Sermon: Heir of Righteousness

Take a copy of God's word this morning. We're gonna turn open to the book of Hebrews. If you're using a Pew Bible, you can turn right open to page 1007. We are looking at Hebrews chapter 11 verse seven This morning, it's 1007 on the in the pew Bible. This morning we are looking at Hebrews just one verse this morning, verse seven. As we continue our way through that book,

Let's pray before we open up the word together this morning.

Father, we do pray this morning that you would be our vision

over these next minutes and next moments, that you would open the eyes of our heart, that we would see your glory and the person of our Savior and your son by the power of your spirit, that you would stir us with your truth, that you would plant it deep within that we would find that we a very real sense with the eyes of our heart. We have come face to face with our living God

and that we are a change people as a result, change for our good, change for your glory. And we pray this in the strong name of Christ Jesus, the one and only mediator and savior of amen. Hebrews chapter 11, verse seven. This is a holy iner, sufficient word of God by faith. Noah being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen in reverent fear, instructed an ark of the saving of his household. By this, he condemned the world

and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith. But the grass withers and the flower fades. The word of God is forever. Thanks be to God. Amen.

I think one of the great encouragement of the Christian life is to be surrounded by those that have just a robust Christian faith, especially those that are going through times of suffering. Uh, they, they don't hide it. They let you know that they're going through a difficult time. It's a trial. They ask for prayer and yet there's just, um, a robustness about their, their faith. I talked to a number of you this week in this congregation,

uh, call you or meet with you to minister to you and find it. Uh, it's the reverse. You are ministering to me and we have many such people in this congregation. We're surrounded by them. We're also surrounded by them in history. And this is what the writer of Hebrews is doing here in chapter 11. He is pointing you and I to different saints in the history of the church, in the history of the scriptures and showing us their, their robust faith.

And this morning what he does is he, he takes the person of Noah, he wants you and I to focus on Noah this morning and we're gonna do so in three ways just in this, this one verse. I want to look at faith in light of Noah's life and first we'll see that faith rests second, that faith works and third, that faith stands. So it rests, it works and it stands the writer. What he is doing is he's reflecting back to Genesis six,

and in Genesis six we have the account of Noah. And if you were to flip back there in Genesis chapter six, verses 13 and 14, you would hear God say this to Noah, I've determined to make an end of all flesh for the earth is filled with violence through them. Behold I will destroy them with the earth. That as he's warning Noah, that he's getting ready to come in his judgment and as he comes in his judgment, he's going to flood the earth.

Why is he going to flood the earth with his judgment? Because the wickedness of man has grown to such a level. It has polluted the entire earth to such a level that God is going to remake if you will, mankind through Noah. So he warns him. He's coming in judgment to destroy and start over again with Noah. And so he says to Noah, make yourself an ark of gopher wood. And then he gives very particular instructions for the constructing of this ark, this massive ship,

this massive great ship that would hold Noah, would hold Noah's family and would hold these animals so that all of them could then repopulate. The earth, as you can imagine, had to be a massive structure. And so God tells him what it's to look like. He says this to be 300 cubits in length, 50 cubits in breath, 40 cubits high. And none of us knows what that means. How big is that? Well, we could get in cars this afternoon

and we could make a road trip down to Kentucky and you could for 59 95 see it or you could imagine it with me. About one and a half football fields long. It was just over four and a half stories of modern buildings, four and a half stories tall. It was a a huge undertaking, a massive effort. And as our verse says, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen, Noah committed himself to constructing this arc. If you look back

to the very first verse in Hebrews chapter 11, the beginning of this great chapter on faith, before he walks through all of these people, the writer of Hebrews says this, now faith is the assurance of things hoped for the conviction of things not seen. Noah has such faith, faith that rests, that rests upon the promises of God.

Noah will construct this arc based solely upon the word of God. He has no visible evidence that any kind of judgment is coming, no kind of visible evidence that there's going to be a flood. And yet he believed God's word was sufficient enough for him to act and it was not a momentary decision. This was a life decision. If we went back again to Genesis chapter six, verse three, it makes it very clear that when God comes to Noah

and he promises them that this is going to happen, it is then 120 years later before the flood actually occurs. That means that for 120 years, Noah is cutting down trees for 120 years. He is sawing timber for 120 years. He's putting together by toman and pitch and he is crafting this great ark and all of that simply based upon the word of God. Faith rests upon God's promises 120 years if the conviction of things not seen often.

Think about the Israelites in Egypt and think about them. They're in Egypt and they're in slavery and they're surrounded by wickedness and darkness and harsh task taskmasters for 400 years.

Most of us in this room haven't even lived half of the 120 years of Noah 400 years. And yet they kept on holding on to the promises of God. They rested in the promises of God and each generation passed on that faith to the generation that followed it. In the midst of changing circumstances, faith rests. It rests that God will fulfill his word. It keeps looking to what is unseen or God is a God of promises who always fulfills his promises.

Faith rests.

But second faith works works. Noah was motivated to build this arc. Why? Well, the writer says that the manner in which Noah constructed the arc was quote, I reverent fear. Did Noah fear retribution? Did he fear punishment if he didn't construct this arc? No, that's not the case. That's what we would call cvi fear. That's the kind of fear that the Israelites had of the Egyptians, that if they didn't act in a certain way,

there would be retribution, there would be punishment. That is not how the Israelites acted with God. That's not how Noah acted with God. Why? Because those in saving relationship with God are never to fear God's punishment never there, there. There's never retribution from God for those that are united to him. Why? Because Christ bore our punishment upon the cross and Noah is looking forward to that promise that he knew from Genesis three 15 of the Savior to come

and we rest in that promise. We're sons. We're sons that are able to cry out. Abba Father, he is our father. Noah is a son. Notice the writer of Hebrews is pointing that out in this passage. He says he's an heir. Children of God do not fear his wrath now or ever has no place.

He never punishes his children. There's never retribution.

The author says he possessed a reverent fear of God. This is not a cerv fear. This is what theologians would call al fear. Philio is a Latin term and it we from that same word group, the word family from,

it's the fear that, um, a son or a daughter have of their parent. They love their parent, they respect their parent, they honor their parent. And so they don't, they don't want to dishonor them and displease them. They they, they want to serve them out of love and honor and respect.

So Noah and Philo fear, he by faith constructs an arc from faith flowed work. Faith works. It's not idle. Noah sets about the work of building the ark where there's smoke, there's a fire where there are good works. There's faith as James says in his epistle. Faith by itself if it does not have works, is dead by faith. Noah constructed an A from faith flowed work. Faith works. I wanna wrap our minds around this this morning.

That's why I just wanted to do one verse 'cause I think it's a good place to kind of stop in this whole chapter about faith and think through this together because Noah is a wonderful example. People get confused and so what I wanna do is think about this together. Calvin famously spoke about that there is a double grace that is given to us in our union with Christ, with the what he called the duplex gratia. The double grace. And the double grace is this justification

and sanctification. That's the double grace justification and sanctification justification. It speaks of that declaration in God's courtroom that we are before God and as we are before God because of a righteousness that has been given to us, we are declared, pardon the Westminster. Shorter catechism maybe has said it as well as any it defines justification This way. Justification is an act of God's free grace wherein he pardons all our sins

and accepts us as righteous in his sight only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us that is credited to us and received by faith alone. That's justification. Sanctification as our progressively becoming holy are growing in righteousness. And Westminster short of catechism again wonderfully defines it as sanctification as the work of God's free grace whereby we are renewed in the whole man after the image of God and are enabled more

and more to die unto sin and live unto righteousness. Justification is punier. It happens in a moment. Sanctification is a process. It's ongoing until you are in glory or Christ's return. And what I want us to see is we have to be careful with Noah here because people get very confused about Noah. Get very confused about Genesis six. Get very confused about this hall of fame of faith here in Hebrews chapter 11. And Noah provides a wonderful case case for us.

He has faith that works, but it's not the works that make him acceptable to God.

If you and I were to go back to Genesis six and we were to look at Genesis six, you'll often hear people misinterpret it or even here in this passage and they will say, well Mo Noah was chosen by God because he was righteous. He was the most righteous man on the earth and so he was chosen by God because of that. No. Verse eight of Genesis chapter six, Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord. He was a recipient of grace.

First God's favor, God's grace comes. Then we are told in the following verse nine, Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation. Noah walked with God God's favor, God's grace first and then he walked with God. His faith worked. Here in our verse, the writer says He became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith and an heir simply receives an heir, doesn't merit anything. He he received grace from God.

He received this righteousness by faith. He did not earn that righteousness. He did not work towards that righteousness. He did not increasingly have that righteousness. He inherited that righteousness. What is the writer speaking about? He's speaking about justification.

Justification has nothing to do with our work. Nothing. Not even a little bit to do with our work. Nothing to do with our work. We simply receive it.

It says constant temptation even among Christians where we make this great error of, of conflating justification and sanctification.

Remember um, Sinclair Ferguson talking about this? They're these two traps. The language he used, uh, I think it's incredibly helpful. He said these two traps of conflating justification and sanctification. He said they are non-identical twins from the same womb. And what are those two non-identical twins from the same womb. It's legalism and what we will call antinomianism in legalism. What happens is if we ground our justification in our

sanctification, what some do with Noah wrongly then, then that leads into a kind of of crippling legalism. If you look at the life of Noah and think he was a man who earned God's favor by what he did and so God spared him, then you understand this faith. You understand this chapter. You understand Genesis six, you understand the Christian life completely wrong. That's not what happens. That's not how he works. That is sanctification swallowing up justification.

And if our justification is based upon our sanctification, we're hopeless.

Hopeless. Many Christians,

some in this room we're absolutely crippled by legalism

in your walk with God. It's even, it's not really a walk, it's just kind of a crawling because you're just, you're weighed down by the the guilt and the the weight of your sin.

It's not a walking in the freedom that he's promised to give us and that he gives to us.

You don't know and enjoy the freedom Christ has purchased. He said, I came to set you free

faith rests upon God's promises including our justification and then that faith works.

It is faulty thinking as a Christian to live as if God accepts you today or to that he accepts you this hour or that he accepts you this minute by the current state of your holiness or your good works or your spiritual fervor. The Christian's justification. Our acceptance with God is not based upon our doing at all. It's based upon his Christ's doing. It is not your righteousness that matters. It's his His righteousness.

It was an heir of righteousness that comes by faith. You simply receive it by faith. Receive what? This righteousness, what righteousness. Christ's perfect righteousness. We as the writer says here, we are heirs of the righteousness that comes by faith we inherit. You don't earn an inheritance, you simply receive it. It's just receive. We're given righteousness. I like the language. Theologians have often used to say,

it's not my righteousness. It's an alien righteousness. It's a foreign righteousness. It's a righteousness that belongs to another that's outside of me. It has nothing to do with me.

That's his.

It's righteousness is secured by what we call the act of obedience of Christ. We will talk theologically about the passive obedience of Christ and the act of obedience of Christ. The passive obedience of Christ is all the suffering that Christ went through in his earthly life and then ultimately upon the death, upon the crawls. You have need of his passive obedience, his atoning sacrifice for you, but you also have need of his active obedience that is

completely fulfilling the law of God and living a perfectly righteous life all the days of his life, his active obedience, you have need of that He lived for us even as he died for us so that when you enter the courtroom of God, that that act of obedience of Christ, that act of obedience, his righteousness is completely filling the fulfilling the law that when you are in the courtroom of God as a child of God, it is that righteousness not yours.

It is his righteousness. That alien righteousness, that foreign righteousness. It is imputed to you. It's credited to you. It's like a robe that covers you over. You trade in all of these soiled, sinful garments and his robe of righteousness is put on you so that when God sees you in his courtroom, he sees the righteousness of his son and you are pardoned,

said, free declared in a moment, forgiven

righteousness simply inherited, received by faith. It's not our doing. Listen to Paul in Philippians three. He says this after listing all kinds of things that would be a pedigree for him to offer God his works to be acceptable before God. He says this, not that I have a righteousness of my own that comes from a law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith, a righteousness from God.

It depends on faith or listen to the most important verse communicating Christ's imputed righteousness to us. What John quoted earlier today as assurance of pardoning grace to you from second Corinthians 5 21, he meaning God made him meaning Christ. He made him to be sin who knew no sin so that we might become the righteousness of God. We by faith notice the parallel presented. Christ has made sin and we become the righteousness of God.

By faith, you do nothing but receive it and you need that act of obedience of Christ.

Jay Gresham Machen, the founder of Westminster Theological Seminary and author of wonderful book Christianity and Liberalism encourage all of you to read it just went through an anniversary this past year on his deathbed. He wrote to the theologian John Murray, he said this, I'm so thankful for the act of obedience of Christ. No hope without it. Amen. There is no hope for you apart from the act of obedience of Christ.

It is a a grievous error. The swallow up justification was sanctification.

The other error is what we call omi, the conflating of justification and sanctification whereby justification swallows up sanctification that also has no place. We're told in such a view that we're simply to look back to our justification as if that encompasses all the Christian life. That all I have to do is just keep looking back to my justification. But that's not that all that is entailed in the Christian life. Noah's faith worked filial fear drove him

to want to honor and to serve and to glorify this God who had bought him, who had poured out his grace upon him. He wanted to serve him.

Our union with Christ makes us secure in our justification. We rest by faith equally. Our union with Christ calls us to put off and put on as Paul says in Colossians three de labor as he says in one Thessalonians one to strive as he says in for Timothy four, we possess a reverential. Feel filial fear. As children who received our inheritance by faith, we want to honor and adore and serve and glorify him. Faith works. Finally,

faith stands to consider. Noah was striving here by faith as he's doing so in sanctification as his faith is is working, he, he doesn't have an easy road, often breeze through these patriarchs and we think, oh, they heard from God and how sweet that is and we quickly go over the verses, but he didn't have an easy road by faith. Noah stood and he stood in the midst of a wicked and hellish generational. I mean Noah had to be considered an odd bird of his day.

He was the first village idiot. He was that crazy uncle.

For 120 years he's building an orc at least a hundred miles away from the ocean. That guy's crazy. And he continued to stand in faith. Each day he would go out and he would cut wood and he would saw wood and he would put it together and he would hire people to help him put together this or, and he's collecting all of these animals for 120 years. His life was one that stood in faith

despite what's happening around him.

The writer of Hebrews here says that Noah was a man who condemned the world. How? By his life and by his words. Peter will tell us in second Peter, he'll give us a little more of insight here. He says that Noah was quote a, a herald of righteousness. He was a preacher. He heralded righteousness be for the world. He was warning them of the destruction to come. He was warning them of the need to repent and the need to have faith.

And by doing so, he's condemning the world through his life and by his worlds, his sanctification. It was not a walk in the park, it was not an easy day to be a believer in God. It required standing and looking very odd. But he stood in faith. He was a herald of righteousness in a wicked generation. And by it the world was condemned. Not that Noah was vicious or that he was vitriolic or that he was dismissive of the people of his generation.

That surely was not the case as he preached to them because God has nothing to do with that in his servants. Look at the end of the book of Jonah where Jonah doesn't really want them to repent, just wants to see them. Dash God wants nothing like that in his servants. But that generation was condemned because they saw his life, they heard his words. He was a herald of righteousness and yet it appears that none besides no in his family were actually saved.

Nobody else responded to his heralding. That guy's just crazy. He's off his rocker.

I'm sure they mocked him. Imagine the comments. No, it don't. You know, boats need water

that's so big that's never gonna float yet he kept on, he kept standing because faith stands. He continued in faith because he knew what God had said and he knew God is always worth trusting. Faith stands

Christians, your heralds today, you know this right? Your life dec proclaims. I hope your words proclaim.

Paul says in two Corinthians five, for we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing to one, a fragrance from death to death to the other of fragrance, from life to life. To some you will be fragrance of death.

You'll be the the town crazy in your family. You'll be the crazy uncle because you dare to believe in the things that are not visible.

Face stands. We know what God has said and he's worth trusting. So faith stands,

his promises and his truth are more fixed than all the changing norms of the day the world may seem. Think you are crazy if you would rather lose your job than given to the new cultural shibboleths. Call you crazy if you actually don't party on Saturday night or embrace the new sexual ethic of the day. Or say you're saving yourself for marriage crazy. If you have conviction of things not seen well, if the world finds you crazy,

you might actually be sane.

It stands, stands upon the promises of God.

We have to ask ourselves, each of us individually, do we truly believe God's word?

Do we truly believe that he will come in judgment as he promised? Do we truly believe that the generation that we are in, that it is facing a certain destruction as much as the generation in Noah's day?

Do we believe in the things unseen?

If you do, you live like it.

You live in faith. A faith that rests in him, a faith that works for his glory of faith that is willing to stand.

It looks like it. Heirs of righteousness become heralds of righteousness either life and with their words.

We the great promise of Christ, our faith rests the great work of God before us. Our faith works with the great challenge of our day. So our faith stands well, foun of love, divine that flows from my savior's bleeding side. Sinners trade, their filthy rags for his righteousness applied. Hallelujah. Christ is king. Alive and reigning on the throne. Are tongues employed with hymns of praise? Glory be God alone. It's faith.

Let's pray together.

Father, we are thankful for the gift of so great to salvation. We're thankful for the gift even of faith and we want to be a people of faith in our generation. We it is absent. Would you grant it where it is languishing? Would you encourage it? And we be a people of faith in our day, even as Noah wasn't his in Christ. Holy name we pray. Amen. Amen.