Justification by Faith

The 2 Covenants

When did it originate?
The plan of redemption was not an afterthought, a plan formulated after the fall of Adam. It was the revelation of the mystery, which hath been kept in silence through time eternal. Rom. 16:25. It was an unfolding of the principles of the foundation of God’s throne from the beginning. Christ and the Father knew the apostasy of Satan and the fall of man through Satan’s deceptive power. God did not ordain that sin should exist but He foresaw its existence and made provisions to meet this terrible emergency. So great was His love for the world that He covenanted to give His only begotten Son “that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life”. Through these verses we understand that the plan of redemption was in the mind of God since the beginning of His existence.
When did it come into effect?

Like everything, it began, from the throne of God. However, nobody can reveal it to us like it is written in the book Story of Redemption. “Sorrow filled heaven, as it was realized that man was lost and that world which God had created was to be filled with mortals doomed to misery, sickness, and death, and there was no way of escape for the offender. The whole family of Adam must die. The angels cried because of man’s fall. The whole of heaven was sorrowful. I saw the lovely Jesus and beheld an expression of sympathy and sorrow upon His countenance” Page 42. Please imagine for a moment the scene in heaven. The Son of God saddened. “Soon I saw Him approach the exceeding bright light which enshrouded the Father. Said my accompanying angel, He is in close converse with His Father. The anxiety of the angels seemed to be intense while Jesus was communing with His Father. Three times He was shut in by the glorious light about the Father, and the third time He came out from the Father, His person could be seen. His countenance was calm, free from all perplexity and doubt, and shone with benevolence and loveliness, such as words cannot express .” page 42. Why three times? Three times He pleaded with his Father to give his life as a ransom. And again at Calvary He prayed three times to His Father, that the burden of this might be taken away. Such a great gift for man, but still it was not easy. Jesus had to go through immense sorrow and pain. That is why He prayed 3 times to His Father.

It was not easy for His Father to accept the sacrifice, although it was ordained from times ageless. It was difficult for Him to give His beloved Son as a sacrifice. Then, when His sacrifice was accepted, His countenance glowed with a love that no human can portray. Then in the throne it was proclaimed. Christ made known to the angelic host that a way of escape had been made for the lost man. He told the angels that He had been pleading with his Father and offered His life as a ransom; to take the sentence of death upon Himself, that through Him man might find pardon. Through the merits of His blood and obedience to the law of God they could have the favour of God and be brought back to life eternal.

But, what happened in heaven when He revealed the plan of salvation? “The angels prostrated themselves before Him. They offered their lives. Jesus said to them that He would by His death save many, that the life of an angel could not pay the debt”. Page 43. Then it was revealed to man. They heard the voice of the Lord walking in the garden, in the cool of the day. Adam and Eve hid themselves from the presence of the Lord because they were naked. The last verse of the chapter 3 in Genesis tells us this, and also that the Lord made of the skins clothes for them. After pronouncing the judgement, the Lord made the first covenant with Adam. He showed him how the plan was ordained and through faith, man can become a partaker of the heavenly nature.

When Adam, according to God’s direction made an offering for sin it was the most painful ceremony that he had to perform. His hand must be raised to take life which God alone could give and make an offering for sin. It was the first time that he witnessed death. As he looked upon the bleeding victim, withering in the agony of death he was to look forward by faith to the Son of God whom the victim prefigured who was to die as man’s substitute. “For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins. Wherefore when He cometh into the world, He saith sacrifice and offering thou wouldst not, but a body hast thou prepared Me: in burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin thou hast not pleasure. Then said I, Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of Me,) to do Thy will, O God. Above when He said, Sacrifice and offering and burnt offerings and offering for sin Thou wouldest not, neither hadst pleasure therein; which are offered by the law.” Heb. 10:4-8. Here He talks about the first or the new covenant, which was also the Abrahamic covenant, or the Adamic covenant. The death of Christ points to the atonement for sin. When Christ mentions this in His Father’s throne, He makes it clear that in bull’s blood or in the lamb’s blood God didn’t have pleasure. God wanted men to see in the bleeding victim, the great sacrifice of His Son, that the hearts of men would change as they see the awesome sacrifice needed to atone sin and would repent.

Men became blinded. They thought that God loved blood and they missed its true meaning. They became corrupted. In psalms 40:6-9. Christ talks about Himself in these verses. He is the sacrifice for sin. The righteousness of God is embedded in Christ and when we look to Christ, He says, “Thy law is within my heart”. The law of God is immutable as is His throne; it can never be changed. Because Satan made us to sin, now Christ made an atonement for sin.

Righteousness is embedded in Christ and also so is the law of God. It proceeds from His heart. It was in His heart where the law originated. It cannot be changed. That is why when ministers and preachers proclaim that Christ abolished the law on the cross, and that we don’t need to obey the 10 commandments, it is a satanic message. The god of this earth has blinded them. We see clearly the author of this false message now. Because of Adam’s sin there need to be an atonement. Christ sacrificed Himself. But His sacrifice doesn’t mean that we have a license to sin. We have His sacrifice to cleanse us from sin and to set us free. The law of God has always existed. The sacrifice of Christ that ratified the new covenant, or the Abrahamic covenant, or the Adam’s covenant, they all had one goal or purpose- the atonement of sin. They lead us to Christ that we would believe in Him. These covenants would have not come into effect if man didn’t sin.

I wish to pose a question. Did Christ’s righteousness message belong only to the 3r angel, or to Waggoner and Jones who presented it to the church, or did it exist before the 3r angel? God is a God of justice; He didn’t treat anyone differently. His justice is equal to every soul born on the earth from Adam to the last person who will exist in this world. He opened the door of salvation. If anybody of Adam’s children does accept, he will have a way of escape. That is why the message of Christ’s righteousness is the message of every living church. It is the foundation of every living church of God. Each generation possessed this marvelous message. This is the mystery of the gospel of God. But many people don’t understand it; they are confused.

Let us give some thought to the passage in Patriarchs and Prophets, .”This same covenant was renewed to Abraham in the promise. In thy seed shall all the earth be blessed. Gen. 22:18. This promise pointed to Christ and Abraham understood its meaning. Gal 3:16. And he trusted in Christ for the forgiveness of sin. And this was the faith that was accounted to him for righteousness. So any human that ever existed from Adam to the last person who ever believes in this message will be saved. It is written that without Him there is no salvation”.

Now let us check to see who else also believed in this same message that Abraham believed in. I have a copy of the National Geographic, which featured Martin Luther, the greatest Christian reformer. Who was the father of Christian reformation in Europe? Was his belief different from the Christian forefathers? Let us see what is written in the National Geographic, October 1983, vol. 164, No. 4, p. 438. “Beside all this he writes to a friend, there arc mine own struggles with the flesh, the world and the devil. See what a lazy man 1 am. For ten years he had been reading the Bible comparing it to a mighty tree and every word a little branch. I have shaken every one of these branches because I wanted to know what it was and what He meant to tell us. Still tormented with the feeling of fearing the righteous wrath of God, Father Martin, with painstaking care and study meditated day and night on Paul’s epistle’s to the Romans 1:17. “For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written. The just shall live by faith.” The whole scripture revealed a different countenance and avenue to me. Father Martin explains that God’s mercy is freely given, but the flesh must die so that the spirit may live. Only when we are lowest, He reaches down and raises His grace, not by payments of alms or performing good works but through faith alone. This passage in Paul opened for me the gates of Paradise. I felt 1 was born again. Tradition calls this breakthrough the “Tower Experience” which he experienced while alone in the tower of the Augustinian cloister at Wittenberg.

What is the experience that Martin Luther went through? Is it similar to the experience of Adam or Abraham or Paul? Here, in the passage of Paul, it is clearly revealed in what he wrote to the Romans. “The just shall live by faith.” Did the Christian ministers who were living at the time of Peter, Paul, John, Andrew etc. have a different message? No, they had the same message—”Christ’s Righteousness” message—which clearly pointed out that without this message no man can be saved. This is tbe living message of every Christian church throughout generations. Why then do some claim this message as belonging only to the 3r Angel? No, it does not belong only to the 3rd Angel. Every human who will be saved in heaven will be saved only through this message. And it is amazing to see what the churches are presenting and what the Bible is presenting. We can call the Millerites the 1st Angel as revealed in the book of Revelation, chapter 14. What is said about them in revealing this message? They said, they have preached the message of justification by faith that every Christian may be changed. And they said, we are still looking for the dear Saviour, the Son of God from heaven, and for the fulfillment of the promise made to our fathers, and confirmed unto us by him that heard Him. They said, we preach the commandments of God that they may obey the law of God and be saved. So. the Millerites did not have a different message than what we have today. They had essentially the same message—Justification by Faith.

Let us look at the 3rd Angel or the Adventist Church. ”Several have written to me inquiring if the message of Justification by Faith is the 3rd Angel’s message. And J have answered that it is the 3rd Angel’s message in verity.” In the book of Evangelism, pg!90. Sister White writes about the Adventist Church. “Surely, Justification by Faith is our message.” It is true what she writes. It is important that we understand what she states here. She states in 1888 E.G.White Materials, page 211 chapter 24. “Looking back at Minneapolis, Lider E.J.Waggoner had the privilege granted him of speaking plainly and presenting his views upon on Justification by Faith and the Righteousness of Christ. In relation to the law this is no new light but it was old light placed where it should be in the 3rd Angel’s message.” And she writes here again Ibid., pg. 281. “To my brethren, many may have not received Christ. They have accepted a theory of the truth, and have been in a large degree left to this kind of experience. I have some words to speak to the people assembled before the meeting in regard to the coming light and walking in the light lest the darkness come upon them. But the message is to go forward in power even if some refuse to advance it. There were a large number of people presented this subject of Justification by Faith, in a plain distinct manner, in such simplicity that none need to be in darkness. Unless he has in himself a decided heart of unbelief to resist the working of the Spirit of God, many were fed and others seemed to be amazed as they did not know what justification by faith really meant. So many didn’t understand this message, they were confused and that is why she writes that you should study this message. The foundation of every discourse is the sacrifice of Christ for the atonement for sin. In order to understand and appreciate every truth in the word of God from Genesis to Revelation, it must be studied in the light that extends from the cross of Calvary. I present before you the great grand monument of mercy and regeneration of Salvation and Redemption—the Son of God uplifted on the cross. This is to be the foundation of every discourse given by our ministers.”

Evg. Pg. 119. I don’t need further evidence because; you yourself will understand. Now, when the early Christians were formed in the time of the first apostles, Paul’s message clearly states about salvation, “The just shall live by Faith.” I don’t need to bring more proof about this message. The class of people who follow the example of Cain includes by far the greater portion of the world. Nearly every false religion has been based in the same principle, that man can depend upon his own effort for salvation. It is claimed by some that the human race is in need not of redemption, but development. That it can refrain, elevate, and regenerate itself as Cain thought as to secure the divine favor by an offering that lacked the blood sacrifice. So do these expect to exhaust humanity to the divine standard independent of the atonement. The history of Cain shows that the result will be that man will become apart from Christ. Humanity has no power to regenerate itself. It shall not tend toward upward, toward the divine but downward to the satanic. Christ is our only hope. “There is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved. Neither there is salvation in any other.” The very sin of the Adventist church is that they refused to accept this message as it was presented in 1888.

What was the consequence? Because they refused to accept this message there was no salvation. They sinned against the Holy Spirit. If you sin against the Holy Spirit there is no remedy for you. For this reason the Reformation Church came into existence, also known as the Revelation 18t!l Angel. E.G.White writes dearly in TM, pg.80. “They began this satanic work at Minneapolis. Afterward when they saw and felt the demonstration of the Holy Spirit, testifying that the message was of God, they hated it the more, because it was a testimony against them. They would not humble their hearts to repent, to give God the glory, and vindicate the right. They went on in their own spirit, filled with envy, jealousy, and evil surmising, as did the Jews. They opened their hearts to the enemy of God and man. Yet these men have been holding positions of trust, and have been molding the work after their own similitude, as far as they possibly could.” They started this satanic war and there was no remedy. They could not comprehend this light afterwards.

In Review & Herald, July 24th 1888, she writes. “The facts concerning the professed people of God speak more loudly than their profession and make it evident that some power has cut the cable that anchored them to the eternal Rock and they are drifting away in the sea, without chart, or compass.” So the church started to drift away and eventually they became so lukewarm they started to break the 10 commandments. In 1888 this message was presented to the General conference. If they would have accepted this message, the events would have been different. The church would have received the heavenly garment of Christ’s righteousness and the Spirit of God would have been poured upon them like the early rain. Their rejection of the message was why the Rev. 18th angel was commissioned to come, the Reform Movement of the 1st world war where the Adventists openly broke God’s commandments. When you sin against the Holy Spirit, Christ’s presence is withdrawn. Their sin was the cause of the greatest change, which came upon the church from this time onwards.

When man fell by-transgression the law was not changed, but a remedial system was established. To bring him back to obedience, the promise of a Saviour was given. Sacrificial offerings pointing forward to the death of Christ as a great sin offering were established. Never has He given to the son of men a more open manifestation of His power and glory than when He alone was acknowledged as Israel’s ruler and gave the law to His people. Here the specter no human eye could imagine and a stately going forth of Israel’s invisible King was unspeakably grand and awful. It was the Son of God that gave our first parents the promise of redemption. It was the voice of Christ that speaks to us through the Old Testament

The covenant of grace was first made with man in Eden and after the fall there was given a divine promise that the Seed of the woman should bruise the serpent’s head. To all men, this covenant offered pardon and the grace of God through obedience and faith in Christ. The promise eternal life on condition of fidelity to the law of God was given to them. The patriarchs received the hope of salvation. The covenant was made with Adam and renewed to Abraham. It could not be ratified until the death of Christ, but it has existed by the promise of God since the world began

Let us read Jer. 31:31-34. “Behold the days come, saith the Lord; that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah: Not according to the covenant I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt which my covenant they brake, although I was a Husband unto them, saith the Lord: But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the Lord, I will put My law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts: and will be their God, and they shall be my people. And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying. Know the Lord: for they shall all know me from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”

What is this New Covenant? Jesus talked about it. As they were eating, Jesus took bread and blessed it and gave it to the disciples and said, “Take it and drink it. This is My blood of the new covenant which is shed for many for the remission of sins.” The old covenant was formed with Israel in Sinai. The Abrahamic covenant was ratified by the blood of Christ. This is called the new covenant. The new covenant was valid in the days of Abraham. It was then “confirmed both by the promise and oath of God that two immutable things in which it was impossible for God to lie.” God brought them from Sinai. He manifested His glory. He gave them His law and a promise of great blessings on condition of obedience. “If ye will obey my laws then ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.”

The people did not realize the sinfulness of their heart and that without Christ, it was impossible to keep God’s law. They readily entered into covenant with God feeling that they were able to establish their own righteousness. They declared’that “all that the Lord has said we will dp.” Yet only a few weeks passed before they broke their covenant with God and bowed down to worship the graven image. They could not hope for the favor of God because they had broken the covenant. And now seeing their sinfulness and need of pardon they were brought to feel the Saviour revealed in the Abrahamic covenant, which shadowed forth in the sacrificial offering. Now by faith and love they were bound to God as their deliverer from bondage of sin. Now they were prepared to appreciate the blessing of the new covenant. It is now very clear that there were two covenants. Now we are clear on this point of the two covenants and what it means. Everybody will be saved through this new covenant. We cannot keep the law without the grace of God. Only Christ working a change in the human heart will accomplish what God wills.
AMEN.