Can we have a moment or two of
silence, lifting our hearts to the Lord, and
each one of us making it a day
that is meant to share, that we not
only hear the words, but the voice of
the Lord.
Lord, it is quite evident from thine own
words and acts that it is something supernatural
begun in us, in man, in order to
hear the voice of the Lord.
We may hear the words and miss the
voice.
We ask that the Holy Spirit will quicken
and open these inner areas that we may
be able to go from this place quietly
tonight, saying, the Lord has spoken, and he
has spoken to me.
In thy great grace and mercy, let it
be so.
We ask in the name of the Lord
Jesus.
Those of you who were here last evening
will recall that I intimated that my own
garden of message for this time relates to
the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.
And I reminded you that in every book
of the New Testament, the cross is either
explicit or implicit.
That is, it is either definitely stated in
one, or it is implied, what is being
said down.
That in the whole gospel, the cross is
historical and acts and events at a certain
time, in a certain place, in certain circumstances,
in history.
In the book of Acts, the historic cross
became the theme of the gospel for the
whole world, and the apostles, the great ones,
were the heralds of the cross.
They were for preaching Jesus Christ and his
crucifixion.
We, priests, Christ's crucifixion is the inclusive crucifixion
made by one.
And then we observe that after the Acts,
every following book has some particular aspect and
application of the cross to a particular situation.
And it is there that we take up
the matter this evening as we come to
the letter to Rome.
The letter to Rome and the cross as
found therein.
Let me say at once it is not
my thought or intention to embark upon an
exposition or commentary upon the letter in particular,
but only to focus everything upon the central
reality of the cross and to look the
place and the meaning of the cross as
conveyed to us in the burial letter.
The letter to Rome has a superior meaning
under the sovereignty of God.
Though by no means the cross of the
apostolic writings of the times, the sovereignty of
the Holy Spirit has been to it that
this letter is given the first place in
the arrangement and that is of superior significance.
Because it is in this letter that we
have set forth in solemn and precise and
exact fit in all its part
the whole basis of salvation.
In a sublime and profound way, yet a
very efficiently pure way, this letter gives us
the basis of salvation upon which the whole
of the subsequent superstructure rests.
This, in a way, is the genesis of
the New Testament.
Like the book by that name, the beginning
of the Old Testament contains as the many
-fold beginning of everything, the beginning of this
and the beginning of that, a floor of
beginnings of everything which will subsequently be developed
in its greater fullness.
The letter to Rome stands in the same
position as contains the foundational things which will
be developed in all the subsequent letters.
I must not be too detailed and take
my time in all this, profitable as it
might be, but I must, I will just
make this suggestion to you if you are
wanting a profitable line of study of the
New Testament.
Just try or work to see in this
letter to the Romanes the things which you
find in all the subsequent letters.
And you will find that they are here,
in one form, in a beginning form.
And you will be able to trace the
subsequent letters back here to these points of
departure.
And when you get to the final book
of the New Testament, the book of the
Revelation, you will have the whole Bible summed
up from Genesis to Revelation.
So, said by those, we must get to
our particular notice.
Now, this letter, the cross in the letter
to Rome.
This letter that I have intimated is comprehensive
and all-encompassing.
Not to say, to take the time, but
just to intimate to you that you are
just to look into the first eight chapters
of this letter and not the place of
the cross.
You will find that it is not implicit
here.
Right there it is stated definitely and particularly
the cross has its place in those eight
letters.
You know that 9, 10, and 11 are
the parentheses on the history of this Bible.
And when you are about to ask about
parentheses, the chapter 12 comes back to take
up the whole thing.
I beseech you, therefore, therefore, by the mercies
of God, to present your bodies, our living
sacrifice, and that of the cross, to complete
the whole.
This one is a comprehensive letter in every
sense.
It encompasses all dimensions.
It will take you back to the before
times eternal, outside of time, before time came
in.
You will find yourself there at one point
in this letter.
It will bring you into the course of
time, and then it will take you on
beyond time into the eternity yet to do.
That's the limit.
It will reach out its arms and grace
all nations, all nations.
That is, the whole human race, in all
its departments, which we perceive for these days.
That is the breadth of it.
It will take you up into the future
mundane, the future earthly, the cosmic and heavenly
realm, that is, the high balance.
And it will take you down into the
ultimate depth of sin's ultimate consciousness.
That's the depth of it.
The length and the breadth and the height
and the depth of consciousness in this letter.
And right at the same statement of this
universe, time and eternity of heaven and of
hell, our life and of death, that's
chapters one to five, lead us to the
cross and sacrifice.
Sacrifice is a kind of, parentheses, a gate,
and then sacrifice, liberation.
The cross is here, right at the heart
of humanity, in God's universe and in ours.
It will take that up.
I'm coming to something very basic.
So, it goes for that.
There is, in this letter, as those of
you who are familiar with it may quite
well, a pursuit to the very last ditch
and post, as we say, a pursuit of
the Spirit of God through the hands of
the Apostle Elijah.
He sent out anyone in this whole creation
who can come right with God, who has
right coming with God.
That search is pursued, first of all, through
the whole history of Israel, right up to
the time that the apostle wrote this letter
and particularly wrote chapter seven, that very difficult
and controversial chapter.
The whole history of Israel as the nation
of religious genius beyond all other nations.
But all that we know about the economy
of Israel and all society, altar, streets, tabernacles,
temples, people over here, the pursuit is set
in motion through all Israel and all Israel's
history.
The eyes, the loose eyes of the Spirit
of God between this nothing is seeking to
find a life if there be one life.
In this Adamic race there is a life
of full pending with God.
It's a very powerful spirit.
Even more careful than that made by the
prophets of God.
Remember?
In the reign of King Ahab that wickedness
of old came to this world, prophet Elijah
called for a bright upon the earth.
Then the giant came into his house.
And the Lord himself had cut Elijah away
somewhere.
You know, when the Lord hides anything you
will not find it.
And the Lord had hidden Elijah away and
he was becoming so furious that Ahab said
to the prophet Abed-Ahar you and I
will go throughout the whole of Israel looking
for that man Elijah.
You go that way, I'll go this way.
And they did.
And Abed-Ahar did his job wherever he
did.
It was always he did, but it was
always her.
And Abed-Ahar went his way, a different
type of man.
And they came back and met and there
was and there of course was no Elijah.
No Elijah.
And it says that Abed-Ahar said to
the king that Elijah was not.
I'm not in that story to make sure
Elijah really appeared, I'm a priest.
But the point is by way of those
statements they cut and harrowed the whole kingdom
to find that man and they could not
find him.
And to say to those that we should
not doubt that that is a mere figment
of being compared with the first captains, the
Lord of the worlds.
The quest for the Spirit of God for
one man to stand in rightness of character
and nature before God.
And whom God could take if he was
a man in the old creation of God.
He could right the job.
I'm leaving that later on when we take
you out to a cold righteous man that
even fell.
The righteous that was not in themselves.
Not in themselves to say well this cold
righteousness is a righteousness which is a sin.
But even so, no man to stand before
God in all his wild history that is
God.
First, shallow, complete, the verdict, true and final.
Come to that.
Then having heard through all his wild history
and all his wild multitude with this gain
the right the Holy Spirit comes to the
Gentile world and the church is set there.
The whole of the nations outside of this
world the same verdict.
And when this has been done God by
his Spirit through this brought down the verdict.
There is none righteous no, not one.
No, not one.
Oh yes, for a moment while we take
up this man who is writing this.
With his hand and his spirit came this
test that and that is this man is
representative of the most religious of all nations
and peoples and he is representative of the
very best the very best spirit
born out and born into the world
the Jewish and the Gentile a Jew a
Hebrew of Hebrew a free man of the
rest of the world a Roman citizen free
born to go into any part of the
world under the cap of Roman eyes in
world world dominion of world and have all
the rights of a Roman citizen as heavy
free as a universal man on the Hebrew
of Jewish side here what he is going
to say about himself that his death his
heritage his upbringing his training and his triumph
in that world and the life after the
age of twelve deep in the north the
gate lord he said he said at the
age of twelve the ceremony of the adoption
of a son of the lord that part
he has and now he graduates into the
next stage of things a son of the
lord the age of twelve in the higher
classes of Jewish education he sits under the
chief rabbi here in England the most
native of all Jewish rabbis he sits at
their feet in the age of twelve until
he comes to the age of maturity and
graduates from the Jewish university as a rabbi
and a member of the Jewish community and
he will qualify to the very last point
in the Jewish eternity not only until that
month but in time so far that could
make most particularly absorbing everything of the lord
according to the standard in a way of
his name he is the representative of the
best of the other race he
has stepped back for a moment into that
old position that he got very enthroned in
in pursuit of the lord he says exactly
the truth about his inner life what he
did outwardly was one thing but what he
has come to discover of himself now through
the cross is quite another thing and at
the end of chapter seven he comes to
tell us it's all personal programs in that
matter all personal programs I oh man that
I a great soul a great Jewish a
great powerful oh man that I am a
man righteous married
I I'm not exaggerating I'm only telling you
what's here I don't think I could figure
it out as it ought to be but
you must make me say that man representative
of the great and the Roman or non
-Jewish world that's the verdict on himself and
that's the verdict of God upon that whole
regime of Adam Jewish of Adam and Eve
now what am I getting at first of
all you can't get to the heart of
things with the cross until you get this
here that is the uttermost of this letter
there are three uttermosts in this letter and
that's what I want to get to but
first of all the importance is that we
have seen the uttermost of human representation therefore
let me anticipate the end of this by
saying that it takes out almost the whole
of our life to accept that as a
truth and reality our difference and abduction our
pro- fundamentalism will accept and if you're
a fundamentalist you do believe in facing discredit
or discredit in your theology or adduction it
is parity of mind you accept that all
have been with no wrong or good with
no righteous no not wrong in your so
-called acceptance that let me say again to
your dying day perhaps in your last days
you may not have accepted that fully in
your heart because you've still been looking for
something good in yourself to make you happy
and comfortable to deliver you some introspection and
self-condemnation all that will be the misery
of this wicked man you'll be bothered about
that to the end unless you come to
the heart of things we are teaching today
heart of things and understand freely the meaning
of the cross that's the first utterance you
see the utterance of human reservation and human
disqualification for the presence of God this is
the one utterance by nation in our souls
in what we are in our souls are
disqualified from fellowship with God from the presence
of God we are by nature wickedly wicked
that's what this letter begins with and we'll
have to settle a little more later we'll
have to settle but so far as we
ourselves are concerned that's where we are so
there's a second part on this here which
is not only the pronouncement of the judgment
and the verdict upon us upon mankind it
is the relegation of that whole humanity from
atom onwards the relegation the exclusion from life
essentially this is going to mean that you
and I have not arrived yet it has
got carried out it has not put out
excluded relegated there are papers as you know
in the Jewish economy do you remember the
paper this one ah they have you see
the print about that paper in page 1
to 2 and the priest presenting the whole
nation himself included lay his hands upon that
dirt and transferring the sin of the nation
the unrighteousness of the nation the retribution of
the nation transferring it to that dirt by
the laying of hands he identified the nation
with that dirt have you heard of that
oh typology yes we miss the point so
often oh yes it is too great to
monopolize the statement of the priest he says
to him people away and away away ever
farther away from the habitation of God from
the habitation of God from where God was
take upon the horizon and then let go
dismiss let me remember the word first dismiss
from the presence of God from the habitation
of God from all that has to do
with God dismiss dismiss beyond the horizon excluded
cut off shut out poor preacher dying far
from God and all that is above that
is there in your bible and look again
look again look with those larger eyes you
are not seeing one man you are not
seeing a priest and one date you are
seeing all this raising up raising away behind
that date following to the far far remaking
of the land of desolation forsaken of the
nation of God as such there is your
Old Testament it is a very powerful one
a very poignant one that in the letters
to the Romans if you study deeper you
will find so much of the Old Testament
in this letter that here in the text
restoration dismissal exclusion you me all of us
in the humanity of Adam this is this
is God very often a very different being
a very universal being this is God you
see this is exactly what the cross means
the whole thing this universal restoration and this
universal disqualification this universal rejection is focused in
that cross when one sin took the sin
of the race your sin and my sin
the sin of the whole race because there
is none righteous no not one took that
sin of the cross forsaken forsaken of God
my God my God taught me and the
teacher living out in the presence of God
that's one side of the cross that's the
meaning of the cross oh it's a terrible
sigh saying God it is only one side
but let's get clear about this as you're
trying to get depth into fable with God
on your own ground you'll find there's a
barrier that you cannot pass for seeking grace
of universal size stands between you and God
grace of your Jesus next to this forsaken
utterance of our situation my picture of the
cross now read more clearly say
that for those who have seen that
who have accepted and who have embraced that
by faith that forsaken of their representatives on
their behalf as well for them and have
said when that faith went out in the
presence of God I was with that faith
said thank you God and cried Lord what
time has God forsaken me that was your
forsaken when we had put together our tradition
and our destiny by Jesus Christ.
And it's faith in the Lord Jesus in
what He did with us.
There's another faith for the heavenly God, faith
in the presence of God.
There's the other half of things, the other
side.
The utter respect to faith in the Lord
Jesus.
Faith that He did all that and us,
not only for us.
Faith that that was you and that was
me in that position and that dire hour
on the cross.
I was there.
It was my penalty.
He was my sin.
He was my redemption.
He borne my sin in His own body.
Blessed be God who did it.
And me, and for me, and I worship
at His feet.
And believe that when we come to a
position like that of faith, although again not
a doctrinal position, not a theological position.
Have you been there?
You have.
You know what I'm talking about.
Then the door is open.
And there's an utterness of acceptance.
Of standing before God.
Righteous.
Oh, can it be?
Can it be?
Yes.
And we have to stand up right in
the presence of that infinitely holy and righteous
One.
And without, without bending my head in that
awful remorse of rejection, find in that beloved
One, Oh God make our doctrine, our familiar
doctrine more real.
It's going to be so.
We're getting away from our teaching to reality.
Anybody who has been this way knows what
a real thing it is.
This very thing, this six chapters of the
Letters to the Romans, turned my life inside
out and upside down and cut it in
two.
Even as a preacher, an organizer of Christian
work, home and abroad.
And a preacher of the very large church
of preaching, thinking I was getting on.
And then came, and in that crisis I
said, never again will I preach.
Never again will I put my hand to
Christian work.
Lord, I'm going out.
I'm left using something you've never done before.
But it was a terrible thing.
I cannot tell you.
It was devastating.
And desolation.
The end of everything.
Something, oh yes, even so was very immense.
So much, so much.
It did mean a lot.
There's only a mere fragment, microcosm of what
my Lord and your Lord went through in
the crisis of Christ.
It's something devastating when you really come into
touch with it under the hand of God,
on the one side.
And until some crisis of that kind, not
saying that it's got to be in the
same way as mine or Paul's or others,
but something like that, or is happening, is
in process of happening, you're coming more and
more and more to an end of yourself
and to despair about yourself.
Until something like that happens, you're not going
to be any good to God.
Preach if you like.
Organize Christian work if you like.
And the end, desolation.
Well, as I say, let's come back, happy
as I am, the utterness of except are
not that you and I are in ourselves
any more perfect than we were before.
But what is happening?
What ought to be happening?
And I ask you if it's happening with
you.
On the one side of your life, your
history and experience, progressively you are coming more
and more to me.
Utterly hopeless a person you are.
Are you?
Are you at the point option of giving
it all up because of your faith?
That's all right, dear friend.
That's very good, so long as it doesn't
go there.
What is God doing?
What is the Holy Spirit doing with us?
If you would leave it out, bringing us
to this position, sir, oh Lord, unless you
take over altogether, I'm dying to spare after
all.
That's very utter, isn't it?
Yes, that on the one side of our
history, we are not getting to the place
where we can say I'm getting better and
better.
That may be all right for two years,
but it isn't all right for six years.
I am getting, am I getting worse and
worse?
No, I'm not.
I never could be worse, and neither I
was.
But I'm coming to discover how worse I
am.
That's bad.
But we must be careful.
And this great man who wrote this letter,
he understood what he was writing.
Tremendously, this man.
At the end of his long, full life,
poor man, at the end of his life,
brethren, I count not myself to have changed.
Neither am I already perfect.
In my ambition, still, within that day, I
shall stand not having a righteousness of mind,
but a righteousness which is of God, who
faith in Him is set right to the
end.
The depreciation of faith and growing apprehension of
Christ.
Now, here arises a point that I would
leave you in trouble if I didn't touch
the point.
You see, we saw a devil around us.
I don't mean we saw it.
It was this devil.
What I have called the thief.
You say that lightly, but that's what it
is.
And you see, you have only got to
have some kind of rebirth in your life,
some difficulty, some adversity, some sorrow, some loss,
some trouble in family, or in business, in
your life.
Something that is difficult, hard.
And we cannot understand it.
Nobody, none of you can explain it.
Beyond your comprehension of understanding at all why
the Lord should allow death to come to
me, why He should deny me life.
So many people haven't got death.
They don't know anything about death.
It's gone.
And there's a sleep right at your ear.
The Lord is asleep with you.
You have upset the Lord.
And therefore, this is the Lord.
The Lord is turning on you.
This is an example or an expression of
the Lord's disapproval of you.
Keep that in your ear.
And if you listen, and if you take
it on, it will not be long before
you have called into question all that the
Lord Jesus did in His cross.
You will have undercut the very foundation of
your new relationship with God.
And you'll be under a dark cloud and
a presence of activation.
Oh, yes.
The fact is that we are still faltering,
inconstant failing.
We slip up.
We make mistakes.
We do wrong.
And this grief is always a condemner to
accuse us and make us believe and accept
that that adversity is the displeasure of the
Lord.
Well, what are you going to do about
that?
Do you know something about that?
Well, you can do better.
I'm going to say, I am hopeless.
I am perfect.
Satan, you have no taste at all.
You see, I have already a taste.
Are you?
Oh, what are you going to do?
This letter, and you will see what I
have tried to point out about the cross
placed in it and what has been done
and what God has been taking, we have
been taken right away and yet here we
are in the reality of an imperfect, faulty
life, not seamlessly perfect.
Forgive me if some of you believe in
that.
I don't.
Not seamlessly perfect.
Capable of failure.
But you're on the other side of chapter
6 now and you're on the other side
of chapter 7 now and a triumphant shout
rises to heaven in the presence of the
lifted man.
There is therefore now no condemnation to them
that are in.
There is no condemnation from God.
All right, devil, see what did I stop
in God?
But here is your difficulty.
Why is it then that when we make
mistakes, we do so?
What are our mistakes?
Don't you see that you're under a different
economy?
Under the old economy, your mistakes block judgment
on you.
Condemnation.
And yet, in the new economy of in
Christ Jesus, you make your mistakes.
You're not of course going to excuse yourself.
Shall we continue in that statement about God
forbid?
No.
You're going to retaliate this.
You are going to say that was wrong.
That was wrong.
The way I spoke was wrong.
What I said was wrong.
What I did was wrong.
There's no justification for that wrong.
But, I confess.
I bring it back to the cross and
I say to the Lord, now turn my
mistakes and my wrongs to good account that's
in your economy.
The sovereignty of grace is that although we
are deposed, it does not bring us under
that old judgment condemnation.
The Lord sovereignly in his grace takes up
our mistakes and turns them to wonderful account.
Have you a history of that?
Oh yes, he made mistakes.
I'm not one of those who thought, thinks
that the apostle Paul was infallible and never
made any mistakes.
No, he wouldn't agree with that.
I think I could put my finger upon
him and tell you all the big mistakes
that he made.
Is that heresy?
Is that heresy about a life such as
his?
No.
But I do think how marvellously the sovereignty
of grace of God turned those mistakes to
account.
And the issue although different from what Paul
wanted expected very different, nevertheless the issue was
more to the glory of God.
Now I'm almost afraid to take that up
because you may be deceived by my provision.
I think Paul did make a little mistake
in there about going up to Jerusalem as
he did and when he did and getting
into the temple and then resorting to expedience
and expedience taking steps on towards Jerusalem again
because the motive was so good.
He didn't make a mistake.
And he had written that he would go
to Rome all the ambitious righteous to go
to Rome He got to Rome all right.
He got to Rome all right.
Not as he wanted or expected in a
very different way.
But how in the grace of God Paul
wrote a certain letter.
Would we be without it?
Would we be without Ephesians, Galatians, Philippians and
so on?
Would you?
What?
The pure good.
I'm going to say to that mistake.
Well, if you don't believe me I'll try
to bury your fundamentals.
But I do believe under this new economy
in Christ fault, failure, mistakes which would be
characteristic of us to the end can be
turned to real account for the law in
his sovereign grace and really really and truly
no condemnation.
Rest a comment.
He'll hold to it.
The utterness of acceptance.
That's my point.
The utterness of acceptance.
What is so fair about this?
Oh, my dear friend.
You need it to be read again.
The utterness of this acceptance after that utterness
of rejection lecturbation and exclusion.
How far we are to well, let's read
it.
Turn to chapter 8.
Here is a challenge thrown out by the
this apostle.
A challenge thrown out in a threefold tune.
What shall we say to these things?
Is God big for us?
Who is against us?
He that Here we are, right back at
the cross.
He that had not his own son, God
delivered him up for us all.
How shall we not also give him freely
give up all things?
Challenge number one.
Who shall lay anything to the charge of
God he lifts?
Who?
Only the devil.
And that would be a false accusation.
No.
Who?
It is God that justifies, that puts us
into right standing with each other.
Who is he that shall condemn, bring us
under condemnation?
It is Christ that died.
The Father that was raised from the dead.
Who is at the right hand of God?
I'm ready for that reply.
Without a doubt, of the devil, and all
accusation, and all cross against at the right
hand of God.
Who also make it in that second for
us?
Third challenge.
Who shall separate us from the love of
that Christian, mighty Christian, and now the apostle,
embarked upon the impossible answer?
Who shall separate us from the love of
Christ?
Shall tribulation all but be peace?
That tribulation came to me because the Lord
of the church was he who shall lay
on the cross.
Shall tribulation, if you interpret it rightly, it
will separate you from your enjoyment of the
love of Christ anyway.
Shall persecution or famine or nakedness or peril
or sword?
Even as it is written, there is a
cross in the life of the believer.
For thy sake we are killed all the
day long.
Then for thy sake, and it is the
Lord against us, for thy sake all the
day long we are accounted as sheep for
a slaughter.
Nay.
The answer is nay.
Who?
Nay.
And what a mighty nay it is.
In all these things we are more than
confident through him that we love God.
For I am self-evident that neither death
nor life nor angels nor principalities nor things
present nor things to come, nor power, nor
height, nor depth, nor reality nor creation, nor
anything else in the whole shall be able
to separate us from the love of God
which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Is that utter acceptance?
Well upon us.
Oh, may the Lord help us by this.
Help us to see, to understand that there
will be such situations.
So may this know.
For under life, life
can be a big burden.
Life, death, height, depth.
Anything else you'd like to mention in the
whole creation?
Yes.
I'll give you a long list of the
things that happen to a human being.
And there's no time that any one of
them, all the pit rats and all the
other things draw any sense of condemnation upon
them.
There may be reasons.
There probably will be some of them in
every life here that is going on with
God but the love of Christ the love
which we come into in Christ, that's it.
In Christ that love is greater than every
mentionable thought in this universe, including the speech.
We will one day feel greater than that
love is greater than that of the other
nations.
But then the apostle Luke would appeal after
this parenthesis, he says by the mercy, by
the merciful I beseech you, present your body,
that is your whole self, a living self.
Put it on the altar of dedication.
Concentration.
Utterness.
Like his first offering is simply to present
your body as a living self.
Wholly acceptable.
After all it's only your reasonable service or
your spiritual work or transmission, whole self whole
Christ because of his utterness for us.
In these words I after all feel how
I fail to get open what I feel
about this dear friend.
I am speaking out of obfuscation of you.
Oh this cruel evil one, this cruel evil
one.
Days of weakness have physically reached you.
Days of outward adversity have come.
Days of unfaithfulness, disloyalty and the past.
Of Christian faith, faith much, much more.
What a cruel enemy he is.
Trying to get in between us and the
Lord.
There you see.
This is only his condemning of us.
We've got to learn something about this God.
Yes.
The marvel by our Lord is the great
beauty of this God.
History in our love it cannot be nullified
by anything in heaven earth or heaven.
God help us to understand that the cross
in Rome very imperfectly presented.
But I think it enough to picture how
often have we sung it and said it
love so amazing so divine demand my life,
my soul my all O Lord breakthrough our
inability to grasp really grasp which changes can
detect of our inability to apprehend of the
great more than ever we have seen how
great and deep that love of we are
believe it to be O Lord what we
and send us out from this space under
the solemn house of the Spirit.