III. THE RESULTS OF THE ATONING DEATH
We have seen then the gracious and glorious purposes of the Atoning Death of Jesus Christ. What are the results of that death? They are
even more glorious. I can speak of them this morning only in part.
1. The first result of the atoning death of Jesus Christ is that a propitiation is provided for the whole world. We read in 1 John 2:2, "He is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for the whole world." This plainly means that by the death of Jesus Christ a basis is provided upon which God can deal in mercy and does deal in mercy with the whole world. All of God's dealings in mercy with any man are on the ground of Christ's death. Only on the ground of Christ's death could God deal in mercy with any man. God's dealings in mercy with the rankest blasphemer or the most blatant atheist is on the ground of the atoning death of Jesus Christ.
2. In the second place through the atoning death of Jesus Christ all men obtain resurrection from the dead. We read in Rom. 5:18, "So then as through one trespass (i.e., the trespass of Adam) the judgment came unto all men to condemnation; even so through one act of righteousness (i.e., through Christ's righteous act in dying on the cross in obedience to the will of God) the free gift came unto all men to justification of life." And we are told in 1 Cor. 15:22, "As in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive." The Apostle Paul in the whole chapter is speaking about the resurrection of the body, not about eternal life, and he here distinctly teaches that as every child of Adam loses life (physical
life—see Gen. 3:19) in the first Adam, so also in Jesus Christ, the second Adam, he obtains resurrection from the dead, through the atoning death of Jesus Christ. Every man, the rankest infidel as well as the most devout believer, will some day be raised from the dead because Christ died in his place. Whether the resurrection which he obtains through the death of Jesus Christ shall be a "resurrection of life" or a "resurrection of condemnation," "shame and everlasting contempt" (John 5:28, 29; Dan. 12:2) depends entirely upon what attitude the individual takes toward the Christ in whom he gets the resurrection.
3. By the atoning death of Jesus Christ all believers in Jesus Christ have forgiveness of all their sins. We read in Eph. 1:7, "In whom (i.e., in Jesus Christ) we have our redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace." Because Jesus Christ died as a full satisfaction for our sins, forgiveness of sin is not something which believers are to do something to secure, it is something which the blood of Jesus Christ has already secured and which our faith has already appropriated to ourselves; "we have forgiveness," we are forgiven. Every believer in Jesus Christ is forgiven every sin he ever committed or ever shall commit, because Jesus Christ shed His blood in his place. Through Christ's atoning death all believers in Him, although they once "were enemies," are now "reconciled to God by the death of His
Son." As we read in Rom. 5:10, "While we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son." That is to say, the enmity between God and the sinner is done away with, or, as Paul puts it in Col. 1:20, Christ has "made peace through the blood of His cross," or, as he puts it in the next verse but one, Col. 1:22, Christ "hath reconciled" believers "in the body of His flesh through death." The story is told of a faithful vicar in England who was told that one of his parishioners was dying. She was a good woman, but he hurried to her side to talk with her. As he sat down by the side of the dying woman he said to her very gently but solemnly, "They tell me you have not long to live." "No," she replied, "I know I have not." "They tell me you will probably not live through the night." "No," she replied, "I do not expect to live through the night." Then he said very earnestly, "Have you made your peace with God?" She replied, "No, I have not." "And are you not afraid to meet God without having made your peace with Him?" "No, not at all," she calmly replied. Again he said to her, "Do you understand what I am saying? Do you realise that you are at the point of death?" "Yes." "Do you realise you will probably not live through the night?" "Yes." "And you have not made your peace with God?" "No." "And you are not afraid to meet God?" "No, not at all." There was something about the woman's manner that made him feel there was
something back of her words, and he said to her, "What do you mean?" She replied, "I know I am dying. I know I am very near death. I know I shall not live through the night. I know I must soon meet God, and I am not at all disturbed, for I know that I did not need to make my peace with God, because Jesus Christ made peace with God for me more than eighteen hundred years ago by His death on the cross of Calvary, and I am resting in the peace that Jesus Christ has already made." The woman was right: no man needs to make his peace with God, Jesus Christ has already made peace by His atoning death, and all we have to do is to enter into the peace which Jesus Christ has made for us, and we enter into that peace by simply believing in the One who made peace by His death upon the cross. Jesus Christ's work was a complete and perfect work. There is nothing to be added to it. We cannot add anything to it, and we do not need to add anything to it. Jesus Christ has "made peace through the blood of His cross."
4. The fourth result of the atoning death of Jesus Christ is that because of the atoning death of Jesus Christ all believers in Him are justified. We read in Rom. 5:9, "Being now justified by His blood." Justification is more than forgiveness. Forgiveness is negative, the putting away of our sins, manifested in God's treating us as if we never had sinned. Justification is positive, the reckoning of us positively righteous, the imputing