Who Is The One Who Condemns?
“Who is the one who condemns?” (Romans 8:34)
We know that Jesus Christ is pleading the case of the believing
sinner in heaven. “Christ Jesus is He
who died, yes rather, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes
for us.”
Who condemns us? Quite
often our own conscience accuses us. Our own thoughts and memories haunt us at times. People reinforce their own condemnation by trying
to dull the conscience by the use of drugs and immoral behavior. But the truth is that
one-day we will stand before God as Judge.
Satan accuses the Christian before God day and night (Rev. 12:10). Some of us really keep him busy. He just loves to rub God in the face with our
sins. Every time we sin, he accuses us before
God.
If you have never put your faith in the death of Jesus Christ to save
you, you stand guilty before God (John 3:18-20).
Revelation 20:11-15 points a fearful picture of judgment before The
Great White Throne of God. The paragraph
concludes, “And if anyone’s name was not found written the Book of Life, he was
thrown into the lake of fire” (v. 15).
Is your name written in God’s book? If it is, the apostle Paul in Romans 8:34 gives us
four reasons why we are forever free from condemnation by Jesus Christ.
Jesus Christ died for our sins on the cross. Jesus died making atonement for our sins. In His death He turned away the wrath of God. He died for us on our behalf! Jesus Christ died in our place so we would not
have to die spiritually. He died for our sins
and bore the punishment in our place. Jesus
took your and my condemnation on the cross, and it is finished forever. You cannot add anything to it, nor can you take
away from it.
Jesus rose from the dead. “He
was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification
(Romans 4:25). It is God’s way of
proving beyond a shadow of doubt that the death of Jesus covers all the sins of every
person who puts his faith in Christ. How do
we know His death was sufficient to cover our sin? God
raised Him from the dead. In the light of the
resurrection, all my sins are covered by Jesus’ blood.
Jesus is praying for you and me right now. He pleads our case and says, “Yes, Wil Pounds
is a sinner. I died for him, and he has
believed on Me as his Savior.”
Donald Barnhouse
once said, “You don’t have a problem too great for the power of Christ. . . .
You don’t have a sin too deep for the atoning blood of Christ.”
Jesus is interceding on our behalf in heaven. He ascended to heaven and is at the right hand of
the Father because His work of atonement is finished. Nothing can be added to it.
A person in his or her sin should fear condemnation. Have you ever fallen on your face and contemplated
the thought of one day standing before God? What
will you do? What will you say? How will you plead?
Only the reasonably minded person will plead guilty before God.
Because God is omniscient He knows every possible
thing about us as individuals. He knows our attitudes, our thoughts, our
"secret sins" of the heart and mind as well as our outward
observable behavior. Nothing is outside the realm of His understanding
of us. Nothing escapes Him. But the marvelous wonder is that He knows
all of this about us in detail and He still chose to justify us by grace
though faith in the finished work of His Son. .
"There is therefore now no condemnation for those
who are in Christ Jesus" (Romans 8:1). Praise God!
Selah!
Message by Wil Pounds (c) 2006
Click for printer friendly page
SELAH INDEX
CLICK to E-mail SELAH! to a friend.
|
![[Valid RSS]](../gra/valid-rss.png "Validate my RSS feed"){kind=small}
