Well, we're glad to be here again tonight. It's been a joy to be here. And we've really enjoyed the fellowship and the food and the fun. It's been a really wonderful time so far. And we trust that the Lord will feed us again from his precious word tonight, that he will speak to our hearts. That's the reason we're here, is that we might hear from the Lord. And we trust that tonight the Lord will again minister to our souls. Let's read tonight a few verses from Romans chapter 4, the fourth chapter of Paul's epistle to the Romans. We're going to read towards the end of that chapter. It's speaking here of Abraham and it says in verse number 18 of Romans 4, who against hope believed in hope that he might become the father of many nations. According to that which was spoken, so shall thy seed be. And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead when he was about a hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah's womb. He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, giving glory to God. And being fully persuaded that what he had promised he was able also to perform and therefore it was imputed to him that really means it was counted to him or it was accounted to him for or credited to him for righteousness now it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him but for us also to whom it shall be imputed if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead who was delivered for, that really means because of our offences and was raised again for or because of our justification. Therefore being justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Amen. God will bless the reading of His Holy Word. Let's bow together for a word of prayer, please. Let's ask the Lord's help as we study His truth tonight. Let's all pray. Heavenly Father, we thank Thee for this gathering. We rejoice, Lord, that Thou art in the midst. We thank Thee, Lord, that we never, as believers, grow tired of the old story of Thy grace. and we would say tell me the story again Lord we thank Thee for the wonderful story I'll repeat it in glory the fact that the Lord Jesus bore our sins in His own body in the tree suffered all the wrath of God that was our due and has made us the righteousness of God in Him we thank Thee Lord for the gospel We pray that as it is proclaimed again tonight, that will give help and power from the sanctuary. Lord, may we know the drawing near of the presence of the Saviour as we study his word tonight. Lord, give clarity of thought and of speech. We pray that we all might receive with meekness the engrafted word of God. which is able even to save our souls. We pray giving thanks for all that thou hast done and all that thou wilt yet do in Jesus name. Amen. Now I have announced already last evening that it is my purpose to speak in these meetings on the subject of justification. A justification as we were reminding the children especially last night is a big word and it's found in the Bible in Romans 4 verse 25 right at the end of the verse you see there the word justification it is according to our catechism and that's a very biblical definition an act of God it is an act of God's free grace wherein he pardons all our sins and he accepts us as righteous in his sight but only for the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ imputed to us or credited to our account and received by us by faith alone. This topic of justification lies at the very heart of the Gospel message. The book of Job asks the question in chapter 25 and verse 4, how can man be just with God? And what that question really is asking is this, how can a man be right with God? How can I, as a sinner, be made right in the sight of God? How can an ungodly sinner, who is legally guilty before God and His holy law, be viewed by that same God as a legally innocent saint of God, a holy one in His courtroom? Justification is a Bible word, it is a legal word, it's a word that belongs to the courtroom. It does appear with like terms in many, many places. We looked at some of them last night in Romans 3 and verse 20. It says, therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified. in God's sight for by the law is the knowledge of sin again we've seen it here in Romans 4 25 Romans 5 verse 1 my father was converted on the 26th of February 1956 And when he gives his testimony, he always begins by quoting Romans 5 verse 1. Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. What a wonderful truth that is, of justification, being made right with God. To be justified, really, is for God to establish a sinful person in a righteous standing before Him. In our last message last night, in fact, we noted the precise meaning of justification. We said it is a legal term. It concerns our relationship to God's law. You see, the Bible teaches that we are all under a law. It is God's law. And that law condemns us. Because if we are not able to keep God's law perfectly, and we're not, then we are condemned as sinners. We are unrighteous. And when we talk about justification, It really refers to our standing before the eyes of God's law. And in ourselves, all of us, preacher included, we are guilty sinners. We're condemned. We've broken God's law. We're not able to keep it perfectly. And so we are justly condemned by God's law to suffer the penalty of the broken law. And what is that? Romans 6 verse 23, For the wages of sin is death. When you think about wages or a salary, you're talking about something that you deserve, isn't that right? It's something that you earn, hopefully. When you get your wages or your salary, you have earned it. And when God says the wages of sin is death, He means that all those that are condemned, that are guilty, that are going to a lost eternity deserve to do so. The wages of sin is death. That is the payment for sin. Spiritual death, in that our soul dies. Physical death, in every funeral, every cemetery is a testimony to that. And eternal death, also called in the Bible, the second death. But the good news of the gospel, we've been giving you the bad news there. The good news of the gospel is that guilty sinners such as you and I can be in God's courtroom legally acquitted. freed from all charges against us and not only that but counted as perfectly righteous, viewed by the Lord as those who have fulfilled every one of His demands, His laws demands in perfection. That's an amazing truth. Justification then really involves two things, it involves pardon from sin, but also what the Bible calls imputed righteousness. Now again, I know that these are terms that some may or may not be familiar with, but they're biblical terms. They are necessary for us, therefore, to consider and to define. And imputed righteousness is a very, very important doctrine in the Gospel. And what it really means is this. God views the sinner who in himself is guilty as no longer being guilty, because the guilt of his sin has been transferred to his substitute, the Lord Jesus Christ. But that sinless substitute has a righteousness, it is his holiness, his perfection, and that holiness, that perfection, that complete conformity to God's law is transferred or imputed or credited to the sinner's account. So that we are viewed in Christ as though we had completely and fully complied with every demand of God's law. See, God said, you must continue in all things that are written in the book of the law to do them. And we're not able to do that. But Christ has done that. And all who are in Christ are viewed as those that are righteous. So the term righteousness, and that's another big word. The Bible is full of big words. Righteousness is a term that is closely related to justification. You see, when we are justified, we are accounted or declared righteous before God's law. If I could try to make it as simple as I can, to be in a state of righteousness is to really be straight. That's what it means. A state of righteousness is really being straight or conforming to a standard of measurement. It is to be absolutely right in the sight of God. Not wrong, not bent out of shape, but absolutely right. It's as if someone who is a carpenter takes one of those implements with a little bubble in the middle, a level, He puts it against the wall and that bubble is exactly between the lines. That tells you that that wall is perfectly straight. Well God's standard is perfection and what God demands of us is that the bubble be right in the middle of the lines. That would be absolutely right, and of course we're not, we're absolutely wrong. Whenever we are measured against God's standard of measurement, we don't conform to it, we are unrighteous. But if I'm made or constituted a righteous man, I am put into a right standing legally before the eyes of God's law. The problem with many is that they think that they can do this on their own. Look with me at Romans chapter 10. And you'll see there that Paul is talking about his fellow countrymen, those that are of Israel, and he's really concerned for them. He says in verse 1, Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they might be saved. For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. In other words, they're sincere, but they're sincerely wrong. And I want to tell you folks, sincerity never got anybody to heaven. Sincerity is not good enough. You have to be right. It's no good someone having a sincere belief that a boat will get them from one side of the lake to the other side of the lake if the thing's full of holes. They can sincerely believe that it will take them across, but once they get out into the middle, they'll soon find out that their sincerity is misplaced. No, we have to be right. And Paul says they have a zeal of God but it's not according to knowledge. Why? Verse 3 of Romans 10. 4. They being ignorant of God's righteousness. God's right standard of rectitude and going about to establish their own righteousness. have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God, for Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth. We've said before, last night in fact, that God has a law, that holy law of His we are bound by, it is a perfect standard, we must keep it perfectly. And righteousness is that state of having met all the requirements of God's law. Unrighteousness, on the other hand, is the state we're in when we fail to meet all of its requirements. That's really what Romans 3 verse 10 is talking about when it says, as it is written, there is none righteous, no not one. There's none of us that are right with God. When I ministered in Scotland in Rotherglen, the area of Glasgow, called Rotherglen. I remember going one night to a home of a dear lady and giving her an invitation to our church and it had a gospel tract inside it. And she said, son, I always like it when old ladies say that to me, it means I'm young. And she said, son, I'm already a member of a church. I taught Sunday school for 35 years. She said, I don't need your literature. I said, dear, tell me, are you saved? And you'd have thought I'd asked her how old she was or something like that. She was very indignant. I said, are you saved? Because the Bible says we must be saved. You must be born again. Oh, she said, I taught Sunday school for 35 years. I said, you could teach Sunday school for a hundred years. But if you're not looking to the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation, then you're lost. You may be religious. You may be a church going sinner, but a sinner nevertheless, and all sinners need God's salvation. People don't like that message. They don't like to hear that they are unrighteous, but that's what the Bible says. Romans 3 verse 10, there is none, and that means not one righteous. No, not one. There's not one of us that is right before God. In fact, Romans 3 verse 19 says, that we know what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. And that word guilty means subject to the judgment of God. We are subject to God's judgment. We are not righteous. We are not right with God by nature. We are unrighteous. Righteousness merits the reward of life. Unrighteousness merits the penalty of death. That's why the Bible says the wages of sin is death. How can we be justified? We are justified when God accepts us as though we have perfectly kept his law and are exempt from its penalty. But you might ask, how can that be? Well, we tried to answer that question in our second point when we dealt with the negative answer to that question. The plain method of justification, not by works. Not by works. We cannot be right with God. We cannot be justified before God. We cannot be pardoned from our sins and accounted as righteous before God by any work that we do. We sang about it a moment or two ago. Not what these hands have done can save my guilty soul. Not what this toiling flesh hath borne can make my spirit whole. Thy work alone, my Saviour, can ease this weight of sin. Thy blood alone, O Lamb of God, can make me pure within. Titus 3 verse 5 puts it like this, Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He hath saved us. Good works are the fruit and not the root of justification. Good works come after justification. They are the evidence of justification, but they are not a means to justification. We cannot be justified before God by the works of our own hands. And we see that clearly taught in Romans chapter 4 when we see from verse 5 that it says, but to him that worketh not. See, it's not of works. But believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness, even as David also." Here's an Old Testament truth. In the New Testament, "...even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man, unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works, saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin. Now that brings us to look in a greater depth at not the negative side of this, not by works, but the positive side of this truth, of the plain method of justification. It is not by works. Well then what is it? It is by grace. By free grace. The word grace is a wonderful word. Someone said grace means God's riches at Christ's expense. That's a very good definition of grace. We could also say that grace is the free unmerited, unearned, undeserved favor of Almighty God to guilty sinners. And the Bible talks about grace, in fact in Romans 3 verse 24 after telling us that we are not justified by works, it says we are justified freely by God's grace. through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. Salvation is by grace. If we had time to read Romans 5 we would see there that there are all sorts of references from verse 15 onwards especially to the free gift and to grace. Salvation is free. Vast, full and free as we sang a few minutes ago. Salvation is by justification, it is by grace that we are justified. This is God's method. Justification is an act of God's free grace towards sinners who are personally in themselves guilty and deserving of God's wrath and condemnation. There's nobody in this room tonight, myself included, who deserves heaven. But we all deserve the wrath of God. But as regards this plain method of justifying sinners, I want to point out this evening two things. First of all, I want us to think about the glory of this free justification. In another place, Paul talks about the glorious gospel of the blessed God. It's a gospel of glory. I think there's a number of reasons why the gospel is glorious. The glory of the gospel is seen in various ways. It's seen in its simplicity. I didn't say the gospel was simplistic, but it is simple. It is so simple that even the smallest child that's here can be saved through faith in Jesus Christ. The youngest child who is brought to understand his need of a Savior is able to come by the grace of God and put his trust in the Savior. The gospel is simple. That's part of its glory, its simplicity, but also its mystery. Because it is a great mystery to us. I can't explain it and could never try to explain it. How God could become flesh and in that flesh die for sinful men. I can't understand that. I don't understand the incarnation. How it is that God who is infinite, eternal and unchangeable in his being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness and truth could be described in scripture as dwelling in a body. For it says of Christ in Colossians 2 verse 9, in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. I don't understand that but I believe it. This is part of the great mystery of the gospel, but it's not only glorious in its simplicity and in its mystery, it is glorious in its ingenuity, that is, its wisdom. What a wise God is our God, He's all wise. You know that only God could ever come up with such a plan for the salvation of sinners as He has come up with? Men could never have thought of it. It is God's great device, because you have a gospel that on one hand fully preserves God's character as holy, just, righteous, who can't ignore any breach of His law, and yet at the same time, wonderfully reveals His love and His mercy and His free grace toward the undeserving and the ill-deserving. Such a glorious gospel is the gospel of a free justification upon the merits of Jesus Christ alone received by faith. Listen to Romans 3 verse 26. To declare I say at this time His righteousness speaking about God that He might be just and He is a just God and yet at the same time the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. God is a righteous God. He is a holy God. One of his perfections, one of his attributes is righteousness. God's law is a reflection of God's character. The law is righteous, it's holy, it's just, it's good. Just like God himself. And as a righteous God, God demands a perfect conformity to His holy standard. You know, some people want to present a gospel that really isn't a gospel at all. It is a lower standard than God has established. I want you to know the gospel does not lower God's standard. It's not a case of God saying, well now, this is what my law says, you've broken my law, but I'm just going to forget all about that and I'm going to forgive you anyway. That's not the gospel. That's not what the gospel says. The gospel never says that God throws his law out. It says it doesn't matter about your law breaking, I'm just going to forget all about that. God's law is inflexible. God is just. He must visit punishment upon sin. But the wonderful truth is this. The truth of substitution of one who has that wrath of God visited upon him for sinners who will believe on him. And so God always punishes sin. But He doesn't always do it in the person of the sinner. He sometimes does it in the person of the sinner's substitute. And that's the difference between being saved and lost. Some give the impression that the gospel somehow replaced the law or somehow the gospel presents a less rigid way to get to God that is not so that is not so the Lord Jesus never talked about God lowering the standard in fact in Matthew chapter 5 verse 17 the Lord Jesus said this think not that I am come to destroy the law or the prophets I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For verily I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law till all be fulfilled. So it is wrong to think that the law and the gospel are mutually exclusive. They're not. The gospel is a gospel that upholds the law of God. It fulfills the law of God. And therefore we can say in Christ that the law is fulfilled for our justification by his life and his death. Remember that the Lord Jesus said to one who asked him the question, which was the greatest commandment? Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy mind. That's the first and great commandment, and the second is like unto it. Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. The Lord upheld the law. Now God demands the perfect fulfilment of both the letter and the spirit of his moral law. We can't even almost perfectly fulfil it, let alone fulfil it in total perfection. But yet God must be true to himself, he must be true to his law. He can't set it aside, he can't lessen its demands. Justice demands righteousness. A perfect conformity to the perfect standard. That's the teaching of both the Old and the New Testaments. In fact, when Paul quoted in Galatians 3 and verse 10 this great statement It is written, cursed is everyone that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them. He was actually quoting from Deuteronomy 27 verse 26. What does God say? Cursed is everyone that continues not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them. You might say, oh, we're lost then. How are we going to be saved if that's the case? I thought the Lord might grade us on the curve, as I talked about last night. After all, don't we sometimes do that with our children? We shouldn't, but maybe sometimes we do. Well, they tried their best. Little Johnny or Little Mary, or whatever their name is, they really tried hard, didn't they? I mean, they really put the effort in. And, well, we can be content with their grades if they did their very best. Now of course, in a sense that's a good thing. You can be content with your child's grades in school if he or she did their very best. But do you know what the problem is? Where God is concerned, our best isn't good enough. You can try your best, but it's not good enough when it comes to God's law. The only grade that God accepts is 100% perfection. James 2 verse 10, Whoso shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. Well then what hope is there for any of us? Here's the answer. Our only hope is in God's grace and mercy. But God is just. He can't set aside all the legal requirements. He will not acquit the wicked. True. and yet the wonderful story is this he devised a method whereby he could be just and at the same time a justifier grace devised a way for God to declare sinners righteous though they were personally unrighteous and deserving of his punishment and this is the glory of the gospel of justification let me quote to you from Psalm 85 look at it for a moment This is a beautiful psalm that speaks of revival. Perhaps we're familiar with that text, verse 6, Will thou not revive us again, that thy people may rejoice in thee? But if you look at verses 10 and 11, there's a wonderful truth here. Psalm 85, verse 10. Mercy and truth are met together. That's justification. You have God's truth. His inflexible law. It won't allow you to get away with 99.999% truth. But yet, mercy and truth are met together. Righteousness and peace have kissed each other. You have God's inflexible justice and righteousness on the one hand. You have peace, the sinner's peace on the other hand. They've kissed each other. And verse 11 says, truth shall spring out of the earth and righteousness shall look down from heaven. And when you think about it, these verses are talking about the work of Christ. Because at the cross, mercy and truth are met together. At the cross, righteousness, perfect righteousness and the peace of sinners have kissed each other. And the one who said, I am the way, the truth and the life. is the one who came from the grave. Truth shall spring out of the earth. And righteousness, that's Christ. He is our righteousness. Jehovah saith, Can you? The Lord our righteousness. Righteousness shall look down from heaven. How? Because He's ascended as well as risen. Here's the cross in verse 10. Here's the resurrection. And here is the ascension in verse 11. It's all here. The gospel right here. And it says in verse 12, Yea, the Lord shall give that which is good on the basis of the work of Christ. You and I tonight require a righteousness that's outside of ourselves. We can't get to God by our own works. The great George Whitefield, the evangelist, was wont to say that you might as well try to climb to heaven on a rope made out of sand. as to get to heaven by your own good works. You can't do it. There is none righteous. And we require a righteousness that is therefore outside of ourselves. What do we need? We need Christ. We need Christ. Left before a judge of inflexible justice in myself, I have no hope at all. but in the gospel God has provided me a way of escape from condemnation that is by justice being satisfied for me perfectly in the person and work of the Lord Jesus. In and through Christ God is both righteous and gracious to believing sinners. That's why he could call himself in Isaiah 45 21 a just God and a Savior. A just God and a Saviour. That is the glory of this free justification. But our second point I want us to think about is the ground of this free justification. We've hinted at it already. It's the work of Christ. When the Apostle wrote to the Philippians about the humility of Jesus he said in Philippians 2 and verse number 7 that the Lord Jesus made himself of no reputation he took upon him the form of a servant or a slave and was made in the likeness of men and being found in fashion as a man he humbled himself and became obedient unto death now think about that statement for a moment he became obedient unto death that's his life even the death of the cross that's his death and when you go back to Paul's writings in Romans in chapter 5 and verse 19 he says for as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners or constituted sinners so by the obedience of one shall many be made or constituted righteous The question is how can guilty sinners be acquitted from all charges at the bar of God and be accounted perfectly righteous when they have already sinned? How can it be? Well the glory of the Gospel of free justification is in the fact that Christ assumed all of our obligations, He bore all of our sins and their punishment in His life and in His death. He obeyed the law for us, in fact He obeyed the law as us. and he suffered the penalty of the law that we had broken which was death. You know that brings us to another interesting word that's used by Paul that we have to examine. We've talked about it in the introduction and that's the word impute or imputed. Let me just quickly show you some references to this word. In Romans 4 from verse 6 it says even as David also described it the blessedness or that means the happiness the joy, the delight of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works, saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed are the happiness of the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin. That word is also used in verse 22, in verse 23, in verse 24. Imputed, imputed, imputed. What does it mean? Well, to impute is actually a verb that's closely related to the verb to justify. And it really means to consider or reckon or to charge to an account. When you read it in the context, it makes sense. Romans 4 verse 3, Abraham believed God and it was counted unto him for righteousness. It was counted unto him. Now, when I was growing up in Northern Ireland, as you know, I know it's hard for you to believe I'm from somewhere else other than America, but I grew up in Northern Ireland, and I never played baseball in my life. I didn't know what it, well, I knew what it was, but I didn't really know the rules or anything like that. But I've since come to find out a little bit about baseball. Still can't play it, but anyway. I know that sometimes, in baseball, someone who is going to bat can have someone to be a runner for him. Isn't that right? A runner. And maybe that guy who's going to bat has hurt his leg or something so he can get a substitute, he can get a sub to be a runner for him. Now, the guy who runs, if he scores a run, he gets to the home plate, He gets a run, but it's not counted as his run, it's counted as the batter's run. Isn't that right? The guy who was at the plate, who was facing the pitcher, he's the one who gets the run, even though he actually didn't physically run to all the bases. He had a runner to do that for him. And what is that? Well, that's an instance of someone whose run is counted as somebody else's run. If I'm at the plate but I can't run and I have a runner to run for me, he's a sub. When he brings in the run, that run counts as my run. It's put to my account. It's put to my name. And that's kind of an illustration of what the Lord does in salvation. That's what imputed means. That's what having righteousness imputed to you signifies. In justification, God imputes or counts or reckons our guilt, that filthy rotten sin of ours. He imputes that to the Lord Jesus. The pure and the holy Christ who never sinned, never even thought of sin. Yet that sin was laid upon him, imputed to him, so that God would look upon him as though he were the sinner, guilty before his law. But at the same time, he reckons or counts or charges to my account the perfect holiness of the Lord Jesus, His righteousness. It becomes mine in justification. And that's what my favourite verse in all the Bible teaches. And my favourite verse, it's very hard to pick a favourite verse, you know. It really is. But I think this is my favourite verse. It's one of them. 2 Corinthians 5 verse 21. For He, God the Father, hath made Him, God the Son, Christ, to be sin for us. Who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. One preacher called that the greatest transaction of grace that had ever been made. Our sins imputed to Christ, His righteousness imputed to us. What a glorious message that is, that God could regard His holy and righteous Son, Christ, as guilty and deal with Him accordingly. while he regards me, the believing sinner, as righteous and deals with me accordingly. Believers are justified on the ground of the vicarious living and dying of the Lord Jesus. Divine justice demands the perfect satisfaction of the law. We have broken God's law however. We are unable by virtue of our fallen flesh to render the necessary obedience. to the precepts of God's law. But that's where Christ comes in. That's where the Savior comes in. If I could say it in a reverent way, He is our runner. He is our runner. He is our substitute. And Romans 8 verse 3 puts it like this, For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh. And that's not a condemnation of God's law, that's really talking of our weakness, the sinner's inability to keep the law. But God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and forcing, condemning sin in the flesh, that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh. but after the Spirit. Christ is the solution to our problem as sinners. What we could never do God has done for us in the person of His dear Son. Two great necessities He provided. On the one hand He obeyed completely the demands of the law and on the other He paid the penalty of the broken law. This is His life and His death. The hymn writer spoke about it like this, Even then shall this be all my plea, Jesus hath lived, hath died for me. And we refer to this as the doing and the dying of the Lord Jesus. Let me talk about this for a few moments. The doing and the dying of the Lord Jesus. Notice the doing of Christ. Vicarious obedience to the precept of the law. Theologians don't always put things in the simplest of terms. And I don't particularly want to be just remembered in these meetings as a theologian. But theologians sometimes, talking about the death and the life of Christ, they speak of it as the active obedience of Christ and the passive obedience of Christ. Although that's somewhat misleading, but it's a way of describing what Christ did. It refers to the righteous living of Christ on this earth, his act of obedience, his obeying God's law for us. Now that was vicarious. Now when we talk about something being vicarious, we mean that it counts for somebody else. And the vicarious life of Christ is a very important truth. It has rightly been said that if Christ had not lived the life that he did, then his death could not have been counted as substitutionary at all because you see the Lord Jesus earned righteousness by his holy life the Bible teaches that clearly for example in Galatians chapter 4 verse 4 but when the fullness of the time was come God sent forth his son made of a woman who of course was the Virgin Mary made under the law Just mark that. Made under the law. The Lord Jesus came. And as He lived in this earth, He was, if I could put it this way, under the rules that we were under. Living under the same rules. He had to obey the law of God. And He did. Perfectly. 1 Timothy 3.16 speaks of Him as being justified in the Spirit. That means He was vindicated or proven to be righteous. Philippians 2 verse 8 says He obeyed unto death. Now that obedience of Christ, that holy life of His counts for all His people. That obedience of His counts as our obedience when we're justified. And Romans chapter 5 deals with that whole subject. Yes, Christ came to die for us, that is true. But I want you to know He came to live for us also. And that is why the prophecy was given in the book of Psalms there are many beautiful messianic Psalms that means that they're talking about the Messiah the Lord Jesus in prophecy and one of them is Psalm 40 and in verses 7 and 8 it says and I quote then said I lo I come in the volume of the book it is written of me I delight to do thy will oh my God yea thy law is within my heart now you say what is that talking about? Well, if we go to the book of Hebrews, the chapter 10, we will discover that it quotes from Psalm 40. And it's telling us that the Lord Jesus is the fulfillment of those words. Hebrews 10 verse 7, Then said I, Lo, I come, in the volume of the book it is written of me, to do thy will, O God. And it says in verse 10, By the witch will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. The one who said thy law is within my heart is the Lord Jesus Christ. He came to fulfill God's law. We recall the words of Jesus at the official commencement of His ministry. You remember there at His baptism? When He talked about it, He said, Thus it behooves us to fulfill all righteousness. Matthew 3, verse 15. Suffer it to be so now, for thus it becometh us to fulfill all righteousness. He lived the righteous life, the life of total conformity to God's commandments that God required of us as believing sinners. But the question is, how can it count for us when Jesus did it? How could it count for us when it was not us who did it, but Jesus? Well, that's where this great doctrine of justification comes in. How the righteousness of Jesus can count for us. How that we can be looked upon as holy before God. It's by imputation. It is reckoned to our account. But how is that true? How can that be so? Well let me show you quickly how that can be so and how that it is so. Romans chapter 5 and reading from verse 12. This is a very important portion of scripture because it deals with the federal headship of the human race to Adam or to Christ. Watch what it says here. There are two men mentioned. Romans 5 verse 12. Wherefore as by one man sin entered into the world and death by sin and so death passed upon all men for that all have sinned. Who's it talking about? It's talking about Adam. We may cross reference 1 Corinthians 15 and verse 22, in Adam all die. And of course the same scripture says in Christ shall all be made alive. In Romans 5 we also read of someone else. For it says in verse 15, but not as the offence, so is also the free gift. For if through the offence of one, that's Adam, many be dead, much more the grace of God and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many. And as you follow these verses down, you will see that there are two men here, Adam and Christ, Christ who is the last Adam. Now legally, God deals with all of us in terms of these two individuals. It talks about being in Adam and it talks about being in Christ. 1 Corinthians 15.22 as we've mentioned. Now note, the entire race of humanity is guilty through Adam's disobedience. That's what Romans 5 verse 12 teaches us. That's one of the proof texts that we use when we're talking about the universality of sin. All men are sinners. Why? Because by one man sin entered into the world. We are all looked upon as being in Adam. So his sin is imputed to us. That's the teaching of the further verses of Romans 5 as well. Verse 19, for as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, or constituted sinners. I've actually heard preachers deny that. I've heard preachers say, Adam's sin was his own sin, but your sin is your own sin. Well, there's a sense in which that is true, but there's a sense in which it's not true, because Adam's sin is our sin. Well, we were in Adam. We were in the Garden of Eden, and there we sinned against God in our federal head, and we are counted as sinners. rightly and justly. But notice this, all in Christ, believing sinners, verse 19 of Romans 5, are counted righteous and freed from the penalty of death. Here you have it, Adam's sin is counted as being the sin of the human race and it's imputed to them justly for he was the federal head of the race, he was a representative man if you like. But Christ's righteousness, his holiness, his purity, his absolute Rectitude, his conformity to God's law is justly imputed by God to all those who believe on him. His life counts for them. That means as I believe on the Lord Jesus, God looks upon me as one who has totally, absolutely, completely fulfilled his law to the letter. I don't know about you, but that's amazing to me. that God could look upon me as having totally and absolutely and completely fulfilled every obligation of His law that I am looked upon Him as perfectly righteous in Christ Christ's righteousness is justly imputed by God to all that believe His life counts for them but as an unbeliever, if you are one tonight, let me speak to you You are still in Adam. You are not in Christ. You are in Adam. To be saved you must be in Christ. And the Bible says that we are born out of Christ. Ephesians chapter 2 verse 12. That at that time ye were without Christ. He is talking now to Christians, to Gentile Christians who lived at Ephesus. And he's talking about what has happened to them, how God has quickened them. By His grace He has saved them, not by works, but by grace. And he says, look, there was a time when you were without Christ. You were out of Christ. You were without a Savior. Being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel. Now I know something of what it means to be an alien. Not from outer space, but I have a little card with my picture on it, that was issued by the internal The Immigration and Naturalization Service, INS. It's called the green card. It's not green at all, it's just got a little green strip on it. It's called your green card. And that's given to those who are allowed residence in this country, whose citizenship is in another country. I happen to be a British citizen. I live in America. I'm allowed to live here by the good graces of your government, and that allows me to pay taxes to your government. But I am classified legally as a resident alien. That's what it says on my card. I am a resident alien. That means I'm not a citizen. So when it says being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, it means that you don't have a citizenship as a child of God. and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. This is an awfully black picture that's given here. People who are out of Christ, they're not in Christ, they're in Adam. But he says, but now, in Christ Jesus, ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ, for he is our peace. What a wonderful truth. Paul teaches in Romans chapter 5 that our legal standing before God either for our condemnation or our justification, our acquittal from all charges depends on who we are in union with. Either our first father Adam or the Lord Jesus Christ. It has to be one or the other. Now believers in this meeting are in Christ. And God views his perfect obedience as being theirs. As Christ is accepted with God, this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased, they are accepted before God. And he says, these are my beloved sons in whom I am well pleased. You know that Jesus never did a wrong deed, he never thought a wrong thought. He lived an absolutely perfect life and thereby he earned righteousness for all that believe. And as we speak rightly of his substitutionary death, so we ought also to speak of his substitutionary life. Because he lived the life that we needed to live but could not. A pure, righteous, holy life of obedience to God's law. And for me, as a believer in Christ, the Lord Jesus has entirely fulfilled God's law. Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. Romans 10 verse 4. I don't have any righteousness of my own, but Christ is my righteousness. He's made unto us righteousness, wisdom, sanctification, redemption. He is Jehovah Seth Kenu, the Lord our righteousness. I can only be constituted righteous, viewed as righteous by virtue of Christ's obedience. That's the only way. He has become By grace, legally liable for me, taking my place under the law, becoming answerable for me at the bar of divine justice. The doing of Jesus meets the law's demands for me and for all who trust in Him. It's vicarious obedience. But there is another aspect to it and I'll have to be quick here, which is difficult for me. And that's the dying of Jesus. We've talked about His doing, His life. Now there's the vicarious suffering of the penalty of the law, the dying of Christ. It's often called the passive obedience of Christ. He became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Now when we talk about the passive obedience, that's somewhat misleading because he was never more active as when he was dying in our guilty room instead. But theologians use the term passive according to its Latin origin. It means capable of suffering. But Christ was never a passive sufferer in his death. He said, I lay down my life that I might take it again. This was an act of the Lord Jesus. He went freely to the cross to offer up himself as a sacrifice to divine justice. We've already said God's law has been broken by us. There's a penalty therefore that has to be visited upon our breach of the law. Just like if you break the law out there tonight and you're caught. and law enforcement arrange you and you're brought before the courts so there's a penalty to be visited upon your breach of the law. So it is with God. We failed to keep his law therefore the sentence of death is to be visited upon us. But Jesus could die for our sins because he had no sin of his own. We could never satisfy God's just penalty. That's why hell must be forever. You think about it. People never get out of hell. You know why? Because they never ever get to the point where they satisfy the justice of God. It never happens. They're continually punished. because God continues to be holy, God continues to be righteous, his law is inflexible but Jesus perfectly obeyed the law unto death and in death he paid the penalty, he received the just wages of sin for his people, he died for the ungodly He died for us, the Bible says. At Calvary He bore our sins upon His body on the tree. He took the curse of sin upon Himself. He suffered the full penalty of God's broken law. He was made a curse for us. And so the law's demands are met fully. And the curse is silenced for us. He died for His people. He died as His people. We've talked about His vicarious life. The grand truth of the Gospel is that of vicarious atonement. Christ died for our sins. Jesus never was a sinner. But yet that we who believe might be justified before his law, our sins were imputed to him. He was viewed as guilty, liable to punishment. Legally in the eyes of God's law, he was viewed as the sinner and thus punished by God. Now that staggers my imagination how that could be so. How the Lord Jesus could be looked upon as the sinner I want you to know that legally that's how God deals with Christ in terms of our sins but praise his name he deals with us believer in terms of Christ's righteousness and what a transaction of grace that is my sins to his account but his righteousness to my account you know we have a lovely illustration of that in Paul's words to Philemon Philemon had a slave called Onesimus who ran away did wrong, sinned against his master. But while he was away in Rome, he got saved through the ministry of Paul. And he wanted to go back to his master Philemon. He didn't know how he would ever go back and be accepted. But Paul wrote to Philemon and he said, I want you to treat him not anymore as just your slave, but as a brother, who is especially useful to me. And he said, if he has suffered, if he has done anything wrong to you, If he oweth thee aught, put that on mine account. Put that on my account. And what Paul said about Onesimus to Philemon is what Jesus says to the Father for us. If he, that guilty sinner, owes you anything, put that on my account. Count me as the sinner. Count him as the righteous one. That's a beautiful truth. And what a glorious message it is. And what grounds for assurance and peace we have as believers. As Horatius Bonner wrote, mine is the sin, but thine the righteousness. Mine is the guilt, but thine the cleansing blood. Here is my robe, my refuge and my peace. Thy blood, thy righteousness, O Lord. My God, the great ground of assurance is this, friend, I'm trusting in Christ's work for me, not my own works. If the Lord has satisfied divine justice, if he has lived and died for me, if he's paid the price and suffered the penalty, then how can I be condemned while hiding in him? Augustus Toplady, whose hymns I love, wrote these words. What tremendous truth is here? From whence this fear and unbelief? Hath not the Father put to grief his spotless Son for me? And will the righteous judge of men condemn me for that debt of sin which Lord was charged on thee? Complete atonement thou hast made, and to the utmost thou hast paid whatever thy people owed. How then can wrath on me take place, if sheltered in thy righteousness and sprinkled with thy blood. If thou hast my discharge procured, and freely in my room endured the whole of wrath divine, payment God cannot twice demand. First at my bleeding surety's hand, and then again at mine. Turn then, my soul, unto thy rest. The merits of thy great High Priest have bought thy liberty. Trust in his efficacious blood. nor fear thy banishment from God, since Jesus died for thee." And that truth, how that Christ appeased the wrath of God by burying it on himself at Calvary, is really well illustrated in a famous true story, actually has been made into a tract. There was a young man and his father out in the Australian bush, and they were in some sort of house or cabin, There was a bushfire that came up very quickly as there won't to do in Australia. And they realised that their path that would have been their path of escape was gone because the bushfire had actually surrounded the area around their home and was advancing toward them. They were going to be consumed. They were going to be burned up and all their property. Until one of them got the bright idea to set some fires around the property, to burn everything in sight with controlled fire around their home and to cause that fire to spread out to meet the fire that was coming. That's exactly what they did, they set those controlled fires, everything brushed all of the grass and all went on fire. They controlled it around their home with buckets of water and so on and were able to cause the fire to spread out toward the other fire that was advancing. And when that bush fire that was coming inexorably towards their property got to the ground that had already been burnt by the fire that was coming toward it, it suddenly stopped. It could go no further. You know why? Because fire will not burn on ground that has already been burned. There was nothing to consume. It was already destroyed. And those men, the man and his son, when they were waiting for those two fires to meet, stood right in the center of their property, right on top of some charred earth. They stood exactly where the fire had been. And so they were safe. For the fire that was advancing would not come and burn again where the fire had already burned. What an illustration that is of the work of Christ. If you're standing in Christ, if you're hiding in the blood and righteousness of the Lord Jesus, then the fire of God's wrath will never burn against you. Because when you're standing in Christ, you're standing where the fire has already been. For at Calvary, God's infinite wrath burned in fury against our sins. Born by Jesus, the Lord Jesus consumed the fire. You know, that's the difference between the Old Testament and the New. In the Old Testament, on every altar, the fire consumed the sacrifice. But at Calvary, the sacrifice consumed the fire. For Jesus bore our wrath. Therefore the terrors of law and of God with me can have nothing to do. My Savior's obedience and blood hide all my transgressions from view. Tell me tonight, are you standing where the fire has been? It's the only place of safety. Justified freely by His grace, through the redemption that's in Christ Jesus. This is the ground of our justification. May we take our stand upon it. Amen.