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The Gospel & Substitutionary Atonement

For The King — FTK
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The Gospel & Substitutionary Atonement

January 23, 2022
For The King
For The KingFTK

Continuing on our Gospel foundations series, this week, we walk through how substitutionary atonement is crucial when understanding the gospel. We must believe and trust in Jesus Christ as our substitute on the cross. He bore the punishment that was due us. We remember in God's word as it says in Isaiah 53: 4-5 and 11-12,

"Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed."

"Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors."

Key Texts:

* Psalm 18:37-43

* Matthew 27:15-23

* John 15:12-13

* Romans 5:6-9

* Colossians 2:13-14

My guest joining me this week on the Sunday series is my brother Bryce. Bryce just finished 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

(music)
But Christ is so much better than all of them that even though we were still sinners, again it assumes we're sinners. We're ungodly. No one's righteous, no not one.
Even while we were sinners, Christ died for us.
Yeah. And that is a beautiful reality that he became our substitute.
Yeah. We were murderers who were liable for capital punishment. And yet that capital punishment fell on Jesus and not on us.
Yeah, exactly. So this is a glorious reality of substitution that we find here in Romans 5. 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.
(music)
And I'll not apologize for this God of the Bible.
(music)
Psalm 18 verses 37 to 42.
I pursued my enemies and overtook them and did not turn back till they were consumed. I thrust them through so that they were not able to rise. They fell under my feet.
Oh. Preach it. For you equipped me with strength for the battle.
You made those who rise against me sink under me. You made my enemies turn their backs to me. And those who hated me, I destroyed.
They cried for help and there was none to save. They cried to the Lord but he did not answer them. I beat them fine as dust before the wind.
I cast them out like the mire of the streets.
Woo! That's the king, baby. That is the king.
Okay, so welcome to the 4th King Podcast. Wherever you're listening in from, we appreciate you spending some time with us. To hear some good theology, God's word proclaimed expositing God's word, commentary on God's word.
We're happy you're here listening to this.
And if you don't know Christ, this passage ought to be a horror to you. Because this is the nature of the king as he is.
That if you do not submit to him and you are on the end of his spear, you're not behind him going into battle with him. You're on the other end of his spear. He will thrust you through and run you over.
And then at the end he says that he's going to beat them fine as dust. He'll turn you into dust. From dust you are to dust you'll return.
That's in Psalm 103. He knows we're dust. And then he's going to cast you out in the streets like you just got cremated and he spread your ashes.
That's what he's going to do to those that come against him. So that's the King Jesus that we're talking about. So if you're wondering who the king is, it's the king that's alluded to all throughout the Psalms, pointing to Christ.
So friendly reminder, bend the knee so that this doesn't happen to you, friend. Bryce and I would like to see you in heaven. We'd like to say greet you and for you to tell us, "Oh, we listened to your podcast and we repented." So we would love to see you there.
So that's our introductory text. Just a reminder of who the king is. So last week on these Gospel Foundation series that Bryce and I are going through, we talk about the foundational aspects of the Gospel laid out in God's Word.
And the analogy I use is a diamond. It's got many different facets, many different faces, all beautiful in their own unique way, just as the Gospel is beautiful in a bunch of different unique ways. It's deep.
We're mining out the deep things of God in the Gospel.
So last week was new birth in Christ, being born again, being made a new creation. This week we're going to talk about the substitutionary nature of Jesus's atoning work on the cross, how he substituted himself for us in our place when we deserved the wrath to come.
Now, in terms of exposition and exegesis, in terms of just frankly exegesis over the whole swath of the Bible, this is laid out most clearly in the sacrificial system, laid out all throughout the Book of Leviticus, and seen as there are burnt offerings and sacrifices offered to God for the people's sin on a yearly basis, because of their sin. There's a substitute. Their sin required something, and a substitute was now put in the stead of what was required, and another party bore the burden.
So that's the exegesis of it. It finds its root way back in the Old Testament. Even God in the garden went out of any of sin.
He clothes them with animal skins that they might not be naked.
So even there from the very beginning we have the root of this idea of a substitute being provided for somebody that had wronged another party. These are our favorite stories in all of pop culture.
Our favorite stories is the substitutionary work in somebody's stead.
And John the Baptist, when he first sees Jesus, he says, "Behold the Lamb of God," that we're looking back to the Levitical system, "who takes away the sins of the world." So he points to Jesus as the substitute. Yeah, the substitutionary Lamb.
So first text in the New Testament that we're going to use is John 15, 12 and 13. "This is my commandment that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than someone laid down his life for his friends." Substitution, that's substitutionary language.
Laying down your life for your friends, for their betterment.
Now, I mean, obviously that can be sacrificing time. There's a lot of little miniscule ways, but Jesus is talking about dying for somebody because there's been some party wrong that's out for blood.
And the party in the Gospel that we're talking about is us and God. Those are the parties involved. And God's out for blood, as we see in the Psalm I read today.
Psalm 18. As we see in Psalm 18, this king is out for blood from those who oppose him. Because he's the king, obviously, and there are rebels in the midst.
So, this is why we know this is what true love looks like, that you'd lay down your life for a friend who has got themselves into a tiffy. Yeah, a tiffy. And that is our own sin.
Yeah, that's our sin. Another text that lays this out super clearly is in Romans 5. It displays even more clearly Jesus laying down his life in theological terms. And Paul says this in Romans 5, 6, and so on.
So, we see here, we were still weak. And in what way were we weak? Paul describes it as this. We were ungodly.
Christ died for the ungodly. A person will scarcely even die for a righteous person. So, you'll see people who will even try to withhold sacrificing their own life from somebody who is themselves righteous.
But Jesus, in a more greater way, goes and dies for someone who is unrighteous. His righteous life for the unrighteous. And God displays his love for us, and that while we were still sinners, Christ became a substitute for us.
And Christ died for sinners. So, even though you'll find remote parts where a person will die for a righteous person, you will never find somebody dying for an unrighteous man. You would never have found somebody who stepped in front of, if somebody was trying to kill Hitler, you would never have found somebody to step in front of him on the team trying to kill Hitler.
Yeah, none of the allied powers would step in front of the bullet headed towards Hitler. Maybe one of the Axis, one of his soldiers or whatever, but not someone on the opposing team. That thing came with him.
When David hit Goliath in the head with a stone, Saul didn't get up and run in front of Goliath and say, "No, no, no, don't do it!" Because he was an unrighteous person. But Christ is so much better than all of them that even though we were still sinners, again it assumes we're sinners, we're ungodly, no one's righteous, no, not one. Even while we were sinners, Christ died for us.
And that is a beautiful reality that he became our substitute. We were murderers who were liable for capital punishment, and yet that capital punishment fell on Jesus and not on us. Yeah, exactly.
So this is a glorious reality of substitution that we find here in Romans 5. Yeah. So the next text I have is from Colossians 2, it's verse 14. Well, I'll read 13, I read it last week, but it warrants 14 here.
And then it talks about he disarmed the rulers and the authorities and put them to shame by triumphing over them. So again, this is the triumphant king, that his death in the cross, his substitutionary death was a triumphant act. He didn't lose.
Yeah, he did not lose. This was the victory of the cross. But the reason why we have substitution here is because those legal demands that were against us, which we'll get into a little bit more, basically we've committed a crime towards God with rebellion.
So there's a legal – legally, because when you break a law, right, there is a punishment. Punishment is a charge brought against you by the other party. So what Christ has done is he's canceled the debt of the legal demands of the nature of our sin towards God as the judge, and he set it aside by nailing it to the cross, insinuating in this text that Christ bore those legal demands for himself while they were given up for us, the charges were dropped against us, is the imagery here.
The charges, the legal demands, the charges were dropped against us because Jesus nailed them to the cross and substituted himself for the legal action that was to be taken against us by the judge God. Right. And something we try to bring up every single week is notice everything we are talking about of Gospel foundations is central and founded upon Jesus.
This is something – this is not talking about some random person. This is talking about the Son of God, the one who is the second person of the Trinity, who robed himself in flesh, who was truly God, and yet is found to be truly man because he took on flesh. Even though he was in the form of God, he did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but he emptied himself, not of his deity, but by humbling himself to death, even death on a cross.
Right. So this is what we're talking about.
This is the substitution.
It's not just a random lamb. This is the lamb. It's not a lamb.
It's the lamb.
It's the lamb, like Revelation says, who was slain before the foundation of the world because he is the plan for redemption for sinners, and he died for the ungodly. Exactly.
And honestly, I can't think of a text that most clearly represents this. Then in Matthew 27, if it's okay if I read that. Yes, please.
I don't know if you have anything else you wanted to bring up.
No, that was good. That's good.
Yeah, the story here.
So in Matthew 27, this is – Jesus is – he came before the councilmen. They are trying him, testing him, trying to bring up false witnesses against him, which ultimately proves futile.
They bring Jesus before Pilate, and Pilate ends up bringing out a person named Barabbas.
And I'm just going to read this story that is historically accurate. I know when we say story, that usually – Yeah, not like a fairy tale.
We're talking about a story, like telling a true event story. Right.
So this is Matthew 27, verses 15, and so on.
And it says this.
Now at the feast, the governor – that's Pilate – was accustomed to release for the crowd any one prisoner whom they wanted. And they had then a notorious prisoner called Barabbas.
So when they had gathered, Pilate said to them,
"Whom do you want me to release for you, Barabbas or Jesus, who is called Christ? For he knew that it was out of envy that they had delivered him up. Besides while he was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent word to him, saying, "Have nothing to do with that righteous man, Frank Jesus. For I have suffered much because of him today in a dream." Now the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowd to ask for Barabbas and destroy Jesus.
The governor again said to them, "Which of the two do you want me to release for you?" And they said, "Barabbas." Pilate said to them, "Then what shall I do with Jesus, who is called Christ?" They all said, "Let him be crucified." And he said, "Why? What evil has he done?" But they shouted all the more, "Let him be crucified." Just in passing, "Go listen to the hymn, 'Wore you there,' when they crucify my Lord." We were there. And sometimes that should cause us to tremble. We were there and we were the ones shouting, "Crucify him, crucify him." But in another way, in another sense, we are Barabbas.
We are the vile murderers who have committed a cosmic act of treason against a thrice holy God, who is just and righteous altogether. All of his judgments are good. And yet we stand before this holy God, who is no tyrant at all, who upholds justice perfectly as cosmic criminals.
Just like Barabbas, he committed a crime not only against Judaism, but also against the Roman Empire at that time, and he's in prison. And Pilate says, "Which one shall I choose for you?" It's my custom that on the Passover, I release for you a prisoner. And he brings out Barabbas the murderer.
He's a notorious criminal in that time.
And they cry out all the more, "Release for us Barabbas, release for us Barabbas, not Jesus." So we have two men, Jesus Barabbas. Jesus, the innocent, spotless Lamb of God.
And Barabbas is sinful, notorious criminal. And what we see happening here is a substitutionary act happening. We are Barabbas.
Scarcely will somebody die for a righteous person, but even for an unrighteous person, one would dare even to die.
But while we were still sinners, while we were still Barabbas, Christ died for us. Barabbas should have been the one hanging on the cross that evening or afternoon.
But Jesus was actually the one who hung there. Jesus was the substitute for Barabbas. So like Zachariah says, when we look on him whom we have pierced, we should mourn.
Because he was pierced for our transgression. He was broken for our wounds. And by his wounds we have been healed.
So that's the substitute for us. We were Barabbas.
Yeah, it's a sad story.
But true and good reflection to think about based on that.
It's sad that the men next to Christ on the cross, they say this man, well one of them says this man has done no wrong. Why is he here? There may have been, I don't know exactly historically how they would harbor prisoners, but those two guys may have been in the same cell as Barabbas and they were expecting him there that day or something.
I don't know. And they see this man and they maybe overhear the crowds chanting as they carry their cross there. And they're like, this man didn't do anything wrong.
This man has not done anything wrong.
That's a good point. So yeah, it's a very sad reality that Jesus had done nothing wrong.
He didn't open his mouth to contest when they released Barabbas. He didn't say, if you're going to release him, he didn't open his mouth. It remained silent and went to the cross, obedient.
And that's the glory of the cross is that our salvation is found in a beautiful substitution for our sins. Exactly. Which is why it's foundational.
Yeah. Okay. I think that's all we have to say.
So I hope that was encouraging and edifying and you're reminded that if you do know Christ, he died in your place. You ought to be thankful. I have to be thankful.
And if you don't know Christ, he did not die in your place.
And he's going to run you through with a spear. He's going to come back with a sword coming out of his mouth, his word, and he's going to slice you down.
And condemnation, he will judge you correctly. He will pronounce judgment. He'll swing the gavel and say, you're guilty and you're going to hell away from me.
So if you don't know Christ, repent. So that does not happen to you. Bryce and I would love to see you in heaven one day and shake your hand.
Redeemed bodies, redeemed hand. But yeah, so that's our exhortation to you, listener, dear listener. Reminder that I've started releasing exclusive content on the For the King podcast website.
The book reviews I do, I thought it would be too much to release book reviews and the Wednesday episodes and the Sunday episodes. So I wanted to just make money off of it. Exactly.
Well, I didn't want to make a whole other podcast just for book reviews once a month. I thought maybe I could just make an exclusive content. It could be a way for you guys to support me and also get something out of it as well.
But it could be a way to, the laborers do his wages right. So it'd be a way, you know, I work hard on this. So maybe it'd be a way that you guys could partner with me and get something in return.
So you could do that for as little as two bucks. And a lack of you or pay into it will display the labors of Rocky that it's not due. Exactly.
It might be that it's crap. Right.
If nobody signs up, that probably indicates it's not worth it.
You should have a quarter option. I would do a quarter. A quarter? I would pay a quarter.
Okay. I'll add a quarter option, quarter payment system. Yeah, you just, I think you can do whatever you want.
So just if you really are interested in it, you can do whatever you want. I think you can put it in quarter. I think I just put it as suggested two dollars or whatever.
Yeah. So yeah, consider doing that. If you are interested in that, when I hear the books I'm reading that might be helpful, you can check us out at forthekingpodcast.com. Reach out to me if you want to ever be on the podcast or want to have an interview with me.
For the Wednesday episodes, you can reach me at forthekingpodcast@gmail.com. Thanks so much for listening. I'm always in with the doxology. So I'll do the one at the end of 2 Corinthians.
The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Thanks for listening. Solely.
Deo. Hola. Hola.

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