Saints By Calling - [1 Corinthians 1:1-9]

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The old saying goes that a preacher has to be ready to preach, pray, or die at a moment's notice. We are now going to see if that's true.
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Timmy Goddard is having an allergic reaction, and Scott is on his way to the hospital.
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So the first thing we're going to do is bow our heads in prayer. Our Heavenly Father, we confess that we do not understand why you bring emergencies into our lives, but one reason is certainly that we learned to trust you better.
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And so, Father, we would hold up before you tonight little Timmy Goddard. We don't know the details, what's wrong, but there's something amiss.
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And so, Father, we ask that you guide the hands of the doctors and the nurses and those who will give care, that you will also lay your hand and your peace that passes understanding upon Scott and Joanna as they worry about their child quite naturally.
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And so, Father, we would hold him up to you and hold the entire family up. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Turn with me, if you will, to 1
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Corinthians 1. And I get to preach without a tie and everything.
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I tell you, it's wow. But the ceiling is not falling that I can tell. So here we go.
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I'm also going to have to get another set of sermon notes now to carry in my Bible. But anyway, Paul starts off.
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Paul, called to be an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God and Sososthenes, our brother, unto the church of God, which is at Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints with all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ, our
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Lord, both theirs and ours. Grace be to you and peace from God, our
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Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God always on your behalf for the grace of God, which is given you by Jesus Christ, that in everything you are enriched by him in all utterance and in all knowledge, even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you, so that you come behind in no gift, waiting for the coming of our
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Lord Jesus Christ, who shall also confirm you unto the end, that you may be blameless in the day of our
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Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful by whom you were called into the fellowship of his son,
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Jesus Christ, our Lord. Now, Paul, all of you are familiar with the first Corinthians, Paul's letter to the
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Corinthians, in which he is going to spend most of his time in this book, taking the Corinthians to task for their very severe failings and the living of the
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Christian life. But first, he starts off writing to the church of God.
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And so he starts by telling them whose church this is and who they are and what their position in Christ is.
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Christians are Hagias, the set -apart ones. They are set apart from sin.
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They are made holy in Jesus Christ. So the
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Christian is holy because he has been made holy in response to his trust in Jesus.
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For both he that sanctifyeth and they who are sanctified are all of one, for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren,
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Hebrews 2 .11. Paul is going to start off with these people before he takes them out to the woodshed.
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He's going to spend a little time telling them who they are and what they are supposed to be and what they are positionally.
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Now, their practice lacks very serious failings in the Corinthians' practice.
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But first, I'm going to tell you, fellow Corinthians, who you are. And, in fact, that's going to give you the foundation for why
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I am going to take you out to the woodshed. It's because this is who you are, but you're not acting like that.
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When I was a teenager and would go off on a date or what have you, my mother would not go through this long list of do's and don'ts.
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The list, of course, was much too long. Anyway, what she would say as I was going out the door was, remember who you are.
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Just remember who you are. Well, Paul is saying that to the Christians at Corinth, the
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Corinthians. Remember who you are. Because Christians are saints by calling. They are saints because God called them.
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The Bible is very clear. No one comes to Jesus on his own. God in eternity past has chosen for his purposes and by his criteria a select set of sheep that are part of his flock.
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And Jesus says, every one of those sheep, God has given me. And they will all come to me, and I'm not going to lose a single one of them, and I am going to give them back to the
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Father. And so if you're a saint, you're a saint because he called you.
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You're a saint because he chose you. You're a saint because he picked you out.
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And don't think that God is in any way frivolous in this.
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Sometimes we get the idea that just because God did not choose to tell us what his criteria were that he didn't have any.
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I assure you he had criteria. We know that because that is characteristic of God.
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That's what God has showed us about himself. He is a God of reason. He does not do anything for no reason.
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It's just that he told us what his criteria were not. He said it's not for anything in yourself.
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It's not because you're prettier or handsomer or more powerful or smarter or on and on and on we could go, richer, whatever it is.
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But he chose. If we are saved, we are saved, and it's because God in eternity past by an act of his sovereign will chose us.
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That's the doctrine of election. Salvation is completely the act of sovereign grace. We have nothing to do with it.
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Man plays no part in it other than to sin, as Virgin put it. God says,
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I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy. God has chosen whom he will save and when he will save and where he will save and the human agent of that salvation.
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All of those things are his sovereign choice. Salvation is not a synergistic process.
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It is a monogistic process. We don't cooperate with God and then we get zapped somehow.
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It is God's sovereign choice to deal with us. And he works a work of grace in our lives and brings us to himself and regenerates us and gives us a new nature.
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And then we react according to that nature. We always act according to our nature.
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When we are sinners and fallen, we are acting according to our fallen nature. Is the will free?
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Well, no, not really. The will is free to do anything that its nature permits. And so we act like what we are, which is fallen human beings.
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And then once he has worked his work in our lives, then we react according to our new natures.
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Certainly not all the time, but we do that. And as life goes by, more and more often, we react according to our new nature and that's called sanctification.
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But Christians are set apart. They're cleansed. They're perfected in the sun. They give a new nature, a divine nature.
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They possess all things related to life and godliness. He says, according to his divine power, hath he given us to all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue, by which are given us exceedingly great and precious promises, that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.
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2 Peter 1, 3 and 4. Now, Paul is going to spend almost the entire letter of Corinthians taking the
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Corinthians to task for unholy living, tolerance of sin, factionalism and error.
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But he starts off by explaining who they are in Christ. Sainthood is a fact.
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It's a fact. And that is the basis for Paul's exhortation to holy living.
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It is pointless to exhort those who are not saints to live holy.
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Number one, they can't. Number two, they have no desire to. You'll get just as much chance by going out and preaching to the headstones in the cemetery across the road there.
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So, his message is summed up as this is who you are in Christ.
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Now, act like who you are. Act like who you are. He goes in, starting in verse 4, he starts into the past benefits of grace.
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First, there's the grace of salvation. He uses terms like, I thank my
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God always on your behalf for the grace of God which is given you by Jesus Christ. It's given and it's confirmed.
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And those are Greek -era stances in the original. That is action completed in the past with results or consequences that continue in the future.
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God has taken action. 100 % an act of God's grace. There's nothing of man in this.
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We are dead in trespasses and sins. Without God's drawing us to himself, we are without hope because we cannot act independently of our nature.
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See, the Bible has two messages primarily. He said, first of all, we're sinners.
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And we need, we have, there is a holy and righteous God and we have offended him mightily.
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What can we do to set ourselves, to fit ourselves, to stand before him?
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But the answers at first glance are pretty disturbing because the
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Bible says two things. You can't come because you're dead, number one.
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And the dead, what's the characteristic of the dead? They do not act independently, right? Once a person is dead, they just lay there.
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They don't get up. They don't move. They don't react to stimulus. You can sit there and stick pins in the foot of a dead person and nothing's going to happen.
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They don't react. So you don't come, you can't come because you're dead. The second thing is you won't come because you're a rebel.
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You are in rebellion against Jesus. You are in rebellion against God. We shout with those at the cross, we will not have this man to reign over us.
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And so you hear objections, particularly to the doctrine of election.
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Well, what if someone wants to come but can't because God didn't elect them?
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Isn't going to happen. Isn't going to happen. Left to ourselves, we will reject 100 % of the time.
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100 % of the people will reject God 100 % of the time unless he works a work in our lives first.
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Secondly, grace cannot coexist with guilt. Grace is unconditional. Grace is unmerited.
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Grace is undeserved. Grace is permanent forgiveness. Our sins are removed.
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They are no longer covered. The Old Testament sacrificial system that the Israelites followed, all of that was pictures.
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This is a picture and a type of what God is going to do for you when he sends his son.
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Here's a type. Here's a picture. Here's something for you to follow. But none of that could take away your sin.
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None of that can permanently remove your sin. But the sacrifice of Jesus Christ takes our sins away.
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Our sins are removed. The Bible says, as far as the east is from the west. Now think about that.
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As far as the east is from the west. If you start off going east, do you ever wind up going west?
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Ever? You keep going east all the time. That's why he didn't say as far as the north is from the south.
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You go north long enough and you'll be going south because you'll cross over the pole. But not so going east and west.
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He is truly trying to say your sins are removed. You can't get there from here. And you can't even by going somewhere else to start.
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And so our sins, while they should concern us and our sins should grieve us, we should have a godly sorrow over our sin because it offends
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God. That's blessed are they that mourn. That's what Jesus is talking about as one of the characteristics of the
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Christian life. Is that our sins, which we still commit, they grieve us because they offend
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God. But this overwhelming guilt over sin has no place in the life of a
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Christian. Because our sins have been removed. We are dealing with an omniscient
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God. Never forget that. And so exactly what sin is it that you're going to commit that would cause
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God to call off the deal? He saved us knowing every sin we would ever commit.
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When Jesus hung on the cross, he knew you and he knew every sin you would ever commit.
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So there is nothing that you're going to do that's going to cause Jesus to say, Wait a minute.
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Man, if I'd had any idea you were going to do that. The deal is off. There's none of that.
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He already knew. And so grace cannot coexist with guilt.
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Grace operates only where there is sin. If men were not fallen, there would be no need for grace.
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But man is born fallen. We have a little sinner right down here in her basket.
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But you know what? She is already a candidate for grace. She was born that way.
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She is a candidate for grace as soon as she draws her first breath. And so Adam's fall is passed to all mankind through the fathers.
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And the result is there is none righteous. No, not one. No one seeks after God. You hear sermons sometime that, you know, the world is crying out for Jesus.
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No, it isn't. Guarantee you the world is not crying out for Jesus. The Bible tells us there is none that doeth good.
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Not even you, Paul says. There's none that seeks after righteousness.
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And David said, Behold, I was shaped in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.
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I was born a sinner, David says. Psalm 51. And God is holy.
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God is holy and cannot ignore sin. Sin must be punished. And the required punishment is death.
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Someone has to die. Sin has been committed and somebody has to die.
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There has to be the shedding of blood. And so it's either your blood that has to be shed for your sins or someone who is qualified to substitute for you.
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Now, Christ died for our sins. Christ died for our sins.
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That is the doctrine of atonement, the doctrine of expiation, the doctrine of propitiation all wrapped into one.
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Christ was qualified to die in our place because he himself had no sin.
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He had nothing to have to offer himself for.
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He did not sin. He lived a holy life for 33 years here on this earth.
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And so he could die in our place. He could take upon himself our sins as if they were his.
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And then he could credit to our account his righteousness as if it were ours.
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The saved are forever free of guilt. Grace is continuously dispensed to the believer.
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And God's free gift is completely and permanently overruling guilt.
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Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our
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Lord Jesus Christ by whom we also have access by faith into this grace in which we stand and rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.
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And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also, knowing that tribulation worketh patience,
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Romans 5, 1 to 3. We have been justified. And that is a legal term.
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That is a legal term. We have been declared to be something legally. We stand before God legally righteous because we have been declared righteous.
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The righteousness of his son is credited to our account. It's not ours.
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We didn't earn it. But it's just like from time to time my father will give me money.
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And he will credit that to my account. It appears in my bank account. I didn't earn it. I have no legal right to claim it.
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But once it's in my account, it's just like I earned it. It's mine to spend.
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It's mine to do as I wish. And so on a much higher level, Jesus' righteousness is imputed to our account.
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And it becomes ours so that when we stand before God, he doesn't see our unrighteousness.
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He sees the righteousness of his own son. And he recognizes that for what it is.
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And we are pronounced righteous. Now, notice what
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Paul said in Romans 2. We have peace with God, with our
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Lord Jesus Christ. And James White has made the point a couple of times when he's been here that that is one question.
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That is a very effective question when you're dealing with individuals who are trying to work their way to heaven.
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Do you have peace with God? Be honest with yourself.
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Do you really have peace with God? And if you say yes, then the next question is on what basis do you have this peace?
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What gives you the right to claim that you are at peace with God? Because only Christians can be at peace with God.
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Otherwise, if we are trying to work our way to heaven, if we are trying to cooperate with God or we are trying to do something, whatever it is, we're trying to function our way to heaven there, how do you know when you've functioned enough?
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You're never going to know. You're never going to know. If you talk to a lot of the world's religions, when you talk, you ask the question, when can
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I know that I'm going to go to paradise or heaven or whatever they call it?
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And the answer keeps coming back, well, you never really know until you get there because you don't know if you did enough.
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You don't know if you really made it or not. And what do we say? We say it's a finished work.
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It's a finished work. It's been deposited to your account. There's no issue about it.
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And Paul is talking to the Corinthians, for crying out loud, who he's going to spend the entire rest of the book dealing with all of the things that they need to have dealt with.
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And yet, right now, he's telling them, you know, you are believers. You have peace with God.
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Now, some Christians cheat themselves of the earthly benefits of grace. They are consumed with a misplaced sense of guilt that renders them almost immobile in life.
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We are guilty, no question about it, but that guilt has been born. The penalty has been paid.
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And we stand before God guiltless and holy. As the hymn writer put it, at the cross, at the cross, when
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I first saw the light and the burden of my heart rolled away. We are clothed in his righteousness, and we can stand faultless before his throne.
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The next thing, grace cannot coexist with obligation. Grace is a free gift.
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It is totally without obligation. It is 100 % of God. Everything pertaining to salvation comes from him.
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God renders us totally, grace renders us totally indebted to God, but totally without debt.
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If you could follow that. Grace renders us completely indebted to God, but totally without debt.
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We cannot pay for salvation, not before it, not afterwards. And grace cannot coexist with human merit.
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Grace is not offered to good people, quote, unquote. What does
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God say? I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy. I choose. The choice is mine,
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God says. And there are going to be people in heaven. There are going to be two things that surprise us when we all get to heaven.
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Who is there and who is not? Maybe three things. We are there, you know. But at least two other things.
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Who is there and who is not? You know, you look around. Well, I certainly thought so -and -so was going to be here.
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No place to find. And what is so -and -so doing here? You know, those two things.
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Because it is God's choice. It is God's choice. Human goodness is always measured relative to other people.
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But God measures by an absolute standard. God measures by himself. And he says there is none good, no, not one.
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There is nobody to whom salvation is owed. God sovereignly chooses those to whom he will show mercy.
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God says whom he will and when he will. Because it pleases him to do so and to bring glory to himself.
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There is no glory involved in this whole process except to God. There is nothing that man can do to merit divine favor.
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There is no system of works, no system of penance, no amount of giving or charitable activity that matters to God in the slightest.
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He is not impressed. He is not impressed. He is not impressed with anything we do. The only thing that impresses
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God is what he has done. The workman earns his pay.
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Every two weeks, my company deposits a check into my account.
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But they have never yet come to me and said, you know, we really think you're a really great guy.
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And we just like you so much that we're going to put this money in your account. Boy, I tell you what.
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No. It's because my company and I made an agreement that I would work and they would pay me so much every two weeks.
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And if they don't, I can go to court. Because what? They owe me. Because I've worked, therefore they owe me.
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I earned that money. But, you see, God doesn't work like that.
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You have no claim whatsoever on God. At no time can we go before Almighty God and say, you have to save me.
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You have to dispense grace into my direction. Because I've done this, I've done that, I've done the other thing. It doesn't work like that.
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Our sin makes it impossible to earn salvation. And grace makes it unnecessary to earn salvation.
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We owe God love, devotion, all that we are, all that we have, out of gratitude for so great salvation.
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We owe him nothing out of a sense of obligation. Now, what does
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Jesus tell everyone that came to follow him? Take up the cross and follow me. We don't want to imply here that salvation is something that you can take without it having the most profound effect upon your life.
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God is not a fire escape. I've been thinking about the verse the last couple of weeks.
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Be not deceived, God is not mocked. And one of the ways you mock him is to say, oh,
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I would just love to have salvation. Yeah, I want to go to heaven when I die. Of course, I don't want to do anything here.
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I don't want to have any claims that you might have on my life affect me here. So I'll just go along and I'll live my life the way
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I want here, but then I'll be happy to take salvation by and by. It doesn't work like that.
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Jesus said, if you're going to follow me, you're going to take up the cross now and you're going to follow me.
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But don't get the idea that you're paying for your salvation, is the point that Paul is making here.
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Then he gives the reasons for grace. God doesn't do anything without a reason.
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And he saves us for a reason. A reason is plural. First of all, he saves us so that we can produce good works.
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He saves us so that we can produce good works. Only Christians can produce good works.
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Only Christians are able to produce good works with good in divine terms.
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Because what does Jesus say in Matthew chapter 7? He said, there's going to be folks at the last day, at the day of judgment, who are going to say,
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Lord, Lord, did we not do all of these things? Did we not do great and marvelous things in your name?
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And you'll notice that Jesus doesn't say, no, you didn't do any of that, you're lying. Jesus said, he ignores it completely.
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But what does he call these people that are saying, you know, we cast out demons in your name and we did this and we did that?
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He says, depart from me, workers of iniquity. So he has labeled all of their works as works of iniquity.
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So the same activity can be a good work on one side, and it can be a work of iniquity on the other side, all depending upon the state of the heart of the worker.
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So only Christians can produce good works. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which
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God hath before ordained that we should walk in them, Ephesians chapter 2. Grace brings blessing.
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He saves us to pour out blessing upon his children because it pleases him to do so. But God, who is rich in mercy for his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath made us alive together with Christ, by grace are you saved, and hath raised us up together and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.
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Again, Ephesians chapter 2. So God saves through grace to glorify himself.
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Whenever someone is saved, God's glory is on display.
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God's glory is on display whenever someone is saved. He can turn to the fallen angels, if you will, and say, see, there's another one.
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That's my glory on display. Because one more person has been saved.
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And so we also have present benefits of grace. And Paul starts to detail these, that the grace that he's thanked
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God for, for the grace has been poured out. And what are the present benefits of grace? Well, first of all, all utterance, it says in the good old
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King James here, but all speech. God gives us the capacity to speak for him. He gives us the message.
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And he gives us the ability to speak his message. And this applies to all Christians.
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This is not directed just to preachers. We all have the ability to speak for him.
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And he gives us all knowledge. He tells us what to speak. He gives us the ability to speak.
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He tells us what to speak. We have everything necessary to speak effectively for the
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Lord. We have the word of God. We have the Holy Spirit to interpret the word.
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And so God hides things from the wise and intelligent of this world and reveals them to babes, which is what he calls all of us.
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Believers receive the light. Believers receive the light.
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And isn't it great? Right here, this is it, right there, when we have a service here, you have the same
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Bible that Pastor Mike has, that Pastor Steve has, that Pastor Dave has, that anyone else up here speaking has.
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We don't go back into Pastor Mike's office and exchange the secret elder handshake and open the safe and get out the higher knowledge.
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Whatever it is, it's right here. It's the same Bible you have. You know what else you've got?
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You've got the same Holy Spirit that we have. You've got the same Holy Spirit.
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And what's his job? His job is to open the word of God to you. You know,
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God has given you the light and he has given you the mechanism for you to receive that light.
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All knowledge, the entrance of thy words giveth light. It giveth understanding unto the simple.
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Love that verse. That's Psalm 119, 129. So even if you think you're among the simple, you have
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God's word for it. He has given you light. He's given you the light.
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And believers have all gifts. He says, and everything ye are enriched in him, in all utterance and all knowledge, so that ye come behind, verse 7, in no gift.
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You don't come behind in anything. Believers do not lack, present tense. You do not lack any resource.
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Now, someone might say, well, I was just saved. Well, okay. You are probably not going to be able to discourse on supralapsarianism.
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But that's all right, because you can tell someone else what
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God has done in your life. You always have that from the get -go.
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You can tell somebody else what has occurred in your own life. So believers do not lack any resource.
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Now, the Corinthians lacked all sorts of stuff. They lacked maturity. They lacked purity. They lacked discernment. But they had every resource at their disposal, which is another one of the reasons why
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Paul is going to get at them. He's, in effect, going to be saying, it's not as if you didn't have these resources to draw on.
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You had them. You just didn't do it. The resources were there.
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So I don't want to hear about, well, Paul, you weren't here. We didn't have a great
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Bible teacher in Corinth for the last five years to teach us. He says, you've got the
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Holy Spirit. You've got the Holy Spirit. You've got all of the resources you need.
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And so believers are not to seek additional blessings.
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They are not to seek special gifts. They are not to seek the second blessing, whatever you want to call it, because God has provided every spiritual gift to his children.
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Every spiritual gift you will ever need has been provided for you. They are yours for claiming at the moment of salvation.
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The Corinthians lacked no gifts. They only lacked the will to appropriate what they had already.
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And then we have future benefits of grace. He goes on. Who shall also confirm you unto the end that you may be blameless in the day of our
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Lord Jesus Christ? God is faithful by whom you were called unto the fellowship of his
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Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. So we have Christ's exaltation. Christ is going to return in power and glory as King of kings and Lord of lords, and he will be manifested without the veil of humanity.
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And at that point, every knee is going to bow. Jesus Christ is the
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King of the universe, and he will not take second place to anyone.
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Everything is going to bow to him. The only issue is will you bow voluntarily or will you be forced to your knees, but count on it.
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You're going to bow. That's not an issue. Christians eagerly await his coming.
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It's Revelation 19. We can look forward to Satan's defeat. Satan will be defeated.
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Satan will no longer be the prince of the power or the heir or the ruler of this world. He is bound for the duration of the millennial kingdom, then he's going to be released for a brief time, and after that, he will be permanently confined to the lake of fire.
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That's Revelation chapter 20, 1 to 3, and also verse 10. Justice will be established.
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Justice will be established. Jesus is going to sit on David's throne, and he is going to rule the world with a rod of iron.
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It will be justice. You want justice? You're going to get it. I'm not sure if everybody's going to like it, but it's going to be here.
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He is going to rule with absolute justice. All of those who have been martyred for their faith will be avenged.
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That's Revelation 6, 9 to 10, and chapter 20, verses 4 to 6. There's going to be the death of Christ's rejecters, those who have died without trusting
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Christ, without trusting Jesus, will eventually face him at the great white throne, and there they are going to be judged, and they are going to be sent into eternal punishment, and it's the eternal punishment they deserve.
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That's a hard thing to deal with. Those who are sent into eternal punishment deserve to go there.
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And finally, there will be heaven for believers. He will confirm us blameless, he says. The believers' works are going to be judged to see of what sort they are.
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Are they wood, hay, and stubble, or are they gold, silver, or precious stones? And our rewards will be determined by the results of that.
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But our sins have been dealt with at the cross, once and for all. Our sins have been dealt with.
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Your sins are not going to be paraded on some kind of a divine big screen up there for everybody to see, because your sins are gone.
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They are removed. They are taken away. They are not going to be brought back.
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They are not going to be brought up again. The issue of eternal salvation has been dealt with, and it has been dealt with eternally.
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And so grace assures everything. First of all, God knows the plan.
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God made the plan. God knows the plan. This is Jeremiah 29 11. He said, I know the thoughts that I think towards you, and they're good thoughts.
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I know the plan, and it's a good plan. It's the best plan for you.
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Everything I bring into your life, count on it. It is the best thing for you for that to happen.
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God is faithful. We can depend on him to carry out his plan. That's verse 9 that we just read.
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God is faithful. By whom you were called into the fellowship of his son. God is sovereign.
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He has the right to make the plan. Remember the former things of old,
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Isaiah says, for I am God, and there is none else. I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, my counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure.
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Isaiah 47 9 and 10. The open theology folks have got it wrong.
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The open theology folks have got it wrong. God knows the plan beginning to end, and it will come to pass.
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It will come to pass. There is no question about that. Because God, not only does he know the plan, and not only does he have the will, he has the power.
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Now, fathers, we all know this, we would protect our children. It is our will to protect our children.
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But that doesn't always happen, does it? Because sometimes we just don't have the power to carry out what we would carry out, what our will is.
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But God does not have that limitation. God has the will, and God has the power.
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And therefore, without exception, his plan will be carried forth. We can depend upon him.
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We can depend upon him. Just like your own children, you would not disappoint that child if it was in your power to not do it, to give them whatever.
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But sometimes, we just can't carry out our promises, can we?
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I mean, things happen. But see, God is not limited like that. God always carries out his promise.
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Always. And so, if you're saved,
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God has promised you life with him eternally in heaven, and he will carry that out.
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And if you are not saved, and you're here under the sound of my voice,
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I guarantee you, God has promised you eternal punishment, and he'll carry that out too. Because God always carries his promise out.
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Always. God is immutable. God is omnipotent. He has the power to carry out the plan.
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God is immutable. He doesn't change the plan. That's what immutable means.
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He says to the Israelites, you know, I am God. I change not.
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Therefore, you sons of Jacob are not consumed. So that's the thing.
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The benefit of grace. The benefits of grace. We are all receiving the benefits of God's grace if we are his children, as he's poured out upon us.
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And Paul's going to go on and start chastising in verse 10. Now I beseech you, brethren.
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He goes into it. But isn't it nice and isn't it wonderful that before he does that, he talks about the benefits of grace that are extended unto all the saints.
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And they're extended unto us. Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father, we would be quick to confess tonight that we do not deserve grace.
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But that is the nature, the very nature of grace. It is undeserved. You would have been perfectly, completely just and righteous to have simply wiped us out of existence and started over.
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And yet you chose not to do that. You chose to send your son. You chose to bring us to yourself.
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And Lord, we can contemplate that. We can do nothing except fall on our faces and bow down and worship you.