Word of Salvation – Vol.53 No.14 – April 2008

 

He Was Raised to Life for Our Justification

An EASTER Sermon by Rev John De Hoog on Romans 4:25

Scripture Readings:  1 Corinthians 15:1-28; Romans 4:18-5:5

Suggested Singing:  BoW 16; 312; 332

 

Brothers and Sisters in Christ.

At 2.30 in the morning on Monday, July 9, 1984, lightning struck the York Minster cathedral. This majestic Gothic cathedral was the pride of the town of York in the north of England. A raging fire broke out, the beautiful, carved oak vaulting of the southern end of the cathedral was reduced to ashes, and a priceless sixteenth-century window of some 8000 separate panes was cracked. The cathedral did not burn down all together, but much damage was done. People all over England began talking in an excited way about the judgment of God. Many were convinced that the lightning bolt was an expression of the anger of God. Why? What was God supposed to have been angry about?

Three days earlier, in that same cathedral at York, the new Bishop of Durham had been consecrated. Dr David Jenkins had been chosen and was ordained as the new bishop. But why the controversy? Because in the months before his consecration, Dr Jenkins had repeatedly denied the virgin birth of Christ, and had made a point of denying the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ. As the time of the consecration drew near the media focused on Dr Jenkins. His comments caused a tremendous stir. A nation-wide petition bearing 12,500 signatures arrived at York. The Archbishop of York received a multitude of protests and an official delegation of clergy requested that the consecration be delayed or cancelled. In spite of that, the consecration went ahead. The ceremony took place on Friday July 6, with the customary pomp and circumstance, as well as several interruptions by protesters during the service. It all received great media attention.

Then, on the third day after the consecration, the lightning struck! The BBC TV weather report said there was no storm over York that night. There was an isolated cell of rainfall that moved rapidly over the city that morning, but it was seen as very unlikely to be the source of such a devastating bolt. And for some reason, the lightning conductors attached to the cathedral failed to protect the building on that day, even though they had always worked in the past.

A bolt of lightning from God? We can’t say for sure, can we? Perhaps it was, perhaps it wasn’t. Only God knows. But what were the comments Dr Jenkins made that drew so much fire, if not from God, then certainly from people all over England?

Dr Jenkins denied that Jesus Christ had risen physically from the grave. He interpreted the statements about God raising Christ in spiritual terms rather than physical terms. He said that the miracle God did was giving the disciples a settled conviction about the “risenness” and continuing relevance of Christ even after his death. He saw the miracle of Christ’s resurrection as being a psychological and spiritual miracle in the hearts of the disciples, rather than a physical miracle in the body of Jesus Christ. He felt that it didn’t matter that Christ’s body was still in the grave, what was important was that the centrality of Christ was something fresh and alive in the hearts of his disciples.

Is the resurrection important for our faith? If it didn’t happen, would it really make much difference for us who live at the end of the twentieth century? Isn’t the really important thing that he lives in our hearts now, rather than what happened to him two thousand years ago?

I think you know the answer. Certainly if you read your Bible with a believing heart, you will quickly come to a very simple conclusion. The physical resurrection of Jesus Christ is the centrepiece, the cornerstone of the Christian faith. The Christian faith stands or falls with the resurrection. If the physical resurrection of Christ did not occur on an actual day in about 30 AD, then we are shipwrecked and the world is a hopeless place for us.

I can be so blunt because the Bible is so blunt. 1 Corinthians 15:14 it says, “And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith.” Verses 17,18 “And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost.” If the resurrection of Jesus Christ did not occur, we cannot be saved, and anything we do or say about life and death is ultimately meaningless.

Just imagine, for a moment, the line of God’s salvation purposes and work in history. Think back. Noah and seven others saved from the flood in the ark. Abraham, chosen from a pagan background to be the ancestor of all who believe. Moses, preserved from the vicious attack of Pharaoh on all the baby boys of the Hebrews, and called to lead God’s people out of slavery. David, the ideal king whose throne is established forever. Isaiah, Daniel, Esther, Nehemiah, Ezra, Malachi, John the Baptist. All pointing forward to Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the Saviour, the climax of God’s saving work. And then, Jesus dies on the cross … and, and that’s the end? That’s it? The whole of God’s work, all the preparation, it all just comes to a screeching halt? Diverted off the highway of God’s purposes into a side street, and at the end of that side street is the grave, where the bones of Jesus have just about finished rotting away? Is that all?

Do you see? If the resurrection of Jesus Christ did not occur, then God has been defeated and only death and darkness are left.

And so we say that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the centrepiece of Christianity. And we are familiar with that truth, I’m sure.

Now today, my aim in this sermon is very simple. It is that we should all become familiar with one very important truth about the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and that is, its link to our justification. I want only one thing from you. There is only one great point of application from today’s sermon. I want you to change the way you speak about justification.

We are used to saying that our sins are forgiven because Jesus died for us on the cross. But that’s not enough; we need to change the way we speak. Even Dr David Jenkins could affirm that statement. Instead of saying that our sins are forgiven because Jesus died for us, we need to get used to saying that our sins are forgiven because Jesus died and rose again for us. This is the point of Romans 4:25. “He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.”

The resurrection of Jesus Christ is essential to our justification.

What is justification? What do we mean when we say we are justified? Justification is essentially a legal term. It is God’s declaration that a believer is delivered from the guilt of sin.

When a person is arrested for a criminal offence and is then found guilty, the offence goes onto his criminal record. To have a criminal record is a big disadvantage in life. Often in the case of first time or juvenile offenders, a court will look sympathetically at an argument to reduce the severity of the charge so that no criminal record is attached to a person. A person with a criminal record cannot become a policeman or a nurse, he cannot serve on a jury, he will suffer in other ways.

Before God, every single person has a criminal record. Everything we have ever done is affected by sin and flawed with sin, everything we have ever done adds to our criminal record.

In justification, God does an amazing thing. He takes your criminal record, and he puts a stamp on every page. That stamp reads “Not Guilty”. When God justifies us, he treats us as if we had never sinned nor been sinners. He treats us as if we had been as perfectly obedient to him as Christ himself was. He forgives us completely; he makes us right with God. Justification is a wonderful blessing. But how is it connected with the resurrection of Christ?

Scripture makes it very clear that it is only possible for us to receive justification, to receive forgiveness of sins, because Jesus died in our place. This is familiar teaching to us, isn’t it! In Romans 3 Paul teaches that we are justified freely by God’s grace because God presented Jesus as a sacrifice of atonement in our place – he died in our place, he died so that we need not die eternally. In Romans 5:9, Paul writes, “We have now been justified by his blood…” We find it again and again. And we know it well.

Think about the question. How can God declare you not guilty? How do you answer? Because Jesus Christ died on the cross and took the punishment for me. The punishment no longer falls on me because it fell on him. We can be justified because Jesus died for us. But then, along comes Romans 4:25. “He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification!” And we read in 1 Corinthians 15 that if Christ has not been raised you are still in your sins – “still in your sins” – in other words, not justified. Justification is impossible without the resurrection.

Of course it’s true that Jesus died for our justification. But it is also true that he rose again for our justification. If he had not risen, we could not be justified, our sins could not be forgiven. It’s not enough to say that we are justified only because Christ died for us. We have to say we are justified only because Christ died for us and then rose again for us. The resurrection of Christ is just as crucial to our justification, to our forgiveness, as the death of Christ.

Why is this so? Romans 4:25 makes it clear. “He [Jesus] was handed over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.” He was handed over to death for our sins. In his death, Jesus represented us. He took all of God’s wrath against sin for all of his people.

Now think. As long as he remained in the state of death, he remained under that condemnation for sin. As long as he remained in the grave, death, that punishment for our sin that he entered, had its hold on him. Would it end here? In the grave? Would this be the final movement in God’s work? Would it all just end in death?

No!! For he rose from the dead! Jesus defeated death. When Jesus rose, the verdict of condemnation was removed. The resurrection of Jesus annulled the sentence of condemnation. The resurrection of Jesus was the justification of Jesus. When God raised Jesus from the dead, he declared Jesus just, he declared Jesus right, righteous. The condemnation of sin, our sin, has been cancelled out. The sentence has been reversed. Jesus has been declared righteous, Jesus has been justified.

So in Romans 1:4 Paul can say that he, “through the Spirit of holiness was declared with power to be the Son of God, by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord.” And in Romans 4:25, our text, he says, “He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.” By raising Jesus from the dead, God declared that the condemnation Jesus suffered for our sin was annulled, reversed, cancelled. Jesus has paid the price. How do you know? Because he has been raised. He has finished paying the price for us, it has been fully paid, and he has risen from the dead to prove it. Without the resurrection, that condemnation would never have been annulled. That condemnation would have killed Jesus, and it would have killed us, and that would have been the end. God’s plan would have come to nothing. If Christ has not been raised, then your faith is futile, you are still in your sins, and there is nothing beyond this life but death, just as there was nothing for Jesus but death.

But Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. The first fruits of those who have been justified. Jesus rose again for our justification. The death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ cannot be separated. Without the resurrection, there would be no justification. So what is there for you after this life? Did Christ take on your sin when he died? When Christ rose 2000 years ago, did he leave behind him in the grave every one of your sins? Are your sins permanently buried from the sight of God?

The Bishop of Durham, Dr David Jenkins, may have been a high-ranking man in the Church of England. But since he denied that Christ truly rose from the dead, he had no right to assume even the most basic thing in the Christian life. He had no basis on which to presume that he had been justified, been declared not guilty of his sins by God. For if Christ has not been raised, we are still in our sins.

But Christ has been raised from the dead. And that simple fact has changed all of history. As the Heidelberg Catechism puts it, “By His resurrection He has overcome death, so that He might make us share in the righteousness He won for us by His death.”

So then, today we have just one point of application; one very simple point to remember. It’s not enough to say that your sins are forgiven because Jesus died for you. Get used to saying that your sins are forgiven because Jesus died and rose again for you.

Amen.