The Two Great Works of God — Roy Daniel

It's amazing when certain families come like the Powell's then you suddenly have a double congregation. But it's lovely to see all of you here and thank you so much for coming. I'd just like to note before I start, I was at a place last week in North Carolina and one man was telling me that his son was a bit rebellious and his son kind of hated him at times and shouted at him and told him ugly things.

But his son also listened to rock music. And amazingly this son came to him one day and said, Dad, you know what, I can prove to you that rock music is right. And of course his son was involved in a lot of other things that were pretty bad.

He was quite liberal in many ways, unbiblical ways. But this son said to his father, you see, I hate you. But when I listen to rock music, then I suddenly feel like I can love you again. And I don't feel irritated by you.

And that proves how can you say that's not of God if while I'm listening. And by the way, he was talking about rock music, not Christian rock even, it was rock music with very bad words. So obviously it was wrong.

But the music itself with the bad words was giving him a feeling that made him feel right with God. And you know, someone was telling me or telling us the other day, they'd met so many people, people lying, people sleeping with women, people doing stuff like that.

And if you ask them, why are you right with God, then they'll give you some experience they've had. Either they've been healed or they have amazing peace or something like that. But they can't point to biblical fruit.

And yet even when I say that, I'd like to point out very fast that some people might think when we talk against these things that it's almost like we're saying Christianity itself is not an experiential religion.

And that's not true. Christianity is one of the most, I don't know what word to use, but experiencing experiential religions that there is. It's the only true religion, it's the only true way to heaven and way to God is through Jesus Christ.

But when we say that these things are wrong and that they give you a false sense, there's so many things that can give you a false sense that you're right with God and you're not right with God, we're not saying that you can't experience things.

In fact, the fact of the matter is that when we come to the Bible, when it comes to the Word of God, and when it comes to Christianity, that which we experience must be, in our heart at least, must be within the bounds of the Word of God.

And there's a wonderful thing. There's a cross wherein Jesus Christ died 2 ,000 or about years ago. And Jesus Christ rose again. And we can experience a depth of God and in our relationship with God that is utterly staggering and alive and full of grace and full of life and full of love through Jesus Christ and through what He did on the cross.

But that doesn't mean if we have fleshly experiences that we are right with God just because we listen to rock music or we get amazingly worked up by music or some tearful movie and then we think we're right with God.

And with that thought, let's go over to pray before we preach the sermon. Yeah, the sermon. Father, I'd just like to thank you so much from the bottom of my heart for thy word, which is truth. And I thank you for every single person sitting here that's come to this meeting.

And I just want to ask that thou knowest, dear Father, I'm one of thy weakest servants, but you said that your strength is made perfect in weakness. And I want to ask that I may rest in Jesus Christ today and that in what he has done and that as I speak, it would not be my words that are spoken, but the words of God and that you would open up our eyes to behold the wonders that are in thy word and what we can experience through Jesus Christ or living on this earth.

The Two Great Works of God: Creation and Redemption

And I ask this in Jesus Christ's name. Amen. The topic of my sermon tonight is the two great works of God, the two great works of God. And I'd like us to open our Bibles to Genesis at the very beginning of the Bible, Genesis chapter two, verse two, right at the beginning.

And it says in Genesis chapter two, verse two, and on the same day, it says, On the seventh day, God ended his work, which he had made, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work, which he had made.

Now, you'll find that right through the Bible, even in the New Testament, meaning different things at different times, there'll be a focus on this idea of there being a rest. And of course, we know that the Israelites had to have a rest.

It was part of the covenant with the head when they left Israel between them and God. And we know that we do not have to keep the Saturday Sabbath, the Jewish Sabbath as Christians, because there was a sign of the covenant between God and Israel.

It wasn't our sign of the sign of the new covenant. But I'd like to ask a very simple question today, a very important question. Why could God cease from his work? Why could he rest? Why couldn't he have done it on the fourth day, the fifth day, the sixth day, the second day, the third day, the first day?

The reason why God could rest from his work was because his work was finished. And that's an extremely important principle in scripture. We'll find it coming out of the New Testament very prominently.

That the reason why that is very important, that God could rest from his work because it was finished. There's another person in the Bible whose work was finished or his great work was finished. John 19, verse 30, when Jesus, therefore, received the vinegar, he said, it is finished.

And he bowed down and gave up the ghost. Jesus Christ in the New Testament had another work which he finished and completed. But let's get back to the Old Testament quickly, because we're going to discuss a few little things, the foundation of what we're going to get to in the sermon.

Sabbath, Covenant, and the Promised Rest

You'll see the theme of this rest, of a rest, of a Sabbath, right through the Old Testament and into the New Testament, meaning different things. The Old Covenant, so we say there's many covenants in the Bible, but the covenant between God and Israel, when they came out of Egypt, that covenant called the Old Covenant, a very big part of it was the Sabbath, the fourth commandment, that we should rest on the seventh day.

And the reason was not because God was actually going to make it a thing that all the Gentiles had to keep. And it was so amazing that we all had to keep it. The reason why it was such a big part of the Old Covenant is there's so many things in the Old Covenant which was pointing to the New Covenant, pointing to wonderful things that Christ would make possible for us.

For instance, obviously, the tabernacle, the tabernacle is not something that we have to do to have church. We don't have to go out in the field and have this tabernacle with all the cows and lambs and goats being killed all the time.

We don't have to do that. The Sabbath is something that we do not have to keep, a Saturday Sabbath. These things were pointing to things in the New Testament. But in Hebrews chapter 4, verse 9 to 11, it says, there remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God.

For he, that's Jesus Christ, is entered into his rest. He also hath ceased from his own works. So, sorry, for he, that's not Jesus Christ, that is entered into his rest, Jesus Christ. He also hath ceased from his own works as God did from his.

That's the seventh day in the Old Testament. Let us labor, therefore, to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief. Now, you have to look at this verse carefully because some people take the word labor and it kind of clashes.

How can you work to get into a rest? But actually, all that it means is that you, it's a focus. It's something that you don't allow to be small in your life. It's something that you must make utterly sure that it is part of your life, that you have entered into this rest.

It's not a joke. We have to make sure, as Christians, that the rest that is spoken of here is part of our life. We'll come a little later to what this rest is. So now, if you look through the Bible, first of all, you've got the seventh day of rest where God ceased from his own works, his work of creation.

In the law, in the covenant, the first, the Old Testament, we have the Sabbath of the covenant between God and Israel, a nation. And then there's a picture, in Hebrews, we see that Canaan was a picture of a rest, a rest.

It's very clear in Hebrews, through the first few chapters especially, that God talks of Canaan as a rest, which is a picture of a rest which we as Christians should enter into. And it says that they could not enter in because of unbelief.

Israel’s Unbelief and the Christian Struggle for Victory

So before we get to what the rest of a Christian is, what all this is, I'm talking about, points to in the New Testament, let's just quickly look at why they could not enter in. Obviously, the Bible says unbelief in Hebrews and it says they couldn't enter into Canaan, the Israelites and the wilderness because of disobedience.

But ultimately, if we want to be practical, they looked at themselves, number one, and they saw, wow, we are very weak. And then they looked at their enemies and they saw all these giants in Canaan and they thought, wow, my enemy is very big.

So I'm very weak and my enemy is very big. And of course, God in that scenario seemed to become very small and his promises didn't seem to make so much of so much effect on their lives because they didn't believe them.

So there was unbelief in what God said. God said to Abram, wherever your feet goes, that shall be yours in Canaan. He promised that land to them. And yet when they looked at their enemies and they saw how big they were, they looked at themselves, how weak they are, the promises seemed to get very small and God seemed to get very small to them and they did not enter into the land.

And that's very sad. You know, we as Christians, sometimes we can see things in our lives which make us feel very weak and like we'll never have victory and an abundant life in Jesus Christ. We can have a temper perhaps where we get angry, we can get irritated at other people, we can have things in our heart which we struggle with and which we feel make us so weak that we can never have a life where you could say we've entered into a rest in Jesus Christ and have abundant life.

And so as we look at our enemies, the things in our life which just we cannot conquer, and we look at these things and the areas of life we feel bad about as Christians, hopefully, and we literally look at them and they become giants to us.

And because of this, unbelief starts to creep into our lives and this keeps us from entering into the rest which is in Christ Jesus, because we do not have faith to lay hold on the promises of God, which promises us that we can, through Christ, enter into His rest.

Hebrews 4 verse 2 says, for unto us, this is the Christians, sorry, the Old Testament was the gospel preached, yeah, and to us the Christians was the gospel preached, as well as unto them, that's the Old Testament people, but the word did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it.

You know, one person said to me recently, he said, you know, the Old Testament, they didn't have, they had wonderful promises, but under that covenant, it wasn't as great as our promises that we have under the New Testament covenant.

And yet the promises they had were not of any, they were useless promises because they didn't believe. But even if we've got greater promises of greater things in Christ Jesus, which we'll read in Hebrews 11 verse 39 soon, is just as worthless to us as the lesser promises that they had under the Old Covenant if we don't believe them.

And they will be just as much not part of our lives. Hebrews 11 verse 39 says, and these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise. Okay, they had faith. God having provided something better for us that they without us should not be made perfect.

This not, didn't mean that they didn't receive any of the promises. Abram, his children received the promise of going into Canaan. But we have better, something better, better promises of something so amazing.

You see, it's undoubted in scripture, if you look at Hebrews, that Canaan was not the final rest. I'm going to read a verse before what I read a bit earlier today, Hebrews 4 verse 7, Again, he, that is God, limited a certain day, saying in David, today, so long a time, as it is said, today, if you will hear his voice, harden not your hearts.

For, and this is the words, very interesting, for if Jesus had given them rest, then would he not afterward have spoken of another day? Now, that sounds a bit complicated, but it's actually very simple.

What he's saying here is, Canaan, it's just been in the earlier chapters or in the section of Hebrews, it talks of Canaan as being a picture of rest. But then he said, David was a long time after Joshua and the Israelites first came into Canaan.

And if Canaan was actually the rest of the people of God that the Old Testament prophesies and talks about, then why, Jesus asked, did David talk of another day? Why did someone long after they'd already gone into that land talk of another day, if they already had rest through keeping Saturday as a Sabbath or through being in Canaan?

Resting in the Finished Work of Christ

You see, there's another rest that is based on another finished work. And let's get back to the topic that we talked about. There are two great finished works of God. Number one is God's creation, and the second is the cross of Jesus Christ.

And the creation, because it was finished, God could rest on the seventh day. But because the cross is a finished work, we can enter into a rest ourselves. John, chapter 15, verse 4, says these words, Abide in me and I in you as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine, no more can ye, except ye abide in me.

You know, I don't know how many of you have read the story or a story or books on the life of Hudson Taylor. But, you know, he went to the mission field and I think he went for over 10 years. I probably got the date wrong, it might have been 15 years, many years of mission work.

And in that time, as a missionary, as a born again Christian, he prayed much. He spent hours in prayer. He read the Bible much. He spent hours reading the Bible. He went out and even if people hurt him and beat him up, he told them about Jesus Christ.

But he came to a day where he realized that he'd wasted a lot of time. Because he read John, chapter 15, and when he read John, chapter 15, he'd read it many times before, but suddenly it became alive to him.

Abide in me and I in you as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine, no more can ye, except ye abide in me. And suddenly he realized his mistake. And now this mistake I'm going to explain to you is a mistake which many Christians make.

Is to think that a victorious life, that what Jesus Christ did on the cross, that all the things that we can experience as a Christian resting in Jesus Christ and him living through us, that that is something which we receive from the outside.

That that is something which new, which we receive, which is new that we haven't received before. Let me explain that. You see, when you receive Jesus Christ into your life, it's not that you can't receive something new.

You know, after I received Jesus, I received a new 15 year old car. I mentioned that yesterday, a few months back. But I received something from the outside. But as far as your heart goes, as far as what God can do in your heart through grace and through pouring out his love in your heart and giving you victory and being crucified with Christ, nevertheless, I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.

As far as those things go, it's not something which we receive from the outside. It's something we rest in because we already have it. You see, in Christ, Jesus, according to Colossians, is the full of the Godhead, is all grace.

And when we receive Christ, we receive every last bit of grace that he brought on the cross and we receive the fullness of God. And what Hudson Taylor found out on that day is that he was seeking for something on the outside.

Oh, God, I want to be crucified with Christ. Give this to me. It's like a box that was reaching out to receive. He wanted to have something that was given to him from the outside, something new, something that Jesus Christ himself in inside him was not already.

And then he suddenly realized this. It's a simple concept. I mustn't reach out to try for 15 years as I have been to get this abundant life to be crucified with Christ. I must rest in what I already have.

Do you get that? I must not for three hours be seeking God. Oh, God, give me a crucified life. Oh, God. Oh, God. For five hours, you're climbing up this mountain of prayer. No, there must come a day when I realize it's a finished work.

And because Christ finished his work, like the seven days, six days of creation on the seventh day, he could rest because it was finished. Because Christ has finished his work on the cross and because this Christ is in me, I can rest in him and what he has done and thus experience a crucified life.

Isn't that wonderful? But let me tell you something. This seems so simple. This seems like such a little truth, but it is the difference between living a abundant life and living a dry life as a Christian.

And you can go through 20 years, 30 years, 40 years as a Christian, as a born again Christian, and you can miss out on the crucified life and you can miss out on the abundant life, which is in Christ Jesus, and you can miss out on the rest, which is in Jesus Christ by one little thing.

You're a person, a Christian who is trying to get something from God that you haven't already received. And you're not someone who's come to the point where you realize it's a finished work and you start to rest in Jesus Christ inside you as a Christian and what he has already done on the cross.

Let's read that that verse in Galatians 2, verse 20, I am crucified with Christ. Isn't that precious? Nevertheless, I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. And the life which I now live in the flesh, in this body, I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.

Hudson Taylor and the Abiding Life

You know, Watchman, he wrote some things which we don't agree with, but one thing I kind of agree with him, he once said it's like many people when they're seeking to live a crucified life as a Christian, crucified to the world, and yet Christ liveth through me.

They're like people who think they've got two coins in their pocket and there's a third coin that's missing. And so they go to their knees and they pray for hours and hours and hours and say, God, God, God, I believe, I believe, please give me the crucified life, please give me this crucified life, Lord, I want to be crucified with Christ.

Nevertheless, I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. And then suddenly they believe there's going to come a point of faith where they've built up this faith or something like that, or they've prayed enough hours or they've wept enough of the heart that isn't crucified.

And eventually they come to the point where they break and then, boom, the third coin comes, which is a crucified life. So we've already got salvation, and to salvation now suddenly appears from the outside, this crucified life.

But what he said, which was so interesting and so true, is it's not like that. You see, to experience the crucified life, you have to realize that on the cross it was a finished work. You were. Nailed to the cross, you were crucified with Christ two thousand years ago.

And therefore, if you're a Christian, if you receive Jesus into your life and he's trained you and there's the fruit of salvation in your life, then it's like having three coins. It's not two coins you need to get something from the outside.

You have three coins and you rest upon that fact. And so you have to realize we are crucified with Christ. And when we rest upon that fact. The power of sin is broken in our life. I'm not talking about sinless perfection.

We'll come to that on Sunday. But it literally, the power of sin is broken in your life. The old man is dead, in a sense, not like the holiest movement in America often says that, you know, like the roots is taken out or anything like that.

No, but you are in the place of death and Christ can live through you. And most people, when they hear that. The first thing Satan whispers in their ears is it cannot be that simple. It can't be that simple.

I cannot have been missing an abundant life in Jesus Christ. I cannot have been missing him living his life through me as a Christian, a crucified life. I cannot be missing that just because I didn't realize that it's a finished work.

But you see, the cross of Jesus Christ, Jesus died to make it that simple. You know how precious it is that it is that simple. Jesus died and rose again so that it could be that simple to us. One old man came to me, said, Roy, recently big eyes, you know, old guy said, Roy, I've known him for a while.

He said, for so many years I read this verse, but it wasn't part of my life because I was seeking for it on the outside. I, I spend much time reading the Bible. I witness to people. I did all these things.

But, you know, there came a day when I realized it's not something that I have to reach out and get from the outside. It's something that I rest upon. It's a fact that I reckon myself to be dead, as the Bible says, to sin because he, I was nailed to that cross.

I am crucified with Christ, as the Bible says. And he said that day when I realized that it's not something I have to reach out and get, and I realized I can rest in this fact, Roy, I started to live a life where I was crucified, not me, but on the cross 2000 years ago and resting in that fact, Jesus Christ started to live through me.

Yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. You know, when I was a little boy, I was a very typical little boy. I don't know if any of you are like this. Who's a little boy? You're a little boy. I was a very naughty little boy.

At least I got lots of spanking, so I didn't feel naughty, but someone told me I was naughty. But there's something you have to realize when you've got a really good mom. Where's my mom? My mom's not here, but she is wonderful.

I'm going to tell you a story. I can't remember exactly how it happened when I was a kid, but I remember things like this happened, if that makes sense. I remember things like this happened. I would be downstairs and I went to a public school and in public school you needed to wear, at least in South Africa, we needed to wear a tie, pants, shirt with buttons, a hat, all those different types of things.

And if you didn't have that, you'd get into trouble. But sometimes in the morning I looked everywhere and I could not find my tie. Oh, I looked, I mean, I looked in the drawers, I looked in the cupboards, I looked under the bed, I looked, I couldn't, and I was getting timed when I had to leave for school because if you're late for school, you get a spanking.

And later on, when I took that away, you get, you get to stay after school. And I didn't want that. And I looked everywhere and eventually I go to my mom and I say, mommy, I can't find my tie. And she says, Roy, but you're wearing it.

Moms are wonderful. Now, with all due respect, some people, they're seeking for this box, they're seeking for victory, they're seeking for so many things, they're looking for it, they're praying for it.

I hope, I hope you do want to have a victorious life. And it's not wrong to pray for ours. It's not wrong to read the Bible for us. But they don't realize that when Jesus Christ died on the cross and he said it is finished and he rose again, it was finished.

And because it was finished, there was a rest in Christ which we can enter into. And we don't have to go looking for that rest because then we adding to the cross, we adding to Jesus Christ and we've received Jesus Christ into our life, we can rest upon the fact that we crucified with Christ.

It's this, like that tie that you're looking everywhere to find, but it's right here in your life if you've got Jesus Christ. In him is his finished work. One old preacher up there in the Congo, when they had revival, they prayed for months and months and months and God came down and many people got saved.

He became a, he came down to South Africa and he became a famous preacher. He once told one of our preachers in South Africa that in the revival in the Congo, there's something wonderful that happened.

You see, we think of revival as many souls getting saved. We think of God's Holy Spirit sweeping down through everywhere. But he said what people started to realize in that revival is that they'd been looking for life everywhere, new experiences.

They were like people digging wells in the mountains. They would run to this mountain, then run to that mountain, looking, always digging a little bit, getting a bit of water and that's not enough. So they ran to the next mountain.

And. But when revival came, they were like people who suddenly realized where they're running to different places. That all they needed to have lots of water was right in front of them, right beneath them.

And they started to drill into the rock which was beneath them, which was Jesus Christ. We have everything we need to build our spiritual life and house and. As far as grace goes and everything else in Jesus, which we received.

Scripture, Obedience, and the Abundant Life

But as I said, some people think it just cannot be that simple. Now, when I'm saying this, some people listen to such sermons, I suppose, and they think, are you saying that there's nothing we have to do as a Christian?

No, there's a lot which we have to do as Christians. Yesterday I preached about the importance of reading the scriptures. You see, if you don't read the scriptures, then even if you've got amazing life in your heart and you're living an abundant life in Christ Jesus, you won't always know when error comes into a church, when error comes into your life through a book.

It's in the Bible which we read and see the finished work of Christ. It's there which we see that we can experience it by faith, simple faith in Christ Jesus. The Bible itself increases our faith because we see what he is and what he has done more fully as a Christian.

Some people think, but Roy, it says in the Bible that if we have converts, we should baptize them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost and teach them to observe all things which whatsoever I have commanded you.

Jesus Christ said we should teach new converts what he taught in the New Testament, not the Old Testament law of the old covenant, but the commands of Christ. And that's absolutely true. We should teach these commands.

We should look for direction in our life through these commands. But even if you try to do them, even if you read your Bible for hours every day as a Christian, and even if you write down every single command of Christ and you try to do them, it's just going to be a box on the outside if you don't have God's abundant life on the inside, which is possible by resting in what you already have, not what you can do or what you can receive from the outside.

It says here in John chapter 10, verse 10, I am come that ye might have life and that they might have life and that they might have it more abundantly. And I want to ask a simple question today. Do you have life?

Number one, are you saved? Was there a day in your life when you came as a sinner deserving of hell, not someone who was very special, but just by mistake was going to hell and God came and he loves you and he just saved you?

No, someone who deserved hell for your sin and sinful state and God came, he reached out and he saved you when you had faith in him. Number one, do you have life? But number two, do you have life more abundant?

Are you crucified with Christ? Nevertheless, I live yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. Do you have much fruit out of your life? The only reason you want to have much fruit in your life is because you're not resting in Christ and what he has done.

Not for lack of works or this or that. You know, Wurmbrand, Wurmbrand, you call him in America, he when he was in jail, he knew a few scriptures of our heart, but when they started to beat him and they started to take his body and mutilated him and put these hot cinders in the side of his body so that there's a hole in the side of his body and all these things they did to him, if there was times when he was so his body was in such agony that he came to the point where he couldn't remember one Bible verse, but there's only one thing he could remember and that's the name Jesus Christ.

You know, all these things are important. It's important to read the Bible. It's important to apply yourself to the Bible, but ultimately the source of the life of a Christian and the abundance of life in a Christian is not even the things which we do.

It's day by day, moment by moment, resting in Jesus Christ and what he has done. And that is our life. And that's not just a word. You know, it's so easy to say, I could say I could rest in that piano and you know nothing's going to happen by me resting on the piano.

But these are living words. This is a deed that has been done. It's a cross that was there 2000 years ago. It's a Jesus Christ that has risen and it's a person that is in some of our lives. And if he's in our lives, we can rest in him and we will have real, very real experiential abundant life because he promised it.

And we just have to believe this and rest in it, the finished work of Christ. But you see, men tend to add to God's work, add to what Christ has done on the cross. And this is not by reading the Bible.

I say it's good to read the Bible. It's not by studying Christ's commands on the will of God. We do that because we love him. But it's very clear in Galatians chapter 3 verse 3, it says, are you so foolish having begun in the spirit, are you now made perfect by the flesh?

You see, if you add just one step, imagine you're walking up the steps, just one step that you have to get up before you can reach life in Christ Jesus, just one step as a Christian, outside of yourself, which you have to do before you can have life abundant in your heart, then you're adding to the cross of Jesus Christ.

And that is terrifying. If you first have to keep the Saturday Sabbath before you can do that, or if you have to read your Bible for 50 chapters every day before you can experience that, before you can experience being strengthened, being rooted in grace, growing in Christ, that is just terrifying.

It seems right. Your flesh says it's right. We have pride that says it's right, but to God that's abominable. You see, his work is finished. And therefore we can experience the crucified life and abundant life through resting in what we have.

There are a few reasons, but one reason people start adding to the cross is they do not realize that Christ is not separate from his working in your heart. Now, of course, I told you there's things on the outside, gifts from God, a car, a wife, or whatever that's on the outside.

But as far as the grace that is in your heart, as far as the life that is in your heart, Christ is not separate from his working in your heart. John 7, verse 38 said, He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.