THE CHASM BRIDGED


A. SIN IS THE BIBLICAL CHASM SEPARATING THE SINNER FROM GOD
  1. "Your iniquities have separated between you and your God": Isa. 59:2
  2. The Psalmist speaks of this separation as a breach, "Therefore he said that he would destroy them, had not Moses his chosen stood before him in the breach": Ps. 106:23
  3. Christ uses, in his parable, the word "gulf" to indicate the chasm between the sinner and God caused by sin: Luke 16:26
B. THE CHASM BRIDGED
  1. God, in love, found a way to bridge the chasm which had separated man from God:
    1. He sent His only Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to redeem man from his fallen condition - Rom. 8:1-3; John 3:16
    2. He made him sin, who knew no sin, that the sinner be placed into a new relationship with God - 2 Cor. 5:18-20
  2. Christ is the divine bridge between man and God:
    1. His name indicates what he does for the penitent sinner, "thou shalt call his name JESUS: for he shall save his people from their sins" - Matt. 1:21
    2. "Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved" - Acts 4:12
  3. This bridge was costly to Heaven:
    1. "ye are bought with a price" - 1 Cor. 6:20
    2. We are blood bought - Acts 20:28; 1 Pete. 1:18, 19; Rev. 5:9
    3. He, at whose command was the wealth of the universe, became so poor that he had not where to lay his own head - 2 Cor. 8:9; Phil. 2:6-11
    4. He was made a curse for us, that was the most painful price heaven paid - Gal. 3:13 Our finite minds are not capable to fathom the cost of bridging the great gulf between God and the sinner, but it was made just the same.
C. GOD'S BRIDGE ACROSS THE GULF OF SIN HAS BEEN IN OPERATION SINCE THE DAYS WHEN ADAM AND EVE WERE DRIVEN OUT OF THEIR PARADISE HOME
  1. The promise was given:
    1. "And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel" - Gen. 3:15; Job 9:17; Rom. 16:20
    2. This promise was repeated to Noah, to Abraham, and his posterity - Gen. 8:20-22; Gal. 3:18
    3. The promise includes all who come unto God by Jesus Christ our Lord - Acts 2:30; 13:23; Rom. 9:3-8
  2. The cost has been covered and the connections between heaven and earth have secured it that the Son of man is now our advocate in the presence of the Father:
  3. That is why our Lord assures us with these immortal words:
    1. "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me" - John 14:6
    2. "And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me" - John 12:32
  4. Many, many penitent sinners have crossed this bridge since it was built by God's mercy:
    1. The thief on the cross - Luke 23:42-44
    2. The keeper of the prison, who would have committed suicide, crossed that bridge by night - Acts 17:30-34
    3. Untold millions cross this bridge every year.
    4. How wonderful it is to know that the chasm that separated us from God and the kingdom of heaven is still intact; it still operates. Let us use it!


Design © John Bryant 2011