He Ain't Lying to Us

 

My primary text for today’s message is from the 15^th chapter of St Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians. It is a familiar passage to many of you and is often the focus of messages in Protestant and Catholic churches during the Easter season during which we fix our attention on the bodily resurrection of Jesus from the dead.  Here is the text:

 

“Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain.”

 

I want to stop here only for a moment and emphasize Paul’s point. If Jesus was not physically resurrected from death, then our Christian faith is based on lies and falsehood. And, as Paul will say in a moment – if Jesus did not physically rise from death, we are without hope whatsoever for eternal life and the forgiveness of our sins.

 

Let me repeat that crucial point:  We are without hope for eternal life and the forgiveness of our sins.

 

Let me now continue with verse three: “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. After that He appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep; then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles; and last of all, as to one untimely born, He appeared to me also. For I am the least of the apostles, and not fit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. . . ¹² Now if Christ is preached that He has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is vain, your faith also is vain. . . [and] your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied.”

 

Some of you might wonder why I am making a point to preach once again on the resurrection of Jesus. I often mention His resurrection during the year – sometimes just in passing, sometimes going into a bit more detail. So why again today – this time devoting an entire sermon to this historical truth? Well, let me tell you why at the outset of my words today:

 

St Peter wrote his two letters around 66 AD. By this time the Church had spread well beyond Jerusalem and into the surrounding nations. But by this time several heresies were also making their way through Jerusalem and into the surrounding nations. One of those heresies denied the physical resurrection of the Christ. Satan knows very well – far better than anyone of flesh and blood can know – that without faith in the historicity of Christ’s resurrection, the Christianity taught by the apostles evaporates – along with any hope for eternal salvation.

 

And so, Peter, knowing the horrible and eternal fate that awaited those who denied the resurrection, wrote this in his second letter:

 

(2 Peter 1:12-15) “Therefore, I will always be ready to remind you of these things, even though you already know them, and have been established in the truth which is present with you. I consider it right, as long as I am in this earthly dwelling, to stir you up by way of reminder, knowing that the laying aside of my earthly dwelling is imminent, as also our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me. And I will also be diligent that at any time after my departure you will be able to call these things to mind.”

 

Now then, I do not have a premonition of my impending death, but Peter makes a very important point, especially knowing the human propensity to forget things we’ve been told – sometimes what we’ve been told over and over.  So, Peter wanted to make sure he told them the truth one more time, even though they already knew it. And I also want to make sure you hear it one more time – even though you already know it.

 

Peter was not alone in his fear for the fledgling Church. Paul, writing at around the same time warned the Christians at Colossae: (Colossians 2:8) “See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ. 

 

Jude also warned his audience: (Jude 4) “For certain persons have crept in unnoticed, those who were long beforehand marked out for this condemnation, ungodly persons who turn the grace of our God into licentiousness and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.”

 

Christian, Satan is still alive and well and walking among the churches, employing the same playbook he has been using since the Garden of Eden when he seduced Eve to doubt God's word. You will remember what he said to our first mother: (Genesis 3:1) - “Indeed, has God said, ‘You shall not eat from any tree of the garden’?”

 

In other words – and I paraphrase verse four – “Eve, do you really believe that nonsense? Surely, you will not die if you disobey Him.’

 

Fast forward to this century. As I researched for this sermon, I came across a 2019 article from ‘Crosswalk.com.* Serene Jones, president of Union Theological Seminary in New York, stated she “doesn’t believe in the bodily resurrection of Christ, the power of prayer, a literal heaven, or miracles.”  

 

When the seminary was founded in 1836, Professors were required to affirm they believed “the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament to be the word of God” and the “only infallible rule of faith and practice.” 

 

How times have changed. And Union Theological Seminary is only one of a growing list of seminaries where the physical resurrection of Christ is no longer a required doctrinal belief.  Therefore, it should surprise no one that a growing number of churches being pastored by graduates of such seminaries are now teaching their congregations to disbelieve that essential Biblical truth – a truth essential to salvation.

 

Yes, Satan is alive and well in our churches. And I will also remind you of Paul’s warning to the Corinthian church in 2 Corinthians 11:13-15: “For such men are false apostles, deceitful workers, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. No wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. Therefore it is not surprising if his servants also disguise themselves as servants of righteousness, whose end will be according to their deeds.”

 

Do you realize that if Jesus did not physically and bodily rise from the dead on the third day, if it’s all a lie, if it’s all made up, then you and I have no rational reason to trust ANY of the Scriptures. If the resurrection is a lie, then you have no justifiable reason to look forward to eternity with the Father. Indeed, the ONLY thing we would have in our future after death is eternal separation from the Holy, Holy God who will never receive any sin – even lingering sin – into His presence.

 

I can quote for you multiple texts in both the Old and New Testaments

which demonstrate that Jesus rose from the dead FOR our salvation. But if a person is disinclined to believe the Bible is the fully inerrant, infallible, and divinely inspired word of God – as is not taught in many seminaries and from church pulpits – then those texts are not going to satisfy him or her. And yet, if someone doesn’t believe in the biblical record of Christ’s resurrection, then these questions ought to be asked and answered:

 

“Are you certain that your sins have been forgiven? If your answer is yes, then on what basis do you believe that? If it based on the promises of God to the penitent, then why do you pick and choose what Scriptures you will believe and what you will ignore?

 

Christian, listen! We do not have the option or the right to choose what we will believe and what we will not believe. Faith in the 100% inerrancy, infallibility, and divine inspiration of God's word is an ‘all-or-nothing’ faith if we hope to face life AND death with a godly confidence.

 

Listen, please. If Jesus did not rise from the dead, then no one can reasonably have confidence that their sins are forgiven. Here again is Paul’s comment in 1 Corinthians 15:13-14 “But if there is no resurrection of the dead, not even Christ has been raised; ¹⁴ and if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is vain, your faith also is vain. . . [and] your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins.”

 

And here yet is another question we might ask those who deny the resurrection of Jesus: “Where is the body?”

 

The story of the resurrection that circulated among the apostles and the early church converts could have immediately been silenced within the first hour that it began. All that the Roman soldiers and the Jewish religious leaders needed to do was to produce the dead body of Jesus. They certainly knew where He was buried. They themselves had set a guard AND a seal across the tomb.

 

But the corpse of Jesus was nowhere to be found. And THAT is the question every resurrection denier has tried to answer for the last two thousand years. In fact, honest investigators – such as Josh McDowell (author of ‘Evidence that Demands a Verdict,” and “More than a Carpenter’), and Lee Strobel, (author of ‘The Case for Christ’) – set out to answer as they tried to expose the story as a myth.

 

At first, Strobel, who was a former legal editor for the Chicago Tribune, thought the Christian faith was merely a crutch for people who couldn’t face life on their own. After his wife became a Christian, Stroble spent the next 21 months investigating the resurrection claims of the New Testament and other historical documents from the era. At the end of his investigations he wrote in his book, “I was ambushed by the amount and quality of the evidence that Jesus is the unique Son of God.”

 

Where is the body? You will hear all kinds of absurd and even outrageous theories – none of which has ever, in 2000 years, held up to even the most superficial scrutiny. For example, some have fallen for the ridiculous claim that the disciples went to the wrong tomb – which is why they couldn’t find Jesus’ body. Yet, as I said a moment ago, the soldiers and the Jewish leaders knew exactly where Jesus was entombed.

 

Others like to say the disciples stole the body from the tomb. Now, how much sense does THAT make, knowing that each of the apostles could have avoided torturous martyrdom if they denied the resurrection since they all KNEW it was a lie.

 

There are other equally ridiculous ideas that have circulated for 2000 years as unbelievers tried and try to dissuade men and women from coming to faith, and perhaps at some time I will specifically address them. But for now, let me say this by way of encouragement:

 

People – whoever they are and regardless of their academic or theological degrees – no one rejects the existence God or the resurrection of the Son of God for intellectual reasons, despite their protestations. People reject the existence of God and the resurrection of the Son of God for moral reasons.

 

This is not MY opinion. It’s what Jesus Himself said. Listen to Him in John 3:19-20 “This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the Light and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed.”

 

When people embrace the stunningly absurd theories that try to do away with the reality of the resurrection, when they convince themselves – and make no mistake, most people who reject Christ’s resurrection HAVE convinced themselves – when they do that it is because they realize that if Jesus came back from the dead then that means He is God.

 

AND, if Jesus is not God, then He won’t be the one who judges them after death. And if He is not going to judge them after death, they can live how they choose without fear of a final judgment.

 

Rejecting the resurrection of Christ DESPITE the overwhelming historical evidence of His resurrection – rejecting the truth really makes a lot of sense for someone who wants to live life their way, and not God’s way.

 

Christian – The reason your sins are GONE is not only because of your confession of those sins to God. Your sins are gone because Jesus physically rose from the tomb. Here again is Paul in 1 Corinthians 15 – and by the way, if it has been a while since you read that chapter, I urge you to do so today. It is only one chapter, but it WILL bolster your faith in what God has done for us:

 

“But if there is no resurrection of the dead, not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, then . . . your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied.”

 

The historical evidence of Jesus’ physical resurrection is as verifiable as is the history of who won the baseball World Series last year. You do not need to back down from your proclamation and your unwavering belief in Christ’s resurrection – even if someone with a dozen Ph.Ds challenges you.

God's word will ALWAYS prove to be infallible, without error, and fully inspired by God Himself. You can stake your reputation and even your life on it – as our Christian brothers and sisters have done for 2,000 years.

Because Jesus physically rose from the grave, so ALSO will every true Christian rise from their own grave.

I will repeat that for emphasis: Because Jesus rose from the dead, YOU ALSO will be PHYSICALLY raised when King Jesus returns to earth on the last day.

That’s one reason it’s called the ‘gospel’ – which means, the ‘good news.’

My brothers and sisters – you can trust what God has told us in His word. He ain’t lying to us.

 

* https://www.crosswalk.com/headlines/contributors/michael-foust/seminary-president-admits-she-doesn-t-believe-in-heaven-miracles-or-christ-s-resurrection.html

How Times Have Changed

The context of this passage in 1 Corinthians 5 is the sexual perversion openly practiced by a member of the congregation, AND the acceptance of that perversion by other members of the Corinthian church.

 

Here is the text in part. It’s important to my point, so please read it thoughtfully: “For I, on my part, though absent in body but present in spirit, have already judged him who has so committed this, as though I were present. In the name of our Lord Jesus, when you are assembled, and I with you in spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus, I have decided to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of his flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.

 

Your boasting is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough? Clean out the old leaven . .  . Remove the wicked man from among yourselves.”

 

St Paul could not have been any clearer about their options. He ORDERED them to excommunicate the man openly living in sin.

 

Oh, but how things have changed in today’s church, haven’t they? We now permit men and women openly practicing sexual sins and perversions . . . we permit them to pastor churches, sing in choirs, teach Sunday School and Catechism classes, act as ushers in the church, assist with Holy Communion, and so on. We give flagrantly godless men and women positions of authority and service in the church, although they remain unchanged and unrepentant of their sins.

 

Christian!  Does that not GRIEVE your heart? Meditate awhile on the eventual results of such damnable, demonic examples that these people are to your children and grandchildren, your teens and young adults.

 

God was not ‘suggesting’ through Paul to be ‘tolerant’ of open sin in the congregation. God COMMANDED the church to exclude them from their fellowship.

 

Christian, if your church leadership refuses to obey God's words, then the only thing left for you to do is “come out from among them and be separate.” (See, for example, 2 Corinthias 6:14-18)

 

Christian, this is very serious stuff. Please, treat it seriously. The eternal destiny of your loved ones – indeed, even your OWN eternal destiny – might very well hang on your decision whether to follow God or the culture’s idea of ‘tolerance.’

 

 

Victory over Death

SERMON OCTOBER 27

VICTORY OVER DEATH

 

 

My text today comes from the apostle Paul’s second letter to the Christians at Corinth. Listen to his words, or read along with me:

 

2 Corinthians 4:16-5:1-4 “Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison, while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.

 

“For we know that if the earthly tent which is our house is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For indeed in this house we groan, longing to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven, inasmuch as we, having put it on, will not be found naked. For indeed while we are in this tent, we groan, being burdened, because we do not want to be unclothed but to be clothed, so that what is mortal will be swallowed up by life.”

 

Let me repeat that last verse for emphasis: “We do not want to be unclothed but to be clothed, so that what is mortal will be swallowed up by life.”

 

I could give you the statistics of how many people – even those in church pews – are afraid to die. But I won’t bother to do that because if YOU are afraid of death, then for you that statistic is 100%. But the question about who is afraid of dying is a reasonable question, especially in this sanctuary because – and I am only guessing now – the average age of those living here at Ashwood is mid-eighties. And for us, death is not so much a distant eventuality as it is a much closer reality.

How many of our friends, family, and acquaintances have died in the last 12 months? Some of you here are ill with a disease that will likely take your life. You might wonder if you even have twelve months to live. And I also know many of you are relatively healthy, and you expect to live not only 12 months, but even another several years.

 

But of the dozens of men and women who have lived and died at Ashwood since it opened in 2015, most of them were relatively healthy when they suddenly died. It was that way for my mother. She ate dinner on July 31. I was told she joked with some of the women in the elevator on her way up to her apartment. And during the night she suddenly died of a brain aneurysm.

 

I don’t want to get any further into today’s message before first assuring everyone that this is a message of HOPE – hope as it is defined by the New Testament writers. Hope, in the New Testament, means to have a ‘confident expectation’ about something God has promised. And so, my goal for today’s message is to leave each of you with a “confident expectation” of God's promise to all of His true children regarding death and what follows afterward. A confident expectation of a ‘forever’ joy, peace, love, and life awaiting you on the other side of the grave.

 

The important phrase I just used is ‘God's true children.’ The New Testament defines God's true children as ONLY those who have placed their obedient faith in the sacrificial and atoning work of Jesus Christ who died on Calvary’s cross and rose from the dead three days later. If you are NOT living today within that specific definition of what it means to be true children of God, then I implore you, please pay attention to this message because the God who loves you ‘to the moon and back’ (to use a modern colloquialism) – the God who loves you to the moon and back wants to appeal to you through this message one more time. Perhaps for you the last time.

 

We all need to know that there are only two groups of people living on this planet: The Lost, and The Rescued.

 

The Lost are those who have willfully rejected Jesus Christ as their only Lord. They’ve never placed themselves under His absolute authority, having confessed to Him their sins, following Him in baptism, and given Him their hearts.

 

OR, the Lost have done all those things with their mouths and in their minds, but never REALLY in their hearts. They are among the many of whom Jesus spoke in Luke 13, They will say to the Lord on that day: We ate and drank in Your presence, and You taught in our streets’; and He will say, ‘I tell you, I do not know where you are from; Depart from Me, all you evildoers.’  In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” (Luke 13:25-28).

 

But for those who are in the second group – the Rescued – Scripture promises you that you have NO reason to fear death. None. Zero.

The apostle Paul, speaking of God the Father to the Christians at Colossae – and the Christians here at Ashwood Meadows: (Colossian 1:13-14): “He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

Christian – I hope you caught that. Because of your relationship with Jesus, the Father has ALREADY transferred you into the kingdom of Jesus. Already. Not some future experience, but now. This moment. And all you and I are waiting for is to close our eyes in death when we will IMMEDIATELY open them in that eternal kingdom.

What is there to fear in THAT?

Now listen to what Paul said about our immediate entrance into God's eternal kingdom: (2 Corinthians 5:1-8) “For we know that if the earthly tent which is our house is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. . . . Therefore, being always of good courage, and knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord— for we walk by faith, not by sight— we are of good courage, I say, and prefer rather to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord.”

For many children on the first day of kindergarten, the little boys and girls are full of excited anticipation. Many, to be sure, are nervous. They don’t know what to expect. Some will cling to mom or dad who brings them to the school classroom. Some will cry out loud when mom or dad leaves them with their teacher.

 

I think death for the Christian will be something like that. We will lie on our deathbed, knowing the proverbial sands in the hourglass are rapidly disappearing. We might be a little nervous, but when we remember God's promises to the Christian – only a few of which I have quoted today – when we remember His PROMISES as we draw our last breath, we will have every good reason to take our last breath with excited anticipation of closing our eyes in death and suddenly opening them in eternal life.

But there are those in the pews who might argue within themselves, “I am such a bad person. You don’t know what all I have done in the past. How horrible my life was. How can God really forgive me?”

Well, let’s let the infallible, inerrant, and wholly true and inspired word of God answer that question. Here is what God tells us through Paul’s letter to the church at Corinth – a church FILLED with those with sordid pasts:

 

“Don’t you know that the unrighteous will not inherit God’s kingdom? Do not be deceived: No sexually immoral people, idolaters, adulterers, or anyone practicing homosexuality, no thieves, greedy people, drunkards, verbally abusive people, or swindlers will inherit God’s kingdom. And some of you used to be like this. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.” (1 Corinthians 6:9-11, HCSB) 

Please – all of you seated in this sanctuary, please hear this. This is important: Despite the litany of damnable sins Paul cites in the text I just read – the Holy Spirit immediately focuses our attention on the good news in verse 11: “But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.” 

I researched the meaning of the Greek words Paul used in this text and were translated into English. “You were washed,” means the person’s sins were completely, thoroughly, utterly cleansed through their initial baptism and ongoing confession and repentance of their sins.

 

“You were sanctified,” means God had purified them from those sins. He Himself had pronounced them ‘pure,’ set them apart for His work. He declared them to be holy because they were covered with the sacrificial blood of Jesus.

 

And finally, Paul tells them, “You were justified,” meaning, God had pronounced them to be righteous, innocent, and without guilt. And if GOD Himself pronounces us to be without guilt – He means what He says and He says what He means. God declares the penitent sinner to be righteous and innocent and without guilt. Period. Full stop. End of sentence. Don’t argue with Him.

For the true Christian, death is like walking through the door leading out of your apartment. THAT is what the death of the body is like for the Rescued, for the Christian, the faithful follower of Christ – walking through the door leading from this life into life eternal. Immediately in the presence of God. No intermediate steps. No such thing as what some call ‘soul-sleep.’ No further cleansing or purging of our sins – just absent, and then present with God.

 

So, why would the Rescued fear death when what we have waiting for us on the other side of that door is what St John wrote for us in the last chapters of Revelation? Eternal health. Eternal safety from our enemies. Eternal joy where there is no longer any death, or sickness, or loss or pain.

 

Listen! Most of you have read the end of the Book! And if you haven’t, open your Bible today and read those last two chapters of Revelation. Then turn back to the prophet Isaiah in the Old Testament. Here is Isaiah 25:8-9:

“He will swallow up death for all time, and the Lord God will wipe tears away from all faces, and He will remove the reproach of His people from all the earth; For the Lord has spoken. And it will be said in that day, “Behold, this is our God for whom we have waited that He might save us. This is the Lord for whom we have waited; Let us rejoice and be glad in His salvation.”

Oh, hear that again. Right now, we are on this side of eternity’s door waiting for the fulfilment of the promise our Holy God made to all who are His by faith in Christ. And then Isaiah tells us by the same infallible Holy Spirit, God will swallow up death for all time and wipe all of our tears away. Oh, yes! We will rejoice and be glad in His salvation.

 

You might remember the history of Lazarus and his sisters Mary and Martha. You’ll find the story in John 11:21-27. The text tells us Lazarus had been dead four days by the time Jesus arrived. Martha ran to meet Jesus when she’d heard He had arrived. We pick up the text in verse 21: “Martha then said to Jesus, “Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died. Even now I know that whatever You ask of God, God will give You.” Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” Martha said to Him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me will live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die. Do you believe this?” She said to Him, “Yes, Lord; I have believed that You are the Christ, the Son of God, even He who comes into the world.”

 

Most people our age living in America know the name Harry Houdini. He was a famous escape artist in the early 1900s. He could free himself from handcuffs, chains, ropes and straitjackets, sometimes even when underwater. He escaped from sealed coffins, riveted boilers and a variety of other ‘inescapable’ contraptions. On Halloween night in 1926, as he lay dying from a ruptured appendix, Houdini told his wife that if there was any way out of death, he would find it.

 

What Houdini did not know – as most of humanity does not know, even some in church pews and pulpits – NO ONE has the power to conquer death except the Son of God whose death on Calvary finally and forever conquered death.

 

Jesus raised Himself from death, and it is Jesus alone who will raise every man and woman who has ever died – including Harry Houdini. Christ will raise them all from death. The Bible tells us some He will raise to eternal life; Some He will raise to eternal damnation. And it is only what men and women do in THIS life with Jesus that will determine to what destiny they are raised.

 

To you who have truly made Jesus Lord of your heart, as well as of your mouth and mind, listen one more time to the infallible words of St Paul to all faithful believers. Listen to the words of God that should generate a confident expectation of what lies ahead for each of us when we close our eyes for the last time:

 

(1 Corinthians 15:50-58) “Now I say this, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Behold, I tell you a mystery; we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For this perishable must put on the imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality. But when this perishable will have put on the imperishable, and this mortal will have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, “Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law; ⁵⁷ but thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

 

Are you afraid to die? Please, if you are and not yet a true child of God, ask God's forgiveness of your sins. Make the decision today to place your trust in Jesus’ sacrificial death to pay the penalty your sins so richly deserve. Be baptized. And make it your goal to obey His commandments for the rest of your life.

 

And if you’re already a true child of God, then be of good courage, KNOWING that when you are absent from the body, you are home with the Lord.

 

You can take courage in that because we walk by faith, and not by sight.

 

All We Have Left

 I minister at a local memory-care facility where the residents are in varying degrees of dementia. None can safely live alone.

Paula attends my church services each week. I mention her specifically because of what she asks me each week. Before I play an old hymn on my Bluetooth speaker system, I start our service with prayer, and then read a short verse or two of Scripture that will form the basis for my brief words of encouragement or exhortation.

It is after I read the text from the Bible that Paula always interrupts me with the question: “Where is that in the Bible?”

Oh! I love it when she asks that question. It tells me she was raised in a church that urged the congregation to not only read the Bible, but to also study them. Her weekly question demonstrates that even in her slowly fading memories, her earlier training to verify with Scripture what she was being told still remains active and alert.

But – what about you? What is your relationship with the Scriptures? Do you read and study God's words to you? Do you memorize portions of His love letters to you?

Only God knows our futures, but the time might come for any of us when our memories fade nearly into oblivion. And if you are ever in such a situation as a memory-care facility – wouldn’t you want to be like Paula, still seeking to know, “Where that is in the Bible”?

Please. Do not neglect the daily reading and studying and memorizing God's word. There might come a time when God's word in your heart is all you have left to cling to.

Who Will Deliver Us?

 

My message today comes from the last verses of Romans chapter seven and into the first verse of chapter eight. Please follow along as I read:

 

(Romans 7:15, 19-25a, 8:1-4) “For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate . . . ¹⁹ For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want. But if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me. I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wants to do good. For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, but I see a different law in [my body], waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my [body]. Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! . . . .8:1 Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 

 

By his own admission, Paul was not a ‘stained-glass’ saint. He never walked the streets of Europe, Asia, or Jerusalem with a halo glowing around his head. Not at all. Paul was a sinner like everyone else.

 

Please pay attention. This is important, especially because of its application to our lives in Christ. Paul openly admits in this text that he struggled with his sin-nature – just as everyone else on planet earth today struggles. Listen again to what caused him such desperate grief: “For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate . . . For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, but I see a different law in [my body], waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my [body]. Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? 

 

Have you ever felt that way – discouraged and frustrated so often by the things that go through your mind and out of your mouth? I’ve been walking with Jesus since December 1972. Nearly 52 years. And hardly a day goes by that I don’t chasten myself for something I KNEW to be wrong, but I did it or said it anyway.

 

I think Paul’s willingness to admit his daily struggle with sin – both to himself and publicly through this letter – I think THAT is part of the KEY to understanding his usefulness for Christ. He had a good and correct grasp of his sin-nature, and how his sin-nature left him in DESPERATE need of God's ongoing mercy and pardon.

 

It's not that Paul in his ‘before-Christ’ life wasn’t living according to the Law of God. Listen to what he wrote to the Christians at Philippi: (Philippians 3:4b-11) “If anyone else has a mind to put confidence in the flesh, I far more: circumcised the eighth day, of the nation of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the Law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to the righteousness which is in the Law, found blameless.”

 

But then he continues to tell them what he had learned in his ‘after-Christ’ life: “But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.”

 

Prior to meeting Christ, Paul THOUGHT himself to be righteous before God. But now, after meeting the Lord and having his spiritual eyes opened, he saw himself as he truly was without Christ Jesus: Wretched. Some synonyms of the word are ‘despicable’ and ‘deplorable.’

 

That’s an interesting word to come out of the mouth of a Christian – and especially one such as the great apostle Paul. Or is it? I’ve read commentators say that this section of Romans describes Paul BEFORE his Damascus Road experience. I think such an idea is a dangerously wrong-headed attempt to remove the humanity of this great man. If you take the time to look at the verb tenses Paul uses in this text, you’ll notice they are all in the present tense. In other words, Paul was declaring his CURRENT condition. He was telling his readers that he is NOW wretched. He is NOW struggling with wrong when he wants to do right. He is asking who will NOW deliver him from his body of death.

 

I believe Paul used the word ‘wretched’ to refer to himself because of how terrible he felt about how often he lost the battle with sin. But we need to pause here for some important application and guidance from Scripture. Paul FELT himself wretched, but as he explains elsewhere in this letter, he KNEW God saw him differently. For example, here is what he wrote in chapter five:

 

(Romans 5:1,7, 9) “Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ . .  . Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him.” 

 

Although Paul FELT wretched, he ALSO knew that because of his ongoing repentance, God had forgiven him, God had JUSTIFIED him, God had declared him to be without guilt.

 

By the way – have YOU ever felt so badly about your own sins as to call yourself ‘wretched’? If not, then perhaps you need to check your relationship with the Holy God. And you might memorize this text in 1 John 1:8-10 – “If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us.”

 

Please hear this again: If the great apostle Paul knew he was NOT a stained-glass saint, then we should not fool ourselves into thinking we are better than Paul. To think that is to run the real risk of our pride interfering with what God wants to do with us. And one of the slippery signs of pride in our life is evidenced by how easily we justify and rationalize our sins instead of confessing and repenting of them.

 

And by the way, when was the last time you asked God to reveal to your mind the length and breadth and height and depth of your sins? It is only when we recognize that our sins – ANY OF OUR SINS – are not merely misdemeanors against the Holy God of the universe, but each sin is tantamount to treason against our Holy Creator – only then will we begin to understand Paul’s most mournful cry: “Wretched man that I am!” And only THEN will we also begin to understand why he said what he said next: “Who will set me free from the body of this death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!"

 

When Paul asked, ‘Who will deliver me from the body of this death’ he was not asking a rhetorical question. He asked a question to which he already knew the answer – just like the psalmist who wrote: (Psalm 121:1-3) “I will lift up my eyes to the mountains; From where shall my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. He will not allow your foot to slip; He who keeps you will not slumber.”

 

Who will deliver Paul from his wretchedness? It is the same one who alone can and will deliver you and me from our wretchedness.

 

Our help, our rescue, our pardon, our forgiveness, our salvation, our deliverance comes ONLY from the One who made heaven and earth. No one else can rescue us from our wretchedness. Not our education. Not the Church. Not our good works. Not religious philosophies or well-meaning opinions.

 

Only the One who made heaven and earth can rescue us from ourselves, and from the grip of sin. God alone can forgive us and change us and wipe away all of our sins. Every last one of them. And THAT is also why Paul tells his readers only a few verses later: “Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 

 

Did you get that?  NO condemnation. No guilty verdict from the Judge of all the earth. Oh! How can anyone realize the utter depth and height and breadth and length of the promise?  Those who live and then die ‘in Christ Jesus’ will never, throughout ETERNITY, face God's wrath for their sins, however minor or major those sins have been. “No condemnation for those in Christ Jesus” is Almighty God's VOW to receive every penitent sinner who follows Christ. There will be no stopovers in a fictitious place called Purgatory.

 

 

As I prepared this message of God's patience with us and His forgiveness, I thought of the lyrics of a song by Kathy Trocolli. I’ll play the song at the end of this message, but I want you to hear some of the more salient lyrics that speak to my heart. I hope they will encourage you, also:

 

Caught again, Your faithless friend/Don't You ever tire of hearing what a fool I've been?/Guess I should pray, but what can I say?/Oh, it hurts to know the hundred times I've caused You pain/Though 'Forgive me' sounds so empty when I never change/Yet You stay and say, "I love you still"/

Forgiving me time and time again

It's Your stubborn love that never lets go of me/I don't understand how You can stay/Perfect love embracing the worst in me/How I long for Your stubborn love

But what does it mean to be ‘IN’ Christ Jesus? Well, first of all, no one can be in Jesus unless we know who the real Jesus is. And we cannot know who He is unless we believe what the inerrant, infallible, and fully inspired Word of God tells us who He is.

 

Regardless of what most of humanity will opine, Jesus is not a philosophy, or a set of church doctrines, or a concoction of myths and spurious history.

Jesus is Almighty Jehovah God who took on the flesh of a human in the Virgin’s womb, lived a sinless life, died on a cross as the ONLY atoning sacrifice that God the Father will accept as payment for our sins, and then raised Himself from the grave. Listen to what Jesus said of Himself in this regard: (John 10:18-19) “No one has taken [My life] from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This commandment I received from My Father.”

 

C.S. Lewis famously said it well: “I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him [that is, Christ]: ‘I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.’ That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic–on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg–or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse…. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come up with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”

 

But there is more to being ‘in Christ’ than just knowing Him from Scripture. We can’t be ‘in Christ’ unless we ALSO know Jesus as our Lord. And what does it mean that we make Jesus the Lord of our life and lifestyle? It means that we fully – not partially – strive to obey Him in whatever it is He wants us to do or not do.

 

That’s essentially what it means to say, “Jesus is my Lord.” Surely one of the more frightening warnings Jesus gave us is this text in Matthew 7:21-23 “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter. Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.’”

 

Those who sat in the churches of Laodicea believed a dangerous idea that God was okay with them. But God was NOT okay with them. Unlike Paul’s abject humility before God, and his open shame over his sins, those who attended church at Laodicea had none of those qualities. Contrast Paul’s ‘wretched man that I am” with what Jesus accused those in the Laodicean church (Revelation 3:17-19):

 

“Because you say, “I am rich, and have become wealthy, and have need of nothing,” and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked, I advise you to buy from Me gold refined by fire so that you may become rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself, and that the shame of your nakedness will not be revealed; and eye salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see. Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline; therefore be zealous and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.”

 

Let me close this message with this last comment: Luke records a conversation between Jesus and a Pharisee with whom Jesus was having dinner. While they were eating, a sinful woman entered the house and began weeping in His presence, wetting the Lord’s feet with her tears and wiping them with her hair. The Pharisee was offended and said to himself that if Jesus was who He said He was, He’d never let that sinful woman even touch Him.

 

The Lord then said to the Pharisee: (Luke 7:41-47) “A moneylender had two debtors: one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty.  When they were unable to repay, he graciously forgave them both. So which of them will love him more?” [The Pharisee] answered and said, “I suppose the one whom he forgave more.” And He said to him, “You have judged correctly.” Turning toward the woman, He said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave Me no water for My feet, but she has wet My feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You gave Me no kiss; but she, since the time I came in, has not ceased to kiss My feet. You did not anoint My head with oil, but she anointed My feet with perfume. For this reason I say to you, her sins, which are many, have been forgiven, for she loved much; but he who is forgiven little, loves little.”

 

I believe Paul loved Jesus as much as he did because Paul KNEW from where he’d come. And Paul KNEW how wretched he remained because of his sin-nature. But Paul ALSO knew that God loved him so very much as to completely erase every one of his sins.

 

“He who is forgiven much, loves much. He who is forgiven little, loves little.”

 

Of how much has God forgiven you? Of some misdemeanors? Or of wretched treason? I hope you will let the Holy Spirit speak deeply into your heart, because only when you and I admit we are treasonous sinners will that text in chapter eight mean to us what it SHOULD mean to us: “No condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.”

 

God LOVES you. God loves me. Calvary’s cross is undeniable evidence of His ongoing love for us. May the Holy Spirit, please, Lord, cause us to humble ourselves before the Savior’s feet, washing them – as it were – with our tears and wiping them with our hair.

 

Oh, how He loves you and me.