The Gospel & the Great Transaction

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The Gospel & the Great Transaction

December 12, 2021

Last week Bryce and I walked through how Jesus has fulfilled the law in all righteousness in his obedient life on earth. Jesus was without sin, yet we are with sin as laid out in our episode "Our fall and the Gospel". So, how can we ever hope to achieve a foreign righteousness that is not our own? The bible lays out a clear mechanism by which we can receive Christ's righteousness and lose our guilt of sin that we have procured for ourselves. That idea has been named in theology as double imputation. Tune in as Bryce and I walk though this biblical mechanism that is foundational to the gospel! Thanks for listening.

Key texts:

* Hebrews 10:12-14

* 2 Corinthians 5:21

* Genesis 15:6

My guest joining me this week on the Sunday series is my brother Bryce. Bryce is getting his undergraduate degree in philosophy and hopes to get his MDiv. from a seminary after he completes his undergrad. He hopes to be a pastor shepherding Gods people one day.

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Transcript

We're longing for that day, but the grounds and the basis by which we are able to see that day is because we have been perfected for all time. So this is the result of this doctrine of our sin being imputed to Christ, his righteousness being imputed to us. Don't think I will even ask you to make Jesus Lord of your life.

That's the most preposterous thing I could ever tell you to do. Jesus Christ is Lord of your life. Whether you serve him or not, whether you bless him, curse him, hate him, or love him, he is the Lord of your life because God has given him a name that is above every name so that the name of Jesus Christ every knee shall bow and tongue confess that he is Lord.

Some of you will bow out of the grace that has been given to you and others will bow because your kneecaps will be broken by the one who rules the nations with a rod of iron. And I will not apologize for this God of the Bible. Matthew 28, 18 through 20.

Welcome to the Four King Podcast. Where, as we have just read in that Matthew verse, switching it up this week and reading another instance of Jesus laying out his authority over all. That's heaven and earth.

And Jesus is saying go therefore because of something that's going to happen in the future. Oh, he's going to have a thousand year reign. I don't know.

It will eventually happen. Or just in heaven. Earth is just going to go to crap.

It's going to dissolve like snow. And that's the end, I guess. And then Jesus will, he'll finally have his heyday then.

Right? So obviously we're poking fun at all-mill and pre-mill peeps. But the Bible's just post-mill when you read it. So Jesus, what's the nature of this king? How much authority is this king got? Like if he's literally the best king ever, like he's got to have authority right now.

If he's been made king, right? Like what's a king without a king? You know? And it's not a future kingdom. He's got a kingdom now. That's the whole point when Jesus came and said hey, here's the kingdom we got folks.

Like it's here. Right? And I guess it stopped. Yeah.

You know, right after. The Jews rejected him so they stumped him up. Yeah.

They were the stumbling block, not him. Exactly. So yeah, that's what this king's like.

King Jesus is king over all things right now. And he told them, as he told him two thousand years ago, told the apostles as he was about to ascend to heaven to sit at the right hand until all enemies have been made a footstool under his feet and the last enemy to be defeated is death. So that's what he told them two thousand years ago and that still stands.

Jesus never lost that authority. Still is happening right now. So that's who this king is that this podcast is about.

Okay. Just to give you guys a little bit of flavor. A little mini episode inside the episode.

But let's move on to what we're really trying to get at this episode. So last week, last week we talked about what did we talk about? So long. It's been a whole week.

I forgot. We walked through how Jesus is the great fulfiller of the wall. We walked through a couple texts in Matthew and then we went to Hebrew seven and we talked about Jesus being the high priest that kept the wall perfectly.

He was perfectly blameless. Therefore he doesn't have to offer sacrifices for his sins. He is able to offer once for all the sacrifices for all the sins of those that would believe on him in faith.

So and receive today because Jesus has offered that sacrifice. How does that sacrifice become when you're sharing the gospel with somebody and you're telling them. So we walked through the bad news and then we were starting to get to the really, really good news and some of the ways we ought to present the good news to people and some things that Bryce and I think are foundational to the gospel that's laid out in the Bible.

That's why we always have texts. The Bible talks about these these ideas. So when you're telling somebody the good news on Jesus fulfilled the wall.

Like, okay, good. I'm glad he did that. And then they're on the edge of their seat.

If they really are softened heart, right? And they're ready to receive the gospel. Then you ought to tell them next how in the world they can receive peace with God and be reconciled to God and be reconciled to Christ. So it's good news that Jesus fulfilled the law.

That's good. Oh, wow. One person was able to do it.

That's great. But I'm still dead in my sin, right? And if Jesus again is if he isn't resurrected, if he isn't God, if he isn't the fulfiller of the law, then we don't have a sacrifice for our sins. There remains there's no sacrifice there for that for somebody like that.

And that's why, you know, Muhammad, Buddha, all these other religious figures, Joseph Smith, all these people did not know the way Jesus is the way because he ever lives to provide mediation to his people forever because of what he did in his life. So we receive Jesus's works because he fulfilled the law, like we talked about last episode, through an idea that has been presented in theology called imputation. So this is a legal term where a party is accredited some kind of standing in the court, like in some proceeding based on somebody else's doing of something or whatever.

It is, it's similar to a gift, but it's recognized. It's not a gift is just, okay, I received a gift. Thank you.

Now it's between me and the party. But like imputation is... It's an accreditation. It's an accreditation and it's before many people, right? Right.

So, okay. So we have this view of God as judge often. And when we come before him, because God has given us his law, when we transgress his law, it's best to think of things in a legal sense.

And that's why we have a lot of legal terms in our theological language because we have transgressed a law and we're criminals. And we have to think of things like ransom. You know, these are, you know, reconciliation is a term that's more relational, not really like a courtroom.

Reconciliation is more relational, but they're like ransom, imputation. Justification. Justification is a good one.

Like these are legal terms, but they help us understand how God has provided salvation for us. Right. So when we're sharing the gospel, it's all about salvation, right? That's what the good news is that we have been saved from our sin.

Right. That's what the good news is by Christ, who's given us a kingdom that cannot be shaken. And he's the king.

And a helpful text that highlights what imputation is, is in Genesis 15, 6, which is quoted by Paul in Romans and in Galatians, is that Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him as righteousness. Right. Yeah.

Credited. Yeah. So Abraham believes and God accredits him righteousness.

And now we'll discover today that Jesus Christ is the righteousness that Abraham had been accredited. Yeah. So through a couple of different texts that Rock and I are going to go through.

So imputation is the accreditation of either righteousness or sin. Yeah. So something's accredited to your account.

It's given to you. It's granted to you. Exactly.

Yeah. Yeah. It's like in school.

You get a grant, which you don't have to pay back. It's something that's given to you. Right.

Exactly. So. And it's recognized formally, which is why we use this legal language.

I can't be patient. You're there's a formal recognition that this this person has now been boom. The gavels down.

They've been imputed this. This is recognized legally binding. Yeah, exactly.

Yeah. Um, okay. So one of the I mean, if you guys are in tune with theological thinking for the past two thousand years, you probably know that this is going to be practically guess which verse we're going to go to.

Um, second Corinthians five twenty one is one of the most clear texts that lay out imputation and not just imputation, but the whole shebang of double imputation of how Jesus bears the wrath of God propitiates it again. And as we've been discovering in Hebrews, he was just a great book understanding the nature of atonement, the nature of Jesus's work and what's happening there. But the blood of bulls and goats cannot satisfy the wrath of God.

He passed over former sins until obviously the slam slam before the foundation of the world would come chronologically into time. I guess, you know, it's hard to understand how that works, but Jesus was that sacrifice once for all, even Abraham. That's where his foreign righteousness.

His alien righteousness was coming from Jesus. Right. Because he believed in the promise, the better promise, the better land, which is Jesus.

Right. Jesus is the fulfillment of all that. So, um, second Corinthians five twenty one says, for our sake, he made him to be sin who knew no sin so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

So for our sake, right, we're the only ones benefiting from this. This is not costing God in the sense of this is expensive or it's hard for him to do or he's giving up a lot. But Jesus is humbling himself to the point of death on a cross.

Right. There's a bit of humiliation there being born in a major even taking on flesh. There's humiliation there.

Right. Because God is lifted up and high. Right.

He's holy. And there is a sense of him lowering himself and condescending to us for our sake. Right.

There's no other way when we sin. There's two ways either we're continuing our sin and he punishes us eternally now or he ends up destroying the earth or whatever just gives up on us because he's that's what should have happened. If God was being perfectly fair, he would have just let us be sin and not given our sin to Christ.

We just would have been our sin and we would have been destined for hell. That's what would have been fair. But because God is gracious and merciful, he's more than fair.

Right. He has sent Jesus to be sin. Even though he knew no sin that we might become the righteousness of God.

So Jesus receives what our sin. Our sin is imputed to him legally before God. God treats him as if he had sinned.

He became sinned. Jesus didn't know what it was like to sin. He didn't become a sinner.

But he took on the punishment of our sin in his flesh on the cross. And he cries out, my God, my God, why are you forsaking me? He takes that sin from us. It's imputed to him before God.

God sees him as that and punishes him. And then we, those who believe by faith are given and imputed that we might become. So why did Jesus do that? That we might become the righteousness of God.

That we might have the kind of righteousness that God has. I mean, that's a crazy thought. That kind of perfection of righteousness.

Not like, not like extremely righteous. Like a saint we might read about. You know, like the Apostle Paul.

Like the Apostle Paul was righteousness. But he didn't, sorry, he was righteous. But he didn't have the righteousness of God.

Okay. So it's not like you're becoming really righteous. Like literally the very righteousness that God has that he judges the nations upon.

That righteousness is given to us. I mean, Bryce and you, if you believed on Christ in faith and trusted in him. And like we've seen in previous episodes, it's because the requirement of the law is perfection itself.

Yeah. We have a desperate need to be perfect. And we have a Christ for that desperation.

A Christ who fulfills all righteousness. Who fulfills the law and who grants us his perfect righteousness. Yeah.

So this is the beautiful adoption of, this is what Martin Luther called the great transaction. This is double imputation. There's a transaction occurring here.

Like Rocky already said, upon him in Isaiah 53 was the chastisement that was meant for all of us. It was laid on him. So he takes our sin and his perfect righteousness is granted to us that we might have now a right standing before God.

So this is an incredibly important doctrine. And it's one that it doesn't matter if you can articulate these things. If you're a Christian, it doesn't matter if like, if you don't have, if you've never heard it articulated like this, that's okay.

It doesn't mean that you're not a Christian, but here's the glorious reality of what has happened to you. The glorious reality is that you have Jesus's righteousness. You possess it.

It's yours. He's given it to you. Right.

The righteousness that we have is not of ourselves. It's one that's been given to us by Jesus Christ. And that's what our faith clings to what Christ has done.

So again, it doesn't matter if you can articulate these things. What matters is this is the reality of what's happened to you. Your sins have been put on Christ.

You've been forgiven. Not only that, his righteousness has been given to you. It's the same righteousness that was accredited to Abraham, which is why he's now in heaven.

Right. The same righteousness that me and my brother's dad has. Right.

The only way he could enter into God's pearly gates in heaven is because of Jesus. St. Augustine, you know, all these, Martin Luther, John Calvin, Zwingli, all these reformers who were godly men, their godliness pales in comparison to Christ's righteousness, which was given to them. Exactly.

So incredibly important reality right here. And if you're sharing the gospel with somebody, you need to take them here to articulate this. When people are like, you know, how does Jesus dying on the cross? Like I didn't even like ask him to do that.

Like, how do I get that? And you need to come here to this text. You need to end your back pocket. You need to memorize it.

2nd Corinthians 5 21. And you need to come here and show people this is what was happening on the cross. That's why Jesus cries out to God who had forsaken him.

And this is how we are saved. And you must believe in Christ who has done this for you. You know? Right.

Okay. So do you want to read your text now? Yeah. And Hebrews chapter 10.

I'm gonna read verse 12 through 14. It says this, but when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God waiting from that time until his enemy should be made a footstool for his feet, for by a single offering, that is the offering of Christ himself, he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified. So who are those who are being sanctified? It's the saints.

It's the saints of God. It's those who are believers in Christ. It's those who belong to him who are united to Jesus.

They have been perfected, it says. But it's perfected for all time those who are being sanctified. So there's a dual reality right here.

And our position before God is perfection. It's pure, perfect, unstained, undefiled perfection before God because of what Jesus has done. Right.

We are seated with him, it says in Ephesians 2, in the heavenly places and the heavenly realms are seated with him because of what Jesus has done for us. Right. We have, we can now with confidence draw near before the throne of God and enter into the Holy of Holies with Jesus, which no man was able to enter except the high priest one time a year.

We can enter there because we are now perfected for all time. Nothing that we could do, no sin, whether life or death, angel or demon, nothing can separate us from this love of Christ that he has perfected us for all time. And yet we are still being sanctified.

And this is the beautiful reality is that we are positionally there, but we're not yet there. It's like when Paul says in Philippians, it's not as though I've already obtained this, but I press on striving for the goal that is set before me for the prize of the upward calling of Jesus Christ. Right.

We're still longing for the day that we're with him. When we see him, we will be as he is, even as we have been truly known. We're longing for that day.

But the grounds and the basis by which we are able to see that day is because we have been perfected for all time. So this is the result of this doctrine of arson being imputed to Christ, his righteousness being imputed to us. That it's not something, it's a legal declaration.

It's not something that you could change. Yeah. Right.

He's perfect for all time. It's signed and sealed by the Holy Spirit. Exactly.

I mean, it's sealed. It's like, that's why that is used. Like you cannot take back the King's seal when he's put it on a wetter that's been sent somewhere.

Exactly. Yeah. Yeah.

And this is, this is awesome. This is the central piece of the gospel. We have assurance before God, not on our grounds, but on his, on Christ's at the cross, but not only the cross, his resurrection as well.

Right. His death, burial and resurrection, all of it. Yep.

And this is beautiful. This is the central piece of the gospel. This, even though you may not be able to articulate it, this is the most beautiful reality that's happened to us is that we have been perfected for all time before God.

And this is what never gets old. This is what we always want to hear year in and year out every Sunday. We hear the gospel and this is a big part of the gospel where you will hear a lot usually.

Yeah. Thanks for that Bryce. Thanks for walking through that last text.

Hope that was edifying to you guys. Thanks for listening to the for the King podcast. You can reach me at for the King podcast@gmail.com. I have a website for the King podcast.com where you can check out blogs and articles and things I've written and also all the podcast episodes are on there.

And there's more ways to reach me on the website and you can check out the Facebook page. I'm trying to be more faithful with that, but just got married recently and I've been a little busy. So hopefully I can get that going how I want it.

He's just a victim. I'm a victim. I like to play the victim a lot.

So thanks for listening to the for the King podcast and I always end with a doxology to the King of the ages, a mortal invisible, the only God, the honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.

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