The Gospel: Justification

Now, tonight we're going to talk about justification. Looks like a big word, but all these words, they look big, but they're not big in content, as to their meaning, but what they teach us is awesome. And so tonight we're going to talk about how God can justify a man that's in Christ.

If any man be in Christ, he's a new creation. Because God made him to be sin for us. He who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.

That word righteousness now is just the same as justification. Because in our language we couldn't say God righteousified you, you see. And so justification and righteousness really, they basically are the same.

And so when you come across that word righteousness, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. And so in Christ, that's where we find our justification. Now let's look at some of the scripture verses before we proceed.

I want to read one found in the book of Ecclesiastes. Chapter 7 and verse 20. For there is not a just man upon earth that doeth good and sinneth not.

So there's not a just man upon the face of the earth that doesn't sin, that does good always, habitually, and never sins. That man does not exist. And now we want to come over into the book of Genesis chapter 18.

Go back rather, not forward. Back to Genesis chapter 18 and verse 25. Oh, it looks like I got the wrong verse.

And so we'll just give it because it will come to my mind as we go. Romans chapter 3. Romans chapter 3 and we're reading verse 24. Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.

So here we find the subject of justification is associated with grace. And then we go to chapter 5. Just go over a page and read verse 1. Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Then go down in that same chapter to verse 9. Much more than being now justified by blood or by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him.

And now we want to go over to James. The epistle to James. And chapter 2. And reading in from verse 21.

Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he had offered Isaac his son upon the altar? Seest thou how faith wrought with his works? And by works was faith made perfect. And the scripture was fulfilled which said, Abraham believed God and it was imputed unto him for righteousness. And he was called a friend of God.

Ye see then how that by works a man is justified and not by faith only. Likewise also was not Rahab the harlot justified by works when she had received the messengers and had sent them out by another way. For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.

That's been a troublesome verse for a lot of people over many years. Now let's read in Matthew. Well, let's go to Genesis again first.

I might as well read all my verses now and then I won't have to go looking at them later. Genesis chapter 4. Now I'm reading this verse because I want to show as some people, some believers have suggested that an unsaved person cannot do a good work. It's impossible for them to do anything good.

Well, let's see what our verse says. God is talking to Cain. And the word well in the original language is good.

If thou doest good, shalt thou not be accepted. And if thou doest not good, sin lieth at the door, and unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him. Matthew chapter 19.

We'll read a verse in the New Testament. Matthew 19 and verse 16. And behold, one came and said unto him, Good Master, what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life? And he said unto him, Why callest thou me good? There is none good but one, that is God.

But if thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments. He said unto him, Which? Jesus said, Thou shalt do no murder. And he went on.

And then said to give his wealth to the poor and come follow him. And that will be all we will read. The term justification, it simply means acquittal.

It means to be set free. You come into a court case, and there's a charge being laid against you, and the judge hears it, and then the judge acquits you. The judge pronounces you not guilty, innocent.

And away you go. You've been acquitted. But the word justification goes further than just being acquitted.

It's got the idea of a positive declaration by the justifier or the judge. You are just. Not just acquitted and set free as innocent.

You're not guilty of the crime, so you've been acquitted. But it goes further with a positive charge by the justifier, thou art just. That he might be, remember we read in Romans 3 the other night, that he might be just and the justifier of him that believeth on Jesus.

So God is the justifier, and he declares to be just the person that believes on Jesus. Now, as we've seen, if a man be in Christ, God made the Lord Jesus to be sin. He who knew not sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.

Now that man here, when he sinned, he brought us into a condition of being a criminal. A rebel, we needed to be reconciled. A slave, we needed to be ransomed.

A criminal, we need to be cleared of our criminal acts. I don't know, maybe you've never thought of sin as being a criminal act. In our country, if you break the laws, you go out here and you break the laws, the speed limit or steal or whatever you might do, that's a crime, and you are charged for a criminal act.

But somehow, we have it and people have it in their head, in their mind, that they can break God's laws and nothing's going to happen. We know right well we cannot live outside the laws of our country and remain at liberty. It just can't happen.

And we want it that way. We don't want guys running around that are a danger to the community. We want them put where they're supposed to be put.

Now somehow we think now when we break God's law, thou shalt not blaspheme, or thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain. God says, I will not hold him guiltless. They do it all the time.

They don't think anything's going to happen. No, they don't think nothing's going to happen. Thou shalt honor thy father and thy mother.

Obey, respect, honor your parents. They don't do that. They don't think nothing's going to happen.

They don't expect nothing to happen. And even the laws of our country would support and measure disobedient children. You can't spank them.

You can't discipline them. Let them do what they like. And we can go over a whole lot of things.

But I want to just draw your attention to this fact that, listen, to sin against God is far more serious than breaking the laws of our nation. The most that our nation can do, and the judicial system is, the most serious thing is take our life, execute it, but then it's over. But listen, if you die a criminal, unjustified, and you meet God that way, you'll go to hell, and you'll be in the lake of fire forever.

That's the difference. You must learn, we must all learn, that to break the laws of God brings the justice of God down upon our head. And we will be punished.

Now, the Lord Jesus knows that. God knows that. And God knows there's not a just man upon the face of the earth that habitually doeth good and sinneth not.

That guy don't exist. We're all guilty. We're all criminals by the acts that we have committed in disobeying Christ and God and going our own way.

But God, it says in one place in the Bible, God will by no means clear the guilty. Just let them go. He won't do that.

Because He's just. And He's holy. And His laws were given to us to be obeyed.

And the human family from the very commencement of the human race, they've been breaking those commands. And like Isaiah summed it all up and said, All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way. And thank God the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.

So when you think of your friends, even your own children, even my own grandchildren, we have to tell them, look, you must learn that you have got to obey. Obeying your parents is not just a command that come from your parents, that's a command that come from God to you children. God says, honor your father and your mother.

Obey your parents. That's a command from God. And the havoc in our world, where's it all springing from? Well, children don't obey their parents.

And the parents cannot force the children to obey without bringing in the social securities and the social system. And then they want to interfere. And I know of them when they've come and taken the child away.

She was 16, they took her away and told the parents that they had no right to spank that child. They took her away and they brought her back pregnant. And now the father and the mother have to look after her, support her.

And that's the very thing the father was trying to hinder from happening. They said, you can't do that. You can't curtail that girl.

If she wants to go, you've got to let her go. She's 16 years old. And you dare not punish her by spanking her.

And so they took her. She'd gone for a few months and that's the way they brought her back. They didn't want to pay for the thing.

Well, that's up to the parents now. That's the kind of world we're living in, where there is no justice. Criminology is just... it's just a joke.

If you have enough money, you can buy your way out of pretty well any predicament. The judicial systems of our world are corrupt. But the judicial system that's divine and has God as the judge, is not corrupt.

And He will bring men and women into justice and be judged for their acts. Now there's four terms here. Therefore being justified freely.

Let's look at that one for a minute. If you want to be set free, if you want to be acquitted, if you want God to tell you and declare that you are just, these are the basis upon which He can do it. He just can't just say because He's God, okay, I declare you to be just.

Okay, run away homeboy, you're free. He can't do it that way. No.

Somebody's got to pay the price for your liberty. Somebody's got to pay for your criminal acts. God has said, the soul that sinneth, it will die.

That's the judgment against sin. It started out that way in Genesis chapter 2 when God told Adam, in the day you eat thereof, you will die. That's been the sentence upon sin from the very commencement.

And it's never been changed. And so when we come before God as criminals, like it shows here, because of our relationship to Him and because of the criminal acts we've committed, then we're going to be brought before God to be judged. How is God going to be able to acquit us? How could you declare a guilty man to be just? Gee, the judges of our world, they can't handle that one.

Once they bring a criminal before the judge and the verdict is he's guilty, the judge can't declare him just. Because he's guilty. Well, the judge might let him go home free without being made accountable for his deed, but then he's not a very good judge.

But God looks at the sinner as a criminal that has broken His laws and come under the sentence of death. He's guilty. He's unjust.

He's unrighteous. And by rights he should die. And yet God has a way that He can declare him just.

Not only acquit him, but declare him to be just. Because God is both just and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus. And so God comes once again now to the aid of the sinner.

This time he's a criminal. Guilty of breaking all God's laws. And he comes before God as guilty.

And God's going to take up His cause. And what does He do? Well, He's going to declare him to be just. But on this basis, He will do so.

First, He'll do it as a free, sovereign act of grace. Now, you have to understand this. If you're going to talk to your friends, especially religious people, because every religion in the world today, basically every one of them, has a work system.

It's just something inside them that they say, God gave those Ten Commandments, and so we're supposed to try and keep those Ten Commandments. And if we do the best we can in keeping those Ten Commandments, we've got a fair chance of getting to Heaven. They all, basically every one of them, have a work system incorporated into their religious system.

I don't know how many times I've had men tell me, and women too, if you do good, God will bless you. If you do evil, God will punish you. See, it's on the basis.

Now, that's kind of natural, isn't it? For the natural man to think that. Because he naturally thinks, if you go to church, you're supposed to be good. And Christians are supposed to be good.

And religious people are supposed to be good. So, if we're supposed to be good, then, if we try and be good, well, isn't that good enough? You can't be better than you can be. And there are all kinds of people.

Some of them on the very edge of death, telling me, I've lived a pretty good life. I did my duty, and that's all that's necessary, as far as they're concerned. We have got to rob them of that false confidence.

We have got to make them aware that there's no amount of good works that God will accept from them, that they might find favor with God and the forgiveness of their sin. It's man is freely justified. Therefore, being justified freely.

There used to be a people I used to work with, they wore a necklace and a cross on it. And I asked them, what do you wear that cross for? Well, they said, you've got to help Jesus bear His cross. You can't expect Jesus to do everything.

See what they had in their mind? They believe in their religion, and they believe they have this necklace, and there's a cross on it, and that's a symbol that they're helping Jesus. Now, what is wrong with people doing good to try and get to heaven? Listen to this verse. In Isaiah 64, I believe it is verse 6. All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.

So that's one verse that shows you that the ungodly can do good works. Because God says, all our good works, or all our righteousness, all those good things we seek to do to get favor with God, God says, all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags. Is God against good? Well, what's He saying that for? Here's a fellow who's done his very best.

Or a lady who did her very best, and God says it's all filthy rags. What does He say that for? Well, because on the cross, God punished His Son. God made His Son to be sin.

And His Son never knew sin, but He made Him to be sin. That you and I might receive the righteousness of God, which you find in Him. Our righteousness comes from His work for us on the cross.

He died for our sins. God made Him to be sin for us. He who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God.

But where? In Him. Now, if God demands good works from you and I to find favor and to be justified through, then it's an admittance that the death of Christ, the work of Christ is not sufficient. And that's a tremendous insult to God.

God will look at it, I have given My Son to die on that cross. I made Him to be sin. Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures.

And now you are saying that that's not good enough that you have to add your little bit? That's an insult to God. Our salvation is a gift. And you can't work for a gift.

You just had Christmas just a few weeks back. Months ago. And you all gave some gifts and you all received some gifts.

And your little girl, maybe Hannah, a little girl Hannah there, she's got the whitest little hair you ever saw. We were saying last night, the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin, but her hair is so white, how can it be whiter than that? It's about as white as you can get it. Now, suppose she brought Becca a little present.

And in her little heart she loves Mommy. And she brings her this Christmas present. And then Mother says, oh, just wait.

I'll go get my purse. And I'll give you $10 for it. Now, you give your mother a gift.

On any occasion. Mother's Day or Christmas or whatever, or birthday. And then she came and said, here, I'll pay you for it.

What would you say? You'd be insulted. It's a gift. I bought it.

I packaged it. I brought it to you. And I'm offering it to you.

It's a gift. You don't buy it. You don't pay for it.

You don't have to work for it. It's a gift. And yet, somehow, I don't know if there's one being that's cleverer than any other creature God's made, and it's that devil.

Because he's convinced multitudes, multitudes, multitudes, religious people, and all kinds of people that you've got to pay for this gift. You've got to work for it. You've got to do something for it.

Now, people are stupid. The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. By grace are you saved through faith, and not of yourselves.

It is the gift of God. Now, how much clearer could you make it? And yet, when you meet your friend at school, or your buddy at work, or you're in those people in your own family circle, we've got to convince them. The Gospel, the gift of God, is a gift just like any other gift.

You can't make the gift of God be different from any other gift. The human language is telling us, and the English, and the Hebrew, and the Greek, they're all telling us, gift is gift. It's free.

So, the first thing we learn is, now, justification is a free gift from God. He'll declare you just freely if you will believe that Jesus Christ, God's Son, died for your sins upon that cross, take your place as a criminal before God, recognizing what you are, and what you've done, and then simply believing that the Lord Jesus Christ died for your sins. And God says the minute you do that, I will declare you just.

As many ways God tells us things like John 3 and 36, He that believeth on the Son. What does God say? You're saved. You do your part.

That's the believing. Taking God at His word, and He will declare you saved, or have eternal life, or redeemed, or reconciled. They all come along in the same package.

Only tonight it's coming from the point of view of a criminal who's guilty of violating the laws of God. And if you'll believe that the Lord Jesus Christ upon the cross of Calvary died for your sins, God will declare you just. Now, I know we've all done that.

But some of us now, we want to tell others. And sometimes we don't know how to go about it. Because these guys with all their arguments and all their foolish reasoning and things, we have to have our minds equipped and trained as to how to answer that guy who naturally... Now, it's not going to be as easy as you think.

Because he's going to put up his argument. So that means God hates good. Now, what are you going to say now? Is God opposed to good? You say God says all my righteousness, all my good works are filthy rags.

So then God doesn't want any good out of me. Anything I do that's good, He's opposed to it. See the way they're going to argue? They'll twist it all up and pervert the truth in all kinds of different ways.

And you've just got to have your mind trained on what the Word of God says. God says, therefore being justified freely. Salvation is a gift.

God's not opposed to your good works. As long as you don't attempt to use those good works to further your acceptance with God. Because that's an insult.

In doing that, you're saying, the Lord Jesus' death upon the cross for my sins is not good enough. I have to add my little bit to it. And when you do that, the character of a gift is gone.

It's no longer a gift. Because you put something into it. So, therefore being justified freely by His grace.

Grace. That word runs right through the Bible. And it's a wonderful, wonderful truth.

Paul said one time, he said, I am by the grace of God what I am. One of the greatest Christian men that ever lived. And he never took no credit for what he did or what he was.

He said it all goes to the grace of God. Grace simply means the unmerited favor of God. That means the favor of God comes to you on no account of anything you've done.

It's the unmerited. You didn't deserve it. If you deserve anything, you deserve His wrath.

But He's not giving you His wrath. By grace, He's going to show you something. He's going to show you, you are a criminal.

And as a criminal, you deserve to die. But I, on the basis of the death of my son, if you will believe that when he died for you, the criminal, if you will believe that, I will declare you just. By grace.

It's a favor. It's a favor. You know what favor means.

You do people a favor. I did it as a favor for the guy. He didn't ask for it.

You did it as a favor. Well, that's what God did. Therefore, being justified by being justified freely by His grace.

Now, if we come down to chapter 5 and verse 9. Romans chapter 5 and verse 9. There we have being justified by blood. Now, that's the basis of God's justification. That's grace, yes.

The favor of God toward us. But that favor has a solid basis upon which it is offered. And that is the blood of Christ.

That's the death of the Lord Jesus. Upon the grounds of His death. In His death, He satisfied God perfectly, totally, 100%.

God requires nothing more. The blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son. That's what cleanses us of sins.

Who else could die for us? If God demands the criminal die, that's the wages of sin is death. Is there any possible way out? Either I die for my own sins and go to hell, or I need somebody else to die for me. And that's what God has done.

God demands death. Now, when you think about the blood, here's another thing. We take so much for granted.

A friend of mine, he's an elder up there in Canada, and he grew up like I did in the gospel hall and we preach the gospel the way we do and we just assume everybody knows everything and we don't have to explain nothing. And his daughter went and married an unsaved fellow and he had no religious background. He was just green.

And so they come home for Christmas holiday and so Tom asked him if he'd come out to the gospel meeting. And so the fellow said, yeah, he'd come. Listen to his father-in-law preach.

And Tom thought, well, what would I preach about? He thought, I'll preach about the blood of the lamb. The blood of the lamb. Put it on the doorpost.

Shedding of blood. Then it was all done. After, at home, had a cup of tea and the boy said, I don't understand you, Dad.

I haven't heard so much about all this blood. What are you talking about blood? I don't want to be washing any blood. What are you driving at? The guy didn't have a clue.

So you see, when we preach the gospel, there's people out there, they used to tell me in the Caribbean, they used to say to me, where can I get the blood? Where can I get the blood? Because they used to think they got the blood at the Holy Communion. That's where the blood was shed. And that's the only place they knew about religion with blood.

And they used to say, where can I get the blood? Well, listen, friend. The blood represents the life, you see. When you hear about the Lord Jesus shedding His blood, it means He gave His life.

Because the life of the flesh is in the blood. If a man's blood is gone, he's dead. Because the life principle is in the blood.

So when the Bible talks about blood being shed, or blood being put upon the altar and so on, the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses from all sin, it means the death. So don't be afraid of being too simple. Because some don't understand.

And Tom found that out. His boy, his son-in-law, hadn't a clue. He thought it was ridiculous what he was talking about.

We've been justified by blood. That means we've been justified by the death of Jesus Christ, who died for our sins upon the cross. On that grounds, God can declare you to be just.

But on no other grounds. Only in that you believe. Put faith in His Son who died for you upon the cross.

And then the other one is in verse 1 in chapter 5. Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God. Faith. You know, unsaved people now, this is where they're at an advantage.

They don't get all hepped up about faith like people do in the assembly. Because we've talked about it so much. They grow up with believing the Lord Jesus Christ, now shall be saved.

And this believing becomes a big problem to them. A lot of unsaved people, they don't have no trouble. They know what believe means.

You believe it, you believe it, and a lot of them get saved. Easily, in our opinion. Faith just means taking God at His word.

He said it. It's true. I believe it.

I take God at His word. If He said it, then it's right. Now what did He say? A jailer one time asked the Lord Jesus.

He said, Sir, what must I do to be saved? What do I have to do? And what did the Apostle Paul say? Just a simple, short statement. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you're saved. Take God at His word.

Or you can take John 3 and 36. He that believeth on the Son has everlasting life. Take God at His word.

He said it. It's got to be true. So when we come to our friends, when we try and explain to them and talk to them, we must keep it simple.

Justification is free. You cannot add one black cent to it. And if you do, you spoil it.

It's no longer a gift. You've got your finger in it somehow. And God is determined that nobody will be in heaven and ever boast.

By grace are ye saved through faith, and not of yourselves. It is the gift of God and not of works, lest any man should boast. God is determined that nobody will be in heaven bragging about anything they did.

They're all, we'll all be there on one grounds. The cross of Christ is all my boast. His blood my only plea.

My passport to the realms of bliss is Jesus died for me. And nobody can have any more than that. The Apostle Paul got no more than that.

But you can't have anything less either. It's faith in Jesus Christ that brings you this justification. So the justification is free.

Its grounds and basis is on the death of Christ. And you obtain it by faith. You can't get it easier than that.

And God will declare you to be just. But what about this term in James chapter 2. Now James says something there that disturbs a lot of people. He says now, and they say James is contradicting Paul.

Paul said man is justified freely by grace apart from the works of the law. Paul goes back to Genesis chapter 15. I think it is in verse 6 where God took Abraham out and showed him all the stars, the sky and said so shall I see thee and Abraham believed God and God reckoned that belief of Abraham to him for righteousness or justification.

God declared him just right there on the grounds of his faith. He believed what God said. Now that's where Paul is drawing all his arguments from.

Genesis chapter 15 and verse 6. There Paul is using faith as the means of justification. And that's what he's building his argument on in the epistle to the Romans and the epistle to the Galatians. Abraham, the father of the faithful.

Now when James talks about it, James goes over to Genesis chapter 22 and I forget the verse now. I think it's verse 18 or it might be down further. And he's using now, not Abraham's faith, but he's going to talk about Abraham's character.

The character of Abraham. And he's going to use the story in Genesis 22 when God asked Abraham to take his son up to Mount Moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering. And Abraham takes his son up and is willing to offer him there upon that altar.

Now here you have Abraham obeying. Paul talks about Genesis 15. Faith.

He's talking about the way you're justified. And that's what Paul talks about all through Romans and Galatians. Faith.

Where James picks up justification now and he picks it up from Genesis 22 where Abraham was prepared to offer his son in obedience to the will of God. So on one side, Abraham was justified by faith. But his faith was made perfect by obedience.

Now James talks about the character of the man Abraham. Anybody can say, you know, I'm justified. I believe in Jesus.

I believe in God. I believe the Lord Jesus died on the cross for my sins. Okay? So that's the true way of being justified.

But James says that faith must be made perfect. That faith isn't complete. That faith must be substantiated by some works.

What does James say? Well, James says you take a body and that body dies. And as long as the spirit is separated from the body, is there any life? Well, James says as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also. Now think about it.

That's James declaring now that faith to be valid and to have worth must have some works to back it up. Faith without works is dead. Now I never said it.

And you can take all kinds of illustrations and you can find all kinds of ways people try and get out of it. You can't get out of it. Now he didn't say how much works.

But there's got to be some little evidence. There's got to be something there. A spark of life may be ever so small, but it's there.

What did Peter say about Lot? Peter said about Lot that his righteous soul was vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked every day. What is the little thing that Peter saw there? Well, Lot's conscience was stirred by what he saw in Sodom. That's what all the work was.

A conscience about what he saw. His righteous soul was vexed with the filthy conversation or the filthy life of those around him. Now most people would say Lot never made it.

But Peter said he did. But James says in that verse as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also. Works makes a man's faith complete.

So no matter how much we might try and get around this, you really can't. I have my own experience and I would tell people you can be about as much as a child of the devil as you can possibly be and be saved. Because I was there.

And I know I was saved. But there were sparks of life. There were sparks of life.

James is talking here about a man who says he is saved, he has faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, but he has absolutely nothing in his life to back it up. And James says that man's faith is dead. You take that verse, James chapter 2, read verse 21 down to the end and see how James sums it up.

Now James, remember, is not quarreling with Paul. Paul is using Abraham's justification by faith to show that all people are justified by faith. That's the principle of justification.

Man is justified by faith. That's the way you're justified. James is talking now about the character.

And he goes to Genesis chapter 22 to show Abraham when God asked him to offer his son upon Mount Moriah, Abraham obeyed God. That's where James comes in now. And James is showing, see, Abraham's faith is being made perfect by his works.

Now, I'm going to quit. But I want to ask you this one question. Would you accept a person who has absolutely no evidence of salvation in his life? Absolutely none.

And he tells you he's saved. Would you believe him? Should you? I'm saved. Yeah, but you haven't got a speck of evidence in your life that you're saved.

The Lord Jesus says, by their fruits you will know. Therefore, another verse says, Paul talking to Timothy said, the Lord knoweth them that are His. Let the Lord be the judge as to who's saved or not in the final analysis.

But we as Christians, when we preach the Gospel, we preach to them that they're justified by faith. But that faith is a living thing that will manifest itself in character. Because Paul said to the Ephesians, he said, you've been saved onto what? What have you been saved onto? Nothing? Just saved from hell and just go and do what you like? You've been saved onto good works.

Good works don't save you. But that's the purpose which God saved you. That you would now live a life pleasing to God.

Let us pray. Father, help us we pray to understand these things. And we're living in a world, a Christian so-called nation.

And everybody would say that sure, we're Christians. We're not pagans. And they all like to claim they're doing something for Thee.

And they're not that bad a people. And in one way or another, they feel they should be accepted by Thee because they're not that bad. Our Father, we pray that would help us in our testimonies, in our Gospel preaching, Sunday school and wherever we talk to men and women.

That we would bring them to this issue. That there is nothing, absolutely nothing in them that Thou would accept. Nothing they do, nothing they are.

They are criminals and they must die. But Thou has found a way to give them life and declare them just. And that way is free on the basis of free sovereign grace.

Most of them don't understand. They can't seem to grasp what a gift is in a spiritual setting. They know what a gift is in natural life.

At a Christmas or a birthday party or so on. But when it comes to Thy salvation, that the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord, then all at once the term gift seems to lose its meaning and is turned into something else. So Father, we pray as we try, give us strength, give us wisdom and use us Father we pray to lead men and women, boys and girls to understand there is a wonderful gift waiting there for them if they'll just take it as a gift.

This we ask now in the Savior's worthy name. Amen. Let us sing.

264. 264. O joy of the justified, joy of the free! I'm washed in that crimson tide, open for me.

In Christ my Redeemer rejoicing I stand and point to the print of the nail in His hand. O sing of His mighty love, sing of His mighty love, sing of His mighty love, mighty to save. O joy of the justified, joy of the free! I'm washed in that crimson tide, open for me.

In Christ my Redeemer rejoicing I stand and point to the print of the nail in His hand. O sing of His mighty love, sing of His mighty love,