What does persevering in Christ look like? | Clip from Perseverance of the Saints

When can we be said to be walking in Christ? And I think we both feel that this is really where his sermon excels

I'm gonna read the the little headings that he gives the subheadings and then Chuck we can talk about it

So when persons may be said to walk so as to comply with the design of the

Apostle in our text And he describes well What does it look like when you are persevering?

He gives these Different points number one this they may be said to do

When they walk in the way of god's commandments with diligence and activity making religion their chief business and employment number two

This they may be said to do to persevere when they go on in the duties of piety or holiness with freedom and cheerfulness number three

Persons may be said to comply with the exhortation When they act in religion deliberately

That is when their religious progress is the effect of due consideration and choice number four

Such as walk in christ are constant in their religious performances The general tenor of their lives being spent this way and finally number five

We know that we're persevering in christ he says When we walk in christ and our walk is progressive

We go forward in our journey zion word so with all those things

Chuck, what do you feel are some of the you know More important things that he points out there The second one that he mentions about happily doing

Put your doing in the christian walk So Not just a list of duties that you're checking off.

I think about uh when I was a kid in Discipleship training or training union. I think they called it Yeah, they would come around and ask who read your bible every day this week and I don't remember other questions

But I do remember that one, you know and I mean certainly there were people surely there were people who read their bible happily, but i'm sure

As a kid there were times when I raised my hand and I was very happy to raise my hand And I hadn't read it to know the lord

Um, but I read it because I wanted to be able to raise my hand and say I read my bible every day, you know

So it was a duty, but it was there was no love to christ in it um So what he describes as as walking in him

Is not just a duty to check off and say, okay i've done that you can imagine doing that You know in a relationship with your wife uh

Check off the list of duties as a husband Um, well, that's there's not much love in that and you're not going to really honor her by doing that But for love of her there are things that you do for love of christ we walk in him

Yeah, so we cannot really call ourselves persevering

Uh in faith persevering in our walk in the lord if there is no love to christ In our duties just doing the duties is not enough to be thought of as a christian who's walking or running the race

I like the first point that he makes when he says there has to there has to be done with diligence

You know and and really he presses that through all of these sub points there there ought to be an intentionality

And an earnestness and let me read you a quote when he talks about how Really walking with the lord and really moving forward in that You know really pursuing the christian life with earnestness how that ought to make every other pursuit in life pale by comparison

Here's what he writes all earthly things Ought to be sought after with indifference

When compared with the pains used in seeking christ So the apostle advises us to buy

As though they possessed not first corinthians 7 30, but alas he writes this is ordinarily practiced the backward way

They pray as if they prayed not they hear As if they heard not a spirit of indifference runs through all the veins of their religious performances

Yes, while they are burning hot In pursuit of the world they are as cold as stone in the service of god, so Merely going to church as you mentioned

Merely going through the duties with no love. That's not perseverance Merely going through these things with a lackadaisical kind of indifference

Level of energy that's not what the bible calls perseverance In his first major point that we we've already covered but he mentioned in that about uh how we come to christ desperate

You know, there's no other cure. There's no other place to go. There's no other hope and so we come As beggars to him

And maybe one of the reasons that we fail in Continuing happily is because we lose something of that desperation or we think that The cure that christ has provided is one that leaves us not no longer dependent upon him

When the truth is he has changed us and made us a new person, but we continue to be dependent upon him

And we never really graduate from that The difference might be illustrated in in thinking about going to the doctor with some sickness

Maybe you have strep throat and they give you a shot and It takes care of the strep throat and you don't have that anymore

And you don't have to keep going back to the doctor and keep getting a prescription filled. The strep throat is gone but um

You could then think about a different situation where like we have in our family I'm a family member with a heart transplant

And with the heart transplant, there's been a radical change in this person's health And so radical that that like there are new antibodies that exist within this body that weren't there previously and yet still dependent upon Medicine so that your body doesn't reject that heart

Uh, so not a perfect illustration, but the dependency, you know, there's not been a graduation from dependency upon medicine

There's an ongoing need even though So much better Than she was before and Really kind of a new lease on life, but still there's an ongoing dependence

We don't graduate we don't we don't we're not cured in a way that leaves us free of christ.

We're cured so that we are Happily dependent upon christ the rest of our lives and into eternity.

Yeah Well, thank you for watching the clip.