← Back to sermon library

Well, you can turn with me in 
your Bibles to Romans chapter 3. Romans chapter 3. This evening we'll look at verses 
21 through 28. Romans chapter 3, 21 through 
28, but we will read the entire chapter. So Romans chapter 3. What advantage then has the Jew, 
or what is the prophet of circumcision? Much in every way, chiefly because 
to them were committed the oracles of God. For what if some did 
not believe? Will their unbelief make the 
faithfulness of God without effect? Certainly not. Indeed, let God 
be true, but every man a liar, as it is written, that you may 
be justified in your words and may overcome when you are judged. 
But if our unrighteousness demonstrates the righteousness of God, What 
shall we say? Is God unjust, who inflicts wrath? 
I speak as a man. Certainly not. For then, how 
will God judge the world? For if the truth of God has increased 
through my lie to his glory, why am I still judged as a sinner? 
And why not say, let us do evil, that good may come? As we are 
slanderously reported, and as some affirm that we say, their 
condemnation is just. What then? Are we better than 
they? Not at all. For we have previously charged 
both Jews and Greeks that they are all under sin. As it is written, 
there is none righteous. No, not one. There is none who 
understands. There is none who seeks after 
God. They have all turned aside. They have together become unprofitable. 
There is none who does good. No, not one. Their throat is 
an open tomb. With their tongues they have 
practiced deceit. The poison of asps is under their lips, 
whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are 
swift to shed blood. Destruction and misery are in 
their ways. and the way of peace they have 
not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes. Now we 
know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under 
the law that every mouth may be stopped and all the world 
may become guilty before God. Therefore, by the deeds of the 
law, no flesh will be justified in his sight, for by the law 
is the knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of 
God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the law and 
the prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus 
Christ to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference, 
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being 
justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is 
in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by His 
blood through faith to demonstrate His righteousness, because in 
His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously 
committed. to demonstrate at the present time his righteousness, 
that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has 
faith in Jesus. Where is boasting then? It is 
excluded. By what law? Of works? No, but 
by the law of faith. Therefore, we conclude that a 
man is justified by faith apart from the deeds of the law. Or 
is he the God of the Jews only? Is He not also the God of the 
Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also, since there is one God 
who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised 
through faith. Do we then make void the law through faith? Certainly 
not. On the contrary, we establish 
the law. Amen. Let's pray. O Lord, we do ask 
again for Your blessing upon the preaching of Your Word. I 
pray that You would be pleased to to bless us this evening as 
we study this passage together, and Lord, that you would be honored 
and you would be glorified, and that Christ would be exalted 
among us here. Lord, that your saints would be edified and built 
up in their faith, and that sinners may see the Savior and run to 
Him in faith for their salvation. So, Lord, we ask your blessing 
on us now, and we pray this in Christ's name. Amen. So, as I was wondering what to 
prepare for a communion, I know Pastor Butler's been working 
through a series on there, and I was thinking of these things, 
and I thought, well, what is communion about? Communion is 
that we come, we gather, and as the Lord Jesus said, that 
you do this in remembrance of me. And so when I think of that, 
what are we remembering when we come and gather and partake 
of communion together? And it's really, it's the gospel, 
the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the truths that are 
contained Therein and I think of I think of the of Paul in 
Romans chapter chapter 1 he says I am I'm not ashamed of the gospel 
for is the power of God unto salvation, you know, this is 
something that that sometimes the gospel, we think, well, maybe 
that's, you know, we understand it, we've heard it, we know it, 
we've, you know, we believe it, and, you know, let's move on 
to greater things. But the gospel is not, you know, 
there's nothing greater that you can move on to. The more 
you study the gospel and what Christ has done, the more we 
ought to, the more it increases our faith and our, and strengthens 
our faith and increases our love for the Savior. I think of, I 
think it's Charles Hodge, I often quote him, but, you know, the 
gospel is so simple that a child can understand it, but yet it's 
so profound that studies by the wisest theologians will never 
exhaust its glories. So as we come tonight, you know, 
we come again, we look at the gospel message of our Lord Jesus 
Christ, something that we are not ashamed of. not in the sense 
of being shamed, but in the sense of hearing it too much and becoming 
tired of it. So, you know, we come here and 
we come to, again, remind ourselves, what did the Lord Jesus do on 
our behalf? You know, so we have the, in 
this section here, Paul's emphasis on the righteousness of God, 
the righteousness of God that we have here. It's important to understand 
here, when we look in verse 21, he says, Now the righteousness 
of God, apart from the law, is revealed. The same thing in Romans 
1, verse 16 and 17, that this righteousness in the gospel, 
the righteousness of God, Revealed it's a righteousness from God. 
That's the you know we're not speaking of the of the the inherent 
righteousness of God or his his Attribute or his perfection of 
righteousness where he's perfectly just and perfectly perfectly 
right perfectly morally morally pure but rather a righteousness 
that God Provides for us so in this section will we see that 
righteousness first we see the righteousness revealed in 21 
to 23, and then we have the righteousness explained in 24 through 25a, 
and then righteousness vindicated, this time God's inherent righteousness 
vindicated, His justice vindicated in 25b and 26, and then we have 
the conclusion in 27 and 28. So first, then, we have to ask, 
well, why do we need a righteousness from God? And in the context, 
it's very obvious, it's because of our sin. Our sin causes us 
to fall short of that glory of God, as we find in verse 23 there. 
So our sin is a lack of righteousness. So for man to come come near 
and to abide with a holy God, he has to be as morally pure 
and as morally upright as God himself. God cannot tolerate 
sin in his presence. Habakkuk 1.13, you have purer 
eyes than to behold evil and cannot look on wickedness. So 
we need to understand that. When we look, when we go back 
to the garden, we understand what Adam was supposed to do 
in the garden was Adam was supposed to to keep the law perfectly, 
to have this perfect righteousness that made him worthy of eternal 
life and worthy of entrance into heaven to be with God there. 
But that sin, of course, broke that, and he fell short of attaining 
that righteousness. So now we all have this same 
problem, this same problem that has separated us from God. And if we go back through the 
previous several chapters, Paul has really labored to show that 
that the sin problem is universal. So he begins with the Gentiles 
in chapter 1 verse 18 and all the way into chapter 2 verse 
17, speaking of the sin of the Gentiles and the pagans and all 
the sins that they did. And then in chapter 2, verse 
18, he goes to the Jews and he says, you too as well, Jews, 
you are just as guilty. And you even have the law of 
God. The Gentiles, they didn't have the law written. They had 
it on their hearts, he says, which makes them just as guilty. 
But he says, you Jews, you have no excuse because you have the 
law there, but you still broke that. You still have fallen short 
of that. In case you think that you know, 
perhaps you don't fit into those two categories You're not as 
horrible as those pagans, but you're also not a Jew Well, then 
he then he gets you in in verse 9 and and verse 9 to 20 and he 
goes through and just very clearly Shows that you know, there is 
none righteous. No, not one. There's no fear 
of God before our eyes Everyone everyone has has sinned, you 
know, we so verse verse 20 then those or sorry then Yeah, in 
verse 20, we see then that by the deeds of the law, no flesh 
will be justified in his sight. So we have all broken that law, 
and we cannot make ourselves right by keeping that law there. So therefore, then, if there 
is to be a righteousness by which we can enter into heaven, it's 
not going to be attained by us. It must come from another, and 
that's where he says the gospel reveals to us where this righteousness 
comes from, and who it comes from, and how, and how do we 
have it. So there we have, then, the righteousness revealed in 
verse 21a. So he begins here by saying, 
but now, but now the righteousness of God, apart from the law, is 
revealed. And so basically, and this but now is referring to 
the first advent, the first coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, and 
his life, his death, his resurrection and ascension. So it's marked 
a major shift in redemptive history from the old covenant to types 
and shadows to now the reality being here. So now it's revealed. 
We understand where this righteousness comes from. And again, this righteousness 
has been clearly revealed to us now. So the Old Testament, 
like I said, it was types, and it was shadows, it was things 
that were pointing forward to God providing a righteousness 
that would avail with Him. And that's what he says here. 
He says that this is... It was witnessed by the Law and the 
Prophets. So in the Old Testament, then 
it was the Law and the Prophets. They pointed forward to these 
things. That, in fact, was the whole 
point of the Old Testament. When we see in the first three 
chapters, we see the fall into sin and that falling short of 
the glory of God. And then the rest of the Old 
Testament starts to reveal in small steps in Genesis 3 with 
the promise to Adam and to Eve. And then as our confession says, 
by further steps it's revealed the righteousness that God is 
going to supply. A righteousness that is not going 
to come from us, because when we understand that we've all 
sinned, we've all fallen short of that, we no longer have this 
righteousness. But God is going to provide it. 
The Old Testament The prophets and the law revealed how that 
was going to come about. The whole sacrificial system 
of the Old Testament was there to show where this righteousness 
was... Where did it come from? How was 
God going to provide a way by which man could approach by which a sinful man could approach 
a holy God. The Old Testament sacrificial 
system emphasized the failure of man to have that righteousness 
of himself, but yet that it showed that provision was made, provision 
was going to be made by God for the people to draw near to them, 
something that would make them acceptable to God, a provision 
of righteousness from God. Psalm 51, David refers to this. 
He says, So he understands there was a righteousness that was 
going to deliver him from this guilt of bloodshed. So now, so again, so it's clear, 
Paul's saying in the Old Testament, they understood, they understood 
that there was a righteousness that was going to come from another. 
You know, that there somehow, they would have a righteousness 
that would avail with God, a righteousness that would make them acceptable 
before God, even though they had sinned. And that's, and that 
now, we see a problem there with that last statement, even though 
they had sinned. You know, so if you turn to Exodus 
34 for a minute, we can see, we can see the problem, that 
our sin presents to us. Exodus 34, Moses has asked the 
Lord for a special revelation of the glory of God. And the Lord, so in verse 33, 
verse 18, he says, please show me your glory. And then the Lord 
says to him, I will make all my goodness pass before you and 
I'll proclaim the name of the Lord before you. So then now 
in verse 34, we see that Moses goes back up on the mountain 
and then the Lord descends in a cloud here and reveals something 
of himself. Now he did prior in the end of 
chapter 33, he did say that he was going to pass by, he was 
going to hide him in the cleft of the rock and then pass by 
and reveal something of his glory. So now as the Lord comes and 
the Lord the Lord reveals something to himself in chapter 34, verse 
5. Now, the Lord descended in the 
cloud and stood with them there and proclaimed the name of the Lord. And the 
Lord passed before him and proclaimed, the Lord, the Lord God, merciful 
and gracious and long-suffering and abounding in goodness and 
truth, keeping mercy for thousands and forgiving iniquity and transgression 
and sin. So if we stop there, then we 
think, oh, that's great, the Lord loves to forgive I understand 
it now. We can sin, but God can just 
forgive our sin. I get it. But listen to the next 
line. By no means clearing the guilty. So now that presents us with 
a problem. If God has revealed Himself as 
perfectly just in that way, that yes, He loves to forgive. He's 
gracious. He loves to forgive all sin and 
iniquity and transgression. But yet, he's also perfectly 
just. He will by no means let the guilty 
go unpunished, by no means clear the guilty. So then we have this 
problem that it presents to us. God had told Adam, on the day 
that you eat, you will surely die. So death was the curse for 
sinning against God. But we know Adam sinned, but 
he didn't die. And instead, rather than dying, 
yes we know he died spiritually, but he did not die physically 
and eternally at that moment. But rather, God gave a promise, 
and he promised that in the future, someone would come who would 
provide the reason why Adam was not cast into eternal death on 
that day. Again, so we understand, yes, 
he spiritually died in the sense that his moral faculties became 
corrupted, but that immediate physical and eternal death, that 
was also part of this curse for breaking the law. But yet, it 
didn't happen, and God passed over that sin. So now, on that 
day in the garden, when Adam sinned, and God had said, you 
will surely die, but then God passed over that sin of Adam, 
Now, humanly speaking, I say this then, the gospel became 
absolutely necessary if God was to remain a just judge. For God's justice to be upheld, 
that gospel, it became necessary that someone would come. And 
again, when I say humanly speaking, I'm not saying this is not a 
plan, this is not plan B in the sense of, you know, God passed 
over and then said, oh, now I need to do something. This was always 
God's plan from eternity. But humanly speaking, the gospel, 
became necessary for God to maintain His justice when He passed over 
that sin. So, Paul's going to continue 
to explain that to us here. So, we go back to Romans chapter 
3. Back to Romans chapter 3. So, 
we're in verse 22 now. And he says, even the righteousness 
of God, now think righteousness from God there, through faith 
in Jesus Christ to all and on all who believe. So this righteousness 
that God is going to provide is, for one, it says it's received 
by faith. And again, we see that in the 
Old Testament as well, Habakkuk 2.4, the just shall live by faith. 
And here he tells us very specifically, it's faith in Jesus Christ. that 
Christ. Christ is the answer to this 
problem. This problem that we have of 
God delighting in forgiveness, but God also having to uphold 
his justice at all costs. He will not sacrifice his justice. He will by no means clear the 
guilty and let sin go unpunished. So Jesus is the answer to that. Jesus is the one that provides 
this righteousness here. So let's move on here. So then first he says, He says 
that it's to all, that this righteousness is offered to all here. So the 
righteousness that is revealed in Jesus Christ, it's received 
by faith in Christ, it's offered to all. And why then? Why is he saying that it's offered 
to all, to everybody? Why not just some? And the answer 
comes at the end of the verse there, Difference for all have 
sinned and fallen short of the glory of God We are all on the 
same the same level the same playing field when it comes to 
ours to our standard And our righteousness with God we have 
everyone has fallen short of that and that's that that really 
is the is the is the is the best news for for anyone if who's 
here tonight who may not be saved that that we are all on, there's 
no difference. There's nothing that set those 
of us here who are saved, who are believers in Christ, there's 
no difference. We had nothing different going 
for us than you did. In fact, we had nothing going 
for us. So if you're here and you're 
wondering, could this be for me? Could it be that Christ would 
offer this righteousness to me. Well, I could tell you on the 
authority of God's word that we find here that yes, indeed 
it is. Christ offers this righteousness to you as well. So not one of 
us here who are in Christ by God's grace have anything to, 
there's nothing different in us. It was all of grace. There is no difference. So it 
says, to all, and then it says, and on all who believe. Again has has the the the on 
all there's a textual variant there But but I believe it's 
it's it's accurate that on on all meaning or overall is a better 
Maybe a better way we could we could translate it. So so not 
not only is it offered to all but for those who have it It's 
it's over all them. It's it's all encompassing You 
know, it covers them. It's not it's not partly It's 
not partly a righteousness that God gives partly and then plus 
something that we have to offer, we have to bring to the table 
in some way or another. It's not that we were morally 
upright somehow and then God gave us this righteousness, but 
rather it is all covering, it is a complete righteousness that 
we need. It supplies everything that we lack. So, and again, 
as I say this to any unbelievers that may be listening, is that, 
you know, this is important to understand. There's no prerequisites 
to being... This righteousness completes, 
it meets every standard that we must meet for eternal life. It is supplied by God there. 
There's nothing that we need to bring to the table. There's no certain expectation 
that we need to live up to before we can be worthy of this righteousness. But it's a gift that's offered 
to all of us. There's no standard you have 
to meet. We're all on the same level. We've all sinned. We are 
all unworthy. But, you know, because there 
is a standard for eternal life, and that's perfect obedience 
to the law of God. What Paul describes here as the 
glory of God, that perfect obedience. All of us have fallen short of 
that standard. So, then we find ourselves, each 
one of us, wallowing in that sinfulness, and then God offers 
a righteousness that meets everything that we lack, and He offers it 
to all, a righteousness that is received by faith in the Lord 
Jesus. And it's to all who believe, 
Paul says here. And then, of course, it's a righteousness 
that's apart from the deeds of the law. It's apart from from 
any merit at all on our part. There's nothing that we can do. 
This righteousness is supplied by God. So what is this righteousness 
then? Righteousness explained. So we've seen in verse 23 then 
that we've all sinned, we've all fallen short of the glory 
of God. That standard that we had to 
meet for eternal life, we've all fallen short of that. So 
what is this righteousness then here? So Paul starts then explaining 
this in verse 24. So he says, being justified. 
Now, justification, this is an important word, important concept 
to understand. speak about it. Justification 
means to be declared right with God. It is a legal declaration, 
a forensic declaration. Sometimes we use that word. Think 
in terms of God being a judge, and the judge is saying, you 
are now right with me. God is lawgiver and he's judge, 
and he's saying, you are right with me. So it doesn't change 
the fact that we've sinned. We still have sinned, so it's 
not changing something about us and our nature, but rather 
it's a change of our status before God. That our status changes. That God, the just judge, says, 
I declare this person to be right with me and to be worthy of eternal 
life. So, again, we're going to see 
how that works. We still have this problem. How 
can that be? If God is going to be perfectly 
just, how then can he declare me, who's unjust, to be right 
with him? So, as our confession says in 
its definition of justification, it says that God pardons their 
sins and accounts or accepts them as righteous, not for anything 
wrought in them or done by them, but for Christ's sake alone. 
So it's accepting them, accounting them, or declaring them to be 
right with Him. So we're being justified, but 
it's freely by His grace, as we move on here. Freely by His 
grace. Again, Paul emphasizing this. There's no cost to this from 
us. We did not need to supply something 
in order for God to return this righteousness or to exchange 
in exchange for righteousness. It's free. It's a gift that God 
offers completely of grace. So, and again, look at what Paul 
is doing here. He still hasn't given us the 
explanation for this, how God can be just and yet justify unrighteous 
and ungodly people. He hasn't given us that explanation, 
but what he's done is he's stripped man down of all ability to earn 
this righteousness, for one. So we cannot earn this righteousness 
because, let's understand that, righteousness here is a full, 
fully satisfying all the demands of the law. Not only the positive 
demands, but the negative ones as well. So the curses, and we'll 
see that in a minute here. But we needed to have a righteousness 
whereby there's a perfect obedience to all those laws of God, but 
also fulfilling the negative aspect, the cursing of the law 
as well. So it's not that we can just 
undo the sin that we've done by doing some more good works 
or more obedience, but rather we have a righteousness that 
we cannot Accomplish on our own we we cannot we cannot do that. 
We've fallen short of that So so not only has he stripped man 
of all the ability to earn righteous to to earn this righteousness 
But he's also taken away. Oh the the the need for man to 
meet any any sort of criteria, there's there's no there's no 
standard that must be met it is completely It is all of grace. We cannot and we need not contribute 
in any way to this righteousness that God gives. I think it was 
Jonathan Edwards that says, you know, you contribute nothing 
to your salvation except for the sin that made it necessary. So, again, if you're here tonight 
and you have, you know, nothing to contribute but sin, then this 
message is for you. And of course, it's for us as 
believers as well, that we never forget this, that this should 
be the driving factor of the Christian life, the grace of 
God. David says that, I will sing 
of the mercy of the Lord forever. So that should be the driving 
force of the Christian. As we come to passages like this, 
and we see how how man is being stripped of every ability, but 
also of every requirement necessary for this righteousness. We praise 
God for His great grace. We sing of the mercy of the Lord 
forever. So, and then, and then we, and 
then now, now Paul gets in, into this, into the explanation here 
in a bit more, more explaining. Now, how is, how does this work? 
So he says, now this, this, this righteousness comes through the 
redemption that is in Christ Jesus. So again, we have another, 
another word here we need to understand. Redemption. John 
Owen gives the definition that redemption is the, is the delivery 
of anyone from captivity and misery by the intervention of 
a price or ransom. That's very important to understand 
that price or ransom there. So to be redeemed was not just 
to be rescued. It's more than just a rescuing. There's a price to pay to be 
rescued, to be redeemed. If we go back to the Old Testament, 
we've been reading through Leviticus. We saw often the concept of the 
Redeemer. in Leviticus, someone who had 
got themselves into debt with somebody and could not pay that 
debt, so then they had to go and work for that. Well, a Redeemer 
could come along and they could pay that debt to rescue that 
person from that bondage and from that captivity and serving 
of that to that other person, so to be redeemed. So Christ, so the redemption 
is in Christ Jesus. So Christ has become our Redeemer. He's the one who has given that 
payment to free us from the bondage that we are in. Now, first we 
need to understand, then, who are we in bondage to? This is 
important because sometimes we can have, you know, the Bible 
often speaks of us as being in bondage to the devil, that the 
whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one. You know that 
we're under his power. We're in bondage to him, but 
that is that is not what is what's happening in this redemption 
Transaction you know Christ is not Christ is not coming and 
paying a price to the devil to to release us from From this 
bondage. You know if that was the case 
if the devil had us held us captive and demanded a Ransom you know 
that then the devil would be the winner in this scenario here, 
but rather you know we have to understand we are indebted to 
God in the so So the payment that Christ had to make was to 
God, it was not to the devils, because our sin has incurred 
massive Massive infinite debt with God 
and that debt must be discharged It must be paid in full if we 
are if we are to be freed. So that is that is how that is 
how Christ Conquers people from the kingdom of darkness and from 
the from the power of Satan in in that way But it is through 
redemption but through paying that price to the father whereby 
then he can he can he can take them out of the kingdom of Darkness 
and conquer them out of the kingdom of darkness So we always need 
to we I think we understand that but just to want to point that 
out again. He's not He's not paying a ransom to the devil. We are indebted to God. So, and 
then when we understand, what does the Bible teach? What is 
that debt then? We talk about, you know, that 
we've incurred debt. God is the, you know, God is 
the creditor. We've incurred this debt. What 
is this in concrete terms then? Well, the Bible is very clear. 
The wages of sin is death, Romans 6, 23. We see that elsewhere. We saw it in Genesis. You know, 
the day that you eat, the day that you sin against me, you 
will surely die. So that's the punishment, the 
curse, then, of sin is death. The payment, the wages of sin, 
or the payment for sin is death. So that's what we see then in 
verse 25. So being justified freely by his grace through the 
redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as 
a propitiation by his blood. Again, we have another word we 
need to define and we need to understand what it means here 
to understand the gospel. A propitiation is payment to 
satisfy justice, to satisfy the divine justice in this situation 
here. The perfect justice of God demands 
a full payment for sin. It demands that sin must be paid. We saw that in Exodus. I will 
by no means let the guilty go unpunished or clear the guilty. 
God will not say, I forgive that debt. I will not clear that debt. 
That sin, that payment must be made to satisfy that justice. And that's what the propitiation 
what it means here. The propitiation is that payment 
that Christ offered here. The propitiation that he says, 
by his blood. So the curse of the law demanded 
the shedding of blood, demanded which is death. So on the day 
that you sin, the day that you eat of it, you will surely die. 
The soul that sins will die, says the Bible. Not just physical 
death, but eternal death. Separation from any any grace 
any any mercy any favor from God and and receiving nothing 
But his but his infinite and his eternal wrath against our 
sin That's that is the that is the curse of the law no favor 
from God, but rather it only wrath against against that sin 
That is the definition of eternal death. And the Bible says, without 
the shedding of blood, or without the death, there can be no remission. And that is the gospel message 
here, is this propitiation by Christ Jesus. That on the cross, 
God imputed, or he credited, our sins onto Christ. That Christ 
was declared guilty by the Father, for the sins that we had committed, 
and He was declared guilty for those sins, and He was punished 
as guilty for those sins. That the Father declared Him 
guilty, punished Him as such. So where you and I should have 
been hanging on that cross, suffering the eternal wrath of God for 
our sin, there stood Christ hanging in our place, facing the divine, 
infinite, wrath of the Father on that cross. We're going to 
sing at the end of worship, in my place condemned he stood. 
That is the crux of the gospel, that Christ there, he was condemned 
in our place, condemned. He was bearing the curse of the 
law. We often think of substitution 
and we think, yeah, Christ was there, he did that for me, but 
Condemned, cursed, bearing the curse of the law. Christ has 
redeemed us from the curse of the law. How? By becoming a curse 
for us. Galatians 3, 13. So Isaiah 53, 
it says, Yahweh laid on him the iniquity of us all. That's that 
imputation, crediting to Christ. laying on Christ our sin. And 
then it says, then it pleased Yahweh to crush Him, to put Him 
to grief and to make His very soul an offering for sin. It 
says that on that cross, Christ was cursed for the sins of His 
people. If we think of the blessings 
in the Bible, specifically the Aaronic blessing, we call that, 
that the Lord The Lord bless you and keep you. Let me find 
it here. And the Lord lift up his countenance 
upon you. Sorry, let me just find it so 
I can get it. The Lord bless you and keep you. 
The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you. 
The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. 
Well, on the cross, Christ received the opposite of that, and where 
we should have received the opposite of that. So instead of the Lord 
bless you and keep you, it's the Lord curses you and the Lord 
And the Lord keeps, it means protects, but rather the Lord 
curses you and the Lord crushes you, to use the word of Isaiah, 
on that cross. The Lord crushes you. The Lord, 
He doesn't make His face shine upon you, but instead He removes 
all of that favor and all of that grace that He shows, and 
there's nothing but divine wrath being upon you. And the Lord 
be gracious to you. Instead, the opposite, the Lord 
is cursing you. The Lord lift up His countenance 
upon you and give you peace. It's it's it there was nothing 
but wrath but but curse the the lord jesus bearing the curse 
that we deserve cursed for the sins of His people, cursed for 
my sin, cursed for your sin, in my place condemned He stood, 
sealed my pardon with His blood." Hallelujah, what a Savior. And 
that is the gospel, that Christ was there, cursed in our place, 
condemned, until that last mite was paid. And then He cried out, 
it is finished, or paid in full is a better translation. Paid 
in full, that curse had been paid in full. On the cross, Christ 
wasn't there as an example for us. He wasn't there as an example 
of love or whatever it may be. He wasn't there just to physically 
die for us, but rather he was there to face that eternal death, 
that eternal separation of any grace and any mercy, any favor 
at all from the Lord, but rather nothing but cursing. And Christ 
fulfilled that in all of our sins upon upon that cross. How an infinite 
punishment can be carried out on the cross in space and time? 
Well, that's only things that the Lord can understand. But 
yet the Bible tells us that's what he was. That's what happened. 
He bore that curse. for us. And that's the gospel, 
that's the good news, that's why we're here this evening and 
celebrating the supper tonight. When he says, do this in remembrance 
of me, this is my body, this is my blood, this is what we 
are remembering, that Christ became a curse for us, that we 
should have been cursed by the sin that we incurred, but Christ 
bore that curse in our place. And that's the righteousness 
that God provides. That's the explanation for it. God demanded 
full obedience to the law of God. Paul's focus here so much 
is the act of obedience of Christ, whereby he perfectly kept all 
of God's laws and earned the positive side of the law and 
earned eternal life that way. His emphasis here is on the fulfillment 
of the law and on the curse side of it, that thereby that law 
is fully fulfilled. All the curse has been paid in 
full as well. So Christ, that's the righteousness. 
Christ has done it all, and that righteousness that is received 
by faith, it tells us here. Whom God set forth as a propitiation 
by his blood through faith. Again, it is received through 
faith. It's not on account of our faith. It's not something that we get 
because... because of our faith as a reward for our faith. It's 
very clear. The wording is very clear that 
this is received by faith. Our faith does not meet any standards 
of righteousness. So it wouldn't make sense then 
for our faith to have merit. The righteous requirements of 
the law were perfect obedience and also fulfillment of the curse 
if those laws had been broken. And that's what Christ supplies 
there. Again, it's it's it is of faith 
that as Paul says in in chapter 4 verse 16 He says therefore 
it is of faith that it might be according to grace So it is 
all of grace and and and faith we receive that that that that 
faith We receive this righteousness through faith and it's interesting 
here. Actually the original The original language says that a 
more literal translation, I guess, would be that whom God set forth 
as a propitiation through faith in his blood. That's actually 
a literal translation. Our English translations attach 
the in his blood to the propitiation as a modifier of propitiation, an 
explanation of what is this propitiation, but a straightforward reading. 
The text says that it's faith in his blood. It's faith in the 
sacrifice of Christ on our behalf this morning in our Confession 
study we looked at what is saving faith and and it comes down to 
it Are we trusting in our own our own? Righteousness for our 
eternal life or are we trusting in in Christ's righteousness? 
and it's that the righteousness which came from the sacrifice 
of of Christ. Again, so it's faith in the sacrifice 
of Christ on our behalf, that righteousness that comes from 
Him. So Machen, J. Gresham Machen quoted him a bunch 
this morning, but again here he says, But the Lord Jesus, because He 
loved us, took upon Himself the guilt of our sins, and died instead 
of us on Calvary. And faith consists simply in 
our acceptance of that wondrous gift. When we accept the gift, 
we are clothed entirely, without merit of our own, by the righteousness 
of Christ." So then, moving on here, he says that whom... Well, just I want to look at 
one thing, actually, first, is that in the beginning of verse 
25, whom God set forth. the NASB says, publicly displayed. So remember what I said earlier. 
I said that the day that Adam sinned in the garden and God 
did not instantly kill him with physical and eternal death, then 
the gospel became necessary for God's justice to be upheld and 
to be vindicated. And here we have that public 
display of the justice of God publicly displayed here. The 
wrath of God being satisfied for sin, the sin that he had 
passed by as God punishes Christ on the cross in this public display 
here. And again, this is not just Adam's 
sin that was passed by, or Old Testament saints' sins that were 
passed by, but your sin and my sin as well. The instant that 
we sinned, God's justice could have very righteously immediately 
destroyed us, killed us, cast us into hell for eternity. That's 
what we deserve. But rather God in His grace, 
He passed by that. And then He publicly displays 
that His justice being vindicated as that sin is not just swept 
under the rug and forgot about, but rather it's paid in full 
on the cross there. And again, that is this propitiatory 
sacrifice by the Lord Jesus, whereby God's righteousness can 
be vindicated. And that's what Paul then moves 
on here to explain. God's righteousness, God's justice 
vindicated here. So he says here, so in his forbearance, 
God had passed over the sins that were previously committed 
to demonstrate Sorry, in the middle of verse 25 here. So God 
set forth Christ as a propitiation by His blood through faith to 
demonstrate His righteousness because in His forbearance God 
had passed over the sins which were previously committed. So 
this righteousness now here, commentators are divided over, 
are we talking about the righteousness that God supplies in Christ, 
this righteousness that's worthy of eternal life, that God will 
credit to our account through faith? Or is it God's inherent 
righteousness whereby God is just and cannot just let sin 
go unpunished? Either explanation is legitimate 
in this context here. Either one fits the context. 
So either the atoning death of Christ on the cross, that's demonstrating 
or showing or proving God's, or explaining, I guess we could 
say, God's righteousness that God gives, the righteousness 
that is supplied. Because it's fulfilling, Christ 
fulfilled the precepts and the curses of the law. So it could 
be that, which fits. It also could be that it's demonstrating 
or vindicating God's inherent righteousness, whereby He shows 
that, yes, He loves to pardon sin and iniquity and transgression, 
but by no means will He leave sin unpunished. So I would lean 
in the direction that this is a better explanation, because 
that is where Paul takes us now in these next verses here, that 
this is how God can be both just and the justifier of the one 
who has faith in Jesus Christ. So God is just, their sin is 
atoned for, their sin is paid in full, not by them, but by 
another. because of God's grace. And then, so therefore, God can 
freely pardon that sin without violating His justice in any 
way. So this is the answer to the 
question that we found in Exodus 34. How can God do this? Well, here we have the answer, 
the cross of Jesus Christ. So justice and mercy meet at 
the cross the psalmist says mercy and truth have met together righteousness 
and peace have kissed and that's what happens at the cross mercy 
and truth meeting together righteousness meaning god's justice and peace 
meaning is meaning that that that mercy they have kissed at 
the cross The cross provides that solution to the problem 
that the Old Testament presents to us in the first three chapters 
of Genesis and then slowly reveals that solution. How can God be just, and yet 
justify a sinful man? Here we have the answer, the 
cross of Christ. As the hymn writer says, So we 
find that in Colossians as well, very clearly. Colossians chapter 
2, in verse 14. Let's go 13, and you being dead 
in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, he has made alive 
together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped 
out the handwriting of requirements that was against us. So that 
record of debt that we had, all of our sins that have stacked 
up against us incurred this massive debt. He wipes this out, takes 
it away, and how does he do that? He does it by, and he has taken 
it out of the way, having nailed it, to the cross. So on that 
cross, the wrath of God was satisfied, which we sung earlier there. 
So that is the gospel. That is why we are here tonight. That is what we come together 
to remember, is the death of Christ on our behalf, where we 
deserve to be there suffering. Instead, it was Christ and that 
righteousness that he has earned, he offers to us freely and by 
God's grace, through faith, we accept that righteousness. So 
then look at the conclusion then in verse 27. Where is boasting 
then? I think the answer is very obvious 
as he gives there. It is excluded. There's nothing 
that we can do. There's nothing that we needed 
to do. There's nowhere anywhere in this transaction for man to 
take any credit. It is all Christ doing the work, 
and it's God being gracious in offering that to us. So he says, 
by what law? Of works? No, no, not at all. We can't earn that. Our works, 
even if we could do good works, they cannot atone for sin. Death is the only way to pay 
for sin, to atone for sin. So it is by the law of works? No, but by the law of faith. And he's using law here as a 
play on words, meaning a standard or a way in which one becomes 
righteous before God. He's not attaching any merit 
to faith here. We need to be clear there. So 
it is faith by which we become righteous before God. apart from the deeds of the law. And that's the best news that 
we could ever hear. That's why we call it the gospel. 
It's good news. It's the best news. There's nothing 
that we need to offer to Christ in exchange for this righteousness, 
but it's a righteousness that avails with God freely given 
and received by faith. So then in conclusion then, as 
I said, that is why we come here each Lord's Day. That's why we 
gather every Lord's Day to remember this, and especially once a month 
as we come here tonight to partake of the supper. The Lord Jesus, 
when he instituted that, he says, do this in remembrance of me. So we come here to proclaim the 
Lord's death to ourselves, to remind ourselves of these things, 
to proclaim the Lord's death until he comes again to remind 
that Christ redeemed me from the curse of the law that I had 
incurred, and he did that by becoming a curse for me. on that 
cross instead. And again, as I've said several 
times here, if you're not a believer here, this is the greatest news 
that you could hear is that this is free. God is offering you 
something that is worthy of eternal life. He's offering it freely 
to all and to whoever Believes that Jesus says come unto me. 
I will give you rest You know all that the father gives will 
come but the one who comes out with no wise cast out so believe 
come to Christ believe on him accept his his work as your Your 
your entrance into heaven that yet he has earned that believe 
on the Lord Jesus and you you will be saved Well, let us close 
in in a word of prayer Lord, how we thank you for the gospel 
message. Lord, our words of thanks cannot 
even come close to doing justice to what you have given to us 
in the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, that he came to that 
cross, Lord, and suffered an eternity of wrath for us. Lord, how how we rejoice in Your 
goodness, how we praise You for Your grace and for Your mercy, 
and that You, in Your grace, have provided that way of salvation 
through Your Son, the Lord Jesus. O Lord, I pray that as we partake 
of the supper, now that our hearts would be filled with a love for 
the Savior, that as we remember what the Lord did, as we remember 
His death on our behalf on Calvary, Lord, that our hearts would be 
encouraged, our faith would be strengthened, and that we would 
be edified by this, and that you'd be glorified. And I pray 
this all in the name of our Savior, the Lord Jesus. Amen.