Encounter the Truth

Jonathan Griffiths: At the cross of Calvary, he has found the perfect way to act in perfect justice and justify the guilty. And he offers you and he offers me the full forgiveness of sin if we will but believe.

Steve Hiller: Welcome to Encounter the Truth with Jonathan Griffiths. We're continuing a message we began last time looking at the just and the righteous God. Jonathan, I think if we're honest, every person listening today would say that they have messed up. They've sinned. They've fallen short of God's standard. You said we can receive the forgiveness of God if we will but believe. But believe in what?

Jonathan Griffiths: Well, believe in God as he's made himself known in the Bible, and in particular, believe that Jesus Christ is who he said he is—that he is the Son of God, the one who came to be our savior, the one who came to address the problem of our guilt at the cross, the one whose death purchases us forgiveness and new life.

We need to trust in the person of Christ and in the work of Christ at the cross. But the promise of the gospel is that those who respond in belief, in trust, to the Lord Jesus as he's made himself known in the Scriptures, those who believe will receive the gift of forgiveness and new life. And it's a profoundly wonderful offer and invitation.

Steve Hiller: Well, that's the heart of the gospel right there. And we're going to continue to look at that today. We're going to be in the book of Deuteronomy and in Psalms, maybe even get to Isaiah chapter 5. So have a Bible handy as we continue our message, The Just and Righteous God. Here is Jonathan.

Jonathan Griffiths: The preacher of Ecclesiastes groans as he sees injustice in the world, but he finds great comfort in this prospect. Ecclesiastes chapter 3, and I'm going to read verses 16 and 17. He says this: "Moreover I saw under the sun that in the place of justice, even there was wickedness; and in the place of righteousness, even there was wickedness. I said in my heart, God will judge the righteous and the wicked, for there is a time for every matter and every work."

There is a day to come, says the Bible, when God will judge this world in perfect fairness and in perfect justice. Psalm 75 verse 6: "It is God who executes judgment, putting down one and lifting up another. For in the hand of the Lord there is a cup with foaming wine, well mixed, and he pours out from it, and all the wicked of the earth shall drain it down to the dregs."

Of course, there are times when we might catch ourselves, even as believers, wishing that God ignored sin. After all, we're all sinners by our natural fallen nature and we all do wrong every day in thought and word and deed. And in our sinfulness, we would prefer to be allowed to sin with impunity and without accountability. Sometimes that might just feel convenient to us if we're being honest about it.

In recent days, we've been playing board games a little more often with our kids at home. I have a daily game of Monopoly Deal with one of our sons at the moment. In the course of playing those games, just occasionally one or other of us will get frustrated with a rule that is getting in the way of our plans for world domination in the game. Either he or I will ask for an exception to the rules. "Can we just put that one aside?" And if the other player is in a good mood, the request might be granted.

But at the end of the day, we both discover that bypassing the rules, playing with no fixed and established rules, it never works out too well. We always at the end of the day realize the value of the rules and revert to preferring them.

I've shared the story before, I think, but I remember so clearly when I was a university student in England attending an evangelistic event at our university. The Oxford mathematician and apologist John Lennox was speaking. He had given his address and now it was time for questions. A young woman stood up and very politely said words to this effect: "Look, I'm from a Jewish background," she said, "and I simply cannot believe in or accept a God who would allow Hitler to get away with his crimes scot-free. Given the reality of the Holocaust, I cannot possibly accept your God."

Lennox's reply was so good and it was a real kind of "aha" moment for me. He replied very graciously and said this: "But you see, Hitler hasn't gotten away with anything. The crimes of the Holocaust, they will not go unpunished. God has set a day for judgment of this world, and Hitler will by no means escape the justice of God."

I guess I knew that truth already, but the force of it came home to me in a new way that day. I realized that the truth of God's coming judgment means that somehow life is made livable in this broken and fallen and sinful world. Life is made livable here because evil is never going to go unpunished.

It is good news that God is a God of righteousness and a God of justice. It is good news that he rules and judges with perfect equity. It's good news that you and I need to hear today if the weight of injustice in this world feels like a crushing load to us at the present time.

We read news stories, don't we, of predators getting away with their crimes. The MeToo movement has exposed many painful stories, but not all of those stories will lead to convictions and punishments in human courts when they should. We read accounts all too often of racial abuse and hatred and cruelty and violence. We're reading them at the present time, aren't we?

And we grieve. And we long for justice and we cry out for justice. And the truth of God's righteous judgment of the world allows us, as we grieve and as we mourn, it allows us to put our heads down on the pillow at night and entrust a fallen and a groaning world to the one who is the righteous judge who, on a day to come, will judge the world with equity.

This is why in the Scriptures we find that the judgment of God, the prospect of this coming judgment, is a cause for praise and thanksgiving, a cause for worship. Psalm 96 and verse 11: "Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice; let the sea roar, and all that fills it; let the field exult, and everything in it! Then shall all the trees of the forest sing for joy before the Lord, for he comes, for he comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness, and the peoples in his faithfulness."

The justice of God, it is good news and we praise him for it. But there is a sense as well now in which the justice and the righteousness of God, they're bad news too. These things are bad news for all sinners in our natural state.

The Bible makes it clear that God in his righteousness cannot tolerate sin. It makes it clear that God in his justice will not tolerate sin. We see that truth expressed initially in the judgment for sin that God has actually already given in this world. When Adam and Eve first rebelled against God in the Garden of Eden, he brought a devastating judgment upon them and upon the whole of the created order.

This was in Genesis chapter 3. Every aspect of life in this world, every aspect of the human condition and of the creation itself would now be put under judgment for sin. And we today, you and I, live in this world under judgment. That's why there is pain and suffering and pandemic and death in this world.

In that broad and global sense, it's all because of sin. It's because we've turned away from the God who made us and we've invited his judgment upon us. We've called down his judgment upon us. That's not to say that every instance of suffering is a direct judgment of God. No, we can't jump to that conclusion. But it is to say that in a general and a global sense, all suffering in this world results from the Genesis 3 judgment for sin.

More than that, all the temporal judgment we feel and experience in this fallen world, it is actually a foreshadowing of the greater judgment that is yet to come. In 2 Peter chapter 2 and verse 6, Peter recalls God's judgment on the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. He tells us that the judgment upon them in history is actually a warning of the greater judgment to come. Listen to what Peter says in 2 Peter chapter 2 and verse 6: "By turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes he condemned them to extinction, making them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly."

We might well ask of this great coronavirus pandemic, we might ask, is this a particular judgment from God? Well, I don't know to what extent we can answer that in particular terms. It's clear from the Bible, it's absolutely clear, that this is part of the general judgment of God upon the world, as all suffering is.

Whatever else we might venture to say or not venture to say, this is an outworking of the Genesis 3 punishment and judgment of the fall. And like every aspect of that judgment, it is a foreshadowing and a warning of the ultimate judgment yet to come. And so I think we do need to look out on the events of our world at the present time. We need to look out on this pandemic and we need to say to ourselves, this is a world under judgment.

We need to say to ourselves, this cataclysm is a reminder for us of the greater judgment that is yet to come. And so the question we ask in the midst of all this, the question we ask when crisis hits, when pandemic strikes, the great question each of us must ask is this: am I ready? Am I ready for the greater judgment to come?

I hope that for each one of us today, I hope that we've paused to consider that question. I hope that the coronavirus pandemic has prompted you to stop and to say life in this world is not stable and secure. I recognize that there is worse trouble on the horizon in the coming judgment of God. Am I right with God? Am I ready to stand before his judgment throne at that final day? Day of judgment is coming and the Lord insists that we must be ready for it.

Listen to what Paul says in Acts 17 and verse 30: "The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead." The day of judgment, it is set. It's on God's calendar. It is surely coming. And so here's the question: are you ready?

Steve Hiller: You're listening to Encounter the Truth with Jonathan Griffiths, a message called The Just and Righteous God. It's been one of the most-listened-to messages this past year. So we've taken this message and the other top nine and put them together in a series called Listener Favorites, which is currently airing on the radio.

If you ever miss a broadcast, come and listen online. Our website is encounterthetruth.org. You can stream the program or download an MP3 for free. In addition to being able to listen online for free, you can also access the free study guide. We've put together the study guide to accompany the messages of this series. Each one is going to help you dig a little bit deeper into the content that you're listening to on the radio.

Some of the different topics that we're covering this month: what it looks like to become steadfast and wise, how to have confidence in trials, what enduring faith looks like, and we look at the gracious and merciful God, just to name a few. Again, if you're interested in getting a copy of the study guide, come to our website encounterthetruth.org. Back to the message, here is Jonathan.

Jonathan Griffiths: The Bible warns us of that coming judgment with one voice. And so if you haven't considered the question before, if you're not sure of your own personal answer, let me invite you to listen very, very carefully to this next and this final point. The justice and righteousness of God, they are good news. They are also bad news. But finally, they are expressed perfectly at the cross of Christ.

Sometimes I think the justice of God and the love of God are rather pitted against each other in discussion and theological debate. Either we proclaim a message of justice or we proclaim a message of love, but the two can't be really reconciled all that well.

Now, I think that generally speaking, those who would make such a distinction would try to claim the cross of Christ as being their own property. The cross is all about love, they say. And at first glance, we might well imagine that the cross involves a great overlooking of the principles of justice, a great sweeping of sin under the carpet, a great declaration that God will ignore sin and allow mercy and love to triumph. But nothing could be further from the truth.

The cross of Christ is of course the great demonstration of the love and the mercy of God—no question about that. But at the very same time, the cross of Christ is the supreme demonstration of the justice and the righteousness of God. You see, these things cannot be separated at the cross. They are instead jointly, eloquently, and perfectly expressed.

To see something of this, I would invite you to turn with me to Romans chapter 3. This is a passage that has been referred to already in our service today. Romans chapter 3. Here in Romans 3, Paul is talking about the fact that all of humanity stands guilty before God because we've all done wrong in the sight of God, we've all sinned.

Paul makes the point that no one is going to be declared guiltless before God the judge. No one is going to be justified before him simply by keeping rules, keeping the law of God. That's never going to be sufficient for sinners like us. Paul wants to be clear that that was never going to be the means by which the Old Testament people of God were saved. God showed them grace, but it wasn't because they kept the rules or earned his favor in that way.

Notice what he says, Romans 3 and verse 21: "But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it—the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus."

The gospel of Jesus Christ, the good news of salvation through his death at the cross, this gospel, it manifests, it shows the righteousness of God, says Paul. The gospel is all about God's righteousness, his perfection of character, his justice.

You see, it might look as though God had ignored all the sins of Israel for all those years, just sweeping them under the carpet, just burying them. Maybe when God judged all the other nations and spared Israel, maybe it was just about favoritism and maybe it was a demonstration that he's not so just and not so righteous. The cynic might say that.

But no, says Paul, the cross of Christ is a great demonstration of his justice and his righteousness. When Jesus was put forward, verse 25, as a propitiation—which means an anger-bearing sacrifice—a propitiation for sin, it was to show, to demonstrate God's righteousness. It was to show the true righteousness of his character.

Yes, he had passed over those former sins, but he did it because his believing people were trusting in his promises to save, promises to forgive. And here is how he was going to achieve that forgiveness: he was going to punish Jesus as a substitute for their sin. He was going to put forward his righteous, guiltless Son as the sacrifice for sin and he was going to deal fully and finally with the sin of his people at the cross of Christ.

Yes, there would be a payment for sin. Yes, there would be perfect justice. The guiltless one would pay for the guilt of the guilty. You see, God wanted to be, he would be, the just judge. But he also desired to justify sinners, to declare them not guilty, to forgive them, and to save.

And that was the point of the cross, verse 26. It was to show his righteousness at the present time so that he might be just—fully just, perfectly just—and at the same time, the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. At the cross, God found the way to be perfectly just and at the same time to justify sinners like you and like me.

He is just, he is the righteous judge. And so sin is going to be paid for. At the final day, either I will pay for my sin or I will stand in the good of the saving work of Jesus Christ at the cross. But either way, sin must be paid for. And that is the reality, that is the ultimate reality with which each one of us must reckon.

The justice of God is astonishingly good news in a seemingly chaotic world. But at the same time, it is very bad news for guilty sinners who stand in the wrong before him. I wonder if you today have confidence before this just and this righteous judge? I wonder if you have the assurance of sins forgiven? I wonder if you're prepared now for that final day when you will meet him? I wonder if you're ready to stand before his throne?

God's not going to sweep any sin under the carpet. He's not going to sweep my sin under the carpet and he won't sweep your sin under the carpet. He's not going to turn a blind eye to anything that's transpired in this world, in my life and in yours.

But at the cross of Calvary, he has found the perfect way to act in perfect justice and in justice to justify the guilty. He did it by bearing the guilt of sinners himself in the person of the Son as he hung upon the tree. And he offers you and he offers me the full forgiveness of sin if we will but believe.

Notice again verse 22: the gospel offers us the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. You see, in the gospel there is not only the offer that the righteous God will take away our guilt. What he actually offers us is an exchange whereby we gain the gift of righteousness from this righteous God.

At the cross, Jesus, he takes upon himself our guilty record and he gives to us in a glorious exchange his righteousness, his perfect standing. In this exchange, our unrighteousness, it is handed to Jesus and he dies for it at the cross. And at the cross, he gives to us his perfect record of life, his righteous standing before the Father.

And if we accept that by faith, when God the judge looks at me on the final day, he will not see the guilt and the record of the life of Jonathan Griffiths. He will see instead the beauty of the righteousness of Jesus Christ. That's the gospel. That's the good news. And it's for me and it's for you and it's for all who will believe.

That's the breathtaking gift of God, an escape from the judgment that we so richly deserve and instead to receive the very righteousness of Jesus Christ. This is a gift which we only grasp in part, only understand in part, only comprehend in part in this life and a truth which I believe we will spend all eternity considering in awe and worship.

As I've been studying these truths this week, I've had in my mind a great hymn by the great 19th-century Scottish pastor Robert Murray M'Cheyne, a hymn not so well known today, but I want to finish with his words and leave them with us as we contemplate the righteousness of God, the offer of the gospel which is for all who believe. M'Cheyne writes this:

"When this passing world is done,

When has sunk yon radiant sun,

When we stand with Christ on high,

Looking o’er life’s history,

Then, Lord, shall I fully know,

Not till then how much I owe.

When I hear the wicked call

On the rocks and hills to fall,

When I see them start and shrink

On the fiery deluge brink,

Then, Lord, shall I fully know,

Not till then how much I owe.

When I stand before the throne,

Dressed in beauty not my own,

When I see thee as thou art,

Love thee with unsinning heart,

Then, Lord, shall I fully know,

Not till then how much I owe."

Steve Hiller: Jonathan Griffiths here on Encounter the Truth and a message called The Just and Righteous God. If you ever miss a broadcast, come and listen online. Our website is encounterthetruth.org, or you can listen through the Encounter the Truth app. It's free and you'll find it at your app store.

Whether you've connected with this ministry online, through the app, or the radio, we're glad you're here. We're able to make all of this available because of your generosity. As you give a gift of any amount this month, we want to send you a book that Jonathan has picked out. It's called The Final Lap. Author John Wyatt is inviting us to think through how to approach the next stages of life well. He helps us look at some of those near-end-of-life things, from retirement to independency to dependency and then finally from life to death as we approach the finishing line.

He's honest about the struggles of each one of these transitions and lays out opportunities that God gives us in every stage. We'd love to send you a copy of this book The Final Lap as our way of saying thank you for your financial support. You can find out more or give online at encounterthetruth.org or call us at 1-833-99-TRUTH. That's 1-833-998-7884 or encounterthetruth.org.

You can also write to us at Encounter the Truth, PO Box 5513, Ottawa, Ontario, K2C 3M1. Or in the US at Encounter the Truth, 215 North Arlington Heights Road, Suite 102, Arlington Heights, Illinois, 60004. For Jonathan Griffiths and our producer Mark Brudda, I'm Steve Hiller. Thanks for listening and I hope that you'll join us next time.