Now, today our subject is the glorification of
man, and we're going to talk this evening
about the glorification of man.
Sometimes we say physically.
I realize that's an inadequate word.
It may be better to say bodily.
And perhaps most of us, when we think
of the coming glory that God has in
store for us, we think of it in
terms of a changed body.
For Paul at the end of Philippians chapter
3, that we will be changed.
He shall change our lowly bodies so that
they will be fashioned like unto his body
of glory.
Well, we will talk about that this evening.
This morning I would like to talk to
you on another aspect of our coming glory,
and that is the moral aspect, that God
will glorify us in the moral sense.
Let me read to you this morning just
two portions from Romans.
Now, many portions could be read, but I
would like to read from Romans chapter 14,
a verse that we referred to yesterday.
Romans chapter 14, and verse 17.
For the kingdom of God is not meat
and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy
in the holy spirit.
May I read it once more?
For the kingdom of God is not meat
and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy
in the holy spirit.
Then turn back for that great portion in
Romans chapter 8, beginning with verse 31.
What shall we say, then, to these things?
If God be for us, who can be
against us?
He that spared not his own son, but
delivered him up for us all, how shall
he not with him also freely give us
all things?
Who shall lay anything to the charge of
God's elect?
It is God that justifies.
Who is he that condemns?
It is Christ that died, yet rather that
is risen again, who is even at the
right hand of God, who also makes intercession
for us.
Who shall separate us from the love of
Christ?
Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine,
or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
As it is written, For thy sake we
are killed all the day long.
We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.
Nay, in all these things we are more
than conquerors through him that loved us.
For I am persuaded that neither death, nor
life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor power, nor
things present, nor things to come, nor height,
nor depth, nor any other creature shall be
able to separate us from the love of
God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
We trust that God will bless this portion
of his word in our hearts today.
Now, when we think of the moral aspect
of our glorification, the words that you have
in Romans chapter 14, I think, are very
appropriate.
The kingdom of God is not meat and
drink.
Rather, it is righteousness, and peace, and joy
in the Holy Spirit.
This is what the kingdom of God is
all about, and we have been born into
the family of God.
We belong to the Lord Jesus, and already
today we know something of righteousness, something of
peace, and something of joy.
Now, the moral aspect of our glorification is
that we will understand and appreciate and know
righteousness in its fullness, peace in its fullness,
and joy in its fullness.
Now, let me take this with you this
morning step by step.
When it comes to righteousness, the scriptures unite
in telling us that we look forward to
a new heaven and a new earth in
which dwells righteousness.
So, our hope is that we anticipate even
now new heavens and a new earth in
which the atmosphere, unlike the atmosphere of our
world today, will be righteousness, perfect righteousness.
Again, Paul reminds us that God has not
appointed us unto wrath, but to obtain salvation
by our Lord Jesus Christ.
Now, I'm sure many preachers many times have
reminded you that there is a future aspect
to our salvation.
You see, God has not appointed us to
wrath.
That points to the future, but rather to
salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ.
So, I would like you this morning to
turn with me just for a moment to
the fifth chapter of Romans, and you'll notice
how our present blessings in a sense are
linked to our future blessings.
Now, Paul does this many times.
I'm only choosing one portion this morning in
Romans chapter 5, and we will read verse
8, but God commended his love toward us
in that while we were yet sinners, Christ
died for us.
Now, on that foundation, Paul goes on to
this reasoning, much more than, being now justified
by his blood, we shall be saved from
wrath through him.
Verse 10, For if when we were enemies,
that was our present, our former situation here
in this world.
When we were enemies, we were reconciled to
God by the death of his son, much
more being reconciled right now.
We shall be saved by his life.
Now, on those two verses, we establish this
morning that in the grace of God he
has come to us, to each one of
us, and he has given us a technical
term, eternal juridical exoneration.
It doesn't matter what you've done, doesn't matter
who you were.
When you committed yourself to Jesus Christ, he
gave you...
Now, the emphasis, Paul, in my reasoning this
morning on the first word, eternal juridical exoneration.
Not salvation for a moment, a week, a
day, a year, a lifetime, but God has
made us right with himself forever.
Now, in verses 9 and 10, Paul takes
this line of argument.
He begins with the greater, and he moves
to the lesser.
Now, the greater, in verse 9, is that
right now we have been justified by the
blood of God's Son, our Lord and Savior
Jesus Christ.
You know, sometimes even as Christians we become
so unconscious of how awful sin is that
we forget the greatness of this truth, that
God has come down to us on a
righteous basis, and even though we were sinners.
You read all about it in verses 6,
7, and 8, what we were.
God came to us in love, and he
has made us right, and he's done that
right now.
Now, if God can take up a person
like you, and a person like me, and
justify us now in our present situation right
here in the world, then from this great
fact we move to a lesser fact, that
in the future we shall be saved from
wrath through him.
Thus, we look out into the future.
Many people have fears about coming wrath, about
the coming judgment of God, but if God
can justify you now, then there is no
thought of coming judgment or wrath.
Let me read the verse again.
Much more, then, being now justified by his
blood, we shall be saved from wrath through
him.
Now, the wrath of God, I always take
it to mean God's holiness excited because of
our sin.
That is the wrath of God.
That is why when the Israelites drew near
to the presence of God, God gave the
word they must not come any closer, and
the boundary was set because the shortcomings, the
sins of the people of Israel excited the
holiness of God, and the result is wrath,
judgment.
But now the blood of Jesus Christ, God's
Son, has cleansed us from all sin.
We have been justified now.
Thus, we look out into the future, unknown,
and there is no uncertainty because, having been
justified, we shall be saved from the wrath
to come.
Verse 10 takes a similar line of argument.
Paul says, "'For if, when we were enemies,
we were reconciled to God by the death
of his Son,' that's the great fact that
even though we were enemies, even though through
the representatives of our humanity we stood around
Calvary and we clenched our fists in the
face of God, and we rejected his Son,
and we said we will not have this
man to reign over us, well, even when
we were enemies, if now we have been
reconciled to God by the death of his
Son, well then, much more being reconciled, we
shall be saved by his life.
His life of intercession today is our guarantee
that there will be no future wrath, no
future judgment."
Having said this, let me take you again
then to Romans chapter 8, and follow this
great theme that Paul has in the closing
verses of the chapter.
In verse 31, Paul writes, "'What shall we
then say to these things?
If God be for us, who can be
against us?' That means God has come down,
and he has made our cause his cause.
God was moved by compassion and by love,
and seeing us in our need, God made
our cause his cause.
So then, if God be for us, who
can be against us?
And, of course, the answer is obvious, no
one.
There is no obstacle, then, in the way
to future blessing in the thought of righteousness."
And you come on to verse 32, and
this is a logical argument.
"'He that spared not his own son, but
delivered him up for us all, how shall
he not with him also freely give us
all things?' Notice again that the line of
reasoning moves from the greater to the lesser.
Now, God already has done the greater.
What was the greater?
He spared not his son.
Now, if God did that, then you move
down to the lesser.
Well, then, surely he will give us all
things with his son, and of this there
is no doubt.
Looking back and thinking what we were in
our sin, verse 33 reminds us, "'Who shall
lay anything to the charge of God's elect?
It is God that justifies.' That is our
eternal, juridical exoneration, and because God has done
it, no one can come and lay any
charge against his people."
Now, in verse 34, and this is something
we must always remember, even as Christians, none
of us here this morning are justified because
of what we are or what we have
done.
The foundation is always and exclusively the death
and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
So, verse 34 reads, "'Who is he that
condemns?
It is Christ that died, yea, rather, that
is risen again, who is even at the
right hand of God, who also maketh intercession
for us.'" So, we have no boast in
ourselves.
We glory in Jesus Christ, and we have
the sense of security and of certainty because
he died, he rose again, and he lives
today at the right hand of the majesty
on high.
Now, the guard, the guarantee of a future
in which we will always enjoy eternal, juridical
exoneration is the love of God expressed in
the Lord Jesus.
Verse 35, "'Who shall separate us from the
love of Christ?
Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine,
or nakedness, or peril, or sore?' Paul says,
"'As it is written, for thy sake we
are killed all the day long, we are
accounted as sheep for the slaughter.
Nay, in all these things we are more
than conquerors through him that loved us.
For I am persuaded that neither death, nor
life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor
things present, nor things to come, nor height,
nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be
able to separate us from the love of
God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.'"
Let me put it like this.
We go back in our communion services to
Calvin.
Now, beyond the greatest things that men could
do, beyond the greatest expression of the evilness
of human beings, beyond the greatest power of
death or Satan, beyond it all, the ultimate
reality is the love of God, and nothing
can triumph over the love of God.
That's because God has come to us in
love.
Our guard for the future is not our
sound, it is not what we do, it
is not what we say.
It is the love of God.
God has come to us in love.
Nothing can go beyond the love of God,
so we look into the future and there
is nothing that can separate us from the
love of God which has come to us
in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
So, the kingdom of God is righteousness.
We have it now, and we shall have
it forever in the person of God's Son,
and no one now and no one then
will ever come and lay any charge to
those that belong to God.
Now, when it comes to our glorification, the
emphasis falls not on eternal juridical exoneration.
It doesn't fall there.
It falls, rather, on the fact of our
complete moral faultlessness in that coming day.
Let me repeat it to you.
I hope you can remember, because you never
believe it today as we look at each
other.
Usually, we see the spots and the blemishes
and the shortcomings in our brethren and our
sisters.
In that coming day, when we stand beside
the Lord Jesus, we will be surrounded in
all that we are by complete moral faultlessness.
There won't be a spot.
There won't be a blemish.
There won't even be the memory of those
things that today cause so much sorrow in
our fellowship with each other.
Paul writes in Ephesians, according as he has
chosen us in him before the foundation of
the world, that we should be holy and
without blame before him in love.
Now, that term without blame is translated in
a number of ways in the New Testament.
Sometimes, without blemish, Ephesians 5.
Sometimes, unblameable, Colossians 1.
Sometimes, like in Jude and that great doxology,
faultless.
So, when we look to the future and
the coming of the Lord Jesus and our
glorification with him, we will stand with him
without blame, without blemish, unblameable, and faultless.
Now, the marvel of this is that this
is the word that is used of the
Lord Jesus when he came into our situation
and, as the perfect man, did the great
work at Calvary.
So, you read in Hebrews that Christ offered
himself without spot to God.
When you look at the Lord Jesus, you
can't find any blemish.
You can't find any stain.
There was no sin.
There was no fault.
Christ offered himself without spot to God.
And, again, Peter writes that as a lamb
without blemish, he offered himself in that great
sacrifice.
So, we look back this morning, and we
can read through the Gospels, and we see
a man, a perfect man, our Lord and
Savior Jesus Christ.
You can study him, the people did of
that generation.
You can observe him from every angle.
When you do so, and it doesn't matter
how critical you are, you will have to
stand beside Pilate and say over and over
again, I find no fault in this man.
Now, the wonder of God's love and marvel
to us is that in that coming day,
we are going to stand with the Lord
Jesus, and we will be without blemish.
No one will see any spot or any
blemish.
Again, the word that is often used of
the Christian in that sense is the word
holy, for we will be presented before God
in holiness to the degree that will completely
satisfy the holiness of God.
Now, dear Christian friend, this morning, unless I
am very different than you are, I am
often aware, acutely aware, of things that are
not right in my life, of shortcomings, the
longing to be more like the Lord Jesus.
I remember once, as a young man years
ago in Vancouver, I quoted the words of
Paul in a little sermon I gave, and
in the audience my father was there.
The words of Paul that I used were
those well-known words, I know that in
me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no
good thing.
I said it, I guess, rather lightly.
When I went home, my father took me
into his study.
He said, Jim, there are not very many
people who can really say with great honesty
and sincerity what Paul wrote in those words.
Not many of us really believe it.
You see, we're often offended.
We know a great deal about pride, but
Paul knew what he was without God, and
Paul says, I know that in me, that
is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing.
The more we come into a knowledge of
God, the more we come into a knowledge
of ourselves.
May I turn that around?
If we have great thoughts about ourselves of
pride and selfishness and self-interest, it only
goes to say how little we know of
the glory and the holiness of God.
The more you know about him, the more
you know about yourself.
So, then you come back, as I do
day by day, and I thank God that
in virtue of the blood of the Lord
Jesus, I have been given eternal juridical exoneration.
No one will ever point the finger because
of what Christ did.
But not only that, I anticipate the moment
with great longing when I shall see the
Lord Jesus, and will be transformed and surrounded
with complete moral faultlessness.
Then I will be truly Christ-like, and
no one will point the finger, no one
will see a spot, there will be no
blemish, and thank God there will not even
be the memory of all those things we
have experienced in our lives and in our
relationship with each other.
So, the kingdom of God is righteousness, and
part of our moral glorification is that we
will have righteousness not only in the sense
of exoneration, but also in the sense of
moral faultlessness.
Now, the kingdom of God is righteousness.
It is also peace.
We experience today something of peace.
The Jewish people, with that famous word shalom,
they used it in connection with the individual
of a healthy, good life.
So when they would say peace, as they
did in their common salutation, they were wishing
to a friend a healthy and good life.
When they used it in the national sense,
they were speaking of the desire, the longing
for national prosperity and security.
You read through the Old Testament, and of
course peace blows through the whole book.
And so you can understand that the Messianic
longing of the people of Israel, individually and
nationally, was for peace.
Now, the Lord Jesus came, and he said,
as you know, on that great occasion, My
peace I leave with you.
My peace.
I give not as the world gives, but
I give you my peace.
That was the Messianic peace.
That was the wholeness, the stability, the order,
the prosperity of the people of Israel longed
for.
Now, we who have come into a knowledge
of the Lord Jesus, we have in a
measure that peace today.
I would like to put it like this.
You live, even here in Keystone Heights in
Park of the Palm, in a little part
of the world which is characterized by chaos
and disorder.
You came to God sometime in your life,
and when you came to God through the
Lord Jesus Christ, he gave you peace.
That is, he gave you order, and the
longing of God's heart today is that you,
wherever you live and whatever you do, will
manifest in your life something of the order,
the stability that comes from God.
That reminds you of Paul's words again.
God is not the author of confusion, but
of peace.
For in contrast to all the confusion and
chaos of the world is the peace of
God, the order, the stability of God.
Now, how do we understand peace today?
Well, we have it in a measure, and
one has defined peace negatively and positively, and
I would like to share it with you.
I do this this morning, acutely aware of
how much in my own life right now
I understand this.
Negatively, peace is the absence of all that
disturbs and distress.
Now, you may not know it, but I'm
deeply disturbed and distressed this weekend to have
someone that is so close to you, and
that you love so much, and for whom
you feel so weak and unable to do
anything to alleviate the situation.
One is deeply disturbed and distressed.
Now, peace in its fullness is the absence
of all that disturbs and distress, but positively
peace is the presence of everything necessary for
the completeness and the wholeness of life.
You see, peace is not just removing that
which distresses and disturbs, but it's also the
bringing into our lives all that is necessary
for perfection and wholeness.
Now, today, in a measure, we enjoy peace,
but even because of our present situation in
the world, there are things that distress and
disturb, and there is the absence of that
which we need to make life full and
whole.
Well, in that coming day of our glorification,
we will have peace in its wholeness, in
its completion, and there will be nothing to
disturb and distress, and all will be present
for a full and active life in the
service of God, and in the worship of
God.
Then our moral glorification is peace.
It is also righteousness, and it is joy.
Now, I've got two girls, and we gave
them special permission not to be here this
morning.
They're down in the swimming pool.
You'll forgive them, but they have a very
close friend, and they're with her just for
a day or two, and they're taking advantage
to be together.
These two teenage daughters of mine, because they're
not here this morning, I can tell you
this.
Sometimes in our home, the radio is on,
or there may be a record, and if
there is music with just a little life
or beat, as they say, they are quite
capable as two young teenagers to move in
rhythm with the music.
And then they'll turn, and they'll look at
me, and they'll say, Dan, you sure are
square and conservative.
You never move.
You sit there reading all the time, and
there's never any movement in your life.
Well, you know, when you come back to
the Old Testament, you'll find that men who
walked in fellowship with God were men who
expressed joy in their lives.
Now, you won't misunderstand me this morning.
David comes with the people of Israel, and
with the ark of the Lord, and he
brings it up to the place where it
ought to be, and David is leaping and
jumping.
He is dancing before the Lord.
He is filled with the joy of the
Lord.
Now, I'm not suggesting to you folks this
morning that we should jump and leap in
that thing, but I am suggesting that there
is a joy that ought to be in
our lives that is far deeper and far
richer than any movement in our bodies.
And so, you read in that portion in
Ephesians chapter 5, and I will read it
to you.
Verse 18, "'Be not drunk with wine, for
in his excess, but be filled with the
Spirit, speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns
and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in
your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always
for all things unto God and the Father
in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,
submitting yourselves one to another in the fear
of God.' There must be joy if you
walk in fellowship with God.
I'm sure here at the Park of the
Frogs you wouldn't have in this beautiful situation
any like a friend of mine in Vancouver
whom I have known as long as I
can remember, though not a member of the
family.
We call him Uncle Bill, and every time
we ask him how he is, he always
speaks of his complaints and his problems, and
he gives the attitude, the impression that he
lives a life of despondency and of sorrow.
Some people, perhaps, are naturally built like that,
but when you walk in fellowship with God,
there must be joy.
Now, we experience joy.
We experienced it in our singing this morning.
We experienced it in our fellowship with each
other, but dear Christian friend, I don't know
what you consider the greatest pinnacle of your
Christian joy so far in your Christian life,
but whatever that pinnacle may be, I assure
you this morning that on that day of
our coming glorification, we will experience joy in
a measure that really today is beyond our
comprehension.
That is part of our glorification.
We will be fully morally righteous.
We will be at peace with God and
with each other, and we will experience the
joy of God in a measure we have
never yet been able to understand or experience.
I think the Lord Jesus knew, of course,
of that joy when you read in Hebrews
that for the joy that was set before
him, he endured the cross and despised the
shame.
The reason I quote the verse is that
it gives you the sense that that joy
which he knew and could anticipate was far,
far greater.
It, so to speak, overwhelmed all that he
was about to experience in the horror of
the crump and the shame that men heaped
upon him, and so for that joy he
endured the cross and he despised the shame.
That gives us just a little insight into
how great and wonderful it would be.
So, we will be glorified morally in righteousness,
in peace, and in joy.
Now, as I close this morning, I would
like to leave with you one other aspect
of that moral glorification that awaits us, and
I can think of no better word than
the word freedom.
I know it's a great word in the
world today.
It's a word that is greatly abused, but
in the Bible it is a very important
word, the word freedom.
Let me put it like this.
The Lord Jesus, when he was here, he
said, Whosoever committed sin is the servant of
sin.
Then he added, If the Son therefore shall
make you free, you shall be free indeed.
Now, in our flag in the Dominican Republic,
right in the center is the National Coat
of Arms.
In the very center of the National Coat
of Arms is a white cross on which
there is an open Bible, and the Bible
is open in John's Gospel, chapter 8, and
the verse that appears in that page is
this, You shall know the truth, and the
truth shall make you free.
Now, it's ironic, but truth and freedom have
been conspicuous by their absence in the history
of the Dominican Republic, but there it is
in the center of our flag and our
National Coat of Arms.
You shall know the truth, and the truth
shall make you free.
Now, that's not abstract truth.
You read that in the context here of
John 8.
It is to know the Son, the Lord
Jesus, and if you know him, then he
will make you free indeed, and that freedom
is freedom from the power and the authority
of sin.
For, the Bible says in that chapter, whosoever
committed sin is a servant of sin.
Now, when we came to the Lord Jesus,
we were given in a measure that freedom
from sin and the authority of sin, but
I doubt if there's a person here this
morning who has not sensed in their Christian
life many times the compulsion to sin, and
those who in all honesty recognize before God
that as Christians they have sinned.
Well, when we talk about our moral glorification,
we will have freedom from sin.
That is, freedom from the compulsion to sin.
There will no longer be any compulsion in
us to do that which is displeasing to
God, but not only freedom from the compulsion
to sin, but there will be freedom, how
precious this is, from the deception of sin.
You know, Philippians chapter 3, you have the
story of Paul.
Paul was a man who believed.
He went outside of Damascus, his eyes were
open, he realized he was the chiefest of
sinners.
Now, how can a man honestly believe he
is righteous, only to have his eyes open
to find that he is a great sinner?
Well, the answer is simply, he has been
deceived by sin.
Paul goes on in that chapter to tell
us that he believed he was blameless.
Then his eyes were open, and he realized
that his whole life was a series of
faults before God.
Now, how can that happen?
Because a man was deceived by sin, and
of course the greatest sorrow in Philippians chapter
3 is that you have Paul persecuting the
followers of Jesus Christ, and honestly believing he
was doing a great service for God.
Then his eyes were open to find out
that it was a tragic disservice for God.
Now, how can that happen?
He was deceived by sin.
Now, not only can the natural man be
deceived by sin, but the Christian can be
deceived by sin.
Let me share with you some of my
experiences without being specific.
Many times in my life as a Christian,
I have come to the word of God,
and I've come to some verse, some portion,
some truth, and I have seen it as
I have never seen it or understood it
before, and it has changed my thinking, and
I have recognized that for a period of
time I was under the deception of sin.
I had erroneous thoughts about certain things, for
sin is so subtle it can come in
even to the Christian's life and deceive him,
and that's why we come back to the
word of God, because it has that continuing
corrective influence in our lives.
Well, in that coming day we will be
freed forever from the deception of sin, and
the last thought leads us now into our
theme for this evening.
We will have freedom from the consequences of
sin.
The wages of sin is death, and so
our Christian friends, they slip away one by
one, and I think I can be honest
and open with you this morning.
I've been away from Park of the Palms
less than two years, and since coming back
this weekend and in talking with the friends
and noticing in the audience the absence of
people we knew before, I have understood and
been told that some who were here less
than two years ago have now gone through
the experience of death.
They have left us, and their presence have
gone.
Thank God that in on that day of
coming glory we will be free, not only
from the compulsion to sin, not only from
the deception of sin, but forever from the
consequences of sin.
No more separation caused by death, but that
great united fellowship around the presence of our
Lord Jesus Christ forever.
So, I summarize.
Our moral glorification means that we will have
righteousness in its fullness, peace in its fullness,
joy in its fullness, and freedom in its
fullness.
That will be a glorious day.
Charles Spurgeon once said, As for me, I
cannot say that I will speak of the
glory, but I will try to stammer about
it, for the best language to which a
man can reach concerning glory must be a
mere stammering.
So, speaking to you this morning of our
moral glorification, I have only stammered.
For Paul says, He saw things for which
there is no adequate language on earth to
describe.
All we know is that we shall be
like him, for we shall see him as
he is.
Not just in the bodily sense, but in
the moral sense.
And I think the psalmist, and you read
in some of the psalms those truths that
are really New Testament truths, but they appear
in the Old Testament, and especially in the
psalms.
The psalmist wrote, As for me, I will
behold thy face in righteousness.
I shall be satisfied when I awake with
thy likeness.
Now, I never take that to mean exclusively
any bodily likeness of the Lord Jesus, though
that, no doubt, is inferred.
But I take it in the moral sense.
The mature Christian, the spiritual Christian, knows what
the psalmist means.
I shall be satisfied when I awake in
his likeness.
Let us sing just two verses as we
close this morning the beautiful hymn, hymn number
413.
A little while our Lord shall come and
we shall wander here no more.
He'll take us to our Father's home where
he for us has gone before, to dwell
with him, to see his face, and sing
the glory of his grace.
Let's remain seated, and I suggest we sing
the first and the last verses of hymn
number 413.
We shall remain seated.
Longings of our hearts today, and we thank
you for that blessed hope that we shall
see the Lord face to face, and on
that glorious moment we shall then be like
him forever.
In the meantime, we pray that you will
give us the grace to grow in the
grace and in the knowledge of our Lord
and Savior Jesus Christ.
As we wait for that great moment, Lord,
do give us the interest, the inner courage,
and the grace to become more like him
day by day while we wait for his
coming.
And now we pray for a good day.
We pray that you will bless our fellowship
together and bring us back this evening for
another message from your word, and we give
you our thanks now in his worthy and
precious name.
Amen.