GLORIFYING IN THE CROSS
GALATIANS 6:11-18
DECEMBER 27, 1998


Paul's concern was to deal with a group known as the Judaizers, a group who professed to be Christians, and yet who were still hanging on to the law and hanging on to circumcision as the means to truly have a right relationship with God, to truly be justified before the Lord. They would acknowledge that faith was okay, but faith was not enough. You had to be circumcised. You had to adhere to the works of the law. And so Paul, with the same fierceness that we see in the opening verses of chapter one, comes to the close of this epistle, and he bears down with all of his apostolic authority, and he makes this declaration: "May it never be that I should boast except in the cross of my Lord Jesus Christ." Is that your boast? Or do you have such an attitude, even as the Judaizers did, that you can look at your life, you can look and see something that you have done, that you think has commended you to God. You see, the human mind will do all sorts of things to get away from the cross of Jesus Christ, because the cross is an offense. Martyn Lloyd-Jones wrote that, "The cross of our Lord Jesus Christ is either an offense to us or else it is the thing above everything else in which we glory." So the critical question we face is this: Can we leave the cross out and still have Christianity? Is there such a thing as a cross-less gospel?

I was listening on Sunday morning to the radio for just a brief period, and I heard a man who is a Southern Baptist pastor from another state, in a very well know, strategic position. And he was preaching a Christmas morning message; certainly a wonderful opportunity to declare the gospel of Jesus Christ. But I was appalled in his gospel presentation. Yes, he did talk about Jesus. Yes, he even, sort of vaguely, even mentioned faith in Jesus, but there was never a mention of the cross. There was never a mention of the death of Christ. There was never a mention of Christ's atoning for our sins or Christ bearing the wrath of God; whatever term that we might find in the New Testament to describe that work that Jesus did on the cross, there was no mention of it at all, not even a hint.  Yet that was presented as the gospel of Christ.

My friends, if that can happen, in what is certainly considered to be a very conservative pulpit, it happens all over the place, all the time, Sunday after Sunday, day after day, all across our land, because the cross is an offense to the human heart. Until you can come to that point where you say, "I glory in the cross, and in the cross alone. My only boast is in the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ," my friend, I daresay, you've never come to really know what it is to be a Christian.

Early in this century, one of the most prominent German theologians was Rudolph Bultmann. He subtly left out the historical act of Jesus on the cross. Bultmann taught that the actual work of Jesus on the cross was non-consequential. He said, "What matters is not whether the execution of Jesus actually took place, but whether we have crucified our own old nature, its lust, and earthbound striving for security." In other words, Bultmann said, "It's not what Christ did 2,000 years ago on the cross the matters; it is what we do now that matters." Now, is that such a strange idea in our day?

I was talking to a man who teaches evangelism in a seminary. And we were discussing the subject of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And he asked me, "Well, what is the gospel? If you're talking with someone and you're explaining the gospel, what do you say to that person?" And so I gave him a synopsis of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And I talked about the person of God, and I talked about His character and His holiness and so forth. I talked about the person of Christ, his deity and his humanity. I talked about the sinfulness of man, and our separation from God, and our enmity between us and God, and how there is this necessity of Jesus Christ becoming a man and bearing the judgment of God for us at the cross, so that He satisfied the judgment of God. And this is what this man said.  He said, "Oh, you don't need all that stuff."  I responded, "That stuff? That stuff is the gospel." I then asked, "Well, what do you need then? What do you say to a person?" He said, "Oh, all they need to do is just surrender. You just need to tell them to surrender." And I thought to myself, "This man is teaching theological students evangelism?"

Paul said, "May it never be that I should boast" - that is, boast in all these things: in my surrender, boast in how much I'm crucifying myself, boast in how much I'm denying myself, boast in all those things that I've done.  He said, "May it never be that I should boast, except in the cross of my Lord Jesus Christ." Is that your boast today? Do you glory in the cross? Let us consider for a few minutes this morning the whole issue that true salvation means that my confidence is in Jesus Christ and Him crucified. That's where I hang my trust. That's where my faith is wrapped up; not in me, not even in my relationship to the church (as wonderful as that might be), not in my service. And I might say, on my part, not in my preaching. Instead, my faith and my confidence is in Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

I. A Cross-less Gospel

First of all, as we consider this text, we are confronted by the issue of a cross-less gospel. Verses 12 and 13, as Paul writes with his own hand in large letters, probably capital letters, rather than the lower case letters.  He writes and he begins to describe the same crowd that he's been discussing throughout this epistle, this group known as Judaizers. Now you can look for the word Judaizer and you will not find it in this epistle. That has been coined by theologians and New Testament scholars to help us understand this group. They were called Judaizers because they were trying to persuade people who professed faith in Christ to embrace Judaism. The real ringer for your life is not that you've professed faith in Jesus Christ, yes you've had that, that's good, but that you have followed the act of circumcision, and you have embraced the ceremonial law, and you have embraced the law as the means to justification. And we find that scattered throughout this entire epistle the whole theme is Paul dealing with Christ and Christ alone. In the early portion of this epistle, we find that Paul says that that kind of gospel, that cross-less gospel, is deserting Christ. It is a different gospel. It is a distortion of the gospel. It is a gospel contrary to what they have received. And he said, "If that is the kind of gospel that you're listening to, then you have been bewitched." He spoke that in no uncertain terms. And then concerning the gospel, he contrasted with the truth of the gospel. And you see that theme running throughout this epistle. And the issue of justification by faith, and by faith alone, that is, that we are declared righteous before a God, in a legal sense, through faith in Christ and Him crucified, Christ in the sufficiency of what he accomplished on the cross on behalf of sinners. So, he contrasts these two throughout the epistle.

1. A cross-less gospel depends upon manipulation


Now, what happens in a cross-less gospel? You see, if someone is trying to get someone to make a decision before God, to be in a supposed right relationship with God, but they subtract the cross, then the first thing they're going to have to do is depend upon manipulation. I know of no other way to create some sense of decision in a person's mind, apart from the cross of Christ, without using manipulation. You'll notice that he says in verse 12, "Those who desire to make a good showing in the flesh try to compel you to be circumcised, simply that they may not be persecuted for the cross of Christ." This idea of showing, means to play the role, to make fair appearance, to look good. And so, the picture that Paul is giving from one stand point is that of these Judaizers, these supposed missionaries, who were coming into the Galatian region preaching a false gospel, trying to look good. They were doing everything they could to persuade people to be converted. They used all sorts of efforts to bring about decisions, and they called it conversion. And on the part of those who were falling prey to them, they were looking at the things they did, and they were thinking that they were making a good showing. "Look what I've done. I've obeyed the law. Look what I've done. I have submitted to circumcision. Look what I have done." Paul said, "No! Don't boast in any of that. There's no saving power in any of that." You see, the common fault in the human mind, and the way to appeal to a human mind, is to let a person know that you've got everything within you that is necessary to be in a right relationship with God. "You've got it all. You're such a wonderful person."

As a matter of fact, one preacher out on the west coast, Robert Schuller, said, "I don't think anything has been done in the name of Christ and under the banner of Christianity that has proven more destructive to human personality and hits counter-productive to the evangelistic enterprise than the unchristian, uncouth strategy of attempting to make people aware of their lost and sinful condition." Well, if you don't make people aware of their lost and sinful condition, if you just let them know that everything is fine - Que sera, sera, I'm okay, you're okay, everybody's okay; you've just got to improve a few things with God, and that's all you need - then the human mind can be easily manipulated to effect some kind of decision, so that outwardly there is, what Paul says, "a good showing in the flesh." Looks goods on the outside. Maybe a person goes through the motions and the emotions of a relationship to Christ. They want all the benefits and all the blessings, but no cross, no true commitment that is found at the cross, where you die to the world and the world dies to you.

You see, man sometimes forgets that he is not saved for his comfort and for his good, primarily. He's saved for the glory of God. In that next epistle of Ephesians, Paul writes beginning in the first chapter, verse 8, "In all wisdom and insight, He made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His kind intention, which he purposed in Him, with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens, and things upon the earth. In Him, also, we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined, according to His purpose, who works all things after the council of His will. To the end, we, who were the first to hope in Christ, should be to the praise of His glory." If you really get down to it, and you ask why did God save you, there is only one sufficient answer: For His glory.

And yet, do you ever think this, or do you hear that expounded very often in our day? I don't want to say ever, because certainly you do hear it occasionally, but it's rarely heard. Instead, there is this idea that if you can view the issue of salvation for personal comfort, then it's easy to manipulate someone to do something. It is simply a matter of sales techniques. I remember quite a few years ago, a book that came out by a man, who considered himself to be a great salesman for God, and the book was entitled: God's Super Salesman. That's called manipulation; my friend, that's called heresy. That's not the cross of Christ.

Paul says, "What do they do? They try to make a good showing in the flesh, simply that they may not be persecuted for the cross of Christ." He said, "They want to compel you to be circumcised. They want to kind of psychologically, emotionally twist your arm behind your back until you say, "Uncle," and it's time for you to respond. There's some kind of pressure exerted, some kind of manipulation that is upon the mind, and put upon the emotions, in order to cause someone to make an outward appearance of looking good. They'll go into great measures all to avoid the cross of Jesus Christ.

You see, that cross-less gospel is really a popular gospel to the unregenerate heart, because the cross is offensive. Anyway you cut it, you look at the cross, and it absolutely shatters our intellectual pride. Man thinks he's too sophisticated, that he's too bright to humble himself at the cross, and yet the Scripture says, "The foolishness of God is wiser than men." The Jews looked at Jesus Christ dying on the cross and that became a stumbling block for them. The Greeks looked at it and said, "That's the most foolish thing that I've ever seen in my life, that there is some kind of saving power in a man dying on a cross." The Jews had a preconceived notion of who the Messiah would be, and how the Messiah would act. And when the cross of Jesus Christ cut across the grain of their thinking they cast it aside as crazy ideas; it shattered their intellectual pride.

The cross of Jesus Christ cuts across our ideas of human philosophy and ideology. Martyn Lloyd-Jones pointed out that we all have ideas about everything, including religion, and consequently we think the natural man in its unregenerate condition thinks that he knows what makes man a Christian. We think we know what God expects, and we're quite confident that we can do it, that we have it in us. If we only put our backs and our wills into it, we can do it. And then you come to the cross, and you see yourself helpless, helpless, helpless. "The cross proclaims at once", as Lloyd-Jones said, "that we are not saved by ideas." We're not saved by thought. We're not saved by our understanding. We're not saved by philosophy. We're saved by a work that is outside of us, the work of Christ, being our substitute, before the wrath and judgment of God at the cross.

The cross is offensive because it is also something that seems to be immoral to the mind of man. The very idea that someone would be punished for another person is immoral; as a matter of fact, the very idea that we should be punished for our sins sounds immoral in most people's minds. Did you know that the Romans would not even say that Latin word crux. They would not even use that word for cross, because it's just not the polite thing to do in public. Instead, they had a euphemism. And I would not even attempt to say the Latin, but it's translated, "Hang him on an unlucky tree." They would use a term to substitute for the term cross.

How often do you have conversations or find people discussing the cross outside of the circle of your friends that are in love with Jesus Christ? How often? People will talk about all kinds of religious ideas, and they'll talk about church, and they may even talk about being good, and they'll talk about morality, and they'll even talk about service; but the idea that at that cross there was a substitute made and the wrath of God was poured out upon you in the person of Christ, that's foreign to the human mind. It's immoral, and so he won't consider it.

You see, the mind has difficulty grasping that substitutionary work of Jesus Christ on the cross, and so it's easier to just reject this. Instead, it's much easier to manipulate the mind and manipulate a person by excluding the cross and appealing to some aspect of supposed human goodness, some area of emotional reality in a person's life. They may even use the idea of the cross as a means of inspiration; maybe even sing a few hymns about the cross to inspire people, but no cross as the only means for a sinner to be in a right relationship with God. You see, those who fall prey to a cross-less gospel have been manipulated.

2. A cross-less gospel is evident by self-glorifying


But there's another thing; a cross-less gospel is evident by self-glorying. You'll notice in verse 13: "For those who are circumcised do not even keep the law themselves." Paul says, "Look at their character. Look at their lives. Do they follow through? Do they keep all of the laws? Do they do everything they've told you to do?" He said, "Of course not.  But they desire to have you circumcised that they may boast on your flesh." This is so interesting and actually so up-to-date in what he's saying. The idea of boasting is self-glorying, and whether it is the one who is seeking to do the converting, or the one who has supposedly been converted, there's glorying on both sides. "Look what I've done", instead of what the Lord has done. "Look how I have won all of these souls. Look what I have done to do this." I like what Alan Cole wrote. He said, "Paul's point was that the Jews wanted ecclesiastical statistics. So many circumcisions in a given year certainly was something to boast about." Timothy George adds, "When they", that is, the Judaizers, "returned to Jerusalem, they wanted to be able to stand up with all the people in the missionary meeting, and declare that they had traveled far and wide and had a good many scalps to show for their effort."

It's much like what we hear in our own day.  Pastors get together, and what do they boast in? "Look how many baptisms I've had." Same thing the Judaizers were doing, except they were boasting in how many circumcisions they had; the very same thing. Can you imagine 2,000 years ago, doing the same thing that's happening in our day? Paul explains it, "that they may boast in your flesh." Probably a little bit of play on words with the idea of circumcision there, as well.

You look at the self-glorying in our day, instead of that sense of humility that is brought to bear upon us by the cross, and you realize something has gone awry. Something is rather strange with so much of what professes to be gospel. As a matter of fact, a man looks at what he does, and he looks at what he's accomplished, and he begins to boast, and he begins to think that God owes him something. As a matter of fact, the average person thinks that the Lord certainly owes him something.

The fact is God doesn't owe us anything, but divine judgment. If you're unbelieving, at this very moment you are under divine judgment. And it's simply the mercy of God and His graciousness to you in a loving way that keeps you from facing all the fierceness of His divine wrath at this very moment. And that's the condition of the sinful man. Have you thought about how Jesus spent His days, His earthly days doing good for others, healing people, taking care of the poor, feeding them, helping the downtrodden, relieving pain and sorrow, and then ultimately going to the cross. And yet the multitudes said, "Away with Him. Crucify Him. Get rid of Him. We don't want that." You'll look at the mind of the typical unregenerate person, and you see that manifest in saying, "I don't want Jesus Christ." And why do they not want Jesus?  Because Jesus said, "I have come to seek and to save that which was lost."

You see, the human mind doesn't mind Jesus Christ coming along and doing nice things for us and giving us what we need and all of that and kind of patting us on the head and telling us we're good and making us comfortable in life. That is okay, that's very appealing to people, but when you begin to see that the very reason Jesus went to the cross was because we are lost, separated from God, under damnation this very moment; that we come into this world, not learning to be a sinner, but born with the nature of a sinner, so that nobody even has to teach us to sin. You don't pull out an instruction book on how to sin.  Every child that comes through naturally sins; that is our nature, and we're under the very judgment of God. And so people object to the cross of Christ, because that cross means there's something wrong with our human condition. And if there's something wrong with our human condition, then you can't really glory in your flesh, can you? You have to look to another to find your boasting, to boast in Christ alone.


II. The Assertion of the Cross

Well, let's move our attention from that cross-less gospel to the assertion of the cross that Paul makes. Verse 14: "But may it never be", very strong words, emphatically, "may it never be that I should boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world."

1. The cross declares your helplessness


Notice, that the cross declares our helplessness. You look at the cross of Jesus Christ, and you realize that it explains man's greatest need; that we can accomplish all sorts of things, and we can do technical, industrial marvels, and we can build great civilizations, and we can have all sorts of culture. Man can do all sorts of things, but he cannot put himself into a right relationship with God. You look at the cross, and that's exactly what it tells you. You are helpless apart from what Christ has done at the cross. We have trouble seeing ourselves for what we really are, right?

I think one of my great frustrations in so often speaking to someone who's an unbeliever, and speaking to them about the gospel of Christ, is realizing that until their convinced that they're lost.  This whole issue of the gospel doesn't make a whole lot of sense; just a nice little story. Oh, it's inspirational. "Thanks for telling that inspirational story." Inspirational? It's the only hope for a sinner. Paul said, "May it never be that I should boast, that I should glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ." Until we see ourselves as lost, we really won't grasp the need of the cross, nor will we grasp what happened at the cross.

Oh, we might make a so-called decision for Christ; there's lots of that that happens. I've talked with folks, who have supposedly made decisions for Christ. I then begin to question them and find out they don't even think they're lost. They don't understand their sin. Oh, sometimes a person might even feel a little twinge of guilt, and so they need something to mollify that guilt, and so they make some kind of outward show, some kind of outward decision; but when you really look at Jesus Christ, hanging on the cross for sinners, you have to see yourself as helpless before God, as undone, as in such a condition that my only hope is that God has come through for me, through His son, the Lord Jesus Christ. You look at the cross, and you realize that Paul was right in Romans 2 when he said, "You are without excuse." You stand before God, guilty. A proud man hasn't seen the cross, but the cross of Jesus Christ tells us the truth about ourselves.

2. The cross describes God's graciousness


But the cross of Jesus Christ also describes the graciousness of God. We're able to see men building space stations, and watching that as it's happening. That's pretty wild. My grandfather never would have dreamed that anything like that would've happen. He didn't even believe man landed on the moon; he just didn't think that was true. It just couldn't happen. But we see stuff like that.

But my friend, that's nothing compared to the fact that God became a man and dwelt among us, that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and He went to the cross. God, the creator and sustainer of everything that is, as man, went to the cross and bore the wrath and judgment of God. There, the Immortal died for mortal men. There, the Prince of life, as He's called, was put death. Paradoxical, isn't it, that God would do that? But when you look at the cross, you begin to fathom the depths of the graciousness of God. You begin to see the wisdom of God. Oh, the cross is foolish to the perishing. As I Corinthians 1 tells us, "The word of the cross is to those, who are perishing, foolishness." The word is the root of our English word, moron. It is moronic, but to us, who are being saved, it is the power of God; that whole dynamic of God. "For it is written, 'I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the cleverness of the clever, I will set aside.'"

This whole idea, that God designed before the foundations of the world, before He ever created anything, that God the Son would become a man and dwell among us, and that He, out of His great mercy, would bear our sins at the cross and bear the wrath and judgment of God, is strange to the human mind, and yet the Scripture says the world calls that foolishness, but to those who are being saved, it is both the wisdom of God and the power of God. You see the love of God juxtaposed against the wrath of God when you look at the cross of Jesus Christ. We're all familiar with John 3:16 and those passages surrounding John 3:16: "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. For, God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through Him. He who believes in Him is not judged, but he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. He who believes in the Son has eternal life, but he who does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him." It is that wrath, under which a sinner abides, that same wrath, that Jesus bore at the cross.

There is the greatness of God's love. Yes, we can see the love in giving us air to breathe and water to drink and food to eat. Yes, but the greatness of God's love is this: "But there is no greater love than this: that a man lays down his life for his friends." That man, Christ, laid down His life for those he calls to himself as His friends, as His children. Martyn Lloyd-Jones talked about the work of Christ on the cross and what happened in a physical and spiritual sense. He said, "The heart had burst and the blood had clotted, and there was serum and blood clot, because His heart was literally ruptured by the agony of the wrath of God upon Him, and by the separation from the face of the Father." That is the love of God. That, my friend, is love of God to you a sinner, not that He looks on passively and says, "I forgive, though you've done this to my Son." No! He Himself smites the Son. He does to the Son what you and I could never do. He pours out His eternal wrath upon Him, and hides His face from Him, and He did it in order that we should not receive that punishment and go to Hell, and spend there an eternity in misery, torment, and unhappiness.

That is the love of God. You see that love of God at the cross. You see the mercy of God. You see sinners that deserve the white-hot wrath of God. Our sin testifies against us, and yet we look at the cross, and there we see mercy, suspended between Heaven and earth, declaring to us that God is gracious and merciful. You see the glory of God and the redemptive work of Jesus Christ on behalf of undeserving sinners. Have you trusted in this Christ who died on the cross?
 

III. The Power of the Cross

Well, one other thing we must consider, and that is the power of the cross. The act of Christ on the cross was not just something that we read about historically; it was that, indeed, but it was not simply a nice fact in the history book, that this man, Jesus, was executed by a group of Roman soldiers at the urgent plea and demand of a group of irate Jews. It was not just that. As a matter of fact, you'll look at the issue of the cross, and you see that it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes. You look at the whole issue of the cross of Jesus Christ, foolishness in the eyes of the world, but this mighty, massive, overwhelming power of God, working in the individual life of a sinner. The cross was not a mistake. Some people say it was a mistake. They say, "Too bad about the cross." It was not simply a gallant act, as an existentialist might say, but there was an actual function and power to the cross of Christ. Something actually happens; a transaction takes place, when you as a sinner come to that place, where you turn from your sin and faith you embrace Jesus Christ and Him crucified alone. What happens?
 

1. To liberate

Well, you're liberated. Verse 14: "May it never that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world." What is that world? Well, that's the whole outlook that puts man at the center. It is a way of thinking. It is an attitude. It is looking at life and saying, "Everything revolves around me. The whole world circles around me." Now, there are all kinds of manifestations of this idea of the world. It comes with a self-centered lifestyle of man. It comes with selfishness toward families. It comes with rebellion against parents. It comes with immoral behavior, destroying others verbally and physically. The world is manifest in a million different ways, but the end result, that whole attitude, that whole way of thinking brings about all kinds of trials and troubles and difficulties and tribulations in life, but the cross liberates us - liberates us from being dominated, controlled by the world and by that thinking of the world. Now, how does that happen?  Because there was a separation that took place at the cross.

Think of it like this: If all the world is under the wrath of God; all the world, unbelieving; all the world, in rebellion against God; all the world, at enmity with God, enemies of God, separated from God; and yet those who are the redeemed through the ages, the elect of God, Jesus Christ has come and borne that judgment of God on behalf of those whom He'll redeem. He has borne all of that judgment of God. God has poured out His white-hot wrath upon His Son, on behalf of all whom He would redeem, so that there's no more judgment left for those who put their faith in Christ. Do you realize that, the sweetness of that?

There is no more wrath left for those who have their faith in Christ. There is a separation; the wrath of God is still hanging over the head of all, who are unbelieving, but those, who are believing, the wrath of God has been satisfied upon Christ at the cross, so that Paul could say, "It is in that cross through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world." There is a separation that has taken place. My whole relationship to the world is different. Instead of looking at the world to think, "Hey, I've got to get in to this. I've got to live with this kind of attitude." It's, "No, here is a world that is fraught with sin and desperately needs the grace and mercy of God." There's a separation that occurs. That means your whole thinking is changed.
 

2. To re-create

And I think that brings us to this next thought of what he says in verse 15: "For neither is circumcision anything nor uncircumcision, but a new creation." Here we are with that attitude of the world, with that mindset of rebellion against God, maybe living like that for 15 years, 20 years, 30, 40, 50 years; and suddenly, this divine transaction takes place, and there's a liberation; your whole attitude, your whole way of thinking, is different. Maybe you can't explain it all, but it's different. You view the world in a totally different way. You don't want to live for the world or love the things of the world; instead, your passion is for Christ and Christ alone, and you are re-created; you're changed. Oh, the Judaizers at this point play their trump card circumcision; Paul said, "You just get circumcised, but it won't change your life.  For that matter, if you're uncircumcised that won't change your life either." He said, "Circumcision's nothing; Uncircumcision is nothing," but he said, "I'll tell you what is something: it's when you become a new creature, when on the inside, you are changed."

What he's doing is working all the way from viewing the whole work of salvation as external, which is what the world does, which is done through manipulation; instead of seeing everything as external, you begin to realize something happens within me down in the very depths of my soul, where the Lord begins to apply what he did at the cross, and a transaction takes place, and I come out a new creature changed forever. As a matter of fact, if you're not a new creature, you're not a Christian. That's the simplicity of it. "If any man is in Christ, he is a new creature", a new creation. "The old things passed away. All things have become new." Paul says, "That's the power of God." It's not simply power that was exercised 2,000 years ago.  That was the power of God that has the lasting effect to change sinners 2,000 years later and change them completely for all eternity.

Conclusion

Are you one of those sinners, that has been melted by the cross of Christ, humbled, as you've seen your own sin that sent Him to the cross, melted because you realize God came and became a man, that He might bear His own judgment against me, so that I, as a sinner, might be liberated from the world and liberated from my sin, and that I might be truly a new creature in Jesus Christ? He said, "Those, who will walk by this rule," that is, this truth, this rule of faith, "peace and mercy be upon them, and upon the Israel of God.", that is, those that are truly redeemed; not what the Judaizers are doing, not what the present manipulators are doing in just getting people to make a bunch of decisions. My friend, if you simply made a decision but you're not a new creature in Christ, that's not going to stand before God. Is your boast in what you've done, or is your boast in Jesus Christ and Him crucified? May it be that we glory in nothing, but the cross of Christ.

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