9.11.16 ~ What Christ Did for You!
Preacher: Pastor Mike Hale | Series: Basic Christianity
Last week we studied the Person of Jesus Christ: Jesus is His human name [meaning Savior] and Christ is His title [meaning the Anointed/Chosen One of God]. Jesus Christ is God’s Son, God’s Servant, God’s Savior, and God’s Sovereign Ruler and King over all Creation.
Today we are going to study just what Christ did for us. In 1Corinthians 15:3-5 Paul tells us, “For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that
Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that He appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve.”
That says it concisely: we are all sinners deserving death, so Christ died for our sins, just like the Scriptures say He would; then He was buried and on the third day He came out of the grave alive, just like the Scriptures said He would.
Why we need the Work of Christ (see Romans 3:10-12). 1.
2.
there is no one righteous, not even one
there is no one who understands
3. there is no one who seeks God
4. All have turned away
5. they have together become worthless
6. there is no one who does good, not even one
A little farther in 3:23-24 we read, “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of
God, and all are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by
Christ Jesus.”
God’s marvelous grace has come through Jesus Christ, apart from which we
would receive death, for James 1:15 tells us the result of sin is death.
There are many Christians in this room, everyone who has sincerely confessed
their sins to God and heartfully believed in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, is
a Christian, for a Christian is one who has received forgiveness for sin and eternal
life through Christ (cf. Romans 10:9-10).
Before you accepted the work of Christ in salvation, you were dead to God
because of your sins, in fact (Ephesians 2:1-3), “we were by [our sinful] nature
deserving of [God’s] wrath [His punishment],” which is (Romans 6:23a) “death,”
and (2Thessalonians 1:9) adds, sinners deserve to be “punished with everlasting
destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord.”
But thanks to God (Romans 6:23b), “the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus
our Lord,” (Romans 5:8), “While we were still sinners Christ died for us,” (Romans
5:10), “We were reconciled to God through the death of His Son.”
1. 2. 3. 4.
Apart from the Work of Christ on the cross, there is no hope for anyone!
And God’s Son did this at great cost to Himself (see Philippians 2:7-8).
He made Himself nothing, setting aside His majesty
He took the form of a slave
He put on flesh
He humbled Himself and willingly died on the cross
This is hard to fathom, God put on human flesh, only to become (Isaiah 53:3),
“despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain.”
Christ’s major Work was to pay the divine price required by God for our sins
(1Peter 1:19), “the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect.”
Hebrews 9:22 says, “the law requires that nearly everything be cleansed with
blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.” Hebrews 9:12
says Christ has, “once for all by His own blood,” obtained eternal redemption for
those who believe in Him (1Peter 3:18), “For Christ died for sins once for all, the
righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God.”
The Work of Christ forced the Son to be separated from the Father, for the one
and only time in all of eternity. That is why Jesus, while on the cross, cried out
(Matthew 27:46), “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?” You see, God is
holy and righteous and perfect, and sin can not coexist in the same space as God.
While Jesus was on the cross He became sin for us (Isaiah 53:6), “the LORD
has laid on Him the iniquity of us all,” (Isaiah 53:10), “it was the LORD’s will to
crush Him and cause Him to suffer, …making His life an offering for sin.”
Sin must be punished, and the punishment for sin is death; if Christ didn’t take
your punishment for sin, you will personally be found guilty and sentenced to an
eternity in hell, because (Ephesians 1:7), “In Him [Jesus Christ] we have
redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.”
John 16:8 says the Holy Spirit will convict the world of its guilt concerning sin,
and John 16:9 makes it clear that sin is simply not believing in God’s Son.
John 3:36, “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the
Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on them.”
The Work of Christ is to make us acceptable to God by the sacrifice of Himself,
to redeem us from this corrupt world, in order that we might serve and worship
God honorably, bringing praise and glory to Him.
Galatians 1:3-4, “Jesus Christ, …gave Himself for our sins to rescue us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father.”
2Peter 1:2-4, “Grace and peace be yours in abundance through the knowledge of
God and of Jesus our Lord. His divine power has given us everything we need for
life and godliness through our knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and
goodness. Through these He has given us His very great and precious promises, so
that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the
corruption in the world caused by evil desires.”
Christ’s substitutionary payment for your sins must make a difference in your
life. Paul writes (Romans 6:5-14), “If we have been united with him like this in his
death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. For we know
that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away
with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin – because anyone who has died has
been freed from sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live
with him. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die
again; death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin
once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. In the same way, count yourselves
dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your
mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer the parts of your body to
sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who
have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as
instruments of righteousness. For sin shall not be your master, because you are not
under law, but under grace.”
The Work of Jesus Christ is not only the divine solution to man’s problems, it is the only solution to man’s problems. Remember back in Romans 3:10-12:
1. 2.
there is no one righteous, not even one
there is no one who understands
3. there is no one who seeks God
4. All have turned away
5. they have together become worthless
6. there is no one who does good, not even one
In Christ alone we are made righteous, given understanding, compelled to seek
and turn toward God, becoming precious to God (Ephesians 2:10), “created in
Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”
Why did God send His Son to save us, besides the obvious fact that we are
sinners, unacceptable to God, deserving of God’s condemnation and eternal
punishment? Because He loves us, and there was no other way for us to be saved
(Acts 4:12), “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under
heaven given to men by which we must be saved [only Jesus Christ the Lord].”
Why did the Son of God willfully set aside His own majesty, put on flesh, live
among us, allow Himself to be rejected, arrested, mocked, unjustifiably sentenced,
severely beaten, and then hung on a cross until He died? Because He loves us, and
there was no other sacrifice acceptable to God, no other payment that could be
made to God for our sin debt.
Hebrews 9:26-28, “He [Christ] has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to
do away with sin by the sacrifice of Himself. Just as man is destined to die once,
and after that to face judgment, so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins
of many people; and He will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring
salvation to those who are waiting for Him.”
The night Jesus shared communion with His disciples, changing forever the
Passover meal to the Lord’s Supper, He explained to them that it was His own body
that would be given, and His own blood that would be shed, to save them and to
provide for them, now and forever.
John 14:1-6, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in Me. In
my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am
going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I
will come back and take you to be with Me that you also may be where I am. You
know the way to the place where I am going. Thomas said to him, ‘Lord, we don’t
know where you are going, so how can we know the way?’ Jesus answered, ‘I am
the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.’”
Listen, if you have never asked God to forgive your sins, confessing Jesus Christ
as Lord, and believing in Him as Savior, do it now!
2Corinthians 5:21, “God made Him [Jesus Christ] who had no sin to be sin for us
[taking our punishment, paying our penalty], so that in Him we might become the
righteousness of God.”
1John 5:11-13, “And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this
life is in His Son. He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of
God does not have life. I write these things to you who believe in the name of the
Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.”
Why did Christ come to earth? What did Christ do for you?
Jesus Christ, God’s Son, who is both Lord and Savior, has provided forgiveness
for your sins and eternal life. He has made you acceptable to God [righteous], and
He has provided a way for you, and for all who believe in Him, to have a personal,
intimate and eternal relationship with God, as dearly loved children of God (John
1:13), “children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s
will, but born of God.”
Pastor Mike
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