Salvation Assured                        SALVATION BY FAITH ALONE
 
        But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.  1 Cor. 1:30.
 
    When the sinner realizes that because of what Jesus did on the cross, he is accepted just as he is, this realization begins the transformation of his life.  Sanctification therefore is based solidly on justification.  If it isn't, it's going to end up misunderstood and confused.  Sometimes we split theological hairs and try to decide which is the most important aspect of salvation--justification, sanctification, or glorification.
 
    Which do you think is more important, getting married or staying married?  I could recite some of the advantages to getting married.  I also understand that there are some tremendous advantages to staying married once you have gotten married.  Which of the two do you think is more important?  Or is that a foolish question?
 
    Which is more important, justification or sanctification?  They are both important!  For different reasons, maybe; but both are important.  Both come in Jesus, and are by faith in Jesus, and are by faith alone in Jesus.  We are not saying that works are not important, but we are talking about method, and the method for salvation is by faith alone.
 
    "Let no man present the idea that man has little or nothing to do in the great work of overcoming; for God does nothing for man without his cooperation.  Neither say that after you have done all you can on your part, Jesus will help you.  Christ has said, 'Without me ye can do nothing.' "--Selected Messages, book 1, p. 381.  "All that man can possibly do toward his own salvation is to accept the invitation, 'Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely."--Ibid., p. 343.  That's all he can do.  So there's something for us to do, but all we can do is to take the water of life freely.  But that's an intangible.  So what is the water of life?  "In this communion with Christ, through prayer and the study of the great and precious truths of His word, we shall as hungry souls be fed; as those that thirst, we shall be refreshed at the fountains of life."--Thoughts From the Mount of Blessing, p. 113. (Italics supplied.)  That's all we can do toward our own salvation--justification, sanctification, or glorification.  Communion with Him.  It's that simple.

Salvation Assured                        PEACE BRINGS RELEASE
 
        Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you.  Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.  John 14:27.
 
    Here's a significant statement from the book Steps to Christ, page 49: "As your conscience has been quickened by the Holy Spirit, you have seen something of the evil of sin, of its power, its guilt, its woe; and you look upon it with abhorrence.  You feel that sin has separated you from God, that you are in bondage to the power of evil."  (Notice this is talking about a person who is in bondage to evil and recognizes it.)  "The more you struggle to escape, the more you realize your helplessness."  (Is this talking about a heathen, a rebel, or someone who is trying to live a right life?)  "Your motives are impure; your heart is unclean.  You see that your life has been filled with selfishness and sin.  You long to be forgiven, to be cleansed, to be set free.  Harmony with God, likeness to Him--what can you do to obtain it?"  If I understand this correctly, this paragraph is describing a messed-up life, someone who is defeated, failing, discouraged.  What can you do?  The next paragraph gives the answer.
 
    But do you know what I expected it to say?  What you need is to try a little harder.  What you need is to make more resolutions.  What you need is to be more sincere, more dedicated, more consecrated.  What you need, maybe, is more Bible study and prayer, or to get out and work for others.  But instead, it says that what you need is peace!  Sounds like a mistake!  I thought that anyone knows that you can't have peace when you have a life that's mixed up like that.  You have to get your life in order before you can have peace.  But that's not what it says.  It doesn't say that peace comes from victory, but that victory comes from peace.  Can you fathom that?  That is one of the greatest breakthroughs in the theme of salvation by faith.
 
    It is known by the experts that the only way a child can outgrow his mistakes and failures is to know he's loved and accepted while he's making them.  It is rejection that keeps a person in his sins and failures.  It's knowing that you are accepted and loved that brings growth, that transforms your life.  It is peace that brings release.

Salvation Assured                        FREEDOM THROUGH SLAVERY
 
        Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things,...but with the precious blood of Christ.  1 Peter 1:18, 19.
 
    In the old days, on the shores of the Mississippi, there was an auction block.  Abraham Lincoln stood nearby one day and watched the tears flow and saw the heartache and pain of separation.  He clenched his fists and said, "If I ever get a chance to hit this, I'll hit it hard."  He did, and signed the Emancipation Proclamation with his own hand.
 
    One day, before the Emancipation, old Joe, a slave, was on the auction block.  He had seen too much, and he began to mutter under his breath, "I won't work!  I won't work!"  The bidders heard him, and bidding fell off.  But one man continued, and paid good money for a slave who wouldn't work.
 
    He led Joe to the carriage, and they drove out of town and down the road to the plantation.  There, by a little lake, was a bungalow.  It had curtains on the windows, and flowers, and cobblestones.  The new master said, "Here's your new home, Joe."  Joe could hardly believe it, but then he remembered and said, "I won't work."  The mater replied, "You don't have to work, Joe, because I bought you to set you free."  I always liked that part, but that isn't the end of the story.  Old Joe fell at the master's feet and said, "Master, I'll serve you forever."
 
    I see another auction block.  I see people who know what it means to have the tears flow, to have pain and heartache and separation.  One day Someone from the far country looks down and says, "If I ever get a chance to hit that, I'll hit it, and I'll hit it hard."  And He did.  He signed the emancipation papers for the human race with His own blood.  He bought us to set us free.  But we look up at Him and say, "We won't work, because we can't."  Have you ever tried it?  We can't work.  And He says, "You don't have to work.  I bought you to see you free."  When you catch that, you go to your knees at His feet and say, "Master, I'll serve You forever."  And you discover that things you could never do before can now happen because Jesus lives His life within.
 
    I understand He has some bungalows, by a lake that goes on and on, and looks like a sea made out of glass.  There are cobblestones and curtains, and flowers like you've never seen.  He has them all for you and me.

Salvation Assured                        RIGHTEOUSNESS THROUGH RELATIONSHIP
 
        That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings.  Phil. 3:10.
 
    It came as a surprise to some of us to discover that the certainty and assurance of our eternal life is based upon being in relationship with Christ.  That's why the question "Do you know Him?" is an important question.  It's not a question of knowing about Him, but of knowing Him.
 
    Romans 5 talks about the gift of righteousness.  If we accept His gift today but don't stay with Him, then what happens to the gift?  "No human being is righteous any longer than he has faith in God and maintains a vital connection with Him."--Testimonies to Ministers, p. 367.  If God casts all our sins into the depths of the sea today, but between now and the time that Jesus comes we turn from Him, is He going to drag them up from the depths of the sea?  Is His righteousness going to be taken back?  And what about this statement from Thoughts From the Mount of Blessing: " 'In His borrowed goodness good,' we may be perfect in our sphere, even as God is perfect in His"?--Page 77.  Is His righteousness borrowed?  Is it a gift?  Or is it a trade?  Which is it?  Is it permanent or not?
 
    I'd like to illustrate like this: Suppose I have a Cadillac Seville.  But I'm single.  And I would like to have someone nice to ride around in my Cadillac with me.  This gets a little tricky, because how can I tell whether the young lady is interested in me or in my car?  But finally one day I am convinced that a certain young lady likes me as much as she likes my Cadillac and she accepts my proposal.  The day we are married, not only does she get me, but she gets the Cadillac as well.  It comes with me.  (Now don't confuse me with the marriage laws of your State.  I have my own today.)  Hopefully when she chooses me, she chooses me permanently.  As long as she continues to choose me, she has the Cadillac.  But if she ever chooses to separate from me, and no longer continue the relationship, no longer does she have the Cadillac. 
 
    Righteousness is never independent of Jesus Christ.  There is no such thing as righteousness apart from Jesus.  

Salvation Assured                        UNBROKEN CONNECTION WITH GOD
 
        God is faithful, by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord.  1 Cor. 1:9.
 
    I would like to tell you a parable.  More than twenty years ago I fell in love with a beautiful girl.  She lived in San Francisco, I lived in Los Angeles.  The day came that we met in San Francisco where her parents were putting on the wedding, like parents of good brides do, and when the preacher asked me if I did, I admitted that I did.  He pronounced us husband and wife.  After the wedding she went home with her parents in San Francisco, and I went back to Los Angeles.  Two years later someone came along and asked whether I was married.  I said Yes.  And they said, "We've never seen your wife."  "I haven't either, for two years."  "When was that?"  "That was the day we were married."  "You haven't seen her since?  Do you write to her?"  "No."  "Do you telephone her?"  "No."  "And you're married?"  "Yes, I said 'I do,' and I have a certificate to prove it." (I did tell you this was a parable, please!)
 
    There were people who were baptized years ago, who apparently said I do, and have a baptismal certificate to prove it.  But there's no such thing as any relationship continuing without communication.
 
    As we continue the communication, the relationship, with Christ, then we have what is called righteousness.  The Bible even calls us righteous.  Are we ever righteous?  2 Corinthians 5:21: "For he [God] hath made him to be sin for us."  Did He become sin for us?  Yes.  Did He ever become a sinner?  No!  Jesus became sin for us, but He never became a sinner.  "That we might be made the righteousness of God in him."  Does that ever make us righteous, any more that the first part made Him a sinner?  No.  We are righteous only through Him.
 
    What does "in Him" mean?  There's another text that might seem hard to understand.  1 John 5:12: "He that hath the Son hath life."  Have you ever pondered what it means to "have the Son"?  We say that we have a friend.  I have a wife, you have a wife or husband.  What does it mean?  It means that you have a relationship with that person.  When it says, "he that hath the Son," it means having a relationship with Him.  We are made righteous so long as we are in Him.

Salvation Assured                        RIGHTEOUSNESS FOR TODAY
 
        O Lord, righteousness belongeth unto thee, but unto us confusion of faces, as at this day.  Dan. 9:7.
 
    C. T. Everson used to say that if we could take a giant scale, and put the world, weighing 6 sextillion tons on one side, and put one human being, even a baby, on the other side, the human would tip the scales.  That's a good picture of how Heaven looks at one individual.  We are worth everything, and the cross proves it.  But we are still helpless to produce righteousness.  The Bible premise is that when it comes to righteousness, we are totally bankrupt.  We have none.  Romans 3:10: "there is none righteous, no, not one."  Isaiah 64:6: "All our righteousness are as filthy rags."
 
    And yet we are invited to come to Jesus and trade our filthy rags for eternal life.  There's nothing we can do to recommend ourselves in the eyes of heaven.  That's why we need to consider seriously this greatest trade ever that Jesus comes and offers to us today.  Righteousness is found only in Jesus; as Daniel said, "O Lord, righteousness belongeth unto thee, but unto us confusion of faces, as at this day."  "Sinful man can find hope and righteousness only in God; and no human being is righteous any longer than he has faith in God and maintains a vital connection with Him."--Testimonies to Ministers, p. 367.
 
    In recent years there are some who have gotten the idea that all you have to do to have righteousness is to look up to heaven someday and say, "All right I accept the fact that everything's taken care of."  They believe that from that moment on, they are declared righteous and have nothing to worry about, and "everything's all right in my Father's house."
 
    But please don't miss the fact that no human being will be righteous any longer than he has faith in God and maintains a vital connection with Him.  That's why the Jesus movement of a few years ago faded away.  There were so many who marched down the beach with their Bibles waving in the air like banners and the name of Jesus on their lips like a slogan, who stopped right there and never came into any closer fellowship with Jesus.  The trade that Jesus offers, in exchanging His righteousness for our sins, is beautiful.  But it's no good for tomorrow unless I accept it again tomorrow.  It is only good for each day.

Salvation Assured                        RIGHTEOUSNESS EQUALS JESUS
 
        There is none righteous, no, not one.  Rom. 3:10.
 
    One of the major breakthroughs that come in the theme of salvation by faith is that you don't get righteousness by seeking righteousness.  Righteousness comes by seeking Jesus.  It is a trap of the devil for us to seek righteousness instead of seeking for Jesus.  Righteousness is deeper than external actions.
 
    The equation for righteousness is R = J.  Righteousness = Jesus.  If we're going to transfer it to our lives, it works like this: Mankind + Jesus = Righteousness.  That's the equation for righteousness as far as we're concerned.
 
    One day we were talking about this in class and a math major in the back row with his pocket computer got this terrible look on his face and said, "Wait a minute.  We just came to the conclusion that Righteousness = Jesus.  Now you say that Mankind + Jesus = Righteousness.  But if Jesus = Righteousness, then Mankind = Nothing!"
 
    I was conducting a Week of Prayer at a Christian medical school.  That's a terrible experience.  The medical students have brains bulging out of the sides of their heads.  And you're supposed to try to say something!  Part of the way through the week we got a reaction from some because we had talked about the fact that without Jesus we can do nothing.  Some had gotten the impression that we were talking about being worthless.  You don't tell people who have worked that hard toward their profession that they are worthless without getting some kind of reaction.  There are people in the world who can do great things without God as long as God keeps their hearts beating in their chests.  But God makes the hearts beat in the chests of those who curse Him.
 
    Even though we are still helpless to produce righteousness, because righteousness is found only in Jesus, Jesus on the cross proved that every human being is worth the entire universe.  We need to recognize that there's a big difference between being helpless and being worthless.  When we accept the premise that we are nothing, we mean what Jesus said in John 15:5, "Without me ye can do nothing," in producing the fruits of righteousness.  But without Him we are worth something; that's why He came--to show us that in Him all things are possible, and to prove the worth of a human soul. 

Salvation Assured                        SEEKING RIGHTEOUSNESS BY SEEKING JESUS
 
        Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.  Matt. 5:6.
 
    Have you ever seen someone who was absolutely certain that he had committed the unpardonable sin?  He was so worried about it!  But the very fact that he was worried about it said something, didn't it?
 
    I remember one camp meeting when each pastor took charge of a little group and conducted a testimony meeting.  In my group, one elderly man who obviously has just come to Christ got up.  His lip was quivering, and he was having a hard time keeping the tears back.  He said, "For a long time God tried to get me, and He finally got me."  And he sat down.  I don't remember any of the other testimonies that were given that day, but I remember that one.  I like it.  I think God tries for a long time, don't you?
 
    Provision has been made for Jesus to trade all of His righteousness for all of your sins.  What is righteousness?  We have some stock answers that we like to give.  One of them is that righteousness is rightdoing.  That's true.  You can find an inspired statement to that effect.  But let's not miss all the rest of them, too.  Sometimes we become experts at taking sentences out of context and forgetting the rest.  If righteousness is nothing more than rightdoing, then all you would have to do to become righteous would be to do what's right.  Do you see the trap?  Someone else says that righteousness is conformity to the will of God.  That's true, and you can find an inspired statement for that.  But there's also a trap there.  You can be led, if you're not careful, to the idea that all you have to do is conform to the law of God.  But that conformity can be merely external.
 
    So as you go through the definitions, you can come to great frustration unless you face the only real live definition: righteousness equals Jesus.  Romans 1:17: "Therein is the righteousness of God revealed," in the gospel of Jesus.  The only kind of righteousness this world has ever known in a real live person was in the Lord Jesus Christ.  The best single definition for righteousness is Jesus.  When we read, "Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness," what we're really saying is, "Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after Jesus."

Salvation Assured                        CERTAINTY OF ACCEPTANCE
 
        And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life.  John 6:40.  
 
    If you could approach God Himself with one question, what question would you like to ask Him?  Some of us have taken surveys in various parts of the country, asking that question.  It's probably a little self-centered, but the one question that always rises head and shoulders above all the rest is "Am I going to be saved?"
 
    If Jesus came to you personally today and traded all His righteousness for all your sins, would there by any question concerning your eternal destiny right now?  Would there?  Some feel that this might be easier to accept if they had the advantage that the thief on the cross had.  But most of us have to keep on living.  Is your certainty in Jesus just as true today as it was twenty years ago when you first accepted the faith?  Maybe we could accept that kind of trade then, but a lot of water has gone under the bridge since.  Time has gone and some of you might even be thinking, I passed my seventy times seven long ago.  We realize that God is wonderful in the forgiveness department, but we are afraid we have passed the limit.  Perhaps you feel that you can't really accept this promise today.  But I don't know of any date on this promise.  I don't know of any one for whom this promise is not made available.
 
    I remember a man at a camp meeting who asked to talk with me.  We went off into a corner, and he said, "It's too late, I've gone too far.  I've committed the unpardonable sin; there's no chance for me."  I invited him to open his Bible to John 6:37.  He looked at it.  Jesus' own words are recorded there: "Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out."  I said, "What do you see in the margin?"  He said, "I don't have a margin in my Bible."  "Well, what do you see in the white space along the edge of the page?  Is there a date on it?"  "No."  "Is there a name on it?"  "No."  "Then this promise is good for you, today."  When Jesus says that He wants to trade all of His righteousness for all of your sins, the promise is still good today, as long as we accept it again today.  We can have the assurance of acceptance with God each day, as we accept His trade anew.

Salvation Assured                        THE GREATEST TRADE EVER
 
        For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.  2 Cor. 5:21.
 
    I have a ball point pen that I would like to trade with someone for a Cadillac Seville.  Let me tell you about the ball point pen.  It's not a bad one at all.  Someone gave it to me.  It's very nice.  It's carved out of some sort of wood.  It's quite expensive.  There must be someone who likes to trade who would be interested in my offer.
 
    When I was a boy back in Philadelphia, we used to trade bubble-gum cards and marbles.  Three little ones for one big one.  Later, in college, I remember one night in the boy's dormitory we had a necktie swap.  It was one of the most fun things we ever did, getting rid of all the neckties we never wore and getting some better ones.  My roommate started out with nothing and ended up with six beauties!  Most of us have been involved in trading something.  But if someone were to take me up on my deal with the ball point pen, I guarantee that he would qualify for one of two things.  Either he would be stupid or he would really like me a lot.  One of the two.
 
    Today I would like to talk to you about the greatest trade ever.  2 Corinthians 5:21: "For he [God] hath made him [Jesus] to be sin for us, who knew no sin [referring to Jesus, of course]; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him."  Let's paraphrase it just a little.  For God hath made Jesus, who knew no sin, to be sin for us, that we, who knew no righteousness, might be made the righteousness of God in Him.
 
    What would you do if Jesus Himself would today, in person, walk up to you as though you were the only one in the world?  How would you feel if He would look into your face with His friendly eyes and open His arms as He did so long ago, saying, "My friend, I've come to trade you all of My righteousness for all of your sins."  Would you be interested?  I have had people tell me that if He would do that, and if they could know that their eternal destiny was settled right there, it would be almost too good to be true.  But it is true--the greatest trade ever made leads to certainty in the Christian life and the assurance of our eternal destiny.