We have been considering the subject of guilt in relation to three objective points of reference: the fact of God; the fact of man’s accountability to God; and the fact of man’s sin. We have focused upon the dawn of history as illuminated by the Bible. Although man was created in regal dignity as the image of God, inexplicably he displaced his love for God with an idolatrous love of self having been spurred to sin by the lies of Satan. Adam’s race, spawned after the Fall, is now conditioned by the liabilities of his disobedience: a legal standing of judicial guilt before God and a depraved nature marred by death. We inherit the legal status of our earthly father Adam: the status of legal condemnation. We also inherit the a fallen nature natively prone to sin.
We are not, however as bad as we could be and that is due to the fourth point of reference: the grace of God. Although Adam ran from God in Genesis 3, God was not approaching Adam to damn him, but to salvage His fallen creation and to inaugurate the demise of the Devil by instituting redemptive religion so that men might yet live in loving relation to Him. Yes, death now conditions our existence, but – but!, God deals with us in grace! In grace He announced the coming Seed (Genesis 3:15) – One who would defeat Satan and deliver us from lies and death. In grace He provided an animal skin covering to replace the fig leaves – a provision by which sacrificial worship was instituted and joined to Sabbath observance. Guilty sinners are yet admitted into communion with God if they look by faith to His Promised Seed and acknowledge their sin and guilt, while relying upon His gracious sacrificial provision.
Instead of man being immediately cast away from God in death, God provides a substitute whose shed blood is a testimony of deserved wrath, but whose acceptance by God is evidence of His unmerited grace. The believing worshipper hopes and relies upon divine grace to be provided deliverance from death. These essentials of grace inform the promises God later gave to Abraham and the Old Covenant religion established with Israel by Moses. Although His people were sinners who by nature would break His Law, God granted priestly sacrifice to atone for sin and satisfy the claims of justice so that He could yet righteously dwell with men. The history of the Old Testament is the account of God moving nearer and nearer in saving grace to redeem unworthy sinners.
The grace of God is now embodied in our fifth point of reference: the fact of Jesus Christ and His sacrificial death and triumphant resurrection. God graciously came near to sinners when the second person of the Trinity became a true man and accomplished what Adam failed to do. Jesus, the incarnate Son of God, fulfilled the mission assigned to the prophesied Messiah. He “destroyed the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8) and established the Kingdom of God. He taught of the Kingdom and demonstrated its power, but His greatest Kingdom victory was His sacrificial death on the cross. There He assumed the guilt and penalty for the sins of His people to effect the ultimate deliverance of the entire fallen cosmos. By His sinless life He fulfilled the requirements of the Law, and by His sacrificial death He satisfied the penalties of the Law – and that in the place of all who will put their trust in Him. The crux of His work was legal – to establish the legal basis for His Kingdom by His own perfect obedience and to satisfy the legal liabilities against His people by dying in their place. “He made Him who knew no sin, to be sin on our behalf that we might become the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Corinthians 5:21).
Jesus’ resurrection must also be understood in legal terms. Yes, He arose bodily. The resurrection was not an apparition nor a fabrication devised by the early church to make a hero of their failed leader. But, as to our interest in guilt, His resurrection is the legal vindication of His triumphant sacrificial death. He “was delivered up because of our transgressions, and was raised because of our justification” (Romans 4:25). He died as a guilty criminal, not only at the hands of the Romans, but also in relation to the court of heaven. Yet death had no claim upon Him and He arose triumphant for those He came to save. He then ascended into heaven and has been exalted as Lord upon the throne of God. As exalted Lord, He has given His church the promised Holy Spirit who is Himself the down payment of an eternal inheritance. The risen and exalted Lord Jesus yet labors as the High Priest of the new and better Covenant ratified in His blood. He is able to save all those who would draw near to God on the basis of His mediating priestly ministry.
Reconciliation, peace with God, forgiveness, pardon and mercy is declared to all men everywhere. All who hear and believe in Christ receive the benefits of His sinless life, sacrificial death and triumphant resurrection. All who join themselves to Christ by faith receive the gift of God’s grace. “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:23). In union with Christ, the believing sinner is granted Christ’s own legal status. “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus”
(Romans 8:1). Now, that’s good news to guilty sinners!
Other articles in this series:
Is There a Place for Guilt? Part I
Is there a Place for Guilt? Part II