That We Might Become Sons of God

We looked at “Christ, the ‘well pleasing’ Substitute” today in our sermon. There is only one in whom it has ever been said by the Father: "You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased (Luke 3:22).

Did you get that? Only one-and its not you or me. Jesus is the well pleasing Son and if we want to be well pleasing to the Father, we must be in Christ. That can only happen by repentant faith.

Indeed, by faith, we receive the same benediction Jesus received at his baptism. That is, we become "welling-pleasing" sons and daughters of God by Christ's work of redemption.

Another way to think about it: Christ the Son of God became a son of Adam that we sons of Adam might become sons of God.

This can only be achieved by Jesus' obedience, even to the point of death, the death of the Cross.

How can this reality not lead us to worship and adoration?

Descend to Reascend

"In the Christian story God descends to reascend. He comes down; down from the heights of absolute being into time and space, down into humanity; down further still...down to the very roots and seabed of the Nature He has created. But He goes down to come up again and bring the whole ruined world up with Him. One has the picture of a strong man stooping lower and lower to get himself underneath some great complicated burden. He must stoop in order to lift, he must almost disappear under the whole mass incredibly straightens his back and marches off with the whole mass swaying on his shoulders. Or one may think of a diver, first reducing himself to nakedness, then glancing in mid-air, then gone with a splash, vanished, rushing down through green and warm water into black and cold water, down through increasing pressure into the death-like region of ooze and slime and old decay; then up again, back to colour and light, his lungs almost bursting, till suddenly he breaks surface again, holding in his hand the dripping, precious thing that he went down to recover. He and it are both coloured now that they have come up into the light: down below, where it lay colourless in the dark, he lost his colour too." -C.S. Lewis, Miracles

The Cross and Forgiveness

Charles Colson tells of viewing a tv interview with Albert Speer, Adolf Hitler's confidant who after WWII was paralyzed with a deep sense of guilt for all the deaths he had been apart of. Speer was one of the few war criminals tried at Nuremberg to admit his guilt, for which he served 20 yrs in Spandau prison. In one of his books, he lamented that he would forever be seeking to atone for his sins. Commenting on this, Speer's interviewer asked him if it would ever be possible for him to be forgiven. Speer shook his head and said, I don't think it will be possible.
Colson remarks, I wanted to write Speer to tell him about Jesus and his death on the cross, about God's forgiveness. But there wasn't time. [That] interview was his last public statement; he died shortly after.

What Speer needed, and the blood of Christ provided is cleansing from his sin. The Apostle John states how the shed blood of Jesus answers this great need: If we walk in the light (faith in Jesus Christ) we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:7-9).

The Goal of Atonement

"The atonement was about Christ's conquest over sin, death, and the devil so that the whole of life might be cleansed and restored, that Christ's reign might be established, uncontested, and unobstructed" (David Wells, "The Courage to be Protestant," 197).

We aren't there yet, but that is where we are headed. Our confidence is bound up in the all sufficient work of Christ in bearing our sin, in our place, and in that act bearing the penalty of our sin, and overcoming the powers of evil behind it (Col 2:13-15).

The Resurrection of Christ and our Justification

The resurrection of Christ represents the justification and vindication of believers. Since Christ bore the consequences of sin on behalf of his people on the cross, his resurrection was God's declaration of both his and his people's righteousness. The great and complex event of Christ's death and resurrection constitutes the basis for the positive verdict of justification for all who are in union with him through faith. In the death of Christ, the trespasses of his people were punished; in the resurrection of Christ, the justification of his people was declared. The justification of believers occurs by virtue of their participation in the reality of Christ's death and resurrection on their behalf (C Venema, The Gospel of Free Acceptance in Christ: An Assessment of the Reformation and New Perspectives on Paul, 44).

O Sweet Exchange!

The Letter to Diognetus was written in the second century around 125 A.D. We don't know who wrote it but it it the oldest existing statement on the work of substitution that Christ underwent for us. Read, reflect, and meditate on it. It is a beautiful statement.
Letter to Diognetus
O, the surpassing kindness and love of God! He did not hate us, or reject us, or bear a grudge against us. Instead, he was patient and forbearing; in his mercy he took upon himself our sins. He himself gave up his own Son as a ransom for us—the holy one for the lawless, the guiltless for the guilty, “the just for the unjust” (1 Pet 3:18), the incorruptible for the corruptible, the immortal for the mortal. For what else but his righteousness could have covered our sins? In whom was it possible for us, the lawless and ungodly, to be justified, except in the Son of God alone? O the sweet exchange! O the incomprehensible work of God! O the unexpected blessings, that the sinfulness of many should be hidden in one righteous man, while the righteousness of one should justify many sinners!

The Glory of the Cross

"The notion which the phrase 'penal substitution' expresses is that Jesus Christ our Lord, moved by a love that was determined to do everything necessary to save us, endured and exhausted the destructive divine judgment for which we were otherwise inescapably destined, and so won us forgiveness, adoption and glory. To affirm penal substitution is to say that believers are in debt to Christ specifically for this, and that this is the mainspring of all their joy, peace and praise both now and for eternity" (J.I Packer, "What Did the Cross Achieve? The Logic of Penal Substitution”).