[This is an edited version of a preaching which I gave recently in Grimsby; I trust that putting it here will be for blessing. I would be glad of any response.]
Romans 3: 21-25 (to “blood”)
Ephesians
1: 6 (from “the Beloved”), 7
Colossians
1: 14
I
trust the Lord with give me help to speak about redemption. It is a wonderful fact that God has presented
salvation to us, but that salvation is one that depends on redemption. And as we see in each of these cases, it
speaks of redemption as in Christ Jesus, in whom is our
redemption. Redemption accomplished: how
wonderful the work of Christ in accomplishing redemption! But how wonderful that the redemption is in
Him. We know the need. I trust everyone here knows the need; I feel
that it is a responsibility in preaching that we should preach to present
salvation, preach without any presumption regarding anyone who is under the
sound of the word. The word should go
out as a challenge indeed to every soul here.
Do you know this? Are you in the
benefit of it? Are you in the blessing
of it redemption, “being justified freely by his grace through the redemption
which is in Christ Jesus”?
But
what does redemption mean? It means firstly
that there is a right: God has a right to you.
Think of Him, the Creator. The
Creator of the universe has a right to you, a right to your attention, a right
to your subjection, a right that you should fulfil His will and His word. And what has your history been? What has my history been? It is one in which the only conclusion can
be, “for there is no difference”, no difference between you and me. No doubt there are different sins, or different
degrees of sinning, but the final point is “there is no difference; for all
have sinned, and come short of the glory of God”. You cannot put yourself on an elevated
platform compared to the most wicked sinner in the world. You cannot say that you have a right to
salvation, or that you have a right to the presence of God, or that you have a
right to eternity with God, on the ground of anything whatsoever that you have
done. You are a sinner, and I am a
sinner through and through. It is the
character of mankind, it is the activity of mankind, sinners, and there is no
answer in us and no difference. There is
no remedy apart from Christ, blessed remedy.
What
a full and blessed remedy there is in the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. What did it require if you were to come into
blessing? It required that wonderful
activity in redemption that you, the sinner, with no rights, who has gone
against the rights of God, should be affected by the glad tidings of His grace. For that, Christ had to go into the depths, had
to take up the challenge, had to take up everything that is necessary in order
that you should come into blessing. He
has done it; He has done it all. How
wonderful that we can preach the glad tidings on the ground that Christ has
done it all. He has paid the price;
redemption's price is paid.
Hark
to the wondrous story,
Redemption's price is paid. (Hymn 332)
Can anyone ask
or demand anything further?
But
what a price it was. What a price it
was, “the redemption of their soul is costly, and must be given up forever”, Ps
49: 8. Think of the blessedness of the
fact that the Lord Jesus was prepared to pay the fullest and the greatest price
in the shedding of His precious blood.
How wonderful: redemption's price is paid. How wonderful that everything that would
challenge God has been dealt with in the fulness and the blessedness of the work
of the Lord Jesus: “being justified freely by his grace”, everything from the
side of grace. The grace of God is
towards you. We are in a period that is called
the dispensation of grace. That does not
simply mean a time of grace: it is a whole administration of grace towards
man. And it is flowing towards you and it
is flowing towards me tonight in the blessedness of the glad tidings. It is wonderful to have such an
administration of grace: it is flowing towards you in all your need. I suppose we could all say we have some
need. Whatever the need is it is
answered in the grace of God in its fulness, because the price has been paid in
its fulness for redemption.
And
where was it paid? It was paid at the
cross. What was the great transaction at
the cross? That is where the Saviour
took up every liability of mine. That is
where He bore all my sins in their totality.
The sins I know, and the sins I have forgotten, the sins I may think little
of, and perhaps some I may appreciate the reality of: every one, Jesus knows
them. He knows every one of my sins far
better than I know them, because He bore every one of them and He has taken
away the charge of them. And the
redemption that is in Christ Jesus is that full witness that everything that
could be charged against me in the sight of God has been removed. How blessed that is. I know it for myself, unchallengeably, and the
blood of Jesus as shed is a witness to that.
How wonderful that is. You need
to know it yourself and to grow in the knowledge of it, to increase in
appreciation of such a love, such a grace, the grace of God would flow towards
you because of redemption.
But
then He has not only come to rescue you from your lost condition, He has come
to attach you to a Person, and that is what the gospel would do to you. There is a Man for your heart here, so that Paul
speaks of it in that way, the redemption which is in Christ Jesus. There He is at the Father's right hand,
glorified as we delighted to speak of earlier.
There He is, glorified and anointed by the Father, “crowned with glory
and honour” (Heb 3: 9), blessed in every way, given the fullest, richest,
greatest accolade that divine giving could bestow upon Him. And your redemption is in Him, and your
blessing is in Him, and your knowledge of God is in Him, and you have a Man for
your heart because of the wonder and the blessedness of that wonderful One.
“Being
justified freely by his grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus,
whom God has set forth a mercy-seat, through faith in his blood”. Wonderful blood of Jesus. How much does the blood of Jesus mean to you?
Think of its preciousness to God, the
fulness of it, while it is an object of faith for you. How wonderful to think of the blood of Jesus,
an object of faith, “through faith in his blood”. It is the answer to your need; it is the answer
to the charge against you. It is used of
course in so many ways; it is referred to in scripture in so many ways. There is the price, as we are speaking of it
in redemption, redemption's price is paid.
And the blood can wash away your sins, the blood of the covenant that
gives that liberty that is in the divine mind for you. It is wonderful to think of the fulness and
the blessedness of the blood of Jesus.
That blood, of course, was blood that flowed from the side of One who had
gone into death. He died. Why did he die? He died for you. He died because you are a sinner. He died because you needed somebody to take on
that penalty. He died so that you should
come into the fulness of the blessing.
Redemption is in the precious blood of Jesus, and that is the eternal witness
to the fact that there is One who has died, who has gone into death, His blood
no longer in His body. What a witness it
was, what a witness to the completeness of the work! Do you value it? Do you appreciate it, and has it attached you
to the Man so that you know what it is, “the redemption which is in Christ Jesus”? God sets Him forth in the gospel as a mercy-seat,
as a place of approach to God, and the place where God would approach you; and
the mercy-seat was where God was satisfied.
The blood was put upon the mercy-seat, and God looked upon it and He was
satisfied. He has satisfied entirely
with the work of Jesus and we have that in Him.
God
is satisfied with Jesus,
We are satisfied as well. (Hymn
410)
You are to be satisfied
in Him. Have you found the Lord Jesus as
the source of your satisfaction? Redemption
not only having rescued you, redemption not only having secured you as the children
of Israel were secured from Egypt by the work of redemption as it was presented
then, but brought to Him, attached to Him, led by Him, having everything in Him,
the One who is of such great attraction to the heart of God.
And
that is what was in mind in reading these other two verses. The Beloved - who is He? It is the Beloved “in whom we have redemption”. It is secured in Him, the One who has done
all the work, the One who has gone into the grave too, the One who is risen,
the One who is ascended at God's right hand: God has given Him the greatest
title. What a wonderful title is “the Beloved”.
The Beloved, the One who
satisfies the heart of God, who rejoices the heart of God. I suppose in this scene He was always the Beloved. God looked upon Him as He walked the pathway
of perfection. God looked upon him as He
walked the pathway of His will. But now
God looks upon Him and has shown to us in the Scriptures that He is the One: He
is the Beloved. But we read yesterday
that scripture about a beloved. There was
someone knowing this, there in the Song of Songs 5. We find a beloved. Assuredly, He was God’s Beloved. Has he become your beloved? You can see He is the assembly's beloved, and
unique and glorious and perfect. A
beloved who is “more than another beloved”, more than anyone else that can be
presented to God's view, more than anyone else that can be presented to the assembly's
view.
How
about you? Do you see the One who is
your beloved, and do you see Him as God's beloved, the Father's beloved? How wonderful that this is the One, and it
says, “in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of offences”. You have offended. Colossians says, “the forgiveness of sins”,
sins, offences. You have sinned and you
have offended. Where are you going to
find the answer? Where are you going to
find the rescue? Where are you going to
find what there is in God's heart for you and the fulness of His blessing? You are only going to find it in the Beloved. You are only going to find it in “the Son of His
love”. But how wonderful and attractive
that One, “the Beloved, in whom we have redemption through his blood” . What it meant to the Father when the blood of
Jesus was shed. What it meant to Him,
what a cost to God, what a thought for the Lord Jesus. But what it was to God, His Beloved despised -
Hail!
Thou once despisèd Jesus.
And you have
despised Him at some stage. I have
despised Him at some stage, have not listened to His word, have not done what He
required of me. Well, grace is towards
you. Grace is towards you in the
gospel. And in that same despised Jesus,
there is salvation - “in the Beloved: in whom we have redemption through his
blood, the forgiveness of offences”. Wonderful
to think your offences, your sins, forgiven.
Think of God looking upon you, looking upon me, and saying that is what
you have offended in, the way in which you have offended. It is forgiven. It is not going to be raised again. And it is righteously forgiven. Men will pardon; men perhaps think that they
could send forth a pardon to persons.
And they do it on other grounds, on unrighteous grounds. And here God is pardoning you as a believer. He has forgiven you entirely righteously in
such a way that no one can charge you.
No one can charge you, because God has forgiven you. How blessed, how beautiful, how simple it is
that we are forgiven. So we know how we
can come before God in that way, in the enjoyment of the fact that we are
forgiven sinners, with a redemption that is “in the Beloved”. God has that One. He has a redemption. The Lord has been set forth by God as a
redemption; Wonderful to find that it is all in Himself. There was a work, a glorious work which has
been done, but we have to be bound up with Himself.
So
God would speak of Him in another way, in Colossians, as “the Son of his love”. It was very interesting. The Ephesians brings in the redemption
through His blood: “in whom we have redemption through his blood”. Colossians does not refer to that. We know it.
It comes in later in the chapter and we know it is vital for it. And we know it is essential to it. But as has been said, redemption subsists in
the worth of the Person, CAC vol 9 p265. Redemption subsists in the worth of Christ, the
Son of His love. God has found Himself a
Man who He has unreserved affection for.
And then having such a Man who is worthy of God's unreserved affection,
He says, ‘You can come into the blessing of that. You can have redemption in the Man who
satisfies me, in the Man who delights my heart’.
One
of the blessed things about redemption is that we are awaiting the fulness of
what is in mind in redemption. It is all
in Christ Jesus, and it is all secured, and it is all unchallengeable. How blessed it is. But then to live in this scene, to live in this
life, we require divine power. How could
we live without divine power to sustain us while we remain here? And how blessed that the Holy Spirit has been
given. But we read later in Ephesians 1
about the Holy Spirit: “Ye have been sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise,
who is the earnest of our inheritance to the redemption of the acquired
possession”, v 13, 14. In Ephesians 4: 30
it says, “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with which ye have been
sealed for the day of redemption”. So there
is a day that we are waiting for, a day of redemption in its fulness and in its
blessedness. I suppose that in its
fulness this is the day of the Lord, the day of God. How blessed that there will be a day of
redemption where everything that is out of order in the scene is put
right. Thankfully, you can know
what it is to be put right. You can know
what it is to be in the redemption which is in Christ Jesus. But everything is going to be set right. The scene in all its beauty will be
flourishing under the hand of Lord Jesus.
He will be there in the day of redemption. As receiving the Holy Spirit you are sealed
for that, you have that seal of the Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is “to the redemption of the acquired possession”. Think of that, that He has given the earnest
of it, given the pledge of it in this present time. What you are going to enjoy in the inheritance
eternally, you have the pledge of now. In
ordinary things, if somebody gives you a pledge, the pledge is much less than
the thing. It is simply a token that you
are going to enjoy something. But God
does not act like that: in the fulness of His grace, the pledge, the Earnest of
what you are going to come into is a divine Person himself, the Holy Spirit of
God. And you are sealed by that. And the believer can know what it is to have
an anticipation of the fulness of God's thoughts in redemption because of the
work of Christ and because too of the giving of the Holy Spirit.
And
then all the time we come back to “in whom we have redemption”; in Him, is a Person.
Remember the word of Job; it was quite
remarkable what he should say in his time, “I know that my Redeemer liveth”,
Job 19: 25. You are looking for the Redeemer. There is redemption, and there is a work, and
all that is accomplished with every believer.
How much we need to be attached in heart to the Redeemer. How wonderful that we know Him, as we go
through times of sorrow and pressure at the moment, and brethren in particular
sorrow. How wonderful to think the
matters are “to the redemption of the acquired possession”.
Another
reference comes to mind in Romans 8, which speaks of “the redemption of our
body”. We think of what it is for a
beloved brother who is now with Christ.
But then he is “awaiting adoption, that is the redemption of our body”. All of us are. But even as having entered into death, how
wonderful to be awaiting the redemption of our body; so that that brother will
rise; he will stand again. How wonderful! Man could not do that. Nothing in the whole range and scope of human
endeavour could raise a person. I am thankful
for the mercy that God has allowed that can maintain life with medication and
so on, but here there is something that is going to rise again. How wonderful!
There will be what will rise.
Life according to God includes redemption of the body in its fulness: free
of all unsuitability for God, and free to enjoy His presence and a whole sphere
as according to His mind.
I
trust every one of us should be more firmly attached to Him, the Redeemer, more
firmly attached to the Saviour, more firmly in the assurance that “he has taken
us into favour in the Beloved: in whom we have redemption”.
May
the Lord bless the word.
Grimsby
9th
June 2024
