The Great Exchange

The Great Exchange

28 September, 2025

Thesis: God declares people righteous based on their faith in Jesus Christ, not on their actions.

Summary: The sermon discusses the biblical concept of righteousness by faith, beginning with Abraham's experience in Genesis 15:6, explaining that his belief, not works or rituals, led to his being counted as righteous, a pattern for all who believe in Christ. It argues that salvation is a gift received through faith, not merited by human effort, a truth underscored by the Protestant Reformation. The discourse then details God's covenant with Abram, highlighting God's self-identification as the covenant-keeping Lord and the significance of the ancient "cutting ceremony" involving animal sacrifices. Critically, God alone passes through the sacrificed animals, establishing an unconditional covenant that foreshadows Christ's ultimate sacrifice on Calvary, where He bore the penalty for humanity's sin and imputed His righteousness to believers. The sermon concludes by presenting repentance and belief in Christ as the means by which individuals receive this declared righteousness.

Sermon

why his faith was counted to him as righteousness. But notice, it was counted to him—not for his sake alone, but for ours as well. It will be counted to us who place our faith in him, the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead.

See, Genesis 15:6 isn't just history. It isn't just Abram's story—it's our story. Because the same God who declared Abram righteous by faith declares you and I righteous when we place our faith in Jesus who died and rose again.

John 8:56, Jesus said, "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day and was glad." In other words, Jesus is saying that Abraham looked forward in faith to the coming of the Messiah. He believed that God would keep his word and send a Savior who would make many righteous. So he looked forward to the coming of Christ. What do we do? We look back.

Abram looked forward to the future fulfillment of the promise. We look back at that promise fulfilled in Christ. And just as Abram believed, we believe in God, and we are counted righteous on the basis of Christ's merit.

Galatians 3:6, "Just as Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness, know then that those who are of faith are of the sons of Abraham."

Notice Abraham wasn't declared righteous when he was circumcised. Circumcision doesn't come until chapter 17. Abraham wasn't declared righteous because he kept the law. Moses wouldn't receive the law until hundreds of years after this.

Abraham is declared righteous because he simply believes God. And every single person who expresses faith in this God of Abraham and the Lord Jesus Christ is a child of Abraham. The family of God is not defined by bloodline or circumcision or works of the law or religious rituals or church attendance or church membership or good works. It is by faith alone and Christ alone.

James repeats it. James 2:23, "And the scripture is fulfilled." It says, "Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness," and he was called the friend of God.

What's the application for us? Just as Abraham heard the gospel preached to him, we have heard the gospel preached to us. Just as Abraham was declared righteous apart from works of the law—not by his earning, working, meriting, or deserving—we are declared righteous by faith alone. Just like Abraham, what do we do? We take God at His word. We believe He is who He says He is, that He is the Savior, and that He will do what He says He will do. He will forgive us of any and every sin, no matter how heinous the crime against Him. He will receive all who come to Him in faith.

Friends, let me tell you, there is no way you can merit salvation. There is no amount of reformation. There is no amount of cleaning yourself up. There is no amount of baptism or church attendance or keeping the law or giving to the poor that can make you right before a holy God.

Also, stopping certain sins—I'm going to stop drinking or cussing or watching pornography or having fits of rage. Great. That doesn't cancel past sins. You need faith in Christ. You need your sins washed away. And you need His righteousness imputed to you. None of us are perfect. Only Christ is. Therefore, we need a perfect righteousness that is not our own.

Friends, salvation is not a wage to be earned. It's not a reward for those good enough. Salvation is a gift to be received. That's the reason why the Bible tells us in Ephesians 2 that we are saved by grace through faith, not of works, least any man should boast. God's righteousness is not a reward to be earned. It's a gift to be received.

Now, perhaps you've heard of the Protestant Reformation. Maybe you've heard of John Calvin and Zwingli and Martin Luther. The Protestant Reformation arose precisely because the church had lost sight of this doctrine of sola fide, of justification by faith alone. The church had emphasized good works, selling of indulgences, and penance as conditions for salvation.

Well, a German monk and scholar by the name of Martin Luther started reading the Bible for himself. He particularly read the book of Romans, where he encountered Genesis 15:6. This revelation transformed his life forever. What does he do in 1517? He takes the 95 theses and nails them to the Wittenberg church door, challenging the church and beginning to preach that salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, according to the scriptures alone, for the glory of God alone.

That sparked a movement known as the Protestant Reformation, and praise God for these courageous men and women who led this Reformation. But friends, we too must defend the gospel because Satan always attacks the gospel. He always seeks to add legalism and works-based salvation and to muddy and distort the clear gospel truth.

Friends, just as we too in our own age must contend earnestly for the faith that's been delivered to us, because the gospel isn't just for lost people. The gospel is for saved people. See, we never leave the gospel. We simply grow deeper in the gospel. And friends, since the gospel is good news, good news is always worth repeating. Amen? So we need to repeat the gospel. Every day we need to preach the gospel to ourselves and preach the gospel to others.

My last point. Main division number three, God's ceremony. Before Abram. Now I want you to really listen closely to this. Verse seven. That God said to him, I am the Lord who brought you up out of Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land to inherit it. Abram asked, Lord God, how shall I know that I will inherit it?

Now after God has declared Abram righteous, he then reminds Abram who he is. I am the Lord. And Moses uses the covenant name of God. Notice it's LORD in all caps. That's YHWH, Jehovah. That's the covenant name of God. And then he asked, Lord, how am I going to know that I'm going to inherit this land like you've promised?

Well, God reminds him of who he is. How can I trust your promises? Abram, I'm Jehovah. I'm the covenant-keeping God. I'm the God who keeps my word. I'm the God who keeps the commandments of the world to God. Keeps my promises, friends. In your time of waiting, you need to remember exactly who God is. God has never failed you before, and He certainly won't fail you now. He is the covenant-keeping, promise-keeping God.

Secondly, He confirms His promise through a ceremony, and this ceremony involves the shedding of blood. Look at verses 9-11. This sounds very strange to our Western culture, but we're going to have to put our feet in Abram's sandals. And He said to him, Bring me a three-year-old heifer, a three-year-old female goat, a three-year-old ram, a turtle dove, and a young pigeon. All right, everybody got some of those hanging out in your backyard?

Then he brought all those to him and cut them in two down the middle and placed each piece opposite the other, but he did not cut the birds in two. And when the vultures came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away. God says, All right, you want me to prove to you that I'm going to keep my word? We're going to go through a ceremony, Abram.

Now, this sounds extremely strange to us, right? Get all these animals, cut them in two. What on earth does God want them to do? Well, this was typical in ancient cultures—cultures where the cutting of flesh was not just a legal act but a sacred ritual, a way to invoke divine witness. This wasn’t strange or weird back then. This is how they came to a binding agreement. It’s called a cutting ceremony. And what do we do when we make a pact with someone? We cut. We deal, right? We cut a deal. That’s where it comes from. At least I’m pretty sure. In those times, the act of dividing an animal was a solemn declaration: if one party broke the covenant, the same fate would befall them. It was a life-altering commitment, a pact sealed in blood and shadow. The gravity of it—how serious it was—must have been palpable to those who walked between the pieces, hand in hand, under the weight of divine judgment.

The ceremony involves cutting animals in two halves. Then they place the halves on opposite sides of each other, creating an aisle, as if this were the path. The two parties then make a covenant, walking between the pieces hand in hand, pledging their commitment. The act symbolizes that the same fate will befall either of these halves if they fail to keep their end of the covenant—serious business, isn't it? They are responsible for fulfilling their end of the covenant under penalty of death.

Importantly, this involves the shedding of blood, doesn't it? How does God confirm His covenant to us? All of this points to Christ, the true Lamb of God, who sheds His blood to take away our sins and establish an everlasting covenant. This is the covenant that Jesus made with us.

And notice Abram. He demonstrates his faithfulness and diligence. He won't let the buzzards or the carrion birds feast on these carcasses. He drives them away.

Verse 12 through 16. Now when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram. And behold, a terrifying and overwhelming darkness fell upon him. Let’s notice first the darkness. After Abram’s hours of shooing these buzzards away, he sits down, and as the dusk begins to settle, darkness overcomes him, overtaking him with a profound horror. The Hebrew word here carries layers of meaning—it signifies fear, but it also conveys the weight of a divine, awe-inspiring presence that strikes with both terror and reverence.

This darkness isn't simply the absence of light. It's symbolic of danger, of mystery, of judgment, of divine awe. So what does this darkness signify? The God of the universe is making a pact, a promise with Abram, and Abram is in the presence of the infinitely holy God. The darkness also foreshadows the reality of sin and judgment. Just like this covenant requires the shedding of blood, the darkness reminds us of the weight of our sin, of the penalty that must be paid. The promise of the covenant is rooted in God's justice. But within this darkness, the brightness of the promise of the covenant begins to shine.

Now this echoes the covenantal bloodshed of Abram's time, as Jesus' death on the cross directly corresponds to the shedding of blood required for the covenant. And from noon to three, darkness covered the entire land as Jesus himself bore the weight of the sin of his people. Just as the darkness over Abram foreshadowed the weight of this covenantal bloodshed, the darkness over the land at the cross symbolizes the judgment of God that fell upon Jesus, the sinless Son of God. Because on the cross, he bore the penalty we deserved. He stepped into the horror of God's judgment. He stepped into the blackness of man's sin. And he died in our place. Yet in this profound judgment, the promise of forgiveness and redemption is secured for us through his sacrifice.

Notice the pledge. Now, we see here in verse 13, God makes promises to Abram. Certainly, that your descendants will be strangers in a land not their own, serving them and being afflicted by them for four hundred years, and also the nation that oppresses them, I will judge. Afterward, they will come out with great possessions. Now, as for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace. You shall be buried at a good old age, but in the fourth generation they shall return here, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.

Now, remember, Abram is in a deep, dark slumber—like Adam in the garden. Centuries before him, Abram has been put under divine anesthesia. And it is while Abram sleeps that God makes the pledges of this covenant.

First, he says, Abram, your descendants are going to spend four hundred years in the land of slavery. That's fulfilled when they are four hundred and thirty years in the land of Egypt as slaves. But during this time, they're going to grow as a great multitude.

Secondly, God promises that he will bring them out with great power. He will judge Egypt, he will judge their false gods, he will receive glory for himself, and they will come out with great possessions. God parts the sea, they leave the land of Egypt, and they come out with great possessions.

Thirdly, God promises that Abram will die at a good old age. By the way, he lived to be a hundred and seventy-five years old. Notice God said, you're going to live not only a long life, but a good life, a good old age. Friends, the two are not the same. The only way that we can live a good life is to live a life well lived for the glory of God. The only way you can die well is if you live well for Christ. Because to live is Christ, and only then will dying be gain. So, if you live for the glory of God, you can not only start well, but you can finish well.

Fourth, God says, I'm giving these Amorites, that is the Canaanites. Sometimes the Canaanites were generalized collectively as the Amorites. He's given them opportunity to repent. Now, this explains and justifies, really, the later command to Joshua to conquer the land and to execute judgment on the Canaanites, the wicked inhabitants, for God's patience in granting them time to turn from their wickedness does not negate His justice, which demands that judgment be carried out on those who persist in their rebellion.

Now, people say, well, that's not fair. No, God gave them over four hundred years to repent and get right before he sent Israel back into the land he had already promised them, by the way. Israel served as God's weapon of justice in the hands of God.

So, be warned, God is merciful in longsuffering, but His patience is not infinite. There will come a time when God says, "Your sins have reached the limit." That's why today is the day of salvation and now is the acceptable time. If God is dealing with your heart, do not put off repenting. Do not put off getting saved. There is an end to His patience. His love is boundless and unending, but the limits of His patience are real, because remember, He is also a good, just, and holy God.

Now, notice the walk, and we're finishing up here. Verses 17 through 21. And it came to pass, when the sun went down and it was dark, that, behold, there appeared a smoking oven and a burning torch that passed between those pieces, that is, the animal pieces. And on that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying to your descendants, I have given this land from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates. And notice, the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Girgashites, and the Jebusites, and may we not forget, the Termites. In other words, all the land of the Canaanites, Abram, I'm giving to you and your descendants.

Now, pay very close attention, because this ties it all together. Finally, when it's completely night, Abram has been swallowed up in darkness, but suddenly there appears a burning torch, a smoking oven that pierces the darkness. And this burning torch moves through the aisle of the carcasses. What's happening? Consider this: every time God manifests His glory on the earth, it's always with fire and smoke. When God brings the law to Moses on Sinai, the mountain quakes, there's fire, there's smoke. When God leads the children of Israel through the wilderness, He does so as a pillar of fire. When God's glory fills Solomon's temple, consuming fire, smoke also. And when the prophets have visions of heaven around the throne, there's earthquake and thunder and lightning. So God is making the covenant. Verse 18 makes that very clear: the Lord alone makes the covenant with Abram.

Now, listen to this. It was customary in these ancient cutting ceremonies for both parties to walk down the aisle hand in hand. But here, it is God alone who walks. It is God alone who makes the pledges, who makes the promises, and it is God alone who walks the aisle. What does that mean? That makes this covenant, this Abrahamic covenant, unconditional and unilateral.

So what's going on here? By God Himself engaging in this specific covenant ceremony, God is saying that He is deathly serious about keeping the covenant. God alone makes the promises and submits Himself to the curse of those who would break the covenant. He alone treads the path between the animals, bearing the responsibility for ensuring every single promise is fulfilled. And He commits Himself to the curse because of our failure to live up to the obligations.

Now, what's Abram doing while all this is going on? He's sawing logs. He's asleep. He's not bartering. He's not earning. He's not working. He's not promising. He's asleep. This covenant depends on God and on God alone. This ceremony shows us that God is doing for Abram what Abram cannot do for himself. And God is pledging His own life to ensure that His word is kept, the covenant will be fulfilled, or God Himself will bear the consequences. What is God saying? Listen. God is saying, I will die in order to ensure that my promises come true.

Friend, that's exactly what God has done for us in Christ, isn't it? We were powerless to save ourselves. And then God sends His Son Jesus to do what we could not do for ourselves, to live the life that we should have lived but couldn't, and to die the death that we deserved to die, and then to rise again on the third day for our sins, for our justification.

Friends, the ceremony foreshadows the ultimate act of covenant faithfulness in Jesus Christ who bears the curse of those, all of us, who fall short of the glory of God. The day came, listen, when God in the person of Christ did walk the bloody path. Not between an aisle of bloody animal carcasses, but up the bloody hill of Calvary. And there He became a curse for us.

Friends, there He died in our place. And there He secures to us all the covenant benefits, justification, forgiveness, and eternal life. I want to end by saying this, the great exchange.

Remember our story from the beginning? The guilty criminal stands before the judge. He's condemned with no hope. But then in this act of unimaginable mercy, the attorney steps in and takes his place. The attorney bears the full penalty of this man's crime. But the judge is satisfied because justice has been served. The debt has been paid. And now the guilty man walks away out of the courtroom with no condemnation, no sentence left to serve.

But remember, it doesn't end there. The judge adopts the man, not merely forgiving him but transforming him entirely. The judge lays down the gavel and declares, "You are innocent. You are righteous." These are not interchangeable terms. Forgiveness removes the stain of sin, like a judge wiping away the criminal's record, but justification is the judge's radical act of declaring the criminal not just pardoned, but legally righteous—his name inscribed in the ledger of the righteous. Praise God for forgiveness, which lifts the burden of guilt and shame. Praise God for justification, which grants the imputed righteousness of Christ, as if the criminal had lived the attorney's life of perfect obedience. This is the heart of the gospel: not merely mercy, but a divine exchange where the attorney's life becomes the criminal's, and the criminal's sin becomes the attorney's to bear. Let the weight of that truth settle in your soul—eternal death is the wages of sin, but eternal life is the gift of grace through faith in Jesus, who alone makes us both forgiven and righteous.

From that moment on, the judge treats this man as if he lived the attorney's life because the attorney was treated as if he lived the criminal's life. Friends, that's exactly what Jesus has done for us. We, like the guilty criminal, have broken God's holy law and fallen short of His glory. The Bible says, "The soul who sins shall die," and the wages of sin is death—the penalty for sinning against an infinitely holy God is eternal death, eternal damnation in hell. But through faith in Jesus Christ, we are not judged based on our own actions, but on His perfect righteousness imputed to us. Jesus took our place, bearing our punishment, so that we might be declared righteous by God—not because of what we do, but because of what He has done for us.

And by the way, John 3.18 says, if you are not in Christ, you are condemned already because you do not believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. You are walking around with a death sentence on your head. And you are but one breath from an eternity in hell. So, please, please, please hear this this morning. You're not just here in church playing around. This is serious. You are one breath away from hell if you don't know Christ. For the love of God, please understand that.

Please understand that Jesus took your place. He lived the life that you should have lived. You didn't keep your end of the bargain. You deserve death, but He died for you. Please understand that He can give His righteousness to you, and He can forgive you. That you can be adopted by the judge. That you can have a place at the family table. You can be given an eternal inheritance in Christ. Because He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us so that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.

On the cross, the great exchange took place. He bore in His body all of our sins, and in exchange for our transgressions, He imputes to us His perfect righteousness, giving it to all who will believe. We, like Abram, believe. What does Abram do? He wakes from his sleep and simply believes, and God declares, "Alright, you're righteous."

Friends, what do you need to do this morning? Repent of your sins and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ in God's righteousness. The righteousness of His Son will be given to you. And friends, if you are in Christ, God doesn't look at you and remember your old sins and who you used to be and what you used to do. He looks at you and says, perfect, righteous, accepted, loved, justified. So rest in His declaration over you, being righteous, not in your performance.

Jesus, our advocate, our lawyer, who speaks in our defense, satisfied divine justice. He took our place. He died so that we might live. He was condemned so that we might be set free. He was pronounced guilty so that we could be pronounced justified. At Calvary, God treated Christ as if He had lived. He lived our life so that now He can treat us as if we lived His.

So in conclusion, as they give us a psalm of invitation, believer, rest in the fact that you are fully loved, completely forgiven, and declared righteous in Jesus Christ. Friends, you are justified not because of who you are, but because of who He is. Friends, you are justified and made right with the Holy God, not for anything that you could ever do, but because of what Jesus has already done for you.

The lost person, you stand before the judge of all the universe with all of your sins before Him and you will stand condemned. Will you allow this attorney to step in and take your place? Will you receive what He has done for you by faith? Say, yes, I believe it. I believe you are who you say you are. I receive His righteousness. I receive His forgiveness. I receive His justification by faith. Like Abram, believe in Jesus and be counted righteous. This altar is open.