Doctrine of Salvation
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
Salvation involves the redemption of the whole man, and is offered freely to all who accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour, who by His own blood obtained eternal redemption for the believer. In its broadest sense salvation includes regeneration, justification, sanctification, and glorification. There is no salvation apart from personal faith in Jesus Christ as Lord.
A. Regeneration, or the new birth, is a work of God’s grace whereby believers become new creatures in Christ Jesus. It is a change of heart wrought by the Holy Spirit through conviction of sin, to which the sinner responds in repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Repentance and faith are inseparable experiences of grace.
Repentance is a genuine turning from sin toward God. Faith is the acceptance of Jesus Christ and commitment of the entire personality to Him as Lord and Saviour.
B. Justification is God’s gracious and full acquittal upon principles of His righteousness of all sinners who repent and believe in Christ. Justification brings the believer unto a relationship of peace and favor with God.
C. Sanctification is the experience, beginning in regeneration, by which the believer is set apart to God’s purposes, and is enabled to progress toward moral and spiritual maturity through the presence and power of the Holy Spirit dwelling in him. Growth in grace should continue throughout the regenerate person’s life.
D. Glorification is the culmination of salvation and is the final blessed and abiding state of the redeemed.
The Baptist Faith and Message, Article IV
Tonight we get to spend time talking about the good news.
Last time we were together in our series, we talked about the doctrine of man and the reality of man’s depravity.
Tonight we talk about what God has done to rescue humanity from their plight.
We are talking about the doctrine of salvation.
Salvation to the uttermost:
Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them.
This salvation to the uttermost is offered to anyone who will accept Jesus the Messiah as Lord and Savior.
He has seen to it that this would be the case by dying and shedding His own blood.
And there is no way to salvation and eternal life, except through Him, who has shed His own blood.
But if we were to call salvation a watch—what are the inner-workings?
What are the mechanics of it, so to speak?
How does God save?
Well the Baptist Faith and Message answers that question with four words—
Outline
Outline
1. Regeneration
1. Regeneration
2. Justification
2. Justification
3. Sanctification
3. Sanctification
4. Glorification
4. Glorification
We could dive deeper than that.
Most Systematic Theologians who talk about the inner-workings of salvation in their order would list out:
Election/Predestination (BFM saves it for Article V)
Gospel Call (Hearing the Word)
Effectual Calling/The Inward Call (The Spirit speaking to your heart)
Regeneration
Faith
Repentance
Justification
Adoption
Sanctification
Glorification
SHOW ORDER OF SALVATION CHART HERE
We even have a chart where you can see the Order of Salvation with more detail tonight.
You will see how some of the events are stacked on top of each other and that is because they happen simultaneously:
As the Spirit calls, He regenerates the heart
As we believe, we repent
As we are justified, we are adopted
As we are sanctified, God preserves us and we persevere
The Faith and Message admits that it intends to be more broad than the chart.
It sticks to the 25,000 foot view and focuses on Regeneration, Justification, Sanctification and Glorification.
But even in doing that, it touches on themes from these other doctrines of salvation that you see on the chart.
Regeneration
Regeneration
1. Regeneration
1. Regeneration
Nuts and Bolts of Regeneration
Nuts and Bolts of Regeneration
Here is the definition from the Faith and Message:
Regeneration, or the new birth, is a work of God’s grace whereby believers become new creatures in Christ Jesus.
An even more simplified definition would simply be to say, “it is God’s initial act to renew a sinner’s heart.”
Salvation by spiritual rebirth
Sinners are born dead in their sins and their trespasses:
And you were dead in the trespasses and sins… (in which you once walked)
David said:
Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,
and in sin did my mother conceive me.
You can see from Paul and David’s words that there is something wrong with our first birth.
Therefore, we need re-birth.
This is why Jesus said:
Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”
This is why Peter said:
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
This spiritual new birth that would take place in the New Covenant under Christ is prophesied about by Ezekiel in Ezekiel 36.
I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.
God is promising that a time was coming where He would:
Cleanse His people
Give them new spiritual hearts
Give them a new Spirit within them
Cause them to walk in His statutes and in obedience to His rules
This New Covenant promise has come true for the people of God in the doctrine of regeneration.
The dead are made alive.
This is what Jesus is referring to when he says to Nicodemus:
Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.
He is not speaking of literal water, but symbolically of the need for spiritual cleansing—the very cleansing promised in Ezekiel 36.
And this cleansing comes about through the spiritual washing that takes place as the heart of stone is removed for the living heart.
This is a work of the Spirit—as the Faith and Message makes clear.
And that is why Jesus says, “water and the Spirit.”
This is what Paul is talking about in Titus 3:4-5
But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit,
So what we can say then is that regeneration is a “re-genesis.”
It is a new birth in which God brings for a spiritual new creation.
The very Spirit who raised Christ from the dead, raises the sinner’s heart from the dead, imparting spiritual life.
This is what it means to be born again.
A born again Christian is someone with a regenerated spiritual heart.
Someone that God has done a work of life in by the power of His Spirit.
Repentance and Faith
Repentance and Faith
Now—what happens when the heart is made alive?
This is where we look at repentance and faith.
The dead heart loved sin and did not care how God felt about it.
The dead heart was also lying in a grace of unbelief.
But once the Spirit regenerates the heart, and the heart of stone is gone, the new heart is drawn to repent of sin and believe by the kindness of the Lord.
Regeneration is not something we do.
It is something that God does in us.
We are passive in new birth, the same way a baby is passive in how he or she is conceived and brought forth from the womb.
However, repentance and faith are not passive.
We have a part to play.
Repentance
Repentance
Our earliest Baptist forefathers called repentance an evangelical grace.
This saving repentance is an evangelical grace, whereby a person, being by the Holy Spirit made sensible of the manifold evils of his sin, does, by faith in Christ, humble himself for it with godly sorrow, detestation of it, and self–abhorrancy, praying for pardon and strength of grace, with a purpose and endeavor, by supplies of the Spirit, to walk before God unto all well–pleasing in all things.
The 1689 Second London Baptist Confession, Chapter 15, Paragraph 3
More simply, the Baptist Faith and Message says that it is a genuine turning from sin toward God.
The longer definition of the 1689 helps us know what a “genuine” turning from sin looks like though:
You have a sense that your sin is evil
You are humbled with sorrow toward God for sin
You hate the sin that is in you
You turn to God, asking for forgiveness and the spiritual strength to walk in it no more—meaning, it is not your intention to return to it
This sort of genuine repentance, from the start, was a key component to the Gospel Jesus preached:
From that time Jesus began to preach, saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
Repentance grows out of regeneration.
Repentance is a plant that never grows on nature’s dung-hill. The nature must be changed, and repentance must be implanted by the Holy Spirit, or it will never flourish in our hearts.
Charles Spurgeon
So we are not passive in repentance.
If we are to be saved, we must truly turn from sin.
However, this will only happen if the old dead, dung-hill heart has been regenerated by the Spirit of God.
Repentance grows out of a heart that is made alive.
Faith
Faith
Then there is faith.
Faith is the acceptance of Jesus Christ and commitment of the entire personality to Him as Lord and Savior.
The Baptist Faith and Message, Article IV
Saving faith means more than believing Jesus exists.
It means believing He exists and died and rose again to save you...
It means trusting in Him and Him alone for salvation...
And it means surrendering yourself in commitment to Him as Lord.
You can’t say you want His forgiveness as a High Priest, but reject Him as the Prophet whose word dictates all things in our lives.
You can’t say you want His pardon, but reject as the King who rules the world and your life.
Instead, when one who is truly saved believes in Jesus, they believe in the whole Christ.
Not just Savior, but LORD and Savior.
When Christ is trusted in wholly, the sinner is saved:
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God,
And like repentance, this is something you are actively involved in as the one tasting God’s grace.
Faith is a gift from God, but it is also something that you embark upon.
The sinner must repent.
The sinner must believe.
Inseparable Experiences of Grace
Inseparable Experiences of Grace
Now, you may be led to wonder, “Well, which one comes first—repentance or faith?”
The Baptist Faith and Message answers, “Yes.”
Notice what is says:
Repentance and faith are inseparable experiences of grace.
You cannot separate repentance from faith any more than you can separate heads from tails.
They are two sides of same coin.
In general, I think that it makes sense to place repentance first because this is how Jesus talked:
and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”
I think it makes sense to imagine that in repentance we turn from sin and in faith we turn to God.
However, these two experiences of grace are so tied together that it really is impossible to separate it.
Mark Sarver says:
Repentance and faith are inseparable twins that always come forth from the womb of conversion together.
Mark Sarver
Those who repent will believe.
Those who believe will have repented.
And if we back it up further—
Those who are regenerated and born again will repent AND believe.
Justification
Justification
The next doctrine we look at in Article IV is:
2. Justification
2. Justification
The Baptist Faith and Message defines justification this way:
Justification is God’s gracious and full acquittal upon principles of His righteousness or all sinners who repent and believe in Christ.
In many ways, justification is the doctrine that explains how those who are born again are made right with a holy God, whose Law they have transgressed.
To understand what the Faith and Message is saying, we can break it down like this:
The Subjects of Justification
The Basis of Justification
The Instrument of Justification
The Method of Justification
The Effect of Justification
The Subjects of Justification
The Subjects of Justification
The Subjects of Justification are all sinners who repent and believe in Jesus Christ.
These are the ones whom God has predestined for salvation.
These are the ones whom God has called for salvation.
And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.
The fact that undeserving sinners are the objects of God’s objective to justify sinners and make them righteous in His sight—fully acquitted—should cause us to marvel at God’s love.
There are many things in our lives that are hard and frustrating and may tempt us to grumble and complain.
But maybe we would be less inclined to do so, if we would stop and remember—those I am facing hardship, I am a subject of justification.
The Basis of Justification
The Basis of Justification
If sinners are the subjects of full pardon—what is the basis for it?
After all, if we are guilty before God’s Law, how can we be forgiven?
If God is just, shouldn’t our sin be punished?
This is where we rejoice to know that CHRIST ALONE is the basis for our justification.
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.
So Paul says we are justified by God’s grace as a gift—and this happens through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus...
Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood...
The basis for our justification is that Jesus was put forward as a wrath-satisfying offering
God is rightfully angry toward our sin
Jesus died in our place and received the wrath that we deserve
So then, God is not overlooking His Law as He forgives our sin.
If He did, He would not be just.
Instead, Christ died for our sins as if He is the One who broke God’s law.
His death satisfies the Law’s demand for justice.
So as God justifies the sinner, He remains just because of the fact that Christ has died for sin.
Just and the Justifier
Therefore, the basis for our justification is not us.
It is not our works.
It is not our good deeds.
It is not any merit in us.
It is Christ ALONE who is the grounds for our being justified.
The Instrument of Justification
The Instrument of Justification
So then—sinners are the subjects of justification.
Christ is the basis for justification.
But what is the instrument?
Again we look to that same passage in Romans 3.
whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.
Christ, who is the basis of our justification, must be received by faith.
Therefore, FAITH is the instrument.
This is the great church bell that the Reformers rang as the they pulled on the ropes of the Protestant Reformation.
John Calvin said that this is the hinge on which all true religion turns.
John Murray says that to this day, the church stands or falls on this doctrine.
In 16th Century Catholicism, and indeed in Roman teaching today, the idea is that there is a thing called the “Treasury of Merit.”
And what is lacking in my righteousness can be completed by my receiving merit from the treasury.
This is merit leftover from the good works of Christ of all the saints and Mary.
As I am found guilty of sin, I do works, and I am given merit by the church to complete what is lacking.
Prayer, penance, almsgiving, Confession, the Mass and indulgences are all ways to fill up what is lacking in my own righteousness.
The Reformers said no. We are not justified by the works we do.
Instead, we are justified by the work Christ has done.
And His saving work on our behalf is received by faith.
Thus, we would say that one is justified upon conversion. Fully.
Justification by FAITH ALONE.
Now, that is not to say that works play no role in our lives.
We will get to this in just a moment with sanctification.
But even now, I’ll read James 2:24
You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone.
James is not contradicting Paul in Romans 3:28
For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.
Instead, James is saying that if one has the true faith which justifies, it will be proven in the works that flow from it.
Salvation is received by faith alone.
But faith that saves will work—not earning merit that lacks, but demonstrating that the merit of Christ has been received in full.
Dead faith does not work and does not justify.
The Method of Justification
The Method of Justification
The subjects of justification are sinners.
The basis is Christ alone.
The instrument is faith alone.
So what about the Method of Justification?
The answer here is the theological term of imputation.
Imputation involves a transfer of someone else’s righteousness.
R. C. Sproul
Without God’s grace, our righteousness is filthy rags before God.
Soiled by pride and rebellion and the sin of Adam.
Because Adam was our representative before God, Adam’s sin is imputed to us—meaning with fell WITH Adam and IN Adam and we are GUILTY like Adam.
But when we repent of sin and believe in Christ, we have Christ’s righteousness imputed to us.
No longer are we guilty in Adam, but are justified in Christ.
For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
Christ took the credit for our sin on the Cross.
Christ has credited His righteousness to us in return.
Many have called this the “scandalous exchange of the Gospel.”
And this exchange—this method—is why God looks at us as if we have never sinned.
He looks upon us in love—the same way He looks upon His Son.
He accepts us and adopts us into His household.
He hears our prayers.
And one day, He will receive us unto Himself in glory.
All because the righteousness of Jesus Christ has been imputed to us—credited to us.
Reckoned to us.
The Effect of Justification
The Effect of Justification
And finally, we have the effect of it.
We can see this in what the Faith and Message says in the last sentence under the justification section:
Justification brings the believer unto a relationship of peace and favor with God.
The Baptist Faith and Message, Article IV
Because God has put forth His Son as the basis for sinners to be justified...
Because Christ has received the punishment for sin...
Because His righteousness is reckoned to us by faith...
… We are a people who have peace with our Creator and favor with our Maker.
Apart from the justifying work of Christ, we would still be warring against God in the darkness.
But in light of His justifying work that we have received by faith, we are at peace with God in the light.
Sanctification
Sanctification
So we have seen regeneration and justification—now for the third doctrine listed out in the Faith and Message:
3. Sanctification
3. Sanctification
According to the Faith and Message, sanctification is defined this way:
Sanctification is the experience, beginning in regeneration, by which the believer is set apart to God’s purposes, and is enabled to progress toward moral and spiritual maturity through the presence and power of the Holy Spirit dwelling in him.
In other words, from the time that the Lord makes your heart alive, He is making you more and more like the Lord Jesus Christ.
He is transforming you.
Changing your desires.
Changing your delights.
Making you more mature.
Seeing to it that grace strengthens in you as corruptions weaken in you.
Here is how the 1689 Confession stated it:
They who are united to Christ, effectually called, and regenerated, having a new heart and a new spirit created in them through the virtue of Christ's death and resurrection, are also farther sanctified, really and personally, through the same virtue, by his Word and Spirit dwelling in them; the dominion of the whole body of sin is destroyed, and the several lusts of it are more and more weakened and mortified, and they more and more quickened and strengthened in all saving graces, to the practice of all true holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.
The 1689 Second London Baptist Confession, Chapter 13, Paragraph 1
Here is what is being said there:
The same Spirit who saw to your new birth...
And the same Word that saw faith born in you...
...This is the same power of God that will see your sin put to death and grace reign in you more and more.
The sin that so easily entangles will be destroyed in your life—is being destroyed in your life—through the power of the Spirit and the Word.
For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.
As this process is happening, there can be conflict in us as believers.
There are times that God says NO and we want to still say YES because of indwelling sin.
There are times when God says YES and we want to say YES, but we end up saying NO because of indwelling sin.
Paul describes this holy war within us in this way:
For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.
Active and Acted Upon
Active and Acted Upon
That being said, we do not sit back and say, “God fix it” and do nothing.
The Faith and Message says that “Growth in grace should continue throughout a regenerate person’s life.”
That is true.
And for that to be the case, We have to recognize that sanctification is a process where we PERSEVERE and we are PRESERVED.
On one hand, we actively persevere.
Remember the words we recently heard from Jude in our Sunday morning series:
But you, beloved, building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life.
You persevere. You keep yourself in the love of God.
You pray.
You build your faith in the Word by studying and submitting to the Word.
You look to the hills and wait on the return of Christ.
You work out your salvation with fear and trembling.
But on the other hand, we are preserved.
Right after this, Jude’s doxology says:
Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy,
We will study this more this upcoming Sunday.
But you see there that as we keep ourselves in the love of God, God keeps us from stumbling and sees to it that we will be presented blameless.
He sees to it that sanctification is a process that will be completed and have its full effect.
Evidence of Salvation
Evidence of Salvation
In the end, this process of sanctification is one of the ways we can examine ourselves to see if we have truly been regenerated and justified.
Are you changing?
Do you love sin less?
Do you hunger and thirst for righteousness more?
Do you find it hard to sin and not have your conscience eating at you?
When a someone can say YES to questions of examination like that, it is evidence that their soul is indeed a construction site of God Himself.
But if someone claims to know Christ but is in truth unchanged, there should be real concern there.
Sanctification is a process that is always completed.
If someone abandons the faith, there was no sanctifying work to begin with.
However, when that work is there—and it is legitimate—it is beautiful.
One of my great joys as a pastor is to get to see men and women put to death what is earthly in them.
To take off the stench of sin and to put on Christ.
It is a sign that someone has been saved, is being saved and will be saved.
Glorification
Glorification
This brings us to the final doctrine tonight.
We have talked about Regeneration, Justification and Sanctification.
Now we talk about Glorification.
4. Glorification
4. Glorification
The Faith and Message says:
Glorification is the culmination of salvation and is the final blessed and abiding state of the redeemed.
Sanctification will not reach its full effect until glorification.
But for those who have been regenerated, justified and are indeed being sanctified, this will happen.
Glorification is when we are fully and finally saved from sin.
In regeneration, we are given a new heart, no longer enslaved to sin.
In justification, we are looked upon by God as if we have never sinned.
In sanctification, we are being separated from the effects of sin.
But it is not until glorification that we will finally be free from sin entirely.
This does not happen in this life.
This happens when we die or when Jesus returns.
The Intermediate Heaven and The New Earth
The Intermediate Heaven and The New Earth
For most Christians, glorification comes about through the means of death.
This is why death is an enemy that has lost its sting.
Instead of the grave being a place of condemnation and judgment, it actually becomes the gateway to a better land and a better life.
Believers who pass away before Christ’s return, will be like the poor man Lazarus in Jesus’ account of the rich man and Lazarus in Luke 16.
The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried,
What Jesus calls Abraham’s side, He calls paradise when speaking to the thief on the Cross:
And he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” And he said to him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.”
You can call it Abraham’s bosom or paradise or the intermediate heaven.
But in each case, what we are talking about is the place believers go when they die.
And it is the place they remain until Jesus returns.
Once Jesus returns, their souls and bodies will reunite as the body is resurrected in the same manner as Christ.
And they will live on the New Earth forever—in resurrection bodies—serving the resurrected Lord, Jesus Christ.
For believers who are alive when Christ returns, they will skip the grave all together.
For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord.
When these glorious events take place, glorification is upon us.
There are three things which the true Christian desires in respect to sin: justification, that it might not condemn; sanctification, that it may not reign; and glorification, that it may not be.
Richard Cecil
The day of your glorification will be the day when sin will not be.
What God has begun, will be completed.
And what God has completed will be enjoyed forever.
Conclusion
Conclusion
My friends—are you experiencing God’s grace in the ways we have talked about tonight?
Is your heart alive?
Are you justified?
Are you being sanctified?
Will you be glorified?
No one can answer these questions for you and yet they are questions you must answer.
There is nothing more wonderful and joyful than the delight of being born again.
If you feel that the Spirit of God is calling you tonight, do not hesitate to come to Christ.
Repent of your sin.
Believe in Jesus’ death and resurrection.
The gift of salvation is open to you.
If you are experiencing His grace in these ways, with Thanksgiving just 8 days away—stop and thank Him for the glory of salvation.
Justified...blessed thought.
Sanctified...salvation wrought.
Glorified...we too shall be.
How amazing is the love of God in Jesus Christ that we can sing things like this and believe they are true?
Salvation is better than we think.
So let’s think on it again and again, growing in our grasp of the glory.
