S. NO CONDEMNATION
NO CONDEMNATION Dr. W. A. Criswell Rom 8:1 10-03-54
I’m preaching through the Word-last time, the last part on Rom 7:1-25, and tonight we begin in Rom 8:1-39 and Rom 8:1.
If you have your Bibles turn to it and we will read it. And then keep your Bible open and we’ll look at some of these things that Paul has written under the inspiration of the Spirit to the churches of God in the earth.
Rom 8:1-39 and Rom 8:1, “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus-there is therefore now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus.” In Rom 7:1-25, he had recorded the conflicts of the inner life of the believer in Christ. Starting up there at the twenty-first verse of the seventh chapter of Romans, “I find then a law, that when I would do good evil is present with me.
“For I delight in the law of God after the inward man.
“But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members”-the conflict-inner-the struggle on the inside of the man who has given his life to God. And then the outbreak, “O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” And then the grand avowal, “I thank God-through Jesus Christ our Lord! With the mind, my inner heart, my spirit, I myself serve the will and the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.
“There is therefore now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus.” You have a chapter heading there and a divide of the verses that is artificial. And when Paul wrote it, by no means was there any such suggestion as a separation between those glorious verses.
Every man who gives his life to Christ and follows the will of God shall find himself in a conflict, in an inner struggle, in an agony of spirit. But in our agony, and in our trial, and in the battle of the soul, “There is no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus.”
Conflict, yes, but no condemnation. In the midst of the hottest of the battle we still are justified. And in our agony and in our trial we still can lay hold upon the Word and the promise of God, “There is therefore now no condemnation.”
Hit by the devil, dragged at the by the appeals of sin, seared [?] between the upper and nether stones of Satan, powdered and bruised and crushed in the mortar and pestle of the hand of our adversary, we shall triumphantly say, “There is therefore now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus.”
All of us who have fled, poor prodigal sinners as we are, find refuge in Jesus. This is our verse, “There is no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus.”
Poverty, yes, but no condemnation. Depression of spirit? Sometimes, yes, but no condemnation. Depression and defeat, weakness, miserable agony, interceding and crying, yes, but no condemnation. “There is therefore no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus.” And you have in your King James Version a concluding word in that verse, “For who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.” Somebody wrote that, we don’t know who did it. It is not in the original, it is not in the text. Paul didn’t put it there. “There is therefore now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus.” Period! And somebody who came along transcribing these texts in the years and the hundreds of years ago seeing that verse said, “We can’t let that stand like that, my fellow Presbyterian ministers!” A fellow read that and said, “Why, it is not possible for a man to be saved trusting in Christ Jesus! We better do something else besides what the Lord introduced in the word there. There must be somewhat to offer unto God of sanctity and holiness there.” And back yonder in the years and years ago, a man reading that said, “We don’t believe a man can be saved by just trusting in the Lord, so we will add to it, ‘There is therefore no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.’”
Over here in Rev 22:1-21, one of those copyists did the same thing. In the King James Version, which is a translation of the Textus Receptus, you have it translated here, “Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have a right to the tree of life and may enter in through the gates of the city.” A copyist did that. Here’s what John wrote, “Blessed are they that washed their robes, that look to Jesus, that trust in him. Blessed are they that washed their robes, that they may have a right to the tree of life.” A copyist saw that and said, “That, that can’t stand. That can’t stand. We have got to change it!” So he changed it to, “Blessed are they that do his commandments.”
It’s not there. No sir, not according to the book, not according to the Bible, not according to the Holy Spirit-no man shall ever be saved by doing His commandments! And God himself spurns your righteousnesses, as they were filthy rags.
If a man is saved, he is saved by refuge, by fleeing to or hiding himself in the Lord Jesus. “There is therefore now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus.”
You notice that word “therefore”? You better look at that. A man who put a “therefore” back of what he says doesn’t have to stammer. He speaks with authority. He speaks with certainty. He speaks under the power and usage of the Almighty God. And Paul speaks thus there. “There is therefore”-wonder what that “therefore” refers to? That word “therefore” refers to all of the things he has said previously in this marvelous epistle to the church at Rome. But all of those things that Paul had said in Rom 1:1-32, Rom 2:1-29, Rom 3:1-31, Paul is saying that all of the world is guilty before God. In Rom 3:19 he sums it up, “That all of the world may become guilty before God.”
Whether a man lives over yonder or over here, whether his skin is white or black, whether he is learned or unlearned, whether he lives rich or poor, male or female, young or old, all alike, we are condemned before God. We’re all sinners in God’s sight. That’s what Paul was saying in the first three chapters of the Book of Romans. And in Rom 4:1-25 Paul was saying that we are saved not by our good works, not by our merits, not by our keeping of the law, not by our working according to the commandments, but we are saved by trusting the Lord Jesus Christ.
Rom 4:1-25 :[5] said, “Him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justified the ungodly, the same is committed to Jesus, is counted for righteousness-Jesus who was delivered for our offenses and was raised again for our justification.”
Then in Rom 5:1-21, he says that all of us who have trusted in Christ, have received the covenant of grace through Him, all of us are in Jesus as our federal head. In Rom 5:18, “Therefore, as by the offense of one, Adam, judgment came unto all men to condemnation”-all of us sinners to die, all of us belonging to a mortal race that descended from old man Adam.
“Therefore, as by the offense of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation, even so by the righteousness of one, by the free gift in Christ Jesus, grace and salvation and mercy came upon all men unto justification of life.”
These of us who have flown to the Lord for refuge and have found in Him an abiding place, we are one with the Lord Jesus. He is our Savior, our representative, and our champion. For us He kept the law, He obeyed all righteousness. And His goodness and His virtue are imputed unto us. And we cannot be condemned because we are one in Him. In Rom 6:1-23 he described that mystical, that vital, and that living newness that we have in Christ Jesus. And he reckons it in the form of baptism.
We are buried with the Lord in the likeness of His death, “That like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also walk in newness, in victory, in the triumph of life.
“For if we had been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection.” We have died with Christ. We are raised with Christ. As Christ is, we are. If He was condemned, we are condemned. But if He is justified, we are justified in Him. We are one in Christ Jesus. And then in Rom 7:1-25, at the beginning he likens that mystical union of the believer in Christ, he likens it unto a marriage. “Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ that ye shall be married to another, even to him which was raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God.”
We are no longer married to the law, no longer married to death, no longer married to good works. But we have been espoused to another. We are the bride of the Lord Jesus Christ, and we are one with Him.
One flesh, one law, one devotion, one commitment, one eternal and everlasting life. Married to the Lord Jesus Christ. We belong to Him. We are His.
Sometimes that oneness of figure is used, the vine and the branch. As the branch is one with the vine, so we are one in Christ Jesus. Sometimes the Lord will use the figure of a foundation stone-as a stone is one with the foundation, so we are one in Christ Jesus. And sometimes the Bible will use the figure of the members of the body. As the members of the body are one with the head, so we are one with the head of the first, the Lord Jesus Christ.
If the head can be condemned, then we can be condemned. But if the head is justified, we are justified. If my head is acquitted, my hand is acquitted. No man can be drowned if his head is above the water.
You can’t drown a man, by his feet! As long as his head is free and above, you can’t drown him, as long as the head of the body of Christ, our Savior, as long as He is above the storm and the curse of condemnation, then His members cannot be lost, cannot be condemned and cannot fall under the sentence of death.
We are one in Him. And through it all-through it all, “There is therefore now no condemnation.” We are all-he is talking about our great substitute and provider, He Who died in our stead. “God commended his love toward us that he while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
“Much more, being justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him.
“For if when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.
“And we rejoice in God by whom we have now received that blessed atonement.”
He died for us that in our stead-and the Lord only needed one death. Just one. Just one. When a criminal is condemned and hanged, or he is electrocuted or in the gas chamber, and his life is forfeited, the law is satisfied. It never demands but one death. And Christ died that death for us. The penalty was paid. I don’t pay it again. The debt is paid. I don’t pay it again. He was our substitute. He died for us. “God commendeth his love for us and while we were yet sinners-under condemnation and under the sentence of death-Christ died in our stead,” in our place. He did that for us! He did it for me, for us. In my reading, Charles Haddon Spurgeon of England and Dwight L. Moody of America, both of the men living in the same generation, happened to come across the same story as their brethren told it. I’ve read it in both of their messages.
It is this. In one of the French wars a man’s name was drawn for the battle, and because of other considerations a friend stepped in and took the place of the man. And that friend went into the war, and in the battle he was slain. In the years after, the man’s name was drawn again. And when he appeared before the law, he said, “My name has been drawn, and I went to the war and I was slain. And I cannot be pushed into the service again.” And they found out that his friend had taken his place and had died in his stead. And according to the law, the man was free-he had already paid, he had already died, and he was free. His friend had taken his place. So it is in the condemnation and in the wrath of the judgment of God that is upon our sins. “The wages of sin is death,” and, “The soul that sins shall die.” And who dies? All of us die, or somebody else. I must pay the penalty, or somebody else.
Christ has done it for us. He paid our penalty. He took our place. He died in our stead. So, “There is therefore no condemnation, no death, no judgment to be, to them who are in Christ Jesus.” We stand free. We stand forgiven. We stand, we stand freed. We stand justified. We stand accepted in the presence of the courts of glory.
“No condemnation for them who are in Christ Jesus.” We must take the whole text, “There is therefore no condemnation.” Many they are who would stop, “No condemnation.”
Many are they who say, “The Lord is merciful, He would not condemn. The Lord is full of grace and mercy, He would not judge. The Lord is full of compassion and sympathy, He would not rebuke. The Lord is full of good tidings, He would not consign to eternal perdition even the least of His creatures.”
Many believe that today, “There is no condemnation in the chapter.” Oh, it does not say that. Jesus doesn’t say that. The Bible doesn’t say that. The Bible is full of the terrible thunder and fury of the Almighty God upon the error and the transgression of man’s sins. From its beginning as in its ending, there are the awful tremblings and judgments of Almighty God on our transgressions.
It is a gospel of Satan, it is a promise of the devil, when he whispers in your ear, when he said, “God said thou shalt surely die. Thou shalt not surely die,” Satan whispers if your ear. That’s a false gospel. It is a false hope, it’s an illusion, “There is no condemnation.”
Outside of Christ, there is nothing but condemnation! All of us are lost and undone sinners outside of the Lord Jesus Christ. Oh those words, Heb 10:27, outside of Christ, nothing left, “But a certain looking for of indignation.” In John 3:18, “He that believeth on him is not condemned, but he that believeth not is condemned already-he’s already condemned-because he hasn’t believed in the only begotten Son of God.” And the last verse in that same chapter, John 3:36, “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life; but he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God, the wrath of God, the burning fury and judgment of Almighty God abideth on him.”
“There is therefore now no condemnation.” This condemnation is the judgment and the wrath of God everywhere-except one “where,” except one place, except one refuge, except one hope, except one gift, except one place, except one conquering mercy, except in one Somebody.
“There is therefore now no condemnation for them who are in Christ Jesus.” We fly to Him for refuge and for hope. We bow in His presence. We look up into His glorious face. We find grace and salvation in Him. And to those who are in Christ Jesus-all in Rom 8:1-39 -and so gloriously and so triumphantly he challenges heaven and it echoes through all hell. Listen to Paul as he says, “What shall we say then? If God be for us, who can be against us?” And again, “He that spared not his own Son, but hath delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?”
Again, “Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect?” Who’s going to do it, anybody? God justifies them in Christ Jesus.
He has said it. We are stammer and stutter, we are feeble and fail, falter, be defeated and be bound. But in Christ, “It is God that justifieth.” We trust in Him and He is equal to God.
“It is Christ that died, yea, that is risen again, and he is seated at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.
“Who is going to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus?”
All that we need, all that will save us, all that shall keep us is in the Lord Jesus Christ. “There is therefore now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus.” When I am in myself, I am in sin. When I am in myself, I am in the flesh. When I am in myself, I am in condemnation. When I am in myself, I am ultimately in the wrath and perdition of the eternal damning of an unending hell. When I am in myself I am lost, I’m lost, I’m lost! But when I am in Christ Jesus, in the Lord Jesus, I trust my soul to the Lord. And in Him, I submit my life unto Him. And in Christ there is no condemnation, there is no lostness, there’s no judgment, there’s no fire, there’s no burning, there’s no wrath, there’s no hell. There is nothing but the promise of the ultimate victory of the glory of God in Christ Jesus.
You are saved in Him. You are saved in Him. Eternally and forever, you are one in Him. You are in Christ, “No condemnation to them in Christ Jesus.” As a man in the days of the Flood in the ark, in the ark, as the heavens grew dark and the fountains of the deep rose, and the waters rolled, the ark flowed on the bosom of the deep, and Noah was safe inside, inside the ark. As a citizen of Israel would say, under the blood that awful Passover night when the death angel scrutinized the doorposts and the lintels of all of the homes and families of Egypt, under the blood, under the blood is the life that was saved. He was safe. As Moses was saved in the cleft of the rock. God said, “Moses, no man shall see my face and live.” And the Lord God took Moses and put him in the cleft of the rock and covered him there with His hand while His glory passed by.
Fannie Crosby wrote that beautiful song:
He hideth my soul in the cleft of the rock That shadows a dry thirsty land.
He hideth my soul in the depths of His love, And covers me there with His hand, And covers me there with His hand. When the devil says, “You are lost. It is part of the stumbling into the perdition of the fire and eternal judgment.” Could we? Could we? “There is therefore no condemnation, no judgment, to them who are in Christ Jesus”-safe in the hollow of His hand, safe forever, forever.
That’s the hope and the promise. That’s the gift of God: eternal life in Christ Jesus. Looking to Him, not to the church, not to the ordinance, not to our good works, not to the keeping of the law, not to obeying of the commandments. Our hearts in Him, loving the Lord, given to the Lord, and all of the rest of the beautiful and precious ways that ought to adorn and embellish the life of those who are in Christ Jesus-it follows beautifully.
There you see, there is somebody helping them, somebody keeping them, somebody guiding them, somebody guarding them-if you’re in Christ Jesus. And that’s our appeal to your heart tonight. While we sing this song, while we pray, would you, somebody you, give his heart to the Lord, come into the fellowship of this church. While we sing this hymn, into the aisle and down here to the front and to the pastor. Would you come tonight?
“Preacher, tonight I give my heart and my life to the Lord Jesus, looking to Him, looking to Him.”
Some of you already saved, already baptized. While we make this appeal, you come and share with us this gracious ministry, the blessed hope we have in the promise in the death and resurrection and the glorious coming again of our Lord Jesus.
While we make the appeal, in the aisle and down to the front would you come while we stand and while we sing?