Spiritual Heredity — Fred Tomlinson

Amen. Well, if you would like to open your Bibles, will you do that please to the book of Ezekiel, Ezekiel chapter 16. We'll look there in just a few minutes. One of my favourite hymns, mind you I've got quite a few favourites, but one of my favourite hymns, and a hymn that we sing here quite frequently, is Full Salvation.

Full Salvation. Lo, the fountain opened wide, streams through every land and nation from the Saviour's wounded side. What I hardly want to admit to it, but it's probably five decades now that I have been preaching this Gospel.

That's been a privilege to preach. I'm just talking about the length of time is how time goes by so quickly. Can it be true? But over those years, I've had the privilege of talking to many, many people and listening to many people as they've chosen to talk to me or asked if they can share something with me.

In many, many cases looking for some kind of encouragement in their Christian lives and so on. But one of the observations that I've made, beyond any doubt, is that there are so very many people who are claiming to be the Lord's people who are living far, far beneath the extravagance of that full salvation.

And that's very sad. And we could pause here and sort of talk about that in particular and try to assess why that would be the case. But here's another observation that I've made and that is that for many people, when they are actually exposed to the fact that God has something deeper, something richer, something more of what Paul calls the hope of his calling, so many people become defensive and in many cases retreat to safer preaching.

In other words, to a situation that doesn't challenge them deeply in their hearts. And that also is very, very sad. I can relate to that, mind you, because many years ago that was exactly my own experience.

I believed at the time I'm thinking about as a young man that I had found forgiveness for my sins through the redeeming work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And while that was true, I really knew nothing about the rest that remains for the people of God, as we read in the book of Hebrews.

And I shall forever be thankful to God that he brought me into the context of some people who were able to do what Priscilla and Aquila did for that great preacher, Apollos. Do you remember? He expounded unto them, they expanded unto him rather, the way of God and showed him the way of God more perfectly.

And I thank God that there were those who were able to do that. And clearly at that time my heart was ready to receive what they were able to demonstrate and show in their lives that was impressing me profoundly.

And also with the teaching from Scripture, as somehow the Holy Spirit through them was able to throw new light on Scriptures that I had known, some of which I had memorized in the early days of my Sunday school experiences and in the Young People's Fellowship that we went to because there was a lot of emphasis on learning and memorizing Scripture at that time.

So these were familiar Scriptures in most cases and yet somehow they became quickened to me and God opened the eyes of my heart. Do you remember that was what Paul the Apostle was praying, Ephesians chapter 1, for the church in Ephesus, praying that God would open their eyes so that they could understand and so that they could see what God actually had in his heart for them.

And that's very, very wonderful. I've asked you to turn to chapter 16 of Ezekiel. This is a most unusual chapter and just for the record and for your information, I was interested at one point to read some words of Spurgeon in respect to this chapter and he said, this is not a chapter to be read publicly.

And I agree with that completely. And if you were more familiar with it, you'd agree with me as well. But maybe you'll look at it after the meeting sometime. The fact is that the chapter actually finds God through the prophet addressing the people of Jerusalem, which in a sense would include also the people of Israel, but it was addressed to Jerusalem, this section here.

And God is addressing their unfaithfulness and their rebellion toward him. And then as the chapter goes on, it goes through many sort of fascinating twists and turns, but ultimately it becomes a section of Scripture that testifies to the amazing grace of God, notwithstanding everything that takes place in between.

Because clearly God was speaking to his people through the apostle, as I've mentioned. For myself this morning, I'm just going to read two verses from the chapter. The two verses themselves are certainly curious, but nevertheless, I'm trusting that God will speak to us.

I think I could just add this comment, in the light of what was the situation and the setting, and in the light that God was wanting to address the people in that situation. And then I'll look at the actual curious things that I find in this chapter, which God says through the prophet.

I have to come to the conclusion, and I quickly come to the conclusion, that God could not really have chosen a more graphic and shocking symbolism in which to frame his message for those people. So let me read a couple of verses here.

I'm right at the top of the chapter. Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying, Son of man, make known to Jerusalem her abominations. And say, thus saith the Lord God to Jerusalem, your origin and your birth are from the land of the Canaanite.

Your father was an Amorite, and your mother a Hittite. As for your birth, on the day you were born, your navel cord was not cut, nor were you washed with water for cleansing. You were not rubbed with salt, or even wrapped in cloths.

No, I looked with pity on you to do any of these things for you, to have compassion on you. Rather, you were thrown out into the open field, and you were abhorred on the day that you were born. Amen. I'm certainly not going to speak on every part of this section that I've read even, but I want to do, I've just said I appreciate the way God used this whole chapter to speak in this unusual way, and yet to convey a very crucial message to his people.

I pray to God that with the couple of things that I'm going to draw from this section, that God would have success to reach you in your heart. Amen. Sometimes I think for those of us who've grown up in a Christian background, we've listened to countless preachers over the years, over the decades.

There can be, and this is a very sad thing to have to say, but there can be a sense in which familiarity does breed contempt. In other words, we just become so familiar with the concepts, even although they are concepts which God has chosen to use to proclaim the full salvation that we were thinking about a few moments ago, which really is the message of the entire Bible.

But sometimes it's good to find a more unusual setting, or for some element to be brought in which is not familiar to us. I think that's exactly what God was doing with his ancient people, and I'm inclined to believe that God is wanting to do that for us here this morning, and perhaps that's the way he will succeed in being able to reach us in the depths of our hearts.

You will notice that as God is speaking here in these verses I've read to you, in the third verse, this is the word of the Lord, your origin and your birth are from the land of the Canaanites, and your father was an Amorite, and your mother was a Hittite.

If you could just think about these Israeli people at this time, and if in fact they were required to make some reference to their own background and their own history, I am absolutely certain beyond a doubt they would never ever have said that about themselves.

Most certainly their story, if they were sharing the story of their background, they would go back to Abraham and they would want to say, as some others do, we may think about them in a few minutes, you know, that they were of their father Abraham.

So what is this that God is saying on this occasion? The only conclusion that I can come to is that God at this time is choosing to speak to these people about their background with a much broader vision.

We can only conclude that really it's as though he's gone back to Abraham and beyond Abraham he's gone to his background, because you remember he was from the era of the Chaldees, he was in a pagan context, he was a pagan man, he was involved in false idolatry, worship, and so on, as were all the people there apparently, and so on.

And God in making this statement through the prophet, he's gone back, he's gone right back into their roots, way back into the past, into their ancient roots. And you know I believe that's exactly what God is looking to do today.

And he needs to show them this is where you really came from, this is your background, this is your heritage, this is your heredity. And I believe that today God with us is wanting to address and highlight our background, but he's not interested at this moment in talking about my mother and my father or my grandparents or so on, but rather he's talking about my spiritual roots and my spiritual heredity.

And the question is perhaps how should we think, how should we think about our own spiritual heredity? Well, when we think of the word heredity of course we think quite naturally in terms of the physical world in which we live and physical things of our background.

And the word itself really conveys the idea of something being passed on, a transmission of certain characteristics for example, from one generation to another. You're very much like your father, you remind me of your father, so she's very much like her mother or maybe even like her grandmother, we can think back that far.

But that's the way we would think, we're talking about something that's passed on from parents to children and to grandchildren and so on and so on. That's how we would quite naturally and readily think about heredity.

Now we're asking ourselves the question how should we think about spiritual heredity? Well that introduces this whole concept of spirituality. What is spiritual? How should we think about that? And we'd probably say well we're thinking about something that is invisible in that realm.

And I think as people who are professing to be Christians and have read the Bible already many, many times, have our own personal stories about our spiritual journey, we give I think a kind of lip service to the spiritual realm.

We have no difficulty in claiming that we believe what the scripture itself says, that God is a spirit. Remember Jesus said that God is a spirit, they worship him, must worship him in spirit and in truth.

We also know from reading the scriptures as the text addresses Satan himself, we understand that Satan himself is a spirit. We're talking about God being a spirit being, we're talking about Satan being a spirit being.

And yet of course the two are polar opposites from one another but they have this in common so far as our limited understanding is concerned that well they're both spiritual beings. If I'm thinking about God, God is a spiritual being, Satan is a spiritual being.

But that's where the similarities end and we could go through a list or make a list of categories that apply to each of them which are completely contrasting so I'm not taking any further than that. The spiritual realm.

I was raised in a kind of a cocoon really. I'm very protected in my background in many ways, much of which I I'm very thankful for. I lived in a different time than which I live today and which you live today.

This was before TV, this I was born during the second world war. Some of you will not even have any knowledge of what that was maybe. But in any event I was born back then, things were very very different and of course my parents were Christians so that isolated me even further from the culture that I was raised in or born into anyway.

And the very first dead body that I saw was when I was required of me to watch a post-mortem when I was involved in training for the Liverpool City Police. But I can remember, I'm sure I'll never ever forget as long as I have my memory, going into that room with some of the young students as well and seeing a body of a person who was deceased.

And I know my mind was just swirling with questions as I stood there as a group of us watching the proceedings. But trying to cope mentally with what I was seeing, to start with to all intents and purposes this was a perfectly normal human body uh of course some things were being done to it before long that were certainly anything but normal.

But the fact of the matter is the strangeness of seeing that from my first experience many of you have had many more experiences than I had at the age that I was then. But to stand there and just trying to cope with the whole thing, sorting out the mega mystery of life and death, what is life really?

And of course I was familiar with the passages of scripture. I've just said a few minutes ago that no doubt I'd given only lip service to them. I hadn't been as compelled to think about these things as I was on that occasion.

But this is the conclusion that we must come to. It is, and according to the bible, the essence of, I'll speak personally, the essence of my being, of my identity is invisible. You see my body but you cannot see the essence, the true inward identity of who I am.

I am, I am a spirit being with a body and so are you. And there's someone going to maybe come in so you can watch out for him. But in any event this is the fact and to believe this, to believe that I am a spirit being or that you are a spirit being, and to follow that through, it causes me to think again about subjects such as abortion.

It causes me to think of course about physical death itself and to try and process these things according to this great fact. But this is how God sees each and every one of us. So we've talked about heredity, the passing on from one generation to another.

We've thought about the word spiritual which causes us to think about this invisible realm, this invisible dimension of our makeup. And so really now the conclusion we're coming to is that we're learning that in the spirit realm we have a heredity which is passed on to other people.

There are things that have been passed on to each and every one of us in this dimension. And there's that which has been communicated to me and transmitted to me from an earlier generation. Someone was talking about this earlier in this meeting, speaking about Wesley standing on the grave of his father and then the reference was made that we're all standing on someone's shoulders and thankful to someone who's gone before who's passed on good things to us we trust.

But in looking back to this text here I'm wanting to remind you that God in dealing with each and every one of us, he has an objective, he has a purpose in his heart. This is not a side issue, he's not sort of got a hobby that he dabbles with from time to time.

He is totally committed to a purpose which the Bible calls an eternal purpose with each and every one of us. He's to include us and incorporate us into all that he is and all that he has planned and ordained for his people.

But here we are at this point in time in the process and I believe this is the message that God is looking at each one of you individually. He's not merely looking on the surface of your life, he's looking into the depths of your being and he knows where you've come from, he knows everything that has been inherited and gained and we're going to focus on that even more particularly now.

But the point is today God by his Spirit is bringing us back to our roots, bringing us for a moment away from all the even all the good things that we've learned which have been important in life, even the wonderful messages that we've listened to and benefited from over the passage of time.

But when we're in the presence of God in his light we see light. In the illumination of his radiance he penetrates us deeply because he knows that in order to bring us into that which he has eternally purposed for us he needs to get down to the deepest inward part of our inner being, of our spiritual being and do something there with us, not merely to give us more information to think about as though that would be satisfactory, but rather to get down and do something in us.

Believing facts of Scripture is very important and if you've learned or been exposed to Scripture in the past that's of great benefit to us. But in the final analysis it's not merely learning the information but it's having God by his Spirit do something on the inside of us that's deeper than we even understood was possible.

And so God has gained a reputation for this as we read through the Bible and we know for example as we move on into the New Testament when we're reading the words of the Apostle Paul, he takes this same concept and the way he approaches it, he says that we've all come from Adam.

And of course he develops that theme to suit the context in which he is speaking as he writes to the Romans or to the Corinthians. We remember with Jesus in talking to the crowd of people around him, he'd said some things which offended the people that were gathered around him and so much so, excuse me, struggling here, I shouldn't have sung earlier before we started.

In any event, when he was talking to them they were upset with him, they were offended by what he was saying and they then made the claim I quoted earlier, we have Abraham for our father, you know. And at that point Jesus corrected them, he said your father isn't Abraham, your father is the devil.

Now he'd taken things back not merely just to even Abraham's background in the era of the Goldies, he'd not even taken as far back as Adam but he went all the way back beyond history. He said you're of your father, the devil and the deeds of your father and the desires of your father you will do, he said.

In other words, the root problem, the root issue that is common to men and women everywhere until we experience something of the redemptive work of Christ is that our ancestry is corrupted. The issue is in our hearts, Jesus said that, you remember as well, that the issue is the issue of your heart.

Thank you very much, thank you. So, have we really seen this? I hope that the Spirit of God can really make this very, very clear to us because we tend as good evangelical people in these days to just gather to listen to more information.

We may feel we need more information so we run around and listen to lots of people giving us more information but the universal need is not merely for information. I'm not diminishing in any way the explained truth of Scripture but the greatest need is for God to be able to do something at this root level of our beings and unless that's happened we have not been transformed as God must transform us.

As we move into this area then, this that we have inherited from a long time back in our background behind us is sin. Here's the issue, we've come to the core issue now and we perhaps commonly tend to think about sin as being limited to an action or actions in which we participate or don't participate when we ought or whatever the case may be but we think of that in that particular way.

But when we understand the teaching of the New Testament and in particular now what the Apostle is teaching, the Apostle Paul, he speaks, he distinguishes between the singular word sin and the plural word sins and by using the word in the singular when he speaks about sin he's speaking of sin as an entity and sins that are commissioned as a result of that but he says perhaps you'd like to turn with me to just see this I'm looking into Romans if you want to turn there and in chapter 7 of Romans the Apostle Paul says this in verse 17 therefore I really need to read earlier but therefore did that which is good become a cause of death to me may it never be he says rather it was sin in order that it may be shown to be sin by affecting my death through that which is good so that through the commandment sin would become utterly sinful and he speaks in the a little lower down in the chapter verse 19 for the good that I want to do I do not do but I practice the very evil that I do not want but if I am doing the very thing I do not want I am no longer the one doing it but sin which dwells in me.

And in verse 23 he said I see a different law in my members or in the members of my body waging war against the law of my mind making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members. He's talking about this entity of sin which he says is in him.

And of course this takes us back in our thinking to to the garden of eden and to what took place there which we refer to as the fall which took place there where the where the very devil himself succeeded in seducing eve and adam adam and eve and as the result he he poisoned the human race as the result of that and it was all done by them believing a lie they received the deception of the enemy.

And as the direct result this was this was an act in itself but something very unusual something remarkable took place from that moment that which they had enacted. The sin act became their inward disposition from that point in time.

And they were then to go on and reproduce after their kind according to the law which god had put into place. There are those who say that in fact one translation wants to take the word flesh which is the greek word sarx and translate its sinful nature.

But the the bible doesn't say we received or we receive a sinful nature. But what the bible does teach is that our human nature became sinful as the result of what took place by one man's sin says paul sin this entity entered into the human race.

So that paul is saying sin which is in me as we saw from that passage and from that which took place originally man's human nature became poisoned it became corrupted it became warped uh it became utterly self-absorbed and they produced or reproduced after their kind.

And one day i was conceived and born into this world. And so were you. And we find that in this invisible realm of my spiritual heredity that which was in my forebears which goes takes me back all the way to eden.

Uh so far as the this record is concerned. And i would have to say with paul that this was something i discovered in myself in my own life. The root problem that we have as men and women is our heredity to sin sin that is in me.

This sin dictates my behavior. This sin places me men and women you all of us. It places us under the judgment of god. This sin prohibits my ability to have fellowship with the divine with god. This sin leaves me hopeless because it's irreconcilable.

There is nothing i can do about it. That's that's both the teaching of scripture and the discovery that we make it in and of ourselves. And that's exactly what paul is talking about when he says the good that i want to do i can't do and the things i hate myself for doing i'm doing over and over again.

And ultimately it drives us in the direction that paul was going in that chapter chapter seven. So to if we're conscious of what's happening and we're concerned about it then we will we will stand with him and we will cry with him oh wretched man that i am who shall deliver me who shall deliver me from this body of death.

Now the wonderful thing that we find at that point is that paul continues by saying by making a statement he answers the question i thank god through jesus christ amen just to pause into a margin for a moment or a for a moment so far as this chapter in ezekiel is concerned if we were to carry on reading it we would find that in the verses between verse 6 and verse 13 so that's seven verses.

In those seven verses on eight occasions we find god referring to himself as i i will or i did. The point being this having spoken to him of his heredity and the people's background and the hopelessness of their condition we find that god is is speaking to them and he's expressing his own desire to to to transform their lives to transform the situation.

And he's saying over and over again eight times which incidentally in as far as numerology in the scripture is concerned is the number of new creation. He's saying i'm doing something about it or i did something about it and so on because we're thinking about the situation which we find ourselves brought to in the light of god and before his word about our deepest need.

And we're admitting that there's nothing that we can do to change it or to rectify it or alter it. And and thank god that the gospel isn't something about behavioral modification but just improving ourselves which we may be able to do up to a certain point but we can't deal with the root we can't even get to it although it's inside our own being only god can do something about it.

And when paul said i thank god through jesus christ at that point of course he was well aware that there was a solution there was an answer to the problem. And i think it's highlighted again in this ezekiel passage where in that context only god could make the change that needed to make.

And i can say to you only god by his holy spirit and through the redeeming work of christ can anything be done to change my spiritual heredity. Amen. And and and the word that stands out to me or at least it it arises not because it's on the page but it rises out of the text of those eight verses i've referred to is the word the fact that god should become involved and have a desire and a plan and a purpose to make a transforming situation in anyone's life is his grace.

And you know as we think about the fact of what the lord jesus christ accomplished at the cross his redeeming work the whole body of truth that we find explained in the epistles in particular that have to do with with being justified by his grace and the sanctifying work that takes place in our lives it's all a cause for rejoicing.

It's all a cause it gives rise to us. It reminds me of the hymn where we sing grace grace god's grace. Grace that is greater than all my sin. And so we rejoice in that. But here's an important factor but so many sort of park their lives i parked my life right there at that point in time we've understood that god has acted in his grace.

He's paid a price that we could not pay to deal with an issue that we were unaware of and were called upon to to believe that and and rejoice in it. And so we gather we sing our great hymns about such grace.

And you know what could be more wonderful than than this. But the fact is i i need stay with me for a minute. I need something more than that. You say really uh we're on dangerous ground because we've thought about the redeeming work of christ.

We sing in a wonderful hymn of charles wesley's tis finished the messiah dies cut off for sins and but not his own. And he accomplished everything that needed to be done. He paid the full price. Am i challenging that.

No a thousand times. No i am not challenging that at all. Uh but but the fact is i i believe that i believe it sincerely. But i have a problem. I am a slave of sin. This is this is the point. And and and and i need this god.

I've just been speaking about the to do what only god can do. I need god to somehow by his grace in his grace and by his power to do something in this area of my being is is this is this in fact true.

I need the power of sin to be broken in my life. And what i'm saying is sadly so many people i have been one of them. We perk our lives too quickly believing things that are absolutely biblical absolutely true.

But we need then to allow god who is behind those words to act by his holy spirit and impact me in my heart. The big question is well how does this happen. How can this happen. And i'd like to just simply mention three things.

Uh i need first to hear the truth. I need i need to hear the truth. Paul would say faith comes by hearing the word of god. And it's not it. I realize there'll be those who could challenge and misinterpret what i'm saying here.

But yes i i need the scriptures. I can't say this enough but but i can never get away from the fact that jesus said you search the scriptures for in them you think you have eternal life. But you won't come to me he says to receive the life itself.

That's the way i'm thinking here as i say these things i i need i need for the scriptures and the word of scriptures to somehow be quickened by the spirit of god. Somehow i need the logos of his word to become transformed by his handling of them so in order that it becomes the rhema of god the personal word of god where god is reaching me in the depths of my being.

And that's your greatest need to hear god speaking to you not a preacher not just words but where something happens where god who is living he's the quickening life-giving spirit of god to address you in your own heart and wake you up to the reality that he is desiring to do something in you which is greater deeper richer more dramatic more dynamic than anything he has able has been able to do up until this point.

I need to hear that. And faith then is quickened in my heart when i hear the rhema that's the word used in the text of god and his word. His word always brings light it illuminates. You know where we say now i see he causes that to be an inward reality.

Embracing the Word Through Obedient Faith

The second thing we need to do is to embrace that word. I need i need to. I'm thinking of paul again. I need to apprehend get hold of that for which he has gotten hold of me. He's gotten hold of me. He's speaking to me.

His word is quickening bringing life into me and light to my understanding. I need i need to receive it. I need to in the words of paul again romans 6 and verse 17 i need i need to obey it. Paul says thank god he said you were the slaves of sin.

But thank god he said you have obeyed from the heart that form of teaching that form of doctrine which has been delivered to you. That's what we're talking about where something on the inside says yes i hear you lord you you illuminating this great truth to me that you are able to do something that will transform me inwardly.

And i i appre you know i've said before one of the i can still remember the running after someone's fresh on the street. It might have been my first day on the streets after going through all my training and i was dropped off by a group of detectives and i was in plain clothes at the time.

And they said see that man down there there's a group of people he said that particular man he said you walk down there and grab him and we'll be there. But but he said they said he knows our vehicle.

It was an unmarked vehicle. He said he knows the vehicle and he'll they'll run. And i i walked down. It was a kind of it was a new experience for me. And i was getting very close and i guess i had my hair cut short and one thing and another and so on.

And one of them looked around and said something to the others and they all ran. And i ran like i couldn't run today uh. But i can still remember apprehending that man getting hold of him and and hoping that.

And then i heard the screaming engine of a car pulling up alongside me. And but i was then congratulated by the chief superintendent or um anyway. But i got hold of him like i must not let him go. Everything at that moment depended on me.

You've got to get hold of the word of god like that with a passion with every fiber of your being. And thirdly you have to receive his life. Receive he's the spirit of life. My bible's open here already at romans chapter 8 as he's moved through this thanks be unto god through jesus christ our lord.

Receiving the Spirit of Life and New Creation

But then in verse 8 chapter 1. Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in christ. Jesus hear this. For the law of the spirit of life in christ jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death.

The law itself couldn't do it but god sent jesus. Jesus came in as as the second person of the trinity. And he condemned sin in the flesh. Isn't that wonderful what the law couldn't do. The law of the spirit of life accomplishes in us.

And we sing sometimes he breaks the power of cancelled sin. Jesus cancelled it on the cross by his death and his bloodshed. Today the holy spirit comes to break the power of the cancelled sin in our lives and sets those who are prisoners to their spiritual heredity to sin in the deepest part of their hearts.

Amen. Just before i close. There's there's a bonus that i must make some reference to. And it's this that when the spirit of life enters into our beings he he actually changes our spiritual genetics. This is what new birth is.

New birth. Another word for it which is also used in scripture is regeneration. And we've played on this only works in the english language. But we've played on the word a little bit just to make a re gene oration.