Ron Dunn Podcast - The Truth About Redemption

Episode Date: February 22, 2023

Ron Dunn speaks on redemption from his "To Tell The Truth" series

...that raised him up from the dead, and gave him glory, that your faith and hope might be in God." Now I want to read again the 18th verse where the Apostle says, For as much as you know, you are not redeemed with corruptible things such as silver and gold from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers. There is a bondage into which every child of Adam's race is born. It is a bondage that perhaps has no visible bars, no tangible cell, but it is no less real. It is a bondage. It is a bondage of life. And it is the supreme tragedy of human existence that that which God has given to man, which was to be the fullest expression of the Creator's love, his very life has become

for him a prison house. There are four observations out of this 18th verse that I think we ought to notice concerning life on planet earth. The first observation is this, that human life, your life, my life, is empty and futile and vain. He calls it vain conversation. And you understand that the word conversation, when the King James was translated did not refer to talk, but rather it referred to manner of life, to the habit of life. The word vain means that which is empty or that which has no direction, no purpose.

Literally it means an ineffectual attempt to do something. And what the Apostle Peter is saying is this, that life as it is lived, sin has squeezed from it all meaning. It has been drained of all of its essence. And we are ineffectually trying to grab hold of reality and yet never really catching hold of it, and that our life as it is now lived is vain, futile, producing nothing worthwhile, leading nowhere, aimless, never arriving at its proper end.

It is a life of emptiness and futility and fumbling and groping and yet never laying hold of reality. The second observation about this kind of life is that it is inherited from those that have gone before us. Those who have gone before us are perpetuating the emptiness of their own life. They can't help but pass it on, and we can't help but receive it. It's like water to a fish. Water is the natural habitat of a fish. And this vain, futile, purposeless, directionless, aimless life is our natural habitat. If a stream is poisoned at the mouth, then the flow of that stream everywhere it goes will also be polluted.

And the Apostle Peter says, We have received this empty life from tradition, from our fathers. They have passed it on, and you'll pass it on. You'll perpetuate the own emptiness and futility of your own life. Third observation, there is nothing connected with this life, there is nothing connected with this world that can change the situation. He says, you know it's an elementary truth. You know that you are not redeemed from this kind of life by such things as silver and gold. And silver and gold symbolize

the most precious things that this world has to offer and the most sought-after things of man. And he says, you take the most precious things of this earth, the most precious metals known to man, and even silver and gold cannot redeem you, cannot liberate you from that kind of life. There is nothing connected with this life that can change the situation. And it is simply another expression of man's futility, of his ineffectual attempt to do something but never really able to do it, where men think that by legislation they can change the situation, by revolution they can change

it, by women's liberation they can change it, by every movement, by new cults, by new religions. But the Bible plainly says that there is nothing connected with this life, with this world, that can change the situation. And then this is where the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ comes in. He says, You know that you are not redeemed from this kind of life by corruptible things, by anything connected with this world such as silver and gold, but you were liberated from this kind of life with the precious blood of Christ,

with the precious blood of Christ and the grand theme of the Word of God and the grand theme and the grand purpose of God our Creator is the redemption of the human race, to liberate us from that kind of life. And that's what Jesus Christ has come to do. He says in John chapter 10 and verse 10, I am come that you might have life and that you might have it more abundantly. Sin had squeezed all the meaning of life out of it and had left us empty, had left us empty. Jesus Christ sent into the world by God the Father has come and by the blood of his own body has paid the ransom for our liberation and has infused back into our existence

life, and not simply life, but life more abundantly. And the one thing that God has in mind today in this service and for the rest of human history for your life is redemption. Redemption. The word redeem is one of the great words of the Bible. It means to liberate a prisoner by paying for him. And what Jesus Christ has come into the world to do is to redeem us, to rescue us, who are prisoners of war, who are captives of our own sin and captives of our archenemy, the devil. And he has liberated us who were slaves to an empty life,

slavery, inescapable slavery. He has liberated that from us by payment of a price, and that price was His own blood. You have in this passage, verses 18 through 21, one of the great passages in the Bible concerning redemption. And I want to share with you this morning the truth about redemption. It's a truth that you need to know, and it is a truth that you must accept if you are ever to be liberated, rescued from a life that is ineffectual and worthless and will never go anywhere. Now he says several things about redemption.

Number one, he says that this thing of redemption was planned in the councils of eternity. In verse 20 the apostle says that Jesus Christ and his death in order to redeem us was verily foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you. Now, that's extremely important. He was foreordained before the foundation of the world, before the foundation of the world was ever digged, before it was ever laid. God predetermined, God predestined, God designed in eternity that Jesus Christ would come into this world as the Redeemer.

You know, God was not caught by surprise. Sin was no surprise to God. And the cross is not a last-ditch effort to save man. When Jesus died on the cross, God wasn't a drowning man grabbing at straws, doing the only thing he knew to do to save men. This was pre-planned even before the foundations of the world. Before there was ever a Garden of Eden, there was a cross on Calvary. God was a Redeemer long before he was a Creator. The Bible says in the Revelation that he was the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. You just can't get ahead of God. You can't surprise God. You can't thwart the plans of God. You

can't frustrate the grace of God. Long before Satan ever fell and before he ever seeped sin into the human race, God had provision already made. It was designed in eternity and displayed in time. He was manifested for us, manifested for us. That word manifested means he was manifested once and for all. Only one time, only one time did God ever send his Son into the world. Only one time did he ever die for the world's redemption. That means you can only be saved one time. Somebody said, well, I believe you can be saved and lose your salvation, be saved and lose your salvation.

Listen, did you know that you can be saved only as many times as Jesus died? Because it takes the death of God's Son to save a person. And the Bible says in Hebrews chapter 6 that one of the reasons a person could not be saved again if he were ever to lose his salvation would be this, seeing that you would crucify the Son of God afresh. God had only one Son to give and he gave him. He was manifested once at the end of God afresh. God had only one Son to give, and he gave him. He was manifested once at the end of time, but notice, he was manifested for you. I like that.

You know, God's always individual. God's always personal. And I want you to know this morning, if you had been the only, the only lost person in all of human history, God would still have sent his Son for you. If all of the human race, from Adam down to this present moment, had lived in perfection and had needed no redemption, and you were the only one who had ever fouled up, I want you to know God would have sent his Son to die just for you, just for you. For your sake he was manifested. Now, this means that redemption, world redemption, is the goal of human history.

It's the destiny of human history. Listen, I got excited while I was studying this passage because I saw something in a new light that I had never seen before. Do you know why God created the world? God created the world so that he could redeem the world. The purpose of creation was not primarily creation, the purpose of creation was redemption. God knows all things. God wasn't caught off guard.

The Lord wasn't surprised when sin entered. Now just a minute, let's think for a moment. Let's be logical, Let's be reasonable. After all, we're intelligent, sophisticated, 20th century beings. Let's be rational. God planned to create a world, and he planned to create a human race. Now, God knew, he knew that the human race would fall into sin, that misery would flood the earth,

that man would be baptized in misery and sin and death. Well, now, surely if God had known that was going to happen, he'd called off his plans. Surely, knowing now that your plans are going to go awry, knowing now that this perfect creation you're going to make is going to be polluted and perverted, surely you would call off your plans. Think about all the misery and the agony and the sorrow and the suffering that's going to flow from the generations to generations.

Now that you know that, surely you'll call off your plans." God didn't do it. You said, Lord, surely it would have been an act of kindness not to have created the human race, and God said, it's more kind to create the human race knowing that they're going to be immersed in misery and sin and sorrow than it would be to not create them and never let them know the joy and the privilege of redemption. You see, the plan of redemption and your participation in redemption is so glorious and so magnificent, you can't comprehend it. You're going to be surprised one day when we get on the other side, just see how great this thing is of being saved.

You don't have any conception this morning, my friend, of the joy and the glory of being one in Jesus Christ. But God knew it. And God said it is better to create a race that will sin and fall and be immersed in misery and let them taste redemption. That's better than never creating them and never letting them know the joy of redemption. God's purpose in creation was redemption.

God created the world just so he could redeem it, just so he could redeem it. And you don't have any idea this morning how glorious redemption is, and I don't either. This is why the Bible says that when Jesus comes again, it's going to be a revelation. It's going to be an unveiling. Well, I thought Jesus had already been revealed. I thought he had already been unveiled. Oh, yes, he has. But, you know, you can only shine a light so bright into a person's eyes,

and if it's too bright, it'll just put them out blind. You couldn't stare into the full glory of the sun without going blind, and God couldn't allow you to see the full glory of what it means to be in Jesus, you couldn't take it in your mortal frame. And the only way we'll ever be able to take it is if he gives us a glorified body, and in that glorified body we'll be able to stand the full impact of what it means to be saved. And the Bible says in Ephesians 3.10, the reason he did that was to prove to all the powers and principalities how wise he was. The Bible says in Ephesians 3.10, the reason he did that was to prove to all the powers and principalities how wise he was.

I wonder if there was an angel, I wonder if there was another angel, a cherub, maybe a Lucifer himself sitting over there, who said, God, you are not too smart, you are not too wise, you know the world is going to rebel, you know it is going to fall, you know the misery and the crime and the sin that is going to be rampant in the earth. It doesn't seem to me too wise to go ahead and create it, but God knew what he was about. And one of these days, all the powers and principalities in the universe will know the wisdom of God in salvation and redemption, and you'll know the wisdom, too, of God in redemption. It was planned, pre-planned before the foundations of the earth, planned in eternity. In the second place, it was accomplished by Christ in time.

In verse 18 he says, You know that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, such as silver and gold, redeemed from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. And now we must take our stand before the cross and look at it. You may stand there for years and look at it and examine it and never fully understand it. But it was on the cross that Christ redeemed us. Dark is the stain that

we cannot hide. What can avail to wash it away? Look, there flowing a crimson tide, whiter than snow you may be today. You have to stand at the foot of the cross and look and examine. And you see Christ as the Lamb of God shedding his precious blood, as the ransom, the payment for our liberation, for our rescue from an empty and vain and hell-bound life. He says in the first place that this crucifixion, this death of Jesus Christ, it was a vicarious death. What does the word vicarious mean? It means in the first place he was our substitute. He was our substitute.

Vicarious means somebody else does it in your place. And he is the Lamb. And if you start back in the early chapters of Genesis and go all the way through the book of Revelation, you'll find that lamb. God never swerves from focusing attention upon that lamb. It was a lamb that Abel brought, and God accepted it. It was a lamb that saved Isaac, substituted for Isaac.

Isaac was going to die, but God provided a lamb for the sacrifice. It was a lamb whose blood was shed, and that blood was flattered over the doorpost of the home. And that night in Exodus 12, God says, when the death angel flies over Egypt, when I see the blood, I will pass over you. And it was the shed blood of the lamb that delivered the people from death. It was that lamb typified in Isaiah 53, coming from the Father, identified as a person, the suffering servant. And the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. And one day when John the Baptist had been preaching and baptizing,

he saw Jesus coming. Now he knew who Jesus was because a few days before he had baptized Jesus and the Father, when he commissioned John, said, now John, here's how you'll recognize who the Messiah is. When you baptize somebody and you see the Holy Spirit descending from heaven and alighting on him like a dove, you'll know that's the one. One day Jesus came, and when he baptized him, the Bible says that the Spirit of God descended upon Jesus as a dove, and the heavens opened, and God spoke for the first time since Old Testament days. God spoke audibly and said, This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased. A few days later, John had all of his disciples around him, and he was baptizing.

He sees Jesus coming and he points his finger and he says, Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world. He was a substitute. Listen, today we talk about being saved, just inviting Christ to come into your heart. And I fear, I fear that sometimes people are inviting a Christ to come into their heart about whom they know nothing. It's not simply Christ that you invite to come into your heart.

It is the Christ who was crucified and died in your place for your sins, and the Christ who was raised, and the Christ who has been glorified and lives and sits today on the right hand of the Majesty upon high. And you can't be saved without knowing that kind of Christ, without knowing that kind of Jesus. He was our substitute. He was sinless. It says that he was a lamb without blemish

and without spot. Now, the word blemish indicates that Jesus had no inherent flaw. He was virgin-born. He was the only one whose Father didn't pass on to him that vain and empty life. His Father was the heavenly Father. He was conceived of the Holy Ghost, and he had no inherent flaw. He was without spot. There was no external defilement. For thirty-three years he had walked through the halls of hell and had met every onslaught of Satan. He had been tempted in all points such as we are, and yet he stands at the end of his

life and he has no defilement of sin upon him. He is perfect and he is pure. He is sinless. He is sinless. And it was a sacrificial lamb. And you'll never understand the gospel until you understand this. The reason that he is pictured as a lamb

is the lamb was an act of worship. As you brought that lamb and you sacrificed that lamb in atonement for your sins, you were worshiping God. And notice the Bible says he is the lamb of God. He is the lamb of God. Throughout the ages, men had been bringing their lambs and they had been sacrificing their lambs, and they had been worshiping God with their lambs. But this is not the lamb of a man, this is not the lamb of a nation, this is the lamb of God.

And, folks, you'll never understand the gospel, you'll never understand the Father's heart until you understand that it was God himself carrying in his arms his own son, his own son. And in an act of worship, in an act of worship and sacrifice, God crucified his own son. You say, well, I thought the Jews did it. I thought the Roman soldiers did it. They were simply the instruments that carried out God's plan. It was God the Father who slew his own son.

2 Corinthians 5.21 says, For he, God, hath made him, Jesus, to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. Isaiah 53, it says, It pleased the Lord to bruise him. Can you imagine that? It pleased the Lord to bruise him. Why could it please God to bruise his own son?

Because God knew the glory of redemption. It's worth it. It was worth it. It was a vicarious death. It was a violent death. You notice the indication here is blood. It doesn't say that we are redeemed by the death of Christ. It says we are redeemed by the blood of Christ. And I tell you something, I have an argument and a quarrel with some of the New Translations that as they translate the New Testament, when they come to the word blood, they substitute the word death. In the first place, that's intellectual dishonesty, and in the second place it's blasphemy.

There is more to it than the death of Christ because he could have died of old age in a bed. But it was the blood of Christ that redeems us. Without the shedding of blood there is no remission of sins. A violent death, a violent death because the cross was man at his worst. If you want to see what man does with that which is pure and holy and righteous and good, you go to the cross and you'll know the potential of sin that's in your own heart. It was the blood. God has never had any way of dealing with man other than the blood, because you see, the Bible says the life of the flesh is the blood. The life of the flesh is the blood. What does man need?

He needs life. Jesus said, I am come that they might have life and have it more abundantly. The life of all flesh is in the blood. And Jesus shed his life. He didn't simply die. He shed his blood, gave his life, and we receive that life. And so the Bible says that the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin. And Romans 3.25 says that we are redeemed, we are justified through faith in his blood.

It was a violent death. But I'll tell you something else. It was a victorious death. In verse 21, it says, Who by him do believe in God, that raised him up from the dead, and gave him glory." That your faith and hope might be in God. He is the victorious Lamb, the Lamb that was slain. God raised him from the dead.

God raised him from the dead. And that's God's sign that everything Jesus did was accepted by the Father. Not only did he raise him, but he gave him glory. He enthroned him. And you know where he is today? I have to read this passage. It's one of my favorites out of Revelation chapter 5. John writing says,

I beheld, and lo, in the midst of the throne, and of the four creatures, and in the midst of the elders, and of the four creatures, and in the midst of the elders stood a lamb, as it had been slain. It had been slain, but it is standing, resurrected, glorified, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God, sent forth into all the earth. And he came and took the book of human destiny out of the right hand of him that sat upon the throne. And when he had taken the book, the four creatures and the four and twenty elders

fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps and golden vials full of odors, which are the prayers of the saints. Now get this. And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book and to open the seals thereof, for thou wast slain and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood, out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation, and hast made us unto our God kings and priests, and we shall reign on the earth. That doesn't sound like an empty, vain, purposeless life. We shall reign on the earth, because you have redeemed us unto God by thy blood.

And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne, and the creatures and the elders. And the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, to receive power and riches and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and blessing. And every creature which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and such as are in the sea and all that are in them heard I say,

Blessing and honor and glory and power be unto him that sitteth upon the throne and under the Lamb forever and ever. And the four creatures said, Amen. And the four and twenty elders fell down and worshipped him that liveth forever and ever. Wouldn't it be great to sing that song before the service is over this morning? And you know, you might well do it because that's the song of heaven.

And one day, everyone who's been redeemed by the blood of the Lamb, been born into the family of God, is going to gather around that throne and sing a new song, And worthy is the Lamb, for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed the Son of God by thy blood. His was a victorious death, because he has been raised and has been enthroned. Now finally, in the third place, this redemption was planned in eternity, accomplished by Christ in time,

and it secures the future of a believer. Verse 21, Who by him do believe in God, that raised him up from the dead and gave him glory in order that your faith and hope, your expectation for the future might be in God. The redemption through the blood of Christ secures the future of a believer. And he secures it in two ways. Number one, by freeing us from the past, by freeing us from the believer. And he secures it in two ways. Number one, by freeing us from the past. Did you know that the future is the slave of the past? And there are some of you this morning that can enjoy your present life and can enjoy your future life because of what's happened

in the past. But I want you to know something. The Bible says that through his blood he has redeemed you from that vain behavior. I don't care what in your past life. You say, well, I've always been this way. I was born this way. My parents were this way. I can't help myself. I beg to differ with you.

Christ has redeemed you and freed you from the past. And until you are freed from the past, there will be a dark shadow cast over your present and over your future. There will never be the expectation and the hope and the glory of the future, even tomorrow, until you are freed from the past. And he has redeemed us from that vain past. But not only by freeing us from the past, but by enabling us to put our faith in God. Did you know you couldn't believe in God apart from Jesus Christ? You say, Well, I don't want Jesus, I'm not going to take Jesus, but I'll just believe in God. You can't do that.

You say, Yes, I can. No, you can't. God says you can't, and it's his rule. You see, the only way you can know the true God is through Jesus Christ. The Bible makes that so explicitly clear. Matthew 11, 27, the Bible says, No man knows the Father save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him. Jesus said, I am the way, I am the truth, I am the life. No man, no man cometh unto the Father but by me.

Jesus has a monopoly on the Father. You can't get to the Father apart from Jesus. You say, I believe in God. You believe in a God that you don't know, and that's idolatry, because you can't know the true God apart from Jesus Christ. The only way you can believe in God is through him. It's what it says, who by Jesus do believe in God.

And it's not the God of creation that you believe in, it's the God that raised Jesus from the dead, the God of redemption. Now that little expression, believing in God, is literally believing into God. Believing into God. It's a preposition that means an active approach. You believe not in God's existence, but you believe into God. You come to God. You approach God. You commit yourself to God, through Jesus Christ. And that's what saving faith is, and it's made possible only through the redemption

that is in Jesus Christ. How do you enter into this? Well, we've just said, by committing yourself to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ through faith in Jesus, realizing that it is Jesus Christ, shed blood on the cross, his resurrection, and his present intercession that enables you to come to God. And you say, Heavenly Father, I am leaving my past life. I want to be redeemed from this life of emptiness. I want to be redeemed from my ineffectual attempts to be what I ought to be.

I want to be redeemed from a life that is leading nowhere except to hell. I want to be redeemed from an empty, meaningless existence. And so through Jesus Christ, receiving him as my Lord and my Savior, I do come to thee

and commit myself to thee and believe in thee. And I want to tell you something. If you'll step out of where you're standing in just a few moments and walk down here to this front and say, I'm coming to God through Jesus Christ and I trust him as my Lord and Savior, I want you to know God will redeem you today from the empty life that you live. He'll wipe away the past and free you from it and secure your future, not only tomorrow, but in the years to come. visit sherwoodbaptist.net slash bookstore and search Ron Dunn. For more Ron Dunn materials,

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