‘But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.’—1 Cor. i. 30.

It is one of the happy characteristics of the present day that persons are much more occupied than they used to be with the subject of emotional religion. The religion of feeling is much more studied than it was forty or fifty years ago. Modern books and modern addresses abound in the records of what is termed ‘Experience.’ To a certain extent this is well; for we all require real, deep, heart-religion, and it would indeed be a shocking thing that we should know the truth of God, and still be strangers to the love of Christ. Love, joy, and peace, are the first fruits of the Spirit, and therefore if God the Holy Ghost dwells in our hearts it seems clear that we must love Him, that we must rejoice in Him, and that we must be at peace resting in His grace. But, just in proportion as we set a high value on the religion of the heart, must we see the importance of a solid foundation of divine truth on which all true heart-religion must ever rest. We cannot build a house on the surface of a river. If we attempt to do so we shall very soon find ourselves at the bottom. So feelings are very apt to fail us just when we want them, if they are not the result of a fixed and solid acquaintance with the truth of God. If they do not spring from established principles they will rise and fall even with the digestion or the weather. It is, therefore, most important that in these happy days of Christian emotion we should have a good foundation of Christian truth, and should be well established in those great foundation facts on which, when all feelings fail us, our souls may rest, and be at peace.

It is well, therefore, that our attention should be directed to the great foundation subject of Redemption. It is one on which everything else hangs, for if we do not understand redemption, we cannot possibly know the value of the Redeemer; and if we do not know the Redeemer, where will our feelings be when the time of pressure comes, and they are all pressed out of us by trial?

There are three questions to be considered carefully at the outset of our study. What is meant by Redemption? How far is our redemption complete? And what is our present position? May God the Holy Ghost both direct and bless the words which shall be spoken!

I. What is meant by redemption?

On this subject I cannot help thinking that there is sometimes a good deal of confusion. People speak of it as if it were the same as ransom, propitiation, or atonement, whereas there is surely a great distinction between them. There cannot be a doubt that the two are very closely connected: but redemption in Scripture means much more than atonement, and always, or at all events generally, includes the idea of deliverance, or recovery. The word itself means to purchase back or to recover by purchase; which clearly implies both the payment of the price and the recovery of the purchased possession. If a man were a prisoner in a foreign land, and a ransom were demanded for his release, there would be two distinct acts necessary to his restoration; first the ransom must be paid, and next the dungeon must be thrown open, and the captive brought out as a freeman to his home. Now the first of these acts, viz., the payment of the ransom, represents atonement, the ransom price for the satisfaction of the law; but redemption includes the actual deliverance as well. It is the payment of the ransom, and also the actual liberation of the captive. When the four living ones, and twenty-four elders said (Rev. v. 9), ‘Thou hast redeemed us to God by thy blood,’ they did not mean merely that He had shed His blood for them in atonement, but that He had actually gathered them out as a ransomed people, and brought them from their former captivity to their present joy; for they said, ‘Thou hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation; and hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth.’ Thus in the Old Testament the idea of deliverance is far more prominent than that of atonement. When it was written the doctrine of atonement was not fully revealed, but was wrapped in types and prophecies. But God’s power in delivering was full in view, and it became the prominent object in the thoughts of the writers. Let us turn to a few passages in illustration. In Exod. vi. 6, we find God saying, ‘I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will rid you out of their bondage, and I will redeem you with a stretched-out arm, and with great judgments.’ In Deut. vii. 8, Moses said, ‘The Lord brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen, from the hand of Pharaoh, king of Egypt.’ In Jer. xv. 21, when predicting the future restoration of Israel, the Lord says by the prophet, ‘I will deliver them out of the hand of the wicked, and redeem them out of the hand of the terrible.’ In all these passages it is perfectly clear that ‘to redeem’ means ‘to deliver;’ and that when God said, ‘I will redeem them,’ He meant that He would set them free. And this is very clearly illustrated by the remarkable prophecy of Isa. lix. 20, when compared with the quotation of it, Rom. xi. 26. In the prophecy our Blessed Lord and Saviour is called ‘the Redeemer,’ but in the apostolic quotation ‘the Deliverer.’ The Redeemer is the Deliverer, for ‘He gave Himself for our sins that He might deliver us from this present evil world.’

In the New Testament, however, there is a difference. When that was written the ransom price had been paid, for the Lord Jesus Christ had died; so that in it the atonement by the Son of God becomes more prominent than the deliverance. The blood of the Lamb is continually connected with redemption there, as for example in such a passage as Titus, ii. 14, ‘Who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works;’ and in the words just quoted from Rev. v. 9, ‘Thou hast redeemed us to God by thy blood.’

But both Old and New agree in teaching that redemption is deliverance, or recovery, through a ransom or atonement. In both ‘to redeem’ combines the exercise of power with the satisfaction of every lawful claim. It consists of two parts, atonement and deliverance. Atonement, therefore, is a part of redemption, but not the whole. It is the first great act on which the subsequent deliverance depends, but it is not the deliverance. Through atonement the satisfaction is made for sin, and by virtue of that satisfaction we are set free; and that deliverance through atonement is the redemption of the Gospel.

II. We may proceed, then, to our second question. How far is our redemption complete? And the answer to that question is, that of the two parts the one is complete, but not the other.

The ransom, or atonement, is complete, and there is no possibility of adding anything to that, as in the words of our Communion Service ‘who made there (by His one oblation of Himself once offered) a full, perfect and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world,’ or, as in the words of Scripture, ‘By one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified.’ That is done for ever and ever. All the masses of the Church of Rome, and all that men call sacrificial offering, can add nothing to it. All that they can do is to throw a shade over its glory. Two hundred million pounds were paid by conquered France as her ransom, and of what use would it now be if any patriotic Frenchman should endeavour to add to the security of his country by paying an additional five shillings to the Prussians? So when the precious life of the Son of God has been laid down as our ransom, and when God’s covenant has been completely fulfilled, shall we now go and add to it—a mass?

But the deliverance is not finished, and therefore in the sense of deliverance the redemption is not yet complete. The atonement was perfected on the cross, but the deliverance will not be perfected till the Advent. Thus there are many passages in which it is spoken of as still future. In St. Luke, xxi. 28, our Lord said, ‘When these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.’ In Rom. viii. 23, those who have the first-fruits of the Spirit are described as waiting for ‘the redemption of the body,’ or, in other words, for the final deliverance of the body itself at the resurrection, i.e., for the gift promised through the prophet Hosea, ‘I will redeem them from death.’ So in the Epistle to the Ephesians the saints are said both to have redemption, and to be looking for it. In chap. i. 7, they are described as having it. ‘In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his grace,’ and in chap. iv. 30, as waiting for it, ‘Ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.’ The reason is that the atoning blood on which forgiveness rests has been long since shed, and the atonement perfected. He ‘has redeemed us from the curse of the law being made a curse for us.’ But the final deliverance will not be complete till His return, when all God’s elect from all ages and all countries shall be all gathered together in one, without a sorrow, and without a fear, without death, without sin, without even a temptation to mar their joy; one vast company ransomed by one atoning sacrifice saved by one perfect Saviour, inheritors of one glorious kingdom, and bound together in one heavenly fellowship in a blessed eternity of never-ending joy.

III. What, then, is our present position? of course I mean the position of those that are really in Christ Jesus? I think this may be very well illustrated by the words of Moses, Exod. xv. 13: ‘Thou in thy mercy hast led forth thy people whom thou hast redeemed.’ Those people had been set free from Egypt, and therefore were said to be redeemed. They were already free, but they were not yet in Canaan, or nearly so. They had not yet reached ‘his holy habitation.’ But meanwhile they were in His hand, and they might be perfectly sure that He would guide them every inch of their way.

Now that appears to be exactly our position. If we be in Christ Jesus we are already free. Our ransom has been paid, our atonement completed, and we are free. We are free from both the imputation and dominion of sin. From the imputation, because the curse is gone; and from the dominion, for we are not under the law but under grace. This part of redemption is not a future thing which we should be always seeking, and never finding; always praying for, and never enjoying; always aiming at, but never reaching. It is the present, blessed, sacred gift of every one of you that is in Christ Jesus. You are not like Israel in bondage in Egypt, nor even like Israel shut in by the rocks at Pi-hahiroth; but you are like Israel on the eastern bank of the Red Sea, with Pharaoh and his host sunk beneath the flood. The language of Scripture twice repeated is, ‘In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins.’ (Eph. i. 7; Col. i. 14.) Accept it then, and live in the joy of your new position. Rejoice in the freedom and give thanks for it. Let the past bondage be forgotten in the joy of the liberty wherewith Christ has made you free; and go forward with a thankful heart to please Him who has thus graciously broken your chain.

(2.) But remember that you are not yet completely delivered. Moses was so sure that the people would be brought to the holy habitation that he praised God for it as if it was already theirs, though they had many a long mile to traverse, and many a hard battle to fight, before they reached it. So you may be perfectly sure of it, for you are ‘sealed unto the day of redemption,’ and no one can break the seal. That day of redemption is perfectly sure to come, and you cannot be disappointed. But meanwhile you have a journey, and a fight. To say nothing of all that is around you, there are two things that you still carry within, viz. death and sin. There is death, yes! that very death that was overcome when the Lord Jesus rose from the dead, still working secretly within you; and, if the day of redemption does not come first, perfectly certain to bring you to the grave. And there is sin, the deadly sin of your fallen nature, not yet removed, but ready to poison the very fountains of your soul. If you think you have done with either death or sin, you will be sorely disappointed before you have travelled far. Your final redemption is not yet completed. You are free from the curse, free from the condemnation, free from the slavery, but you have not yet reached home. You must not, therefore, lay aside your armour, nor must you be disheartened even if you meet with that which makes you groan, for we read in Rom. viii. 23, ‘Even we ourselves,’ which have the first-fruits of the Spirit, ‘groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.’

(3.) But our delightful assurance is that all the while we are safe in our Redeemer’s hand. He has delivered; He will deliver; and He is delivering. Or, if we take the word ‘redeem’ in its full sense, He has redeemed; He will redeem; and He is now redeeming. He has set us free by His finished atonement. He will set us free by His resurrection power; and He is now setting us free by the mighty indwelling of God the Holy Ghost. See, then, the unspeakable blessedness of such a text as that in Jerem. L. 34: ‘Their Redeemer is strong; the Lord of Hosts is his name: he shall thoroughly plead their cause.’ He is our Redeemer, for He has redeemed us by His blood: He is a strong Redeemer, for He is the Lord of Hosts: He is a gracious Redeemer, for He pleads for His people; and putting all together, He is a perfectly sure Redeemer, so we will trust Him never to leave us for a moment, till He give to every one of us a triumphant victory, and present us sinless and deathless before His glorious throne, saved by His grace, redeemed by His blood.