March 31, 2022 — “Not Able”

This issue is too important; it is incumbent that the teacher cross every t and dot every i.

When considering the eternal destiny of a soul, there can’t be any untidy thinking. And as we examine this offering for sin that has no blood in it, we must ask what it is teaching. It can’t be saying that anyone is saved without the sacrifice of Christ being applied to their sin-debt, because the Bible makes that clear: “Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12). But it could mean that a person can be saved by transferring their trust to God, without understanding how exactly God will save them. As noted, no one except God really understands what happened at the Cross anyway. We must know we are guilty sinners and unable to satisfy God’s righteous standards, but that is the work of the Spirit who has been sent to “convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment” (Jn 16:8). The world, of course, means everyone. But I want to focus on these words from Leviticus 5: “If he is not able to bring a lamb” (v 7), and “if he is not able to bring two turtledoves” (v 11). Only then could a person “bring for his offering…fine flour as a sin offering.” This is not a person who has heard about God’s Lamb, but says, “I prefer to think about Jesus as a doer of good, and reject the part about the Cross.” No, if someone is able to trust in Christ’s work on the Cross, that person is obligated to go as far as the light shines for him. Any rejection of God’s light is fatal. But God will not judge a person for rejecting light he never had. As Paul said at Athens, God has arranged things so that “every nation of men…should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us” (Acts 17:26-27).

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