The Power of God's Grace Over Sin

Well, howdy. I love that. We didn't have that in California for some reason. Well, for those of you who are here Sunday night, you're probably going, I'm surprised to see you here again. And me too. Yesterday, was walking my dog in the morning, and I got a call from Matt at around 10:30.

He says, can you preach tomorrow? I said, yeah. Okay. And so I rushed home. I told my wife, I'm preaching tomorrow. She said, what? And so I said, do I have a suit? I haven't worn a suit in years. And so we dug out these old suits and moths had hit eaten through you know, so if you think that moths can't eat cloth, they can.

And so there was holes in them. And fortunately, this one was okay. And I said, do I have a tie? Do I have dress slacks? Do I have any I found a black pair of socks this morning tucked way back in my drawer. I'm like, yes, Lord. Yes.

Jehovah Jireh. And so here I am, man. And I I count it a privilege, though. I say all that. What a privilege to preach God's word. Right? What a book. What a book. Let's pray and then we'll dig into this. Father, I thank you. I thank you for this opportunity to proclaim your truth and yet I feel just inadequate.

Lord, who is sufficient for these things? Lord, your your truth is life changing. It's powerful. It's divinely authored and here we are here on earth trying to do our best. But, Lord, we know our best is adequate if you'll get involved. And so, Lord, I pray that you would be with me as I teach your word, and I pray that you would be with the congregation from pulpit to pew, Lord, that, you would be involved because I know that those who are listening, unless you help in the interpretation, Lord, they will not understand.

And so, father, we count on you. We trust you. We look to you that this moment, Lord, would be significant in our lives, that your truth would be proclaimed, understood, and afterwards applied. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, this morning, I have some good news for you. We're going to look at how God has dealt with our sin.

How every sin we have we have ever committed is not merely forgiven, but completely removed forever. That's good news, isn't it? And removed to the extent that there is no guilt left on our record, there is no condemnation hanging over you now, and there is no accusation waiting for you in heaven.

That's the gospel promise, isn't it? So in this study, we're going to see how God illustrates this beautiful truth centuries before on the day of atonement in ancient Israel. We'll see how Christ paid for our sins and what God has done with those sins he paid for. And so we're gonna take a trip back ancient Israel and the Day of Atonement.

And so turn over to Leviticus Leviticus 16. We'll read a passage out of that eventually. So we're gonna look at the Day of Atonement, and let me give you some background on it. It was a day that God designated one day a year to be set aside to deal with the national sins of Israel.

It was to take care of those sins that no offering had been made for in the previous year. Now one writer likened it to a kind of spiritual spring cleaning. This was necessary because sin not dealt with would break the fellowship in between God and his people. And so on this day, the necessary sacrifices were made so that that wouldn't happen.

Now what we're going to do is we're gonna focus on out of the many things that happened on that day, we're gonna focus in on two goats. Right? We're gonna look at two goats that the high priest would pick out of the herd, and he would cast lots over them.

One goat would be slaughtered, and one goat would be sent into the wilderness. So let's look at the first goat that would be sacrificed. The high priest would sacrifice the goat, then he would take the blood from that goat into the most holy place, that place in the temple where God symbolically dwelt.

He would then sprinkle the blood over the mercy seat, which was a slab of pure gold that sat on top of the Ark of the Covenant, and that symbolized the throne from which God ruled Israel. This was done as a plea for the sins of the people of Israel.

Then he would come out and he would deal with that second goat. And that second goat was called the scapegoat. So now if you ever heard, God, they're making a scapegoat out of him. It comes from this. So as all the people watched, the high priest would lay his hands on that second goat on its head and he would confess the sins of the people of Israel.

In this act, he was symbolically transferring the sins of the nation to that goat. Then they would all watch as this goat was led into the wilderness and released to never be seen again. That's the Leviticus sixteen twenty through 22. Let's read that. And when he has made an end of atoning for the holy place and the tent of meeting and the altar, he shall present the live goat.

And Aaron or whoever the high priest was was at that time. And Aaron shall lay both his hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the iniquities of the people of Israel, and all their transgressions, all their sins. And he shall put them on the head of the goat and send it away into the wilderness by the hand of a man who is in readiness or a man specifically chosen for that task.

Verse 22, the goat shall bear all their iniquities on itself to a remote area and he shall let the goat go free in the wilderness. Okay. What is the symbolism here? It's very rich. We've gotta see it. The first goat was sacrificed for the sins of the people.

That's the idea of substitution, isn't it? An innocent victim taking the place of the offending sinner, bearing the penalty their sin deserves. The second goat shows what happens to those sins that were transferred to that goat. Those sins are carried away from the presence of God and the people never to be seen again.

And that's where this really becomes comforting as we'll see. It's all a beautiful picture of the work of Christ on our behalf. The first goat symbolizes Christ's work on the cross, doesn't it? The innocent victim suffering in the sinner's place. There, Jesus made atonement for our sins by fully satisfying God's justice and exhausting the wrath We're so, be to result of Christ's work on the cross.

That sin he paid for is another theological term. That sin he paid for is expiated expiated or removed, right, from the presence of God and from the presence of the saved sinner. In other words, it is a complete and total cleansing. So two important theological words. Jesus exhausted the wrath of God that was against us, that's propitiation, and that work removed the sins that were against us, that's expiation.

So God's wrath is no longer against us, and our sins are removed. But we're still trying to answer the question. The one I was thinking of is, what happens to those sins that are removed that could give us great comfort? I mean, will they come back on us ever?

That's what we wanna discover here. What happens to our sin? And I have two main scriptures I wanna look at. Turn over to Psalm one zero three. Both of these passages we're going to look at, look forward to and rely on the work of Christ on the cross.

David in Psalm one zero three and Psalm one zero three is a wonderful Psalm. What David is doing is he's rousing himself to worship God. I love the way David preaches to himself. But but one of the things he reminds himself of to rouse himself to worship is this, how God deals with sin.

And so he talks about how God deals with sin and that is meant cause his heart to burst into flame and to worship his God. So look at Psalm one zero three verse ten and twelve. First thing we're gonna see is our sins are removed as far as the east is from the West.

I love this. Look at this. He does not deal with us according to our sins nor repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love towards those who fear him. Now here it is. As far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us.

Have you ever asked that question? Now why east from west? Why not north from south? You know why? Because you can go east forever. Right? If I take off from Bryan and I head to the East Coast, go across the Atlantic Ocean, get into Europe and just move east, I can move east forever.

But I can only move north for so long. Be do to that. And we're as far as possible. It's infinite. In other words, a believer will never meet up with their sins again. So good. I love the way Spurgeon said it. He says about this verse, oh, glorious verse, no word even upon the inspired page can excel it.

Sin is removed from us by a miracle of love. What a load to move, and yet it and yet is it removed so far that the distance is incalculable. Fly as far as the wing of imagination can bear you, and if you journey through space eastward, you are further from the west at every beat of your wing.

If sin be removed so far, then we may be sure that the scent, the trace, the very memory of it must be entirely gone. Come, my soul, awaken thyself thoroughly and glorify the Lord for this riches of blessings. Hallelujah. The Lord alone could remove sin at all, and he has done it in a God like fashion, making a final sweep of all of our transgressions.

He has removed our sin in a God like fashion. Amen. Now we see why the verses in Hebrews make so much sense. Hebrews four sixteen, let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace. Hebrews ten nineteen, therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, why can I be so confident when I approach God?

Because I know this. I have no sins waiting for me there. I go to his throne of grace where I am accepted accepted because of the merit of Christ, I'm clothed in his righteousness, where God sees me as perfect as he sees his son. There is nothing there to condemn me.

God has cast all those sins away as far as the East is from the West. That's why I can go, not because of any of my merit. I have no merit. The only thing I deserve is hell. Nothing else. But Christ has earned my blessings. Christ has earned heaven for me.

And I go dressed in his righteousness, in his perfection. Oh, brothers and sisters, that's good news and that is the gospel. So our sins are removed as far as the East is from the West. Second, our sins are blotted out and remembered no more. Isaiah forty three twenty five says this, I I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins.

God comforts us here with two terms that assure us of the complete removal of our sins. He blots out our transgressions, and he will not remember our sins. So let's look out let's look at he blots out our transgressions. Now to blot out in the Hebrew here, it means to completely remove it.

No trace of it left. And so it is completely removed from our record. It's like highlighting a sentence on your computer and hitting the delete key. Well, you can stare at that screen forever, can't you? And you're not gonna see anything. There's no trace of that sentence left.

See, when God looks at your legal records in heaven, what does he see then? He sees nothing. Nothing. It's not just forgiven stamped over a list of sins. There is no list. There is no list. Listen. It's as if you've never sinned at all. That's how God sees you now.

When you were justified, justified means this, a declaration from God and he declares you to be not guilty. Why? Because there's nothing left to condemn you over. Why? Because of the work of Christ. So our sins are blotted out, but our com but for our comfort, we need the next one too.

He will not remember our sins. And notice it doesn't say he will forget our sins. See, God is not like us. I mean, we forget things all the time. Right? Our mind is fallible. Our mind is feeble at times. Where did I put my keys? I'm so sick of that.

Forgot where I put my keys. But you know what? God never forgets anything. So what does it mean that he will forget our sins? What means that he chooses not to remember the believer's sin. He chooses to. In other words, he is promising. Now get this. He is promising to never bring those sins into his mind again to use them against you.

So let's apply this, putting these two thoughts together. This means God doesn't have a list constantly adding to. A list he has on, you know, that he's constantly adding to every time we sin, where he's growing more and more disgusted. Disgusted. That's three sins already and the week has just started.

What's wrong with you? Ridiculous. Try harder. Try to be a little bit more like Christ. Christ. It's not like that. He has no list. He has no list. He blotted out blotted out. He's not writing anymore. He put the pen down when Christ paid for it all for his children.

He highlighted everything that was against me and hit delete. Oh, I'm so grateful for that. He has nothing against me anymore. And that's why I'm still here. Right? No condemnation for those who are in Christ. He's not holding things against me. That's why he's still allowing me in the pulpit.

See, I'm still here in church this today after almost knowing him, walking with him for fifty years, not because I'm good, not because I'm faithful. The longer I've walked with Christ, faithful. I'm not good. I'm fallible. But I'm here because he's faithful and he's good. He's kept me.

You're here in church. Why are you still in church? Well, you know, I'm just spiritual. I'm more spiritual than my neighbors who aren't in church. No. You're here because God is faithful. You're good. You're here because he has held you and he is not gonna let you go.

You are in the grip of love and you are cleansed from all of your sins. See, this is so important when we think of future judgment, isn't it? In Revelation 20, there's going to be a day where everybody stands before the Lord at the great white throne judgment.

It says the books are gonna be opened and every sin is going to be read, and that's going to determine the degree of judgment. Everybody at the Great White Throne judgment is going to end up in hell because they've rejected Christ, but there's different degrees of hell, and it will be determined by those sins written in the book.

Won't be good for anybody, but it'll be worse for some. But you know what? If there was a book there for us, if they looked under your name, what would they see there? Nothing. Blank. And and here's why it's important that God said, I won't remember your sins.

Because they look under your book and it's blank and, you know, we go, that's good. And then all of a sudden, God the father goes, hey, wait a minute. You don't think I remember the way you treated your wife on 01/25/2025? You don't remember that I remember what you did this day, that day?

You think I forgot all that? You think you're gonna skate past this? No. What God says is I've blotted out the book and even though I can remember, I won't. I will never bring those sins up against you again. And notice what it says. It says, God does this for his own sake.

I should have had you turn to the scripture, but I didn't. It says Isaiah forty three twenty five, I I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake. All this kind of forgiveness glorifies God, doesn't it? When we think of who we were, sinners and rebels, when we think of who he is, holy and just, when we think of who we still are, we stand amazed that a God like him could be so kind to people like us.

All we can do is praise him. See, this kind of forgiveness, it causes us to worship. It sets our hearts on fire. Oh, God, you've been so good to me. It fills our eyes with tears. And you know what's going to do that for all of eternity? I think for all of eternity, we're gonna look at Jesus Christ and we're gonna see the scars in his hands, the scars in his side where the spear entered, the scars in his feet.

And we're gonna say, I'm here. I am here because of him. I'm here because of his gracious forgiveness of my sins. I have nothing to boast in. All I can do is worship him for all of eternity, for what he's done for a wretch like me. So this kind of forgiveness glorifies God.

And this kind of forgiveness also honors his son. Think of this. It shows what the father thought of his son's sacrifice, how sufficient it was. He counted Christ's work as being so perfect that he could take our record of sin the moment we believed and blot it out for all of eternity.

So ample that he could say, I need not ever bring that sin into my mind again because my son and his work on the cross because his blood cleansed that sin so thoroughly that I never have to think of it again. Right? I like what one writer said.

He said, this is the father's amen to Jesus' cry, it is finished. Finished. When he says, I will never remember the sins anymore. This is the father's amen to Jesus' cry, it is finished. When Jesus cried, is finished. Well, what was finished? You ever think about that? What was finished?

Your record of sin, finished. Your guilt before God, finished. God's wrath against you, finished. The threat of hell, finished. Everything Christ needed to do for you to be saved, finished. Finished. We stand in his finished work. See, on the day of atonement, we had two goats, one slain, one sent away.

This was a picture of what Jesus would do on the cross. Right? Through his work on the cross, he completely exhausted the exhausted the wrath of God, propitiation. And God honors that work by completely casting those sins away from himself, expiation. Well, that's great news. But what would keep us from enjoying it?

You know, I can preach this, and I know there are some out there that go, sounds good, but you're just not enjoying it like you should. What could keep us from enjoying news like this? Well, let me give you a couple things. First, I think grace at this level frightens some.

It frightens people. If God's grace really is this amazing, if my sins have been paid for, removed forever, and can never condemn me again, then why not just sin freely? If salvation is that secure, what motivation is there to obey God? See, grace scares some. We can find a sense of security in rules and laws.

I remember as a young Christian, I was trying to figure grace out and, you know, what do I do to please God? And I felt like I wasn't pleased. I always felt condemned. You know, I had a grace period about a little while where it was a honeymoon period with Jesus.

I fell head over heels in love with him. But then all of a sudden, I decided to think it can't be this easy. It can't be this easy. And I figured, you know, I've gotta do something to please God, to merit something in my salvation. I remember I couldn't everything I did, I felt condemned.

Never felt like I was living up to what he wanted from me. You know, at Grace, I felt like I could do things, but every time I did them, you know, was that the right thing to do? I remember thinking, I wish I was still under the Old Testament law because at least the law would tell me what to do.

I could line my life up with that. Now I'm kind of I don't know what to do. I don't feel like I can please him with anything. See, we find a strange security in laws and rules. We also find a strange security in fear, thinking God might still judge us if we mess up.

There's a strange comfort in that for some because we feel like, you know, I don't trust myself, what I'm gonna do. So if I can live with this fear hanging over my head, then that'll probably keep me in line. Let me suggest though something that may surprise you.

It isn't fear that keeps the Christian in check. It's grace. It's grace, I believe. It is knowing that we are completely forgiven and fully accepted in Christ that compels us to live for him. But now our obedience flows out of love, not fear. And our obedience becomes an act of worship.

You know, I'll just read it here. Romans twelve one. Listen to this. Now listen. Therefore, I urge you brothers in view of God's mercy to offer your bodies sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God. This is your spiritual act of worship. I love that. What does Paul say? Paul has taught 11 chapters of theology.

And he has shown the incredible grace and mercy and kindness and love of God. And now finally in Romans twelve one, he says, in view of all that, in view of everything God has done for you, in view of how good he's been to you, how loving he's been to you, how kind he's been to you.

Now the reasonable thing for you is to offer your body as a living sacrifice all in for God, all in for Christ. He says, and to obey him as an act of worship. Isn't that good? I don't obey him because I'm afraid he's gonna beat me if I don't.

I mean, that can only go so far. Right? As a young pastor, I used to use fear as my main weapon. Man, I felt like if people left the room and they were beat up, man, that was a powerful sermon. You know, I'd much rather tell you about how good God is, how wonderful his grace is, how breathtaking his mercy is and his kindness.

Because I know if I can tell you that and you get that, it's gonna capture your heart. It's gonna capture your affections. And you're gonna leave wanting to obey him from the right reason because I've fallen in love with a God who loves me like that. And now I wanna worship him with all my life.

See, that's what grace will do. That's why we should never be afraid to teach the breathtaking truths of grace. The converted heart will not take truth like that and use it for greater sin. It will inspire the recipient of grace to greater service and service that comes out of a heart of worship.

So we don't enjoy these truths because we're afraid of them. Because we think, you know what? We might go crazy. If I really believe that, it might be like spring break in this church. No. Thanks. Rules. Give us some law. Give us some fear. No. But there's another reason we don't enjoy these truths.

We don't enjoy them because we don't feel forgiven. Right? Can you relate to that? Don't feel forgiven. I hear this truth, how great the gospel is, how gracious God is, how accepted I am by the merit of Christ. Then here's the problem. I leave the church, I go back out into my life, and I'm me.

When I was in bible school, had a Romans teacher who said, here's your greatest problem. Everywhere you go, there you are. Right? And so I go back out and I'm me. And so I live with this subtle sense of guilt because I'm not perfect. I am fallible. I do struggle with things.

This is so common. Listen to the words of this well respected seminary professor. He says, I write these words at the age of 55. During the past ten or twelve years, I have often and with greater seriousness than ever before, reflected upon the course of my life. Certain patterns of thought and attitude and conduct have come to light, some of them quite disturbing.

I look back upon repeated failures in my efforts to subdue inner conflicts and fears, to combat immaturity and self centeredness, to build genuine and enriching relationships with other people, to conquer besetting sins, and to grow in holiness and communion with God. I now see that every period of my life has been marked by struggle.

But the persistence of the failures, together with a growing understanding of the past, has made the struggles of recent years exceptionally intense and painful. Those aren't words of a nominal Christian. This is a seminary professor who was respected by all his peers and the students around him for his piety and his humility.

He knows the truths we're looking at this morning better than any of us do. But this sense of falling short so consistently made it hard for him to embrace them and enjoy them. Can you relate? You know what? Can you relate? Many of you can. You're thinking, you know what?

How can God not remember my sin when I can't forget them? How can my sin be blotted consistently fail? How? Doesn't make sense. What is the answer to this? So we can enjoy our relationship with God. Here it is. We must choose to live by truth and not by what we feel.

And we must choose to live by faith even when and especially when we fail. Trusting that Jesus not only bore our sin on the cross, past, present, and future, but he also carried that sin away from the presence of God and judgment forever. That's the scapegoat. Well, let's work this out to see how the gospel comes to our rescue in times of failure.

Step one, I got two two practical steps here. I've titled this section, the gospel to the rescue. Step one, humbly admit when you sin. Humbly admit it. Confess it. Take it to God and agree with him about that sin. See, what happens when I sin, I own my sin.

I don't deny it. I don't justify it. I deal with it before God. So in this teaching, if you walk away thinking, oh, he's minimizing sin. No. Wrong. Wrong. I'm not. We don't treat sin as if it's okay because we're saved by grace. Scripture tells us every sin is an act of defiance against God that we are to put to death.

So we fail. We go to God and we honestly confess it. God, I admit I sinned against you when I lied, when I gossiped, when I entertained thoughts I shouldn't, when I looked at what I shouldn't have. Whatever it is, whatever the sin is, take it to him and agree with him.

That's what confession is. It's agreeing with God. And say, God, I agree with you. That was sin and I renounce it. Help me to live in victory over it. Help me to live in a way that brings you glory. So again, don't lighten sin. Take it to God.

Confess it. And many times when you confess our sin, it will be with tears. True confession, being honest with God, sometimes is very painful, isn't it? But you've gotta do it. But here's the thing. You don't stay there. I mean, many people will confess their sin before God and then they'll stay there in a two week pity party.

I wanna show God how serious I am. No. God doesn't want you to stay down. He wants you to go to step two. And step two, by faith, we apply the truths we're learning here. But father, I thank you that Jesus paid for my sins, and I thank you that you have accepted his sacrifice on my behalf.

God, how grateful I am that you don't hold this against me, that you have already blotted it out of your book, and that you have promised that you will never bring it back into your mind to use against me. I thank you because of the merit of Christ alone.

I stand before you clean and accepted. You move to step two. See, here's the thing, guys. We take our eyes off of our failure and fix our gaze on to the beauty of Christ and his finished work. Do you wanna get depressed? Let me give you a full full study here.

I'm teaching you everything today. I'm gonna teach you how to get depressed. Just look at you. Focus your eyes back on you and your performance. You'll be depressed before the day is over. Wanna know how to be lifted up, filled with joy, worshiping? Take your eyes off yourself and fix them on you on Christ.

Get your eyes off the ugliness of you and your failure and fix them on the beauty of Christ and his finished work for us. You know what that'll do? That will turn your sorrow into worship. Let me read you from Melton Vincent. Has anybody seen a gospel primer for Christians by Melton Vincent?

It's just a wonderful little book. And he says this, the deeper I go into the gospel, the more I comprehend and confess aloud the depth of my sinfulness. A gruesome death like the one that Christ endured for me would only be required for one who is exceedingly sinful and unable to appease a holy God.

Consequently, whenever I consider the necessity and manner of his death along with the love and selflessness behind it, I am laid bare and utterly exposed for the sinner I am. Now listen to this. Such an awareness of my sinfulness does not drag me down, but actually serves to lift me up by magnifying my appreciation of God's forgiving grace in my life.

And the more I appreciate the magnitude of God's forgiveness of my sins, the more I love him and delight to show him love through heartfelt expressions of worship. He turned from the ugliness of his sin and saw the beauty of Christ. And what that did was it birthed worship into his heart, set his heart on fire, and he wanted to obey more.

And his worship became deeper. See, the gospel gives us truth to stand back up again. Right? To fight with. It's the power to have victory after failure, to worship after failure. It tells us although we have been tripped up by sin, we don't have to stay down. We don't have to be defeated.

We honor God's holiness by confessing our sin. We don't skip that. We've gotta confess our sin. We have to deal with it honestly with God. And then we honor Christ's work on the cross by standing back up and walking with him. We turn from the ugliness of our failure to the beauty of Christ finished redemptive work.

As we do that, Christ is magnified, our love for him grows, our heart catches fire, and our worship takes off. We get a clue to fighting sin here then, don't we? The key is where we fix our gaze. After failure, we don't stay down fixated on that failure.

The bible solution is to look away from ourselves, the Christ. The more you learn to look at him, the less you'll want sin in the world and the more you'll wanna obey and bring him glory. I love the Sunday school, hymn that was written for children in Britain, and I forget the date it was written.

But it says, turn your eyes upon Jesus, look full in his wonderful face, and the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of his glory and grace. Have you noticed that? The more you look at Jesus, the more you contemplate his beauty, the more you gaze upon him, the more you look away from the ugliness of who you are, the world starts growing strangely dim.

And the things of world, the temptations of the world, the possessions of the world, all of that kind of fade into the background. And you think, you know what? Christ is enough. Christ is all that I need. So what have we seen? Let's close this up. God has offered a solution for our problem with sin through Christ.

Because of his work, our sins have been completely dealt with. Our sins have been forgiven. The guilty record that was against us is blank now, blotted clean, and nothing else will ever be written in there. And God promises he will never bring those sins to mind, to his mind to use against us again.

He so rest. God, the father, so rest in the work of Christ that he says, your sin's so done. No list and I will never think about that sin again. That's what the work of my son did for you. We saw what to do when we failed. Don't stay down staring at the ugliness of that failure.

Confess your sin honestly, then lift your eyes to the beauty of your savior. Honor Christ by believing what his cross accomplished. Let me say that again. Honor Christ by believing what his cross accomplished and resting in that truth. The more you do that, the more the more you do that, the more you glory in Christ and his finished work.

The more you'll love him, the less you'll want to sin. And let and let me say this. I know there's somebody out there. I don't know how many, but I know there's somebody out there where you where you're letting a sin from your past crush you. Right? Some carry the guilt of sin that they have confessed a thousand times.

Is that you? Are you sorry for your sin? Did you take it to God? Yes. A thousand times I've taken it to him. A thousand times with tears in my eyes, I've pled for him to forgive me. I'm thinking about a a good friend of mine in California that I used to talk to all the time and say, brother, you need to honor Christ and what he did for you.

Didn't he say that his blood will cleanse you from all that sin? Didn't he say that there's no condemnation now to you who are in Christ? How many times are you gonna confess that? When are you gonna finally stand up and believe what the bible says? That there is no condemnation now.

That when you confess that sin that God accepts it. That God sees you in Christ. When are you finally gonna do that? It's been twenty years. See, if the father has accepted the sacrifice of his son, you know what the father says to you? He says, I want you to do the same thing.

I want you to do the same thing. Believe that the sacrifice of my son was sufficient for your sin. You know what guys? I pray this helps. I pray you'll put this into practice when you leave these doors and go back and there you are being you. I pray you will remember what Christ has done for you and you will worship him and fall in love with him.

See his glory. Let me say this right before I close. If you've never trusted Christ, I don't know what your spiritual state is, but you can rectify that today. For some of you here in the bible belt, you need to stop trusting in your own goodness and place your faith in Jesus alone.

Your own goodness, I don't care how religious you are. Let's see. You're never gonna out religion the Pharisees. They were as religious as you can get. Paul was as religious as you can get, zealous. And he said, you know what? I have to count my own righteousness as rubbish so that I can have another righteousness.

It's what the theologians call an alien righteousness that is given to me from somebody else, comes from without end. It's Christ's righteousness given to me. That's what you need. You need to trust Christ, and you need to cast away any dependence upon yourself. I don't care how good you are.

You're not good enough. I don't care how religious you are. It's not enough. It's just not enough. On the cross, Jesus bore God's wrath for sinners and carried away the guilt of all who believe in him. This is good news. If you will come to Christ in repentance and faith, your sins will forgiven, your record will be wiped clean, and you will be accepted by God forever and those sins will never be brought up again.

Not because of your merit, but because of his. Let's pray. Father, we are so grateful for the work of Christ on the cross, that it was powerful enough to cleanse us of all sin, that it was sufficient enough where you said that you would accept that work and never bring our sin up again.

Lord, I thank you that we stand secure in the grip of your love. I thank you that every one of us who have believed in your son, we can look forward and we know that we are gonna be with our God in eternity. We are gonna see you face to face.

Oh, that truth breaks my heart, Lord. I know who I am. I know who I am. I know that I don't deserve this kind of grace. I don't deserve this kind of blessing. Blessing. I don't deserve you. I don't deserve glory. But God, by grace, you are giving me what I don't deserve.

You are giving me what Jesus deserved through his perfect life. So, God, we're grateful. We love you so much. And as we go back out into this world and, Lord, we deal with ourselves, help us us do that through the grid of seeing you and what you have done for us.

In Jesus' name, amen.