In this sermon, Pastor Steve Hopkins continues his series on the Book of Romans, focusing on Romans 4:1-8 to discuss the doctrine of imputation. He emphasizes that justification before God is based on the imputed righteousness of Christ, not on personal merit or works. By examining the examples of Abraham and David, Pastor Hopkins illustrates that faith in God leads to righteousness being credited to believers. He critiques alternative views to imputation, particularly those prevalent in Roman Catholicism and the teachings of Charles Finney, arguing that these views distort the true gospel. The sermon highlights the dangers of false gospels and underscores the necessity of understanding and accepting the doctrine of imputation for true salvation.

Welcome back to Burnet Bible Church. Join us this week as Pastor Hopkins continues his sermon series through the Book of Romans. Good morning once again. Feeling great this morning, like a coiled spring. Turn with me in your Bibles to the book of Romans.

Once again to Romans chapter 4 verses 1 through 8 we'll be reading. And if you would stand with me for the reading of the Word of the Lord. Let's read together. Romans chapter 4 verses 1 through 8. What shall we say then that Abraham our father as pertaining to the flesh hath found?

For if Abraham were justified by works, he hath whereof to glory, but not before God. For what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness. Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him, that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.

Even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputed righteousness without works Saying blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered? Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin. Let's pray. Father, wonderful Father in heaven, we pray God once again that you would help us, God, help us this morning to understand just how important this doctrine, O God, of imputation is. Help us, God, to see that apart from the imputation of the righteousness of Christ to believers by faith, there is no such thing as justification before God.

Help us, O God, to see that the gospel is at stake, O God, when we set aside the doctrine of imputation. And help us to take to heart the truth of this doctrine and to understand, O God, what Your Word means when it says, blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin, for we ask it in the name of Your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. Let's be seated. I want us to review our first session on the doctrine of imputation.

This morning, as I said, we're going to be in this section of chapter 4 verses 1 through 8 for three weeks, the Lord willing, last week, this week, and the coming week. But I want us to review our first session on the doctrine of imputation this morning, and then I want us to look at the alternatives to this doctrine. What are the alternatives? What are the other guys saying? Because the other guys are saying a lot of things.

Namely, if the doctrine of an imputed righteousness is not the teaching of Scripture, as many assert and have asserted down through the ages and even into the modern era, then what are we left with? What are we left with if Christ's righteousness imputed by faith to believers is not the way in which we are justified before God. What are we left with?" And what I'm going to be proposing is that what we will see is that what we are left with is something that is most definitely not the gospel of Jesus Christ, but another gospel. Another gospel. So first, in review, I want us to review, and it's going to take us about 10 to 15 minutes to review our last session on Romans chapter 4 verses 1 through 8.

In verses 1 through 8, we saw that the apostle Paul used a variation of the Greek word from which we get the English words impute and imputes and he used it five times. How many were here last week? Okay. How many watched on their televisions at home last week? Okay.

All right. In verse 3, this same word is translated counted, where you look in your Bibles in verse 3 and it says, Abraham believed God and it was counted unto him for righteousness. In verse 4, the same word, logizemi, or a form of it, is translated reckoned, if you have a King James version. Now, to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace. Same word, Same word, counted, reckoned, credited, imputed, all the same word.

In verse 5 again, counted, but to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. In verse 6 again, it's rendered in the King James Version, imputeth, or imputes, if you have the New King James Version. Even as David also describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputeth, counts, reckons, credits, Same word, righteousness without works. And then again in verse eight, impute. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute.

Same word, or count, sin. What we found in our last session was the same form of this Greek word, logizomai, translated to impute, to count, to reckon, or to credit. All the same word in the Greek, or the same variation of the same word in the Greek, translated into these different English words, which all mean the same thing, to impute, to count, to reckon, to credit, et cetera. So then as chapter four of Romans opens, we saw Paul answering this question that might naturally come to the mind of his readers. He's been talking about justification.

He's been talking about the basis of our justification before God. And so he asks in so many words, What do you suppose Abraham, the father of all the faithful, has concluded? What do you think he's found as it pertains to boasting in the flesh? That is, with regards to any human merit for justification before God. What has Abraham found?

And remember he goes back to Genesis the 15th chapter to prove his proposition that justification before God is on the basis of an imputed, Reckoned, credited, counted righteousness, the imputed, credited righteousness of Christ, not on the basis of one's own merits or works. And his argument we see is in verse 2. If Abraham were justified by works, he's not, but if he were justified by works, he would have some reason to glory or boast before God. But Abraham didn't. He didn't have any ground to boast or glory before God.

Not before God, he says, not before God, Paul says, because he wasn't justified by works. That's his argument. And then the apostle makes his case from Scripture. Old Testament Scripture, the only Scripture in existence at the time, And his proof text is from Genesis 15 and verse 6. We looked at that last week.

For what sayeth the scripture? Abraham believed God. Verse 3, Abraham believed God. Abraham believed God. That's the only way anyone's ever been saved, Old Testament or New, Abraham believed God.

That's the only way anyone's ever been saved. Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness. It was imputed to him for righteousness. It was reckoned to him for righteousness. It was credited unto him for righteousness.

Abraham believed God. And guess what? He believed God before he did anything that God told him to do. Before he was circumcised, before the obedience of circumcision, there was a faith in the promise of God. Faith.

Faith in the promise of God. Faith. Faith in the promise of God. Faith in the promise of God that God would fulfill His promise and provide Abraham an heir. Abraham believed God.

He believed what God said would come to pass, pointing, as I said in our last session, to the promise of Christ. All faith is always pointing to the object of Christ, Christ who would come from the seat of His own body, in the body of Sarah. And I remind the congregation, again, all saving faith is ultimately directed to Christ. Those who were of the household of faith who preceded Christ, please hang on to this, listen to this, Those who were of the household of faith who preceded Christ looked forward to the coming of Christ Everybody understand that and we look back But we all together believe God Abraham believed God looking forward to the coming of Christ. We look back to Christ who's already come.

Old Testament and New Testament believers are all saved in the same way. They believe God concerning Christ, faith in Christ. And the scriptures tell us that Abraham believed God and it was imputed to him. It was counted to him for righteousness And as I said in our last session the instant Abraham believes Abraham is justified before God How By the imputation of the righteousness of Christ. The crediting, here it is, those words again, all the way through verses 1 through 8, the crediting, the reckoning, the counting of the righteousness of Christ apart from any works.

The instant Abraham believes, Abraham is justified before God by the imputation of the righteousness of Christ. That's what Paul is teaching. That's what the Apostle Paul is teaching. If we could just get this into our minds, Christ's righteousness is imputed to us by faith, and that is the means by which we are justified in the sight of God. Our sin is imputed to him and his obedience is imputed to us.

Our sin is imputed to him And his obedience is imputed to us. This is the gospel of Christ. This is the gospel of Christ. Before again, Abraham kept any of God's law, this is what the Apostle Paul is driving home, before Abraham's circumcised, there's no reward due him, there's no debt owed him, There is no merit to his account before Abraham has done any works required of him by God. Abraham who is placed in the category of the ungodly Look at verse 5 Look at verse 5 who is placed here in the category of the ungodly God who saves the ungodly who justifies the ungodly He believes on him.

He believes on God, who justifies the ungodly, who declares just in his sight an ungodly sinner, Abraham, his faith Being counted or imputed or reckoned to him for righteousness. Have we got it? Have we have we got this have we grasped it? God doesn't know Abraham anything God isn't indebted to Abraham or anyone else for that matter Paul has made the point clear To him that works the reward is not reckoned of grace but of debt but to him that hasn't done any works whatsoever like Abraham But it simply believed on him that justifies the ungodly his faith is counted to him for righteousness It's counted for righteousness God proclaims Abraham just in his sight purely by grace. Abraham hasn't done anything.

No circumcision, no law keeping, no works, just faith in the promise of God. That's what God has promised. And what God has promised, God will perform. And what God has promised through Abraham's heir points to Christ to come. We've got to keep that in mind.

Then, in closing on the review, the apostle brings in David as a star witness, verse 6, even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works." God imputes, God reckons, God counts righteousness without works. It is apart from works. God imputes, God credits, God reckons righteousness apart from works, apart from works. Here is a righteousness alone acceptable before God, imputed by grace without any human works associated at all. As I said last week, a double imputation, right?

The sinner's guilt is imputed to Christ. Christ's righteousness is imputed to the sinner. This is what happens the moment a person puts his or her trust in Jesus for their salvation. The filthy robes of the sinner are removed from him and placed on Jesus on the cross and dealt with retrospectively, and the sinner is clothed in the spotless robes of Jesus." Children please listen, you get this? All the children listen to me.

Think about this. The filthy robes of the sinner are removed from off of you the moment that you believe in Jesus. The filthy robes of your sins are removed from off of you and placed on Jesus on the cross, dealt with on the cross retrospectively back then, and you are clothed in the spotless robes of Jesus, his perfect obedience and righteousness. It's called in theological terminology a double imputation. The sinner's guilt is imputed to Christ.

Christ's obedience is imputed to you. Transferred to you. Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven. Those to whom God imputes the righteousness of Christ are freely by grace apart from any human effort. They whose iniquities that is lawless deeds are by our definition are forgiven, put away, absolved of all guilt whose sins are covered." Think about this.

I want all you children to listen, look at me for a moment. All the children listen to me. I want to tell you a story okay all children look at me I'm gonna tell you a story and I'm hoping that next week when you come back all of your parents will print out for you a picture of Joshua okay the high priest has anybody ever had has anyone done that already Joshua the high priest remember that where he took his filthy robes off of him and the angel of the Lord put on the clean robes, okay? In Zechariah chapter three, Joshua, Joshua the high priest, okay? He's standing before the angel of the Lord.

Do y'all know the story? He's standing before the angel of the Lord. Do y'all know the story? He's standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan is at his right hand, the devil's at his right hand, and he's accusing him, okay, of all these things. And the Lord rebukes Satan and he says, is not this a brand that is plucked out of the fire?

And Joshua was clothed with filthy garments, representing the filthiness of his sin. And he's standing before the angel, and the angel tells those that are standing before him, he says, take away the filthy garments off of them, off of Joshua. And he said unto him, Behold, I have caused thine iniquity, I have caused your sin, to pass from thee, and I will clothe thee with change of raiment, change of clothing. And he clothed him with garments, with clean garments. This is a picture of the imputation of the sins of Joshua and of sinners to Christ, and a picture of the righteousness and obedience of Christ being imputed to sinners.

He takes off our filthy robes, puts them on Christ, Christ pays for them at the cross. Okay, It's imputed to him and then his perfect obedience, his perfect white spotless robes are given to us and we're clothed in his perfect righteousness. That's what Zechariah 3 is a picture of. I hope everybody will print that out next week and let their kids color that because we've got one more week we're going to be dealing with this. The moment we believe God concerning His Son, the moment we trust in Jesus and Jesus alone for our justification, for our right standing before God, for our salvation, our sin is imputed to Jesus.

Please get this. And His righteousness is imputed to us. Our sin is declared to His account and He deals with it. He's dealt with it, retrospectively on the cross. And His righteousness, His obedience is imputed to us.

It's credited to us. It is reckoned to our account. At that very moment, our sins, our nakedness, our shame, think about Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, running around naked, God closed them in the skin of the animals, okay? Our sin, our nakedness, our shame is covered by Jesus' righteousness the moment we believe, the moment we believe. Jesus merited a perfect righteousness in the sight of God for his people by his active obedience, remember?

His keeping the law of God perfectly in our place and his passive obedience and death and that righteousness is imputed, reckoned, declared, Okay, credited to the account of everyone who like Abraham believes God. Do we have that? You got it? Who believes God. It is counted to them also for righteousness.

When we believe God concerning His Son, our sin is imputed to Jesus and His obedience is imputed to us. His righteousness is imputed to us. At that very moment, our sins, our nakedness, our shame are covered by Jesus' righteousness. We are clothed in His righteousness and ever thereafter, listen to me, ever thereafter when God looks at us, remember what I said last week, when God looks at us he sees the righteousness of his son isn't that good news he sees the righteousness of his son that's good news blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin not may not not might not but whom to whom the Lord will not will not impute sin. That's good news.

But what's the alternative? Many alternatives have been suggested. But what are the prevailing alternatives to justification before God on the basis of the righteousness of Christ imputed to believers by faith? What are the prevailing alternatives? Because you know, there must be a massive misunderstanding of what it means to be declared just in the sight of God when you can go to almost any church in America and find people who have no concept whatsoever of what Paul meant when he said it was imputed unto Abraham for righteousness.

That he believed God and it was imputed unto him for righteousness. You ask them what that means and they look at you in their head just kind of cocked sideways. They have no idea. Or you ask them, what does it mean when David said, and the Apostle Paul quotes him as saying, blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin. And they go, impute?

They've got no idea, no earthly idea, never even heard the word, never came out of the pulpit, never came from the the pastor in the pulpit. It's a big problem. And if a biblical understanding of justification and imputation are intricately involved with any true definition of the gospel of Jesus Christ, then we're staring, friends, down the barrel of a false gospel when we ignore these things. You understand that? We're staring down the barrel of a false gospel, and a lot of people have gotten and are going to get hurt.

In eternity, we might use more graphic terms like a lot of people got their spiritual heads blown off because they don't understand the doctrine. They never were taught the doctrine of the imputed righteousness of Christ. They've got no concept whatsoever of it. The Scripture speaks of the danger of preaching, quote, unquote, another gospel in Galatians 1-8. And the warning is severe.

Turn there with me. Galatians chapter 1 and verse 8, I'm sure you're familiar with this passage, but I want us to look at it. There's a word here that I want us to really focus on. Galatians chapter 1 and verse 8, but though we, this is the apostle Paul speaking, talking about we, Not we the people, but we the apostles. But though we, myself and the other apostles, or even an angel from heaven, preach unto you any other gospel, little G, Because there's only one true gospel, right, but there's lots of false gospels.

Any other gospel than that which we have preached unto you, that's the gospel of Jesus Christ, let him be accursed. Let him be accursed. The Greek on that word is anathema, and it means to be damned. Let him be damned. It means let him be doomed to eternal destruction.

It's strong language from the apostle, and he's speaking, of course, by the Holy Spirit. It's serious business to tamper with the gospel. By the way, just as the Scripture speaks here of another gospel, you know the Bible speaks of another Jesus. I started to ask for a show of hands how many would say that there's more than one Jesus? It was a trick question.

I'm not gonna do it because there's really only one true Jesus, right? But the Bible actually teaches that there are many Jesuses. You know that? Did you know that? There's many.

What does it say in Matthew 24, 24, 25? Many shall come in my name, right, and draw away many. And in 2 Corinthians 11, 4, if someone comes and preaches to you, quote, another Jesus, you might follow them, be led astray. So clearly there are many entities parading themselves out there as the one true Jesus, but there's only one true Jesus. But there are false Christs and there are false messiahs, and they need to be continually exposed.

But what we're dealing with here this morning is a false gospel, but there are many gospels. There are Lots of false little G gospels out there floating around, but there's only one true gospel. But any supposed gospel that denies the imputed righteousness of Christ is a false gospel, and it's powerless to save anyone, and it needs to be condemned. I mentioned the infused righteousness of the Roman Catholic system in our session last week. They believe in the infused righteousness.

So you get baptized as an infant and you're infused with righteousness. You imagine like taking the cap off the baby's head and you're infused with righteousness, you pour in righteousness. Now you're righteous until you commit not venial sins but mortal sin. Then after you've committed mortal sin then you can go through the process of penance and you can have those that system some are shaking their Gs. They know they've been maybe in Catholicism or whatever in the past.

So you know you can you can go through the system of penance and you can have your your salvation your justification restored. That's not the teaching of Scripture. The teaching of Scripture is once we've been justified, it's not a revolving door of justification. They confuse justification with sanctification. Yes, we are incrementally Conformed to the image of Christ, but once we have been justified we remain justified The question is whether we're truly justified Whether a person is truly saved or not if you're truly justified in the sight of God you remain justified in the sight of God You may have a time where you fall away, like Peter for instance, denied three times that he even knew Jesus.

Did he become not saved or not a Christian? No, he was still a Christian. But he had to repent and he had to turn. Did he become not a Christian, and then he was a Christian, he wasn't a child of God, now he's a child of God, now I'm not, now I'm in the kingdom, now I'm not, now I believe in, now I'm not, no. He had a time where he sinned and God brought him through a low point, or what have you, in his life.

But he never was in a revolving door where he was thrown out And he's no longer a child of God and then he has to get saved all over again There's no such thing in Christianity. So people say they don't believe in the doctrine of once saved always saved No, once you're saved you're always saved. The question is were you ever truly saved that's always the question whether a person was truly born again where they were truly in the kingdom of God if you are you're always in God doesn't throw his children out into the street once you're a child of God you're always a child of God he's not gonna throw you out So where was I going with all of this? Oh, so the Roman Catholic system has a now you're in now you're out and Here's how you get in and here's how you get out. But what about evangelicalism?

The premier false apostle of anti-imputation theology in American history was a man named Charles Finney. Charles Finney, I mentioned him briefly last week, in his false doctrine has infected the mainstream of evangelicalism in America even under this very day. He's the one who started the altar calls, by the way. You know, the walk the aisle, shake the hand of the preacher, say the sinner's prayer, and you're saved. That's not found in the Bible.

Anyone find it for me? I remember one time preaching on the streets, I said that. I said, if you can find for me any place in the Bible where if you walk down an aisle, shake the preacher's hand, or say a sinner's prayer that you're for sure saved. I'll give someone $100. A guy tried to come up and show me.

He couldn't find it. He tried to show me, but he couldn't find it. It's not in the Bible. It's not in the Bible. Saying a sinner's prayer doesn't guarantee that you're in the kingdom of God.

You repent and you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what the Bible tells us that we're to do. Not saying a sinner's prayer, not shaking the preacher's hand, not walking the aisle. I remember being in a Baptist church growing up, a independent Baptist Church, and I remember Sunday after Sunday after Sunday, I was probably saved a long, long, long time ago because I was repenting and believing, sitting on that front pew, afraid to get up and walk the aisle. I was just afraid, but I was repenting and believing.

I was repenting and believing a long long time ago. Just wasn't my demeanor to get up and be able to stand up in front of people, you know, and be able to walk down there and and say those words or whatever it was in front of everybody. But you don't have to do that. You right now could be sitting in your chair, you repent and you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, guess what? You're saved.

That's what the scripture teaches. Repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and your life will show it. Old things will pass away, behold all things will become new and they will be becoming new. But the premier false apostle of anti-imputation theology in American history was Charles Finney, and I just barely mentioned him last week. And I also said that last week I found a, in our homeschool library, a book on the heroes of the faith and he was listed in it and I had to either I can't remember if I threw the book away or tore out a section from it but I got rid of either the section or the entire book because Finney is not a hero of the faith but a heretic from the faith.

Born Charles Grandison Finney August 29 1792 quote head and shoulders above his peers Finney, quote, the method of the gospel is all that it takes to save souls Finney, quote, give me five minutes with anyone and I can convert him, Finney, who is credited with preaching what some people called the second awakening, but it was an awakening that didn't last a second because it didn't awake anyone like all man-made revivals. The only thing it really produced was a man-centered false gospel that laid the foundation for numerous false revivals and movements that have persisted even unto our present day. But what did Finney believe? What did Charles Grandison Finney believe? Well, I'll tell you first what he didn't believe.

Charles Finney didn't believe in original sin. You get that wrong, you get everything else wrong. He didn't believe or preach that man inherited the corruption of his first parents. That's what it means when we talk about original sin. He didn't believe that man inherited the corruption of his first parents.

That's what it means when we talk about original sin. He didn't believe that man inherited the corruption of his first parents. He didn't believe that by ordinary generation that sin passed down from one to another. So in effect, he was basically a Pelagian. We don't have time to go through all the doctrine of Pelagius, etc., etc., again and reiterate what that man stood for.

But basically it's perfectionism, That basically you come into the world a tabula rasa, you are written on as a blank slate rather than inheriting original sin by natural generation, inheriting the corruption of your first parents. You come into the world a blank slate, and you learn sin rather than inherit sin. He didn't believe in original sin. He didn't believe you inherited sin from your first parents. He didn't believe that a man needed to be born again from a state of the spiritually dead, because he didn't believe that men came into the world spiritually dead.

He believed that men just came into the world spiritually needy and spiritually vulnerable. Finney didn't believe that Jesus' righteousness was imputed to Abraham or anyone else for that matter, and thus he didn't believe in the substitutionary atonement of Jesus for sinners. He didn't believe that Jesus actually died in the place of sinners. His was a very convoluted doctrine, but he's credited in history books of Christian history as being one of the greatest preachers in the history of evangelical America. How many have heard good things about Charles Finney?

I mean, come on. But he was a heretic. He was an absolute heretic and he laid the foundations for many bad things in the Western world. I'm going to be quoting from Spurgeon.org, a very good website which carries all of the archives of the Spurgeon sermons. This is Spurgeon.org from the website speaking on Finney.

Quote, this is Spurgeon.org quoting Charles Finney. Here's what he said about justification. This is what he said about the imputation of the righteousness of Christ. Quote, there can be no justification in a legal or forensic sense. You notice his wording there?

It's a tack on the reform doctrine of justification, Because what do we say? What do we say? And what do the Reformers say? That it is in a legal sense. It is an imputed righteousness that we are justified or declared just based upon the righteousness of Christ imputed to man.

He says no, there can be no justification in a legal sense or a forensic sense, let's say in a legal sense, but upon the ground of universal, perfect, and uninterrupted obedience to law. Here he is with his perfectionism. This is, of course, denied by those who hold that gospel justification, or the justification of penitent sinners is of the nature of forensic, " that's legal, or judicial justification. Here he is attacking the Reformation again. "'They hold, ' that's us, "'to the legal maxim, that what a man does by another he does by himself and therefore the law regards Christ's obedience as ours.

That's what we hold, that Christ's obedience is ours. Our faith is in Christ and therefore Christ's obedience is ours. And that on the ground that He obeyed for us. Yeah, that's what we hold. And that's what He denies.

This is from Charles Finney, his book Systematic Theology, page 362, if you want to look it up. He goes on to say, I could not but regard and treat this whole question of imputation. It's a biblical word, but he says, I could not but regard this and treat this whole question of imputation as a, quote, all of this is a quote, theological fiction. Theological fiction. Now he's borrowing from the Roman Catholics.

A theological fiction. That from page 60 of his memoirs. Wow. So what does he believe? If he doesn't believe in justification by faith in the righteousness of Christ imputed to believers by faith, what does he believe?

Here again from Spurgeon.org website, quote, having decided that the doctrine of imputation was a theological fiction, Finney was forced to deny not only the imputation of Christ's righteousness to believers, but also the imputation of the sinner's guilt to Christ on the cross. Under Finney's system, Christ could not have actually borne anyone else's sin or suffered sin's full penalty in their place and in their stead. Finney therefore rejected the doctrine of substitutionary atonement." The guy's a full-blown heretic. Full-blown heretic. End quote.

This is me now. Finney preached a false gospel, and he infected the whole of evangelical America with it. But Finney was a hero to many evangelicals, as I said before. I had to throw away a book on heroes of the faith because it included a man who denies the faith, who denies the faith, historical faith believed by Christians for hundreds of years. But listen to this, even men like Billy Graham praised Finney.

Did you know that? Billy Graham, Charles Finney was a hero of Billy Graham. Here's a quote from Billy Graham before he died, obviously. Few men have had such a profound impact on their generation as Charles Grandison Finney. Through his spirit-filled evangelistic ministry, uncounted thousands came to know Christ in the 19th century, resulting in one of the greatest periods of revival in the history of America." End quote.

Really, he preached against the substitutionary atonement of Jesus Christ and against the imputed righteousness of Christ, and he's upheld as a hero of the faith, even by Billy Graham. To that I respond with the words of the Apostle Paul, if any man preach unto you any other gospel than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. Let him be accursed. Let him be accursed. Let him be accursed.

A gospel that denies The substitutionary atonement of Jesus and the imputation of Christ's righteousness by faith for justification is a false gospel, and whoever preaches it, let him be accursed, not praised. Apart from the imputation of the righteousness of Christ to believers by faith, There is no such thing as justification before God. The gospel, friends, the gospel is at stake when men set aside the doctrine of imputation. Abraham, as we close, believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.

Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered. And iniquities are forgiven and sins are covered when and only when a man's sins are imputed to Christ and the righteousness of Christ is imputed to a man, and this is apprehended or received the moment one believes. Some think it to be a small matter, this matter of imputation, but it's really the most significant issue of life because it answers the question of how sinful man might be justified before the all holy Creator God before whose tribunal all men must ultimately stand. And I'll end with this from Ligonier from R.C. Sproul's statement on Christology.

For us, he kept the law, atoned for sin, and satisfied God's wrath. He took our filthy rags and gave us his righteous robe. Amen? Amen. Let's pray.

Father, we do thank you for your word. We thank you for this time together. We thank you, God, that you have given us your holy word, and we thank you, Lord, that you have given us your righteous robe and taken away our filthy rags, the filthy rags of our self righteousness and our own works, oh God, and given us the righteous robe of Christ's obedience and they've imputed that to us, oh God, by faith, which is a gift from you. We love you, Lord, and we thank you, God, and we just praise you for this time together. And we ask you, Lord, to be with us now as we share together in this table set apart from all others.

Help us now to examine ourselves before we eat of that bread and drink of that cup showing Christ's death for us For it's in His holy name. We pray these things