Great Doctrines of Salvation
Mike Doyle · Mar 14, 2010
Great Doctrines of Salvation, No. 11
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/492615729468

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

We've gotten a little bit into forgiveness last week and we talked, just a quick review, Marchbanks in his book talks about two basic meanings for the word forgiveness. Do you remember what they were? Forgiveness. One is pardon and the other is to send away. So in the Old Testament system, the Jewish sins were covered and pardoned, but they were never sent away.

And we talked a lot about the significance of the scapegoat. On the Passover, there were two goats. There was a goat that was sacrificed, and then the scapegoat, and the sins were transferred to the scapegoat. They took him out in the wilderness, let him go, and he never came back, which was a forerunner or understanding what Christ was going to do when he came. And that was to put sin away.

And that's a really important point because you and I aren't attached to our sins anymore. So, and we talked a little bit about God can't excuse sin no matter how great His love for sinners is. His inflexible and unchanging word is the soul that sins, it shall die.

On what basis then does God forgive a sinner? Just because he's big hearted? No. Why does he forgive you? Under what basis does he forgive you? Because we believe that Jesus sacrificed for us. Okay. Is it because you believe or is it because of Christ's work? Well, if there were no work, there would be nothing to believe in. That's true. So which came first, the chicken or the egg? Chicken.

So we have redemption, we have forgiveness because of his work. From God's perspective, and I didn't ask how we got into it, I asked on what basis does God forgive? You can have all the faith in the world, but if Christ's work wasn't there, you wouldn't be forgiven, right? So he forgives solely on the basis of the work of Christ, and not because you're sorry. And not because you did penance, not because you did anything. He does it solely on the basis of what Christ did. Why is he so tough about that? Because he can't look at sin. Because sin is an abomination to him personally. Because he's a righteous And holy God, He just can't say, oh, never mind.

So, some of the verses I wrote down. The sole condition for forgiveness for you and me is faith in the Lord Jesus who bore our sins. Acts 10-43, of Him all the prophets bear witness that through His name everyone who believes in Him receives forgiveness of sins. That's the sole condition. Nobody can forgive you your sins. He forgives them.

Acts 13.39, 8 and 9, Therefore let it be known to you, brethren, that through him forgiveness of sins is proclaimed unto you. So when the gospel message comes to you, and let's say that Steve brings the gospel message to us, how's it going to be couched? What's he going to say to us? Is He going to tell us that our sins are already forgiven?

The forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you if you believe. And through Him everyone who believes is freed from all things from which you could not be freed through the law of Moses. When Christ died on the cross, let's see how smart you guys are. When he died on the cross, did he pay the penalty for the sins of the whole world?

Every single one? Then my buddy that lives across the street, who's not a believer, are his sins forgiven? Why not? I thought they were paid for. What's that? He told us he doesn't have faith. He doesn't believe. That's right. But didn't Christ die for his sins too? He rejects it. He rejects that. So what happens to his sins? He's forgiven that he's still going to hell.

Is that what you're saying? No. Oh, come on. If he believes that the forgiveness will be applied to him, it's a perfect work. It's a perfect work? And the Bible clearly says that you're going to die in your sins if you don't believe. But how can that be if Christ paid the penalty for the sins of the whole world? How can that possibly be? Doesn't that sound like it's a conflict there? Not to you? Have you got that really clear? No? I'm not forgiven for disbelief. I'm not forgiven because I don't believe. But my sins are paid for.

It's not what Romans 10.9 says. What's it say? If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. You have to believe it.

1 John 4.14 says that Jesus is the Savior of the world. Right? That's the claim. What's that?

So, I guess the problem I'm having, John 1.29 says that Jesus is the one who takes away the sins of the world. It doesn't clarify just those who believe. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son.

But if you reject him, he's not going to run after you. So, okay, let's say that you reject him. Let's say that you reject him. Your sins paid for? Yes, but I reject him so my sins are right in front of me. I don't know. Why don't you tell us? Then it wouldn't be any fun. I don't know. That's good. What's that? I am, slowly, you're all going to die. Terry says, positionally the sins are all handled, but conditionally they're not. Here's the issue, I think.

It's accurate to say that Christ died for the sins of the whole world. Every single sin. And the reason you can say that is because God must be satisfied about the sin issue. And just because my friend across the street doesn't believe, he isn't the one person in the world that is going to dissatisfy God by not believing.

You see that? But here's the problem I have. If he's paid the penalty for the sins of the whole world, yet the Bible clearly says that I'm going to die in my sins if I don't believe. I thought they're not gone. So what's the connection here? And that's the connection I want to talk about. There you go.

See, your faith does more than just put sins away from you. It detaches you from your identification with the sin nature. Now, what does the Word of God say about what God did about your sin nature? Did your sin nature get forgiven, all you guys who believe? Was your sin nature forgiven? Yours? Your sin nature now, was it forgiven? Turn to Romans chapter 8, verse 3. And those of you who can read English, when you get there, somebody read it. Please. Romans chapter 8, verse 3. What does that last phrase say?

Condemned. So, he didn't forgive the sin nature, did he? What did he do to it? He condemned it. What's condemned? What's condemnation mean? It's not forgiveness. It's not forgiveness. It's true. He never said he died to it. Well, I'm talking about the sin nature itself. What happened to it? What did He do to it on the cross? He didn't forgive it. He forgave us our sins and our transgressions, the things that we did and do. But how about the source of those sins? Sin itself. What did He do? He condemned it. Condemnation doesn't mean annihilation. It doesn't mean it's gone away. You still have it. But every sin nature of every human being that ever was or will be has been judicially at the cross condemned. This kid that got convicted of shooting the Bronco this week, right? 21 counts, he's guilty.

They're going to have a sentencing hearing for him next month. He's going to get condemned. That's what's going to happen. They're not going to send him to die, but they're going to send him to life in prison. That's the condemnation. If they had the nerve to send him to death, they would condemn him to death. He's still walking around in the light, but he's condemned. He's going to die.

Your sin nature and my sin nature has been condemned on the cross. So, my buddy across the street who has a sin nature that has been condemned And he's still attached to it. He's still identified with it. When he leaves the planet, what happens to his sin nature? It goes to condemnation. Where does he go? He goes wherever it goes. Condemned.

And his sins are still attached to that sin nature, even though they're paid for. Does that make sense? If it doesn't, ask me. Challenge me. It's like he didn't cash the check. He has a check in his pocket, but he didn't cash it. That's true. He didn't cash it.

Okay, now let's take Monique. Monique has a sin nature, right? Yes. Like she doesn't have one? So, when Monique, by God's grace, goes home to be with the Lord, What happens to her attachment to her sin nature? Separation. She's already been separated from it, right?

The moment that you believe, you were separated from your sin nature. It's still active within you. But when you leave the planet, you don't leave with the sin nature. Do you understand that? Because you have been separated from it by your belief in the work of Christ. This condemned sin nature, whatever, I don't know what happens to them, but because you're not attached to it like the guy across the street is, then you go to be absent from the bodies to be home with the Lord.

See? And sin is not an issue. The third part of our salvation or our redemption is to be freed from the very presence of sin. See? But that guy will never be free from the presence of sin. Never. Okay? And isn't a big part of it that we get the Holy Spirit? Say that again? Isn't a big part of that that we get the Holy Spirit? In place of the sin nature? Yeah. That's a good way to look at it. You understand what she just said?

You were indwelt by and controlled by your sin nature when you believed you were now indwelt by the Spirit of God and separated from your sin nature. So spiritually, you're alive to God. And you have the very God of the universe dwelling in you. So wherever you go, whatever you do, God is in you. You okay with that? Yeah.

So at the White Throne of Judgment, when all the unbelievers are judged, they'll be... I mean, essentially, they're going to come up to God, right? And since they think that they did all the good things, God will put them up and let them say, okay, here's the standard. Here's what you're... and it doesn't match. Those sins are paid for. What do they get judged on? What God is going to say, well, hey man across the street, I paid for your sins, right? So what are they going to be judged on?

Unbelief. Unbelief about what? Christ. That's right. That's the real condemnation. Because if you look at John 15, isn't that what the Lord Jesus said? I'm sending the Spirit of God who's going to convict the world of sin, because they don't believe in Me. So you say, well, come on. Everybody in the world doesn't know about Christ, do they? But they will. And yet the great white throne judgment, they're going to reject Him there. Have you ever imagined that scene? Here's the Lord Jesus Christ in all of His glory. And all of you are there in all of His glory. Right? And here comes my buddy across the street. Time to judge him. He's going to look at Christ in all of His glory. You know what he's going to say? It's a good thing that you didn't pick me then because I wouldn't have accepted you then and I don't accept you now. Well he'll say which one of these doors is the door to hell because I don't want to be in your presence. That's exactly right. That's exactly right.

Have any of you scholars ever read Dante's Inferno? Ever read it? What's interesting about it is that there's a dissension in the parts of hell, and this is really kind of interesting. And that's what it's about, that hell is that God gave you what you wanted, but he gave it to you so full on that it just destroys you all the time, but you can't get free from it. And you don't want to be free from it. Isn't that interesting? It's all like ego. Ego, whatever your passions were, whatever your dance was.

So the reason that forgiveness is such a really interesting issue is because you can sit down and you can make a case from passages in the Bible that all the sins of the whole world were forgiven and that the only reason that anybody is ever condemned is because they don't believe in Christ.

But then at the same time you can look at an awful lot of verses that say Well, you're going to die in your sins. Your sins, you're still attached to them. If you don't believe, you're not forgiven. I think the answer to that question is to not use the word forgiven about the work of Christ on the cross. That the penalty for your sins has been executed and paid for by Christ. Everybody would agree, and all scripture would agree with that. So why is a non-believer condemned? The real reason is, is because he's still attached to that sin nature.

Because the sin nature, according to Romans 8.3, has been condemned. In other words, in the garden, and at Calvary, there was a trial. And the sin nature lost. And condemnation was adjudicated at that point. So anybody who's attached to that sin nature, who leaves this planet, is going to be is going to suffer the consequences that have been adjudicated to the sin nature.

So, here we are as believers, right? And so we have this sort of a weird term called the identification truce, in which we were crucified with Christ, we were buried with Him and raised with Him, right? And we think, well that's kind of cool, but what's the really cool significance about it? One is that From God's perspective and position, you have been separated from that sin nature. My buddy across the street is not separated from it. It controls him totally.

And as we're studying on Wednesday nights, we are now under grace. We do not have to serve sin anymore. And by the way, I don't care what the Constitution says, we're all slaves to something. We're either slaves to sin or slaves to righteousness. You're not anywhere in the middle, and you get to decide what's the choice you get to make. For those of you who were there on Wednesday night, do you get to decide, could you say, I'm not going to sin anymore? Would that work? I'm going to exercise my will not to sin. How far am I going to get? How far? For who? It doesn't work to work. I mean, it's still a workspace. Oh, that's right. It's still a workspace.

So what's my, I do have a will and I can use it and I'm supposed to use it. How am I supposed to use it? What's my decision supposed to be? Please yourself. That's not. No, here's the deal. One or the other. Romans 6 says that whoever you present yourself to, you're a slave of.

Either unto righteousness, unto God, or unto sin. So what's my decision? Who do I present myself to? I can either, by faith, present myself to God, or I can, by exercising my will, present myself to sin. Those are my choices. What I'm doing is I'm allowing one or the other to control me.

That make sense? Now, cool thing I learned last week and we talked about on Wednesday night. There are three power structures in the universe. And you rate them by how strong they are. One, two, and three. Number one is who? God. No problem. Number two is who?

Satan. And? World. And? Sin. Right? Satan, the world, and sin. Who's number three on this totem pole? Me. I'm in trouble. Because sin and self in the world is stronger than me. Right? They're number two. I'm number three. How am I going to keep sin from controlling me? Close. How am I going to do it? I'm going to get plugged into number one. How do I get plugged into number one? by faith. So what do I do?

I say, I exercise my will to present my members, to present me as alive from the dead to God. I have the resurrected life of Christ. Whose battle is it? It's His. It's not yours. Your job is to believe and to present yourself to God as a new creature in Christ. He's the one that overcame sin. You're not going to do it. he already did it.

Is that okay? In terms of experientially? Oh, what a great question. Anybody read The Hungry Heart this morning? It addressed that. According to that guy, it's a while. No. Here's how I think it goes. There's an equation here. The very first thing is to know, right? The very first thing, so here you are, you're cruising along, and you get into Romans 6, and somebody, you're reading it along, and the Spirit of God kind of shows you, you know, don't you realize when you're baptized, you're baptized into Christ's death.

Okay. So that when he was buried, so were you. Okay. And that's, by the way, that's already, you know, that's Aristante, it's already happened. Okay. And then when he was raised to newness of life, so that you might walk in newness of life. And then you get to 6.6, and it says, that your old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be put out of business, that henceforth you should not serve sin. Right? And you come down through that and you begin to understand, you know, in your feeble little mind, wow, it really is saying that I was crucified with Christ.

Well, what does that mean? So, you know, if you're like me and you read stuff like that, the next thing that comes in my mind is, So what's the significance of it? You know, you can say, well, da-da-da-da-da-da, and I'm always going to say back to you, so. Here's the so. So, reckon yourself to be indeed dead unto sin and alive unto God. That's pretty cool. So now you know it. Okay?

And you're kind of excited about that because I think for the first time anybody who's sensible and has had a struggle with sin, sees in those truths the probability and the possibility of not sinning as much, or maybe not at all. And so you continue to read, and on and six, you know, you present your members.

You make a decision to who's going to control you. You go through the struggle of seven, trying to do it yourself. You get down to 723 and Paul says, O wretched man that I am, Who's going to deliver me from the body of this death? Paul, in number three position, is trying to carry out the power of number one and can't do it out of his own power.

He learns that through struggle. That's part of the experience. But he's living by faith this whole time. He understands. And then he gets to Romans 8, which is the beginning of the Christian life. Number one, there's no condemnation for them that are in Christ Jesus. Hallelujah. What the law couldn't do, or the new principle of the spirit of life. new life in Christ, it has set me free from the law of sin and death. I really am free because of him.

Romans 8.3 we just read, sin nature's condemned. Law couldn't do anything about it, so I have that in place. All along what am I doing? As I learn every bit of information, as they start to build up line upon line, I believe. What's the experience that results? I begin to understand and experience freedom from sin. It isn't a hoorah, hoorah. It's wow.

I used to go down that road and every time I couldn't stop myself. And boy, I walked right by that alley this time and didn't even notice it because my focus was on Christ and who I am and not on whatever that was. The last 300 times that person came in my life, I was mad at him. They showed up today and I wasn't angry. How come? I got all this information, my faith is in place when I'm walking in the Spirit and my focus is on Christ and not on me. Isn't that cool?

So it's a process and it's a growing process, a grace process that takes us most of our life to learn. You know, we have a sinful nature and we do sin. let's say that you are afflicted with something terrible. And so then you ask, you have faith, but somehow it keeps going up. So then you ask God to help you in that. So does he actually do that? Or is it only because of your faith that you eventually get away from that? That's a great question. How many in this room have gone to God and say, help me with this sin? Did he?

There you go. That's the answer. You know, it's like me coming up and saying to Bruce, give me a hundred bucks. He said, well, I already gave it to you. As a matter of fact, I gave you a thousand. What are you asking me? Imagine God and all the work He did, and He's teaching us through His Word who we are, what we have, and we go up to Him and say, Lord, would you die for me? And He says, what?

I already died. Well, I need to die. Well, you already did. I'd love to walk in resurrected life. He said, well, you got it. It's all done. Well, God never asks you to believe in anything that is going to be done. He always asks you to believe in what He has already done. So when you're asking Him to do something, you're demonstrating by your question that you don't believe them. Do you see what I mean? Yeah, I've done that.

So how important is it to learn the facts? It's really important. And not only that, when you learn them... It's through my work, belief, my head. But belief isn't a work. No, okay. Here's the thing. You always get a choice. Back to your choice. If I can say, well, you know, I want to yield myself to the Lord as one alive from the dead. Or, here's what I really want to do. I want to do it myself with your help.

You see? Yielding is one of those things where it's a total abandonment to God based on his truth. Do you see that? And that's hard. So then if you say, well, thank you God, you've taken it away from me. That would be the wrong thing to say. No, that would be the right thing to say. He's already taken it away. I trust you. What? Okay, so then what is the answer? That's the word reckon. We talked about the word reckon, didn't we? What's the word reckon mean? What does it mean?

How many Dr. Pepper cans are right here? How come? Because there is one. He reckoned there's one. Why? Because there is one. Reckon yourself dead unto sin. Why? Because you are. Reckon yourself alive unto God. Why? Because I am. Your reckoning doesn't make it so. You reckon in view of the facts. 2 plus 2 is, I reckon it's 4. Why? Because it is 4. Do you see that? So when you go to God and say, Oh God, help me with my sin. He says, 2 plus 2 is not 5.

I've already dealt with the sin issue. Would you just believe me about that? Trust me. I took care of it. Yeah, but. No buts. I took care of it. That's why position and condition is really important. You understand your position. And that's where your faith goes. It goes to what God says is already true of you.

Colossians 3.1, one of my favorite verses. It starts out like this. Since you're risen with Christ. Are you? The verse says you are. Okay, now I'm risen.

And the Lord says, here's what I want you to do as a risen one. Seek those things which are above. You say, I can't do that. He says, why not? I just told you, you're risen. Seek those things which are above where Christ sits at the right hand of God. Set your heart, your mind and emotions on things above and not on things of the earth.

Oh wait a minute, you mean I have to tear up my prescription to the Denver Post? Yeah, maybe. Can't watch CNN anymore or Fox News? Maybe. Set your mind on things above and not on things of the earth. And then he tells you why. Anybody remember why? What the next verse was? Because you died. And your life right now is hid with Christ and God.

What a statement! Is it true? Is it really true? Do you believe that it's true? Well, you nod your head because you don't want to say, nah, nah, nah. But really, Really, you come, you sit before God and you say, you know, I read it, I believe you, but come on, my experience isn't. So what do you do? Are you relying on your experience or are you trusting God? That's what it comes down to. Where's your faith? On your experience or on what God says? And Terry says, well, when do you get to enter into it practically? Well, the first thing you have to do is believe Him. And that's the thing you get no credit for. So you ratchet it back. Are you risen with Christ? Are you? How do you know?

He said so. That's the only reason you know, because he said so. Do you believe him? Maybe? Yes. Okay, I believe you. If you believe him, hang on, because you're going for a ride. He's going to demonstrate to you and prove to you that that statement is true. and you will walk resurrectedly. You will be focused on things above. See that? It's kind of cool the way he does it. But he always comes to us and says, I'm only asking you to believe in what I did. When I say I forgave you, and I put your sins away from you, and I crucified your old man, I'm serious about that. I did that. And it's true of you. And you say, well, yeah, but... No, there aren't any buts. There's no butt monkeys in Christianity. None. No. None. Zero. When God says it, it's so. And so we're to walk by faith.

When he says sin won't have dominion over you because you're not under the law anymore, you're under grace. Do you believe that? In spite of the fact that you sinned 15 minutes ago? Or 5 seconds ago? I'm under grace. Oh, I better find out about grace, huh?

Does that make sense? I'm hoping it does. So we live by faith in the facts that God has given us, in his word. And if you can go through the word of God, especially the New Testament, and you can demonstrate to your satisfaction proof that God isn't telling you the truth, then you might as well throw your Bible away. You agree? That's the point.

The news is so good, it's hard to believe it. It really is. I mean, the news is overpoweringly wonderful, and we kind of look at it like, well, we don't deserve it. Yeah, no kidding. Okay, so therefore we always have these questions, even though sometimes they're ridiculous. The questions are really important. Yeah, because it is overwhelming when you think of it.

The grace is. Yeah, where sin did abound, what did grace do? It was just enough to cover it, right? Now, what's Romans 5.21 say? Grace super abounds. See? So what's the difference between the way in which God forgives and the basis on which you forgive? So I stepped on your toes. And you say, oh, I forgive you. What did you do? You just passed over the offense, didn't you? You just, and if there was a penalty due, you said, ah, never mind. Isn't that what you do? We don't want you to feel that. That's right.

But God doesn't forgive me based on that premise at all. He only forgives me. He doesn't excuse my sin. He takes care of it in love by the cross of His Son so that He can forgive me judicially. You see that? His forgiveness is all based on what He already did. to satisfy himself about your sin. So how do you distinguish between what's known as judicial forgiveness and parental forgiveness? Now let me set this up. Judicial forgiveness is that because of the work of the cross and your faith in Christ, you have been judicially forgiven.

Your sins have been taken away. So before God, you're not attached to your sins at all. You're going to sin. So you do sin. So how does God deal with the fact that you sin after you're a believer? Does He say then, oh never mind? No. No is not good enough. You've got to explain. Well because He knows you believe. What's that? He knows you have faith in Him. You believe in Him.

Okay. Though we still have that sinful nature. Okay, Carol, you can put your hand down now. To ask for forgiveness whenever... Alright, stop right there, stop right there. Do you need to ask for forgiveness? Because we are recognizing our sin and that it is offensive, at least to us. Even though we know God took care of it long ago.

Okay, turn to 1 John 1 verse 9. It's too bad Bud Tracy isn't here today. This is his favorite verse. 1 John 1 verse 9. Chapter 1 verse 9. My Bible publisher underlined it themselves. Okay, read it. Anybody, read it. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Okay, where does it say in that verse that I'm to ask for forgiveness? It doesn't, does it? How come? Because you're already forgiven. You're asking? Yeah, see, here's the thing.

Confession is not asking for forgiveness. Confession is not making a list of the bad crap you did last week or yesterday and asking God to forgive you. Confession means to say the same thing. What has God already told you about you and your sins and Him? It's done. Your sins are forgiven. So your sinning, from a parental standpoint, what did your sinning do? You're a son of God, you're in the family, you sinned, what happened? What was the consequence? The loss of fellowship, right? So he says, you want to be restored to fellowship?

Yeah, I'd really like to do that. How do you do it? Well, you confess your sins, and I'm faithful and just to forgive your sins and cleanse you from all unrighteousness. So you say, okay, what's confession mean? It means to say the same thing. Same thing as you're saying, Father? Yeah.

What does he say about me and my sins? You're done. I forgave you your sins. I separated you from your sin nature. Do you agree with me? I confess that I am. I have been. I also confess that I've been functioning and acting totally inconsistent with who you say I am. I have not been living by faith. I confess that you're right and I'm wrong. I'm restored to fellowship. I'm back in the good graces of the family position that I've always had.

So I want you to notice carefully in 1 John 1.9, there's no place for you to say to God, will you forgive me? Because it demonstrates your lack of faith. You should thank Him for being forgiven. Because you are.

Does that make sense? Does everybody understand what I meant by confession? Do you understand when I say you should say the same thing God says, and you have to go back and say, well, what does He say about me? How does He view me? What's my standing before Him when it comes to forgiveness? I already am forgiven. Well, what about my sin? What did it do? It screwed everything up. No, it didn't. It didn't screw up my standing.

It just screwed up my relationship. my fellowship. And once I agree with God about the sin issue, I'm restored to fellowship. And if you're like me, if the Spirit of God convicts me of, I don't know, ten things, when I go and confess, by the time I get halfway through the first one, I'm restored and I'm done. Do you see how important it is that the Father have you in fellowship with His Son?

He does not wait for you to get through your list. You get restored to fellowship the minute it hits your mind. He doesn't want you out of fellowship. He wants us in fellowship all the time. So he doesn't say, well, come on, get the other five, you know. No, he doesn't do it. Once you recognize and the confession thing hits your mind, you're restored. Oh good. I don't think that's true.

Wouldn't it be cool if you could get this confession thing for everybody to understand it, that what it really means, that it is not, it is totally against what it really means to make a list, go to, you know, sit down, confess our faults to one another. Aren't we supposed to do that? What is that about? I'm going to go to Bruce with my list, and he's going to come to me with his list? I want to see your list.

Confessing our faults is when we're on the phone and we're talking about the Lord and we're talking about our Christian life and we're talking about, you know, I struggle with this or I struggle with that and we fellowship with one another and we encourage one another. That's what that means. And so imagine the mindset If you could get every Christian in the world to live from the frame of reference that their sins are already forgiven, the guilt would go out of Christianity. It would be really cool because we could serve the living God then. Okay? Alright. I've kind of covered all the stuff that's in there.

So do you understand, as a member of the family of God, When you go to confess your sins, it isn't like a non-believer coming to salvation. You're already family. Do you see that? If I offended you and one of your children offended you, your dealing with them would be different. If my dog or I bit you in the leg or tore down your fence and I came over and asked you for forgiveness, you could say yes or no, but do you ever not forgive your kids? Well, some of you might. No, you never do.

Why? Because you love them. Well, God understood all that, and so what He did was He took care of the issue before they ever came. Do you see that? He took care of the problem from His side. That's the great word that we'll study in a couple of weeks called propitiation. It's a wonderful word. It means to be satisfied.

Has God been satisfied about the sins of the world? Yes, He has. Has He been satisfied about your sins? Your personal sins? Yes, He has. Is He satisfied about you personally? Yes, He is. Why? Because you're such a good guy and a swell dancer? Why is he so satisfied with you? He sees us in Christ. He sees us only in Christ. He never views you as being outside of Christ, even though you're sinning.

Do you understand that sinning for a Christian is spiritual insanity? You know, if we find somebody in our society who isn't conforming to the norm, and they won't conform to the norm, we think they're nuts and we put them away. Or we counsel them, give them drugs, whatever we do. But we tag them as being abnormal. In the body of Christ, it is abnormal to sin. You buy that? Is it abnormal for believers to sin? Would it be abnormal for Christ to sin? Then why is it not abnormal for you to sin if you're in Christ? You're not? Back to position. Your position in Christ, is it a sinless position?

Positionally it is. Sure it is. Conditionally, it may not be. It probably isn't. But your position in Christ is a sinless position. He does not see you attached to that sin nature anymore. Isn't that something? So there's where the faith lies. Do you believe God about that or don't you? Because the choice really is, well, I'm sinning, I'm a bad guy. That must be what reality is from God's perspective. But the Word of God says, no wait a minute, I'm in Christ, I'm positioned, I'm resurrected, I'm separated from sin.

Those two, you know, I can't compromise those two. It's either one or the other. What am I going to believe? Is that okay? I mean, it's not, trust me, I don't want you walking around like, I won't mention the denomination who says that now that they're Christians they don't sin anymore, because they do. But your position is sinless because you're in Christ. Could God accept you as a son if you had sin? He can't have sin in his presence.

We can go to his lap, so that's obviously his presence. Sure. Yeah, that's right. Say that again, I didn't hear that. We can go to his lap, so obviously we're in his presence. To his left lap. Go sit in his lap. Now, according to Courtney, sitting on a well. So he didn't give me his. I don't think he did. He's going to his topic next week is assurance, which would be a really cool topic. He didn't get to me. So we'll. You'll have to fend with Him. So let's close. Dear Father, how we thank You for our position in Your Son. We thank You for forgiveness and for the fact that we are Your sons and that we have a standing before You because of the Lord Jesus. And we pray in His precious name. Amen.