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The Word of Truth is sponsored
in part by Paul Rents. Visit paulrents.com for party
and equipment rentals. Welcome to the Word of Truth,
a ministry of Pastor Lars Larson and the First Baptist Church
of Leominster, Massachusetts. It is our desire that our Lord
use this broadcast to instruct, encourage, and strengthen both
Christians and local churches in the New England region. Pastor
Lars is always available to assist you. You may reach him at 978-660-8869. May today's message from our
pastor be blessed by our Lord to instruct and encourage you
through the Holy Scriptures. The Word of Truth. Greetings, and thank you for
listening to our program. Today we will continue our study
of Paul's epistle to the Romans. We began last time our consideration
of a new major division of this epistle, beginning with Romans
5, verse 1, that continues through the end of Romans, chapter 8,
in which we see emphasized the theme, hope as a result of righteousness
by faith. Let us pray for our Lord's assistance. Our Father, you are the creator
and upholder of all things. You are the ruler of all history,
accomplishing your good purposes through Jesus Christ, which is
ultimately to bring glory to yourself through all that unfolds
through history. We thank you, our Father, that
you are glorifying yourself in the damnation of sinners. We
affirm what you have revealed to us in this study of Romans
and what is set before us in all of scripture, that you made
mankind upright, but they have sought out many schemes, many
devices to rebel against you and your ways. But thankfully,
Father, although man has rebelled against you, he's not cast off
your control of him. Indeed, our God, You are the
Lord of all the earth, and we pray that Your justice would
be manifested. We look and long for the day
when the wickedness of this world will come to an end, when every
knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is
Lord to the glory of You, our Father. But Father, not only
are we thankful that you justly damn sinners, we are even more
thankful that you pardon sinners who deserve damnation, who warrant
your everlasting punishment to be inflicted upon us. For we're
no different than all the rest. However, you are our God of your
own free grace and love. You've determined that you would
love your people whom you have chosen for yourself, that you
have determined you would show yourself gracious, merciful,
wise, and just, and loving in saving us from our sin through
your Son, our Lord Jesus. Help us, our Father, to rejoice
in Him and all that You have promised in Him. And help us
to proclaim Him far and wide as the only hope for condemned
sinners. And may You show Yourself wonderfully
gracious in these days by bringing many of us sinners into His kingdom. And to that end, Lord, we pray
that You would bless us as we set forth Your Word today in
our hearts and minds. For we pray in Jesus' name, amen. I wish to read the first 11 verses
of Romans chapter 5. Paul wrote, therefore, there
he's drawing a conclusion from all that he's written before.
Therefore, since we've been justified by faith, we have peace with
God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained
access by faith into this grace in which we stand and we rejoice
in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we rejoice
in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance,
and endurance produces character, and character produces hope,
and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured
into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to
us. For while we were still weak,
at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will
scarcely die for a righteous person, though perhaps for a
good person one would dare even to die. But God shows his love
for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for
us. Since therefore we have now been justified by his blood,
much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For
if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death
of His Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be
saved by His life. More than that, we also rejoice
in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have
now received reconciliation. That's the first 11 verses of
Romans chapter 5. The Apostle had argued thoroughly
for the teaching that God justifies sinners freely through faith
alone, apart from works. He proved his case throughout
the first four chapters of Romans, and then using the illustration
of Abraham in chapter 4. But now, beginning with Romans
chapter 5, Paul addressed several blessings that are received by
those who are justified through faith alone. Justification is
the beginning point, the entrance point into all the blessings
of God. Justification by God's grace through faith alone is
the ground on which all of our hope in receiving God's promises
may be affirmed to us. As the writer to the Hebrews
alluded to this in his definition of faith, now faith is the assurance
of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. Hebrews 11,
verse one. And faith in Christ entitles
the believer to all the blessings of God that are bound up in Jesus
Christ. Now, God identifies before us
several of these promises in the first verses of Romans chapter
5. The first grace, the first blessing of grace is found in
verse 1. Again, there we read, Therefore, since we've been justified
by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Paul identified the first great
blessing among several, that our justification before God
through faith has secured for us. Our justification is written
as having taken place in the past. God justified us when we
believed on the Lord Jesus Christ. Because we have been justified,
we have peace with God. Let me just interject this, because
we live in Roman Catholic New England. If you're Roman Catholic,
attend a Roman Catholic church. Roman Catholicism does not teach
what Paul just asserted in Romans 5, verse 1. Paul says, since
we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through
our Lord Jesus Christ. Rome says, however, you haven't
been justified until after you've lived a life of faith, plus works
born of grace. And even at the end of this life,
that's not enough. You have to go through purgatory
to be purged of your sins. And maybe after 10 or 20,000
years of that, you'll finally come forth as righteous, righteous
as God, and then He justifies you. Now Paul says, we were justified
in the past. Since therefore we have been
justified by faith, we have peace with God. Rome knows nothing
about that. In fact, the Council of Trent
declared back in the 1560s that anybody who teaches that you're
justified through faith alone apart from works, you're anathema,
you're cursed of God, you do not have salvation. Well, if
Rome knew what they were saying. They were basically dechristianizing
the Apostle Paul because he was declaring here in Romans 5 verse
1 that believers, true believers in Jesus Christ are righteous
before God. It's a state of justification,
a righteousness, and as a result, peace exists between the forgiven
sinner and the holy God. Now, the subject of God's peace
has already arisen in this epistle. In the opening greeting to the
letter, Paul expressed his desire that God would give his peace
to these Christians at this church. Romans 1, verse 7 reads, To all
those in Rome who are loved by God and called to be saints,
grace to you, and here it is, peace from God our Father and
the Lord Jesus Christ. Now at that time we pointed out
that when the Bible speaks of God's peace that the believer
enjoys, it comes in one of two forms. There is a subjective
peace and there is an objective peace. Both are God's gifts to
his people. Subjective peace is the awareness
that the believer senses in his soul that he is at peace with
God. And so this subjective peace
is what people feel. Because of our faith in Christ,
we sense peace or a tranquility of soul, a settling of our guilty
conscience respecting sin. When we receive through faith
our free and full pardon of sin due to the death of the Savior,
we are secure. And if we're thinking and believing
rightly, we feel ourselves to be secure. So in Romans 1-7,
when Paul expressed his desire for them, peace from God our
Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, Paul desired that they would
experience this subjective peace, this awareness that all is well
between them and God. All disciples of Jesus Christ
may enjoy this subjective peace with God. And again, this is
a feeling of peace, a sense of well-being that God bestows upon
his people. Sadly, not all Christians experience
this subjective peace, but they all may. Paul wrote to the church
at Philippi, In nothing be anxious, but in everything by prayer and
supplication, with thanksgiving let your requests be made known
unto God, and the peace of God, which passes all understanding,
shall guard your hearts and your thoughts in Christ Jesus. Now, that is a promise to Christians,
and Christians only. They may enjoy that subjective
peace. But there is also a second kind
of peace that God grants His people. The Bible speaks of objective
peace, peace between God and the believer. Through our Lord's
life, death, and resurrection, God has brought us, believers,
into a state of peace with the Father. And this state of peace
is the same for all true believers in Jesus Christ. Subjective peace
varies between believer and believer. You can find a Christian who
has great peace, no matter what they're going through. And then
you have some Christians who have very little peace, and when
you examine their life, they're really not going through a whole
lot compared to others. And so subjective peace varies
from believer to believer, but objective peace is the same for
every Christian alike. And that's what Paul is writing
about here in Romans 5, verse 1. Objective peace. Therefore
being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our
Lord Jesus Christ. Now, this word and idea of peace,
as understood by Paul, should be seen through the Old Testament
meaning of the Hebrew word for peace, which is Shalom. Principled in the idea of Shalom
is the character of salvation that the Old Testament prophets
declared would appear in the last days. And according to Scripture,
we are living in the last days. With the coming of the promised
Son of God, Jesus Christ, the last days commence. Now, this
idea of Shalom speaks about our peace with God. not the peace
of God that we were talking about earlier, but peace with God.
as one commentator expressed it, this background, that is,
shalom in the Old Testament, this background defines for us
what Paul means by peace with God. Not an inner sense of well-being
or feeling at peace, what we might call the peace of God,
but rather the outward situation of being in a relationship of
peace with God. You see, that's what Paul's talking
about here in Romans 5, verse 1. Now, before we came to Christ
as our Lord and Savior, we were not at peace with God. If you're
not a Christian, you're not at peace with God, and God is certainly
not at peace with you. Before becoming Christians, our
very beings were opposed to God. We were His enemies. And the
God of the Bible was our enemy as well. Why, if the true God
comes to us when we are in our sin, and apart from grace, He
comes before us, we would crucify Him if we had half a chance.
That's what happens when a holy God comes into the presence of
sinners. And so we were enemies before
coming to Christ. We were opposed to His rule over
us, just as the people of Israel were opposed to His rule over
them. But Christ, as the Prince of
Peace, ended that hostility between God and ourselves. Christ gained
peace for us by dying on the cross for us. This appeased God's
wrath with respect to us, and as a consequence, a state of
peace was secured for believers. We read of this in Colossians
121, and you who once were alienated and enemies in your minds by
wicked works, yet now he has reconciled in the body of his
death to present you holy and blameless and above reproach
in his sight. This objective peace, this state
of peace, belongs only to those who have been reconciled to God
through faith in Jesus Christ. For Christ alone may be the basis
and secure of peace for sinners. If you're outside of Christ,
you're outside of this state of peace, you are, whether you
realize it or not, you are at war with God, and God is at war
with you, and you're not gonna come out in the end. He's gonna
win the day. And so, I would urge you, if
you're not a believer, do as we did, we who believe. Capitulate. Surrender. You're not going to
win fighting against Him. But rather, do as the last verse
in Psalm 2 says, kiss the Son, lest He be angry. But blessed
are all those who put their trust in Him. He receives all who come
humbly before Him in faith. Now, this objective peace is
in the realm of fact. Nothing changes our status with
God as believers in Jesus Christ. God is always at peace with his
people due to Jesus Christ. But again, subjective peace is
in the realm of feeling. Any number of factors may cause
one's sense of peace to either increase or diminish, whether
or not one is prayerful or prayerless, obedient or disobedient, believing
or unbelieving, knowledgeable or ignorant, participating in
fellowship with the saints or not. All these will have bearing
upon whether or not one enjoys subjective peace. Now, ones who
are in a state of peace with God are the objects of God's
promise of peace. They are ones for whom Christ
died, whereby peace with God is obtained and secured for them.
They have an object of peace with God. God is no longer at
war with them. A state of peace exists between
God and them. And again, Paul states, therefore
being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our
Lord Jesus Christ. So the reason for that is that
we've been reconciled. As Romans 5.11 states, not only
that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ,
through whom we have now received the reconciliation. Reconciliation
is a great word. It's a word that describes the
cessation of hostility between two warring factions, resulting
in peace between them. How does this reconciliation
take place? Well, it can only take place
when their former hostility and rebellion ceases, and the justice
of God toward their crime has been satisfied. Again, God is
at war with sinners, and His purpose is to punish them for
their sins, because they have violated His laws. Justice is
in order, and they must answer to the judge of all the earth.
And the reason that Christians alone can escape the condemnation
of this unbending, inflexible justice of a holy God is that
Christ Jesus bore their punishment on their behalf when He died
on the cross. And so by Christ, through faith
in Him, all believers may be reconciled to God. As we read
in Colossians 1, 19-21, For in him Christ, all the fullness
of God, was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile
to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making
peace by the blood of his cross. and you who once were estranged
and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he is now reconciled in
his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy,
blameless, and irreproachable before him." Again, that's Colossians
1, 19-21. The blessing of peace can only
be appreciated fully when one considers the state of the non-believer
who is not at peace with God. We live in a world in which people
will allow you to believe any kind of God you like, but if
you say that you believe God is a God of wrath against those
that are outside of Jesus Christ, you will be rejected and opposed. And I know unbelievers listening
to me are probably just horrified. I can't believe that guy said
that. But Paul declared, therefore, since we have been justified
by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
But what of those who are not justified through faith? They
do not have peace with God. Rather, the wrath of God rests
upon them. Consider that. John 3, 36, 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. People who are outside of Jesus
Christ are not in a state of peace with God. There exists
a state of war between God and them. Jonathan Edwards wrote
of their dreadful condition in his sermon entitled, Natural
Men in a Dreadful Condition. He had a way with words. Listen
to Edwards. They are not only without God,
but the wrath of God abides upon them. There is no peace between
God and them, but God is angry with them every day. He's not
only angry with them, but that to a dreadful degree. There is
a fire kindled in God's anger, and it burns like fire. Wrath
abides upon them, which, if it should be executed, would plunge
them into the lowest hell and make them miserable there for
all eternity. For they have provoked the Holy
One of Israel to anger, and God has been angry with them ever
since they began to sin. He has been provoked by them
every day, ever since they exercised any reason, and He's provoked
by them more and more every hour. The flame of His wrath is continually
burning. There are many now in hell that
never provoke God more than they do now. Wherever they go, they
go about with the dreadful wrath of God abiding on them. They
eat and drink and sleep under wrath. How dreadful a condition,
therefore, are they in! It is the most awful thing for
the creature to have the wrath of his creator abiding on him.
The wrath of God is a thing infinitely dreadful. The wrath of a king
is as the roaring of a lion. But what is the wrath of a king
who is but a worm of the dust to the wrath of the infinitely
great and dreadful God? How dreadful is it to be under
the wrath of the first being, the being of beings, the great
creator and mighty possessor of heaven and earth. How dreadful
is it for a person to go about under the wrath of God, who gave
him being, and in who he lives and moves, who is everywhere
present, and without whom he cannot move a step nor even draw
a breath. Natural men, inasmuch as they
are under wrath or under a curse, God's wrath and curse are continually
upon them. They can have no reasonable comfort,
therefore, in any of their enjoyments, for they do not know but they
are given them in wrath, and shall be curses to them, not
blessings. As it is said in Job 18, verse
15, brimstone shall be scattered upon his habitation. How can
they take any comfort in their food or in their possessions
when they do not know but all are given them to fit them for
the slaughter? Now that's the direct approach,
folks. John Gill wrote of the wrath of God under which unbelievers
exist and for their need of reconciliation with God. Here are Gill's words. First, by observing the character
of the persons reconciled, which will show the cause, reason,
and necessity of a reconciliation to be made, they are enemies.
And in one of the texts referred to, they are said to be enemies
in their minds by wicked works, which is expressive of the internal
enmity there is in their minds and hearts. The carnal mind,
as every man's mind is naturally carnal, is not only an enemy,
but enmity itself against God. Romans 8 verse 7, To the very
being of God, wishing there were no God, to the nature and perfections
of God, denying some of them, misrepresenting others, and framing
God in their own minds as altogether such a one as themselves. to
the purposes and decrees of God, which they cannot bear, and to
which they insolently reply, and to the providences of God
they charge with inequality and unrighteousness, and they are
inwardly and secretly enemies to Christ, to his person and
offices, particularly his kingly office, being unwilling that
he should reign over them. and to his gospel, and the special
doctrines of it, and to his ordinances they care not to be subject unto.
And they are to the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, to his person, whom
they know not, nor can receive, as to his operations which they
deride and ridicule. The things of the Spirit of God
are foolishness to them, and they are enemies to the people
of God. There is an old and implacable
enmity between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent.
The saints are hated by the world, because chosen and called out
of the world, God's elect, themselves, while in a state of nature, are
hateful, hating one another. Paul, a chosen vessel of salvation,
was, while unregenerate, exceeding mad against the saints. But there
is an external enmity which appears by wicked works and sinful actions
openly committed, which are acts of hostility against God, and
they are contrary to His nature and will, are abominable in His
sight, provoke the eyes of His glory, excite His wrath, and
cause it to be revealed from heaven, and for which it comes
on the children of disobedience, and all are deserving of it.
Sins are breaches of the law of God. Render men liable to
the curses of it and to death itself. Oh, may God have mercy
upon us through Jesus Christ. Thanks be to God for those that
have been justified through faith, they have peace with God. Well,
until next time, may the grace of God be abundantly granted
to you. We trust that God has blessed
you from listening to Dr. Lars Larsen. Today's program
as well as previously recorded messages are available through
our website. We invite you to visit the wordoftruth.net. The First Baptist Church of Leominster
and Concerned Friends have sponsored this broadcast of the Word of
Truth. If we may assist you by directing you to a sound, reformed
church near you, please contact us. If Pastor Larson can assist
you further or answer a question that you may have about today's
subject, he would be pleased to speak with you. You may reach
him at 978-660-8869. Until our next time together,
may our God bless you richly through our Lord Jesus Christ. Today's The Word of Truth program
was sponsored in part by Paul Rents. Visit paulrents.com for
party and equipment rentals.
The Epistle to the Romans (45)
| Sermon ID | 621161823498 |
| Duration | 26:00 |
| Date | |
| Category | Radio Broadcast |
| Bible Text | Romans |
| Language | English |
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