Reflections on Lord’s Day 41 of 2019: “A Heart for the Lost”

On 10/13/2019, the sermon, “A Heart for the Lost,” preached by Pastor Joe Rosales, was based on Romans 9:1-5.

The pastor said there’s no double jeopardy in the court of God. We don’t have to face a future judgment because Christ satisfied our judgment already at the Cross. Amen!

He also mentioned that empty prayer meetings are a symptom of a dying church. He quotes Abraham Lincoln again when he responds to the soldier about his concern as to whether we are on God’s side, rather than vice versa.

God is our provider, protector, and justifier. No one can condemn us:

Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified. What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. (Romans‬ ‭8:30-34‬ ‭NKJV‬‬)

By His stripes we are healed, by His death we are justified, and His resurrection declares our justification, as Horatius Bonar so beautifully explains:

The manifold blessings flowing from resurrection and ascension are not to be over-looked; but nowhere does Scripture teach justification by these. The one passage sometimes quoted to prove this, declares the opposite (Rom 4:25); for the words truly translated run thus: "He was delivered because we had sinned, and raised again because of our justification." It was because the justifying work was finished that resurrection was possible. Had it not been so, He must have remained under the power of the grave. But the cross had completed the justification of His church. He was raised from the dead. Death could no longer have dominion over Him. The work was finished, the debt paid, and the surety went free: He rose, not in order to justify us, but because we were justified. In raising Him from the dead, God the Father cleared Him from the imputed guilt which had nailed Him to the cross and borne Him down to the tomb. "He was justified in the Spirit" (1 Tim 3:16). His resurrection was not His justification, but the declaration that He was "justified"; so that resurrection, in which we are one with Him, does not justify us, but proclaims that we are justified,—justified by His blood and death.(8) (The Everlasting Righteousness, http://www.gospelpedlar.com/articles/Salvation/ER_Bonar/ch_3.html)

Christ is therefore our advocate instead of our Judge, “For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews‬ ‭4:15-16‬ ‭NKJV‬‬), and

“My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” 1 John‬ ‭2:1‬ ‭NASB‬‬

“But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption.” ‭‭1 Corinthians‬ ‭1:30‬ ‭NASB‬‬

Christ is not begging in tears for us to come him; He has justified and effectually saved us. Because of our Union with Christ we shall be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven: “But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us” (Romans‬ ‭8:37‬ ‭NASB‬‬).

But not all Jews will necessarily be saved, “for they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel; nor are they all children because they are Abraham’s descendants, but: “ THROUGH ISAAC YOUR DESCENDANTS WILL BE NAMED” (Romans‬ ‭9:6-7‬ ‭NASB‬‬).

True Israel, therefore, is the sum of all believers in Christ, both Jew and gentile,

And will not the physically uncircumcised, if he fulfills the law, judge you who, even with your written code and circumcision, are a transgressor of the law? For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh; but he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the Spirit, not in the letter; whose praise is not from men but from God. (Romans‬ ‭2:27-29‬ ‭NKJV‬‬)

Only this Jesus, and only this gospel, can save, “for the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke‬ ‭19:10‬ ‭NKJV‬‬).