The Cause and Effect of our Redemption

A dear friend and spiritual mentor, who is now with the Lord, taught me to study the Bible.  One of the first rules he taught me is the one that I have come to believe is the most important.  That is, a student of the Scriptures must ask questions of the text.  We should not assume that we understand what a passage means at first glance.  We should refrain from skipping past familiar verses in haste to get to something new.  Instead, we ought to slow down, rarely assume anything, carefully think through what God is saying at each point, and so focus our meditative attention upon Him.  I place the importance of this questioning step above any other principle of Bible interpretation. 

The reason is this.  To be sure, we must accurately translate the original languages to be certain we understand the author’s intent.  Without a doubt, we must seek to learn the cultural factors that would have affected both the author’s and his audience’s perspectives.  But, ultimately, Bible study is not merely an academic exercise.  It is not a pastime for us to do in a clinical manner, studying it as if it were a textbook and we are preparing for a test.  The Bible is an inspired book of power and authority that God uses to reveal His character and speak directly to the deepest crevices of our souls.  It is a book that is incessantly relevant and unapologetically divisive.

The objective of Bible study is not only to learn, but to grow and change, from the inside out.  To do that requires time spent meditating upon what God has said, seeking to go beneath the surface of the English words we read in our Bibles, and gaze upon the face of God Himself. 

In other words, the foundation stone of proper Bible study is the desire to know.  To know this Christ whom we are united with, His Father who loves us, and our relationship to them both through the Holy Spirit.  It is in the hunger to know, and in the asking and subsequent answering of questions that seek to assuage that hunger, that I have found the greatest insights into the power and awe-inspiring wonder of the Bible. 

If we read the Scriptures, skimming over what we already think we know, pausing only when something particularly confusing rears its head, then our time spent in the Word will be brief and our ability to see deeply into the mind of God will be stunted.  If, however, we invest the time and mental energy to engage in the asking and subsequent answering of questions, even ones we already know the answers to, and follow it up with sound exegesis (including historical and grammatical context), then I believe our Bible study will be rich and relevant.

It is this method of asking questions that led me down some startling paths recently while considering the first chapter of Ephesians.  In verse 2, as part of his opening salutation to his audience, Paul writes: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.  These two elements, grace and peace, can be found in every one of Paul’s letters.

Regardless of who he is writing to, group or individual, strained or loving relationship, heretics or orthodox believers, Paul always desires to confer grace and peace on them.  This is particularly strange to me, because in most cases Paul is conferring upon his audience something they already have.  He clearly states in Ephesians 1:2 that he wants them to have grace and peace from God.  These people were Christians.  They already had God’s grace and peace.

Given that, why is Paul so insistent that they have what they already have?  Perhaps he thinks there is something to the notion that those who already enjoy these benefits should meditate upon them.  And, in so doing live lives that are markedly different than they would be without such contemplation.

So, my questions of the text at this point are quite simple.  Given Paul’s clear emphasis upon grace and peace, I want to know the following.  What is grace?  What is peace?  What impact do they have upon our lives?  And, how should we live in light of this knowledge?

I will begin with peace.  I want to build a biblical definition of peace, using the Bible as my guide.  I think we can gain insight from this same letter, Ephesians.  In chapter 2, verses 11 and 12, Paul presents us with an important concept – that of two separate groups.  He writes: Therefore remember that formerly you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called “Uncircumcision” by the so-called “Circumcision,” which is performed in the flesh by human hands – remember that you were at that time separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.

What we can see from this passage is that there is a very clear line of demarcation between Jews, whom Paul calls the “Circumcision”, and Gentiles, or the “Uncircumcision.”  These two groups have many dissimilarities.  The first can be seen right in the titles they are given – circumcision versus uncircumcision.  This is a reference to the sign of circumcision that the Jews were given, through Abraham, that marked them out as a special chosen people for God’s own possession.  Furthermore, the Jews were beneficiaries of the sacred covenant that God made for them, they were inheritors of the promise He made to Abraham, they were personally incorporated as a nation by God Himself, and they were the people from whom would come the special anointed One who they called Messiah, and who Paul refers to as Christ in Greek.  Not only that, but the Gentiles, because they were cut off from all of these special privileges, had no hope and no God.  They were in a very sorry state indeed.

But then, in verse 13, Paul writes that in Christ these Gentiles who were previously far off have been brought near by His blood.  And, more significantly for our point, in verse 14 he writes: For He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall.  Right there, in verse 14, is the nucleus of a biblical concept of peace.  It is the uniting of two (or more) disparate groups, making one where there used to be many.  And even more importantly, this one new group has been reconciled to God through the cross, as we read in verse 16: and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the corss, by it having put to death the enmity.

From these elements we can assemble the following working definition.  It does not contain all that the Scriptures have to say about peace, but it will suffice for the moment.  God’s peace is the means by which He unites both Jew and Gentiles into one corporate body who has been reconciled to God through the cross of Christ.

Setting peace aside for a moment, I want to turn to grace and attempt to define it just as we have done for peace.  To do that, I think there is arguably no better treatise on grace than the 4^th chapter of Romans.  In this letter, Paul has spent the first three and a half chapters laying out the case and the charges that God has against humanity.  He shows, with blistering detail, that no man has any grounds to boast before God, to be spared from God’s wrath, or even to stand upright before this holy and blameless judge.  Then, in the last half of Romans 3, Paul unveils the solution to man’s dilemma.  Namely, through faith in Christ, man can now be justified in God’s sight.  This is a redemption that is purely on the basis of that faith.  It does not accord with any work of human self effort.  It is purely an act of mercy on God’s part.

I think Paul knows perfectly well that his explanation is going to face a hostile reception from anyone who reads his letter.  He knows that humans, by nature, do not like the feeling of owing anything to anyone.  We, generally speaking, like to earn what we receive.  And, when it comes to the sphere of faith, religion, and salvation the sinful pride of man rises up and demands that our theology conform itself to the notion that we can obtain our own redemption through hard work and self effort.

With that in mind, Paul spends the next chapter of Romans defending his doctrine of justification by faith alone.  He does it through the example of Abraham, the patriarch of the Jewish nation.  In verse 2 he writes: For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God.  Then in verse 4 we find: Now to the one who works, his wage is not credited as a favor, what as what is due.  What Paul is doing here is setting up a contrast.  He wants to show the difference between a justification that is accomplished by the product of human works and a justification that comes purely by faith.  And, as his prime example of what this justification by faith looks like he presents exhibit number one, Abraham the patriarch, who was not justified by works but rather by faith.

Along with that understanding, we also need to realize that when Paul writes the word works, it is synonomous in his mind with the Law of Moses, and vice versa.  When we read Law, we need to think works, and when we read works we need to think Law.  We can see this link in verses 13 and 14 where Paul writes: For the promise to Abraham or to his descendants that he would be heir of the world was not through the Law, but through the righteousness of faith.  For if those who are of the Law are heirs, faith is made void and the promise is nullified.

The Law is the the covenant, or contract, that God made with Israel at Sinai under Moses’s leadership.  The Law was a set of statutes and ordinances that were imposed upon the nation of Israel.  Obedience to this Law was the stipulation that God demanded in order to maintain His favor upon the Jews.  God, in effect, said to the Jews that if they could maintain all of His laws perfectly, then they could obtain favor and justification from Him.  Thus, if they could have accomplished this, they would have earned their redemption through works, or human effort.

Contrasted with this paradigm is the doctrine of justification by faith.  In verse 5 we read: But to the one who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness.  In God’s economy of effort and reward, the only means of authentic rightness before Him is to do no work at all, but merely to have faith.  This is totally counter-intuitive to human thinking, as stated before.  Indeed, it stands against every other principle of the universe that we are aware of.  Nevertheless, God has revealed clearly that the means by which mankind may gain acceptance and favor with Him is faith alone, and this faith is not counted as a work of human effort.

Correlating this with verse 2 above, we can say that faith excludes boasting before God because when we come to Him in faith we have nothing to offer as payment for His favor.  We can only accept what He deigns to give.  What is it that God gives to those who have faith?  It is the promise of redemption that He originally made to Abraham.

Now then, we are attempting to define grace, and we have not talked about it at all yet.  What we need to understand is that faith and grace are inseparably linked.  In verse 16 we find the connection: For this reason it is by faith, in order that it may be in accordance with grace, so that the promise will be guaranteed to all the descendants, not only to those who are of the Law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all. 

The “it” Paul mentions in verse 16 refers back to the promise he talks about in verse 13 – the promise that God made to Abraham because of Abraham’s faith.  So, what Paul is saying in verse 16 is that the promise to Abraham and all of his offspring depends upon faith.  The reason is so that the fulfillment of this promise will be predicated upon grace and guaranteed to all who follow in the faith that Abraham originally had.  Thus, we can see that faith and grace, while not synonomous, are nevertheless inextricably linked such that they cannot be separated.  Faith cannot exist without grace, and grace is visible through faith.

One further question remains before we can define grace.  That is, where does this faith and grace combination come from?  Romans 3:24 gives us the answer.  In reference to those who are recipients of God’s righteousness, Paul writes: being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus.  The grace of God flows to us in the form of faith as a free gift that we cannot earn.

Putting all of these pieces together, we can define grace as follows.  God’s grace is a free and unmerited gift, that cannot be earned, which provides redemption to its recipients through faith in Christ.

Having come to a good understanding of peace and grace, I now want to consider what they should mean to our lives.  To get at that, I think we need to understand what both peace and grace look like in the real world.  We have already looked extensively at Romans 4.  In chapter 5 Paul expends considerable effort to show the superiority of Christ over everything else that exists.  In the middle of that discourse, in verses 9 and 10, we find this: Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him.  For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.

Paul’s point is that Christ’s redemption is of sufficient power to satisfy the wrath of God and to save those of us who trust Him.  But, I want to focus in on the little phrase “saved from the wrath of God through Him.”  Consider how powerful, terrifying, and unavoidable the wrath of God is.  The fury of an omnipotent creator God is so overwhelming that it required the death of the perfect Son of God to quench it. 

The prophet Zephaniah describes the wrath of God this way: Near is the great day of the LORD, near and coming very quickly; listen, the day of the LORD!  In it the warrior cries out bitterly.  A day of wrath is that day, a day of trouble and distress, a day of destruction and desolation, a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and thick darkness, a day of trumpet and battle cry against the fortified cities and the high corner towers.  I will bring distress on men so that they will walk like the blind, because they have sinned against the LORD; and their blood will be poured out like dust and their flesh like dung.  Neither their silver nor their gold will be able to deliver them on the day of the LORD’s wrath; and all the earth will be devoured in the fire of His jealousy, for He will make a complete end, indeed a terrifying one, of all the inhabitants of the earth.

Jonathan Edwards, in his famous sermon “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” speaks thusly of the wrath of God: “The bow of God’s wrath is bent, and the arrow made ready on the string, and justice bends the arrow at your heart, and strains the bow, and it is nothing but the mere pleasure of God, and that of an angry God, without any promise or obligation at all, that keeps the arrow one moment from being made drunk with your blood.”

There is no worse condition in all of reality than to be facing the wrath of God unshielded, without any protection from the scorching heat of His anger.  But it gets worse.  Back in Ephesians 2:3, Paul is describing the way we who are now Christians used to live.  He writes: Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.

It is not bad enough that God was angry with us.  But we, like ignorant children, actually had the nerve to be angry back at Him because of the state of affairs that our own rebellion and disobedience had gotten us into. 

Picture a tiny three-year-old little boy.  He has just blatantly ignored his father’s instructions not to throw rocks.  One of the rocks has shattered the windshield of the family vehicle.  The father is rightly furious and is ready and willing to enforce corrective discipline of such a degree that he hopes the child will never, for the rest of his life, forget it.  But the little one, filled with self-righteous indignation at having his wishes thwarted stands there before his six-foot tall giant of a father, stamps his feet, and screams out a defiant rejection of his father’s authority.

We were like that little child.  So obtuse that we had no concept of the extreme and deadly eternal danger we were in from God’s burning anger.  So, when we come to Romans 5:1 and read this: Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, we must remember what was at stake for us.  We must drill into our minds the terrible reality of our former state of war with God so that we can understand the ramifications of what it means that we now are at peace with Him.  We can only appreciate fully the tranquility of peace if we have known intimately the horrors of war.  All the descriptions we need are contained right there in the text of Scripture.

Now then, what is the means by which we now have peace with God?  It is solely through His grace.  What does God’s grace look like?  I want to highlight three elements of it.  The next verse of Romans 5 provides us with the first.  In describing our relationship with Christ, Paul writes: through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand.  It is only because we are recipients of God’s grace that we are capable of standing at all.  So stand, Christian!  This is not a day to be timid and cower before our Savior.  It is a day to rejoice and exult in His overflowing and abundant grace that covers us completely.

Secondly, God’s grace is a richness that exceeds all others.  Once again describing our relation to Christ, Paul writes in verse 7: so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.  What is it about God’s grace that makes it surpassingly rich?  The word for surpassing is also used in 2^nd Corinthians 3:10.  Paul is contrasting the interaction that God had with Israel through Moses and the relationship that He now has with us through the Holy Spirit.  Paul calls the former the ministry of death and condemnation and the latter the ministry of righteousness and the Spirit.  In verse 10 we find: for indeed what had glory, in this case has no glory because of the glory that surpasses it.

The glory of God that shook Mount Sinai.  The glory of God that caused Moses’s face to shine so much that he had to cover his face with a veil so that the people would not be frightenened.  This incomparable glory that worked acts of stupendous supernatural power before Israel and the nations they came into contact with.  All of this is as nothing compared with the glory of God that now shines forth in the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.  The glory of the gospel is so powerful that it is as if the former glory that God displayed was no glory at all.  And, it is that same glory that He has poured onto you by showering you with His grace.

Thirdly, God’s glory is the means by which He is to be worshiped.  Consider Ephesians 1:6.  Here Paul is describing predestination and election.  He writes that God’s entire plan of redemption is: to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved.  God’s plan of loving, predestined redemption and adoption is not primarily for our benefit.  It is for Him.  He designed His redemptive plan of salvation so that His own glory might be manifested through the grace that He pours onto us when He saves us.

So, to summarize these three points, we can say the following.  We can only appreciate the incalculable wonder and splendor of God’s grace if we understand its vital importance for our redemption, its ability to display the surpassing richness of God’s glory, and its position as the means by which we are able to worship Him.

I have two last questions I want to consider.  The first is this.  Do we live like we are recipients of God’s grace?  I think that one who realizes they have been forgiven and given a gift they do not deserve are much more inclined to forgive and give unmerited gifts to others.  Think about it.  If you were sentenced to death, and at the last minute you received a presidential pardon, you ought to be much more appreciative of the life you now live.  And, you ought to be vastly more willing to give others some leniency when the time comes.

If you understand God’s grace and live like you are a recipient of it, you will be a compassionate and kind person.  But, if you fail to appreciate grace you will tend to be unforgiving of other’s faults and harsh about their failures.

My second question is much like the last one.  Do we live like people who are at peace with God?  Let us think this through.  One who is at peace with God is in unison, or harmony, with Him.  Unity with God results in adherence to what delights Him, what incurs His favor, and what leads to His blessing.  It is no different from a human relationship, such as a marriage.  For that relationship to be harmonious, both parties need to look out for the interests and concerns of the other person.

So, in our relationship with God what should this look like?  It should look like obedience.  Now, that may not sound like a very exciting word to you.  It may not be very compelling to think about your life with Christ as a life of obedience.  But consider Jesus’s teaching in Matthew 11:28-29.  He said: “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.  Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”

Or how about what Jesus’s Apostle, John, wrote in 1^st John 5:2-3?  There we read: By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and observe His commandments.  For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome.

Now, if we are being honest we should probably admit that much of the time Christ’s yoke and his commandments do not feel easy or light and they most certainly do feel burdensome.  Why is that and how do we change it?  I believe the problem is that we tend to approach obedience the wrong way.  We think of obedience like slavish subservience to a task master who oppresses us. But that is not the way it should be with God.

Our obedience to Him is not like bondage to law.  Rather, it is a willing and joyful submission to God’s instructions, and a recognition that they are designed for our ultimate benefit.  The only way this is possible is through love.  That is why John wrote that the love of God is the keeping of His commandments, and that it is through this love that we know we ourselves are children of God and that we love other children of God.

It is our love for God, precisely because of the grace He has given us and the peace He has established with us that causes us to love Him back and desire to obey Him and please Him.  This is what enables God’s commandments to become light, easy, and not burdensome.

I think the sequence goes like this.  We have to start by recognizing the surpassing, overflowing, abundant grace we have been given.  This leads naturally to an awareness of our current state of peace that contrasts so sharply with our former state of enmity.  This understanding overflows into an abounding love that causes us to hunger to obey. 

Thus, we can see quite clearly that the cause of our redemption is God’s grace that has been granted to us.  And, the effect of our redemption is the peace we now enjoy with our Creator.  I believe that our charge now, as Christians who are committed to following Christ, is to go out and live like we believe this.