JRS 90 THE NEED OF MAN 8/30/2026 SELECTED SCRIPTURES JESSE RANDOLPH Well good evening and welcome back as we get started here tonight, I want to put before you a very, very unlikely scenario. Let’s say that some time end of this year, early next year, the President of Southeast Community College calls me up and says, “Hey, I heard you’ve been teaching anthropology over there at Indian Hills. It turns out we’re in need of adjunct anthropology professor here at Southeast. Would you consider giving it a go? We’ve heard that the classes you’ve been teaching over there have got lots of slides at least. You’re teaching something with the word anthropology in it. What do you say? We’ll give you 500 bucks. All you have got to do is teach these 3-hour Tuesday night blocks and just think of the impact you can have with the youth for tomorrow by teaching anthropology at Southeast. Now let’s say that I talked with my wife about it and talked about bandwidth and talked with the Elders here about would this be wise thing for me to take on. And let’s say we all agree that I should go for it. I should take on the role of adjunct professor of anthropology at SCC. So, day one of classes rolls around. I walk to the front of the class, ready to start my new title and position, Jesse Randolph, Professor of Anthropology. As I do so I see a bunch of bored teenagers, tweens, late twenties, mid-twenties, early twenties, people in their thirties who are really more glued to their screens than anything. They occasionally peer up at me. They are waiting for me to say whatever I’m going to say as I drone on. They’re thinking about what paper I’m going to assign and what their AI will be used to write the paper that I’ll assign. Then comes the moment, my moment to start teaching anthropology. The study of mankind. The study of human beings. The study of human society, human development, human progression. What should I say? How shall I start class #1, hour #1, minute #1, teaching anthropology at SCC. I know what I would say and this is such a hypothetical. It will never happen so I can just share it with you, and we can just leave it here. But I know I would become the shortest-tenured professor ever at SCC because what I would do is I would open up God’s Word. I would offer unapologetically God’s assessment of humanity. God’s assessment of mankind, specifically, God’s assessment of mankind in his natural, sinful, unregenerate condition. I’d tell those in the class at SCC, the truths from Galatians 5:19-21, that “The deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these.” Then I’d let them know I Corinthians 6:9-10, that “Neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God.” Then I’d turn them to Titus 3:3 and let them know that they are “Foolish, disobedient, deceived, enslaved to various lusts and pleasures, spending their life in malice and envy, despicable, hating one another.” Then I’d quote Romans 1:29-32 to them, saying to them that they are “filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, violent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful,” and they are quote, “worthy of death.” Then I’d tell them of Ephesians 2:1, that they are “dead in their transgressions and sins.” Then I’d tell them Ephesians 2:2, that they are “walking according to the course of this world, according to the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience.” I’d tell them Ephesians 2:3, that they are “doing the desires of the flesh,” and that they are “by nature children of wrath.” I’d tell them, from Colossians 2:5, to flee from “sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which is idolatry.” I’d tell them from Colossians 2:6, that “on account of these things, the wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience.” Then last, I’d tell them, from II Thessalonians 2:7-8, that “At the revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire, (he will) execute vengeance on those who do not know God and to those who do not obey the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.” I would say in a really friendly voice, “Alright class, go ahead and turn with me in your textbook, The Art of Being Human” or whatever the textbook would be for a cultural anthropology class. No, I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t turn to a textbook. That part’s a joke. Actually, what I would do to those shell-shocked students as I read those texts to them, about their great worry that they should have and the great need that they do have. I would tell them that there is a great God who has fulfilled the need they have for salvation by providing Jesus Christ. And I would tell them that because of His Person and because of His work and because of His death and because of His resurrection, there is hope for them. And then I’d walk down the hall to the office of administration and offer my resignation on day #1. I think that little hypothetical or scenario is a useful way to segue into our topic for this evening as we get back in the SUMMER IN THE SYSTEMATICS where we have been studying, not cultural anthropology, but rather Biblical Anthropology. Tonight we’re going to consider THE NEED OF MAN. So far this summer we’ve looked at, THE ORIGIN OF MAN, we’ve looked at THE IMAGE OF GOD IN MAN, THE CONSTITUTION OF MAN, THE DESIGN FOR MAN, THE INTRINSIC VALUE OF MAN, THE FALL OF MAN, THE DEPRAVITY OF MAN, and most recently we’ve looked at THE CONSCIENCE OF MAN. Tonight, again we’re going to look at THE NEED OF MAN. You have ten blanks on your worksheet this evening. You’re going to have to fill these in as we go. Here’s our first one. MAN’S NEED FOR GRACE. What is grace? Well grace to begin with, is an intrinsic characteristic of God. It’s an attribute of God. As Dwight Pentecost notes here, it’s “that intrinsic quality of God’s being or essence by which He is spontaneously favorable in His disposition and actions.” Now grace, it is a self-contained attribute of God. It’s something that’s inherent to who He is. But it’s not something He holds exclusively within Himself. No. God provides grace. God supplies grace. He gives grace. Like Wayne Grudem notes here, “God’s grace means God’s goodness toward those who deserve only punishment.” As we’ve seen from the Scriptures I read at the very beginning, and really over the last few weeks of this study, as we’ve been looking at THE FALL OF MAN and THE DEPRAVITY OF MAN, man is born into this world with a sin nature. He is born under a curse. He is born spiritually dead, Ephesians 2. He is born into a Satanic world system that is under the control of its head. And in our natural condition, our natural state, we are of our father, the devil. But God shows His grace. He offers His grace. He provides grace. God has always been a God of grace. He’s an eternal and unchanging God and He’s always perfectly been a God of grace and He’s always perfectly expressed His grace, going back even to the earliest pages of the Bible, we see God’s grace in action. Genesis 2:17. We went through this several times in this study over the summer. We have here God giving the command to Adam from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. “You shall not eat from it; for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.” Well, there’s grace even in this warning. God didn’t have to give the warning. He could have just smitten and wiped-out Adam and Eve right away. But He gave a warning. This warning alone was a demonstration of God’s grace. Genesis 3:15. God previewed the grace that He would show in one day, providing a promised One who would crush the tempter’s head. “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel.” In Genesis 6:8, a few chapters later, in the middle of the wicked generation that Noah found himself born in, it says, “But Noah found favor in the eyes of Yahweh.” That word favor can also be translated grace. This is the first specific mention of God’s grace in Scripture. There are many other examples of God’s grace in the Old Testament. You just must dig around for them and do a study of them. But we also see of course as we get over to the New Testament this theme of grace. Reporting on the arrival of Christ to earth, John the Apostle said this in John 1:16-17, “For of His fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace. For the Law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” Of course, in the ministry of our Lord during His first visit to earth, He showed much grace. We’ve seen that every Sunday morning in the Gospel of Luke study, like when He healed the paralytic in Luke 5, when He cured the centurion’s slave in Luke 7 or brought him back to life. When the woman who wiped His (feet) with her tears and hair, He showed that woman great grace at the end of Luke 7. Here is a statement which reflects the great grace of God shown in the Person of Jesus. Luke 19:10, “For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save the lost.” That’s grace. Now the clearest means by which God has shown His grace in our age, is through the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. Titus 2:11, “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men.” How was salvation shown to all men? Well Titus 2:14 says He “gave Himself for us,” which of course is referring to His death on the cross. So, the salvation God offers through Jesus Christ stands as the clearest demonstration that God is a God of grace. We see it in several other passages. Romans 5:15, “If by the transgression of the one the many died, much more did the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one Man, Jesus Christ, abound to the many.” II Corinthians 8:9, “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though being rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich.” Romans 3:24. We’ve been “justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus.” Romans 5:20, “Now the Law came in so that the transgression would increase, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more.” Ephesians 1:6, says that all that God has done for us in our salvation has been “to the praise of the glory of His grace.” God looked down upon us. He looked down upon our wretched state, our pitiful condition. He pitied us because He is a gracious God, a God of grace. He provided us with our greatest need, salvation by grace through faith, like we see here in Ephesians 2:8-9, “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not of works, so that no one may boast.” I’m on a real hymn kick these days. John Newton, “Amazing grace! How sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me! I once was lost, but now am found, was blind, but now I see.” Once lost, now found. That’s John Newton’s testimony and that’s your testimony; that’s my testimony for anybody who’s put their faith in Jesus Christ. You may not have been as bad as John Newton, but in the sight of God, you were as bad off as John Newton and so was I. Praise the Lord that He is a God of grace. That was our first one. MAN’S NEED FOR GRACE. Next, we’re going to look at MAN’S NEED FOR REGENERATION. That’s our second blank on your worksheet. What is regeneration? We’ll go to John MacArthur for this one since they just announced a new pastor at Grace Community Church. We’ll do some MacArthur quotes tonight. Regeneration is, “The work of the Holy Spirit in creating a new life in the sinful person, by which act he repents and comes to believe in Christ.” That’s a good definition. Now our English word, regeneration is Latin in its origin and the word originally meant to generate over again. That is kind of clunky. We can also say it’s to be born a second time; also, kind of clunky. The better way to say it is the way that Jesus would say it to Nicodemus later in John 3, when He said you must be born again. We were all born physically into this world. We were all born spiritually dead. Ephesians 2:1, “And you were dead in your transgressions and sins.” What we desperately need is to be born a second time. We need to be born of a new Father. We need to be born into a new family. We need to be born again. We need to be regenerated. Paul said it this way in Titus 3:5 that “He saved us, not by works which we did in righteousness, but according to His mercy, through the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit.” So, what Jesus was referring to in John 3 by being born again, Paul is referred to here as regeneration in Titus 3:5. That same truth of our need for regeneration comes through in other places. Like in Ephesians 2:4-5, albeit with different terms and terminology. “But God, being rich in mercy because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, (and here’s the phrase) made us alive together with Christ.” Note that we were once dead in our transgressions, but now we have been made alive. We’ve been born again. We’ve been regenerated. We’ve experienced regeneration. There are other parallel passages that pick up this idea of regeneration like I John 3. Look at these two passages. “See how great a love the Father has given to us, that we would be called children of God.” I John 3:2, “Beloved, now we are children of God.” I think both of these are making at least an implicit reference to the fact that we have been regenerated. We’ve been born again. We’ve been born into a new family, a spiritual family. We are now children of God. Similar is John 1:12-13, “But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.” So, whether we speak of being born again or experiencing the new birth, or being made new creations, or being made alive, or being children of God, or sons of God, each is pointing back to reality of regeneration. Each is pointing back to the fact that we are born of God. Born again. That is the key truth of the doctrine of regeneration, that we are born of God. And born not only of God, by the way, but born specifically of the Spirit of God. And that’s what Jesus said to Nicodemus here in John 3:5-6, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which has been born of the flesh is flesh, and that which has been born of the Spirit is spirit.” God the Father is the Author of our salvation. That’s Ephesians 1:3 that says, “He has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.” But God the Spirit is the active agent in the miracle of our regeneration. We are, as it says here, “born of the Spirit.” Now, in terms of the means by which the Holy Spirit brings about the miracle of the new birth, take a look here at I Peter 1:23, “You have been born again (there’s our language again) not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, that is, through the living and enduring Word of God.” So, this is saying that the Word of God, Scripture, is the means by which the Spirit of God accomplishes the miracle of the new birth. That should really come as no surprise to us because we remember that Scripture is living and it’s active. Hebrews 4:12, “For the Word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” The Word of God, according to the Word of God, is living and active. And the Word of God shows us why we need to be born again. The Word of God points to our need for regeneration. Romans 10:17, “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.” Scripture tells us that we are sinners, and as sinners we sit under God’s wrath, and judgment, and condemnation. Scripture reveals to us that we sit in our unsaved state under this divine sentence of death. Scripture tells us that in our natural-born condition, we have no relationship with God and we have no shelter from His wrath, and ultimately, we have no hope. Scripture tells us that Jesus Christ came into this world as God’s solution and as our Savior. Scripture tells us that as the sinless Son of God, He took our sins upon Himself, He bore our griefs, He carried our sorrows, our iniquities were placed on Him, and Scripture tells that if a man will simply repent and believe in the message of the Gospel, the message of Jesus dying and three days later rising; He will immediately pass from death to life and have his sins forgiven and have his eternal destiny in glory secured. There is tremendous power in Scripture. It is that incorruptible seed as it says in I Peter 1:23, “Through the living and enduring Word of God.” That is one of the reasons why we give no apologies for preaching the unadulterated Word of God here. Putting it on this pulpit and preaching it from this desk with power and effect knowing it’s the Spirit who does the work. Because it is the Spirit ultimately who works through His Word to bring the spiritually dead ones to spiritual life as He regenerates them, as He brings about the new birth. Here’s our third one. MAN’S NEED FOR IMPUTATION. This word imputation means to reckon over to one or to set down to one’s account. You can even think of it this way. To charge to one’s account. It might bring up memories of that little letter to Philemon that Paul wrote and in Philemon 18 he says of Onesimus the slave, “if he has wronged you in any way or owes you anything, charge that to my account.” Now this idea of imputation it carries with it this idea of God as being this divine Bookkeeper who opens up His book. He opens up His ledger and He’s considering credits in one column and He’s considering debits in another column. He’s going about the task of reconciling the debits and the credits in this divine book. This idea of imputation, Biblically speaking, is really threefold. First, we learn that Adam’s sin has been imputed to us. It’s counted to us, as members of the human race. That truth comes through and we saw this a couple of Sunday evenings ago, in Romans 5:12, “Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned.” So, Adam’s sin has been placed into the account, you can think of it this way, of his descendants, of sinful mankind. And the result is that when we are born into this world, we are already counted as and in fact are, spiritually dead. We come into this world already spiritually indebted, having been charged with Adam’s sin which is imputed to us. Second, we learn that the sin of the human race was imputed by God the Father, to God the Son. That which did not belong to the Lord Jesus, was placed into His account. Our sin, our guilt, was placed upon Him like we see here in the prophecy of His coming in Isaiah 53:4, “Surely our griefs He Himself bore, and our sorrows He carried.” Note that, the Lord bore our grief, not His grief, but ours. He carried our sorrows, not His sorrows, but ours. It continues in Isaiah 53:5-6, “But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our peace fell upon Him, and by His wounds we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; (note this) but Yahweh has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him.” That’s describing a transferring, a reckoning, in which God the Father took our sins from one side of the ledger and placed those into the account of his Son. The theological term for this again, is imputation. It’s a term that is supported by Scripture. For instance, here, in II Corinthians 5:21, “He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” Note that. God didn’t make His Son to be a sinner. If He were a sinner, He couldn’t be a qualified substitute. He couldn’t bear the sins of the world as the perfect spotless lamb. No. God the Father made His Son, God the Son, to be sin. He reckoned over to the Son’s account all the sins of sinful man. So, step one, Adam’s sin is imputed to all those who are in his line. Step two, all of humanity, all of our sin as descendants of Adam, is transferred to the One, Jesus, who became sin. That was another act of imputation, one by which God the Father placed our sin into the account of God the Son when Christ bore our sins in His body on the tree, I Peter 2:24. That brings us to the third step of Imputation. Not only is Adam’s sin imputed to the human race, not only are the sins of the world imputed to Christ, but divine righteousness, God’s righteousness, some even say the righteousness of Christ. And I have no problem actually saying that because Christ is God and Christ is inherently righteous and as a matter of sound Trinitarian theology, you can’t divide up a divine attribute like righteousness and say that God the Father has it, but God the Son doesn’t have it. If one is imputing it, the other is imputing it. For that matter the righteousness of the Spirit would be imputed. Three Persons work inseparably. But divine righteousness is imputed to those who place their faith in Christ. Divine righteousness is placed into the account of Believers. It’s reckoned over to the one who puts their faith in Jesus Christ as Savior. So just take a step back. God is a righteous God. This righteous God in His work of salvation, has righteousness of His own to impart, to impute. To put on the positive side of the ledger, for anyone who is in Adam who has since put their faith in Christ. Now, apart from that righteousness of God, there is Romans 3:10, “There is none righteous, not even one.” We are lost. We’re unrighteous. We need righteousness. We need divine righteousness. Well, through this third step of imputation, God reckons the one who has come to faith in Jesus Christ that which is not his, namely divine righteousness. II Corinthians 5:21, “He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” Or Philippians 3:8-9, “More than that, I count all things to be loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own which is from the Law, but that (i.e. righteousness) which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God upon faith.” So, we’re sinners in light of our relationship with Adam, but we’re made righteous in light of our relationship with Jesus Christ. Our unrighteousness, our sin, gets transferred to Him and we get divine righteousness in exchange, as God receives us into His family as His children. Now when did this exchange of righteousness take place? Where our unrighteousness goes into Christ’s account and divine righteousness gets placed into our account. Was it through Christ’s perfect keeping of the Law of Moses? I have to say it. Is the imputation of the active obedience of Christ the basis for our righteousness? I’ll leave that alone for tonight. No. The answer is no. Righteousness was imputed to us; divine righteousness was imputed to us at the cross. Hebrews 10:14, “For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.” God the Father, because of the payment for sin made by God the Son on the cross, He transferred our guilt and our iniquity into the account of the Son while imparting divine righteousness into our account. The result is that our record has been cleared and our sin debt has been paid. Here’s number four. MAN’S NEED FOR REDEMPTION. Now that word redemption comes from the Greek word agorazo, which means “to purchase in the marketplace.” In the New Testament era, in which that word would have been used, it was used to refer to the sale of slaves or the purchase of slaves in the marketplace. Now carrying that over to our context, a spiritual context, as we consider man’s need, that word redemption can rightly be used to explain man’s being purchased in the slave market of sin. As he is set free from sin’s bondage, with the purchase price of course being the blood that was shed for him by Jesus Christ. I Corinthians 6:20, “You were bought with a price.” I Corinthians 7:23, “You were bought with a price.” Revelation 5:9, “You were slain and purchased for God with Your blood (this is speaking of the Lamb) people from every tribe and tongue and people and nation.’” So that’s one Greek word that refers to being purchased in the market. There’s a second Greek word. There’s agorazo, that’s the first one. The second one is exagorazo. Same word but with a couple letters added to the front, exagorazo. Those two little letters at the front of that word when it becomes exagorazo, not agorazo, what they do is communicate the reality that Believers have not only been purchased in the slave market of sin; but they’ve been purchased out of the slave market of sin. Taken out of the slave market of sin and both are true. We were purchased in the slave market of sin. The cesspool of sin in which we once lived. But then we were removed out of that slave market of sin. Taken out of the world in which we once maneuvered, both are true. We see this word exagorazo in passages like these where we’re taught that Jesus not only purchased our salvation with His blood, but He redeemed us, He bought us, He took us out from under the bondage that we were under, under the Law. The Law could only condemn. The Law couldn’t save and Jesus took us out from under it. Galatians 3:13, “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, (there’s exagaorazo, redeemed) having become a curse for us for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree.” Galatians 4:4-5, “But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, so that He might (exagorazo) redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.” He set us free from the bondage of the Law and from its condemnation. Leon Morris notes that “a curse rests on everyone who does not fulfill the law; Christ died in such a way as to bear or be a curse; we who should have been accursed now go free.” Now a practical point. Because the Believer has been bought by Christ, because he has been bought with Christ’s precious shed blood as it says here. I Peter 1:18, “You were not redeemed with corruptible things like silver or gold from your futile conduct inherited from your forefathers.” Because of this reality, he’s no longer belonging to self but rather is the slave of Christ. He’s been bought under that slave market of sin, taken out of the slave market of sin, but He has a new Master. Leon Morris again says, “The redeemed are paradoxically slaves, the slaves of God, for they were bought with a price. Believers are not bought by Christ into a liberty of selfish ease. Rather, since they have been bought by God at a terrible cost, they have become God’s slaves, to do His will.” We even see that here in Titus 2:13-14 which says, “Our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ gave Himself for us that He might redeem us from all lawlessness, (and then note this next part) and purify for Himself a people for His own possession, zealous for good works.” So, He saves us to be slaves yet again. He saves us to be His slaves. He saves us to serve Him. Fifth is MAN’S NEED FOR RECONCILIATION. That word reconciliation, I won’t give you another Greek one here, (katalasso) it simply means to effect a change. To bring about a change in relationship. It speaks to the fact that there has been this barrier between man and God. Sin has estranged man from God and sin has rendered man hostile to God as it says in Isaiah 59:2, “Your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden His face from you so that He does not hear.” But through reconciliation, in reconciliation, as a result of reconciliation, we now have peace with God. Colossians 1:21-22, “Although you were formerly alienated and enemies in mind and in evil deeds, but now He reconciled you in the body of His flesh through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach.” Note that language, “He reconciled you in the body of His flesh.” Our reconciliation to God is tied directly to what Jesus Christ did for us on the cross. Through His sacrificial and atoning death, that enmity between us and God has been taken away. That the wrath of God no longer hangs over us. Romans 5:10, “While we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son.” Now notably, God is the one you will see who initiated reconciliation. God is the One who bridged the gap, as it were. God is the One who moved to reconcile sinful man to Himself. II Corinthians 5:18, “Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ.” Or the next verse II Corinthians 5:19, “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.” Though it was man who was the one in need of reconciliation since it was man who, through his sin, had removed himself and estranged himself from fellowship with God. It’s God who actually moves first to reconcile man to Himself, which as in each of these only testifies to God’s grace and God’s goodness and God’s mercy and kindness. As the offended One, as the grieved One ends up being the One who provided the solution and taking that first step. Here’s our sixth one, MAN’S NEED FOR FORGIVENESS. Forgiveness of course, is at the very heart of our Christian identity. I don’t know that I quote a passage in counselling members of our church more frequently than Ephesians 4:32, “Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, graciously forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has graciously forgiven you.” Or the parallel in Colossians 3:12-13, “So, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience; bearing with one another, and graciously forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone, just as the Lord graciously forgave you, so also should you.” These words carry such weight because we know that ultimately and fundamentally as Believers as Christians, we are a graciously forgiven people. Because we’ve been graciously forgiven so much and undeservedly so through the grace of God at the cross of Christ, of course we ought to graciously forgive one another. And I do appreciate by the way, that here in both Ephesians 4 and Colossians 3 that word graciously has been put in front of the word forgive. That’s really good. That’s a solid translation. Because the Greek word in both of those passages which has been translated forgive is charizomai, charis. It’s the word grace is built in there. So, this literally means when it says graciously forgave, we’re called to forgive out of grace. We looked at our first heading was that we have this great need for grace. We’ve been shown that grace, and so now we’re called to extend grace through forgiveness to our brothers and sisters in the faith, specifically. Now the idea of that is the cancellation of a debt. This word charizomai is talking about the cancelation of a debt. That’s how it’s expressed directly here in Colossians 2:13, “And you being dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive with Him, having graciously forgiven (charizomai) us all our transgressions.” There were sins on our ledger. There were sins on our record. We had a sin debt paper. But then that entire sin package, that entire sin debt, that entire record of our sins was nailed to the cross. Colossians 2:14, “Having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us, He also has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.” There’s another word for forgiveness by the way in the Greek New Testament. It’s aphiemi. There is another term, aphiemi which means to let go, to release, to send away. That’s another expression of that word forgiveness. One is cancellation of a debt. Another word for forgiveness is to release, to let go. That comes out here in Ephesians 1:7, “In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness (aphiemi) of our transgressions, according to the riches of His grace.” This word again highlights that the Believer’s sins have been sent away. They’ve been mailed far away according to the riches of God’s grace, purpose, in the death of Christ. There is one sense in which forgiveness means settling of a debt in Colossians 2:13-14. But there’s this another sense in which forgiveness means our sins being cast away which I can’t help but think of Micah 7:19 where it says that “You will cast their sins into the depths of the sea.” Praise the Lord for both forms of forgiveness because they highlight our need, our greatest need which is to have our sins dealt with. Seventh is MAN’S NEED FOR PROPITIATION. At the heart of this term propitiation is the idea of satisfaction, of appeasement. When it comes to our topic for tonight, that of the need of man, what man needs most is to have God’s wrath, God’s indignation to be appeased, satisfied. God is holy and God is righteous and God cannot and will not overlook sin. Our sin has to be paid for one way or another. That was true in Old Testament Israel where sin was paid for, atoned for ritually through their system of blood offerings and sacrifices. Here’s an example in Leviticus 4:35, “Thus the priest shall make atonement for him in regard to his sin which he has committed, and he will be forgiven.” Leviticus 10:17, “For it is most holy, and He gave it to you to bear away the guilt of the congregation, to make atonement for them before Yahweh.” In the New Testament, this same need to have our sins covered and the wrath of God toward our sin appeased, it still exists and it’s highlighted in several different places. Romans 3:24-25. We’ve been “Justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith, for a demonstration of His righteousness, because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed.” Or Hebrews 2:17, “Therefore, He had to be made like His brothers in all things, so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.” I John 2:2, “And He Himself (speaking of Jesus of course) is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world.” I John 4:10, “In this is love, not that we have loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” So again, we have this problem. Sin. We have this other problem because of our sin and on account of our sin that the wrath of God is looming. It’s hanging over our heads. And God’s wrath is rightly directed toward our sin and unless His wrath is appeased, we face eternal destruction. But God provided a remedy. He provided a solution for the sin by sending Christ into the world to be the satisfaction for sin, the payment for sin, to be the propitiation for our sin. Because of Christ’s death, God’s wrath is both satisfied and averted. His justice and His holiness are taken care of. They’re appeased and we are spared. I think this is a helpful summary of propitiation from John MacArthur again. He says “The significance of propitiation, then, is that it identifies Christ’s work as a wrath-bearing sacrifice. Sin may not merely be overlooked; sin must ever and always be punished, whether in the sinner in hell or in Christ the substitute on the cross. God has not relaxed His justice, “He himself declares that he will by no means leave the guilty unpunished.” Exodus 34:7. Every ounce of wrath that the elect sinner deserved, all the wrath that God would have exercised on the sinner in the eternal torments of hell, was poured out fully on our substitute in those three terrible hours on Calvary. Because of this, there is no longer any wrath left for Christ’s people. God is propitious toward them, for their sin has been paid for.” So that’s propitiation. Man’s need for propitiation. Number eight on your worksheet, justification, MAN’S NEED FOR JUSTIFICATION. We’re just going to cover justification. The core doctrine of the Reformation in like 5 minutes. Justification traces back to this question from the book of Job. Job 25:4, “How then can mortal man be right with God? Or how can he be pure who is born of woman?” That is the question we’re after when we talk about justification. How can mortal man be right with God? There are a million different definitions of justification out there. Henry Clarence Thiessen offers a helpful one. It’s “that act of God whereby he declares righteous him who believes in Christ.” I like that definition because it includes that word declares. Justification is ultimately fundamentally a declaration. It’s not something that’s brought about by a man. That’s what all the different world religions would teach. Rather it’s something declared of man by God. Now again justification is this massive topic. It’s the battleground of the Reformation. It’s been a battleground for 500 years since in various pockets of Evangelical theology. It would be impossible to give this topic justice tonight. We’re going to cover Soteriology in two years and get into this further. Let me just paint with a few broad strokes. Starting with the question, what is accomplished in justification? What is accomplished in our justification. A few things. First, the penalty for our sin is remitted, it’s paid. We remember the penalty for our sin is death. Romans 6:23, “For the wages of sin is death, but the gracious gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” To be declared righteous by a holy God, that penalty has to be not only paid, but our penalty has to be removed. It has to be taken away. That is what happened at the cross when Christ bore the penalty for man’s sin. I Peter 2:24, “Who Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, so that having died to sin, we might live to righteousness; by His wounds you were healed.” Because He did so, because Christ took on that penalty, that wrath on our behalf, those stripes on our behalf. The penalty for our sin has in fact been removed. Romans 8:1, “Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” Our sin has been forgiven. Romans 4:7-8, quoting Psalm 32, “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.” So that forgiveness that we’ve received, that’s at the very heart of our justification. When we are forgiven, when we’re pardoned, when we’re acquitted, we’re also experiencing the blessing of our relationship with God being restored. So much so that the justified person is now described as being a friend of God as it says here in James 2:23, “And the Scripture was fulfilled which says, ‘and Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness,’ and he was called the friend of God.” The one who is justified or forgiven is also called an heir of God and a fellow heir with Christ. Romans 8:16, “The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are children of God.” Hebrews 2:11, “For both He who sanctifies and those who are being sanctified are all of One; for which reason He is not ashamed to call them brothers.” So, our justification is tied to our forgiveness by God, and it’s tied to this new status that we have before God. Now how is one justified? Well, we know it’s not by the works of the Law. Galatians 3:10, “For as many as are the works of the Law are under a curse, for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book if the law, to do them.’” Romans 3:20 is even more to the point. “By the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight, for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin.” No. We’ve already seen that justification is a gift of grace. Romans 3:24, “Being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus.” Or Titus 3:7, we have “been justified by His grace, we would become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.” And our justification is secured by the blood of Christ. Romans 5:9, “Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him.” Hebrews 9:22, “According to the Law, one may almost say, all things are cleansed with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.” Here’s another important truth to remember. Justification comes only through faith. Romans 5:1, “Having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Galatians 2:16, “We may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the Law; since by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified.” Romans 3:28, “For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of the Law.” Last under this eighth heading, there are a number of results of our justification. As we’ve already seen, we’ve been forgiven. Romans 4:7, quoting Psalm 32 “Blessed are those whose lawless deeds have been forgiven, and whose sins have been covered.” The condemnation for our sins is now gone. Romans 8:1, “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” Romans 5:1, “Therefore, we have peace with God having been justified by faith.” And then there’s this. We’re now in Christ. I Corinthians 1:30, “But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption.” Not only that, but we’re also heirs. Titus 3:7, “Having been justified by His grace, we would become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.” We’re sanctified or being sanctified. Philippians 1:11, “Having been filled with the fruit of righteousness which comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.” I John 3:7, “The one who does righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous.” We’re promised that one day we’ll be glorified because we have been justified. Romans 8:30, “Those whom He predestined, He also called; and those whom He called, He also justified; and those whom He justified, He also glorified.” We are assured that we’ll be saved from the coming wrath of God. Romans 5:9, “Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him.” I Thessalonians 1:10, “And to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, Jesus, who rescues us from the wrath to come.” Massive topic is justification. That gives you some of the highlights. We need to move on and here’s number nine. MAN’S NEED FOR ADOPTION. No surprise here because this is a term that’s familiar to us in our human experience. But this word adoption literally means to place as a son. To place as a child. Now in terms of the other needs, we’ve gone through tonight, the eight other needs we’ve worked through already, each serves a different purpose. In regeneration we’re given a new nature. In justification we’re given a new position or standing. In adoption we’re given a new privilege. We’re now children of God. Having been born of God we’re now children of God. John 1:12, “But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name.” I John 3:1, “See how great a love the Father has given to us, that we would be called children of God; and we are.” So those who have put their faith in Christ, those who have been justified, they are now children of God. They’ve been adopted into the family of God. Having been adopted into the family of God, we each receive a certain number of family privileges, like being delivered from the Law. Galatians 4:3-5, “While we were children, we were once enslaved under the elemental things of the world. But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, so that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.” Another privilege of being adopted into the family of God is that we’ve been given the Holy Spirit who is the Spirit of Sonship. Galatians 4:6, “And because you are sons, God sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, ‘Abba! Father!’” He’s the Spirit of adoption. Romans 8:15, “For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons by whom we cry out, ‘Abba! Father!’” Romans 8:23, “And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly awaiting for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body.” So, God the Father starts His children out by giving us this deposit of the Spirit which is the down payment of the full inheritance we’re going to receive when Christ comes. Ephesians 1:13-14, “In Him, you also, after listening to the word of truth, the Gospel of your salvation, having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, unto the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory.” He has given us the Holy Spirit as this pledge, this down payment. But in the meantime, as those who have received that deposit of the Holy Spirit, “we walk in the Spirit,” Galatians 5:16, we’re being led by the Spirit, demonstrating that we truly are God’s children. Romans 8:14, “For as many as are being led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.” Now, in terms of when our adoption occurred, it’s sort of a multilayered answer. On the one hand Scripture teaches that our adoption occurred in eternity past. Ephesians 1:3-5, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him in love, by predestining us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself.” There is a sense in which our adoption occurred in eternity past. But we also know, in terms of our own human-level personal experience that our adoption took place at the moment we put our faith in Christ. Which we see in Galatians 3:26, “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.” We also know this though right now, in the present, we have this adopted status before God. It’s also the case that the full realization of our adoption, the full realization of our sonship, it still awaits the coming of Jesus. It will be then that our adoption will be fully consummated as it says here in Romans 8:23, “And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body.” It will be at that time that our bodies will be delivered from their corruption and their mortality and made like His glorious body as we see here in Philippians 3:20-21, “For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory.” And until then we live in these bodies of flesh. We still battle sin. We still fight sin and we still wage the war of sin and against sin. And that brings us to our tenth need, MAN’S NEED FOR SANCTIFICATION. We’re not going to spend too much time here at all because each of the other nine needs, we’ve worked through has to do with salvation, which is our greatest need having our sin dealt with, being saved from sin. But the reality is that a man who has had the greatest need of all taken care of by having his sins forgiven, he’s not going to remain stagnant. Rather he will grow spiritually. He will grow in sanctification. He will become more like Jesus as we see in these passages. II Corinthians 3:18, “We all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit.” Romans 12:2, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” Philippians 2:12, “Work out your salvation with fear and trembling.” Then as if to eliminate any question as to who ultimately is doing that work of sanctification in us, making us more like Jesus, Philippians 2:13 says, “For it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.” We need to be sanctified as we grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. But it’s God who causes the growth. We’re reminded of the words of Jesus, John 15:5, “He who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit.” And then He says this. “For apart from Me you can do nothing.” It is God who works in us. The Lord who works in us, to sanctify us. We’ve made our way through a lot this evening. We’ve looked at MAN’S NEED FOR GRACE, MAN’S NEED FOR REGENERATION, IMPUTATION, REDEMPTION, RECONCILIATION, FORGIVENESS, PROPITIATION, JUSTIFICATION, ADOPTION and SANCTIFICATION. And with that, we’ve now made our way through lesson number nine in Biblical Anthropology. Next Sunday night our last Sunday night before Labor Day, the official end of summer, we’ll wrap up 2026 SUMMER IN THE SYSTEMATICS looking at THE FUTURE OF MAN, which will be a nice segue into resuming our Sunday evening study in the book of Revelation, Revelation 14 on September 20th. Let’s pray.