… Chapter 50, as we continue on in our series of studies in the life of Joseph and we continue on in our little kind of miniseries within the series and the subject of assurance. We’re back at that incident between Joseph and his brothers, and their lack of assurance concerning their standing and security before their brother upon their father’s passing. Verse 15 of Genesis 50, when Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, “Perhaps Joseph will hear us and may actually repay us for all the evil which we did to him.” So they sent messengers to Joseph saying, “Before your father died, he commanded saying, ‘Thus, you shall say to Joseph, I beg you please forgive the trespass of your brothers and their sin for they did evil to you.’ Now, please forgive the trespass of the servants of the God of your father.” And Joseph wept when they spoke to him.
Then, his brothers also went and fell down before his face, and they said, “Behold, we are your servants.”
Joseph said to them, “Do not be a free, for am I in the place of God, but as for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring it about as it is this day to see if many people alive. Now, therefore, do not be afraid. I will provide for you and your little ones.”
And he comforted them and spoke kindly to them. I want you to think about this. If a person is wrong about being right with God, then ultimately it doesn’t really matter what else he or she is right about. None of us want to be wrong about being right with God. The most wonderful thing in the world is not to be saved. The most wonderful thing in the world is to be saved and know it. In fact, it is to be saved and know it, and know that you cannot lose it. That’s one of the greatest things in the world. None of us want to go through life or die with our fingers crossed, as it relates to our relationship with God, and God certainly doesn’t want us to be in a state of limbo as it relates to our standing and security before him. God is sure about our salvation, so sure that in Romans chapter 8, as Paul talks about the saving work of God in the soul of man, look at Romans chapter 8 in verse 30.
This is quite striking. If we back up into verse 20, 8, for we all know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to his purpose, for whom he foreknew. He also predestined to be conformed to the image of his son that he might be the firstborn among many brethren, moreover whom he predestined, those he also called, whom he called these he also justified, and whom he justified, these he also glorified. What’s interesting in the Greek text is that that word glorified is in the past tense in the Greek, that we’re speaking about something that’s yet to happen in the future. Our glorification, our being brought into the presence of God when God finishes his work in us, begun in faith in Jesus Christ on planet earth, but that is so sure a reality in God’s mind that he, when he speaks about our future glorification, speaks about it in the past tense. Heaven is a done deal for you and me in the mind of God, because he who begins a good work in us will perform it.
He’s the one that lacks, he’s the one that predestines, he’s the one that calls. He’s the one that justifies, he’s the one that keeps, and he’s the one that someday will glorify us. God doesn’t want us to be in a state of doubt. God doesn’t want us to be living in some state of limbo when it comes to our soul’s salvation. We don’t need to live, and we don’t have to die. With our fingers crossed. We would all love to experience the assurance of the man who said that he was so sure of salvation that he could grab onto a cornstalk, swing out over the fires of hell, look the devil in his face, and sing, “Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine.” We all want to experience that, and I think God wants us to experience that and to enjoy that, and we’re wrestling with that. This is a very real issue. I have seen doubt grip my family. My brother went through a terrible time, a time of soul travail and soul turmoil where he doubted his salvation.
He wondered if he didn’t belong to the group in Matthew 7, that did things in Jesus’ name, but someday would hear from Jesus the part, “I don’t know you,” and it was a terrible thing to watch, a soul in travail and turmoil about its standing and acceptance before God. This is a very real issue. You know someone that has struggled with the issue of assurance. Perhaps you, yourself, have struggled with it or you’ve dealt with someone who presently is struggling with it, so I think we’re dealing with a very practical and pastoral issue, and that’s why I’ve kind of slowed down. We’re going to look at it one more time tonight and next Wednesday night. We’ve been looking at this subject, saved without a doubt, and we’re using this incident and the story of Joseph Brothers to cause us to take a look at the doctrine of biblical assurance. We’ve said many times that here we have Joseph’s brothers revisiting the past. Upon the death of Jacob, their consciences seem to be awakened.
They begin to doubt Joseph’s love. They believe that perhaps he will hate them and repay them for their evil, so evidently done. They’re in such a state, that I think they lie about what Jacob said but didn’t say. We see them groveling at the ankles of their brother, offering themselves into servitude to Joseph. This is a sorry picture, and it’s one that grieves the heart of Joseph. We read here that he weeps. He’s grieved and wounded that they would so doubt his love and they would so question their standing and security before him, which has been abundantly evidenced for 17 years or more in the land of Goshen. And so, we’ve kind of worked through this narrative, which really is speaking about physical salvation and material security, but I think it becomes a springboard for the greater issue of our standing and security before God. Now, we’ve broken this part of the story up into two general thoughts. We’re looking at the evolution of their doubts, and we’ll try and wrap that up tonight.
We’ll begin to look at the resolution of their doubts. We’ve already established, under the thought of the evolution of their doubts, we’ve seen its fruit. This doubt, this insecurity, this second guessing on their part, produced in them pessimism, panic and paralysis. We reminded ourselves that that’s true also when you and I begin to lose our grip on grace, although grace never loses its grip on us. We get to a place of joylessness and fearless fearfulness and ineffectiveness in the service of God, and then we move from the fruit of doubt to the root of doubt. We have tried to get our hands around some of the contributing factors in this sorry scene, where you have the brothers graveling at the feet of Joseph. He doesn’t want that for them, and they have grieved him in doing it. We have come up with four things that have contributed to their doubt. Here are the roots that bear this awful fruit of pessimism, panic, and paralysis. We covered two of them last week.
If you’re taking notes, you might want to be reminded that we established the fact that they doubted his promise. They doubted his promise. He has to reiterate again. He has to speak kindly to them again. He has to comfort them again verbally, that he does not intend to wreak revenge. They doubted his word, and we reminded ourselves that you and I find our feet slipping when we don’t plant them firmly on the foundation of God’s unchanging word, which is rooted in his immutable character. Then, we established that they couldn’t get over their sin. I mean, their sin was very grave, and it was very great, and it was hard for them to grasp that Joseph could actually forgive that. Could he actually overlook that? Could he turn a blind eye to that? Could he really bury that and forget all about what they had done to him and the events that their betrayal had triggered in his life, the sorrow he had gone through, the hurt he had gone through, the loneliness he had experienced?
This is too good to be true, and sometimes you and I actually have a similar thought when it comes to God’s mercy and when it comes to God’s grace. We are very slow to accept grace. It comes natural to us that you’ve got to work for your salvation or pay for forgiveness to some degree, and we reminded ourselves that grace by its very nature is unmerited and it is something that covers all of our sin. We reminded ourselves that the chief of sinners has been saved. We reminded ourselves that we shouldn’t remember what God has forgotten and we reminded ourselves that grace is unaffected by the degree of our sin, but we’re coming to a third contributing factor. If you’re taking notes, this is where you’ll want to pick up. They doubted his promise, they couldn’t get over his sin, and thirdly, they had grown apart, which had led to a misunderstanding. What I’m talking about here is they had an insufficient knowledge of Joseph that brought about this questioning and this querying of his love.
They didn’t really know him, because if they knew him, they wouldn’t think like this. They wouldn’t grovel like this. They wouldn’t question and query like this. Although they have been together for 17 years now, because that’s how long Jacob was in the land. Remember we saw that when Jacob passed? But they were apart for more than 20 years. There was a lot of catching up to do. There was a lot of gaps that needed to be filled in, a lot of blanks that needed to be filled in also in their understanding of Joseph, and I think this contributed to this scene where if they really knew the heart of their brother, they would not act this way. Even after the reunion, remember to some degree they did live on two levels. Joseph lived in the palace and was in Pharaoh’s administration, and no doubt came down to Goshen many times to take care of his extended family, but to some degree he lived in a circle that was beyond their sphere of influence or entrance.
And so, I think there’s enough in that to tell us that there was gaps between them and they misunderstood him. They didn’t know him. That’s why I believe Joseph Weeps, we read about it here in verse 17, and Joseph wept when they spoke to him. And so, I think they’d grown apart, and that had led to a misunderstanding. If they had a full knowledge of Joseph, they would’ve enjoyed a full assurance before Joseph. It seems to me that if we make the crossover, which we’ve been trying to do, moving from the kind of physical deliverance aspect of this story, into the eternal salvation aspect of our own relationship with God, invariably I would argue this, that a lack of assurance on the part of a believer or a saint of God, someone who feels uncertain about their acceptance before God, invariably, if you get down to it, if you scratch beneath the surface, you’ll find that there’s a deficient knowledge regarding Christology, regarding the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ.
You and I need to grasp who Christ is, and we need to grasp what Christ has done. If we really grasp the fullness of who he is and the completeness of what he has done for us, I think we can grab that corn stock, swing over the fires of hell, and look the devil in the face, and sing, “Blessed assurance. Jesus is mine. That work is complete. It is finished. It has been accepted by the Father,” and as we come into union with Christ, nothing will separate us from his love, but often we haven’t grasped the breadth and the depth and the height of the work of Christ on the cross for us and the fruits that issue from his suffering on the behalf of his believing people. I think we all are capable and often comes to me with, I think, a greater impact, because my name’s mentioned in the verse, but you know that scene in John 14, and Jesus is talking to the disciples and he’s talking to Philip, and Philip says, what does he say? “Show me the father,” and what does Jesus say?
I remember reading it as a young Christian like God was speaking to me, “Philip, how long have I been with you and you still don’t know me?” And I think we’re all capable of being in that place. Many years in Christ, it’s been many months and years since we put our faith in Jesus Christ and claimed his forgiveness, but you know what? Perhaps through a lack of diligence, perhaps through ignorance, through a lack of good teaching through your own failure or through the failure of others to minister more appropriately to you, you and I can be at a place even years into our walk with Christ, where Jesus would say of us, “How long have I been with you and you still don’t know me?” I think that reminds us that, invariably, a lack of assurance is rooted, in many ways and in many respects, in a deficiency in our knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. Let me give you an example of this. Go with me to the book of Colossians. Colossians chapter two and verse two.
Let me give you the kind of background to this letter. One of the reasons for its writing is it’s polemic. Paul wants to defend this church from the encroachment of an early form of Gnosticism, perhaps with a Jewish ceremonial twist, but there were those who were advocating that Jesus wasn’t God, he was an emanation of God. He was far down the totem pole in the spiritual world, and he was only one of many spirit beings. He was disembodied. He wasn’t God. Paul’s concern that this kind of thinking is encroaching in on the church of Colossi, and according to verse of chapter two, it’s cheating them. Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit according to the attrition of man, according to the basic principles of the world and not according to Christ, for in him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily, and you are complete in him. Paul there is making a full-frontal attack upon this theology and philosophy, under which Christ’s deity is downplayed.
His historicity and his humanity is questioned, his uniqueness is attacked, and his sufficiency and saviorhood is trashed. In verse eight, he says, “Hold on. You’re being cheated. Don’t buy into this.” The word cheated, it means carried away as spoils of war. It means to be robbed, and basically, he’s saying, “Don’t allow others to rob you of what you have in Christ.” If you understood the fullness of who he is and the completeness of what he did, you wouldn’t settle for anything less than him, because there’s nothing beyond him, and he warns them not to be cheated, robbed by others, but I think by implication too within this text, he warns them not to rob themselves through a deficient understanding of Christ. Go up to verse two of the same chapter. In fact, let’s go to verse one, “For I want you to know what great conflict I have for you and those in Laodicea.” Paul’s burdened for this church. He’s got a shepherd’s heart. He’s got a pastoral heart.
He’s concerned about its health. He’s concerned about these cancerous cells that are getting into the body life of this church. Verse two, he wants to see their hearts encouraged being knit together in love, attaining to all riches of the full assurance of understanding to the knowledge of the mystery of God, both of the Father and of Christ in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Now, this I say. Lest anyone should deceive you with persuasive words. So he’s saying, “Look, watch out for those who want to cheat you, and don’t cheat yourself. Attend to, pursue, study, seek the full assurance of understanding of all the riches that’s to be found in the knowledge of the mystery of God, both in the Father and in Christ.” You get this beautiful picture that Christ is like a gold mine. He’s full of riches both in his person and his work, and Paul is saying to them that Christ is like a rich mine which conceals a wealth of precious materials.
They have not yet begun the quarry it, still lest exhaust it, so it’s foolish for them to turn away from him so soon do other forms of teaching and mount the quest for other forms of religious experience. He said, “Why would you pursue this when you haven’t yet quarried and plumbed the depths of all the riches that’s to be found in Christ, the glory of his person and the marvel of his work on our behalf before God?” There is complete forgiveness. There is complete acceptance in the one in whom dwells the fullness of the Godhead bodily. We have in Jesus Christ, the self-substitution of God for us by means of the incarnation and the substitutionary death of Jesus Christ. He talks about it in chapter one about how Christ has reconciled us to God. Christ is not down the totem pole of the world of spirituality. He is the fullness of the Godhead and bodily form. He is complete in himself, and the work he does on our behalf is complete. When we are united to him by faith, we have complete forgiveness, complete acceptance before God.
I’m just reminding you and I that if we find ourselves in a place where we’re not sure about our standing before God, it’s because we haven’t fully grasped the perfect standing before God that Christ has provided for us, as our great high priest and the one who made propitiation for us. John Murray, the great reformed theologian, is right. Too frequently, believers entertain far too truncated a conception of salvation as if, for example, it consisted merely in the forgiveness of sins. He wants us to understand that, in Christ, we’re adopted. In Christ, we’re justified. In Christ, we’re sanctified. In Christ, we are redeemed. Are we coming to terms with the vastness of his person and the completeness of his work? Are we, as Paul encourages the Ephesians, plumbing the height, the breadth, and the depth of God’s love for us in the Lord Jesus? We need to be doing that. We need to be reading theology. We need to be studying the epistles. Why not get into Dave Dunn’s class on a Sunday morning, study the book of Colossians, and come and understand the fullness of the Godhead bodily in Christ?
Christ, giving himself in self-substitution for us, perfectly satisfying God’s justice in his death as the spotless and sinless sacrifice. God has been completely satisfied, and when we are in Christ, we are complete. You don’t need to look beyond him or beside him. Find your security in him, quarry. Dig deep into the riches of the full assurance of the mystery of God in the Father and in Christ. Do you know what you have in the Lord Jesus? In Jesus Christ, we have a life that can never be forfeited. In Jesus Christ, we have a relationship that can never be abrogated. In Jesus Christ, we have a righteousness that can never be tarnished. In Jesus Christ, we have a judgment that can never be repeated. In Jesus Christ, we have a title that can never be clouded, a position that can never be invalidated, a standing that can never be disputed, a justification that can never be reversed, wealth that can never be depleted, peace that can never be destroyed, and a victor who can never be vanquished. Those are just some of the things that we have in him. You are complete in him.
You have a sufficiency and a security in the Lord Jesus Christ. When we lack that assurance, there is a depletion in our knowledge of him, and we’re not spending time reinforcing our faith with great truths. I’ve mentioned this book before, Alister McGrath’s book, The Sunnier Side of Doubt. Listen to this quote by him, “Faith is like reinforced concrete. Concrete that is reinforced with steel framework is able to stand far greater stress and strain than concrete on its own. Experience that is reinforced with understanding will not crumble easily under pressure.” Again, “Faith is like the flesh and bones of the human body. Just as the human skeleton supports the flesh, giving its shape and strength, so understanding supports and give shape to the Christian experience. Without the skeleton, the human body would collapse in a floppy mass. Without flesh, a skeleton is lifeless, hollow, and empty. Faith needs the vitality of experience if it is to live, but it needs the support of understanding if it is to survive.”
See, the concrete of our faith needs to be reinforced with the steel of understanding I, and it’ll be stronger for that. We need to put our faith in a Christ we are increasingly coming to know, and as we know him more, our sense of our peace and standing before God is in increased. Here’s the fourth thought. They focused on circumstances and feelings, okay? They doubted his word. They couldn’t get over their sin. They’d grown apart through a lack of understanding, and they were now focusing on circumstances and feelings. See, upon Jacob’s death, they began to focus on that circumstance which triggered all kinds of emotions for them. Instead of staying focused on Joseph’s word, on the data which proved the faithfulness of his character, person, and heart towards them, they focused on circumstances which triggered very negative feelings. “Father is dead,” Verse 15, “And perhaps Joseph will hate us.” Once the emotions get into the driving seat, from there on in, it was anything but a joyride.
They began to question Joseph’s love, not based on fact, not based on objective evidence, but based on subjective feelings and circumstances that argued to the contrary, and again, I think you and I need to think that through. They had allowed circumstances and feelings to cloud their view of Joseph. In fact, this story begins with their hatred of Joseph and it ends with them believing and thinking that Joseph is about to hate them, but their hatred for Joseph was real. His hatred of them was only imaginary, but they were affected by a misreading of the circumstances, and by allowing their feelings to dominate their will and their responses in the given situation. And so, they were rising and falling on the ocean waves of vacillating feelings. Joseph’s brothers were forgiven, whether they felt it or not, but that was immaterial, given the fact that they had allowed circumstances to lead them to wrong conclusions, which then triggered a set of negative and troubling emotions.
This, I’m not going to spend a lot of time on this, but it’s a point worth grasping, that the object of reality was not the same as their subjective perspective. That’s something, again, we need to keep coming back to, because this is one of the issues of a lack of assurance. You and I can misread circumstances. In fact, Christians become very pagan when they try to read their circumstances. The pagans, if something happened that was negative or our country, they concluded, “You know what? The deities are mad with us. They’re out of sorts, and now we’ve got to implicate them,” and they lived nervously until they had some sense, either by sacrificing something at the temple or doing something that, in some way, they could have swayed the deities, and they were dealing with deities that were very vacillating and temperamental, and they were reading their circumstances as a kind of almanac as to where they were at with the deities. Now, that’s not how a Christian ought to behave because God is not vacillating and God is not temperamental.
He loves us with a chesed love, a covenant love, a love that’s rooted in his unbending character and immutable nature, and his love for us is sure, and we don’t need to question that, but sometimes we do. Many times if you found yourself maybe on a given day, when something goes wrong, maybe thinking, “You know what? Is God angry with me?” Why would you conclude that at all? Are you trying to divine your understanding of God through circumstances, through feelings? That’s a mistake, and it leads to doubt and it shakes your faith and it leaves you no firm foundation upon which to plant your feet. The Bible warns us not to do that. Peace doesn’t come through analysis. Peace comes through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. You and I need to remember that whatever our frame of mind, whatever funk we have allowed ourselves to get into, our circumstances on our feelings are not, listen, not a good barometer for determining God’s goodness and God’s grace.
Never rest on your feelings, and never try and conclude anything from your circumstances in relation to your relationship with God, because the objective reality is that God loves us, and his love for us doesn’t change. It remains the same, and we don’t walk by sight. We walk by faith, and we lay hold of our knowledge of God and Christ as we’ve come to understand it in the Bible, and the Bible would encourage that our thinking be molded by revelation, and then our thinking that’s molded by revelation will determine the actions we take, and we bring our will to bear upon that. We decide that’s what we’re going to do based upon the thoughts informed by God’s word. As we mold our will around godly thoughts, you’ll find that also you’ll mold your feelings around those actions and those attitudes, but sin hijacks that process and turns it on its head. We don’t begin by thinking informed by revelation. We allow ourselves to be dragged around by our emotions, that then calls our will into service and leaves us all screwed up in our thinking.
That’s why we can sometimes get into a place of doubt, and I think this is reminding us here, “No, guys. Look at the facts. Don’t go on the feelings.” I like the old poem. You’ve maybe heard it before, “Three men were walking on a wall, feeling faith and fact. When feeling got an awful fall, then faith was taken back. So close was faith to feeling, that he stumbled and fell too, but fact remained and pulled faith back, and faith brought feeling too.” That’s the way it works. Fact, faith, feeling. Think, act, feel. But sin hijacks that process and these guys allow emotions to get in the way. Maybe the best way I could illustrate this before I move on is that scene in Exodus 12, right? The Passover. Towards the end of the plagues and the coup d’etat is about to happen. The angel of death is about to visit, and the people of Israel are told what? They’re told to shed the blood of an innocent lamb, and to dab that blood on the lintels and the door posts of their homes.
Then, to stay indoors under the blood, safe under its covering, and we know that the angel of the death passes over those homes and over the land of Egypt, and the firstborn of the Egyptian die. You can imagine the piercing screams in the darkness of that night, as Egyptian parents waken up to find their firstborn dead. Now, imagine a little Jewish family in their home, and you can imagine it. It’s not like they’re necessarily all sitting there in absolute peace and composure. They knew that the angel of death was passing over. I want to guess there were some evidences of what was going on by noise or movement or whatever. They knew something awful and something awesome was taking place, but despite their frame of mind or even their feelings, which may have gone up and down during that night, they were safe because of the blood, because God had said, “When I see the blood, I will pass over,” and I think you and I need to remind ourselves that inside those homes, some may have been worried about their own sins. They may have even had a sense of insecurity.
Their frame of mind may not have been perfectly peaceful and their feelings may have gone from positive to negative, but they were safe, not based on their feelings or frame of mind, but based on the objective results and fruit of the shed blood and the innocent life given. You and I need to remind ourselves of that when we find our souls in travail and turmoil, and despite our frame of mind, despite perhaps even the feelings we go through, doubting and questioning and querying, it doesn’t change the objective reality that we are forgiven in Christ, that the blood has done its work, that we are justified, we are being sanctified, and it’s as good as done that we will be glorified. So, be careful with your feelings, and be careful with your circumstances. Just for a couple of moments, because I want to leave the bulk of this for our next study, let’s just begin to look at what we might call the resolution of their doubts the resolution of their doubts.
We’ve looked at the evolution. We’ve looked at the fruit and the root of their doubt, but now we begin to see Joseph address the brother’s concerns. Joseph was most certainly saddened and hurt by the approach and the appeal of his brothers on this matter to forgive them again, to give them a confidence again that Joseph truly loves them, and he’s not about to hate them or turn on them. That was hurtful, because there was tangible unmistakable proof to the contrary, and it brings him to tears, but as he deals with their approach and their appeals in this matter, he does two things. I’m only going to deal with one of them, and I’m going to deal with it quickly. He confirms his pardon. He confirms his pardon, and in secondly, he affirms his promise. We’re really going to concentrate on that next week, and we’re going to get into the whole issue of the Bible’s validity and veracity, because Joseph says to them, “Fear not. Don’t doubt my word. You have no reason to do it.”
As John says in 1 John 5, “If we are willing to accept the witness of man, how much greater is the witness of God?” Joseph’s saying, “Hey, guys. You’ve got to believe my word,” and God says the same thing, and I’m going to give you many reasons not to doubt that word, which will give you great grounds for assurance, but that’s next week on the last part of this study. But he not only affirms his promise, but he does confirm his pardon. Look at verse 19. Joseph said to them, “Do not be afraid, for am I in the place of God, but as for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant that for good, in order to bring it about as it is this day to see if many people alive.” Now, there’s some to be it as to what Joseph’s getting at here in verse 19. It could possibly mean in that it’s not my place to execute justice. [inaudible 00:40:55] the Romans 12, “Vengeance is the Lord’s. He will repay. I’ll leave room for the wrath of God,” kind of deal.
It could be saying that. “Guys, you fear judgment. That’s not my role.” Implicitly, he would probably be wanting to be said. I mean, after 17 years, it doesn’t look like that’s God’s purpose either. Instead of justice, you’re getting mercy. Also, it could be read this way, and it might be emerging of both thoughts, that Joseph’s kind of saying, “I’m in the place where God wants me to be,” so you’re back to the kin of Genesis 45. “Hey, guys. I’ve learned more, with hindsight than foresight, that actually God put me through all of this, so that I would get ahead of you guys when news came down. I was able to preserve your life, and so carry on the promise of God through Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” So, I’m in the place of God. I’ve got God’s perspective on this and, understanding the sovereignty of God and how he’s using this, I’m certainly not going to fight the purposes of God even in my pain. I’m going to forgive you. I’m going to pardon you.
In fact, if he merged those thoughts, I think Joseph is simply saying this. “I’m in the place where God would have me, and I’m not about to do to you what God evidently has been unwilling to do to you. Am I not in God’s place, or am I in the place of God? And so he confirms his pardon. He does not intend to stand in judgment over them. He’s got God’s perspective on this situation and they need not fear retribution. There will be no retaliation. So, let’s apply that and close up you. He’s saying, “Guys, I’m not going to judge you. I’m not going to judge you,” and I think God will want us to be aware of that tonight as his children, that when you and I doubt, when we revisit our forgiveness, when we question our acceptance before God, I think God wants us to hear it again and again, because the Bible reminds us of it again and again, that God does not stand over us as judge. Romans 8:1. If any man is in Christ Jesus, he’s a new creature, right? In Christ, there is no condemnation.
We read in John 5:24 that if we will believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, we will pass from death on the life and we will not what? Come into judgment. God does not stand over any one of us tonight who knows his son in judgment. Joseph’s saying, “Am I in God’s place? I’m not about to wreak vengeance, because it’s clear God has shown you mercy instead of justice.” You’ve met with mercy from God, and you’re going to meet with mercy from me. And that’s the astounding reality. I like the story of the lady who went to collect her pictures from Walmart, and she got them from her vacation trip and looked at them. They weren’t what she thought they were going to be, and so she complained to the clerk behind the counter, “You know what? These pictures don’t do me justice,” to which the clerk replied, “Lady, you don’t need justice. You need mercy.” Justice we deserve, but mercy we received. That’s the marvelous thing. God has exacted the payment for our sins in the suffering of Christ on our behalf.
That’s at the heart of the gospel, the substitutionary death of Jesus Christ for us, the self-substitution of God in our place, the giving of God’s son for us. He delivered them up. He didn’t spare him, and Christ died on the cross for our sins. According to Romans 3:21, he made propitiation for our sins. Listen to these words. Let them sink in Romans 3:21. This is God saying to you, “I’m confirming my pardon. I’m confirming my pardon, and 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 there is no difference. We’ve all sinned and fallen short of his glory, but 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 passed over the sins that were previously committed.”
Listen to verse 6:26. “To demonstrate at the present time his righteousness, that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Christ.” We deserve the justice, and a just God would’ve been just to meet it out to us. His law must be satisfied, the law that you and I broke, but the amazing thing is that this God who has just acted graciously and freely in Jesus Christ and surrendered up his own son as a substitute in our place, the sinless one dying for the sinful, so that Christ in his death might make a propitiation. That’s the word that means satisfy. What did he satisfy? Who did he satisfy? He satisfied God’s law, and he satisfied God in all his justice so that the one who is just can be the justifier of the unjust. Joseph’s brothers did not deserve their pardon, but a pardon they God. Joseph says, “Am I in God’s place? I’m not about to wreak vengeance on you. In fact, you didn’t meet with God’s justice. You met with God’s mercy.”
He’s fulfilling his promise to Abraham, and I’m not about to do to you what God has been unwilling to do to you. You and I need to remind ourselves of that fact tonight, that God is satisfied in Christ, and he will not take it out on our hide. The scorched ground of Calvary affords us security. The backfire of Christ’s death on our behalf provides for us safe ground upon which to stand without fear of the fire falling a second time. Listen to this story as I close. It’s the story of Rosalind Goforth. She was a well-known missionary in China who, along with her husband, Jonathan, enjoyed an illustrious career in ministry. She labored for many years in China with great success, but even during those years, she was often oppressed by a burden concerning her sin. She felt guilty. She felt dirty. She nursed an inward sense of spiritual failure. And so, one night, all alone, quietly, she sat at a desk. She cracked open her Bible. She got our concordance, and she started to fill in the blanks, like we talked about earlier.
She determined to find out God’s attitude toward the failures, the faults, and the sins of his children, and she put words down on paper under this thought, “What God does with our sins?” And she come up with 17 truths, and I’m not going to go through them all. I’ll cherry-pick the best. She come up with 17 truths that really encouraged her, that God, according to Isaiah 53:6m had led her sins on his son. Our iniquities were led on him. In the character [inaudible 00:49:30] John 1:29, Jesus Christ bore them away, as he bore them in his own death. We read in Psalm 103:12, that God has removed our transgressions, our sins as far as the east is from the west, and you’ve heard me say it. I say it again, that if you travel from the north to the south, at some point you will travel north again, but that’s not true of traveling from east to west. If you begin to travel west, you’ll never, at some point, turn to traveling east.
The Bible’s just trying to tell us, in an immeasurable way, that the distance Christ put between us and our sin is almost incomprehensible. God cannot find that sin. It’s as far as the east is from the West. According to Micah 7:19, God has trampled our sins under his feet. According to Isaiah 38:17, he has cast them behind his back. In fact, I remember studying that verse years and years ago, and if my recollection is right, the Hebrew there speaks of that place between your shoulder blades. You know, the one you can’t get to with your finger or when you want to scratch? That’s the point. It’s a beautiful picture. According to Micah 7:19, he’s cast our sins into the depths of the sea. According to Isaiah 44:22, he’s blotted them out with a thick cloud. We’re so spoiled here with the sunshine, we can hardly handle the dune gloom, the clouds that blot out the blue skies and the blazing sun. That’s the picture.
You can’t see the sun on certain days. When Jesus Christ covered our sins, it was like a thick cloud covering them. Finally, you’ve got Colossians 2:14. He blots them out. The writing that is against us has been nailed to the cross, is the way Paul put it. It’s like all our offenses and all our sins were all written down, nailed to the cross, and blotted out. That’s a beautiful picture because back then they didn’t have paper or ink. There’s a certain acid in ink, and it bites into the paper. If you write with a fountain pen or an ink pen on a piece of paper, you can’t rub it out, but then they used parchment. They used animal skins, and they wrote on top of it, but it could be reused, and they would often just take a sponge and wipe it all away, blot it all out. That’s the picture, that all of our sin, all the record of it, the ledger of our lives, has all been nailed to the cross, and God confirms his promises.
I’ve just given you a sample of the 17 truths. You can be sure, as she filled in her deficient thinking about her forgiveness before God and her standing in Christ, that as she filled that in and let hold of it by faith, peace and assurance came. As I was going over those notes this afternoon, I find myself, towards the end of this, just singing in my soul, the words of that hymn I learned as a boy, years I spent in vanity and pride, caring not, my Lord was crucified, knowing not it was for me he died on Calvary, but mercy there was great and grace was free. Pardon? There was multiplied to me. There, my burdened soul find liberty at Calvary. Amen. I love that phrase. Pardon, multiplied to me. 17 truths. We’ve just looked at a couple, but God affirms his promise to us.
Our sins are forgiven, and we are as sure as being in heaven today as if it was going to take place tomorrow. The greatest thing in the world is not to be saved. The greatest thing in the world is to be saved and know it. In fact, the greatest thing in the world is to be saved, know it, and know that you can’t lose it. Think through those issues. Are you doubting God’s word? Are you allowing circumstances and unrestrained feelings to cloud your judgment and your thinking biblically? Are you working hard at filling in any deficiencies concerning your knowledge of the gospel in Christ? Work on those things as God works on you. Let’s pray. Lord, we come before you tonight, and we realize this is a real issue. Lord, if we’re wrong about being right with you, it really doesn’t matter what else we’re right about, and we don’t want to be wrong about being right.
We don’t want to go through life or death with our fingers crossed, and you certainly don’t want us to go that way yourself. Lord, affirm yourself to us in your word and by your spirit. Help us to cherish the gospel, and learn it and preach it to ourselves day by day. Help us to see the fullness of Christ and the completeness of his work. Help us to not doubt your word. It’s rooted in your immutable character, and heaven and earth will pass away, but it will not pass away. We can be sure about being sure, because you are sure that those whom you’ve predestined, those whom you have called, you have justified and you have glorified. Lord, heaven is a done deal, and we thank you for that, because it is all because of the ruby red blood of Jesus Christ, and these things we ask and pray in his name. Amen.