back to index2017-06-25 Marks of Genuine Saving Faith Part 2
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Let's pray first before we get into the message. 00:00:09.480 |
Heavenly Father, we want to thank you so much for your continued grace, and we do want to 00:00:13.520 |
pray for the mission team from BMC and for Jason and for Andrew, who are going to be 00:00:22.640 |
We pray, Father God, as He has requested, that the camp would go smoothly, that there 00:00:28.040 |
would be no opportunity for Satan to divide them, a greater heart, Lord God, for the lost, 00:00:34.160 |
and specifically, Lord, for Jason, that he may be able to meet someone who is hungry, 00:00:39.080 |
Lord, to learn, to grow, that he may be able to follow up on even after he comes back. 00:00:44.280 |
I pray for each of the team members, for the leaders, Lord God, who are leading this team, 00:00:49.120 |
that you would watch over them, and that, again, it would be truly a time to bear fruit, 00:00:54.920 |
Father God, and that their fruit would encourage us, Lord, when they come back as well. 00:01:00.320 |
We pray this morning as we search your word, help us to understand, Lord, your heart for 00:01:05.540 |
Help us not to simply study, Lord, the meaning of it, but your very heart and thought, Lord, 00:01:10.680 |
that it would convict our thoughts and our heart, Lord God. 00:01:14.360 |
So we entrust this time to you in Jesus' name we pray. 00:01:18.440 |
All right, let me start off this morning by asking you a simple question. 00:01:24.440 |
In the last week, is there something that you've been looking forward to? 00:01:30.680 |
Maybe it could be coming down next year, maybe you have a child coming, or maybe you have 00:01:35.960 |
a vacation coming, and maybe in a few weeks or months, or maybe you apply for a job and 00:01:41.920 |
you're waiting for a reply, and whatever it may be, what is it that you've been longing 00:01:53.900 |
Maybe there isn't anything specific going on in your life, but there's something that 00:01:58.200 |
we're looking forward to, whatever that may be. 00:02:02.160 |
And a lot of these things are not wrong, that's just human nature. 00:02:05.640 |
If something exciting is happening or something is changing, it's something that we end up 00:02:11.120 |
But along with that question, when was the last time that you really thought that you 00:02:20.200 |
When was the last time you were really longing and anticipating for Christ coming? 00:02:28.400 |
Now these short-term goals that we have, or short-term things that we're looking for, 00:02:36.200 |
If there's change coming or something that we're desiring, a better position and job, 00:02:40.720 |
or maybe a vacation you're going to take, there's nothing sinful about that. 00:02:43.860 |
But these are all short-sighted things, only short-term goals. 00:02:47.640 |
When was the last time you really longed for and looked for a deeper fellowship with Christ, 00:02:53.320 |
and which caused you to long for the coming of Christ? 00:02:58.000 |
The reason why this question is so important, if you can't remember the last time that there 00:03:02.880 |
was a stirring and longing, not just a simple passing thought, "I should be this way, I 00:03:07.680 |
should be that way," but a stirring in your heart that is so deep, and it caused you to 00:03:15.240 |
long for, maybe even look up into heaven and think, "When is he going to come?" 00:03:23.320 |
That question is so vital that we don't just dismiss that, that we don't just file that 00:03:30.520 |
Because scripture says in 1 John 2 and 3, "Beloved, we are God's children now, and what 00:03:36.640 |
we will be has not yet appeared, but we know that when he appears, we shall be like him 00:03:44.060 |
And everyone who does hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure." 00:03:51.700 |
Our sanctification is directly linked to this longing for Christ. 00:03:59.000 |
It is this longing for his second coming, his longing to connect with Christ, is what 00:04:07.640 |
If there isn't this longing in your heart, you can put in the time to pray, but it's 00:04:17.320 |
We're always looking to just kind of do what's needed to do. 00:04:20.920 |
Ultimately, our sanctification, our desire for holiness is directly linked to this hunger 00:04:28.280 |
So if you can't remember the last time you had this longing and hungering, not just a 00:04:33.680 |
passing thought of duty, like, "I should do this," but this longing for his second coming, 00:04:40.120 |
that may be a revelation that you've been disconnected with Christ. 00:04:47.960 |
You may have had some fellowship, but it may be a sign that you've been disconnected, that 00:04:53.840 |
you haven't been growing, that you haven't been maturing. 00:04:57.700 |
Sanctification hasn't been happening in your life because he says, "He who longs for these 00:05:04.600 |
It is our longing for him, longing for who he is that causes us to be holy and to pray. 00:05:11.240 |
Now, why is this pertinent to the passage that we're looking at this morning? 00:05:16.440 |
Paul has been explaining in the context genuine salvation because the Jews were so focused 00:05:24.920 |
on the external things that they were doing and they were coming before God and said, 00:05:36.160 |
Remember what Jesus says to the Samaritan woman, that he doesn't care if you're worshiping 00:05:43.000 |
He's looking for true worshipers who will worship him in spirit and in truth, real worship, 00:05:50.320 |
not just people who are checking off the box and say, "Well, I'm being discipled because 00:05:57.600 |
Is there this longing and hungering for God that's causing you to study the Bible? 00:06:03.880 |
Or are you studying the Bible because that's what you're supposed to do? 00:06:08.300 |
Is there a longing and hungering for God that's causing you to want to pray and seek God? 00:06:14.280 |
Or is it just another check off box that you need to do because that's what a good Christian 00:06:20.120 |
Paul has said, he says, "Moses writes," in verse 5, chapter 10, verse 5, "Moses writes 00:06:26.680 |
about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandment 00:06:32.920 |
In other words, if you are going to base your righteousness upon what you do, you need to 00:06:38.720 |
He says in the next passage, "Who's going to say? 00:06:41.320 |
Who's going to go up to heaven and bring him down? 00:06:43.320 |
Who's going to descend and bring him back up?" 00:06:48.720 |
Even by faith, if we were to be saved in any other way, he said, "You need to be absolutely 00:06:56.520 |
You would have to go up to heaven and bring him down. 00:06:58.360 |
You'd have to descend into the abyss and bring him up." 00:07:03.840 |
So the beginning of our salvation is recognition that we cannot. 00:07:11.040 |
This morning, we're going to go into the second part of what I started last week. 00:07:14.600 |
And then I'm going to just give you, again, three-point outline of this morning's sermon 00:07:23.640 |
Saving faith requires confession of lordship of Christ. 00:07:27.220 |
We kind of started on that last week and I didn't get to finish that, so I'll finish 00:07:31.680 |
Saving faith requires confession of lordship of Christ. 00:07:34.800 |
Second point, saving faith requires belief in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. 00:07:40.840 |
B, saving faith requires inner transformation that leads to outer confession. 00:07:46.920 |
Saving faith requires inner transformation that leads to outer confession. 00:07:50.640 |
Thirdly, saving faith requires belief in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. 00:07:57.040 |
Last week, we talked about how it says, "He who confesses that Jesus Christ is Lord, believes 00:08:04.440 |
in his heart that he was raised from the dead, he shall be saved." 00:08:07.560 |
And we talked about last week about how in the oral tradition that what they said and 00:08:13.200 |
what they confessed was equivalent to today of maybe signing a contract or even a marriage 00:08:21.280 |
So oftentimes, people took that oral, this confession as kind of like public baptism. 00:08:28.760 |
Where somebody stood and publicly professed their loyalty to Christ was no different than 00:08:35.120 |
today if they were to come into a marriage contract and filed it into the court of law, 00:08:43.000 |
So confession wasn't simply words being spoken. 00:08:46.360 |
It was a public declaration of radical change that took place. 00:08:57.080 |
This confession was to confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. 00:09:06.800 |
Now again, you and I live in a culture where we call him Lord without really giving much 00:09:14.480 |
We sing songs about how he is Lord, we establish you and we worship you, we say all of these 00:09:19.400 |
things, we confess all of these things without really giving it serious thought. 00:09:25.960 |
Are the things that I am saying, do I really believe this? 00:09:29.840 |
Am I studying the word of God and listening and reading these things, do I really confess 00:09:37.720 |
And you know, the sad thing is when we live in our Christian bubble and we're not being 00:09:41.960 |
challenged, we never really have to even think about it. 00:09:47.160 |
You know, that's why it's very uncomfortable. 00:09:48.960 |
If you're, you know, while you're in college, you're surrounded by other Christians and 00:09:53.120 |
we're all we're doing is affirming each other's faith. 00:09:55.320 |
It's like, yes, you know, don't worry about it. 00:10:00.200 |
And we have these cliche things that we say to each other and all of a sudden we graduate 00:10:04.120 |
and we go to our workplace and somebody asks, you believe that? 00:10:12.080 |
You mean Jesus Christ is the only way that you really believe that he died and was resurrected? 00:10:17.400 |
And then once we get challenged, we feel uncomfortable because we never really had to answer these 00:10:24.500 |
And so our knee jerk reaction is, oh, those people are, you know, they're not, they're 00:10:29.680 |
So we end up kind of staying away from those people who make us uncomfortable. 00:10:34.040 |
But if we're regularly engaged with non-Christians, these are things that they will constantly 00:10:43.360 |
But as long as we're in our Christian bubble with Christian friends and Christian family, 00:10:47.440 |
Christian church, you don't really need to answer this question because there's a constant 00:10:59.760 |
I didn't, it is absolutely crucial we're able to answer this question with an amen, not 00:11:04.840 |
just I think so, because our whole salvation hinges upon the genuineness of our faith. 00:11:13.840 |
Our whole hope in Christ hinges upon how genuine this faith is. 00:11:19.460 |
So if we just assume faith and we're constantly encouraged not to think any deeper than, of 00:11:25.460 |
course you do, then what if we never really asked the question and we die and then standing 00:11:32.840 |
before God, we realize that this confession wasn't real. 00:11:39.500 |
And that's why it says, "He who confesses with his mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord." 00:11:45.420 |
We talked about that and again, I didn't get to finish it last week, but you know, in the 00:11:49.940 |
scripture, the very definition, the very definition of sin is to not to have Christ as Lord. 00:12:00.900 |
There's a lot of different words that have been translated. 00:12:03.100 |
There's transgression, disobedience, there's error, blemish, lawlessness, but the most 00:12:08.180 |
common word that is translated in the English Bible where we see the word sin is hamartion. 00:12:15.660 |
And the word hamartion simply means to miss the mark. 00:12:19.020 |
Now that doesn't sound too serious in comparison to transgression or disobedience or wickedness 00:12:27.340 |
That sounds more like a sin that deserves punishment, but to miss the mark, it almost 00:12:34.060 |
kind of sounded like you shot for an A and you got a B. You missed the mark. 00:12:39.420 |
That you wanted to do something and you just kind of didn't make it or you shot an arrow 00:12:44.100 |
and you didn't hit the center, you kind of hit the side, you missed the mark. 00:12:48.980 |
So on the surface, it seems like hamartion, the word sin, doesn't seem deserving of this 00:12:58.700 |
And we talked about that last week, how that word perfectly describes how the reign of 00:13:07.820 |
All they did was eat fruit that was forbidden from God. 00:13:12.220 |
God said, "Do not eat of this fruit or you shall surely die." 00:13:14.780 |
What was so wrong about eating this fruit that sin would penetrate into mankind and 00:13:27.420 |
They were rebelling against the Lordship of Christ. 00:13:31.660 |
They decided that they're going to determine what is good, that they're going to determine 00:13:38.060 |
So in the very essence of the word hamartion, there is this idea of self-governing. 00:13:47.800 |
So this word hamartion isn't simply that you shot for an A and you got a B. The word hamartion 00:13:52.700 |
basically means I'm going to make my own target. 00:13:56.140 |
I'm going to determine what is right and what is wrong. 00:13:59.500 |
I'm going to determine what I'm going to do with my life. 00:14:03.820 |
So the essence of human rebellion is to reject God's Lordship and to put me in that place. 00:14:14.300 |
That means you can be the most moral person in this room and not be saved if you miss 00:14:24.800 |
That means you can be the best father and mother that you can possibly be and still 00:14:35.960 |
You can have the most integrity in your work and people may say, "Wow, that person is really 00:14:47.940 |
And you can have all of that and still miss the mark. 00:14:52.580 |
And we determine for ourselves what is right and what is wrong, what I pursue, what I'm 00:14:58.700 |
And that's why Jesus says, "He who finds his life shall lose it." 00:15:03.680 |
In the context of finding life, a lot of times you're not trying to be a murderer or a cheater. 00:15:12.020 |
You're trying to take care of your family, pay the bills. 00:15:15.260 |
In and of itself, it doesn't seem like rebellion. 00:15:19.480 |
In and of itself, it seems like that's what every good person should do. 00:15:26.000 |
All the good that you've been pursuing, you've been trying so hard to take care of your family, 00:15:29.880 |
you've been trying so hard to be a good Jew and to be faithful, serve the temple, even 00:15:34.400 |
giving to the poor, and yet they completely miss the mark. 00:15:41.480 |
He says, "That's why he says, 'He who confesses that Jesus Christ is Lord.'" 00:15:46.240 |
See, in Revelation 7, 15-17, whenever we think of lordship, we automatically think of somebody 00:15:58.280 |
Those of you, obviously, all of you guys, most of you guys are not teenagers anymore, 00:16:01.940 |
but some of you guys don't remember, it wasn't too far ago, that long ago, that you remember 00:16:07.900 |
what it was like to have your parents tell you what to do. 00:16:12.800 |
And now you're a college student or beyond college student or married and have kids, 00:16:19.320 |
I make my own money, I do my own thing, so I don't have anybody governing me. 00:16:24.020 |
So the idea of lordship, it kind of feels like it's taken us back to when we were young 00:16:29.400 |
and having our parents telling us what to do, when to go to sleep, when to come home. 00:16:33.480 |
I don't need a curfew, I don't need somebody breathing down my neck telling me if I've 00:16:39.080 |
So when we think about lordship, a lot of people have this knee-jerk reaction, it's 00:16:45.320 |
I have to, he's going to tell me what to do." 00:16:48.040 |
And so we wrestle with this idea of surrendering the freedom that we've gained from maturing, 00:16:58.060 |
But in Revelation 7, 15-17, there's a passage that we studied in Revelation this week, it 00:17:02.440 |
says, "Therefore they are before the throne of God and serve him day and night." 00:17:10.920 |
At the end times when we get to heaven, we're going to be serving him day and night. 00:17:17.080 |
So if you wrestle with lordship, the idea of lordship just kind of feels oppressive, 00:17:23.160 |
that automatically kind of like, "Man, these are things that I want to do and God's going 00:17:27.560 |
So if you get to heaven, he said, "You're going to be serving him day and night." 00:17:32.160 |
You're not even going to be wrestling with it because God, you know, maybe he won't catch 00:17:35.980 |
certain things when you're up in heaven, he's up close, he's going to see everything. 00:17:40.760 |
So if the idea, or at least your false concept of lordship feels oppressive, then man, you're 00:17:49.200 |
headed for deep oppression when you get to heaven because when we get there, he said, 00:17:53.320 |
"We're going to be serving him day and night." 00:17:56.160 |
But I want you to continue to read what it says. 00:17:58.280 |
He says, "We serve him day and night in his temple and he who sits on the throne will 00:18:06.240 |
They will serve him and in that service, when we are in his service, he says, "We are going 00:18:11.120 |
to be sheltered," meaning that God is going to protect us. 00:18:16.240 |
Just like any good father or mother will do for their children, he says, "I want you to 00:18:21.240 |
obey because my ultimate purpose is to take care of you. 00:18:26.080 |
They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more, the sun shall not strike them, nor 00:18:30.760 |
any scorching heat, for the lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd and he 00:18:36.520 |
will guide them to springs of living water and God will wipe away their tears from their 00:18:43.060 |
You notice how lordship of Christ is directly linked to his shepherding presence? 00:18:51.160 |
The lordship of Christ is directly linked to his presence. 00:18:57.520 |
So when we talk about lordship, it's God commanding us, demanding of us to stay within his care. 00:19:07.920 |
That he spreads his wing among us and says, "This is where I am." 00:19:11.480 |
So lordship is him telling us to come under his wings. 00:19:16.480 |
So to rebel against that lordship basically is saying, "I don't want to be under your 00:19:24.600 |
I want to keep my distance so I can adore you from a distance." 00:19:29.360 |
So there are so many Christians who live off of other people's testimony. 00:19:34.640 |
And we hear about other people who are going to far off countries and they come back and 00:19:39.040 |
they're excited for their faith or people who've sacrificed and prayed and how God answered 00:19:43.240 |
their prayer and they have all these testimonies. 00:19:45.240 |
But so many Christians, in fear of, "If I get too close, he's going to demand things 00:19:53.640 |
So their testimony is always just observing other people from a distance. 00:20:01.600 |
We love hearing testimonies because it makes us feel like we're close to God without being 00:20:09.320 |
We love to hear like stories of answered prayers of what God is doing around the world because 00:20:15.680 |
it makes us feel like we're near Christ without being near to Christ. 00:20:20.720 |
I think the best way for me to explain Lordship is, I know some of you guys have visited certain 00:20:27.720 |
parts of the world that you wish that you could take your maybe future spouse, you know, 00:20:34.520 |
or somebody that you really care about or a really good friend. 00:20:37.920 |
And you come back and you show them pictures, you put it on Facebook and say, "It was awesome." 00:20:43.880 |
You know, I've been to a couple places like that. 00:20:46.080 |
At one place, I really, I don't know if I'm ever going to be able to, but I've seen pictures 00:20:54.440 |
I don't know, like all the pictures I see online, that's one place I was like, "Wow, 00:21:00.280 |
I know some of you guys have probably visited that place. 00:21:03.160 |
I visited a couple places in China, and I'm not talking about Beijing. 00:21:07.880 |
I went on this Silk Road tour when I was there the first time, and it took me down to areas 00:21:17.560 |
It's way in the countryside, two, three-hour drive. 00:21:20.920 |
And basically, we followed the Great Wall, or like the whole Great Wall, and there are 00:21:26.880 |
some places where it just kind of, you can see it just kind of dwindle out and where 00:21:30.800 |
And you go to some of those places, I mean, it's just completely, no human hands have 00:21:37.240 |
And I remember the mountains that I saw, it was like nothing I've ever seen. 00:21:41.000 |
So I came back, and I said, "Esther, you know, one of these days, I want you to come with 00:21:49.920 |
We've been to China, but usually it was for summer missions, so we didn't have opportunity 00:21:56.020 |
But when you go to some place like that, you immediately have this thought of, "I wish 00:22:04.720 |
See, the Lordship of Christ is God trying to bring us into His life, into His protection. 00:22:12.760 |
But the only way to really show you is if you have to leave where you are and come with 00:22:19.880 |
The only way that I can really show you what I saw is to let go of whatever it is that 00:22:24.160 |
you're afraid of letting go and come with me so I can show it to you. 00:22:28.680 |
Ultimately, that's what Lordship is, where God is saying that you've been satisfied for 00:22:37.400 |
You've been satisfied and content with trivial things that ultimately doesn't satisfy, and 00:22:45.520 |
You know that the things that you've been pursuing, it's one disappointment after another. 00:22:51.040 |
And Jesus comes to us, He says, "Well, I've delivered you from an empty way of life. 00:22:54.760 |
Now come follow me because I want to give you life. 00:23:00.960 |
The life that you've been pursuing, it just keeps leading to an empty road or dead end." 00:23:08.120 |
See, if we don't recognize Lordship as Him inviting us away from an empty way of life 00:23:15.700 |
so that He can give us this new life, it will always feel like a burden. 00:23:22.780 |
And if it's a burden in your heart, then preaching of Lordship is just going to feel heavy. 00:23:31.820 |
Life is hard enough as it is, and then He wants me to do more or do less. 00:23:38.140 |
You know, these trivial things give me energy to make it another week, and you want me to 00:23:44.900 |
See, at the core, at the essence of salvation is to confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. 00:23:54.340 |
Is to acknowledge that we've been living in sin before we met Christ. 00:24:00.000 |
The essence of salvation is to recognize that what I've been pursuing, that I've been at 00:24:04.500 |
the center of my life, that I've been making my own decisions of what I'm going to pursue, 00:24:12.140 |
The essence of salvation is to recognize that, to repent of that, and make Christ my Lord. 00:24:23.100 |
If you do not have that, that is not salvation. 00:24:27.860 |
That's what James calls demonic salvation, where you acknowledge all the theology without 00:24:39.340 |
You can talk about testimonies because it's always about other people, but it's never 00:24:45.600 |
You could share stories about what I've seen and say, "Oh, you know, Peter has seen this 00:24:51.620 |
You can regurgitate that information to somebody else, but what does it mean to be a witness? 00:24:58.940 |
Evangelizing isn't getting a set of facts and then transferring that fact to other people. 00:25:04.700 |
Evangelism is what you have seen, what you have witnessed, you take it to somebody else 00:25:08.580 |
and come with me so that I can show Him to you too. 00:25:12.620 |
So if you are not seeing Him, if you're not connecting to Him, if you're not hearing from 00:25:22.460 |
See this Lordship of Christ is at the center of what it means to be saved. 00:25:28.140 |
You become a Christian and then here's some other Lordship thing that you have to worry 00:25:33.260 |
At the very core of salvation is to make Him our Lord. 00:25:37.940 |
At the very core of our salvation is to abandon our old life and to embrace a new in Christ. 00:25:46.060 |
Secondly, saving faith requires inner transformation that leads to outer confession. 00:25:54.740 |
That's what I should be doing," and there is no internal transformation, then yeah, 00:26:00.500 |
everything that you hear this morning is just going to end up making you feel guilty. 00:26:06.720 |
If all you're hearing is, "I got to do more," then you're going to leave this room heavily 00:26:18.380 |
How many of you who've been out of college for more than five to 10 years, has it been 00:26:24.920 |
Some of you guys had difficult time finding jobs. 00:26:28.940 |
Some of you guys found jobs that you thought was so great and then you found out your boss 00:26:33.000 |
was no good, or maybe your coworkers are slandering you, or someone else is getting the promotion 00:26:40.440 |
You see your friends advancing and you don't see yourself, or maybe you feel stuck and 00:26:47.700 |
Then you come to church and then I got to do more and the very little thing that I have 00:26:52.620 |
that gives me strength to continue, like I can't do that anymore and I'm going to feel 00:26:59.980 |
If there isn't an inner transformation that leads to this confession of Christ as Lord, 00:27:12.500 |
That's why he says in two separate ways in verse 9, "Because if you confess with your 00:27:15.920 |
mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you 00:27:21.580 |
He basically says the same thing in reverse order in verse 10, "For with the heart one 00:27:25.380 |
believes and is justified and with the mouth one confesses and is saved." 00:27:33.740 |
Our confession, at least in the order that we see in scripture, if it isn't coming from 00:27:39.740 |
what is within, and say, "Well, Jesus is Lord," but that's not how you really feel. 00:27:46.620 |
That's not what's happening within you, inside. 00:27:53.780 |
In Matthew 12, 35, "The good person out of his good treasure brings forth good, and the 00:27:59.740 |
evil person out of his evil treasure brings forth evil." 00:28:02.620 |
In other words, if this confession of Lordship isn't coming out of a transformation that's 00:28:08.020 |
taking place in your heart, it will lead to bitterness. 00:28:22.020 |
I have teenage children in my house, and I have a little one. 00:28:27.940 |
My little one, who's nine, he's kind of like our pet. 00:28:32.580 |
He still loves to go everywhere we go, and so everything is more fun when he's around. 00:28:38.780 |
But the teenagers in our home, wherever we go, if their friend's not there, it's not 00:28:46.220 |
We've gotten to a point where we don't expect them to come with us. 00:28:49.660 |
Anybody who's raised kids or anybody who's been a schoolteacher, you know how excruciatingly 00:28:57.260 |
difficult it is when you have a group of people that you're going, "They just don't want to 00:29:06.820 |
I stopped asking them to come to weddings, unless they wanted to come. 00:29:11.860 |
I stopped asking them, "Hey, we're going to do this," unless it's a family gathering where 00:29:17.820 |
Because when they come, they ruin everything. 00:29:22.140 |
Because you know they don't want to be there. 00:29:25.980 |
The moment you get there, they're like, "How long are we going to be here? 00:29:31.100 |
Every five minutes, "How long are we going to be here?" 00:29:51.100 |
Because they're doing something they don't want to do. 00:29:55.460 |
But they have to do it because their parents are making them do it. 00:29:59.540 |
So at some point, as soon as they're old enough, we stopped asking. 00:30:03.380 |
"I only want you to come if you want to come, because I don't want to torture you, and I 00:30:19.540 |
When you've got a church filled with people who are obligated to come to church, but they 00:30:24.980 |
don't want to be there, it is excruciatingly painful. 00:30:31.340 |
You're doing Bible study with people who are really not that interested in what the Bible 00:30:35.420 |
has to say, but they will keep coming because they have to come. 00:30:41.740 |
If they want to be a member of this church, if they want to be participants of this community, 00:30:46.420 |
But they're not interested in the Bible study. 00:30:49.540 |
But we're going to have Bible study anyway because you're here. 00:30:56.220 |
Try to have prayer meeting with somebody who doesn't want to be there. 00:31:00.600 |
But they have to be because they're supposed to be. 00:31:07.220 |
What he's saying is like, "Oh, here's some things that you need to do," and jump over 00:31:13.620 |
The real confession comes from an inner transformation that takes place in our hearts. 00:31:18.060 |
In 2 Corinthians 4, 6, it says, "For God who said, 'Let light shine out of darkness,' 00:31:22.700 |
has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the 00:31:37.820 |
There was a transformation that took place that caused us the desire to want to know 00:31:44.380 |
So our worship is a privilege when there's a transformation that's taking place in our 00:31:52.660 |
But when there's no transformation in our hearts, it's like taking teenagers to a wedding 00:32:02.140 |
So in their minds, they go, "Well, that wedding's 45 minutes and reception an hour. 00:32:08.140 |
Anything more than that, anything more than that, you'll hear grumbling and complaining, 00:32:18.060 |
You have a church filled with people who are not really attracted to Christ. 00:32:29.180 |
Food, position of chairs, the temperature of the room, certain people, where they sit, 00:32:45.940 |
Hebrews chapter 8, 10, it says, "For this is the covenant that I will make with the 00:32:50.260 |
After those days, declares the Lord, I will put my laws into their minds and write them 00:32:53.820 |
on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people." 00:32:59.380 |
On their hearts, meaning salvation happens in our hearts first. 00:33:06.940 |
There is a longing and a stirring that takes place within our hearts when true faith, saving 00:33:13.620 |
And it causes us to see Christ as our treasure and not this world. 00:33:19.740 |
And when we see Christ as our treasure, we get to come and worship him. 00:33:29.380 |
But when he is not our treasure, and he says, "Pick up your cross," like, "Oh my gosh, 00:33:35.580 |
We don't see what's on the other side of the cross. 00:33:44.020 |
See, it says in 1 Corinthians 12, 3, "No one can say, 'Jesus is Lord,' except in the Holy 00:33:54.020 |
Unless the Holy Spirit is in you, stirring you, drawing you to him, you cannot confess, 00:34:00.460 |
at least in the way that the scripture declares it, that Jesus is Lord. 00:34:08.180 |
Anybody can say it, but what he means by confess, to make this covenant, willingly, 00:34:14.180 |
joyfully, to publicly declare that he is my Lord. 00:34:19.180 |
Not only is that the case, in 1 Corinthians 2, 14 and 15, you can't even understand the 00:34:24.380 |
things of God unless there has been a transformation taking place in our hearts. 00:34:28.180 |
The natural person does not accept the things that are of the Spirit of God, for they are 00:34:33.100 |
See, this idea of placing him as Lord in our lives is foolishness to those who have not 00:34:40.780 |
And he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. 00:34:45.420 |
So unless there is a spiritual transformation in our hearts, every Bible study, every prayer 00:34:50.900 |
meeting, every gathering, every worship is just clocking in and clocking out. 00:34:58.580 |
It is nothing more than superstition because you have been raised to think that if you 00:35:05.540 |
If you don't go to church, God won't bless you. 00:35:08.660 |
So you feel a sense of uneasiness when you are not at church. 00:35:13.840 |
So you go, like a teenager, to a wedding he doesn't want to be at. 00:35:20.300 |
You go to prayer meetings, like a teenager going to a wedding that doesn't want to be 00:35:27.880 |
You go to Bible studies, like a teenager who doesn't want to go to a wedding but has to 00:35:37.940 |
And it's not producing in you life, it's producing in you death. 00:35:54.140 |
It doesn't produce joy, but when real worship takes place, there's life. 00:36:05.020 |
When you search the Word of God and you hear His breath from His Word, there's no Netflix 00:36:12.900 |
movie, there's no blockbuster movie that can compare to being in the presence of His Spirit. 00:36:23.880 |
Lordship is not something that you have to do and you calculate, I shouldn't do this, 00:36:28.660 |
Lordship happens, not because you're a good person, but because we're selfish. 00:36:39.960 |
Lordship happens because we're selfish, because we want to be happy. 00:36:44.420 |
Lordship happens because we want to feel alive. 00:36:48.500 |
It's not because we're benevolent, not because we're sacrificial. 00:36:53.300 |
Lordship happens because we're selfish, because we want what we want and we want Christ. 00:37:01.320 |
So lordship happens when there is inner transformation. 00:37:06.460 |
That's why He says, "He who confesses with the mouth of Jesus his Lord and believes in 00:37:09.660 |
his heart that he was raised from the dead, he shall be saved." 00:37:14.820 |
Third and finally, and I won't spend too much time on this, saving faith requires belief 00:37:20.500 |
Now why is this particular doctrine singled out? 00:37:25.460 |
There's His death, His incarnation, there's all kinds of things, like glorification, but 00:37:35.220 |
Obviously you also need to believe in His death, His deity, His incarnation, you need 00:37:41.920 |
This is being singled out because it really is at the core. 00:37:46.620 |
There's three things that I want to quickly mention before why He singles this out. 00:37:50.340 |
One, just to give you an example, in 1 John 4, John is dealing with Christian Gnostics 00:37:59.340 |
So he says, "By this you know the Spirit of God. 00:38:02.040 |
Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every 00:38:06.240 |
spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God." 00:38:09.300 |
So he singles out His incarnation as genuine faith because that's what he was dealing with, 00:38:16.100 |
Here he singles out resurrection because the resurrection was at the core. 00:38:24.380 |
So there's three specific things that I'm going to mention. 00:38:27.460 |
One, resurrection of Jesus Christ distinguishes Him from every other prophet. 00:38:33.380 |
Many other people came and they kind of performed miracles, remember? 00:38:38.200 |
Even when He was delivering Israel from Egypt, He performed these miracles and they tried 00:38:46.660 |
In fact, if you look at the prophets of Jewish history, the greatest prophet or the prophet 00:38:52.260 |
that performed the most miracle was not Jesus. 00:38:56.380 |
As much as Jesus did in His life, if you look at Elijah's life, he did some crazy stuff. 00:39:02.300 |
You look at Elisha, Elisha probably performed more miracles, more spectacular miracles than 00:39:09.700 |
Maybe he did more, but at least that's recorded. 00:39:12.540 |
What distinguished Jesus from any other prophet, because many people believe Jesus, maybe He 00:39:18.780 |
He might be the greatest prophet possibly, but what distinguished Him from any other 00:39:23.300 |
prophet, any other human being was His resurrection. 00:39:26.780 |
Secondly, the resurrection proved that Jesus had the power to forgive sins. 00:39:33.140 |
That His proof that He was beyond the prophet, that He really was the Son of God as He proclaimed, 00:39:39.580 |
that He was equal with God, that only He had the power to give life and take it out. 00:39:47.780 |
His resurrection, His resurrection proved with power that He had the power to forgive 00:40:00.180 |
But along with that, He says, "There's no greater love than this, than a friend lay 00:40:06.120 |
So His resurrection was a proof that He was beyond other prophets, that He said who He 00:40:12.380 |
said He was, and ultimately that it proved His love when He resurrected. 00:40:18.740 |
But third and finally, resurrection is the ultimate goal of salvation. 00:40:27.660 |
You have, when we talk about salvation, you have, we're saved from something, and what's 00:40:37.660 |
See His death at the cross saved us from our sins. 00:40:42.380 |
His resurrection from the dead saved us for this new life. 00:40:46.900 |
That's exactly how salvation is described in Romans 6, 3-4. 00:40:49.940 |
Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into 00:40:55.940 |
We were buried therefore with Him by baptism into death in order that just as Christ was 00:41:00.860 |
raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in the newness of life. 00:41:06.420 |
You were buried with Him in death in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead 00:41:11.860 |
in the glory of the Father, that you too may live a newness of life. 00:41:16.380 |
So we were saved from our sins in order that we may live unto God. 00:41:22.880 |
So the resurrection in the confession of itself is to establish His Lordship over our life, 00:41:31.120 |
meaning that our old way of life is being put away. 00:41:35.480 |
First Corinthians 15-20, "But if in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruit 00:41:39.480 |
of those who have fallen asleep, for as by a man came death, by man has come also the 00:41:46.840 |
For as Adam all died, so also Christ shall all be made alive. 00:41:50.940 |
But each in his own order, Christ the first fruit, and at His coming those who belong 00:41:56.700 |
Our whole point of salvation is not to prevent eternal damnation. 00:42:02.100 |
He prevented eternal damnation in order that we may have this newness of life. 00:42:08.480 |
Whole point of Christianity is the resurrected life. 00:42:13.280 |
The whole point of His death, and that's why His resurrection is called the first fruit, 00:42:25.900 |
The whole point of our repentance is to live the new life, new life. 00:42:32.580 |
So let me ask you with this, and as I started with the same question, when was the last 00:42:38.660 |
time that you can remember where there was this stirring for Christ that led you to pray? 00:42:48.300 |
When was the last time you came to Scripture because you recognized this new life and you 00:42:56.900 |
And that's what caused you to search through Scripture. 00:43:01.980 |
When was the last time that you hungered and thirst for this new life, and that's why you 00:43:07.780 |
wanted to connect and fellowship with other Christians, to talk about what you loved, 00:43:14.700 |
not simply because you felt lonely or you needed friends? 00:43:20.380 |
If you can't remember the last time where there was a stirring, you're in big trouble. 00:43:41.060 |
So if that is not there, whatever it is we're pursuing, in light of that, if you really 00:44:05.580 |
Could your relationship with your family and friends, could it be that important? 00:44:09.700 |
Even your kids, is it even that important if the core of salvation, you don't have assurance? 00:44:33.700 |
It is impossible to please God without faith. 00:44:37.940 |
He who comes to God must first believe that He is, and He is a rewarder of those who genuinely 00:44:45.940 |
I pray that we would be those people who genuinely seek Him, who believe with all our heart that 00:44:59.180 |
Let's take some time to pray as, again, we ask our worship team to come. 00:45:07.300 |
Again, just take a few minutes to come before the Lord in genuine confession, genuine desire. 00:45:22.860 |
Because it is so easy to fall into this routine. 00:45:27.060 |
You don't have to make a decision to dry up your heart. 00:45:31.220 |
It happens when we're not being deliberate, when we focus our eyes upon the problems in 00:45:41.620 |
So let's take this opportunity to come before the Lord. 00:45:44.860 |
I've been focusing so much attention on the externals and maybe not enough on where I 00:45:53.100 |
So let's take some time to come before the Lord in prayer as our worship team leads us.