Understanding Redemption: The Cost and Call of Christ

In the first chapter of the first Epistle of Peter, for as much as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things as silver and gold from your vain conversation with received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. [00:16:48]

It's almost impossible to stop reading the moment you start reading these great and moving and glorious Words which are here written for us by the Apostle. You see, it's all one great theme, and what we've been doing now for a number of Sunday evenings is to look at different aspects of this theme. [00:65:43]

The Apostle here is giving us a display of the Gospel. It's a great enunciation of the Gospel in its various parts, as I say, yes, but it's also another thing. It is something that tests us as we listen to it all along. Every definition of it becomes a test. [00:203:12]

We have seen that this gospel tells us something about our state and condition by Nature, the sort of life we live, our vain conversation received by tradition from our fathers. We've seen that we have also seen that our whole position is a very precarious one because we are face to face with a God who judgeth every man according to his works. [00:324:88]

Our greatest need of all in this world is the need of knowing God that we may receive the blessings that he alone can give us. Well now then here arises the great question, how can we get into that position where we know God as our father and begin to receive some of the blessings? [00:376:44]

Before you were redeemed, you were not in that position. You have been redeemed. You are therefore in the you call upon the father now because you have been redeemed. If you hadn't been redeemed, you couldn't do it. Therefore, I say the first thing we are told about men as he is by nature in this world is that he needs to be redeemed. [00:510:52]

Our fundamental need as men and women born into this world in sin is not to be helped nor to be encouraged. It is to be delivered. You see, it is because so many have never understood that they need first and foremost to be set free, to be delivered from a bondage that they've never understood. [00:554:39]

The position is not merely that men do certain things that are wrong. The terrible thing is that their whole condition and position is one of slavery. Now that is the teaching of the Bible everywhere. Let me give you some of these indications of it in the Biblical teaching. [00:779:63]

We are not only slaves to sin, we are slaves of the law of God. We are under the law and under the Dominion of the law. What does this mean? Well, it means this, that whether we like it or not, there is a law of God, and we all know about it, and it makes things worse for us instead of better. [00:1049:24]

We are all in a great castle, and there's a mighty wall surrounding us, and we're allowed to walk back and forth in the grounds of the castle, and some fools think they're free because they can walk about. You try getting out if you can. You try to scale the walls and get Freedom. [00:1341:48]

The precious blood of Christ, a of a lamb without blemish and without spot. You know, that's the gospel. This is the heart of the Gospel. This is Christianity, that we know God and are reconciled to him and become his children and begin to receive His blessings for one thing only and for one reason only. [00:1829:88]

The love of God is Holy, it's pure, it's clean, it's righteous, it's just, it's Heavenly, it's precious. It means this, you see, not that God do some eternal OG is gloating over man in sin and delighting in punishing him. No, no, God has mercy and compassion and love even to this extent. [00:2831:11]