MCLEAN BIBLE CHURCH SEPTEMBER 9, 2012 PASTOR LON SOLOMON

Transcription

1 MCLEAN BIBLE CHURCH SEPTEMBER 9, 2012 PASTOR LON SOLOMON >> PASTOR LON: For those of you who have been around McLean for a while you know that normally when I come back from summer break the first week back, I always do a vision message. I talk about what our vision is as a church, and by the way let me tell you what that is. It's to make an evangelistic impact on secular Washington with the message of Jesus Christ and we talk about what our core values are and how we'll do it. But I'm not going to do that this year. The reason is because after we celebrated our 50th anniversary this past year, we decided it would be the right time for us to really take a comprehensive look at how we are doing ministry here at McLean Bible Church and make sure that we are positioned to be maximally effective for the next 50 years. Make sure that we are being good stewards of the money that God and the resources that God has given us. So we're right in the middle of that. It's massive. Bigger than I thought! But we're right in the middle of that. I don't want to share something with you now until we are sure where we will land with all this. Okay? I promise we'll have a vision message and tell you all that we are praying through and working through - just not yet. Would you pray for us? Can I ask you to do that? This is an enormous task so please pray for us and as soon as we know something, we'll tell you something fair? Okay. Today we'll go back to our study of the book of Genesis which is where we were when we left off in the spring and we'll talk today about Genesis 15. You know, for my message today, I sat in front of a laptop computer and I typed my message in and then I hit a button and it printed out exactly what I had typed in. What an amazing machine! I love this machine! Now, if you were to ask me how it works, I don't have the slightest idea in the world how it works. But it works! I'm happy for that. Isn't that true of so many things in our world? We flick on light switches but if someone were to ask you, well, how exactly is electricity made and how does it travel through the wire to get inside your house? Most of us could not answer that question. My point is that many of the things in life that bring us great benefits, we use them, enjoy them, but honestly when it comes down to how they really work, their mechanism for working, we don't have the foggiest idea how they work. I bring that up because I have learned that this same thing is true so often with us as followers of Jesus Christ when it comes to our salvation in Christ. We know we have it. We enjoy it. We hopefully are telling

2 other people about it everywhere we go. But when it comes down to the actual mechanics of why it works and how it works, we really don't understand that. To put it another way, how does believing in Jesus Christ as my savior make me righteous in God's sight? How does it enable God to blot out my sin? How does it allow him to take me into heaven? This is what we want to talk about today. We will resume our study as I said of the Book of Genesis and Chapter 15 and right here in this chapter God explains to us the actual mechanism that makes our salvation in Christ work. This is one of the most exciting truths in all the Bible. It's so exciting when I got into it, I said one week is not enough. So I'm going to do a four-part mini-series entitled "Our Salvation in Jesus Christ" and today is part 1, entitled "How our salvation works." Are you ready? Ready? Okay. Here we go. Little bit of review. Remember in Genesis 14 that Abraham went and rescued Lot, his nephew, and all the people of Sodom and Gomorrah from an invading army. Now Abraham has returned home to the city of Hebron in Canaan, in the Promised Land So picking up, here we go. Genesis 15:1. After these things the word of the Lord came to Abraham in a vision, saying "Do not be afraid, Abraham. I am your shield and your very great reward." Abraham said, Oh Lord God, what will you give me since I remained childless and the heir of my head is Eliezer of Damascus. Since you have given me no children my household servant is currently serving as my heir. Hopefully you remember back in Genesis chapter 12 when Abraham was 75 years old, God said to him, verse one, leave your country and go to the land I'll show you, the land of Canaan, and I will make you into a great nation. Later in that same chapter, verse 7 and the Lord appeared to Abraham and said to your offspring, I will give this land. So, twice, God has already promised Abraham that he's not going to be childless. But now, we have moved to Genesis 15, ten years later. Abraham is now 85 years old. He still doesn't have a child. Now, I think we can all relate to Abraham's dilemma right? I mean, 85-year-old men can father children, but it's not something you see every day. In fact, you know the definition of an optimist, right? An optimist is a 92-year-old man who marries a 26-year-old woman and buys a seven-bedroom house right next to an elementary school. That is an optimist. (Laughter) I thought that was hysterical myself but... all right. Hey, Abraham is 85 cotton-pickin' years old. So it's totally understandable that here in Genesis 15, he asked God for

3 some clarification. For some reassurance. God says, verse 4, Then behold the word of the Lord came to Abraham, saying, this man, Eliezer, your household servant, will not be your heir but a son who comes forth from your own body, he shall be your heir. God says Abraham, I promised you a natural-born heir and I'm going give you a natural-born heir. We need to stop right here and take a look at some archaeological findings because they bring enormous corroboration of the veracity of the Bible right at this point. Between the years of 1925 and 1941, archaeologists excavated a city in northern Mesopotamia, modern day Iraq, named Nuzi and here they found thousands of clay tablets detailing all of the social customs of the day at the time when the Bible says Abraham lived, around 2,000 BC. One of those customs we discovered was this, that if a married couple was childless, they could adopt one of their household servants to be their heir. And that is precisely what we see Abraham and Sara did, right here in Genesis 15, with this man Eliezer. Now, someone writing a thousand years later in the 1,000 BC or 500 BC and making up mythical stories about a mythical man named Abraham the way critics of the Bible say happened, they would never have written this information down about Eliezer because they never would have even known this custom existed in 2,000 BC. Only someone writing Abraham s true history in the time of Abraham would have had any idea of this adoption custom that existed in that day. You know what we say? Say it with me: The more they dig out of the ground, the more the Bible proves to be right. In the same tablets from Nuzi, we found that if this childless couple later goes on to have a child of their own, the adopted servant was immediately stripped of his inheritance rights and they were automatically given to the natural-born child. So here in this chapter when God says Eliezer is not going to be your heir, God was not being unfair to Eliezer, he was not being unethical to Eliezer, he was not being illegal with Eliezer, this was standard operating procedure at the time of Abraham and everybody knew it so once again, I'll give you a second chance: The more they dig out of the ground, the more the Bible proves to be right! Verse 5, then God took Abraham outside and said look up at the stars and count them if you can. So shall your offspring be. What comes next, one of THE most important verses in all the Bible. Verse 6, then Abraham believed God and God credited it to him, to Abraham, as righteousness. This verse is so important, let's dissect it for a moment. It says Abraham believed God. What did Abraham believe? He believed God's

4 promise that he and Sara were going have a son, and in response, God credited it. What? He credited Abraham's willingness to believe what God said to him, that is to Abraham, as righteousness. God at that moment granted Abraham a righteous standing in the eyes of Almighty God and all of this happened, don't miss this now, because simply because what did the verse say, Abraham what? Believed. Believed God. Abraham didn't do anything, Abraham did not merit anything. Abraham did not perform any kind of religious rituals, Abraham did not get baptized. He didn't give up smoking. Abraham didn't get circumcised. He didn't join a church. He didn't send in his weekly love offering, he didn't not eat fish on Friday. He didn't keep the Ten Commandments. Abraham didn't volunteer at a soup kitchen. Abraham didn't shovel his neighbor's driveway. And Abraham did not leave a small carbon footprint. What did Abraham do? Abraham believed God s promise and God credited it to him as righteousness. Do we all see this yes? Okay. Now friends, this verse, Genesis 15:6 explains to us exactly how the plan of salvation for the human race works. You say Lon, I mean, I see the verse but you know what I don't -- I'm not sure I really, really get it! Okay. No problem we'll explain it more and you will get it, I promise. But before we do that, we have a very important question we need to ask you didn't forget the question. Did you? (Laughter) Hey, out there in Prince William and Bethesda, you didn't forget, did you? No. So this is my welcome home, Lon, welcome back, so what? So you ready? You ready? Here we go. Come on now, everybody, one, two, three. So what!?!? >>PASTOR LON: How sweet it is! All right. You say hey, Lon, I don't really 100% get it. Not quite clicking for me. All right. Let's go into the New Testament. Romans, chapter four, in the New Testament, the apostle Paul here discusses this very issue. God's plan of salvation. How people get saved. How we get our since forgiven, how we become righteous in God's sights, how we get admitted into heaven. He used this verse, Genesis 15:6 to explain it. Watch. Verse one. What then, shall we say, Paul says, that Abraham discovered about this matter? What matter? Well, about how God's plan of salvation works. Verse 2, for if Abraham became righteous in God's sight by means of human works, he, Abraham, would have had something to boast about. But Paul says that's not the way it works. That's not how it happened. That's not how Abraham did it. Watch, verse 3, but what does the scripture say, Genesis 15:6, about how Abraham became righteous in God's sight. It says "And Abraham believed God and it was counted Abraham s faith was credited to him as

5 righteousness in God's sight." I said earlier without a doubt this verse, Genesis 15:6 is one of the most massively important verses in all the Bible and its massiveness is centered around the beautiful words "was credited." His faith was credited as righteousness. The New American Standard says was reckoned as righteousness. King James says was counted to him as righteousness. The New King James says was imputed to him as righteousness. All these translations are trying to capture for us the rich meaning of the same Greek word, the Greek word is the Greek word logizomai and it appears 11 times right here in Romans chapter four and let me explain it to you, because, friends, when we get what this word means, we get how the plan of salvation for the human race works. Logizomai is a banking word, book-keeping word, economic word. But it s not a complicated word that only CPAs and accountants can understand. If you have a checkbook, you understand the meaning of logizomai because it simply means "To make a deposit into someone's account." You say that's it? That's it. Every time you get a paycheck and endorse it and fill out a deposit slip and you take that deposit slip to the bank and you deposit that money in your account, you have just logizomai d your bank account. Just made a deposit into your bank account. And hey, if somebody else that you did not even know got a hold of one of your deposit slips and anonymously deposited $10,000 into your checking account, they would have just logizomai d your bank account. You say Lon, I gotta tell you what, I don't know much Greek but I just learned enough to know to pray dear Lord Jesus, say somebody by to logizomai my account, amen! (Laughter) Well the good news of the Bible, my friends, is if you have trusted Christ as your savior, God already has logizomai d your account, and mine. Let me explain. The Bible says that we all have a spiritual bank account in heaven. It also says we all start life with that account reading zero. Empty, unrighteous. Romans 3 verse 10 for there is none righteous, no, not one. Romans 3:23 for all of us have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. What's worse is the Bible tells us there s no way that any of us can make a deposit into that account by our own human actions or effort. Isaiah 64:6 says all our righteous acts, our best human works, are like filthy rags in God's holy sight. Friends, put another way, it's not just that you and I don't have any deposit slips for our heavenly bank account. It's that even if we did, we don't have anything to deposit anyway! And that's bad, because the Bible says anyone who goes out into eternity with their account reading empty will experience God's full wrath

6 against their sin and will be separated from God for everybody in hell. But wait a minute, there's good news coming. Good news coming. And the good news of the Bible is God has made you and me a promise. Remember he made a promise to Abraham about a son. Remember that? Well, God has not made a promise to you and me about a son. He's made a promise to you and me about heaven, eternal life and forgiveness of sin and salvation. Listen to his promise. Romans 10:13, everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Listen to his promise. John 3:36. Whoever believes in the Son, that means the Lord Jesus himself, has eternal life. Listen to his promise. Acts 16:31, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. Now, I'm going to say the most important thing that I'm going to say in this whole message, if you don't get anything else, you make sure you get the next 30 seconds of what I'm going say. Listen now. When we believe God's promise about our salvation, and when we are willing to believe in Jesus Christ just like Abraham believed God's promise about a son, God credits our faith to us as righteousness. God imputes our faith to us as righteousness, he accounts our faith as righteousness in his sight just like he did for Abraham. You say, Lon, you sure that's correct? Oh, I'm positive. Listen to Romans 4:23. These words, Genesis 15:6, it was counted to him as righteous were not written for Abraham only. Say the next four words with me. "But also for us." Watch. To whom God will also credit righteousness if we believe in Jesus whom God raised from the dead. You got it? You got it? (Applause) Now, Think what this means. This means the day I submitted my life to Jesus Christ, God took out his big ledger book in heaven and he started going down the S s, you know, he went down, Smith and Snyder and Sobel and -- Solomon! Solomon, Lon Neal, there he is. Born, August 24th, Pay attention. All right. In Portsmouth, Virginia, Jewish, male. Blue eyes. Talks a lot. That's him. And God looked next to my name in that ledger and guess what it read? Empty. Empty. Zero. But because I had just trusted Jesus the way God told me to, God took out a little slip of paper with the word "Righteous" on it and he put that piece of paper right next to my name, over top of the word "Empty." Let me tell you two great things about that piece of paper. Number one it's opaque, meaning that God has agreed never, ever to see through that piece of paper for all of eternity. Let me

7 tell you the other great thing about that piece of paper. God puts it on with super glue so nobody can remove that piece of paper. Not my sin, not my failures, not my stupidity, not even the devil of hell himself can ever remove that slip of paper from next to my name. Praise the Lord! (Applause) And friends, if you have believed in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, God has done this very same thing next to your name in His ledger book. So let's summarize. What have we learned today? We've learned his plan of salvation for the human race operates on the principle of imputed righteousness. What does that mean? It means that you and I don't become righteous. We are still sinners through and through. It means instead that God has credited our account. God has imputed to us righteousness, not a righteousness that you and I earned in any way with our own effort or our own human activity. No, no. But a righteousness that Jesus purchased for you and me on the cross, and a righteousness that God by his grace deposited into our account as a free gift. And now, since next to our name it reads "Righteous! God declared that all his judgments against our sin are over. They are satisfied. And you and I are paid in full. We can go to heaven. Because we're paid in full. We can be reconciled to God. Because we are paid in full. God can be our heavenly Father and we can be his children. We are paid in full. Do we see this? Does this get even an amen? Or a clap or something. (Applause) That's how God's plan for salvation of the human race works. Right like that, friends, it's all about that slip of paper. Going on next to your name. One final thing before we stop, that is please notice who this offer of imputed righteousness is open to. Romans four verse 5 says God offers to justify, to declare righteous, the ungodly. How awesome is this? God doesn't say to us, hey, go get godly and then I'll put righteousness in your account. No, no. God finds us standing there in our filthy rags and he doesn't say to us, hey, go see a tailor, would you? No, he says, hey, standing there in all those filthy rags I will cover you with the robe of the righteousness of Christ for free if you'll just let me. You know, the really sad thing, is that so many people won't let Him. I have a theory as to why. It's because in order to let Him do that, we have to be willing to admit our account reads empty. I think our world is full of people who aren't prepared to admit that. I mean, they are sure that there must be something in their account. I mean, with all of their baptism and all their church membership and keeping the

8 sacraments and their Jewish ancestry and philanthropy and their haj to mecca and good life and all their good deeds, they are sure there must be something in their account! God says, sorry, there isn't. It isn't till we get to the point that we are willing to admit our account is empty that we are open to God's offering. I tell you the greatest day of my life was the day I admitted that my account read "Empty" in the sight of the holy God. There was no hope, there was nothing I could do to ever fill it. I took God at his word, that he would fill it for me, if I would just believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. I tell you, that happened in March of 1971 and praise the Lord 40 years later, my account still reads righteous. It still reads full. And it's going to read full and it's going to read righteous for all of eternity. That's the deal God made with me, praise God for that, huh! Amen. (Applause) Now, you say, well, Lon, this is great. But I just have one final question. And that is why would God do this for me? Well, I can only give you the answer the Bible gives. That is because he loves you. That is because he cares about you. That is because he's totally committed to you and intensely compassionate about you. You know this summer, I was having my devotions and Psalm 40 one day and I came across a verse I m sure I ve seen it before but in never hit me like it hit me this summer. Psalm 40, verse 17: "As for me, I am poor and needy, but the Lord takes thought for me." Unbelievable. The Lord of the universe takes thought for me. Folks, I can't tell you why he does this. I don't have an answer for that. But I'm sure glad he does. I want to tell you I don't care what circumstance you're in, how tough the times are, I don't care how bad you're struggling, I don't care how difficult your times are right now. My friends, the Lord takes thought for you. Every moment of every day, and he proved it, he proved it by sending Jesus to the cross so he could create this plan of salvation for you and me. Don't you ever doubt God's love. There's no reason to. Let me say if you are here today and never trusted Christ as your personal savior, friend, I want you to hear me clearly. You dare not go out into eternity with your account reading empty. The result of doing that would be so catastrophic that you can't even imagine it. You know, friends, it's so unnecessary. God is standing with open arms saying I'll fill your account if you just let me. Ahhh, but you have to humble yourself and admit it's empty. And you got to humble yourself and admit you can't fill it yourself and you have to humble yourself and throw yourself on the mercy of God and ask him to

9 fill it for you. But if you are willing to do that, God says, hey, I filled it for Abraham. I filled it for Solomon, I filled it for thousands and millions of other people through the centuries and I'll fill it for you. We're going to give you a chance to do that right now. Let's pray. With our heads bowed and eyes closed I'm going to lead us in a very short prayer. We'll just tell God the very things we have talked about. So I'm going to pray out loud, you pray silently. If you want to change systems for how you're planning to fill your bank account here is your moment. You pray silently. Lord Jesus, I come to you today to admit that my bank account reads empty in your sight. To admit that all my good deeds to try to fill it up are like filthy rags in your holy sight. So today I give up that approach. Instead, I do what Abraham did. I believe your promise. That if I'm willing to trust Jesus, and what He did for me on the cross, You will fill my account to overflowing for me. So today, I invite Christ into my life as my personal savior. I surrender my heart and my life to Him, and I give up all attempts to become righteous on my own, instead, I trust You to put that slip of paper next to my name. In Jesus' name I pray and I want to pray for the folks that prayed that prayer. That even as they sit here today, you would confirm to them when you make a promise, you keep it. And that if they were sincere, you just went down to their name and super glued that label right next to them. Lord, for those of us here who know Christ, encourage our hearts that you take thought about people like us. Every day. Thank you for creating a plan of salvation that we could not mess up if we tried. One that works, because you do it, not us. Help us to revel in imputed righteousness every day of our life. We pray these things in Jesus' name and what do God's people say? Amen. * * * This text is being provided in a rough draft format. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings. * * *