A question still remains, however. John obviously wants those to whom he is writing to keep free of sin, but how precisely do the truths about which he has been speaking lead to godliness? He has spoken of God’s faithfulness in forgiving sin. But how does the assurance of forgiveness actually lead to holiness?
This is the principle of 1 John 2:1-2: forgiveness in advance for any sin that might ever come into our lives. This is God’s promise, and it is given to us precisely that we might not sin. God is not shocked by human behavior, as we often are; for He sees it in advance, including the sins of Christians. Moreover, and in spite of this, He sent His Son to die for the sins of His people so that there might be full forgiveness.
The second term used by John of Jesus is “righteous.” Indeed, it is this word rather than either “advocate” or “propitiation” which is emphasized. In what sense is it used?
It is in the Old Testament sacrificial system that the true idea of propitiation is observed, for if anything is conveyed through the system of sacrifices (in the biblical sense of sacrifice) it is that God has Himself provided the way by which a sinful man or woman may approach Him. Sin means death. “The soul that sinneth, it shall die” (Ezek. 18:4, 20). But the sacrifices teach that there is, nevertheless, a way of escape and of approaching God.
Somewhere in my library I have a pamphlet by Donald Grey Barnhouse entitled How to Mark Your Bible. This pamphlet contains suggestions for using Bible markings as an aid to Bible study, and it contains sample pages from a Bible Barnhouse used and marked thoroughly. I think of this now because at Romans 3:21 and following, Barnhouse had written the picture of a heart in the margin of his Bible. That was to remind him, as he came to this passage, that Romans 3:21-27 is the heart of the Word of God.
Verses 10 and 11 capsulize Paul’s whole theology on this subject when he writes, “There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God.” When Paul says there is no one righteous, he is talking about the moral dimensions of our being. When he says there is no one who understands, he is talking about the intellectual dimension of our being. When he says there is no one who seeks God, he is talking about the volitional dimension of our being. Together these mean that things are so desperate that our state is actually hopeless unless God intervenes to do what needs to be done.
We need to see how desperate our situation is, because it is only when we see this that we can begin to appreciate the magnitude of the grace of God. So long as we think that at the worst we only have a few flaws, we believe that insofar as salvation is concerned all we need is for God to make up the deficit, plug the hole in the dike, or rub off the rough edges. But that is not the situation.
In Christ, God has turned aside His own wrath, punishing sin in the person of His Son who died for sinners. We deserve to die. The wages of sin is death, and we have sinned. Nevertheless, God sent Jesus to bear the punishment of death in our place. He experienced the wrath of God for us.
Yesterday we looked at propitiation and justification. The third term is redemption. It is a business term. It has to do with buying something back. In the ancient world much of the commerce had to do with the purchase and selling of slaves, and this term relates particularly to slavery. It meant to buy a slave out of slavery and set the slave free. It is what Jesus has done for us.
When I was talking about the third chapter of Romans, I pointed out that Romans 3 is the heart of the Bible. If that is true, Romans 8 is the Bible’s climax. It is a climax because it takes us from the matter of our deliverance from the penalty and power of sin to that final glorious consummation of our salvation when we are made free from sin in all respects and are brought into the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ and God the Father forever.
You recall what is said in the third chapter of John’s gospel, the very chapter which contains that great verse beloved by Christians everywhere, beginning, “For God so loved the world . . .” The chapter talks about the Gospel: that God sent Jesus Christ that we might have eternal life. But immediately after that it also talks about condemnation, saying that if we have not believed in Jesus we are condemned already because of our unbelief. In other words, our natural state is not neutral.
Just as Adam, Moses, David, and all the Old Testament figures were saved, though they were sinners, so did Christ save the woman, knowing that the time was coming when He would die upon the cross to pay the just punishment, not only for her sin, but for all whom the Holy Spirit should draw to faith in Him, ourselves included.
Third, in verses 26 and 27, Paul talks about our weakness. “The Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness,” he says. He acknowledges that we have it. We have a sinful nature within. We face hostile circumstances without. We are weak. How can we triumph? How do we know that these things are not going to gang up on us, and in the end, regardless of the value of the death of Christ, overcome us and defeat us?
The second reason why there will be no separation from the love of God is the impotence of everything, when set over against the sovereign love of God toward us in Christ Jesus. What are things, when set over against God? Paul talks about a number of things that might tend to separate us from that love.
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