A Word in Season: The Fruit of the Promises (2 Corinthians 7:1)

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What ought we to do with the precious promises of God which are yes and amen in Christ Jesus our

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Lord? How ought we to react to them and respond to them? When we read of God's sweet dealings with us, when we understand the faithfulness of a covenant

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God toward us, when we read of the comforts and assurances that he has granted to us, when we hear him declaring to us of his unchanging love toward us, what ought we to do with those things?

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For example, at the end of 2 Corinthians and chapter 6, the living God speaks to his people, that temple in which he dwells, and says,

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I will dwell in them and walk among them. I will be their God and they shall be my people.

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Those are precious words indeed. And therefore, verse 17, come out from among them and be separate, says the

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Lord. Do not touch what is unclean and I will receive you. I will be a father to you and you shall be my sons and daughters, says the

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Lord Almighty. Again, we will be sons and daughters of God.

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He is going to be our father. He is going to receive us to himself.

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And it's proper for us to delight in these things, God dwelling with us, God walking with us,

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God our father owning us as his beloved children. What heart would not, understanding those things with any degree of clarity, rejoice at God's goodness and mercy?

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And there are some who seem to suggest that when you hear those things, you should just sink into them like a warm bath or a soft feather bed and just bask in everything that God has said and enjoy what

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God has made known. And we should delight in them and we should rejoice in those promises which are made to us and we should find comforts and assurances in them.

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But there's something else as well that we should do. The Apostle Paul goes on in the first verse of chapter seven to say, therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.

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That's already bound in to the promise. Come out from among them and be separate, says the

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Lord. Do not touch what is unclean and I will receive you. I will be a father to you.

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It is on the basis of the promises that God makes. It's grounded in the comforts and it's building on the assurances that God's people pursue holiness, cleansing themselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, looking at every part of our humanity and doing everything that we can in the power of the

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Holy Spirit, equipped and enabled by him to root out, to grind out, to scour out every trace of ungodliness in every part of us, whether it's the uncleanness of the flesh or the uncleanness of the spirit.

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We are to put sin to death. In the words of John Owen, we are to be killing sin that it might not be killing us.

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And alongside of that, alongside of what is called mortification, putting sin to death, there is this vivification or cultivation of virtue.

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Vice is to be destroyed and driven out. Virtue is to be cultivated and embraced.

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We are to perfect holiness in the fear of God. We are to live before him, conscious of his gaze upon us, eager to glorify our heavenly father and to live as his sons and daughters, to honour him who dwells in us and walks among us.

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My friends, if the promises don't stir up that kind of appetite and promote that kind of pursuit, then we haven't understood them properly and we may not be entitled to them.

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If God forbid, God's mercies seem to you an excuse to go on in sin, that is the devil's logic and you have not understood salvation.

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But neither do the mercies of God simply mean that we can lie back and enjoy those things without any pursuit of godliness.

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The very delight that we take in God is to spur us on towards the real pursuit of holiness, crushing sin and lifting up righteousness, putting sin to death and bringing virtue to ever greater expression, independence upon the

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God who has given us such exceedingly great and precious promises as these in his beloved son,