Sovereign Grace Church

not by works of righteousness which we have done…

(TITUS 3:5)

It is the believer’s blessedness that each glorious Person in the Godhead has a glorious hand in His salvation. God the Father saved, chose, sanctified, or set him apart, in Christ, before the world was; God the Son took humanity into union to his personal Godhead, and thus became incarnate, lived a holy life, suffered, bled, died a solemn death, rose again from the dead, ascended upon high, having led captivity captive, and is now exalted at the right hand of the Father, ever living to make intercession for him. Thus Christ has meritoriously saved the elect by his life, obedience, death, resurrection, exaltation, and intercession. As it is written: “He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect?” God? No. “It is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth?” Christ? No. “It is Christ that died; yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us” (ROMANS 8:32-34). Thus the blessed Redeemer “was delivered for our offences and raised again for our justification” (ROMANS 4:25) and, bless his precious name, he has been the destruction of death, hell, and sin. The gloriously-blessed God-man Mediator “gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works” (TITUS 2:14). So that, before the world was, the church was saved purposedly by God the Father; in time, meritoriously by the God-man Mediator, who now lives above to make intercession for them; and, in the day of God’s power, they are saved manifestively and vitally, by the “washing of regeneration, and the renewing of the Holy Ghost.”

Now, not a particle of this is either for, or according to, our works; for it is “not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us” (TITUS 3:5) or, as our text has it, “Who hath saved us, and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works” (2 TIMOTHY 1:9).

What an indescribable mercy it is, that salvation is of the Lord; yea, that God himself, as the God of Zion, is our salvation. Blessed, triumphant faith, under the sweet power and unction of God the Holy Ghost, can, at times, sweetly sing, “Behold, God is my salvation! I will trust and not be afraid; for the Lord Jehovah is my strength and my song; he also is become my salvation” (ISAIAH 12:2). This salvation contains a complete deliverance from every foe and soul-damning danger, and it is a complete salvation to every real good. We have all spiritual blessings in Christ, all bliss and blessedness secured in him; for it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell. He is full of grace and truth; and of his fulness we receive, and grace for grace. All things are the real believer’s; for he is Christ’s, and Christ is God’s; and, as I said before, this glorious salvation is all of grace, not of works, lest any man should boast