"Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand; and we exult in hope of the glory of God." (Romans 5:1-2)
I recently committed to memory the passage beginning with these verses. They've been rattling around in my head for the past two weeks. I've spent a lot of time contemplating them, manipulating them in my mind to see all the various angles with the result that they increasingly captivate me and encourage my heart. They are the last thing I think of as I fall asleep at night and the first thing I bring to mind when I awake in the morning. As painful as it can be to memorize, what immense value it affords! To further develop my thoughts in this direction I decided to read Martyn Lloyd-Jones sermon on these verses. The following excerpt offers his great insight into how we need to think about the gospel in relation to ourselves and how careful we must be when presenting it to others.
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What a wise teacher (Paul) is! ...Every time he mentions these glorious blessings he persists in telling us that we get them 'through our Lord Jesus Christ', that they cannot be obtained apart from Him, and that any man who thinks he knows God, or is blessed by God, except in and 'through our Lord Jesus Christ', is deluding and fooling himself. There is no other way. He is the only way.
What is it that we get through Him? The first thing is, 'peace with God'. "Having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.' This is the thing He puts first. He goes on to tell us of the blessings we get from God through the Lord Jesus Christ. But that is only put in the second position. This is put first - 'peace with God'.
Why am I emphasizing that? ... there are many people today who put the blessings first, and invite people to 'Come to Jesus' in order that they may get this or that or the other blessing, without saying a word about 'peace with God'. ...'Do you want a Friend? do you need help? do you need comfort? do you want happiness, peace and joy?' These are the things they put forward and emphasize, and so Christianity is made to look like the cults and to appear to be in competition with them.
The primary business of the Christian Gospel is not to give us blessings. ...It's primary function is to reconcile us to God. ...It should ever be one of our objects to show the uniqueness of the Christian message, and so the first thing we must emphasize is 'peace with God'. Why? For the simple reason that we can have no blessings from God until we first of all have an access into God's presence and are reconciled to Him. We cannot pray to God as we are, and if we desire God to bless us, the first question we have to face is this - How can I have an entry, how can I have access to God, how can I have an audience with God? We shall never know 'the peace of God' until we first have 'peace with God'.
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