The Unchanging Truth

Guest (Male): Welcome to the unchanging truth, the verse by verse Bible teaching ministry of Dr. Jared Gilcher, lead pastor of Christ Community Bible Church in Arlington, Texas. Through the living and active word of God, the unchanging truth exists to encourage your soul, transform your life, and help you trust and treasure Christ as redeemer, savior, and king. Now, opening the scriptures and proclaiming the truth that never changes, here is Dr. Jared Gilcher.

Dr. Jerod Gilcher: That word redemption, there is the language for the ransom of slaves. In fact, the word literally means, get this, to release from slavery by the payment of a ransom price. To release from slavery by the payment of a ransom price. That that's the meaning of the word. And that was that's a highly fitting word to use for us, isn't it? Because slaves is exactly what we were. John 8:34, we were slaves of sin. 2 Timothy 2:26, we were bound and blinded and chained by the devil. And the thing is we loved our masters. We loved our sin.

We loved the devil. And we could not break free from their control even if we wanted to, and we did not want to break free. Which means someone had to break us free. Someone had to intervene and and free us from our idols by an unmatched beauty, which is what redemption did. Christ kicked open the dungeon with his death. He paid the ransom with his blood. He broke the chains with the bolt cutters of grace, and then he set the prisoner free, not to live a life like the one they did before, but Romans chapter 6 Romans chapter 6 freed from sin and alive to God.

Yes, yes, we still feel the remaining power of sin and the effects of sin and the temptation to sin and the allurement to sin. But if you are in Christ, you are not slaves to sin anymore. Which means lasting, satisfying victory over sin is not merely a possibility, but a profound and inevitable reality. I think it's very interesting, don't you? That Christ characterized his entire ministry as one of ransom. Even the son of man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many. Ransom, same word.

Romans 3:24. And beloved, this is very practical because what this what this means is that if you are in Christ, sin doesn't have to have the upper hand. If you're in Christ, did you know you don't actually have to click the link. If you're in Christ, you don't actually have to touch the screen. If you're in Christ, you don't have to say the word. You don't have to think that thought. You don't have to do that thing. Because you are were a slave. And now, ransomed by the payment of a ransom price. We're free. We're free.

I I I think of Paul's words about sexual immorality in 1 Corinthians 6. Do you remember? He says flee, flee from immorality. Flee, run from it. Every other sin that a man commits is outside the body. But the immoral man sins against his own body. Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God and that you are not your own? You don't belong to you. You are not your own. Your life is not yours. Why? Because verse 20 he says, you were bought, literally ransomed with a price.

Therefore, glorify God in your body. Do you see the logic? And so I ask you, how are you enjoying your freedom? How are you enjoying your emancipation from sin slavery? How are you enjoying your liberation from sin's control? We're free. And and and just so we're clear on this, the question is to whom did Christ pay the ransom? Be careful before you answer. To whom did Christ pay the ransom when he died? Because I'll tell you who he did not pay it to. He did not pay it to Satan. He paid it to God. He paid it to God.

Because we were not under Satan's condemnation, but God's condemnation. It was God's holiness offended. God's righteousness required a payment. It is God to whom sinners are in debt, in whose court they stand condemned. Ephesians 5:2, Christ gave himself as an offering and they sacrificed to who? To God. Which makes me want to ask you, in all seriousness, whose slave are you this morning? Who is the master who owns you this morning? Because everybody belongs to somebody. We either belong to the redeemer Jesus Christ who freed us by the payment of a ransom price, or we are co-ruled by sin and Satan and there is nothing in between.

And if you are not freed from sin, you can and must be freed by faith in Christ alone. Don't miss the point. The point is not necessarily redemption, but that redemption is the means to our justification. Do you remember? In other words, listen carefully. God God doesn't wave a magic wand and just simply declare you righteous. This wasn't some hocus pocus trick. Rather, we are declared righteous, listen carefully, precisely because there was an actual historical transaction where our souls were purchased and paid for by the ransom price of Jesus Christ. It's a staunching. It's rooted in the facts of history.

Variable number two. Variable number two, verse 25, and this is massive. Look at the text, verse 25. Paul says, we are justified as a gift by his grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus. Here it is, whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation through faith in his blood. And there it is, propitiation. I love long theological words, and I want you to love long theological words. They look kind of intimidating, but inside them is contained absolute treasure. And and now you see now you see the equation. Do you see it? There's the equation.

Redemption plus propitiation equals justification. Do you see? Redemption plus propitiation equals justification. The math adds up. It's the algebra of the cross. And the question is, of course, what is propitiation? What is propitiation? And I'll tell you what it is. It is the time and the moment and the place when the wrath and mercy of God met together at the cross. Because at the cross, listen carefully, the wrath of God was appeased. The wrath of God was satisfied. The wrath of God was extinguished towards all those whom the father purchased and gave to his son for whom he would die and purchase with his blood because God was angry, wasn't he?

He's angry with you and with me. We were children of wrath. We were enemies. We were sons of disobedience. Romans 2:5, we were storing up wrath for ourselves in the day of wrath and the righteous judgment of God. And the worst part of all is there wasn't a darn thing that you or I or anybody anybody else could do about it. We were doomed. We were hopeless unless unless God made a way to satisfy his wrath and save wrath deserving rebels all at the same time. That's propitiation. As a kid, I loved to fry ants on the pavement with a magnifying glass in the summer.

And you know how it works. You angle the magnifying glass just so and all the light and heat from the sun becomes concentrated in a single beam of intense light and you burn the ant until there is no more ant left to burn. And it's pretty weird and kind of demented and I don't know why that was so fun to do. I might even do it today just to remind me of how how fun it was. And and the the the point is the moment of the cross, beloved, the moment of the cross was different than that.

The same and different. You see the father punished his own son out of infinite love and mercy. 2,000 years ago, the father in a single beam of fury over the earth concentrated his wrath on a single object outside Jerusalem, namely the cross upon which hung his son. And in his love, the father unleashed his wrath until there was no more wrath to be unleashed. And when it was all over, what did the son declare? It is finished. What is finished? Among the many things, the wrath of God. And and what cannot be overlooked and what you cannot miss is the sovereign initiative of God.

Notice verse 25. It was it was not Satan, it was not the Roman soldiers, it was not the Jews, it was not you or me. It was God who displayed his son as a propitiation. Do you see that? God publicly displayed his son as an object of his fury. God did that. Which means in his love, God killed his own son. Isaiah 53:10, Yahweh was pleased to crush him. 1 John 4:9, in this is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins.

And this was always the plan, wasn't it? This was always the plan. Christ did not have to wrestle his angry father to the floor of heaven and take the whip out of his hand, did he? Christ didn't have to pressure his father to be merciful to humanity. No, this was always the plan of the father and the son was always in agreement. Think think of the terrible wonder of the love of God, beloved. The father heaped his own wrath on his own son that we might become the righteousness of God. And the question is, how do you how did you get the payment of propitiation transferred to you?

Why is it if you are in Christ, why is his wrath no longer upon you? And Paul answers the question verse 25, it's you believed. You trusted in the blood of Christ. For whatever reason, the English switches the order and I don't know why they do that and I wish they didn't do that because the Greek literally reads through faith in his blood, through faith in his blood. Blood was the object of faith. We trusted in the blood, not in the literal cells or the substance or the platelets or the plasma. No, in scripture, blood is synonymous with death.

Blood is the proof the victim has been killed and he has been killed, hasn't he? And raised and he reigns and he will return and rule all things on a kingdom on this earth. And and I hope you can see, church, I hope you can see the beauty of propitiation that it is clear and obvious. You need to remember that propitiation didn't merely settle the score. Propitiation didn't merely bring the balance to zero. It didn't just cancel a debt. No, get a load of this. Propitiation got your sin out of the way and brought you home to God as the treasure of your soul.

It results in reconciliation. And sinning again doesn't rekindle the wrath. Sinning again doesn't require another propitiation. It doesn't need another sacrifice. Not that we don't need to repent of sin because we do. Not that sin doesn't grieve the spirit because it does. But guilty feelings for sin may come and go, but real actual guilt was paid for and purchased and taken care of in the propitiation of Jesus Christ. God is not angry with you anymore. Here's an encouragement, even a recommendation. Take two minutes one day. Two minutes every day wouldn't be bad. And just take a walk around the block or while brushing your teeth or while driving in your car or doing whatever and take those two minutes and think literally about nothing except for propitiation.

Just think about this. And just think the wrath of God against me is God. For everything that I've done, he loves me. He chose me. John 17:23, he loves me as much as he loves his own son. What kind of God is this who not only did not spare his own son, but delivered him over for us all? How will he not also with him freely give us all things? Who will bring a charge against God's elect? God is the one who justifies. Who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is he who died, rather he who was raised, who is at the right hand of the father, who intercedes for us.

The father's not going to go back on his son's payment. And and so you see the equation, don't you? Redemption plus propitiation equals justification. Redemption plus propitiation equals justification. I I can get my my head around that kind of math. I like that. I'll study that. Which means, listen carefully, and you know this, justification wasn't some loophole, wasn't. It wasn't some clever way to cheat the system. It wasn't some divinely approved tax evasion, tax fraud where the father pretended like the the payment was made when it wasn't actually. Well, let's just, you know, let's just pretend.

No. The payment was real. It was paid in full. The freedom is real. The verdict has been declared. And now we are fully reconciled to God. This is no legal fiction. It is crucifixion, purchased by crucifixion. My question is, do you love this? Do you love this? Do you do you make the redemptive achievements of Christ the the focus of your daily contemplation? Because I'll just say to survive and to thrive in a fallen world with joy, this is what it's going to take. This is what it's going to take. This these are the kind of great salvation realities that that that clothe our heart with bulletproof steel and help us persevere in a world of evil and chaos and danger and disappointment.

Let me ask you this. If it were Christ on this stage this morning instead of me, which we would all prefer, and and if you could somehow arrange to go to lunch with him afterwards, for what would you ask him? For what would you ask him? To to change what about your life? To transform what about your life? In what way would you love to see the power of Christ working through your lives to put his glory on display? If you could ask for anything, what would it be? And I think you know this, but you don't need him here physically to make that happen.

Because he is here in and through his word. All the power of the cross with which he changes and transforms people's lives is channeled and transferred and mediated to our lives through the sacred text. So go to the word, beloved, every single day and throughout the day in sacred meditation, not because it makes God like you more, but because his word is the means to which he changes people's lives. I kind of sort of close with this. Here we are. Here we are in in the holy of holies. We we're looking at the mercy seat.

We we are seeing how the cross works. We're seeing how the atonement functioned. We're seeing how it is that a man crucified 7,000 miles away, 2,000 years ago, changes anything about us. And yet that being said, the the only thing left to do now is to bear with me, remove the cover of the ark of the covenant and look inside. Because there we get to the very heart of God and the deepest meaning of the cross. We are still not there. You noticed verses 25B and 26 is still there which we did not cover. And there in that text is the deepest meaning of the cross.

That's next time. That's next time. I close by simply asking this. Do you believe this? Do you believe this? Do you believe this gospel of the God who became man for us and for our salvation? Do you believe that God is the supreme and sovereign king of all creation to whom belongs all glory and worship and allegiance? Do you believe that? And do you believe that every person is born spiritually dead, slave to sin, blinded by the devil and under the wrath of God and that on their own they are absolutely hopeless. Do you believe that?

And do you believe that sin is an infinitely evil crime against an infinitely worthy God which deserves an infinite punishment which thus requires an infinite payment? Do you believe that? And do you believe that Jesus Christ alone is that payment? Sent from God as fully God, he came to earth as fully man. He took the wrath he didn't deserve for sins he didn't commit, but rose from the dead, crushing death in its power. And he ascended into heaven where he is right now alive, ruling all things at the right hand of the father, but he won't stay there.

No, he will return and he will build a kingdom and rule all things, rule the planet that rightfully belongs to him. And the question is, do you believe that salvation alone is found in him? Do you believe that? And do you believe that there is not a fraction of a contribution that you could make to the payment that he made? In other words, do you believe that it is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone for the glory of God alone? And the real question is, have you bowed the knee to him in repentance and faith?

Have you despaired in your worthless works to save you and cast yourself upon Jesus Christ alone for all of his redemptive achievements? Have you, listen carefully, turned from the suicidal pleasures of sin to the one in whose presence is fullness of joy and in whose right hand there are pleasures forever? Because if you haven't, now is the time to yield and to trust and to enjoy forever.

Guest (Male): Thanks for joining us for the unchanging truth, the verse by verse Bible teaching ministry of Dr. Jared Gilcher and Christ Community Bible Church in Arlington, Texas. At Christ Community Bible Church, we exist to prize, portray, and proclaim the supremacy of Christ as we trust in his word and wait for his return. We hope today's teaching has encouraged your soul and helped you trust and treasure Christ as your redeemer, savior, and king. If you're in the DFW area and looking for a church home, join us for worship Sunday mornings at 10:30. To learn more about the mission of the church, meet the pastoral staff or plan a visit, go to cc biblechurch.com.

You'll find ministry services and additional teachings there as well. Just click on the resources tab to get started at cc biblechurch.com. Join us again next time as we open the scriptures together and proclaim the truth that never changes. This has been the unchanging truth.