The Kingdom of His Son

6 · Oswald uses the legal mechanics of inheritance—wills, stipulations, disqualification for murder—to illustrate the stunning nature of God's qualification

And that grace gets even more stunning when we think of what's involved in the idea of our inheritance. Now, I think this is a helpful illustration. When you think of inheritance, what's one of the things that usually comes to mind pretty quickly? If someone's inheriting something, money, exactly. And the way you get the money through the inheritance is if you are named in the will. Inheritance is usually tied to a will. Not everyone inherits when someone dies. Bad news for you this morning, when Bill Gates dies, I doubt anyone in this room is going to get a cut of it. There's not going to be a line out in Seattle where the first 100 people through the door get to sign their name at the bottom of the will and they get a cut of the pie. That's not how it works. Only people mentioned will be invited to the reading of the will. And sometimes the person writing the will even puts stipulations into the will. I will give these possessions or this X number of dollars, this aspect of the inheritance to this person, provided they meet these stipulations. That's kind of a cranky person who's died. All sorts of stipulations before they'll give out their goodies. It's an understood concept of law that even if a person dies and hasn't listed stipulations, there are still ways a person listed in the will can be disqualified. One of the most obvious ones is if you're found guilty of murdering that person and you're named in the will, you don't get what's named in the will. It's a nice little provision of law that protects you if you're really wealthy. So if a husband has a really wealthy wife with lots of family money and he kills her and he gets caught, he forfeits all that would normally be left to him in the will. It goes to the children or some other descendants, other people named. You can't profit from a crime. So if you're complicit in the death of a person, it prevents you from gaining benefit from their death.

7 · Oswald names the magnitude of grace: God qualifies not the neutral or the deserving but those who are complicit in Christ's death

Now think about what happens in our qualification. The Father isn't just taking neutral people and adding them to the list of those who become co-heirs with Christ. He's not looking around the earth and finding the best and the brightest. He's not scouring the SAT scores. He's not looking at Mensa. He's not looking at the wealthiest 1%. He's not looking at those most involved in charitable endeavors. He's taking rebels. He's taking members of the crowd in Pilate's court screaming for Christ to be crucified. He's taking Paul holding the cloaks of those who are stoning the disciples. He's taking us with the blood of Jesus on our hands, and the Father in His grace is wiping away all of that disqualification. We're not qualified, we're actually disqualified. We've been complicit in the death of the heir. But the Father wipes away disqualification and empowers faith. He qualifies us to inherit with Jesus, the one we're guilty of killing.

8 · Oswald grounds the idea of inheritance in both Hebrews and the OT land allotments, showing that while the 11 tribes received land, the Levites received God Himself as their portion

Hebrews 9:15 puts it this way: Therefore he, Christ, is the mediator of a new covenant. He's the mediator of a new covenant so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant. God qualifies us by redeeming us from everything that disqualifies us. The magnitude of that grace becomes even more profound when we understand the way Paul talks about inheritance. If you look at the Old Testament, what does the word inheritance usually refer to? In the Old Testament, the idea of inheritance is tied to the land. In fact, when they enter the Promised Land, right? The 12 tribes of Israel get allotted land. At least 11 of the tribes get allotted land. 11 tribes are given sections of the land. This is your inheritance. It will be yours, given to your descendants generation after generation. All except for the tribe of Levi. God gives them no part of the land. He tells them, "You won't receive an inheritance in the land. The Lord will be your portion." This tribe, from which the priests will come. Paul, when he refers to inheritance in the New Testament, isn't referring to land. It's not that Paul doesn't believe that there's going to be a renewed earth. It's not that Paul doesn't believe when Christ returns there will be a new heavens and a new earth and that all the world will be the inheritance of the saints. But he's drawing our attention to the spiritual realities.

9 · Oswald expounds Ephesians 1:11 to show that the inheritance is not merely through Christ but in Christ—Christ Himself is the inheritance

In Ephesians 1:11, he says, "In Christ, we have obtained an inheritance." He's not just saying, "Through Jesus, you get an inheritance." No, "In Christ, you have obtained an inheritance." He's pointing to the greatest aspect of our inheritance, that we get Christ Himself. A few years back, my mom and dad were working on their will, and so they asked my brother and I, "Is there anything in particular you guys kind of want to designate and say, 'I'd really like that. That's something I would like to have'?" And I like immediately— like, it's just so interesting to watch how my mind and my brother's mind work differently. I immediately said, "I'll take the books!" And my brother, a half second later, says, "I'll take the money!" And I thought about it for a couple seconds and I thought, Wow, I didn't really think that went through very well. I'll take the money, I can buy my own books. Here's the point. When God lays out the inheritance and asks, what portion do you want? Of all that I have, of all that will be available, in the new heavens and new earth. What do you most want? We shouldn't be clamoring for crowns, but there will be plenty of crowns. We shouldn't be clamoring for the biggest mansion, a mansion on the best boulevard. I want to live on the block with Peter and Paul. Like, I want to have barbecues with them. No, his point is that we've been qualified for an inheritance. In Christ, we have received an inheritance. What do you want, child? I want Jesus. That's the point Paul makes with our inheritance. In the end, the Father gives us the best of both worlds. Like the 11 tribes of Israel, we will inherit the land. You will get crowns. There will be rewards. You will get a mansion. I can't promise it'll be on Peter Street. But you will get something much better. For all eternity, like the tribe of Levi, you will receive the Lord as your portion and your inheritance.

10 · Oswald summarizes the first point (qualification) and pivots to the second: deliverance to a new kingdom

God pushes back against the domain of darkness by qualifying His people for inheritance. He pushes back against the domain of darkness by delivering His people to a new kingdom.

11 · Oswald identifies the Damascus Road encounter as the source material for Colossians 1:13

God battles the domain of darkness by creating and transferring and delivering broken people into the new kingdom of His Son. We see this in verse 13. It's expanding upon the idea of verse 12. He says this: "He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son." For Paul, this is a huge statement that's directly connected to the realities of the resurrection. You look back at verse 13, it's like there's actually nothing in that that says resurrection. Nothing that says the risen Lord. Doesn't actually even talk about his death there. How do we see resurrection? Well, the language tips us off. Remember, Paul isn't initially called Paul, right? He's Saul. Initially, when we encounter Saul, he is dead set against the rise of Christianity. He's dead set against this new kingdom pushing back against the domain of darkness. He doesn't realize it's the domain of darkness. In the early days of the church, he's convinced this is a new sect that's blasphemous. It's heresy. He thinks that this Christianity is hell-bent on destroying his precious Judaism. It's probably not a stretch to imagine Saul at the first Easter, one year after the anniversary of the crucifixion, passing out the first pamphlets of the mass media blitz discrediting the resurrection. That's the camp Paul is in. I don't know what a pamphlet looked like in those days. It's like a parchment? He's got like special parchments? That's what Paul would be doing. Sitting on street corners poking holes in the proof of the resurrection, thinking that he's doing God's work. He's convinced this Jesus is a fraud. This movement has to be stopped at all costs. And that all changes on the Damascus Road. A blinding light from heaven knocks him over. Paul encounters a voice. Who are you? It's me. It's Jesus, the one you're persecuting. Blinded by that light, laying in the dusty road, it became undeniably clear Saul had been dead wrong about Jesus, wrong about his identity. He wasn't a fraud. He was the Son. Wrong about what happened after He died. His body wasn't stolen. He was raised. And then Jesus says this on that road to Paul. He commissions him: Saul, I am sending you to the Gentiles. And this is what He says, listen: To open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light, from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me. You want to know the source material for Colossians 1:12-14? It's Paul's first encounter with the resurrected Christ.

12 · Oswald uses two cultural illustrations—Mordor from Tolkien and the American South in 12 Years a Slave—to depict the domain of darkness as an inescapable, all-encompassing tyranny

In a blinding flash, everything Paul understood about Jesus changed. To his horror, he realizes he hasn't been doing God's work. He's been captive to the power of Satan. That's not a pleasant thought. Most of us don't get up in the morning thinking, "That person's captive to Satan's power." Before we come to Christ, we don't view ourselves as being part of the domain of darkness, part of the bad guys. People don't view themselves that way. But Paul realizes it's true. The entire imagery is just dark and foreboding. The domain of darkness. Kind of brought to mind for me images of Mordor from Middle-earth, right? If you've ever seen the movies, Mordor is just this black place. You've got Sauron's eye just creepily hovering over it and there's mountains It's just uninhabitable and disgusting and there's orcs and it's just a place of death and decay and slavery and agony. The domain of darkness. Sauron rules and there is a horrible yoke placed over everyone by the Dark Lord. But in Middle-earth, Mordor is just a territory on the map. You've got places like the Shire, Rohan, you've got Elrond's kingdom. There are places where the domain of darkness doesn't exist. What the Bible tells us is that all of humanity is captive in the domain of darkness. The domain isn't this idea of a territory with boundaries. The word "domain" actually in other places gets translated as "power" and "authority." We are under the authority and power of the devil. Paul's point is that we're enslaved. There's no border to cross where if you can get across that border, now you're out of Mordor and you're free. No, it extends everywhere. Think of the movie 12 Years a Slave recently. Samuel Northrup, the main character, just knows in his heart and his mind if he can get out of the South and get back to the North, he'll be free again. His slavery is contained by these boundaries. And so liberty rests if he can just find someone to sponsor him, to speak for him, so he can get back north and be reunited. If he gets there, then all the horrors of his life are gone. What Paul is referencing is a reality where there is no north. The tyranny of Satan extends everywhere. It's a tyranny that imprisons people morally, imprisons them intellectually, and imprisons them spiritually. And ultimately, it physically crushes them with the penalty of death. Wanna see how far the domain of darkness extends? How many people face the reality of death? That's the domain of darkness. We're helpless to escape it, not smart enough to escape it, can't buy our way out. In short, We need deliverance. And if Christ had remained dead, the tyranny would have gone unchallenged.

13 · Oswald expounds Colossians 2:11-15, showing that the resurrection power that raised Jesus is the same power that makes believers alive, cancels the record of debt, and disarms the spiritual rulers and authorities

The echo of Paul's account in Acts is that he's encountering the resurrected Christ who says, "I'm sending you as a light to the Gentiles to proclaim to them freedom from the authority and power of this domain of darkness, to declare to them a way out from under Satan." Why can He do that? Because He's the resurrected Christ. He's not dead. Colossians 2:11 makes an explicit connection. "In Him, in Christ, also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of flesh by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with Him in a baptism in which you were also raised with Him through faith in the powerful working of God." That powerful working of God connects it with our passage. The powerful working of God who raised Christ from the dead. Verse 13 says, and you who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, and you who were stuck in the domain of darkness, God made alive together with him, together with Christ. Having forgiven us all our trespasses by canceling the record of debt that stood against us. This He set aside, nailing to the cross. Verse 15, He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame by triumphing over them in Him. Rulers and authorities isn't just thinking of Pilate and Herod and the chief priests. And the scribes. It's thinking of the authorities and the principalities and the powers of the domain of darkness. In a resurrected Christ, you have hope. You were buried with Him in a death like His. You will be raised with Him in a resurrection like His. The very power of God that raised Jesus is your hope. You've been transferred from that kingdom.

14 · Oswald expounds the bitter irony of Matthew 27: the crowd taunts Jesus to save Himself, but we are delivered precisely because God chose not to deliver Jesus

We find deliverance through Christ's death and His resurrection, which is also to say we find deliverance because initially Jesus wasn't delivered. There's a bitter irony in the taunts of the crowd before the cross. Matthew 27 describes the chief priests and the scribes and the elders So all the Jewish leaders, this is their moment of triumph, right? They're sitting there and they've got Him. He's pinned to the tree. They're watching Him slowly bleed and suffocate to death. And then they start rubbing salt in His wounds. That's what they said. He saved others. Can't He save Himself? He's the King of Israel. Let Him come down from the cross. If He comes down from the cross, we'll believe in Him. Verse 43, "He trusts in God. Let God deliver Him now if He desires Him. He said He was the Son of God." We find deliverance through Christ's death. We find deliverance from Satan's power and authority because God chose not to deliver Jesus. Because God chose to leave His Son hanging there, slowly dying. We find deliverance because Jesus was put in our place.

15 · Oswald cites Peter's Pentecost sermon to show that the resurrection ensures believers are not merely freed but granted citizenship in Christ's kingdom

The fact that there's even a Kingdom for us to be transferred to is only possible because Christ was raised. As Peter preaches at Pentecost, so on the heels of the resurrection, right? Acts 2:24, that great first sermon. God raised Jesus up, loosing the pangs of death because it was not possible for Him, Jesus, to be held by it. This is what the resurrection ensures. Not just that we're delivered from the domain of darkness and then we become refugees for the rest of our life. That happens to some people. They sit under an oppressive regime and then they're finally delivered, but they don't get to go to a home. They get to go to a refugee camp. And live in somewhat less miserable state the rest of their life. No, the resurrection ensures we don't become refugees merely freed from slavery. We don't have to wander without a home the rest of our lives. Because the Son is raised, we are made citizens. We become members of the risen one. We're transferred from Satan's authority, transferred to Christ's authority. We get uprooted from one kingdom to another, given citizenship in the kingdom. This is a sweet phrase: of his beloved Son.

16 · Oswald unpacks the phrase 'beloved Son' by juxtaposing the cross (where the Son bore wrath and was made sin) with the resurrection (where the Son is vindicated and declared beloved)

You think of how this is happening, what Paul has in mind, that phrase becomes particularly meaningful. The kingdom of his beloved Son. The Son who bore the Father's wrath. The Son whose back God's hatred against sin was poured out on. The Son who was made guilty and vile and condemned before God's holiness. The Son who was made to be sin even though he had never known sin. But it's all changed. Now it's the kingdom of the beloved Son. Now the Father looks and says, "Well done. This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased." You see this, I think, C.S. Lewis depicts it well in that classic, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

17 · Oswald narrates the plot of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, focusing on Aslan's substitutionary death for Edmund

You can make so many illustrations from those books. But the one in particular is in the first book, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, you have Aslan. And we all know Aslan is this massive, powerful lion. He even describes like the other lions are not like Aslan. Aslan is a special lion. More powerful, he's more beautiful, he's more intimidating. The other lions are almost like little playful puppies around Aslan. Aslan represents Christ, and in the book, he takes Edmund's place. Remember, Edmund is the brother of the 4 children who betrays his family to the White Witch. Well, in Narnia, it's written into the law, the witch knows this, that anyone who is a traitor must be put to death, and the witch gets the opportunity to put traitors to death. And so she comes before Aslan and demands for Edmund's life, and Aslan, the Christ figure, says that he will take Edmund's place. So he gets shaved and humiliated. His mane is torn from his head. This demonic-looking army of the witches binds his powerful paws tightly, and they heave him up on this table. He's put to death in Edmund's place. The Witch imagines she's triumphed. She assumes that now her power is finally at its zenith. At points, she cowers before the Lion, but now Aslan is dead. Narnia should fall completely under her authority and control.

18 · Oswald unpacks Lewis's theological framework: the witch (Satan) knows the law (deep magic) but not the deeper magic—the eternal plan of substitutionary atonement

I love how C.S. Lewis puts it. The witch only knows, he says, the deep magic from the dawn of time. It's a magic that's marked for an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. So Edmund has to pay for his sins and Aslan takes his place, and the witch assumes the law gives her power. I can kill Aslan because the law says someone has to die, has to atone for these sins. But really, the witch just carries a mechanical function. Mechanical function built into Narnia to carry out the moral law in the same way that Satan performs a mechanical function to punish sinners. Seems powerful, but it's a limited power. The real authority, C.S. Lewis lies in the deeper magic from before the dawn of time. The witch knows the magic from the dawn of time. Aslan knows the deeper magic from before the dawn of time, and so Aslan explains, "When a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitor's stead, death itself would start working backwards." So Aslan dies for Edmund.

19 · Oswald narrates the mice freeing Aslan from his binds and then corrects the illustration: unlike Aslan, Jesus needed no help to break the bonds of death

And here's one place where the imagery breaks down. You remember? His huge body is laying on the table, he's dead, And Susan and Lucy, the two girls, come up and they're crying and they're mourning because Aslan has died. And what do they try and do? They try and take the binds off. They take the muzzle off his face and they try and take the binds off his hands so he looks more natural. And they realize the cords, the binds, are too tight and they can't get them off. And so there's little mice that come up and the mice, out of reverence for who Aslan was, chew the binds off. Really interesting tidbit. Side note: up to that point in Narnia, mice can't speak. They're stupid rodents. From that point forward, mice have the ability to speak, and so you get characters like Reepicheep. In honor of what they did for Aslan, they're given the gift of speech. Well, C.S. Lewis is diverting from the real story. There are no mice in the tomb. With Jesus. Jesus needed no rodents to release Him from the cords of death. The cords are tight. They're too tight for any human to undo. But they're not able to hold the Son. The bonds of death, the cords of Sheol as the Israelite psalmist would say, have no power to keep Jesus in the grave.

20 · Oswald identifies the irony in Pilate's command to secure the tomb and declares that neither Roman power nor modern skepticism can seal or reseal the tomb

You want to know one of the most ironic lines in the entire New Testament? After Jesus is killed, the scribes and the chief priests, they're like in a panic, right? Because they know, hey, He's predicted He's going to rise again. So it's not enough that we've killed Him. They come to Pilate and they say, you've got to give us some soldiers so we can go defend this tomb because we know these duplicitous, sneaky disciples, these Galilean fishermen, they're going to come and try and steal the body and claim He rose. Give us some soldiers. And so this ironic line, Pilate agrees and says, "Go, make it the tomb as secure as you can." What an utterly impotent command. Go, make the tomb as secure as you can. Take these Roman legionnaires, have them stand guard and secure the tomb. The secular authority, the power of Rome couldn't seal that tomb. Today is no different. The secular media, a thousand Time magazine articles, skeptical scholar books year after year, they don't change the reality that Jesus has been raised. Pilate couldn't seal the tomb and no one today can reseal it. The unthinkable has happened. Death has been beaten back. As Aslan says, death itself has started working backwards.

21 · Oswald quotes the Jesus Storybook Bible's rendering of the angel at the tomb to emphasize the simplicity and power of the resurrection message: tombs are for dead people, and Jesus isn't dead anymore

Our citizenship now belongs to the kingdom of the beloved risen Son. I love how the angel puts it in the Jesus Storybook Bible. The women come, and you know, it's this Bible that paints the picture for kids, but it says things so poignantly. Kind of humbles us as we listen to it. The angel says, "What are you doing here? This is a tomb, and tombs are for dead people." That's so true. What are you doing here? This is a tomb. Tombs are for dead people. And the women couldn't speak. And the angel said, "Jesus isn't dead anymore." He's alive. Tombs are for dead people. Jesus is alive. Jesus is enthroned. Jesus is reigning. And the Father has made us citizens. He's delivered us and transferred us to that Kingdom.

22 · Oswald uses the historical example of the British Empire to illustrate the fleeting nature of earthly kingdoms

Great Britain used to brag the sun never set on their empire. They had colonies all over the globe, and so there was always a place in the world where the sun was shining on the Union Jack. The sun never sets on our empire. Except then the sun did set on their empire and it waned after World War II. That empire pales in comparison to Christ's Kingdom.

23 · Oswald cites John Flavel's quote to emphasize the incomparable glory of Christ's kingdom, which surpasses even the physical sun

I love how the Puritan John Flavel puts it. The whole world, the whole world, is not a theater large enough to display the glory of Christ upon it. The sun never sets on Jesus. We sang it this morning. The sun forbears to shine. Not because it's the kingdom of darkness. The sun forbears to shine because in Revelation we see there's no more sun in the new earth. You don't need a sun. You have the Sun. The risen Christ and His glory emanates from Him. The sun never sets on His empire because there is no sun, only the risen Christ. And He calls us to be His people, to be His citizens, to be co-heirs, to be brothers and sisters in this kingdom. And it's possible because he's redeemed us from our sins.

24 · Oswald transitions to the third and final point: redemption and forgiveness of sins

And it's possible because he's redeemed us from our sins. The final way Paul shows us in this passage that God is pushing back the domain of darkness, verses 13 and 14: He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption. The forgiveness of our sins.

25 · Oswald explains the rarity of Paul's use of 'forgiveness' and unpacks the theological mechanics of redemption: a price is paid (Christ's blood), and the slave is freed

You know that forgiveness actually isn't a common topic in Paul's letters? He doesn't talk about forgiveness as much as you'd expect. You do a search for the word forgiveness in the New Testament, it's all over the place. It's real. It's true. A real theological concept. But Paul doesn't talk about it all that much. So when he does talk about it, we should sit up and listen. There's a reason he's calling our attention to it. Ultimately, this is precisely how deliverance happens. Not because we get out of the south and get to the north, but because redemption has taken place. Redemption is this ancient word in the Roman world where someone pays the price for a slave. They pay the redemption price, they pay the price, and then the slave is redeemed. They're set free, they're given their liberty. They're purchased. Listen to what Ephesians 1:7 says: "In Him," in Christ, "we have redemption." How? What's the price? "Through His blood." "We have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace." Christ's blood. His broken body, His sacrificed life pays the full price. And while the cross is the price, the resurrection is the receipt that verifies that before the Father, the price is accepted. The price was sufficient.

26 · Oswald defines expiation: not just redemption (freedom from slavery) but forgiveness (the removal of the marks of slavery)

But listen, it's not just that we're purchased. Our redemption involves the good news that we're not just purchased and out of slavery, but our sins have been forgiven. It's not just that we're redeemed, but we have to walk around and we've got scars and a bloody back and we're tagged with brands. And so even though we've got a card that says, "I'm free," people look at us and say, "Ah, that was a slave at one point." No, that's what redemption means. Redemption and your sins have been forgiven. You've been liberated and your sins are forgiven. The things that marked you as a slave have been put away. That's what expiation means. It's part of the Jewish sacrificial system. You expiate their sins. You take the sacrificial goat, the scapegoat, and the priest would lay his hands on it and they would send the goat out of the camp. What's it doing? It's expiating the sins of the people. It's carrying them away. They're gone. You're redeemed. You've been forgiven.

27 · Oswald uses the Malaysian Airlines Flight 370 disappearance to illustrate the unfathomable depth and secrecy of the ocean

We've all seen it in the news recently, the Malaysian Airlines Flight 370. The Boeing 777 with 239 people on board vanished on March 8th. It was almost comical at first thinking, how on earth have they lost a plane? Like, is this an elaborate hoax that's supposed to remind us of the show Lost? A plane vanished? That doesn't seem possible. After weeks of speculation, they couldn't figure out how it had vanished. They couldn't figure out where it had gone. They finally narrowed it down and figured out, we think the wreckage is here in the South Indian Ocean, somewhere in this vicinity. I remember one expert on a news station trying to explain to people why it was so hard to find the wreckage. He said, you know the phrase trying to find a needle in a haystack? The issue with this disappeared plane is they don't even know at this point which haystack to look in yet. They can't even find the haystack to find the needle. The plane was just gone. Well, finally, recently, a few weeks ago, they heard a pinging on the last day of battery life in the black box. The black box is that little flight recorder, right, that records what happened to the plane. Now, they know everyone's dead. They're not going to find any survivors. But that black box can at least explain to them what happened on the plane. They're hoping they would find it, give some closure to the family members. On the very last day of the battery life of the black box, outside of the normal search area, this Chinese ship says it hears the pinging. It's on the right frequency. It's coming at the right intervals. Every 2 seconds, the ping comes up from the ocean floor. They found it and they're circling. They're finally going to find the black box, right? Wrong. They still haven't found it. It's so deep, they don't have subs that can carry humans that low without them being crushed and dying. So they've got special technological subs that go down there and are searching, and they've taken 7 trips down. With all the technology of multiple nations in the search party, even having narrowed it down to the haystack, they still can't find the needle. For all intents and purposes, there's no physical evidence that that plane is in the ocean. Why do we bring that up? The lesson is simple: the ocean keeps her secrets hidden, dark and deep, hidden so well that even modern man can't find them.

28 · Oswald expounds Micah 7:18-19, applying the Malaysian Airlines illustration to the prophet's imagery: God casts our sins into the depths of the sea where they cannot be found—no black box, no signal, no trace

Now consider the words of the prophet Micah: Micah 7:18, "Who is a God like You, pardoning iniquity and passing over transgression for the remnant of His inheritance?" Who is a God like You that passes over the sins of those You have qualified to inherit and transfer to the kingdom of Your Son? He, this God, does not retain His anger forever because He delights in steadfast love. Verse 19, He will again have compassion on us. He will tread our iniquities underfoot. He's going to grind them into dust so you can't see them. Here's the key passage. You, God, will cast our sins into the depths of the sea. He's going to cast them into the depths of the sea. And there will be no black box attached to them sending up a pinging with a signal where they're at. You got those images from CNN of just the vastness of the ocean and these planes flying hundreds of miles overhead and looking and can't see anything. Where has it gone? It's a plane and it's gone. Now you think of this imagery given to Micah and he doesn't have this notion of planes with this huge vantage point and multinational contingencies going out and submarines. No, the image God gives the prophet is that I cast your sins into the sea. And he thinks of the sea and he sees a little wooden dinghy floating on the sea, redeemed through his blood. Your sins are forgiven. They're gone. You're not free but still looking like a slave. You're walking in the kingdom as if you've never been anything but a citizen of that kingdom.

29 · Oswald declares the certainty of forgiveness: as surely as Christ was crucified, raised, and reigns, so surely are sins forgiven for those who repent

As surely as Christ was crucified, as surely as Christ was raised, As surely as He's now reigning and at the right hand of the Father, so surely has every sin been forgiven for those who've repented and turned to His Son. Cast them into the sea. He's wiped them from the ledger. Isaiah says, "He remembers them no more."

30 · Oswald issues the sermon's primary application: give joyful thanks to the Father

There's only one response to that kind of news. The way Paul calls us to act at the beginning of the passage. Verse 12: "Give joyful thanks to the Father." There's lots of application you can make some Sundays. And some Sundays it's just like, you know what you do? You go and you give joyful thanks in response to good news. You kneel before the Father and you thank Him. You raise your hands before the risen Christ and you cry out with joy because your heart has been changed. Because your eyes can see Him for His beauty. Give joyful thanks to the Father regarding the Son. Give thanks that death couldn't hold Him because of His inherent power over it. He said in John, "No one takes His life away, but He lays it down of His own accord." You give thanks to the Father because death death couldn't hold Him. He's innocent, so sin had no wages to hold Him in the grave. You give thanks to the Father that death couldn't hold Him because redemption has been finally accomplished. It's an accomplished fact in Colossians. You have been redeemed. Your sins have been forgiven. God's not waiting for a future point, kind of saying, well, I kind of got them tucked in my back pocket. If you slip up a couple times, I'm going to pull these back. No. Redeemed, forgiven. I've treaded them out. Isaiah says, I've cast them over my back. They've sunk to the bottom of the sea. We give thanks, joyful thanks, that death couldn't hold Him because the Father approved. And it was His good pleasure to exalt the Son to glory and to transfer all those who trusted in Him into that kingdom.

31 · Oswald reads Psalm 107:1-16 (with verse 9) as a doxological conclusion to the sermon, paralleling the psalm's narrative (darkness → deliverance → thanksgiving) with the sermon's argument

Listen to how Psalm 107 says it. Conclude with this. "Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for He is good! His steadfast love endures forever. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so!" Let those who are redeemed from trouble. Verse 10, he says, "We sat in darkness and in the shadow of death, prisoners in affliction and in irons." For we had rebelled against the words of God and spurned the counsel of the Most High. Then we cried to the Lord in our trouble, and he delivered us from our distress. He brought us out of darkness and the shadow of death and burst our bonds apart. Let us thank the Lord for his steadfast love for His wondrous works to the children of man. Verse 9, "For He satisfies the longing soul, and the hungry soul He fills with good things." Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for He gives us our inheritance. Redemption. Forgiveness. Union and fellowship with his son.

32 · Oswald signals the transition to closing prayer, inviting the congregation to a posture of worship and response

Would you bow your heads?