Faith
Is the Word of God so common that the goodness of it is ignored? We go to church and listen as the preacher presents the Word of God to us and yet go home afterward no different than when we came. Has the Word of God lost its power? Is it no longer appropriate for this day and age? And another thing that sits on my mind, why is it that those who serve God with their whole heart are lonely? There are several passages of Scripture that come to mind. Psalm 74:9 tell us, “We see not our signs: there is no more any prophet: neither is there among us any that knows how long.” Ezekiel 7:26says, “Mischief shall come upon mischief, and rumor shall be upon rumor; then shall they seek a vision of the prophet; but the law shall perish from the priest, and counsel from the ancients.” Amos 8:11 reads, “Behold, the days come, says the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, not a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord.” Is this where we have arrived? Israel went through times like this. In 1 Samuel 3:1 we find, “And the child Samuel ministered unto the Lord before Eli. And the Word of the Lord was precious in those days; there was no open vision.” When we choose to ignore what God is telling us and go about life as though what He has said has no value, then God’s patience will eventually wear out. Yes, God will stop trying to get us to listen and will stop sending His wisdom our way. This then becomes the time that God will bring judgment.
Our society has no interest in God’s Word today. Those that profess to be Christians live much the same way as all the rest of the world. Yes, there are some that attend church faithfully, that give tithes and offerings to support the work of the church, and some even donate to help missionary efforts around the world, but once they leave the church service their thoughts are not about what God would have them do but what are they going to eat and what entertainment will they pursue. From God’s point of view, I believe that He’s had a belly full of false worship and statements of dedication that have no depth. To speak of the times that we are living in today, Jesus said in Luke 18:8b, “Nevertheless when the Son of man comes, shall He find faith on the earth?” This is an obvious rhetorical question with the obvious answer of NO. Yes, God tells someone that dearly loves the Savior to build a ministry that has elevated goals and the common consensus is that it can’t be done. So no one wishes to get behind it for fear that they would be wasting their funds. Odd though, God says that there is nothing too hard for Him to do. I personally know of a ministry that God is richly blessing with thousands of souls coming to the Savior. That ministry has difficulty getting financial support and has to stretch their funds in an effort to get God’s work done. Oh, there are many that would gladly support a humanitarian effort, after all it would look good for them to do so, but don’t ask for funds to win souls. What’s the problem here?
Part of the answer lies in the message of James 2:19, “You believe that there is one God; you do well: the devils also believe, and tremble.” There are many in our churches today that profess to know the Savior. They believe that Jesus is God and that He died to pay the penalty of their sins, but they have failed to take the next step and ask Him into their heart and life. They will attend church but they don’t have any real interest in living for the Savior because they don’t possess the Holy Spirit. When they die if they have not taken that needed step they will not find themselves in heaven. Some preachers think that the parable that Jesus gives in Luke 8:5-8would indicate that only 25% of those that profess to be Christians actually possess salvation. It is certain that there are many in our churches today that do not possess salvation. There is a story of a pastor that had spent years preaching the Gospel and found himself in a hospital with heart failure. He asked his assistant to come in and show him how to get saved as he felt he was going to die. His assistant made the effort to enter his room but was stopped by the medical staff. The medical staff was busy trying to keep that pastor alive, but unfortunately he shortly thereafter passed away without Christ. It is time we carefully examine ourselves as to whether we are indeed in the faith. Paul warned in 2 Cor. 13:5, “Examine yourselves whether you be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know you not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except you be reprobates?” Yes, if the Holy Spirit as the representative of Christ is not in those that profess to be Christians, then they are NOT Christians. That is, they are not saved having never received the Holy Spirit, for it is the Holy Spirit that seals us in Christ. It is also the Holy Spirit that does the regeneration work of salvation. Saying you believe is not enough. “You believe that there is one God; you do well: the devils also believe, and tremble.” James 2:19. This means that we must give up trying to get to heaven based on our own good works and must depend totally on Jesus and His righteousness to get us to heaven. Depending on Jesus to get us to heaven means we have opened the door of ourselves to let him in. Galatians 2:16 provides a clearer understanding, “Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.” Praying the sinner’s prayer without opening the door of your heart to the Savior is merely a work and it will not do anyone any good. Believing in Jesus provides the opportunity to open the door of our heart to allow Jesus to take up residence within us. Paul here has said that justification occurs by the faith of Christ. When Jesus takes up residence in our being, we receive His faith. Look at it this way; Jesus is the owner of the faith of justification or salvation. When we open the door of our selves to allow Jesus to take up residence in us, the Holy Spirit applies the gift of justification through Jesus’ faith and the Holy Spirit takes up residence in our being. You simply must open the door of your heart and let Jesus in. He literally enters into your body in the person of the Holy Spirit and your body becomes the temple of the Holy Spirit. “What? Know you not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which you have of God, and you are not your own? 1 Cor. 6:19.
When we accept Jesus as our Savior several changes occur. In order for us to accept Jesus as Savior the Holy Spirit must draw us to the need to get saved. The Word of God tells us, “As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that understands, there is none that seeks after God.” Rom.3:10-11 We do not desire nor seek to have our sins forgiven. The Holy Spirit must bring our need to our attention. Then and only then can we know that we must ask Jesus to save us. Jesus in John 6:44 said, “No man can come to Me, except the Father which has sent Me draw him.” God the Father must use the Holy Spirit to draw us to Jesus. Before God draws us we have no interest in coming to Jesus for salvation. The fact that we are concerned about being saved is direct proof that God has drawn us. When we accept God’s invitation to be saved the Holy Spirit comes inside of us immediately and we are sealed. Eph.1:13 reads, “In whom you also trusted, after that you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that you believed, you were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise.” The presence of the Holy Spirit within us provides two things that tell us we are saved. Some of us actually notice the Holy Spirit coming inside of us when we are saved. Not all of us notice this, but all of us after getting saved will be convicted by the Holy Spirit when we sin. This did not happen to us prior to getting saved. Before we came to Jesus to get saved, we could commit sin and have no problems with it. It was our natural way of living. Once we are saved we can no longer sin and not be bothered by it. After salvation the Holy Spirit will convict us of having done wrong when we sin. If the feeling of conviction hits us when we sin, then we can be assured that we did get saved.
There is more. When we get saved we are changed and are a new person in Christ. II Cor. 5:17 tells us, “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” We are a new creature created in Christ Jesus when we get saved. Eph. 2:10says, “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God has before ordained that we should walk in them.” When we get saved we will have an inward desire to do those things that please God. We will not want to sin. This does not happen in us if we are not saved. If we desire to please God, then we have been saved. If our desires are to do sinful things and we can do them without being bothered by them, then we are not saved.
Having accepted Jesus as our Savior, we will then have a desire to see others get saved. This is part of our new found desire to do the things that please God. Also, we have come to believe that we must get saved to get to heaven. If we desire that others would get saved, we are saved. Those who are not saved will never be concerned for others. If we are not saved, the only person we will be concerned about is ourselves. There are a few other things that need to be said.
Some think that it is necessary to spend much time agonizing over our sinful state before we can get God to save us. This is a lie. If we desire to get saved, the very moment we ask God to save us we are saved. Salvation occurs instantly. Also, some think we need to have some sort of emotional experience. This is also false. Some of us will have an emotional experience as a result of getting saved and some of us will not. An emotional experience is not necessary to get saved. God does the saving, not us. There are also no necessary feelings that we need to have. We are each different individuals, some of us have more feelings than others. Some of us will have much feeling and others will have none. No special feelings are necessary to get saved. Romans 10:13 says, “For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” If we have sincerely called on the Lord Jesus to save us opening the door of our being to Him, we are saved. God cannot lie and He will not lie. Also, Jesus said in John 6:37, “All that the Father gives Me shall come to Me; and him that comes to Me I will in no wise cast out.” Jesus guarantees that anyone who comes to Him to get saved will be saved. We must put our trust in Jesus, and not some other person or thing. When the Holy Spirit takes up residence in us we are guaranteed heaven. The Holy Spirit binds us together with Jesus so that we can enter heaven based on Jesus’ righteousness and not our own.
Putting our trust in some speaker or some church will not save us. Our trust must be put in the finished work of Jesus on the cross of Calvary. Only faith in Jesus will give us salvation. I Tim.2:5 explains, “For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.” Also in Acts 4:12 Peters tells the Jewish leaders about Jesus that, “Neither is their salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.” Our trust must be in Jesus and Jesus only. Our trust cannot be in a prayer that we said. Saying the sinners prayer does not give us salvation unless we are genuinely opening our heart to let the Savior in. The act of saying the prayer is not enough. It must be sincere and genuine. If our trust is in Jesus we are saved. There are some other things we need to know.
After we get saved, the devil wants very badly to get us to doubt our salvation. Let’s look at some truths that we can be assured of. First, the type of life that Jesus gives us is eternal life. Jesus tells us in John 3:15-16, “That whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” Once we are saved we have everlasting life. This means that we cannot perish or die. If we were to die then our life would not be everlasting. When we leave this world we will be with Jesus forever. Jesus also tells us in John 10:27-29, “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me: and I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of My hand. My Father, which gave them Me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of My Father’s hand.” Once we are saved Jesus has His hand around us and God the Father has His hand around us. There is no one that can remove us from the hand of God, including ourselves. No human being or any other being can remove us from the hand of God. There are some more truths like this.
When we accept Jesus as our Savior we become a child of God. We are born immediately into God’s family. John 1:12 reads, “But as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on His name.” Also Romans 8:14-16 says, “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. For you have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but you have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God.” When we get saved we gain adoption into the family of God. We are children of God. God the Father is our Father. Family is something that never changes. When we are born we are the child of our parents. No matter what we do we will always have the same parents. Once we become children of God we will always be God’s child. There is still more.
When we get saved we are baptized or immersed into the body of Jesus. In Romans 6:4-5 we learn, “Therefore we are buried with Him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection.” We become a part of Jesus when we are saved. In order for us to lose our salvation Jesus would have to die again. Jesus is God. He is never going to die. Therefore, we also will never die. When we leave this world we will be with Him forever. Finally we will eventually receive a new body that will never die that will be just like Jesus. In I John 3:2 we read, “Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it does not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is.” The only way that we would ever be able to look upon the infinite glory of Jesus is to become just like Him. Just as Jesus body will never die so also our new body will never die. With all of these guarantees we can be certain that we will never lose our salvation. Our salvation is totally dependent upon the Savior and in zero dependence on us. All praises be to God for what He has done for us.
So a simple question remains, do you know for sure that you are saved? If not, you can make sure right now by simply turning to God, tell Him you know you are a sinner, open your heart, and ask Him to come into your heart and life and save you right now. He will!
Making sure that we are saved is but one part of the problem. Most Christians today don’t live for Jesus, they live for themselves. They are taken up with materialism and self worship. It is not possible to serve self and a materialistic lifestyle and serve Jesus at the same time. Jesus tell us in Matt. 6:24, “No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.” Mammon is money and material things, like new cars, new furniture, a large bank account, entertainment, and a variety of other things. Everything in this world is going to be totally destroyed, consumed by fire. “But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.” 2 Pet. 3:7.
Romans 8:29-30 tells us, “For whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom He did predestinate, them He also called: and whom He called, them He also justified: and whom He justified, them He also glorified.” We know from this passage that God predetermined that all that would accept Jesus as their Savior would also be fully conformed to the image of Jesus. This God made into a guarantee, such that one may either choose to arrive there willingly or may resist and be brought there unwillingly. Certainly the better choice is to go willingly for the unwilling pathway is full of God’s chastisement, unhappiness, and defeat. It is a wonderful thing that God has done for us. He has provided a way of salvation for us. He has provided victory over sin to those who are saved. God has also guaranteed that all Christians will be made into the very image of Jesus. We are saved from the penalty of sin. We are saved from the power of sin. Also, one day we will be saved from the very presence of sin. The certainty of this last statement is so strong that God already sees us in heaven shouting and singing praises to the Lord Jesus. All of these are worth shouting about, but let us consider for a moment what must have occurred to bring about all of this.
Let’s first of all return to Romans 8:29-30, which was referred to above. The word translated “predestined” in Romans 8:29-30 has a primary meaning of “to see beforehand or to foresee.” God in His infinite knowledge and wisdom, in eternity past, knew the path His creation would take. God knew that mankind would reject their Creator. God also knew that the only way He could redeem His creation was for Jesus, God the Son, to pay the full penalty on the cross and rise from the dead the third day. It is very doubtful that any human being who has ever lived would have been willing to allow his only son to pay the full penalty for the sin of another. Yet God chose to go ahead with creation anyway, knowing it would cost Jesus the cross. “For God SO LOVED the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:16 “Oh, the love that drew salvation’s plan! Oh, the grace that brought it down to man! Oh, the mighty gulf that God did span at Calvary!” The song writer indeed had the story right. God because of His infinite love for us “foresaw” us into existence as conformed to the image of Jesus. The price for this choice…God the Son would have to take on human form for all eternity, suffer and die on the cross, be buried and rise again. And yes, here stands God the Father looking down on His only begotten Son, painfully turning His face away from the One that He has loved for an eternity. Oh, the awful pain and agony, just so He could redeem mankind. God gave ALL for us!!!
So why is it we have such a difficult time giving all to Jesus? It’s very simple actually, but not so easy to admit. The truth is that we love our sin more than we love Jesus. When we love Jesus more than our sin, then we will do everything we can to avoid that sin. Philippians 1:9-10 tells us, “And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment; that you may approve things that are excellent; that you may be sincere and without offence till the day of Christ.” Paul here tells the Philippians that he wants them to increase in their love, that is their love of the Savior, because then they will approve the things that are excellent, things that are not sin. When we accepted Jesus as our Savior, something very wonderful happened. Yes, we were freed from the penalty of sin, but we also were freed from the power of sin. No longer are we forced to sin by our sinful nature. We can now choose to either serve self and sin or serve Jesus and live a holy life. In Gal. 2:20 Paul explains this a little with, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ lives in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.” The part that is very crucial here is the source of the faith. Some will say that this means that Paul was living by the faith he had in Christ. Although this is a good thought it does not carry the true meaning of this verse. The expression ‘faith of the Son of God’ is a Greek construction that means the Son of God’s faith not our faith in the Son of God. When we accepted Jesus as our Savior, Jesus, in the person of the Holy Spirit, took up residence in our bodies. We then received all of Jesus. We received His faith, His holiness, and His love. As we learn more or gain a better understanding of the love of Jesus, we begin to love Him more. As we love Him more, we will be able to love Him greater than we love our sin. This will greatly catapult our ability to defeat sin in our life. We will be fighting it with Jesus’ love for righteousness and not our own. We can help ourselves by asking God to give us more love for the Savior, spending more time in the Word of God, and doing small tasks for the Savior. Paul in his letter to the Philippians was wanting their love to abound more and more because the result would be that they would be able to live a more victorious life in the Savior.
Paul expounds the wonderful things that God has done four us in Romans 6 – 8, then in Romans 12:1-2 tells us, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be you transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.” This is our reasonable service. OH, how we owe ALL to God!!! Romans 12:1 tells us that the giving of our bodies as a living sacrifice is our REASONABLE service. God gave all for us and we must surrender ALL to Him as our REASONABLE and JOYFUL service. There is a statement in the Old Testament that illustrates for us what surrendering all is. In I Kings 20:2-4 Ben-Hadad the king of Syria besieged Samaria and demanded full surrender from the king of Israel. The king of Israel’s reply in verse 4 was, “O king, according to your saying, I am yours, and all that I have.” Even Ahab, the wicked king of Israel, knew what total surrender meant. Ahab, the king of Syria, offers Ben-Hadad, first of all, himself. Ahab describes Ben-Hadad as his king and offers himself as Ben-Hadad’s servant. Ahab also offers Ben-Hadad all that he has. Total surrender is what we need to offer God. We need to offer, first, ourselves. We must give ourselves over to God totally and without any reservation. To give ourselves over totally to God means to give Him full control of each and every part of us, each and every minute of our lives, and each and every aspect of our lives. There can be no part of our lives left out. We must give Him our sleeping hours. We must give Him the morning hours. We must give Him the main part of the day or the working hours. We must give Him the evening hours, and all that remains. We must give Him control over all parts of our lives. We must give Him control over our thought life. We must give Him control over our eating life. We must give Him control over our social life. We must give Him control over our work life. We must give Him control over our dating or married life. We must give Him control over our physical life our spiritual life, our private life, our public life, and all that remains. We must also give all that we possess to Jesus. We must give Him all of our money, all of our clothes, all of our houses and lands, all of our vehicles, all of our toys, all of our tools, all of our furniture, all of our friends, all of our loved ones, all of everything. All must be given to the Lord Jesus. It’s His anyway. Not giving it to Him is thievery and idolatry.
In talking about our sacrifice and surrender to God, Jesus in Mark 9:49 said, “For everyone shall be salted with fire, and every sacrifice will be salted (seasoned) with salt.” Being seasoned with fire refers to being offered as a sacrifice as well as having our chaff burned up. Seasoning food with fire (i.e. barbecue) improves the flavor of the food. 2 Cor. 3:3 says, “clearly you are an epistle (letter)of Christ, ministered by us, written not with ink, but by the Spirit of the Living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of flesh, that is, of the heart.” When we offer ourselves up as a living sacrifice we improve the quality of the letter the world is reading in us about Christ. Just as a fire improves the flavor of the food, so yielding all to Christ increases the quality of the message we offer to the world about the One who gave all for us. Also the size of the fire determines what the benefit is. A small fire means improved flavor or great rejoicing but a huge fire means burnt barbecue or great loss. The amount and type of fuel is important to consider. If our source is wood, hay, and stubble we can expect a massive flame and if the source is diamonds, gold, silver, and jewels we can expect a fine fire that will produce enriched products. Oh, the love that drew salvation’s plan! Oh, the grace that brought it down it man! Oh, the mighty gulf that God did span at Calvary!
Jesus also mentioned that the sacrifice was seasoned with salt. My, what a difference a little salt can make in a recipe. Without salt food can be very bland and lack flavor. With salt even some foul tasting foods can please, but if the salt has been fouled nothing can help. In the time of the New Testament, salt was used to purify and cleanse as well as to preserve. If we offer ourselves with salt, we offer ourselves with purity and great reward can be expected. If however the salt put on our sacrifice is dirty because our lives are full of sin, then we can expect our sacrifice to be rejected.
We can choose to serve God or to serve ourselves. The choice is ours alone, no one can make the choice for us. A life given over completely to God is a life of joy and great reward. A life lived for self is a life lost, and forever unrecoverable. “Oh, the love that drew salvation’s plan! Oh, the grace that brought it down it man! Oh, the mighty gulf that God did span at Calvary!” Which choice do we want; full surrender to God or live for self? Give God your all. Make Him your forever King, King of everything in your life! Remember, we can do nothing without Jesus, His love is our true source of victory! The more we love Him the more we will want to please Him and will be able to do so!