The Great Joy of the Christian – by Desmond Ford

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Nov 10, 2015 1497

Ninety-nine people out of a hundred think they are good enough and most of them are in church. We are the dead on holiday. All have sinned and the wages of sin is death and we are all under condemnation.

However in Romans 3:21–26, we read about the cross of Christ, “But now,” and wherever you come across a ‘but’ in the Bible it is usually turning the tables. He has just given bad news. “What things soever the law says, it says to them that are under the law that every mouth may be stopped and all the world becomes subject to the world of God.” I happen to live on that planet. You happen to live on that planet. So all of us are subject to the judgment of God.

“But now,” it says, and it goes on to talk about the cross under three metaphors: the metaphor of the slave market, the metaphor of the temple, and the metaphor of the court. It talks about the redeeming of slaves, the day of the atonement, the sprinkling of the blood in the most holy place and justification, being declared righteous, winning the case, receiving the verdict.

The great joy of the Christian is that once you know the Gospel you have the verdict of the last judgment in your pocket. It is not just when you become a Christian. It is for every day after. It is for when I stumble, when I fall – justification is not a momentary thing. It is over me all the time.

I will be justified by faith in the last judgment. Christ is not just my substitute on Calvary, He is my substitute on judgment day if I feel my need and have claimed Him.

– Des Ford. Rom 8:27–32. Adapted from, “The News That Shook The World – Part 2.”