Well, let's be turning in our Bibles to Romans chapter 4 as we continue our series of messages from this wonderful and just glorious letter that the Holy Spirit gave to us through Paul. Romans chapter 4. And let's pray together and ask God's blessing on the hearing and the preaching of the Word. Shall we pray? Our gracious Father, we thank you that you have given to us the Holy Spirit to guide us into all truth and that your Holy Spirit is able to make the Word alive and understandable and real to us. We thank You, Father, that the Holy Spirit is able to convict and comfort and encourage and strengthen us in every situation that we are in, doing for us and working in us what is Your good pleasure. Father, I pray that You would give us direction and that Christ would be glorified and that sinners would be saved. Amen. My text this morning is three verses near the end of the chapter 22, 23, and 24. As we continue to work our way through this chapter, I'm going to read a larger section than just those three verses to help include those of you that are visiting here in the context of where we have been so far, and also to reinforce the theme of this chapter. So let's go back to verse 13, where my Bible has as a heading for this last half of the chapter, the promise is granted through faith. Verse 13, for the promise that he would be the heir of the world was not to Abraham or to his seed through the law, but through the righteousness of faith. For if those who are of the law are heirs, faith is made void and the promise made of no effect, because the law brings about wrath. For where there is no law, there is no transgression. Therefore, it is of faith that it might be according to grace. so that the promise might be sure to all the seed, not only to those who are of the law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all. Parentheses, as it is written. I've made you a father of many nations. Backing up. Who is the father of us all in the presence of him whom he believed, God, who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did, who, contrary to hope, in hope believed, so that he became the father of many nations, according to what was spoken, so shall your descendants be. and not being weak in faith, he did not consider his own body already dead, since he was about a hundred years old, and the deadness of Sarah's womb. He did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully convinced that what he had promised he was also able to perform. And therefore it was accounted to him for righteousness. Now it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him, but also for us. It shall be imputed to us who believe in him who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead. He was delivered up because of our offenses and was raised because of our justification. I started my preparation for teaching the end of this chapter thinking that I was going to have a two-part sermon One part, just finishing up Paul's comments here concerning faith and the fact that righteousness is imputed to us by faith or through faith. And my second point was going to be the section there, verse 25, talking about the two pillars of our salvation. but I soon realized that unless I went with what Jake mentioned and did the event thing rather than the time thing, that there was no way to cover both of these sections at one time. So I gave that up and I'm simply going to be preaching on one subject on these three verses under the title that the promise still comes through faith, the promises through faith, that righteousness is imputed through faith, that salvation does not come to us in a different way than what it came to Abraham. And Paul does a wonderful thing here as he's addressing the believers at Rome, many of them were believing Jews, in his argument, he says let's talk to Abraham about this, let's bring Abraham in and let's examine how it was that Abraham was justified and we'll answer the question of justification by studying the case history of Abraham. And so this morning we are going to look at this matter of justification or imputation through faith in Jesus Christ. Salvation does not come to us through different means than what it came to Abraham. Now there are certain elements When we think about Abraham and then we move on to Paul, we move on to the Romans, we move on to us, there are certain circumstances that are different. But fundamentally and essentially, salvation for Abraham and salvation for you and I is the same. that there's not two ways of salvation or an old way and a new way. It's one way of salvation and salvation was always through faith in the work that God has done and never in any reliance upon the work that we do. The paradigm for salvation is the same for Abraham and all of Abraham's believing children. which we are if we believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and there is a difference in matters of time and events and circumstances and the amount of revelation that was given there are some of those differences but there is no difference in the fundamental issue of salvation and Paul makes this exceedingly clear when he is presenting this truth he brings Abraham into the picture and said we're going to settle this argument once for all by an examination of the faith of Abraham. You know Salvation for Paul came in one way. Salvation for Peter came maybe in some other circumstances. You know, for Paul it was, you know, in a moment, at a certain spot on the road, you know, in a very dramatic way. We know that that is when Paul experienced the new birth. But for Peter, when did it happen for Peter? Well, we don't know. Was it when he was called? Was it when he confessed that we know that you're the Christ? Was it after the resurrection when Christ restored him to faith? Was it the day of Pentecost? We don't know for certain but it was the same salvation for both. The salvation that Paul experienced was not different in essence from the salvation that Peter enjoyed. And so we believe in God as Abraham believed in God and we're justified as he was. And I want to make that clear as we work through these three verses. I want to show you four things here this morning in this short text. Number one, Abraham like us believed in the person of God and underline the word person because there's going to be a parallel word in each of the other three statements. Number one, Abraham, like us, believed in the person of God. Number two, Abraham, like us, believed in the power of God. Number three, Abraham, like us, believed in the promises of God. And then number four, Abraham, like us, received and imputed righteousness from God. That's the closest that I could get the letter P to the beginning of the word. And so if you can do better than that and move it front two spaces help me out afterwards. And so we are we're finishing up this study on on faith as being the way through which we receive the righteousness of God. In my last message I gave you seven points and this morning I give you four more to finish up this study. So let's walk our way through these four statements from our text. Number one, Abraham like us believed in the person of God. and I emphasize the word person that God was not an idea to Abraham, God was not a force to Abraham, God was a person to Abraham. What does verse 24 say? That for us also Abraham, like us, Abraham believed in God, for us also, and it shall be imputed to us also, who believe in, in what's the next word? Who believe in what? Him, who believe in him. For Abraham it was belief in him, and for us it is belief in him. We believe in Him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. Why bring this up? Well, because there's a lot of people that think they're saved by having faith in faith. And we don't have faith in faith. We have faith in God. Our faith is in a person. Our faith is in God himself. We're not saved just by believing hard enough, and sometimes we hear that, well, I have strong faith. Well, I'm sorry, but it's not the answer. You having strong faith is not the answer. I want to know what is the object of your faith. I want to know what it is that your faith is in. Is it faith in you? Is it faith in tradition? Is it faith in good circumstance? Is it faith that's connected to a checkbook or a position? What is your faith in? And so being strong in faith, that by itself is not nearly enough to bring us into union with Christ. And these kind of individuals think that their faith saves them. And they may even call themselves, or we may refer to individuals as people of faith. But believing doesn't make anyone saved. Believing in itself does not make anyone safe and secure. Did your faith die for you? Did your faith lie in the tomb for you? Did your faith rise from the dead for you? No, our faith did not ascend into heaven for us. Our faith does not intercede before the Father for us. Jesus, the Son of God, is the one who did this for us. And our faith must be in Jesus Christ, must be in Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Abraham's faith was not in Abraham. Abraham's faith was focused away from himself. It was not an inward-looking attitude. It was not Abraham thinking that, I, Abraham, am a man of great trust and great confidence in me. No. He believed in him who was able to raise Isaac from the dead, and he believed in him who was able to raise Abraham from the dead and he believed in him who was able to raise Sarah from the dead in a figurative sense in giving them, him and his wife, the promised son. And so we start here. This is a fundamental issue. That we believe in the same God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. We look away from ourselves. Verse 17, the middle section, that we believe in the presence of Him. whom he believed, God, Abraham believed in God, we believe in God. One of the questions I asked some of the young people that asked for baptism is, you know, what's the object of your faith? Now, they haven't been down the road maybe as far as you have, but they gave the right answer. They said, our faith is in Jesus Christ. That was their uniform testimony when I asked them, in what are you trusting in this moment? And I tell you young men and young ladies, don't ever move from that. You're never going to mature out of that. You're never going to grow up out of that. That from the beginning to the end, we believe in the person. We believe in a in God. We believe in the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. We believe in Jesus Christ. We believe in the Holy Spirit of God. And some of you may have a bit of a problem right here in this point that you're looking inward. You're looking within yourself for your consolation and your comfort and your strength. And our humanistic society urges us to do that. You know, look within and cultivate within and have self-confidence. I say to you that self-confidence is not going to bring you safe home to glory. It is confidence in another. It's a confidence in the person of our triune God. You say you have faith. You say you trust. But is your faith in faith? You know, there's a bit of really bad theology in Maria's song, I Have Confidence. You know, she sang that song, I believe, on the way to the captain's house to be the maid there in that house for those children. You know the song, and she was frightened out of her wits. And as she went, she reminded herself to have confidence in herself. And she concludes with this double line, I have confidence in confidence alone, besides what you see, I have confidence in me. That may make a good movie, but that's an awfully poor sermon. That's bad doctrine. Now, I don't care if you sing that song, but I sure hope that you don't bring it anywhere close to the confidence that you should have in Jesus Christ alone. Last night Miriam and I were looking at just a few clips where Dr. Albert Moeller was being interviewed by CNN and there were in those interviews there's always an antagonist and protagonist and then the news reporter and the one who was defending homosexuality was saying just can't you just let people you know have the kind of faith they want and what kind of God they want and just leave them alone preacher can't you just leave them alone and if they want to believe in this God or that God and no I can't because there is salvation in no other no other than Jesus Christ alone. And so there is a growing notion that as long as you are sincere in faith or sincere in religion that everything's cool. It's not cool. It's damning. It's a damning delusion. It is crucial, it's critical that you can be sincere and be sincerely lost at the same time. And so we see in Romans chapter 4 that Abraham believed in the person of God. Number two, Abraham, like us, believed in the power of God. He not only believed in the person of God, but the person, the God he knew was a God of power. Look at the end of 17. The God he believed in is one who gives life to the dead. At the end of the chapter that's called resurrection, isn't it? That's power, that's resurrection power that Abraham, Abraham's God, had the ability and had the power to raise things and people from the dead. He was not only the one who is the resurrection, he also calls those things which do not exist as though they did. What's that? That's creation. So God is not only the creator but he is the resurrection. He is the one who raises from the dead. He is the Almighty. He is the creator. He is the resurrection. I'm not sure who it was that read from Hebrews chapter 11 this morning, but if they would have read one more verse, they would have come to verse 19. And what was Abraham thinking whenever he took Isaac, his only son, his promised son, up there to the mountain to kill him? What was he thinking? Did he have any idea what God was going to do? Well, if you read in Genesis, the answer is not given. But if you read in Hebrews, we know what he was thinking. He had just figured that God was going to let him offer his son in obedience to the commandment. I'm going to do it. And then when I'm done, God's going to raise him from the dead. And that's given to us in Hebrews 11. See, Abraham knew something about the God that he believed in. He was a powerful God. He was a resurrection power God. He was a creator God. And he had this confidence in the power of God. And as that lovely verse says, he concluded that God would raise Isaac up. He had confidence in God because the God who covenanted with him, the God who spoke to him, had power to raise the dead. You know that wasn't too hard of a stretch for Abraham to reach that because in order for Isaac to be even born, there had to be two resurrections already. His own body was as good as dead, and Sarah's womb was dead, and so if someone can do two resurrections, why not three? Let's just go ahead and make it another. And so he believed in the power of God. We're going to, in our next sermon, we're going to focus on that as we look at verse 25. But we too, we believe our faith is in God who raised Jesus from the dead. You know, that's an historic fact. That's not fancy and imagination. Jesus Christ really died. He was buried. He was in tomb and God raised him up. That's the God that I believe in. I believe in the God that raised Jesus Christ up from the dead. And I believe in God that he is going to do that for me as well. And that he has done that. And I have already had part in the resurrection and the life. Our God is a God of great power. He is the Almighty God. Number three. Abraham, like us, believed in the promises of God. So he believed in the person of God. He was in the person. He was in God. He was in God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Abraham believed in the power of God. That his God was not a myth. His God was not a fancy. His God was a powerful, creating, resurrection God, and then number three, Abraham believed the promises of God. My point is here that God is a speaking God, and I think it would be hard for me to overemphasize this. I think this is much more crucial than what we may think. Our God is a speaking God. He is a God that spoke forth promises he declared promises he has given a message and of course if we go back and we came through the study of Genesis several months ago in our Wednesday night and did you notice how many times that the God spoke to Abraham You know, we think that God came and visited this pagan in the land of Ur who was just a grandchild of the Tower of Babel in that time of idolatry. He was a pagan. But God spoke to him. And that was a wonderful thing, you know, to have God come and speak to Abraham. If you were Abraham and you got such a promise, you would say that was a wonderful thing that God gave me this message. But God didn't stop with one time. If you keep reading, five times God came to Abraham and spoke to him and renewed the promise and extended the promise and expanded the promise. And so God spoke, he made promises to Abraham. And verse 18 refers to one of these promises. Who, contrary to hope, in hope believed so that he, Abraham, became the father of many nations according to what was what. Imagine, what was dreamed, what was No, of what was spoken. So shall your descendants be. Abraham, you're going to be a father to many nations. Now, I don't believe for a minute that that was fulfilled in Ishmael. He was not a son of promise. And I've heard people say that, yeah, Abraham was the father of many nations, you know, the Jews and the Ishmaelites. And I say, wait a minute. That's not many, you know. I wouldn't say two is many, you know. Many is many. Many is not two. But what does he, what's he mean when he says that he's a father to many nations? It means that these nations are the other sheep of John's gospel. Remember Jesus said there are other sheep that I also have them too must I bring with me? I have other sheep. He's referring to the tribes and tongues and peoples and nations and kindreds of Revelation chapter 7. These are the other nations. We're part of those of the other nations. But God spoke a promise to Abraham that in every part of the world there would be people who trusted in God, who had their sins forgiven. In verse 13, Paul says that God promised that he would be the heir of the world. That he was going to inherit the world in a glorious promise. And that promise is extended to us as well. We're heirs of the same promise. Verse 16 says, we receive that promise. The meek shall inherit the earth. And when Christ is finished conquering and putting down every rebellion, and eliminating every sin, and destroying every form of death there is, we too are going to be with Abraham, heirs of the world. When we preach the gospel, we are being used of God to extend this promise to others, even as we preach the good news to others. Verses 20, he did not waver at the promise of God. God gave a promise. He didn't waver through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God. Verse 21, and being fully convinced that what he had promised, what God had promised, God was able to perform. And so Abraham's God was a speaking God. He is a promise-making God. He's a covenant-making God. And the Christian religion, the Christian faith, is word-based. And I'm unapologetic about that. It's word-based. The Christian religion is Bible-based. Christianity is a religion that is based upon the words of God. And you know, that's so clear to us that John 1,1 begins, and the beginning was what? The Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and then God said His Word to us. Hebrews chapter 1 starts with that great beginning, that strong beginning, that God spoke, and God spoke, and God spoke, and in these last days, God spoke to us by the Word, by His Son, by the Logos. And our God is a speaking God. In any matter of faith and conduct, we should immediately find out what the word says and apply it to our lives. Young people, I'm not talking to the visiting young people. I'm sure you don't have any issues with this. We do. We're in Tennessee. but you have issues, you have decisions that you're making. Do you stop and ever wonder, you know, what has God said about this? Has God revealed anything in the word? Has God spoken concerning this? And I wonder sometimes, is that of any concern to you? And young people, as you come to faith and you begin your walk with the Lord Jesus and you are making decisions on your own and guiding your life. Don't ever, don't ever make a decision and move forward in some important part of your life until you have stopped and listened to what God has to say. Our God is a speaking God. He wants you to know. He wants you to understand. And I don't mean close your eyes and when you're half asleep try to listen to what God's saying. I'm talking about praying with your eyes open and the book open and trying to find out, you know, what does God have to say about this decision in my life? I'm a believer. I believe that God Is my Savior that He's redeemed me, that I belong to Him? I delight in His will. I trust in Him. Oh my God, what have you to say about it? Learn to do that. And then to the rest of us, we ought to be more quick whenever a subject comes up and there's a decision to be made. You know, I was blessed by what one of you said this morning, that you were in a place where a discussion was going on and the discussion led you to opening up the Word of God. Not everything was right in my upbringing but that I acknowledge was right. I had a father and a mother and my father and mother had many friends that it was almost reflexive for them to to answer the question, well, has God spoken to this matter? Has he said anything concerning this? And how would God have us to go? And what would God's word, what instruction would God's word give to us? In matters of faith and conduct, we should immediately and quickly find and apply to our life what God has already spoken and written for us. What else should determine what direction I take in my Christian life? The very word believer, and that's my favorite word for Christians, is believers. The very word believer means that something was said, right? I mean, that's the fundamental. If you use the word believer, a believer is somebody that heard something. That's the very essence of what a believer is. And so if we say we are believers at Believer's Chapel in Tullahoma, we've got to be about responding to what God has given. Keep your finger here and turn to chapter 10. I don't have much time on the clock, but just look at, it will only take a couple minutes, Romans chapter 10. Paul's talking about the need for the gospel to be spread and preached. In verse 5 we find that Paul calls attention to the fact that Moses wrote some certain things about the righteousness which is of the law and the failure of trying to receive righteousness that way. But verse 6, he says, the righteousness of faith, it does what? It speaks. Do you see that? The righteousness of faith, it speaks. It has something to say. And then we go down to verse 8, but what does it say? What is said? The word is near you, it's in your mouth and in your heart. That is the word of faith which we preach. And that word of faith is not a name and an acclaim it, but it's rather a read it and obey it. Okay, that's what the word of faith is. And then we go on that We come down to verse 11, for the scripture says, whoever believes on him will not be put to shame. There's no distinction between the Jew and the Greek for the same Lord is over, the Lord over all is rich to all who call upon him. For whoever calls in the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then shall they call on him? in whom they have not believed, or how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard, and how shall they hear without a preacher, and how shall they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, how beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace, who bring words, who bring glad tidings of good things, but they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, Lord, who has believed our words? Who's believed our report? So then faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. Abraham believed the promises that God had made. Our God is a speaking God. He has words for us. Not only is our worship words, but the God who is our God, he speaks to us through words, through the scripture. So Abraham believed in the person of God. Abraham believed in the power of God. Abraham believed in the promises of God. Now, number four. Abraham, like us, received an imputed righteousness from God. There was a righteousness imputed to Abraham that became his through faith, through belief in God. the righteousness of Jesus Christ is imputed to those who have true faith in God to those who trust him to deliver them from sin and all of the judgments of sin and again it was it was a joy on Friday evening to sit with a number of the young people and and ask them you know whether or not their their trust is what they're trusting in, what their hope is in for salvation, for forgiveness. And to have them answer crystal clear that I'm trusting in the righteousness of God that he gives to me through Jesus Christ. And my heart says, amen. Don't ever move from that. It is the righteousness that we have. It's imputed to us. It is the righteousness of another that's given to us. The last verse of John 3 says, he who believes in the Son has everlasting life. He who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him. He that believes in the Son, there's righteousness imputed to him. There's righteousness credited to him. Do you realize that in our text we have the 7th, 8th, and 9th references in this chapter to imputed righteousness. Up until verse 22 there are six earlier references that we are righteous because there's a righteousness that's given to us. And then in verses 22 and 23 and 24, three more times I'm sorry, yeah, 22, 23, and 24. In verse 22 he says it's accounted to him for righteousness. Faith is accounted to him for righteousness. Verse 23, it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him and verse 24 but also for us it shall be imputed to us who believe in him who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead three times in just three verses and I want you to get this I don't want you to be tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine, wrong doctrine. I don't want you to be tossed to and fro in your Christian faith by feelings and circumstances. I want you to be strong. I want you to be mature. I want you to be stable. There are many things that we need to do in our Christian life. I'm not devaluing the fact that there's much maturity to gain, but you're never going to get any better than this foundation is in your life. You're never going to work out the details of your life any better than what you have imputed righteousness settled in your soul. The house you build is never going to be stronger than the foundation that you're building upon. And I find a lot of people that are messing around in their lives trying to be godly people and they don't have a foundation that's worth a flip. They just don't have it. And they work and work and work and work and trying to grow their Christian life and they don't have a foundation worth putting a chicken coop on it. Because they don't understand that the foundation of our life is the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ. And that's the foundation that it all the rest rests upon. For hundreds of years the saints of God were strengthened knowing that I am righteous because the righteousness of Jesus Christ was given to me as a free gift of grace. For hundreds of years they were strengthened by that. They knew that to be true. And I thought as I was preparing, why should this be kept from us? Why shouldn't we also be comforted by this great truth? Perhaps I will stand by your bedside at the hour of your death. And I want to be able to remind you of the most comforting words in all the world at that time. And as you come to cross the river over which there is no bridge, I want you to be at peace. And I want to be able to remind you of something that you know to be true, that Jesus Christ is your righteousness. I want to remind you that the righteousness of Christ is already laid up for you in heaven. I want to be able to remind you that the promise is sure and certain, not because of the strength of your faith, but because of the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ. Maybe the real reason why I want you to know this is because by the looks of things, I'm older than a lot of you here. I want you to be able to say that to me in that day. I want you to be able to remind me that Philip, keep in mind, In this hour, as you cross this river, even though your faith is fragile, you have a righteousness laid up for you that's plenty and sure. Please remind me of this when I come to that river. Children, I have an example for you. I seldom do this. But I have here a little sign that says, Jesus Christ. And I have one here that says, you. And I wanted this to be higher, but I don't know how to do it. I want to keep it simple. So let's just, instead of, you were afraid, weren't you, that I was going to make you come sit on the chairs. But let's just illustrate this imputed righteousness before we move on. Two different individuals. two very different individuals, and one of these individuals has a life that's quite pathetic and quite ruined. That's a shirt worth dying for, isn't it, right there. You guys that go to the shopping mall and get yourself nice clothes, designer clothes, I got some there for you. I designed that myself and my company produced it this morning or yesterday. That's pretty good. Pretty good for you, isn't it? Pretty true, isn't it? You know? A little envy and stealing and lying and hatred and idolatry and pride and there's stuff on the back side that you don't see. Then I have another shirt here as well. This is the shirt that Well, it goes to Jesus Christ. I thought of this illustration because my family knows that I like white shirts. So there we have two individuals, two examples. One of them is ruined by rottenness. Born rotten, right? Born rotten. Ruined by rottenness. And the other is spotless, holy and pure. You know, in a couple of chapters, Philip is going to show us in Exodus that the lamb, the Passover lamb was to be separated, taken out of the flock on the 10th day and kept until the 14th day. Why? Because the lamb was to be examined, to be shown that it was a perfect lamb. And that's Jesus Christ. That's this one here, right? That's this one here. And here's you. Here's me. What is imputed righteousness? And I've got to say this. I've got to get this off my heart. You need more than an example. You need more than a good example. You know, I was raised that Jesus is a good example. And praise God, He is a good example. But Jesus only makes the shirt worse, doesn't He? You know, in comparison, you know, if you really want to encourage yourself, discover something as pure and spotless as Jesus Christ. We need more than an example. An example is not just going to cut it. This shirt doesn't need an example. This individual, this you, needs imputed righteousness. You need the righteousness of Jesus Christ given to you by grace. That's what you need. And then, as Philip read from 2 Corinthians 5.21, Our sin was put upon Christ. And He went to the cross, didn't He? To bear our sin away. See, it's double imputation. And praise God, it's double imputation. It must be or there's no salvation. There's no hope. And I know that all illustrations break down. And don't take it any further than what you ought. But the righteousness of Christ is imputed to us by faith. When we believe, when we put our trust in Jesus Christ, He takes our sin, all our sin, upon His own body, and He goes to the tree, and He dies there in our place, and He gives His perfect righteousness to us. And it's laid up for us. And it's secure for us. And how glorious is that? How glorious, how wonderful is that great exchange? He made God. He, God, made Him Christ who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. Do you know that our righteousness is not an improved righteousness? Now that sounds close to imputed, but it's a world of difference. It's not an improved righteousness, it's an imputed righteousness. Theologians state that the righteousness that is given to us, I'm sorry, that This righteousness of Christ is ontologically different. It's of a different nature, of a different source, of a different being. It's God's righteousness. It's not a certain level of faith that we reach. It's not a certain level of growth that we grow into. It's not a certain point of development that we accomplish. Sometimes it's called an alien righteousness and that's a good term for it. It's alien in that it is not of our production. It's not from this planet. It's from another planet. It is from the heavenlies. He takes our sin and we take his righteousness. 1 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse 30. You may not realize, but Bunyan, who wrote The Pilgrim's Progress, had some years of struggle in his life as he was working through his own salvation. And he wrote that one day he discovered 1 Corinthians 1.30, where Paul says, but of him, of God, you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us. Christ Jesus became for us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. And he realized that Christ became righteousness for him. And he said as he went from that day forward, by this scripture I saw that the man Christ Jesus is my righteousness before God. Therefore from then on I lived with sweet peace with God before Christ. He says it settled the issue. You know that sounds almost like verse 1 of chapter 5 of Romans. Therefore having this Having this taken place, this justification by faith is imputed righteousness, I have peace with God. Doesn't that say it best? Because of all of chapter four, I have peace with God. Suppose you had a daughter, and I use this illustration so that I don't make you dislike me for what I said about Maria earlier. Suppose you had a daughter that wanted to go to see the Broadway production of The Sound of Music in Huntsville just a couple weeks ago. And you told her that if she gets her room cleaned up by Friday evening, she can go. You must get your room cleaned, you say to her. I've asked you many times to do it, but it's never happened. And I'm sure that doesn't apply to any girls here, does it? Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, come and go. She plans very poorly, and on Friday morning, she goes off to school, to classes, without taking care of her room. And during the day, you discover that her room looks like a burglar ransacked it. And you're disappointed, but you decide to just, she's gone, to dig in and clean up her room yourself. And you do it and you put things in order and you do whatever needs to be done in a room like that. And your daughter comes home in the afternoon realizing that she failed to do as she should have done. She thought about it during the day. She kept putting it off. She feels very terrible. And when she comes in, she comes to you and she apologizes and accepts the consequences of her failure. She says, I was wrong and I know that I don't deserve to go and that's okay. It's my fault. You might then say to her that you're going to credit her apology and her submission to her as a clean room. You told her that she must have a clean room and that she cannot go to the play. without a clean room, and that that's still the requirement. And when you say to your daughter that I credit your apology as a clean room, it's not that the apology is the clean room, nor does her apology clean the room. Her apology is not the clean room. You're not saying that somehow she cleaned the room. You're not saying any of that. You cleaned the room. It was pure grace on your part. It was of grace that she has the right to go to the play. And what you mean is this. In my way of reckoning, in my grace, her submission and her repentance connects her to the promise given for having a clean room. The clean room is her clean room. It's credited to her. And I credit her apology as a clean room. However you say it, the result is that she gets to go to the play. And Paul says it both ways here. Look in verse 22. In 22 he says, Faith is credited as righteousness and in 23 and 24 he says God credits righteousness to us through faith. And you know really an apology and submission is not very different from faith. It's actually quite a good parallel that when we What is faith in God? It is submission to God. And it is acknowledging that I'm wrong before God. That's what faith is. That's why as you read the accounts that Jason and Aaron and Nathaniel that we read on Friday, some places concerning baptism it says believe and be baptized. Other places it says repent and be baptized. and because there's not a lot of difference, you know, faith and there's not a huge difference between the two. So repentance and faith are many times quite synonymous. Abraham's faith was not a narcotic that he took to escape from reality. Faith is not the way to escape the pain of life. Karl Marx was ignorant when he said that religion is the opiate of the masses. Abraham's faith was not something that made it easier for him to live in Ur while he dreamed of pie in the sky by and by. Abraham's faith made him hit the road and he began to live in tents among felons in uncharted territory. God had come to Abraham and spoken words to him and how God spoke to him and what God said to him had the marks of divinity on it so that there could be no other response than to believe it all and move upon it. And he responded to the promise of God and lived for years waiting upon God's providence, believing God's word, trusting that what God had said was true, was trustworthy. Faith is believing the propositions of scriptures, the teaching of scripture, trusting in the person who has spoken, Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Biblical faith is not blind faith. Abraham did not close his eyes and leap into the dark. He followed a person that he came to trust. That's what his faith was. He followed a person that he came to trust, a person he came to know, a person that he knew was creator God and resurrection power God. A God who spoke to him. Think about it this way. You and a trusted friend, I hope it's a really trusted friend, are mountain climbing with all the gear and ropes and anchors and you have a rope between you and you're separated by some distance and suddenly a thick cloud moves in all around you and you cannot see. You're separated from your friend. And as soon after you're separated, you realize that the ledge that you're on is running out, that there's nowhere else to go, and you can't see, and you're in a dangerous situation, and you call out to your friend, and you hear a response. You hear a voice coming back. Then I'm down here. I'm over here. I'm here. Can you hear me?" You're separated, but you have a friend that, and you don't have anywhere to go, so you drive in an anchor, you secure the rope, and then Your friend calls to you from below, and he shouts up to you as he lightly tugs on the rope to let you know he's there. He tells you that, I'm on a wide ledge. It's below the cloud. Just go ahead and secure the rope and let yourself down over the edge. But you hesitate. You don't see the ledge that he's on. But listen to me. You know your friend. You feel the tug on the rope. You hear the voice. You hear him shouting back to you. You hear him say, I'm here. He's never let you down. Now, is taking hold of that rope and dropping down over that precipice to an unseen ledge, is that an act of blind faith? No. No, you do it in full confidence. It's not a leap in the dark. Why isn't it a leap in the dark? It's because you trust your friend. You know him. You have his word. You hear his voice. You pull the rope and he tugs back. He's never let you down in all your life. It's a very sensible and reasonable thing to go ahead and go over the edge and drop down to him. Faith in God is not irrational. It's trusting a friend who's proven himself faithful again and again and again. And you hear his voice. You feel the tug on the rope. You have confidence in Him, and I urge you this morning to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, to trust in Him, put your faith in Him. No, we don't walk by sight, but we don't walk in blindness either. We have confidence. We don't have time this morning. to go to that passage, that lovely passage where it talks about our hope and that Christ entered in behind the veil for us. And I have confidence in the finished work of Jesus Christ. Do you? Do you have confidence in the finished work of Christ? Do you have full confidence? Will you go over the edge to Him? Will you? He has a safe. and protected and gracious spot for you to welcome you to. Is trusting a God who has over and over and over again proven himself to be true, is that blind? Is that irrational? No, it's not. Let's trust him today. Let's pray. Father, we do thank you this morning that You are a trustworthy Heavenly Father, and that You speak to us. You never lie to us. We thank You, Lord, that You are able and willing to save us from our sin. We want to thank You right now for the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ that's given to us. We're unworthy of it. What love you have for us? What love Jesus has for us? And that he said to us that I'll take that dirty shirt. And I'll wear it. And I'll give you my. Spotless holy righteousness. Thank you Father for such an unspeakable gift. As we have in Jesus. Amen.