Radio Broadcast Wednesday 02/16/2022

Classic Christianity – A Closer Look at The Reality of The Resurrection P35 (02-16-22)

Our Eternal Inheritance

We’re getting ready to begin now at chapter number 11 called an eternal inheritance and this lesson should answer a number of questions that people have in regard to this thing of our inheritance. And Christ, is it eternal or is that temporal? Some people call that eternal security. Some people call it once saved always saved. I just call it truth and the issue is is it true that when Christ did it that he did it, or was it just a partial death on the cross? A partial resurrection? And is it some of him and some of me or is it all of him and none of me? Or is it all of me and none of him? And to those questions, we have to ask ourselves where are we in our belief system? So before we pick up, I want to spend just a moment of talking about at the beginning of the book of Romans and chapter three picking up there. Beginning in verse 19. Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God. So what the law says, it is saying to those who are under the law, we will hear in another point, another place in scripture where the law was not given for the saved, but for the lost.

So the law is stating to the Gentile as well as to the Israelites, that these are the righteous requirements. The minimum, incidentally, righteous requirements of God, if you ever are going to find perfection in and of your own strength. This is what you had to do, not today. But from the day you were born until the day you die with the stipulation that if you ever violate the least of these, my commandments you violated all of them, because only 100% perfection will do. God is not 99.9% God, nor is he 99.9% perfect or 99.9% holy if he did, he would cease to be God. And so, in order for you and me to be able to go into the presence of a holy God we’re going to have to find a way of going in there in holiness, in total righteousness and total perfection. And we look at that and say, well, that’s impossible. He says, now you got it because it is impossible with man, but with Christ, all things are possible. And now we find out that it’s all him and none of us. So, the reason that we’re all held accountable to God is because if we’re trying to gain our righteousness in and of our strength through obedience to the law, then we’re going to get an opportunity to be accountable to God. Say, how’d you do?

So one of these days when we are going into the presence of God, it will be. What did you do with my Son? And if you didn’t do it, anything to with my Son, then how’d you do with my law? Because you’re going to have to be judged by one of the two things either, how you did under the law or how’d you do with what did you do with my Son? And if what I did with His Son was accept him and rely upon Him, 100 percent for my eternal security, and my relationship with God, you’re going to hear a word, well done, good and faithful servant. To the person who says, I didn’t need Jesus. I didn’t need your Son. I was good under the law. Why that’s where I think we’re going to see the video and that is where he’s going to say, well let me just see how you did. And that thing will last about 5 seconds and that’s all it would take to condemn the very best of men. And so the whole world, every mouth from Adam to whoever is the last one has been silenced and the entire world held accountable to God as to how you do under the law.

The answer to that is I didn’t. And he said I know but my Son did. What did you do with my Son? Therefore no one will be declared righteous in His sight by observing the law. That’s not someone, that’s maybe someone – that is no one. No person will ever be declared righteous in the sight of God through observing the law, rather, it’s through the law that we become conscious of sin. The law is a mirror. It shows you that your face is dirty, but a mirror cannot wash your face. So the law shows every person that he is accountable to God, that he has violated the minimal requirements of God and that if you in your own strength, go out to try to make yourself acceptable in the sight of God, through obedience to the law than all you’re going to do is to find out that that law that you’re trying to obey merely made you conscious of sin. And pointing out that you can’t do it.

Why is that important for us to know? So that we will turn to the one who did and could and that’s Jesus Christ. But now, it says, a righteousness from God, apart from the law, has been made known to which the law and the prophets testify. So this is not just a new testament, new covenant discovery. It was prophesied in the Old Testament, Abraham, as an example believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness. Never through obedience to the law. He didn’t have the law but only by believing God. Now folks, there are still people out there who are trying to make themselves righteous in the sight of God by obedience to the law, when the Bible says, very clearly that there’s a righteousness from God, apart from the law, that’s been made known that has been testified out of the very book that you’re trying to live in obedience to. And you find yourself that you can’t. And now if you have found yourself, you can’t now, you know why the book was written. And that is to show you that you can’t. And all the old testament is a very pitiful account of people falling on their face. Right one after the other from Genesis to the very end of the old testament is a history of man’s failure, to be able to present himself to God, holy and acceptable. That’s all it is. It is a phenomenal book of man’s failure, and of God’s faithfulness. So it’s saying then that this righteousness from God that comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe there’s no difference, Israelite, Gentile, no difference, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came through Jesus Christ.

Now as we talked about before it says that the NIV, translates that as a sacrifice of atonement. Again, the word atonement is not used in the new testament. So it’s a very poor translation on the word atonement. The word is propitiation. If you look at your footnote, if you have an NIV, you’ll see down there as the one who would turn aside God’s wrath taking away our sin. He didn’t come to atone for sin; that’s what the blood of bulls and goats did. He came to do something far greater than that, and that was take it away. So God presented Him as the one who would turn aside his wrath taking away our sin through faith, in his blood or in his life. When a person sheds his blood for you and me. He lays down His life for you and me, and the life is in the blood.

Because we are pressing on in the lesson and sometimes the preface is longer than the lesson. It’s like I was at a conference one time that finished a lecture and after I finish this, I just got one little more point that one make before we close and I went ahead with it and Ed Heck’s mother who’s on our staff came out of a Hebrew background and was the cutest little thing in the world. She’s with the Lord right now. But as she walked out, she looked at me telling me she enjoyed it. She said, incidentally, your PS is longer than the message. So I think maybe sometimes the preamble here is longer than the lessons that I did. The foundation needs to be established over and over again. So as we were talking about the fact, no one will ever be justified by obedience to the law because first of all, we couldn’t, because we can’t be obedient to the law. And so it said that he there therefore God presented him, Jesus as the sacrifice, the one who would take away your sin, the wrath of God, taking away your sin, not a toning covering as the blood of bulls and goats did, but taking it away. That’s why sometimes translations are so unbelievably important because that word atonement waters down the magnitude of what Christ did for us. Atonement was with the blood of bulls and goats did. It covered sin. But the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ had to do far more than the blood of bulls and goats. Not only was it a once and for all sacrifice with it, it certainly puts it far above the blood of bulls and goats. But only a man can sacrifice for a man and an animal cannot. And only God can justify the wrath of God. And that’s why Jesus as God shedding his own God life was the only thing that was worthy to the magnitude of being worthy over and above the unbelievable, vileness of sin throughout the entire world. So when you’re talking about Christ’s death on the cross and the shedding of his life, you’re talking about something that was done to take away sin. Not only no more sacrifices that you have to go over and over again, but the only blood that was worthy to fulfill that role.

Now, He did that through faith without therefore in his life. In his blood. He did this to demonstrate His justice because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished. What do you mean unpunished? Well, no one had died for it. There was no one who could die for sin. The blood of bulls and goats was to cover sin, but never to take it away. So the sins committed before Christ were forgiven, kind of on a credit card that you got to enjoy the furniture before it was paid for. And so they were enjoying forgiveness based upon the payment being made at a time in the future. And so in Christ Jesus went to the cross, He was the only one who could adequately pay, punish, take the punishment for it, man’s sins. It took God as man to be able to die for man’s sin. So the sins that were covered beforehand, literally the cover was ripped off and the sins were paid for. And that’s what Jesus did. He descended into the holding pattern for old testament saints. No more for us. Today when we die were absent from the body present with the Lord. For them it was a holding pattern until the payment was made and he marched into there and said it is finished. And then it said, led captives captive.

It’s paid for, it’s now done. The furniture you enjoyed for years has now been paid for. Now we’re going to heaven. So he did this therefore to demonstrate his justice at the present time. So he did it today, taking care of all the sins of the past, going sins literally paid for all the way back to Adam and he did so to pay for all the sins through till time eternal. So to this present time, so is the just to be the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus. So he did it all. He did it for all the past sins. He did it for all the future sins. Now, that is good news. Now it said, where then is the boasting? Well, it’s excluded on what principle on that of, observing the law. No, but that on faith for, we maintain that a man is justified by faith, apart from observing the law. Well, is God, the God of Jews only is he not the God of Gentiles too? Yes, of Gentiles too, since there is only one God who will justify the circumcised, that’s the Jew by faith and the uncircumcised, that’s a Gentile through the same faith. Well, do we then nullify the law by this faith?

In other words, you can just hear the the people wanted to hang on to that law. Say well, then do we nullify it by this faith? In other words, said, no, we don’t nullify it. We uphold it. We’ve talked about that on past programs. What in the world does that mean? Well, it means that the wages of sin is death and the wages of sin the way, you know, it’s sin, is if there’s a law that says, it’s sin.

And so the law has no purpose without the punishment for the violation. When a criminal is convicted and put into prison and punished, the law is upheld. If a prisoner is convicted of a crime and let go free, the law is not upheld. You’re not upholding the law. The only thing that upholds the law is where the punishment is executed, that is commensurate with the crime.

So Christ in the preaching of grace, of the grace of God, whereby Christ paid that price, not with some lamb out there, not the blood of bulls and goats, but Christ was the only time in all of history, where the law was not only fulfilled by his life, but it was upheld by his death. Because he who knew no sin became sin for us and the one who deserved, no death took death for us, thus paying the price and the penalty for what we deserve to have taking it upon himself, and thus upholding the law that says, that the wages of sin, the violation of law, the violation of the law that said the wages of that is death and he took it therefor not notifying the law but upholding the law. So everybody says you preach the grace of God, you just make or nullify the law. No, you uphold it because you can’t obey it and I can’t either. But one did and could, and that was Christ Jesus and that life that he lived again, is get this clear, folks, that life that he lived is, what fulfilled, the law. He said, I didn’t come to abolish, I came to fulfill it and he did, he did it with a perfect life walking and perfect love. And love is the Fulfillment of the law. He fulfilled the law he did, so with his physical life. So that through his physical death, he could uphold the law (wages of sin being death} He canceled the law for you and me, who come to him by faith and his resurrected life that ushered in a new covenant. So that’s the whole plan of Salvation.

Now, it goes ahead to say that, Shall we say then that Abraham, our forefather, what did he discovered this matter? You can hear them say what did Abraham think about all this. Well, in fact, if Abraham was justified by works he had something to boast about but not before God. He might boast before you and me, but not before God. What does the scripture say? It said that Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. Now, when a man works and folks, we’re just about to get to our lesson, when a man works his wages are not credited to him as a gift. You don’t go work all week and then your employer come and say I got a gift for you, your paycheck. That would be ridiculous, but it’s an obligation. However, to the man who does not work, but trusts God, who justifies the wicked, his faith is credited to him as righteousness. Folks, what kind of a God did you respond to, the God that saves Catholics, the God who saves Baptists, the God who saves Pentecostals, or the God who saves the wicked? Do you if you responded to the God who saves the good people, the ones who are 80% good, but just a little 20% bad, kind of a Brill Cream of a little dab’ll do me Lord? Or did you come to the God that justifies the wicked? Did you come to a God that says, no wonder God saved me as wonderful as I am; thank God that I’m not a sinner like that person over there? Or did you come to a God, that because of his own Holiness is not only proven and shut your mouth and made you accountable to God, but also a shut the mouth of the entire world, where there is none righteous, no, not one, and to recognize that fact that there is no one righteous, no, not one, that preacher you look at on Sunday, the radio minister that you listen to right now, no righteous, not one, not even close to it? That’s the God who saved the wicked and that includes you and me.

Click to Donate to Bob George Ministries

There are many people who have responded to a God that is not the God who justifies the wicked, but he’s a God who rewards the law-abiding and we respond to a God, who rewards the law-abiding. I want to tell you that God is not the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Nor is he God, the Father, God, the Son, and God, the Holy Spirit. He’s some other God that has been created by a bunch of human beings. False straw God that one of these days will be burnt down in front of your eyes. That is not the we respond to. There is no God who rewards the law-abiding because there isn’t any law abiding. There’s only a God who justifies the wicked because that’s all he has to justify is the wicked. And when the Bible says that you’re in my heart’s are wicked and deceitful above all things and who can know them, and there’s none righteous, no, not one; that’s exactly what He means. And we can’t come to Christ thinking that we are deserving of salvation, because we’re only deserving of death. The wicked don’t deserve salvation. We deserve death. We don’t deserve eternal inheritance that we’re going to be talking about. We deserve eternal damnation. But he’s the one who came to justify the wicked. And to realize that that man who does not work, but trust Christ, the one who justifies the wicked is the one whose faith is credited to him as righteousness. That’s why people will come and say, what do I do? What do I do? You don’t do anything. If you don’t do anything, that’s when you’ve done something and that what you have done is say, I can’t do anything. That’s what you do is to come to grips with the truth, that I can’t do anything, but Lord, you did at all. And that’s when you come to him by faith. So his faith was a work. How ridiculous it would be to say that you’re saved by faith. It’s not a work. If it was a work, then it wouldn’t be a gift. It wouldn’t be a gift, it would be an obligation.

But it is not an obligation, an obligation means you deserved it. We don’t deserve an ounce of it. And so when you and I come to Christ, we come by faith in The God who justifies the wicked, and to those people, your faith is credited as righteousness. He makes the wicked righteous. He makes the dead alive. He makes the evil holy and acceptable in the sight of God. Now folks, if that isn’t love, then I don’t know what love is. If that isn’t grace, then I don’t know what grace is.

And why people would want to still be trying to make themselves justified in the sight of God, to obedience to the law, with the full recognition that they never have been obedient, that God looks on your heart and not your actions, and comes to the end of themselves and receives Him who could for us, who couldn’t, I’ll never know. It’s only pride that keeps us from coming to the God who justifies the wicked.

As we were closing out teaching through those chapters in Romans we come to a very firm conclusion that instead of God as religion teaches, rewarding the righteous, He is the God who justifies the wicked. And our engineer was just talking at the break. He said, if God is the one who justifies the righteous He wouldn’t have anything to do. And that is very true. He wouldn’t have anything to do up there. But he is not the God who rewards the righteous because there aren’t any. He’s the one who justifies the wicked and that’s all of us. Now folks, that is the foundation for eternal security that we are talking about. Eternal inheritance when we understand that fact, it answers the question in regards to the inheritance that we have being eternal, and how we can walk in security of that.

In Hebrews 7:11-12 If perfection could have been attained through the Levitical priesthood for on the basis of it the law was given to the people. Why was there still a need for another priest to come one on the order of Melchizedek? Not on the order of Aaron. For, when there’s a change in the priesthood. There must also be a change of the law. So if perfection could have been gained through obedience to the law, why did there need to be a new covenant? Now, the answer to that is because no one could obey the law. That’s why we did need a new covenant, The new covenant that said their sins and lawless deeds I’ll remember no more because of what He did not because we do. And now it goes ahead in verse 18 for the former regulation is set aside because it was weak and useless for the law made nothing perfect. And a better hope is introduced by which we draw near to God.

It goes here to say by this oath, has become a guarantee of a better covenant. Now, do you catch that folks, a guarantee of a better covenant? Now folks, a guarantee is no greater than the guarantor. So what we are talking about is the guarantee and the faithfulness of the guarantor. Now, if the guarantor is Jesus, how good is the guarantee? Well, I think it probably, you would have to say is pretty good. It’s better then General Motors or AT&T or any of those guarantees. It is guaranteed by God himself. Now, what does He guarantee? A new covenant, your sins and lawless acts I will remember no more. Now that eliminates what if a guy walks away from God? What if this, what if that? It eliminates all that. He is the guarantor of a guarantee that your sins will no longer be held against you to all who come to God and believe that he justifies the wicked. To come to a God, not on my performance, but on His. Now when a person comes to God on that, he is a new creation. He’s not one who says, oh, whoopy, now, let me just go out and just keep in my own lifestyle. That does not work that way when you come to the God who justifies the wicked, to the right God, not the one you’ve made up, but the right one. So it says in Hebrews 7:23 going ahead now, there have been many of these priests since death prevented them from continuing in office, but Jesus lives forever and has a permanent priesthood. And he is able therefore to save completely those who come to God through him. Why is he able to save completely? Because he always lives to intercede for them. Is that good news? That is good news. I don’t know why we don’t preach and teach good news.

Now, let’s get to the introduction to our lesson. Then in Galatians, if while we were still under the law before Christ became the mediator of the new covenant, we were slaves to something and Galatians 3:21 tells us we were slave to the law. Is the law therefore opposed to the promises of God? It says absolutely not God forbid for if a law had been given that could impart life, then righteousness would have certainly have come by the law. But Paul says, before this faith came, we were held prisoners by the law locked up until faith should be revealed. So, under the law, condemned under the law. We are literally locked up under that law like a prisoner until faith in Christ is revealed. And once faith in Christ is revealed, we realized that we have now been freed from the thing that held us prisoner in order to walk in a brand new way of life. And that’s with the Holy Spirit of God, living in us, leading us, no longer a slave to the law. Now because we could not be justified by the works of the law and that’s spelled out in Galatians 3:11. Clearly, no one is justified before God by the law because the righteous will live by faith. We were slaves to the consequences of the law, the wages of sin is death. So if I when I am under the law, I am a slave to the consequences of the violation of the law, and that is death. Now what has changed? Well Christ has set us free from sins committed under the law. And as Galatians says, so that you are no longer a slave, but a son and since you are a son, God has made you and heir, and that’s not a air, but heir. So here we are an heir to the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, Galatians 4:7 tells us, you are no longer a slave, but a son and since you are a son, God has made you also an heir. Child of God out there, do you realize that you are an heir, you are a child of the living God, and an heir of Christ Jesus?

Thank you so much for tuning in to Classic Christianity with Bob, George. We hope you’ve enjoyed today’s program. We truly hope that today’s message has inspired you to walk a life of faith in the Lord.

Click to Donate to Bob George Ministries