What Makes My Life Christian?
00:00:00.000 | (music)
00:00:04.000 | What distinguishes my life from the life of a non-Christian?
00:00:07.880 | What makes the Christian life distinct in this world?
00:00:11.640 | It's one of the most important topics that we can address and we're going to today on this Monday.
00:00:17.800 | Welcome back to the podcast and we're gonna get there through another question. How do I serve in God's strength?
00:00:24.760 | That's the question that is sparked by 1 Peter chapter 4 verses 10 to 11. It was sent to us by a listener named Jacob in
00:00:32.160 | Minneapolis. Dear Pastor John, thank you for looking at my question. 1 Peter 4 10 to 11 says, "As each has received a gift,
00:00:41.160 | use it to serve one another as good stewards of God's very grace.
00:00:45.480 | Whoever speaks is one who speaks oracles of God.
00:00:49.240 | Whoever serves is one who serves by the strength that God supplies in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ."
00:00:57.240 | In my fight for faith and love and holiness, I want to glorify God.
00:01:03.840 | I don't want my work to be in vain. So my question is this, what does serving by the strength of God mean?
00:01:10.600 | How do I do it and how am I to work in such a way that it is God's strength working in me?
00:01:17.640 | I think this is just about the most fundamental question you can ask about how to live the
00:01:25.320 | distinctively Christian life.
00:01:27.680 | How do you live so that it is not you who live but Christ who lives in you?
00:01:34.760 | How do you exert yourself and make resolutions in such a way
00:01:41.160 | that you are not relying on your exertions and your resolutions,
00:01:47.160 | but on the supernatural work of the Spirit of God in you?
00:01:50.800 | The text that Jacob is focusing on, one of my favorites for ministry, is verse 11 of 1 Peter 4.
00:01:58.720 | "Whoever serves, let him serve in or by the strength that God supplies."
00:02:05.840 | There's the command and he's just saying, "Please help." How do you do that? What a mystery, what a miracle that is.
00:02:13.440 | We serve,
00:02:15.680 | but we serve by the supply of the strength of another. How, he says. And of course,
00:02:22.600 | this is not the only text that presses this huge issue upon us.
00:02:29.960 | Romans 8 13,
00:02:32.400 | "By the Spirit put to death the deeds of the body."
00:02:36.880 | So we are to do the sin-killing,
00:02:41.120 | but we are to do it by the Spirit. How?
00:02:45.680 | Philippians 2 12, "Work out your own salvation,
00:02:49.560 | because it is God who works in you to will and to work for his good pleasure."
00:02:57.000 | So we are to work,
00:02:58.880 | but the willing and the working is God's willing and working. How? How do we experience that?
00:03:04.320 | 1 Corinthians 15 10, "I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I,
00:03:09.800 | but the grace of God that was with me." So Paul did work hard,
00:03:15.240 | but his effort was in some way not his.
00:03:17.600 | How do you do that?
00:03:19.960 | Colossians 1 29, "I toil,
00:03:22.280 | struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works in me." Wow.
00:03:30.600 | We toil, we struggle, we expend effort and energy,
00:03:35.240 | but there is a way to do it so that it's God's energy, God's doing. How?
00:03:41.120 | Okay, so there it is. It's a pervasive issue.
00:03:44.800 | It's fundamental. It's right at the heart of what it means to be a Christian.
00:03:48.800 | I wish everybody were asking this question.
00:03:51.640 | In 1984, J.I. Packer, who's going to be with the Lord now,
00:03:57.800 | published his book, "Keep in Step with the Spirit."
00:04:02.440 | I really enjoyed it. I remember reading it the year it came out.
00:04:05.720 | Yeah.
00:04:06.400 | In it, on page 125,
00:04:09.760 | he gives his answer to this question.
00:04:12.600 | And I'm going to read you his quote, just one paragraph.
00:04:16.920 | Quote, "First,
00:04:19.600 | as one who wants to do all the good you can,
00:04:24.040 | you observe what tasks, opportunities, and responsibilities face you.
00:04:30.200 | Second,
00:04:32.200 | you pray for help in these,
00:04:35.640 | acknowledging that without Christ, you can do nothing.
00:04:40.640 | Nothing fruitful that is," John 15, 5.
00:04:43.520 | Third,
00:04:44.800 | you go to work with a goodwill and a high
00:04:49.600 | heart expecting to be helped as you
00:04:54.160 | asked to be. Fourth,
00:04:56.640 | you thank God for help given.
00:05:02.520 | Ask pardon for your own failures and rout and request
00:05:07.520 | more help for the next task." End quote.
00:05:11.240 | Well, I was 38 years old when I read that.
00:05:14.640 | I had been a pastor for four years.
00:05:18.440 | And what thrilled me about that answer to,
00:05:23.680 | "How do you do this, Packer?
00:05:25.680 | Tell us, how do you live this life in the strength of another?"
00:05:29.920 | What thrilled me is that he spelled out exactly
00:05:34.920 | what I had preached the year before. You can go to,
00:05:37.560 | you can go to Desiring God, March 13, 1983, not four, three.
00:05:42.600 | And I called it APTAT, A-P-T-A-T, the acronym.
00:05:46.840 | A, admit you can do nothing. P, pray for supernatural help.
00:05:51.240 | T, trust a specific promise about your situation.
00:05:55.000 | A, act, use your will, move. T,
00:05:58.840 | thank God.
00:06:00.160 | I was just blown away that the year after I wrote APTAT,
00:06:04.520 | I found in my favorite theologian, just about,
00:06:08.160 | a duplicate of what I was thinking. I thought, this is not,
00:06:11.240 | I'm not quirky here at all. This is just old fashioned.
00:06:14.200 | He calls it Augustinian sanctification or something like that.
00:06:17.720 | The difference between my APTAT and Packer's paragraph is,
00:06:22.880 | is this.
00:06:24.320 | He barely mentions my middle T.
00:06:29.320 | Trust a specific promise about your situation that
00:06:33.880 | you're about to walk into. You can hear that he, he means it. He believes it.
00:06:38.040 | Of course he does. You can hear it in his third point,
00:06:42.160 | but it's almost lost. He says, he says it this way. Third,
00:06:46.840 | you go to work with a goodwill and a high heart.
00:06:51.080 | And then he says, expecting to be helped. I say, yes,
00:06:56.040 | yes, yes, exactly. That's faith.
00:06:58.080 | Expecting to be helped according to your request for
00:07:03.120 | help. But I think this is the biggest difference.
00:07:06.800 | It's a matter of emphasis. I think this middle T,
00:07:10.560 | ask, pray, trust. So trust is the middle T, ask, pray, trust,
00:07:15.640 | act, thank APTAT. The middle T is so crucial.
00:07:20.160 | I wrote a whole book about it called Living by Faith in Future Grace.
00:07:24.520 | That's a 400 page book on T.
00:07:26.440 | We need a book for every one of those letters. But for me,
00:07:31.880 | it was so huge that it didn't get muted in 0.3.
00:07:36.800 | It got blown up in Future Grace.
00:07:40.320 | That book was really about the middle T,
00:07:43.880 | trust a specific promise when you're facing a situation
00:07:48.960 | that causes you uncertainty or anxiety or fear.
00:07:52.440 | And I think that step of T,
00:07:56.080 | trust in a specific promise is missing in
00:08:00.760 | most Christians attempt to live the Christian
00:08:04.880 | life. It's certainly my most common mistake.
00:08:08.680 | Most of us face a difficult task that makes us
00:08:14.320 | anxious. And we remember to say, help me help God.
00:08:19.440 | I need you.
00:08:20.760 | So we more or less reflexively express
00:08:26.720 | the first two steps, AP,
00:08:29.520 | ask or admit, admit helplessness and ask for a
00:08:35.120 | pray for help.
00:08:36.120 | But then we move straight from
00:08:41.320 | pray and admit to act.
00:08:45.920 | We pray and then we act.
00:08:50.240 | But this robs us of a very powerful
00:08:54.880 | step in walking by the spirit,
00:08:58.000 | walking in the strength that God supplies.
00:09:01.240 | After we pray for God's help, this is T now,
00:09:05.800 | we should remind ourselves of a specific promise
00:09:11.040 | that God has made and fix our minds on it
00:09:17.280 | and put our faith in it.
00:09:19.560 | How many times, and I wish I did it absolutely consistently,
00:09:24.200 | because it's so precious when you consistently do it.
00:09:28.080 | How many times have I said, I believe you,
00:09:32.440 | I caught myself a promise, like the promise of, I will help you, John Piper.
00:09:36.200 | I will strengthen you. I'll uphold you. And I say, I believe you.
00:09:39.600 | I believe you right now, I'm walking into this pulpit.
00:09:43.040 | I believe you walking onto the stage.
00:09:44.760 | I believe you walking into this difficult conversation I'm going to have down
00:09:49.200 | here at Maria's. I believe you right now.
00:09:53.680 | This is true. Help is on the way. Increase my faith.
00:09:58.320 | I'm trusting you, Lord. Here I go. And then, then you act.
00:10:03.360 | Now Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5, 7, we walk by faith.
00:10:09.240 | Galatians 2, 20, we live by faith.
00:10:14.200 | But for most of us, this remains vague.
00:10:17.680 | It's vague. Like I walk through the day and yeah, I guess I'm a believer.
00:10:22.960 | Of course, I'm a believer as I walk through the day,
00:10:24.960 | but am I believing anything specific about God? Anything specific about,
00:10:29.800 | what he's going to do in the next half hour that I'm struggling with?
00:10:34.000 | Hour by hour, we need to do this.
00:10:39.520 | We do it by reminding ourselves of specific concrete promises that God has made
00:10:46.800 | and Jesus has bought with his blood. 2 Corinthians 1, 20,
00:10:52.480 | all the promises of God are yes in Jesus.
00:10:55.600 | And we consciously trust the promises that we have and we act on them.
00:11:04.040 | So here's my suggestion practically to Jacob for how to put this into practice.
00:11:09.600 | Read the Bible every day, every day,
00:11:12.240 | always on the lookout for specific promises God may want to give you for that very day.
00:11:18.960 | But don't lean only on the Bible reading for the day.
00:11:24.440 | Memorize a few promises that are so universally applicable to every situation
00:11:33.400 | that they will serve you when you face a task to be done in the strength that God supplies.
00:11:39.120 | Then as those tasks come, go through Aptat.
00:11:44.720 | Admit you can't do this on your own, not fruitfully, not with any eternal significance.
00:11:50.720 | Pray for the help you need.
00:11:53.280 | Then call to mind one of your memorized promises and trust it.
00:11:59.600 | Put your faith in it.
00:12:02.800 | Then act, believing that God is acting in you, through you,
00:12:09.080 | according to his promise, and then thank him.
00:12:11.760 | So here are a few of my go-to promises day by day.
00:12:15.800 | I suppose the most common one over the last 50 years is Isaiah 41, 10.
00:12:21.400 | "Fear not, John."
00:12:22.880 | So I can hear it. I hear God talking. I hear Jesus say this.
00:12:26.240 | "I bought this for you, John. Fear not, for I'm with you.
00:12:30.240 | Be not dismayed. I'm your God. I will strengthen you in the next half hour.
00:12:34.760 | I will help you in the next hour.
00:12:36.880 | I will hold you up with my righteous right hand in the next day. I will."
00:12:42.480 | Do you believe me, John Piper? Do you believe me?
00:12:45.760 | Oh, what a difference it makes when you have a concrete word from God,
00:12:50.600 | from the scriptures, and you believe it as you walk into a difficult, trying situation.
00:12:56.120 | Or Philippians 4, 19, "My God will supply every need of yours,
00:13:02.960 | according to his riches in glory." Every need. No question.
00:13:06.920 | What you need, you'll have. Go.
00:13:09.680 | Or Hebrews 13, 5 and 6, "I will never leave you.
00:13:14.440 | I will never forsake you."
00:13:16.000 | So we can confidently say, "The Lord is my helper.
00:13:19.240 | I will not fear. What can man do to me?
00:13:23.120 | Man can't do anything to me but what God at my side
00:13:27.680 | omnipotently permits him to do, because he loves me."
00:13:31.400 | And foundational for every one of those, I've got, goodness,
00:13:35.480 | I don't know how many of these promises are written down,
00:13:36.880 | but here's the last one I'll mention. Romans 8, 32,
00:13:39.720 | "He who did not spare his own son, but gave him up for us all."
00:13:44.200 | So that's the foundation of absolutely everything.
00:13:46.440 | "Christ died for me.
00:13:50.560 | How will he not with him graciously give John Piper all things?"
00:13:56.640 | What a great promise to walk into every situation with.
00:14:00.360 | So never cease to ponder Paul's words in Galatians 2, 20,
00:14:06.080 | "I have been crucified with Christ.
00:14:08.600 | It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me."
00:14:12.840 | There's that switch. No longer I, but Christ. And then he explains it.
00:14:18.480 | "And the life that I now live, oh yes, you do live a life.
00:14:22.560 | In the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God
00:14:28.000 | who loved me and gave himself for me."
00:14:31.440 | So not I, yet I by faith.
00:14:36.040 | And I'm simply saying, make it specific.
00:14:39.720 | By faith in a particular precious promise.
00:14:44.800 | Yeah, very applicable. Thank you, Pastor John.
00:14:47.280 | This episode reminds me of one other episode that featured this trio of texts.
00:14:51.320 | 1 Corinthians 15, 10, and Colossians 1, 29, and 1 Peter 4, 11.
00:14:56.680 | It was back in our first year, I think it was, APJ 143.
00:15:00.920 | And it's titled, "Work like an Arminian, Sleep like a Calvinist?"
00:15:05.040 | Question mark. "Work like an Arminian, Sleep like a Calvinist?"
00:15:08.200 | Great episode to compliment this one. Check it out.
00:15:10.800 | Thank you for joining us today.
00:15:12.520 | Ask a question of your own. Search for APJ 143 in the archive
00:15:16.320 | or subscribe to the podcast.
00:15:17.640 | You can do all that at AskPastorJohn.com.
00:15:20.840 | That's AskPastorJohn.com.
00:15:22.680 | I'm your host Tony Reinke. We'll see you back here on Wednesday.
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