Hello, welcome to today's program. We are live from beautiful, lovely Kingsport, Tennessee, and I'm wearing a new flannel that my precious wife got. First of all, wear something red. It's like, it's like fluorescent red. This camera like really picks up, picks up red. So it's like sending the red on the carpet, whatever. All right, today I want to talk about one of my favorite characters from church history, J. Gresham Machen, and he wrote—actually it was a series of sermons, I guess they were eventually edited for publication—a book that I've not read all of it, but I've read a few parts of it. It's called God Transcendent and Other Selected Sermons, and there's a sermon in here on the active obedience of Christ. One of the little anecdotes about J. Gressom Machen, who was the great defender of orthodoxy against the rise of liberalism in the P.C. USA before they excommunicated him for it. Machen was the great defender of that, of the truth, the virgin birth, and biblical missions, which is why he founded the Independent Board of Presbyterian Foreign Missions, which is kind of an oxymoron, I guess. But he got in big trouble for that, for not towing the party line. But he founded the Independent Board, IBPFM, the Independent Board for Presbyterian Formations, which still is part of the Bible Presbyterian Church, which was the first denomination I was ordained in long ago. And they still have a lot of great missionaries that are under the oversight of IBPFM, but Machen wanted there to be a missions board that actually believed the gospel and actually had people that wanted to do evangelism because without the gospel, people go to hell. And I was actually listening to Darrell Hart has a lecture series. It's free on the podcast apps. Probably, I think Spotify probably has it. I use the Apple podcast, Apple Purple, the Purple app. That's where I listen to most of my podcasts. But Spotify is actually pretty cool too. It's got a lot of stuff on it that's really, really good. But I was listening to Daryl Hart's lectures. Daryl Hart is the great Machen biographer. And I've got his book, Defending the Faith, about the life of Machen. And it's really good. The sections of it I've read are really good. One thing in that lecture series, I've listened to the whole series a couple of times as I'm driving around, I've been listening to it. There was a group of people were hired. It was funded by the Rockefellers to investigate missions and to report on missions. They produced this gigantic report. And there were people on this commission to study missions and write a report about missions. There were people on there that didn't even believe in the virgin birth of Christ. There are people that weren't even Christians. And the findings of this report were astonishing. And they basically came back with, we don't need to tell people about Jesus and about the gospel and the cross to, you know, rescue people from hell. As if, yeah, that's not a problem anymore. Now we just want to spread the love of Jesus and be nice to people and recognize the good in all of man's religions and all this other liberal garbage. And so Machen was greatly distressed by all of this and said, no, it'd be good to have a mission board that did missions and actually shared the gospel with people, where we have a Savior who was actually born of a virgin. No, I did a whole podcast on Harry Emerson Fosdick's sermon, if you want to call it that, Shall the Fundamentalists Win?, where he says, surely there are wonderful Christian people who hold to different theories of the virgin birth of Christ. And you know what one of those theories was? One theory says it happened, and there's another theory of the virgin birth that says it didn't happen. You think, okay, those aren't different theories of the virgin birth. That's, some believe it, and liberals don't. But Fosdick, you know, Fosdick was just, he was a liberal Baptist. What was a liberal Baptist preaching in a Presbyterian church anyway? But anyway, just listening to Daryl Hart's lectures on the jaygrass of Machen's life and the ways that God used Machen and his classic book, Christianity and Liberalism, I wish that every Christian person that loves the truth would read it, because the same trajectories and the same ideas are beginning to, in fact, whatever's left of conservative Bible-believing Reformed Christianity, which ain't much, left today. I'm not sure how much of the PCA actually believes anything anymore. I know some that do. There's guys around the area here that still believe something, which is good. But Machen did a lot of preaching, and some of these sermons were edited for publication in the book God's Transcendent. Chapter 19 is called The Active Obedience of Christ, and it's a very famous anecdote. It's a wonderful story. As Machen fell ill of the illness that would claim his life, the very last telegram he ever sent someone, I believe it was sent to John Murray, and Machen, as he's dying, says to Murray, I'm so thankful for the active obedience of Christ. Stop. No hope without it. And that's a precious truth, the active obedience of Christ. Now, one of the things that you'll hear from very ignorant men who are not familiar with the history of the Westminster Assembly is they'll say, well, there were guys there that denied the imputation of the active obedience of Christ. That's actually not, that's really a half-truth. were individuals who thought that when Romans chapter 5 speaks about the obedience of Jesus Christ, that it really was a reference to His cross and His whole act of the incarnation and the whole life of Christ, and particularly the cross. And they thought that, well, if we have a separate category for the imputation of His act of obedience, that's going to detract from sola fide. Actually, just ordered, special ordered, it was kind of expensive, because it's out of print like every other good book in the world. Daniel Featley was one of the Westminster divines, and I saw reading J.B. Fesco's Theology of the Westminster Standards and Historical Context and Theological Insights, which is an excellent book by J.B. Fesco, that's spelled F-E-S-K-O, J.B. Fesco, The Theology of the Westminster Standards. There's a chapter on justification And there were speeches made against the act of obedience of Christ, not because they didn't believe in justification by faith alone. It's that their concern was, this is going to take away from Sola Fide, because it's almost like faith in the cross is not enough, and you're saying there's this additional thing. Daniel Featley, Thomas Goodwin, made a whole bunch of speeches against the opponents of the imputation of the act of obedience of Christ. And the thing is, they persuaded the people that were opposing it. and what made it into the Confession is what they ended up agreeing on. And the Westminster Confession and the Catechisms and the Confession itself speaks of the imputation of Christ's obedience and His satisfaction. So that's not a compromise. A lot of people think, well, they compromised so that the opponents of the act of obedience of Christ could sign off on the Westminster Standards. That's really not true. That's really not true. In fact, I wanted to read This whole section I've got here, I've got it all highlighted in my Kindle. Daniel Featley. I actually ordered, special ordered his book. It's called Dippers Dipped, and it's primarily aimed at Anabaptists, but one of the things that's in the book, which I have a hard copy of now, which I need to sit down with a pencil and read through it and highlight everything, but all of his speeches in favor of the Imputation of Christ Act of Obedience are in this book. And even though it's in Old English where the S's are F's, which is really distracting, they're really good. What I have read is really, really good. But Featley opposed that point. Listen to what he says. I just want to read a couple things here. Featley opposed this point by arguing that Christ's act of obedience could not be imputed before a person sins or first can be forgiven, for it is not righteous with God to account him righteous, to account him as righteous, who hath no way satisfied for his sins, neither by himself nor other. The captive must first be freed before he be advanced to honor." So, Featley is arguing forgiveness comes first, and then Christ's righteousness is imputed to us. And he gives five distinct points. Actually, I've got them all highlighted here. Do I want to read these? Yeah, I'm going to go ahead and read these. These are so good. So listen to Daniel Featley. Daniel Featley and Thomas Goodwin refuted the opponents of the imputation of the Act of Obedience of Christ, and they refuted them by answering their concerns. They thought that this would add to sola fide. So when you hear federal vision guys or other goofy, ignorant reform people say, there are people at the Westminster Assembly who opposed the Act of Obedience of Christ as if they taught what the federal vision guys teach about justification, that is just perfectly false. Okay? Listen to Featley. It says Fesco here summarizing it. Featly then offered five positive reasons for the imputation of the act of obedience of Christ. Let me see, I see there's people chit-chatting here. The audio is breaking up? No, that's not good. Here, let me turn this up. Turn this up here. Maybe that'll make a difference. Hopefully the internet. The internet in this area has been really spotty lately, but that's kind of annoying. Okay, let me see who else is here. Brian Norman and Tara of Ur. And there's Susan. Howdy, Susan. Thanks for all the stuff you do, making thumbnails. Robert Vogler, yes, sir. Good to see you on there. All right. Says Featley. Featley then offered five positive reasons why we need the imputation of the act of obedience of Christ. First, he argued that justification is distinct from redemption and satisfaction. He's right about that. It is. And therefore, the imputation of Christ's passive obedience is insufficient for justification. That's exactly right. Think about it. If my penalty is paid, I still haven't kept positively the Covenant of Works. I have not positively kept the righteous requirements of the law. Second, the Scriptures state that righteousness, dikaioma, in Romans 5, is imputed, not the mere passive obedience, and Featley is right about that. Third, fulfilling the ceremonial law is different, according to Featley, from Christ's passive obedience. The elements of the ceremonial law were legal acts and a kind of confession, and therefore given to believers. Fourth, Featley pointed out the irony. that opponents of the imputation of the act of obedience of Christ argued for a partial imputation of Christ's act of obedience. According to most Reformed theologians, Christ's suffering upon the cross was an act of both passive and active obedience. I think that's a very important point. There's nothing exclusively passive about his bearing the wrath of God. That is a very active thing that Jesus did there. Hence, if opponents of the imputation of the act of obedience of Christ were willing to give some part of the act of obedience to believers, why not the whole of it? Good question. Fifthly, finally, unless believers receive the imputation of the act of obedience of Christ, then they must be barred for eternal life, because such is the nature of the law. Listen, do this and you will live. not merely have the penalty satisfied, be redeemed from the curse of your disobedience, and you will live. The commandment is, the commandment of the covenant of works, the commandment of God's law, Leviticus 18.5, is do this and you will live. And dear ones, that's exactly what we haven't done. You and I have not done this, have not done the law. I've not kept its righteous requirements, and neither have you. And that's why we need Jesus to do this so we can live. Leviticus 18.5, Matthew 19.37, do this and you will live. And if you would enter into life, keep the commandments, said Jesus. You see why simply having the penalty canceled, which thankfully the cross does, but that's not sufficient for me to live eternally. Okay, so Featley did a really good job. He did a really good job of explaining this and listen to this last paragraph that Fesco writes about this debate. Featley was concerned with other objections, as well as with refuting the errors of miscreants such as Papists, Arminians, Antinomians, and Sassinians. Sassinians were basically liberals way back then. For example, Antinomians commonly argued that if Christ fulfilled the law in the stead of believers, then what need of holiness was there? Featley acknowledged that since Christ's act of obedience is imputed to believers, they are not obligated to fulfill the law to justify us before God or to procure us a title to the kingdom of heaven. Rather, their fulfillment of the law is to other ends, such as the glory of God, to demonstrate their faith by their works, to make one's calling an election sure, to adorn one's profession of faith with holy conversation, to avoid scandal, and to avert God's judgment. That's almost word for word what chapter 16 of the Westminster Confession says about the reason we do good works. And I wrote in a little note here, I made a note on my Kindle, any student of the Bible knows that Thelius write about that. that the reason we do good works as Christians is not to justify ourselves or save ourselves. That destroys the gospel completely. Rather, the reason we do good works is to shut the mouths of adversaries, to evidence our faith that it's real, to give fruit and evidence of our faith, to adorn our profession with the gospel, and to shut the mouths of our adversaries and things like that. An objection of the Papists was that if Christ's righteousness is imputed, then believers must receive all of it, which means they are as righteous as Christ. And Featley appealed to Luther, quote, all believers, according to the speech of Luther, are equally just in respect of imputed justice, though not of inherent in respect of passive, non-active righteousness. In other words, Christ's righteousness was inherent, whereas ours is imputed. And the reverse would apply to Jesus on the cross. Think about this. Did Jesus Christ, when he was nailed to the cross, did he actually become inherently evil? No. He is morally, sinlessly perfect in himself. but he was legally treated as if he was sinful in exactly the same way we, although still sinful, are legally treated as righteous. It's amazing to me. The Roman Catholic Church to this very day still calls the gospel, the biblical doctrine of justification, a legal fiction. They call it a legal fiction. You're saying that God lies about us. God lies about us and says that we're righteous while we're still sinful. You make God a liar. That no more makes God a liar than Jesus dying on the cross for our sins makes God a liar. God the Father treated Jesus as if he had committed all my sins even though he didn't. Well, how does that happen? Imputation. Legal reckoning. Crediting. Jesus didn't have any sin in himself, and he remains inwardly, inherently perfect throughout the entire cross. He never becomes intrinsically, inherently evil, but he's legally treated as if he were, in exactly the same way that I am legally treated as if I'm righteous while I'm not. That's no more a fiction than the cross of Christ was a fiction. Would you say that, that Jesus' death on the cross is a legal fiction? God lied about Jesus by treating him as if he was a sinner? No. He treated him as if he was a sinner because as Isaiah 53, verse six says, and Yahweh has laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was wounded for our transgressions. How could he do that? How could he be wounded and crushed for our transgressions and iniquities? imputation. They were legally credited to his account in the sight of his father, and he was treated accordingly. That's why his death was so horrible. Was that a legal fiction? I've said for years, the Roman Catholic religion's charge against the gospel that it's a legal fiction is the most blasphemous thing that they could ever say. The only way that God justifying the sinner on the basis of Christ's righteousness imputed to them would be if God lied about Jesus by treating Him as if He committed sins when legally He really wasn't even responsible for them. No, He was. In that moment, God the Father reckoned all of our sins to His account and treated Him accordingly. So that brings about our forgiveness. But Christ also withstood the temptations that we face and never gave in to them. Jesus was tempted in every way that we are, yet without sin. He maintained his sinless perfection throughout his entire life. Now listen, sitting out, a lot of people think that the Westminster Confession was a compromise on this issue. It really wasn't. It really wasn't. Listen to what Fesco says here. He says, and it is notable, it is the notable absence of this phrase, as well as any mention of active or passive obedience from the confession that has led some to the conclusion that the assembly later accommodated the minority views of Gattacher twists and the other opponents of the imputation of the activities of Christ. The question of whether the divine's accommodated the opponents of the imputation of the activities of Christ will be treated in the next section, which examines justification according to the standards briefly stated, The standards do not accommodate the minority position, but affirm the imputation of the act of obedience of Christ. And he's exactly right. They affirm it. Because it says the obedience and satisfaction of Christ are imputed to us for our justification. Okay, so Machen, simply holding to what Scripture says, he's simply holding to what the Westminster Standards said and say in his lifetime, because he believed that confession was faithful. So I want to read a little bit of Machen's sermon on the act of obedience of Christ and explain why. It wasn't just a little Reformed hobby horse or something like that that he held to. This is the beating heart of the biblical gospel that we're talking about here, okay? All right, he says this. There's some discussion going on over here. Let's go quick. OK. And I don't get where the confession box came from. Yeah, I don't know where the box came from. We're supposed to confess our sins one to another, but not to a priest for absolution or anything like that. That's not biblical. Okay, says Machen. Last Sunday afternoon, in outlining the biblical teaching about the work of Christ and satisfying for us the claims of God's law, I said nothing about one very important part of that work. I pointed out that Christ, by his death on our stead on the cross, paid the just penalty of our sin. But I said nothing of another thing that he did for us. I said nothing about what Christ did for us by His active obedience to God's law. Can I break from the sermon here? Which is what Leviticus 18.5 and Matthew 19 is talking about. Do this and you will live. It's not merely forgiveness. The gospel, how we're saved, is not merely forgiveness, although we do need forgiveness. We need to have the justice that is due to us for our sins satisfy, which Christ does in his death at the cross. But we also need to have done the law. Leviticus 18.5, do this and you will live. And just remember, when it comes to the law, there's nobody that has done it. All have sinned and fall short. There is none righteous. Okay. It's not that there's just none that have transgressed. There's none positively righteous either. Okay. Listen to me, Jim. It is very important that we should fill out that part of the outline before we go one step further. Suppose Christ had done for us merely what we said last Sunday afternoon that He did. Suppose He had merely paid the just penalty of the law that was resting upon us for our sin and had done nothing more than that. Where would we be then? Well, I think we can say If indeed it is legitimate to separate one part of the work of Christ even in thought from the rest, that if Christ had merely paid the penalty of sin for us and had done nothing more, we should be at best back in the situation in which Adam found himself when God placed him under the covenant of works. That's a brilliant insight. He is exactly right. If all Jesus did was satisfy divine justice against me in terms of removing the curse of the law, the penalty, well, I still haven't positively kept the covenant of works. I have not earned my right to eat from the tree of life and live forever. And that's the thing that is so important to understanding the biblical covenant of works, is that there's no grace in it at all. It's not a gracious covenant. It is a legal covenant. Adam had to obey and to do so perfectly. Perfect personal and perpetual obedience. And had he done that, he would have earned the right to eat from the tree of life and live forever. Says Machen, that covenant of works was a probation. If Adam kept the law of God for a certain period, he was to have eternal life. If he disobeyed, he was to have death. Well, he disobeyed and the penalty of death was inflicted upon him and his posterity. then Christ, by His death on the cross, paid that penalty for those whom God had chosen. Well and good, but if that were all that Christ did for us, do you not see that we should be back in just the situation in which Adam was before he sinned? The penalty of his sinning would have been removed from us because it had all been paid by Christ. But for the future, the attainment of eternal life would have been dependent upon our perfect obedience to the law of God. we should simply have been back in the probation again." Okay, breaking from the quotation there. Don't you love how clear Machen is? I mean, what he's saying is very clear. This is how good theology is done. This is how good preaching is done. It's not ambiguous. He's not using long words. He's not making up cutesy-wootsy little words along the fly. He's trying to be crystal clear. He's engaging in repetition. He's making sure that no one can misunderstand what he's saying. And I read a Spurgeon quote a couple of years ago, and I mentioned on my program, I need to get this chiseled into some wood. So one of my children, my daughter, Lily, burned it into a wood plaque I've got on the wall over there. My eyes are getting about, let's see if I can read it from here. It says, write not so that people can understand, but so that they cannot misunderstand. And I said the same thing of myself. Preach in such a way, not just so you can be understood. Preach so that it's impossible to misunderstand you. That's one thing if If a pastor or a Christian writer, conference speaker, author, whatever, is constantly being told, you've got to clarify this. We're not really sure what you mean about just how you get to heaven. Maybe you shouldn't be teaching anyone that. If you've been trying to clarify your views on the gospel for 23 years, and world-class theologians still can't understand what you're talking about, maybe you've missed your calling. Maybe you shouldn't be teaching anybody. But Machen, one of the reasons that his book, Christianity and Liberalism, and his preaching and his other writings have stood the test of time, you can understand what he's talking about. He writes with his audience. He's not trying to bedazzle young people by using weird words. He's easy to understand. He preaches pure and simple. That's the way I am to preach. says Machen. Moreover, we should have been back in that probation in a very much less hopeful way than that in which Adam was originally placed in it. Everything was in Adam's favor when he was placed in the probation. He had been created in knowledge, righteousness, and holiness. He had been created positively good, yet despite all that, he fell. How much more likely would we be to fall, nay, how certain to fall, if all that Christ had done for us were merely to remove from us the guilt of past sin, leaving it then to our own efforts to win the reward which God has pronounced upon perfect obedience, i.e., do this and you will live. See, it's not enough to be just forgiven. A lot of times, justification in some broader pop evangelical circles, well, justification means just as if I'd never sinned. That's a half-truth that actually turns into a complete untruth, if you think that's all it is. Justification is not merely just as if I'd never sinned. Justification is also just as if I had done the law and can live thereby. just as if I had kept God's commandments perfectly, personally, and perpetually. Listen to that sentence again. Nice, clear sentence. How much more likely would we be to fall, nay, how certain to fall, if all that Christ had done for us were merely to remove from us the guilt of past sin, leading it then to our own efforts to win the reward which God has pronounced upon perfect obedience? Good, good point. We would fall. We would fall. says Machen, but I really must decline to speculate any further about what might have been if Christ had done something less for us than that which He actually has done. As a matter of fact, He has not merely paid the penalty of Adam's first sin and the penalty of the sins which we individually have committed, but also He has positively merited for us eternal life. Okay, I wanna issue a warning, so if you've zoned out on me, come back here. Hey, listen, listen, listen. If you hear anyone disparaging the concept of merit, or saying that, you know, man, Adam could never have merited anything on the side of God, 99.99999% chance you're talking to a heretic. If people don't like the concept of merit, it's because they hate the gospel. The concept of needing to merit, to earn eternal life, by perfect obedience is the reason Jesus came. If we could be declared righteous by our own works in any way, then Christ died for nothing. Galatians 2.21. He died to no purpose. Okay, listen to it, Machen. As a matter of fact, He has not merely paid the penalty of Adam's first sin and the penalty of the sins which we individually have committed, but also he has positively merited for us eternal life, praise God. He was, in other words, our representative both in penalty paying and in probation keeping. He paid the penalty of sin for us, and he stood the probation for us. Now, what he means by probation is Adam was put in a position where he's created righteous and upright, doesn't have any kind of inclination towards sin, and he is given a commandment. In the day that you eat of it, you will surely die. There is an implied promise of life in that as well. Anytime God makes a threat for disobedience, the contrary promise is implied without being stated. So, in the day you eat of it, you will surely die, also means in the day you don't eat of it, you will live forever. Okay, so Jesus has got to be tempted in every way that Adam was, every way that we are, and maintain his righteousness. so that there is a righteousness, a preceptive obedience to the Ten Commandments, to the law, that can be legally credited to our account if we're going to go to heaven. Listen to that sentence again. This is why Machen is going to—a hundred years after we're all dead, people will still be reading him, just like they still read Luther, just like they still read Thomas Brooks and Thomas Watson and John Owen and John Calvin. Why are those guys such stalwarts of the faith? Because you can understand what they're talking about! You can actually read them, and it makes sense. That's what good theological writing is supposed to do. You're supposed to learn from it. It's supposed to be easy to understand. Listen to Machen again. He was, in other words, our representative, both in penalty paying and in probation keeping. He paid the penalty of sin for us, and he stood the probation for us. That is the reason why those who have been saved by the Lord Jesus Christ are in a far more blessed condition than was Adam before he fell. Adam before he fell was righteous in the sight of God, but he was still under the possibility of becoming unrighteous. Those who have been saved by the Lord Jesus Christ not only are righteous in the sight of God, but they are beyond the possibility of becoming unrighteous. Is that not good news? That's why, as this dear man of God who spent his life defending this stuff, as he's laying there on his deathbed, where are his thoughts? I'm so thankful for the obedience of Christ. No hope without it. I promise you, if I'm not comatose on my deathbed, so I'm going to be thinking about too. My sins were nailed to the cross and I bear them no more. And I am clothed, I am arrayed in the robe of Christ's righteousness. And as Mason said so well there, I mean, this is evangelical biblical gold. Those who have been saved by the Lord Jesus Christ, not only are righteous in the sight of God, but they are beyond the possibility of becoming unrighteous. In their case, the probation is over. Is that not good news? Everything I need him to be, he is. Everything I needed him to do, he did. Justice smiles and asks no more. I cannot be condemned for my sin. There is now, says Paul in Romans 8.1. Not at the end if I cooperate or bear enough fruit, Now, no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. Who will bring a charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies, who is he that condemns. My probation is over. The second Adam, the last Adam, fulfilled its righteous requirement for me and has imputed that righteousness to my ledger, to my legal account, in the sight of God. Now, the probation is over. It is not over because they have stood it successfully. It is not over because they themselves earned the reward of blessed assurance, which God promised on condition of perfect obedience. But it is over because Christ has stood it for them. It is over because Christ has merited for them the reward by his perfect obedience to God's law. I think I can make the matter plain if I imagine a dialogue between the law of God and a sinful man saved by grace. Now listen to this. I love this. Man, says the law of God, have you obeyed my commandments? No, says the sinner saved by grace. I have disobeyed them. not only in the person of my representative, Adam, in his first sin, but also that I myself have sinned and thought word and deed. Well then, sinner, says the law of God, have you paid the penalty which I pronounced upon disobedience? No, says the sinner. I have not paid the penalty myself, but Christ has paid it for me. He was my representative when he died there on the cross. Hence, so far as the penalty is concerned, I am clear. Well then, sinner, says the law of God, how about the conditions which God has pronounced for the attainment of assured blessedness? Have you stood the test? Have you merited eternal life by perfect obedience during the period of probation? No, says the sinner. I have not merited eternal life by my own perfect obedience. God knows, and my own conscience knows, that even after I became a Christian, I have sinned in thought, word, and deed. But although I have not merited eternal life by any obedience of my own, Christ has merited it for me by His perfect obedience. He was not for Himself subject for the law. No obedience was required of him for himself, since he was Lord of all. That obedience then, which he rendered to the law when he was on earth, was rendered by him as my representative. I have no righteousness of my own, but clad in Christ's perfect righteousness, imputed to me and received by faith alone, I can glory in the fact that so far as I am concerned, the probation has been kept, and as God is true, there awaits me the glorious reward which Christ thus earned for me." Isn't that wonderful? That's the end of the dialogue. It's exactly right. It's exactly right. That is the simple glory of the gospel. It's what Rome hates. To this day, Roman Catholic religion detests that truth. The federal vision has buried it under their goofy going from immaturity to maturity or whatever. The judgment of works as my future justifications by all of that destroys, annihilates the simple, blessed, glorious gospel. Listen to Machen, he says, Theologians are accustomed to distinguish those two parts of the saving work of Christ by calling one of them his passive obedience and the other of them his active obedience. By his passive obedience, that is by suffering in our stead, he paid the penalty for us. By his active obedience, that is by doing what the law required, he has merited for us the reward. I like that terminology well enough. I think it does set forth as well as can be done in human language in two aspects of Christ's work. And yet a danger lurks in it if it leads us to think that one of the two parts of Christ's work can be separated from the other. This is a very important point. I highlighted this next paragraph. Please listen to this carefully. How shall we distinguish Christ's active obedience from his passive obedience? Shall we say that he accomplished his act of obedience by his life and accomplished his passive obedience by his death? No, that will not do at all. During every moment of his life on earth, Christ was engaged in his passive obedience. It was all for him humiliation, was it not? It was all suffering. It was all part of his payment of the penalty of sin. On the other hand, We cannot say that his death was passive obedience and not active. On the contrary, his death was the crown of his active obedience. It was the crown of that obedience to the law of God by which he merited eternal life for those whom he came to save. Okay, just stop from the quotation there just for a moment. So Machen is right. Every aspect is passive and active because passively there's a curse bearing aspect to everything. because he's born in a low condition, born under the law. I mean, he's born and put into a feeding trough as a baby. I would never have tolerated that for one of my children. To be laid in a manger with dry donkey slobber on the side of it. I mean, the whole humiliation of Christ is passive and it's active. And on the cross, he is not just passively having the curse of our disobedience laid upon him, it's actively being put upon him. He's actively taking it. So while that can be helpful, active and passive obedience, it is helpful in theological categories, but there's an active and passive element to both aspects of his work, his curse-bearing work and his positively keeping the law. It's passive and active on both counts. Now says Machen, Do you not see them with the true state of the cases? Christ's active obedience and His passive obedience are not two divisions of His work. Some of the events of His earthly life being His active obedience and other events of His life being His passive obedience, but every event of His life was both active obedience and passive obedience. Every event of His life was a part of His payment of the penalty of sin, and every part of His life was a part of that glorious keeping of the law by which He earned for His people the reward of eternal life. The two aspects of his work, in other words, are inextricably intertwined. Neither was performed apart from the other. Together, they constitute the wonderful, full salvation which was wrought for us by Christ, our Redeemer. I almost bring tears to my eyes. That's pure gospel gold in an age of gospel obfuscation and gospel mud, isn't it good to hear something clear, something biblical, rather than all of the silliness about final salvation by fruit, and there's no covenant of works, and the covenant of works is a covenant of grace, and all that kind of theological doublespeak and nonsense? It's good to hear someone who actually understood the Bible talk about it. Listen to Machen again. I'll read just a couple more paragraphs. I see people are commenting over there, but I can't. I'm not going to look at that yet. We can put it briefly by saying that Christ took our place with respect to the law of God. He paid for us the law's penalty, and he obeyed for us the law's commands. Isn't that great? Isn't that simple? That's why Machen, although he was a world-class scholar, That's why this kind of stuff will stand the test of time. That's why I am sitting here right now, and I have two copies in paperback of God Transcended, and I've got it on Kindle. Why is it still in print? Why do we still read this stuff? Because it's clear, and it's biblical. It's clear and biblical. And do we need a dose of clear and biblical today? Yeah, I think so, especially on this, especially on the gospel. He says, he saved us from hell, and he earned for us our entrance into heaven. All that we have then we owe unto him. There is no blessing that we have in this world or the next for which we should not give Christ thanks. As I say that, I am fully conscious of the inadequacy of my words. I've tried to summarize the teaching of the Bible about the saving work of Christ, yet how cold and dry seems any mere human summary, even if it were far better than mine. in comparison with the marvelous richness and warmth of the Bible itself. It is to the Bible itself that I'm going to ask you to turn with me next Sunday afternoon. Having tried to summarize the Bible's teaching in order that we may take each part of the Bible in proper relation to other parts, I'm going to ask you next Sunday to turn with me to the great texts themselves in order that we may test our summary. in every human summary by what God Himself has told us in His Word. Ah, when we do that, what refreshment it is to our souls, how infinitely superior is God's Word to all human attempts to summarize His teaching. And he goes on from there, and I might read some of the next sermon here and look at some of these great texts of Scripture. Actually, I'd like to look at one real quick, a passage I go to constantly. because it's wonderful and glorious. Since BibleWorks still isn't working, I thought someone on staff there, or someone left over, I know that place shut down, might be able to help me, but they still haven't been able to help me get BibleWorks 10.0 to work anymore. So I might end up having to go to Accordance, but I really don't want to because I've been using BibleWorks forever. I really don't want to change. Romans 4.4, not to the one who works his wage is not credited as a favor, but as what is due. But to the one who does not work, but believes on him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness. Just as David also speaks of the blessing on the man to whom God credits righteousness apart from works. Okay, that's the positive part. That's his obedience to the law. That's do this and you will live credited to our account, credits righteousness apart from works. Blessed are those whose lawless deeds have been forgiven and whose sins have been covered. Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord will not take into account." And there's the forgiveness side. God will not take my sins into account because Christ bore them at the cross. And God looks at me as if I have done the law and can live having merited eternal life because His active obedience has been imputed to my account. That is the direct teaching of Romans 4 four through eight. It's right there in scripture. Y'all need to read it. All right, let me see. Wow, a bunch of people commenting here. I don't get where the confessional boss came from. Okay, where's Paul Garvey? Y'all went to Catholic school and we had mass. I see other kids go up and get the communion, but I couldn't go because I hadn't done my Holy Communion. Made me feel like crap. Is that called piety, your own works? I'm not sure, Brian Norman, what you're talking about there. Yeah, thank you, Jesus. It's not earned, but freely given. That's right, that's right. Amen, I'm glad I started the year with Jesus. May he never get to the point that we have no need for him. Yep, when I'm dying, my telegram, if I send a telegram, maybe I'll send a text message if I can still move my fingers. I'm so thankful for the justice satisfying crosswork of Christ. and for his act of obedience. No hope without it. That's all I'm trusting in. Get into heaven. I bless the Lord for all the ways he's changed me, all the sin he's helped me put to death in my life, for the fact that there's so many things that used to be such a huge struggle. They're still a struggle, but not like they used to be. God has done incredible work in my life, but the thought of trusting in my works in any way, my progress, to finally save me is pure nonsense. If righteousness could be achieved by keeping the law, Christ died for nothing, Christ came for nothing, Christ obeyed for nothing. The message of God's law is do this and you will live. And if you don't do it, you're under the curse. Jesus bore the curse and Jesus alone did it so that we could live our sins and all their guilt imputed to Christ at the cross. His satisfaction of divine justice, His achieving of righteousness for us, imputed to us. That's what Machen's talking about. As He's dying, I'm so thankful for the active obedience of Christ. No hope without it. Thank you all for watching, or for listening. Keep your eyes fixed on the cross. Keep your eyes fixed on the gospel. Then everything else, everything else will come into focus. Thank you all for watching or listening.