next week. But, One can't be redeemed apart from being partakers of the redemption purchased by the blood of Christ. Question 32 relates to chapter 14 of our London Baptist Catechism, as well as chapter 10, where it says in 14, the grace of faith whereby the elect are enabled to believe to the saving of their souls is the work of the Spirit in their hearts. It is the Holy Spirit who effectually applies the redemption of Christ to us. First note that we are made partakers. It is not our work. It is done for us and in us, but not by us. Salvation is initiated by God. It's a supernatural work. And John, Well, it's a supernatural work because we are helpless. It has to be done for us. John 3, 5, and 6 tells us that Nicodemus came to Christ and while he was jibber-jabbering, Christ cuts right to the point and answers the real need of his soul. And his need is the same as our need. How can I, who am unholy, live with a God who is holy, holy, holy? And Jesus told Nicodemus, You must be born again. You must be made anew, born of the spirit. Jesus answered, truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born of the water and the spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of flesh is flesh, and that which is born of spirit is spirit. Now I was present at my natural birth, but I had nothing to do with it. It was happening to me, but not by me. and entering the kingdom of God is synonymous with being in the presence of a holy God who cannot tolerate evil for a minute. Some great change is required for us to be in the presence of God, to enter into God's presence, to be there and not be destroyed like that, wait, like that, means that some radical thing has happened. We must be made new. Murray, as well as our catechism, rightly connects entering the kingdom of God with the application of Christ's redemption. Our Lord indicates that apart from the new birth, regeneration, there cannot be any seeing or entering into the kingdom of God. Similarly, 1 John 3.9, the same John, writes, no one who is born of God practices sin. Because his seed abides in him, he cannot sin because he is born of God. Now, of course, John is not saying that anyone who is a believer will never sin, but that sin does not control the life of the one who trusts in God because he is born of God. He is a new creation. We were passive. We were not seeking after God. when he did this, but God opened our eyes to see the need of him by the activity of the Holy Spirit applying redemption to us. It's a supernatural work because we are dead. The gospel says that God must do a great work in man, a work that he can't do for himself. The gospel says that he must be born again, he must be regenerated. Now that is very different than the gospel taught by the devil, the siege of which he replants generation after generation, the fruit of which is the same heresy under different names, and typically it always involves that Christ is not really divine, and that he did not atone for the sins of the elect, and that man is either fully capable of his own renewal, or he partially participates in his salvation, because evidently God is not up to the task. Well, again... G.I.A. Williamson calls this a naturalistic religion. He says, we say naturalistic because what is needed by those who hold to these views is this. There is no need for the supernatural or miraculous. And when one subtracts from the gospel the doctrine of Christ's virgin birth or bodily resurrection, et cetera, all that is left is a mere human Jesus who sets an example for others. And whether it is Pelagius, in the 4th century, or the Roman Catholic Church starting probably as far back as the 6th or 8th century, or Arminius in the 16th century, or secular humanism, today the Bible condemns all man-centered gospels. They are non-gospels. The prophet preached that salvation is from God. Jonah, when he graduated from fish school, said salvation is from God. The apostles preach salvation is from God alone through the blood of Jesus Christ alone, applied by faith alone through the power of the Holy Spirit. There can be no cooperation between God and the spiritually dead sinner in his salvation. The one whom Christ saves is not resuscitated. He's not even pulled out of a situation where he's drowning. Now, as our brother R.C. Sproul, may he rest in the glory of Jesus' arms, said, know the dead sinner is a rotten corpse at the bottom of the ocean, and God drags him up out of that, sets him on the shore, and breathes new life into him. That is an accurate representation of our atonement. Redemption is a supernatural work. Next, redemption is purchased by Christ. All that was necessary for the redemption was accomplished by Christ, who alone meets the requirements of the covenant promise first spoken to Adam. Christ did the work and earned for us a right standing with God. Titus 3.5 says, He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us richly through Christ Jesus. Christ, in His act of obedience, fulfills all the righteous requirements that God's law requires fulfilled them on our behalf. He fully obeyed the ceremonial laws under the covenant which he was born, fulfilled the promises of the Abrahamic covenant as the Messiah descended from Abraham. He fulfills all love and good deeds required by the Holy Spirit because he loved God with all his heart all the time. It's not enough not to sin, of course, boys and girls remember, it's not enough not to sin, but we must do good. We must love our neighbor as ourselves. We must look to the interests of others and not merely our own interests. We must consider others better than ourselves. All these are required of God if we are to be right with God. Obeying the positive commands is as necessary to be accepted in the presence of God as not transgressing the forbidden commandments. But we can't do it. We cannot do what Christ did. We've already sinned, and if we try even for a moment to do all the good that God requires, we'll fall short. But Paul says, in the fullness of time, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, so that he might redeem those who are under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons." Galatians 4, 4 and 5. the things that were necessary. He was a real historic person as we learned last week and in the week before in the offices of Christ Jesus in his humiliation. He was a real human. This is a real event that took place in time and space. He was the one who did everything necessary to fulfill the law's demands, to please the Father and establish righteousness for us as the second Adam. Behold my servant whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom my soul delights. I have put my spirit upon him. He will bring forth justice to the nations. Isaiah prophesied of our Savior Jesus. Also, redemption is accomplished by Christ through his passive obedience, through the atonement, meaning he became our substitute to bear our sins. Our redemption is bought by the blood of Christ. Our sin is serious. Our sin is a bloody, messy affair. His bloody death is not an object lesson to tell us how bad sin is, but it is the cost of sin itself, blood. It is by his blood that our sins are washed away. Blood was the price of our atonement. And Hebrew says, and not through the blood of bulls and goats and calves, but through his own blood, he entered into the holy place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. It is the blood of the sinless man. He is the unblemished lamb of God, the spotless lamb. In the Old Testament, people would have understood that picture, that only one without sin can atone for sin, and yet he had to be a man in order to take the place of guilty sinners. And this way is exclusive. He does not allow any other means of atonement save his son, Jesus Christ, for no man can lay any other foundation on which is laid which is Christ Jesus. No, for no man can lay a foundation other than the one which is laid, which is Christ Jesus. 1 Corinthians 3, 11. The second person of the Trinity, the eternal Son, begotten, not made. He loved the Father from all eternity, and the Father loved him. The atonement is not some abstract, distant, hypothetical matter between the father and the son. Though in his deity, the son cannot suffer, and God is without passions, yet the son's suffering in his humanity is real and intense and beyond anything that we can comprehend because he suffered the wrath of God. And yet God's love is true love, and his anger is true anger, his anger with sin. And God's wrath was really satisfied and it will only be satisfied in one of two ways. It's either satisfied through the just execution of his wrath on the sinner or it has already been executed upon the son as the willing substitute. There's no other way. There is only Christ or men must bear their own sin. And God's love, Israel, and His love is for you if you come and repent, if you come to Him for mercy. He shows His love for the lost and broken sinners by sending His dear Son to the cross. If there was a better way, if there was a more wise way, if there was a more loving and just and good way, he would have done it. He's God. He makes the right decision. There was no better way. There was no other way. And if you would prefer God accept your religious efforts over his own wisdom and love, then you are deserving of what you will get. The response that you will get at the judgment seat is condemnation. Because all judgment has been given to the Son. And this is the Son's suffering that you are willingly setting aside. You regarded it as unworthy. You're trampling it under feet. You've scoffed at God's love. And the time for mercy will have been passed. Don't look for any other redemption than that which Christ purchased. Christ purchased our redemption. Our redemption is a supernatural activity. The redemption was paid by Christ. And thirdly, the redemption is applied by the Holy Spirit. And what does it mean he applies redemption? It means the merit of the good accomplished by Christ and the penalty of the sin paid for by Christ is applied to us. God reckons it to our account, but how does it become ours? I think this is what is in view here in question 33. It involves regeneration. It's still a general statement about how sinful man acquires an interest in Christ but it assumes the effectual call that is actually talked about in 34. In 33, we see that the Holy Spirit works faith in us. Those of us who believe, we may think we believed God's word, and we may think that we exercised faith, but the word of God says that that kind of faith is not in our toolbox. Our own experience, even our experience of coming to Christ, needs to be subjected to the scriptures and through the light of God's word. Our experience may seem like believing was our action, but now, in fact, we, and we do truly believe, we do truly choose, and yet, our experience in light of Scripture shows that it is God, who has enabled this action in us. It has to be that way. God has to do that work in us because the natural man is spiritually dead. Dead men don't think and they don't hear and they don't believe. He cannot understand what God is saying to him because these things are spiritually discerned. 1 Corinthians 2.14, which you all know, the natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit. So when the light of truth is shown, when we look at our own experience in coming to Christ, we must see that a great work of regeneration and a work by the Holy Spirit preceded it. The London Baptist Confession, chapter 14, paragraph 3 says, this faith, although it be different in degrees and may be weak and strong, yet it is in the least degree of it different from the kind or nature of it, as is all other saving grace, from the faith common grace and temporary believers, from the faith and common grace of temporary believers. What am I stumbling over there? What I'm stumbling over there is that the Spirit must do a special work. This saving faith is different than the faith that we have as we believe the things that are common to our senses. Saving faith is not temporary faith. Jesus said, if I told you earthly things and you did not believe them, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? It is not within our nature or rather it is within our nature to believe natural things, things that align with our experience, things like gravity, you know, what goes up must come down. We believe things we don't even understand that, you know, light is made of molecules that, you know, are transparent and yet give off light. We, you know, we believe things like that. You know, we even believe lies, right? In fact, we're inclined to believe lies. We're inclined to believe things that aren't true. It seems that it's easier to believe things that aren't true than it is to believe things that are true. So we believe many things. but we cannot believe God's word or know true truth without the work of the Holy Spirit. That's what the word of God tells us. The faith to believe the gospel is no longer part of our being after the fall, okay? The ability to believe truth went down with Adam's ship. It sank in the garden and we are left broken and fallen and unable to believe what is true without the work of the Holy Spirit. The faith to believe the gospel has to be worked in us by the Holy Spirit. And this is part of what is meant in John 6, 63, where he says, it is the spirit who gives life. The flesh profits nothing. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life. Another example of this is in Acts 16.14, which we had in Sunday school last week. A woman called Lydia from the city of Thyatira, seller of purple, a worshiper of God, was listening and the Lord opened her heart to respond to the things spoken by Paul. And again, Philippians 1.29, for it has been granted to you both to believe God and to suffer for Christ's sake. And then Philippians 2.13, for it is God who works in you both to will and to work his good pleasure. And of course we all know Ephesians 2.8, for by grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves, it is a gift of God. And then from Jesus' own lips, I'm getting out the whole arsenal here. There's no arguing with this. No man can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him and I will raise him up on the last day. So, saving faith must come from a work of the Holy Spirit. It's not in your pocket. Now there are degrees of faith, our confession says. This faith, although it be different in degrees, and may be weak or strong. Matthew 6.30, Christ spoke of some who had little faith. Hebrews 5.14 speaks about Abraham not wavering in faith. So he had strong faith. Benjamin Bedom, he wrote just a wonderful scriptural exposition of the Baptist Catechism. Just asks questions, answers it with scripture. Boom, boom, boom. And he says, is the same measure of faith bestowed on everyone, and then answers it with Ephesians 4, 7. But to each one of us, grace was given in accordance to the measure of Christ's gift. Then in Pilgrim's Progress, you must remember little faith, right? How I relate to him, sorry to say. And he warns his companions, he says, I won't be able to keep pace with you, and I'm probably gonna be high maintenance. That's the paraphrased version. But they put up with his company gladly. And when the time came for him to cross the river Jordan, the water was low and he crossed easily. And he made heaven safely. So saving faith, whether it's small or great, is effective. It's efficacious. Redemption is a supernatural work. Redemption was paid for by Christ, redemption is applied by the Holy Spirit, and then redemption unites us with Christ. Believers are united with Christ. Jesus prays as our mediator, going before the cross, as John preached from just this morning in 1723, he says, you know, Christ is in us, and the Father, or, You know, Christ is in us, and the Father is in Christ, and there's perfect unity. You know, Paul tells us that we are all one body in Christ, and we are one spirit with him, which should drive our purity and restrain our sinful desires in 1 Corinthians 6, 15 through 17. Another way that we are united in Christ is in the church. which he calls his body. He is the head of the church, and in his mediatorial work, he represents all believers. And we are not won by a creed or an earthly system, as useful as those things are, but we are won by being united to the head, Jesus Christ. Bavinck says the oneness of all churches does not come into being and then he uses that Latin word I can't pronounce, by the establishment of a creed, a church order, or a synodical system, neither is the church as an association or individual persons, but first became believers from the church and subsequently united themselves. Oh, I made a mess of that, anyway. But it is an organism in which the whole exists prior to the parts. Its unity precedes the plurality of the local churches and rests in Christ. It is he who, in his continuing mediatorial work in the state of exaltation, joins his churches together and builds them up from within himself as a head. He gathers and governs it, always remaining with it. It is most intimately connected to it and he dwells in it by his Spirit. There is great unity in the church because we are in Christ, the church is Christ's body. And Paul calls this He calls this bond, or he also calls the bond of a man and a woman who are believers in Christ, he compares that to the bond that Christ has with his church. He says it's a great mystery that the love Christ has for his bride and the great desire that he has for it to present her to himself without blemish is this great unity that we have. a man and his wife, Christ and the church. It is a beautiful picture of this bond that we have, and we see that in Ephesians 5, 32. And then this bond that he has with his bride is unbreakable. It is eternal, and we see that in Hosea 2, 19. Redemption is a supernatural work. Redemption was paid for by Christ. Redemption is applied to us by the Holy Spirit. Redemption unites us with Christ. There's certainly so much more that we could say there. But then redemption begins with preaching God's word. And this great redemption has been the centerpiece of all human history. and it has come about by the sure promise of God founded on his scriptures that contain the truth and the character and the revelation of God. Paul states in Romans chapter 10 that God has decreed that hearing and believing the gospel is the process and that preaching is mandatory. And Bavinck shows that the necessary link from preaching God's word through the work of the Holy Spirit quickening the soul and applying the message until final glorification of God's people and with Christ is a continuous chain of power and grace. And as much as all these benefits of Christ are not accidentally aggregate, but organically interconnected, the Holy Spirit distributed them in a certain order. Those who believe will be saved, through regeneration, or regeneration is necessary for us to enter the kingdom of God. Without faith, it is impossible to please God. Without holiness, no one will see God. Those who persevere to the end will be saved. One cannot obtain the ensuing benefits without having received the preceding ones. Calling, the preaching of the gospel, therefore precedes all the other benefits. For as a rule, the Holy Spirit binds himself to the word that is preached. That calling, however, serves not only at the start to invite non-believers to faith and repentance, but also to admonish and warn, to teach and to lead believers permanently. It begins with the preaching of the gospel. All our needs are met in the gospel. All our praise and gratitude flows out from the gospel. Sinners need to hear the gospel. Christians need to hear the gospel. The communion table is an object lesson of the gospel. And our pulpit, until this moment, is front and center, showing us that the scripture and preaching is paramount. prime, the work of the Spirit begins that work of redemption in the elect person through preaching the word. and pursues him with irresistible love, regenerates his dead soul, working faith in him to continue to minister to him and intercede as the Spirit of Jesus, the Holy Spirit is also referred to as the Spirit of Jesus in that sense, comforts us, teaches us, and will deliver us over the Jordan River into the presence of Christ himself. but do you know something of this inward work of the Holy Spirit? If a profound sense of sin or even despair of soul, it could be that the Spirit is making you sensible to your sin. Sometimes it may be accompanied with remorse over sin. It will definitely produce faith in Christ, always faith in Christ and believing the Word of God. The Messiah of the Jews, who is the Savior of both Jew and Gentile, he must be the one that we come to. He commands us to repent. He commands us to come regardless of how you feel. If you don't have any great sense of sin and remorse, he still commands you to come to Christ and calling on Christ by faith, the power of the Holy Spirit is again at work. And what confidence we should have in Christ in times of trouble, when we fail or when we don't know what we should do. We always know that God has begun a good work and that he will complete it. But we're also cautioned that we should not be negligent. We should not neglect the calling that we have responded to. We are not free to presume upon the grace of God. but we must make our calling in election sure as Peter warns us to do. Let's pray. Dear Father in heaven, we thank you for the opportunity to learn more about our salvation through our catechism, to examine the steps by which the Holy Spirit convicts us and works faith within us. We pray, God, that you would be with us as we seek you and pray to you now. We pray that You would hear us not because of anything within ourselves, but because of your son, Jesus, who pleased you in all things, and who has become our atonement through his life and death and resurrection. We pray, Lord, that you would bless the prayer meeting to follow, and we pray this in the name of Jesus Christ, our Savior, amen.