‘Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.’—Tit. ii. 14.

If we wish to understand the various passages in the word of God on the subject of redemption, we must never forget the two parts of which redemption consists, so often brought before you in these lectures—the satisfaction of the law by the payment of redemption price, and the actual deliverance of the ransomed people as the result of the finished atonement. It is of especial importance that we bear this well in mind in the study of those texts in which redemption is spoken of as being either now in progress or still in the future, for there is no possibility of any present or future atonement, that having been for ever completed on Calvary, and such passages can only refer to the work of deliverance which will not be complete till the glorious day of our Lord’s appearing. The atonement is complete, but the deliverance is in progress still, and those texts refer to it.

I believe that this remark is of great importance to the right understanding of this text. It occurs in the midst of one of the most practical chapters in the Bible. The words are addressed to the various different classes of society. Aged men are exhorted to be sober and sound in faith; aged women to be in behaviour as becometh godliness; young women to be sober and to love their husbands and their children; servants to be obedient, pleasant, not contradictory, and honest; and all of us to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts, and to live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world.

Now, according to the text, the great motive power to all this is the fact that our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ ‘gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people zealous of good works.’ Let us study then the redemption work, and the redemption power; and may God the Holy Ghost so bless it to our souls that we may be led in practical life to adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things!

I. The redemption work.

To redeem in these words clearly means to deliver, as the result of the finished atonement. The foundation of the deliverance is the fact that our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ gave Himself for us. The actual deliverance is described in the words, ‘that he might redeem us from all iniquity.’ A question has arisen as to the meaning of this expression. Does it mean that He might redeem us from the curse and judgment of all iniquity and so set us legally free, as when He said, ‘Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us?’ or does it mean that by the power of the Holy Ghost He might deliver us from the bondage of all iniquity, and so make us actually a holy people unto Himself? There is much to be said for both interpretations. ‘Iniquity’ may stand here for the curse, or guilt, of iniquity, as ‘sin’ stands for the guilt of sin in 1 Pet. ii. 24: ‘Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree.’ Or it may stand for sin itself, and its deadly power over the ruined soul. I am inclined on the whole to prefer this latter application, and to believe that the words describe the actual deliverance from the dominion of sin. The context clearly points in that direction, and so, as far as I can judge, do the words. The word here rendered iniquity strictly means ‘lawlessness.’ It is the same word as that in 1 John, iii. 4, where it is translated ‘transgression of the law,’ and appears generally to express the actual disobedience to the law, or will of God. If this be the case the idea evidently is that in our natural condition we are slaves and bondsmen to disobedience, or lawlessness. But that the great God and Saviour made an atonement for us in order that He might set us free from that dreadful yoke, and call us out to be a people set apart for His praise. This is in harmony with what we are taught in Rom. vi. 19, for there we are described as having in former times ‘yielded our members as servants to uncleanness and to iniquity’ (the same word), and as now being set free by the grace of God. But there can be no such freedom without redemption from the curse of sin. You remember that when a man had sold himself to be a slave, the only way in which he could obtain his liberty was by his kinsman legally redeeming him from his master. So it seems to be here. Christ our kinsman has paid the ransom in order that we, being redeemed, may be freemen unto God, and may now as freemen have the joy of serving Him.

But this is not all that is done for us, or nearly so, for the text does not merely refer to the bondage from which He died to deliver us, but leads us also to consider the new life to which He came to raise us. It takes the positive side as well as the negative. It looks forward as well as backward. It describes the new-master to whom being redeemed we belong, as well as the old master from whom by redemption we are delivered. Now you see this transfer very clearly in the text. The old master is lawlessness, the new master is Christ Himself. He came to redeem us from all iniquity, and ‘purify unto himself a peculiar people.’ ‘Peculiar’ does not mean odd, or eccentric; but special, and separated, as you may see by a comparison of Deut. vii. 6, and xiv. 2. In chap. vii. 6, we read, ‘The Lord thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself,’ and in chap. xiv. 2, ‘The Lord hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto himself.’ You see that these words respecting Israel of old exactly correspond to those here spoken of the redeemed Church, and they completely explain what is here meant by the word ‘peculiar.’ As Israel was a peculiar people, delivered from Egypt, and set apart unto God, so those who are in Christ Jesus are redeemed from the old bondage of their past lawlessness, and set apart as a special people unto Him who has redeemed them by His blood.

Observe then the three characteristics of this new service, the service of the redeemed.

(1.) It is the service of the Redeemer Himself. In redeeming us from iniquity He makes us His own, and sets us apart unto Himself. If redeemed we belong to the Redeemer. We love Him, we follow Him, we serve Him, we are His.

(2.) It is a pure service.

He does not merely separate, but purifies us unto Himself. He carries on such a sacred work in the soul, and effects such a marvellous change that the words of St. John are realised, ‘Every one that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure,’ and that we even know something of the blessing which He described in the words, ‘Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.’

(3.) It is a zealous and active service.

If we are thus redeemed we are not to sit still, and quietly rejoice in a holy abandonment of soul; but we are to be up and doing. There is a great work to be done for God, and who is to do it if they are idle whom the Lord has redeemed? We want no slothful, listless, inactive, self-indulgent believers. Our missions are crippled for the want of help; and our work at home sometimes seems paralyzed by the lukewarmness of professors. But those who are brought near to God, and purified as a peculiar people unto Himself, must be filled with zeal for His service; for the lukewarm professor is a scandal to the Church of God. The object of the Lord’s death was to call out a zealous people; and when there is no zeal, there is no effective result from the cross, for the purified people, redeemed by His grace, will, according to the text, be ‘zealous of good works.’

Now all this is a work at this present time in progress. It is not, like the atonement, complete, but is going on now. It is at this present time in progress in the Church. The people who form the purchased possession are being daily gathered in to God. He has not yet accomplished the number of His elect. The body of Christ is not yet perfected, and our earnest desire is that day by day, yes, this very day, immortal souls may be delivered from the power of darkness, and translated into the kingdom of His dear Son. So also is it progressive in the soul of each individual. We are not suddenly wafted into perfection, or made pure as Christ is pure. This chapter is a very clear proof of that, for while it speaks of the great purpose of the Lord’s death, viz., to redeem us from all iniquity it is full of exhortations to all classes amongst us against practical misconduct. It is perfectly clear, therefore, that the deliverance is not yet complete. There is temptation around and temptation within; sin in the world and sin in our own hearts; corruption in society and corruption in our own nature; so that even after we have actually experienced redeeming grace, we may say, as St. Paul did, ‘Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?’ (Rom. vii. 24.)

II. This leads to our second subject, the redemption power.

The redemption power is the Redeemer Himself, and so, as pointed out in a previous lecture, the Lord Jesus is called in Isaiah, lix. 20, ‘the Redeemer,’ and in the quotation of that passage Rom. xi. 26, ‘the Deliverer.’ And this applies whichever way you understand the words. If you apply them to the curse of sin it is He that delivers from that curse by the satisfaction of the law through His precious blood. He paid the ransom, and in the Father’s name He has set us free. Or, if you apply it to the bondage of lawlessness, it is equally He that delivers, for it is just as much His office to release from the dominion of sin by the power of the Holy Ghost as it was to remove the curse. In either sense the passage brings Him before us as a present living Deliverer, not merely one who has given Himself for us, but one who is now engaged in actually delivering us from all iniquity and purifying unto Himself a peculiar people. The first clause, ‘He gave himself for us,’ describes His work on the cross finished at once and for ever; the latter part, ‘That He might redeem us from all iniquity,’ His present work as a risen and living Saviour, continuously employed in delivering and purifying His Church. Whatever we may think of the clause, ‘that he might redeem us from all iniquity,’ this is clearly the meaning of the words that He might ‘purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.’ So that either way we are brought to the indisputable and most important lesson, that in our great struggle against sin, either without or within; either in the world or in our own hearts; and in our efforts to aim at the practical Christian life exhibited in this chapter, we may take the greatest possible encouragement from the fact that it is the present office of our living Lord to deliver and to purify. We may be profoundly conscious of the deep, inbred corruption of our own nature. We may know by bitter experience how often we have failed; we may be humbled to the dust at the thought of our shortcomings; we may be ready to say, as St. Paul did, ‘Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?’ but in the midst of it all we may look up in peaceful trust, and thank God for the delivering power that is in Christ Jesus, our risen and living Head. We may say as St. Paul did, ‘I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord.’

But there is one thing which we must be sure to remember. The purifying power depends entirely on the reconciling blood. According to this text, in order that He might redeem and purify, He first gave Himself for us; or, in other words, in order that He might deliver, He first made satisfaction for sin by bearing its burden Himself. We may, therefore, be perfectly sure of this, that we shall never know His power as a deliverer unless we first know the power of His atonement. Not one amongst us could ever have been delivered if the curse of God had not first been removed, and that curse of God could never have been removed except by the fact that the Son of God became a curse for us. Till that was done there was no hope of deliverance, and till that is applied or appropriated there is no hope of personal holiness. Before the special, or peculiar, people could be purified unto Himself, they must be set free from the curse, and redeemed through the power of His blood. Not one of that people has the curse of God still resting on his soul, for so long as the curse remains it is perfectly impossible that any one of us should be one of the people. While, therefore, you trust in a Saviour living to deliver, be sure you keep well in view that same Saviour having died to atone. His life will be nothing to you unless you first know His death. You will never experience the power of His work in you until you realise His most gracious work completed for you on the cross. That blotting out of sin through the precious blood of the Lamb must lie at the foundation of all true holiness. It is the rock on which we stand, and unless there be a sure standing ground there is not the slightest hope of progress. If, therefore, you wish to press onward, and earnestly desire to be heart and soul holy to the Lord, and I am sure I am speaking to many that do, be sure you keep close to the great old foundation truths. Trust your living Lord as your living Deliverer. Accept His promises of the Holy Spirit’s power in all their fulness and throw yourself on Him for their complete fulfilment; but while you do so remember that the one power which in the purpose of God could remove the curse was the atoning blood, and the one hope of your being partaker of the deliverance rests altogether on the one fact that the great God our Saviour in boundless mercy gave Himself for you.