The 3 Requirements for Redemption: Person, Blood, and Power

Hello and welcome to Through the Bible with Les Feldick. An Oklahoma rancher and farmer, Les Feldick has been teaching homestyle Bible classes for 20 years in Iowa, Oklahoma, and Texas. Les Feldick's unique style of Bible teaching has made the books of the Bible come to life. When Les is teaching, it's so interesting that people say time just seems to fly by. And now, here is Les Feldick. And again, good afternoon, and we'll continue on right where we left off, because again, as we've said so often, time is so precious. I'm going to have you turn right off the bat to Exodus chapter 14. You remember in our last program, we left Israel now down on the shores of the Red Sea, and the Egyptians, of course, by now are coming in behind them with the chariots, the Red Sea in front of them, the mountains to the right, and populated areas probably to the left, and everything seems hopeless, doesn't it? Put yourself in their shoes. No wonder they were scared stiff, as we'd say. But drop down to verse 13 of Exodus 14. And Moses said unto the people, Fear ye not. What's the next two words? Stand still. Can you imagine how those people must have thought under those circumstances, and then have their leaders say, stand still? You know, every time I read this verse, I normally don't ascribe much to humor, because I'm no comedian, but I always have to think when I read this verse of a story, and I'm sure you've all heard it or probably read it, of the little fellow that came home from Sunday school, and his unchurched, un-Bible-taught dad said, Well, son, what'd you learn today? And the kid said, Well, he said, we learned all about Moses crossing the Red Sea, and how as they came up against the sea, and all the Egyptian army behind them, the engineers threw up pontoon bridges, and they all went across, and then just when the Egyptians came up after him, he says, they pushed the plunger and blew them all up. And the dad, as unchurched as he was, said, Now, wait a minute, son. He said, Is that what they taught you in Sunday school? And he says, Well, no, but he said, If I'd tell you what they told me, you wouldn't believe it anyway. Well, you know, that is exactly how the world takes these things. They want to somehow rationalize it, how it could have happened naturally by ordinary events. But listen, these things aren't ordinary. These aren't just commonplace. This is the miracle working power of God. Now, I put on the board during break time that the book of Exodus, as we first introduced it, is the book of redemption. Israel, of course, was God's covenant people. But by virtue of the sin of the brothers, when they sold Joseph into Egypt, spiritually what happened between God and his people? Well, they were separated. He lost them. And they end up down in Egypt in bondage, without an altar, without a sacrifice, without a worship, and they had been totally alienated. So now what is God going to have to do? He's going to have to buy them back. He's going to have to redeem them. And so this is the whole process then of the Exodus is a redemption whereby God is going to do the redeeming. Israel is in a position where she can do nothing. They don't have any armed forces. They don't have any economic clout, no political clout. They're just slaves. They're servants. They're helpless. Now, throughout the book of Exodus, then, we find that redemption is going to require a person, in the person of Moses, of course. Now, Moses had to be proven as the legitimate leader, the legitimate deliverer, by virtue of what? Way back there at the beginning. What did he have to do? Remember? He performed the sign miracles. Remember, he threw his rod on the ground, became serpents, put his hand in his booboo, became leprous, put it back in, and it was healed? Well, all these were to prove to the Jew that Moses was indeed God's man to deliver them. All right. Now, the person, so far as we're concerned with in our redemption process, was the Lord Jesus, who in His three years of earthly ministry, again, what did He do? He proved who He really was by virtue of His miracles, and He validated His claim that He was indeed the Redeemer of Israel. Secondly, all the way through the book of Exodus, and especially now here in chapter 12 and 13, we've seen that God required the blood of a lamb. It had to be placed on the doorpost, or they would have never survived. You bring it into the New Testament, our lamb, of course, is who? It's Christ, and the New Testament substantiates that. Keep your hand in Exodus and go with me to 1 Corinthians. 1 Corinthians, chapter 5, 1 Corinthians, chapter 5, drop all the way down to verse 7. 1 Corinthians, chapter 5, verse 7, where Paul now writes, "...courage out therefore the old leaven," and again, it's a reference to evil, to sin, "...that you may be a new lump, as you believers now are unleavened." Our sin problem has been removed by virtue of our forgiveness, by virtue of our salvation. We are now to be an unleavened people. "...for even," now here it comes, "...for even Christ our," what? Our Passover, see? "...He was our Passover Lamb. Even as Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us." Now then, if you'll come back to Exodus again, we come down to the third step now. In these next few verses, God is going to have to bring about their redemption by exercising His power. Israel is not going to be able to throw up a pontoon bridge. Israel is not going to be able to requisition ships and boats and go across the Red Sea. They're going to have to wait on the power of God. For us, the power of our salvation is epitomized. Now, by epitomizing, I mean it's brought to its crescendo at the resurrection. It's the power of the resurrection of Christ that makes our salvation possible. Otherwise, the Scripture says, we are yet dead in our sins. All right, now then, if you look again at verse 13 of chapter 14, it almost seems like a ridiculous answer to their dilemma. And again, I want to emphasize, there is no hope. They're locked in, and the enemy is pursuing them from the rear. The clouds of dust are rising up within their view. And now Moses says, stand still. Why? Because there's nothing they can do, and only God can provide the answer. And so what does he do? He opens the Red Sea, and now let's read on. Verse 13, he says, fear not, stand still, and see the—what's the next word? The salvation of the Lord, which He will show you today. For the Egyptians whom you have seen, you shall see them again no more, forever. In other words, God is not only going to let Israel escape, He's going to destroy their enemy. You got the picture? Now, how does that apply to us? Well, let's go back to the New Testament. I'd like to have you start with 1 Corinthians. We'll try to take it as much in a book-by-book order as we can, so you won't have to go back and forth too often. But let's start with 1 Corinthians, chapter 1. 1 Corinthians, chapter 1, and come down to verse 18. 1 Corinthians, chapter 1, verse 18. I don't like to start until I see you've all got it. All right, for the preaching of the cross. Now, I think I've mentioned it before, but I think it bears mentioning again. Have you ever realized that Paul never mentions Bethlehem? He never mentions the birth of Christ. He never makes any reference, so to speak, of his earthly ministry, of his miracles, all those things. Why? Because Paul only has one message, and what is it? The death, burial, and resurrection of Christ, the shed blood. That's the very core of his whole message in all of his epistles. And here is what he's alluding to again. For the preaching of the cross, see? Not the preaching of Christ and His miracles. Had an interesting conversation with a lady who called again from the Denver audience, and she just expressed how she enjoyed the program. I think I alluded to it a couple programs ago. But in the closing of our conversation, she made a statement like this, that she said, after all, we have to go by what Jesus said. And I said, well, now hold it just a minute. Be careful how you say that. I said, you've got to realize that what Jesus said in His earthly ministry, He said to the Jew under the law. And you always have to take that into consideration. And I could tell by the little stop in her voice that we had set her to thinking. But I said, when you go to the epistles of Paul, Paul is revealing to us the very words of the same Jesus, but now from His glorified, ascended position as the resurrected Lord and Savior. Now, that makes a big difference. And this is why Paul never refers back to his earthly ministry, but only to the resurrected Christ, where the power of God was made so evident so far as we are concerned. All right? So he says, the preaching of the cross is to them that perish. In other words, to those who just simply reject it and ridicule it and scorn it, because it's to them foolishness. My, you know, how many people try to say, well, what's something that took place 2 ,000 years ago got to do with me today? Hey, it's got everything to do with us today, because it's the eternal God who was on that cross. But the preaching of the cross is foolishness to them, but unto us who are saved, who have believed it, that preaching becomes what? The power, and that's the word I want you to underline. It's the power of God. Just as sure, excuse me, just as sure as God opened the Red Sea by His power, God also exercises His power not only in resurrecting Christ from the dead, but bringing us out of our deadness in sin and in slavery to it. Then come on down to verse, oh, let's see, in the same chapter, verse 24. But unto them who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the what? The power of God and the wisdom of God. So we have to rely upon that power. Now I'd like to have you come back to Ephesians. I said I'd try to keep it in order, so let's go from Corinthians through the Galatians and into Ephesians chapter 1, and we're going to see almost all three aspects of these three steps in the redemption of Israel right here in Ephesians chapter 1, where Paul again is writing to the Gentile believers in the area in which he had ministered throughout the Book of Acts there in the western end of Asia Minor, or what we know of as today as Turkey. And so to the Ephesians he writes in chapter 1, verse 7, in whom, and who's the in whom referring to? To Christ, of verse 5, in whom we have redemption. We've been brought back, how? Through His blood. Now I know a lot of people are repelled by that. I can't help that. And as I said in earlier programs, you have to understand that God in His sovereign way of doing things decided that it would be through the shed blood that He would be able to forgive sin and no other way, and we just have to take that by faith. I have a personal idea why He chose the blood is because life is in the blood, and you cannot have new life until death takes place, and life again comes out of that death of a previous life, and that's what the death, burial, and resurrection is all about. So God has mandated that there can be no salvation, there can be no forgiveness, without the shedding of blood. It's mandatory. All right, so here it is. We have redemption in verse 7, through His blood, and not only are redeemed, we're what? We're forgiven. The forgiveness of sins according to what we deserve? No, that's not what it says. According to His grace, His unmerited faith. We don't deserve it. I don't deserve it. Nobody does. But it's by His grace that He's seen fit to do it. And then if you'll come down to verse 12, all this God has done that we should be to the praise of His glory. How many people—and I'm afraid too many times this is especially when we have children saved—are merely saved as a fire escape. They just want to not go to hell. They want to go to heaven. Well, there's nothing wrong with that, of course. But listen, we're not just saved to escape hell. We're not saved just to go to heaven. We're saved for what? To be to the praise of His glory in this life, right now. This is why God has paid the price of our redemption, that we can be to the praise of His glory, those of us who first trusted in Christ. We've believed, see? It doesn't say to you who were baptized and joined the church. It doesn't say to you who have done good works. It says to those who have praised Him and have brought Him glory, see? All right, now let's go on. That verse 13, "...in whom also you trusted after..." Now watch the sequence here. "...after you heard the word of truth." How many times haven't I heard someone say, well, I have always been a Christian? Have you ever heard that? Does that fit this? Were you a Christian before you heard the word of truth? Impossible. And so it always scares me when I, and I've had real close friends use that expression, well, I've always been a Christian. Listen, was Israel always free? No. Israel had to come to the place where she recognized, here we are over here. They're up against the Red Sea. Israel is up against it. There is nothing she can do. She's doomed. Until what? The power of God enters in, and that's her escape. Now it's the same way with our salvation today or tonight or tomorrow or whatever. Every last one of us were separated from God. We were in the bondage of sin, and we had to come to that place where the power of God... Now a verse just comes to mind. I'm not through with Ephesians, but hold your finger there, and we'll come back to it. Turn with me a minute to Colossians, where the power of God is the only thing that can do it. Colossians chapter 1. Colossians 1. Now don't lose Ephesians. I want to come right back to it. But in Colossians chapter 1, dropping down to verse 12, where Paul, of course, had been praying for the Colossi believers here, and he says, "...strengthened with all might," verse 11, "...according to His glorious power." Now verse 12, "...giving thanks unto the Father, who hath made us meet, or who hath prepared us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light, who," speaking of God the Father, "...hath," past tense now if we're a believer, "...who hath delivered us from the power of," what? Darkness, out of slavery. Egypt was in the darkness—or Israel was in the darkness of slavery back there in Egypt. But what brought them out? The power of God. All right, now read on. It's God the Father, then, "...who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath," again, past tense. It's not something we're working toward. It's not something we're hoping for. It's something that we have right now. "...and he hath translated us from that darkness," into what? "...into the kingdom of his dear Son." Now, we were talking at break time. You know, it just opened my eyes when someone asked me a question years ago, why heaven isn't taught in the Old Testament? Why the Jew had no concept of dying and going to heaven? Well, my answer to that, of course, was Israel was an earthly people with earthly promises. But you see, we in the age of grace now are a heavenly people with what kind of promises? Heavenly! See? And so here we have it. Even though we're here on the earth tonight, yet where is our citizen? Where is our citizenship, rather? It's in heaven. We are already a heavenly people by the power—I don't want to get away from that—by the power of God. All right, come back to Ephesians, if you will. Now, I hope you kept it so you don't take time to look for it. Now back to Ephesians, and again in verse 13, speaking of Christ in verse 12, "...in whom you also trusted after you heard the word of truth." Now, I'm emphasizing that because I've had so many people come up after I've taught this little verse, and they'll say, well, this is the first time I saw the order. This is no way I could have been saved as an infant. There's no way I could have been saved by something that someone else did for me. I had to hear the word of truth. And I'll take you right back to the shores of the Red Sea again. Neither could Israel move out of that slave experience except for the power of God. Now they're going to, by faith, walk through. I know that. But yet God exerts His power while they could do how much? Nothing. Nothing. That's where you and I are. But we have to come to that place where we recognize our hopelessness. There's nothing you and I can do to get us out of that hopeless estate of being lost in sin. All right, now read on. After you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, the good news of your salvation. Now I'm not going to take time to look at it. I'll give the reference. For those of you in television, write it down. 1 Corinthians chapter 15, verses 1 through 4, where Paul says that by the gospel you are saved, and that gospel is that Christ was crucified, He was buried, and He what? He rose from the dead. That's the gospel, see? That's the gospel. Now implied, of course, in His death is the shed blood. We can't leave that out. But the gospel is that body of truth, which I usually like to just concentrate by saying the finished work of the cross. The finished work of the cross. That's what opens our Red Sea that is out in front of us. It's that work of the cross that takes us away from the power of the Egyptian army behind us, or the power of Satan in our word. But whatever. After that you believed, the rest of the verse says, see? Now again, I always like to point out in Scripture the things that are not there. How many people would like to put it this way? In whom you also trusted, after that you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, in whom also after you believed and were baptized and joined the church and blah, blah, blah, blah. Isn't that right? But it isn't in there. The Bible is so plain that our salvation comes by believing plus how much? Nothing. Because Christ has done it all. I told one of my class again the other night, and I think we probably shook up one lady for sure, and she said, well, no less. I've been baptized in such and such a way, but she said, I just wanted to get to heaven. Well, no, that's noble. But listen, you don't get to heaven by being baptized. You get to heaven by trusting and believing the gospel. And then all these other things, of course, will follow in their rightful place. But see how plain it is? In whom also after that you believed, period, plus nothing. And then what did God do? He sealed us. He sealed us with that Holy Spirit of promise. And then Paul goes throughout all his epistles and explains that the moment we believe the gospel or we were saved, we were born again, what happens so far as the Holy Spirit was concerned? He indwells us, see? He empowers us, and he keeps us. All right, now I've got to clear any fees, and I've got to look at a couple more verses before this half hour is gone. Come on over into chapter 2. And again, I want to take you back to the hopelessness of Israel and of a lost person as we are, figuratively speaking, encamped on the shores of the Red Sea, the enemy behind us, locked in from both sides, and the opposition of the Red Sea in front of us. Here it is in Ephesians 2, and you, Ephesians 2, verse 1, and you, Paul says as he writes to believers, he hath quickened, or made alive, who were dead, we were on the other side of the Red Sea, in trespass and sins. Now look at verse 2 and 3. Isn't this the exact picture of Israel in Egypt and of you and I before we were saved? Look at it. Wherein in times past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air. Who's that? Satan, Satan himself, the devil. The spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience, among whom also we, what's the next word? All! See, some of us didn't escape this. We were all here. Among whom also we all had our conversation or our manner of living in times past in the lusts or the desires of the flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others. That's where we were. But oh, look at those next two words. What is it? But God. Oh, don't lose that. But God. Paul doesn't say, but you. Paul doesn't say, but I. But what? But God. Now, come right back to the Red Sea again. Here was Israel. Stand still, Moses says, and see the salvation of God. What's he saying? Oh, we're locked in. There's nothing we can do. But God, see? But God. And what's God going to do? Open the Red Sea. And that's exactly what He's done for us. And we walk through on dry ground, not by anything that we have done or deserve, but all because of what Christ has done for us in and through us. Now read on. But God, who is rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead, we were hopeless, we were helpless, He quickened us together with Christ. And then I'm going to close with two choice verses. Most of you probably know them from memory. For by grace are you saved. How? Through faith. See? Plus anything else? No. Through faith. And that not of yourselves, it is thee. What's the next word? Do you work for a gift? A real gift? Do you deserve it? No. A gift is something that somebody extends to you for really no reason. And there's nothing you can do to merit it. See? All right. And then verse 9 and 10, not of works. See how plain that is? There was nothing Israel could do. They could have tried. It wouldn't have done them any good. They didn't have time. But they were to stand still. And that's where God wants us, to the place where there is nothing we can do but simply and completely trust the finished work of Christ. Now don't let that slip away from your memory. The finished work of Christ is what makes our escape possible. 74552. That's Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, Oklahoma, 74552. Through the Bible with Les Feldick is viewer supported. And your gift is appreciated. Thank you. And be sure to tune in next time for Through the Bible.