“For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith.” (Rom. 1:16, 17.) Such were the words of one who knew, in his own soul, the power by which God had wrought in him through the gospel, a gospel not received from man, but taught to him by the revelation of Jesus Christ. (Gal. 1) Look at him as he goes on his way to Damascus, with authority from the high priest of the Jews, breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ! The eye of the Lord is upon him, and his career of wicked persecution must come to an end. Suddenly a light from heaven, brighter than the noonday sun, bursts upon him in his murderous path, and the proud, persecuting Saul of Tarsus lies upon the ground, a poor, broken sinner, ready to obey the voice of Him who had been the object of his bitter hatred.
This was the power of God. By this power the proud persecutor was humbled and broken to pieces in the presence of Jesus of Nazareth, and Jed to own the despised Nazarene as his Savior and Lord. And the Lord Jesus now became the one great object of his life. For the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus the Lord, he suffered the loss of all things, and “Christ and him crucified” became his theme. It was the power of God, through the truth of the gospel, that wrought this wonderful change. Paul had now learned the humbling truth, that man at his very best estate was lost—man, not the Gentiles only, but the Jews; not the publicans and sinners among the Jews, but the best and strictest of the religious Pharisees. He learned, moreover, that “If One died for all, then were all dead, and that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him who died for them and rose again.” “All were dead”—“dead in trespasses and sins.” What but the power of God could avail for such? Who but God could quicken the dead? None. Now this power of God was manifested in His Son Jesus Christ, who died and rose again; who, through death, destroyed Him who had the power of death, and ascended on high, leading captivity captive. By grace, Saul of Tarsus was brought to the knowledge of this great Deliverer; and he, who before was a blasphemer and persecutor, now proclaimed God’s great salvation thro ugh Jesus the Savior. “This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief.” (1 Tim. 1:15.) Such were the words of this saved persecutor. Blessed words! Worthy of all acceptation! “Christ Jesus came into the world;” this was grace. He came “to save sinners;” for this power was needed as well as grace. The glad tidings were worthy of all acceptation, for He had saved the chief of sinners. If the chief was saved, who need despair? If he found grace, surely there must be grace for all. If the power of God could save him, surely it was enough for any, or, for all. And this is what the apostle would have us learn from his own conversion, as he says in 1 Tim. 1, “Howbeit, for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might show forth all longsuffering, for a pattern to them who should hereafter believe on him to everlasting life.” This bold, blaspheming persecutor, this chief of sinners, was the one in whom it pleased God that Jesus Christ should show forth all long-suffering, for a pattern—a pattern to others of the mighty grace that wrought in him unto salvation. He found mercy. He was saved by grace. The power of God wrought in him effectually, and not only saved him, but transformed him from a blaspheming persecutor into a bold and self-sacrificing servant of Jesus Christ, who counted not his life dear, so that he might finish his course with joy, and the ministry which he received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God. Such was the power of God as it wrought in the apostle Paul.
Salvation is by grace, but there is in it also the operation of divine power. “The gospel is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.” The same power that wrought in raising up Christ from the dead, and setting Him at God’s right hand in the heavenly places, also operates in those who believe in Jesus; quickening them with Christ, raising them up, and seating them in the heavenly places in Him. If the sinner is dead in trespasses and sins, he not only needs atonement to meet the question of his sins and guilt, but he needs also divine power to bring him out of the state of death. This power is through the gospel. The dead hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear, live. “He that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but is passed from death unto life.”
Have you heard the voice of the Son of God? If you have heard that voice, you have life. The precious blood-shedding of Christ is the basis of all your blessing; but you have heard the voice of the Son of God; the eternal Word, and it has proved an almighty power to bring you out of, death into life.
The cross is the basis of all. There the blood of atonement was shed; and God’s claims about sin were all met. God was glorified in the death of Christ, His Son. This was the basis; and on this ground God raised up Jesus from the dead, the witness of accomplished redemption, of Satan’s defeat, and of everlasting triumph over sin, death, and hell. The resurrection of Christ was God’s power put forth as His righteous answer to the work of Christ on the cross; and this same power works in the sinner who believes in Jesus. The grace of God revealed in the gospel, meets the sinner in his extreme need—ruined beyond recovery—cold in the death of sin——not a pulsation in the heart toward God—and not only gives him perfect clearance from guilt, but also everlasting life, and everlasting deliverance from the power of death. It delivers from the whole position and state into which the sinner had been plunged by sin. It brings him out of a state of moral death, delivers from the dominion of sin, and sets him free to walk in the presence of God, and in communion with Him, in the power of a new life, and in the energy of the Spirit of God, by which he has been quickened and sealed, and by which he cries, “Abba Father.” Not only so, but it reveals heaven opened, and Jesus entered in, a Man in the glory of God; in whom he too, a believing sinner, saved by grace, has been brought to God, and has found a place in God’s infinite delights in His own Son, the heaven’s Beloved One.
And then, all this is in the righteousness of God. Were it not righteous the power of God could not be put forth. Grace reigns through righteousness. All is in virtue of the precious work and sacrifice of Christ. God puts value on the blood of Christ; and according to that value He acts for the sinner in grace. It is righteous to do so. And it is righteousness of God. It has its source in Him, and is according to His nature. The gospel reveals it. Precious revelation! May your heart and mine prize it. It is ours at an immense cost. But it is just like God to bestow it, for God is love! Love is the very essence of His being—love infinite as His being, that springs up unbidden, and flows forth in rivers of mercy. Yet that love was barred by sin. Sin was in the way of its reaching the sinner, so as to deliver. Righteousness and holiness forbad its bringing salvation to the sinner without the removal of sin. But love was not to be baffled. God gave His Son—His only begotten. The eternal Word was made flesh.; The Lamb of God came to take away sin, so that the sinner might be saved consistently with the claims of divine holiness, and thus divine love had its own way. In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only-begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him. “Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” (1 John 4:9, 10.) Thus God provided the sacrifice by which He was glorified in the putting away of sin. God’s throne was vindicated in the blood-shedding of Jesus, and now love is free to flow on in its course in rivers of mercy to the lost and the perishing, according to divine righteousness. It reaches the sinner just where he is in his misery and ruin, lifts him out of his shame, and gives him a standing in righteousness before God. And this is not man’s righteousness, but God’s. It is not what man has wrought for God, but what God gives to man. What a righteousness for a poor sinner! Righteousness bestowed freely in God’s unspeakable love! Reader, do you stand before God in His righteousness? If so, you are divinely complete—clothed in the “best robe.” More as to righteousness you could not have, nor desire to have; nor could God give more, or ask for more; it is His own, perfect, divine. And it is just what is suited to the presence of God; for its blessed expression is found in His glorified Son in whom is all his delight. God is bringing sinners to Himself, but He is bringing them there according to His own nature, and in a way consistently with His own character. He is filling His table with guests, but He will have them worthy of Himself. He is finding His joy and delight in man brought into His presence and glory, but brought there according to His own perfection, in His own nature, in His own likeness, to be partakers of His own everlasting joy. For this divine righteousness alone is suitable. This righteousness the gospel reveals. It is God’s righteousness revealed on the principle of faith. The sinner does not merit it. It is given freely. All is grace. Works have no place. It is on the principle of faith, not of works. And it is revealed to faith. It is not only by faith, or on that principle, but it is to faith: it applies itself wherever faith exists. It applies to all—Jew or Gentile—who believe. The sinner, no matter of what nation, no matter what his circumstances, no matter how deep his guilt, the moment he owns his guilt before God, and believes the gospel of His grace, gets a standing in divine righteousness in His holy presence. The gospel is the power of God by which he is saved, and brought into the consciousness of God’s unfathomable love, and of his standing in divine righteousness in the presence of God, where His love is shed on all around. Reader, have you known this power? Are you saved? Can you say you stand in the presence of God in divine righteousness, saved from guilt, from wrath, from the dominion of sin, a possessor of eternal life, a partaker of the divine nature, meet for God’s presence forever, and a sharer of the everlasting joy of that place? Then you have known the gospel as the power of God unto salvation. You may yet learn to know it in a deeper way, but you know it, and it is the spring of “joy unspeakable and full of glory”— joy divine, unfading, eternal.