1/3/2016 First Resolution by Pastor Josh Sheldon

Psalm 52 and the Fate of the Wicked

More than the blind, ravenous-speaking righteousness. You love all devouring words, you deceitful tongue. God shall likewise destroy you forever. He shall take you away, pluck you out of your dwelling place, and uproot you from the land of the living.

The righteous also shall see and fear, and shall laugh at him, saying, here is a man who did not make God his strength, but trusted in the abundance of his riches and strengthened himself in his wickedness.

But I am like a green olive tree in the house of the Lord. I trust in the mercy of God forever and ever. I will praise you forever, because you have done it. And in the presence of your saints, I will wait on your name, for it is good.

Amen. Amen. Now Philippians, chapter 1, beginning in verse 1, of Josiah, page 790, if you're using a Hebrew Bible. Paul and Timothy, bondservants of Jesus Christ, to all the saints who are in Philippi, with the bishops and the deacons, grace you with peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

I thank my God upon every remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine, making requests for you with all joy, for your fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now. Being confident of this very thing, that he who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.

Just as it is right for me to think this of you all because I have you in my heart, inasmuch as both in my chains and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel, you are all partakers with me of grace.

For God is my witness, how greatly I long for you all with the affection of Jesus Christ. And this I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in knowledge and discernment, that you may approve the things that are excellent, that you may be sincere and without offense until the day of Christ, being filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Christ Jesus, to the glory and praise of God.

Prayer for Grace, Discernment, and the Glory of Christ

Dear Heavenly Father, in Jesus' name, we thank you and praise you for your incredible grace and mercy towards us. We confess our utter dependence on it and our dependence upon your spirit to accomplish any good thing.

We just ask now you to pour him out on this gathering, on the speaker and hearer alike, and that your word will go forth with clarity and with power to convict and to encourage and to discern righteousness, evil, judgment.

Father, all the things that we need to be able to see clearly, we ask that you'll grant us this and we ask that you'll show us your glory through your word, the glorious face of your son, Jesus Christ, who is the perfect image of the Godhead bodily.

And Father, we just ask that you'll do this and enable us to increase in knowledge and all the strength, Father, that we may walk well, pleasing to you, and that we may spread your glory among all those who cross our paths.

And we just ask that you'll accomplish these things in us and we ask in the Jesus name, for your glory, amen. Amen.

New Year's Resolutions in Light of Philippians 1:6

In Philippians 1 .6, to repeat, being confident of this very thing that he who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ. Common practice this time of year for us to make resolutions, New Year's resolutions.

As I've told you before, it's like that line in the sand we can draw and remember on this day, I decided to start or stop this thing and make the resolution and carry on so that we can look and say, a week later, we know it's been a week because we remember the day we started, New Year's time of resolutions.

That's not something that's demanded of us in the Bible, but there's really no problem with it. Look back on a year just gone by, determine that we're going to improve in some areas, we might decide to exercise more, eat better, mow the yard more often, wax the car once a month or whatever the case is, just something that's going to improve things or ourselves.

It's time when our habits of excess get special attention though, isn't it? Hopefully many of us are resolving to pray more often, alone with God, with our husband, with our wife, in the church to seek the throne of grace more consistently.

If resolutions are to be made, I would hope that some, if not most, if not all of them, would have to do with our lives as Christians, more prayer, more Bible study, not just at New Year's, but throughout the year, more time with the saints, more involvement with the means of grace that God has given us in the church with each other.

If these things are lacking and having a date set in memory where we started the better pattern is helpful to us when I say, God bless you, let's make the resolution, let's steel ourselves again to greater strides in sanctification and holiness.

Our Bibles don't tell us to wait for New Year's to do these things though, do they? We're everywhere told to resolve to do things, but not necessarily to wait. I mean, what's going to happen if on January 2nd you notice a very bad habit in yourself and you say, well, in 11 months and 29 days, next New Year's, we'll take care of it.

Well, that would make no sense at all. But that said, all things being equal, there's nothing wrong with New Year's Day is that time when you look back and say, in these ways this next year, I will improve in all these different aspects.

Now, I don't want to give a long list, but I just want to say that the imperatives of the Bible are to be obeyed, not just on January 1st for January 2nd and following. Always to be obeyed. Jesus said, if you love me, you will follow my commandments.

Requires determined resolve. Resolutions are okay, maybe they're even required, but this is a life of the Christian. To resolve to be more like Jesus Christ. To always be looking back upon his image as he's presented to us in the Gospels.

And resolving, if you will, to move closer to that image. What Paul says here, he's confident in this very thing that he, who's he, he is God the Father who elected, he is God the Spirit who applied what Jesus Christ did to us who changed our heart, remade our soul so we are able to believe.

He who has begun the good work in you, he will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ. Meaning until the day, as I spoke of a few moments ago. The day that we're called to him either by his return or by our taking our last breath in these tents.

Until that day, that good work that God Almighty began in you, he, can I say, is resolved to complete it. If you've made a resolution, I have a suggestion for success, actually I have two suggestions for success.

And first is, let's be sure we're resolving ourselves towards the image of Jesus Christ. That's most important, that's key. What's the well done, good and faithful servant going to be other than you look more like me now that I see you?

Well, how far will we be from that image is incredible. It's a huge difference, we will never make his, be exactly like him, we know that. But I think part of that well done, good and faithful is gonna be based upon that growth from where we were when we started to where we are when we draw that last breath.

That resolution that we had throughout to be more and more and more like Jesus. So let's resolve ourselves towards his image. And my second suggestion, I hope will help us to get there. Not only in this, maybe in any resolution that we've made that is otherwise a good enough resolution.

Not necessarily spiritual and heavy duty like that. Though I hope those are there. And it is from our verse, the second suggestion, he who began that work will complete it. And what I wanna say, what I want you to think of as we resolve ourselves this time of year when we do that, when we stop and have that reflection.

Remember that there is a resolution that came before any that we can make. There was a resolution made regarding us that no matter how diffused our effort, how weak our resolve, will come to its intended goal.

The father of our Lord Jesus Christ, he, he is the one who began a work. And he will complete it. Making resolutions is good. I give you a basis for looking forward to success in them. Insofar as our resolutions meet with what the word of God says, this verse by Paul, this part of that verse by Paul says that God has resolved to complete the work that he has determined for you.

This verse doesn't teach that salvation's bestowed upon a person and then he or she works into it and finds out in the end if they achieve the goal, God began the work, God will complete the work. What are we speaking of here?

We're speaking of sanctification. As I've been saying, growing into the image of the Lord Jesus Christ, the process of growing more and more into his stature, into his image. And that's the goal of what God began in you, isn't it?

Isn't that the goal? That when we see him, we'll look more like him than we did at the beginning? Salvation, if you know the Lord Jesus Christ, if you have repented of your sins and salvation through him, by faith in what he did on the cross, if that is yours, if salvation is yours, it's just the beginning of a great journey.

The end result is never in doubt because it's God who began the work, God who will complete it, and that's our first point. What God has started, he will see through to his determined end, to what he determined for you, what he resolved.

God Finishes What He Starts

Now, there's some key words in the verse that I wanna touch on here. Paul is confident. He says, I am confident of this very thing. I think I used this analogy last time I preached from this verse some years ago, but I'll use it again.

A professional sports team is confident, aren't they? They're confident that they're going to win the game. You don't get to that level of competition if you don't have that kind of self-confidence, that over-brimming self-confidence.

I mean, we don't go and watch the 49ers or the Raiders or anybody else because they said, well, you know, we're pretty good, our game plan fits the task at hand, but man, we just don't know if we can take these guys and we'll do our best.

No, that's not the team we're rooting for. That's not the kind of confidence we want. They're fully confident in themselves, but the best teams, as some have learned this year in football, they do have to acknowledge the possibility of another team winning.

I mean, it does happen. In what Paul says in Philippians 1 .6, he allows no such possibility. There's no contingency for failure in what God has resolved to do. He says, God began the work, God will complete the work.

What God has started, he absolutely will finish. I think back to Genesis when God said eight times, let there be. Let there be, and in each case it was, each time just as he commanded, each time brought to complete fruition, exactly as God willed it.

Isaiah 66, verse nine says, shall I bring to the time of birth and not cause delivery, says the Lord? Shall I who cause delivery shut up the womb, says your God? What God starts, he finishes. As we resolve ourselves to be more like Jesus, what are we resolving?

We're resolving to do what the scripture says. And how do we do it? Well, we do it by the power of God. We do it because of his indwelling spirit. We do it by obeying his word. But did you notice here, each time I said that, I said, we do it.

We don't do it on our own. We do it for God's glory. We don't do it in our own power. We do it in God's power. But we do it. And we do it by resolve. I would have us be confident that as we decide to do these things that would bring us closer to the image of God, these things that the scripture would command or commend to us, start with confidence.

Start with confidence that as you are finding yourself in the will of God and desiring those things that God's will is revealed to us in the scripture, that it's actually God who's going to complete it.

God will do the work. We have so much doing. There's so much commanded of us to do the works that God prepared in advance that we should walk in them. I don't deny human responsibility. But as we grow in that image, remember who it is who's bringing us there, who is guaranteed the end result.

Failure hasn't even a glimmer of a chance to overcome God's design. What God starts, he sees through to the end. And of this, we can be with the apostle fully and unshakably persuaded. He says, I am confident.

That means there's no chance of anything other than this being the result. God will complete it. Even when the work is as monumental as bringing sinful humans into the light of the gospel of Jesus Christ, well, think of that.

Think of what you were before Jesus Christ came to you, before his spirit renewed you. If God can change a hell-bent sinner like you were, like I was, and make us a Christ-loving saint, if God can do that work, do you not think that he can make us more like that Christ that we came to?

Of course he can. Of course he will. His word promises so. So he's confident, unshakably sure that this will be the result because of who it is who began it, because of who it is who says the work shall be thus and such.

Because of the person, the nature of God. So as your resolutions for this year are to be more like him, like his son, Jesus Christ, know that it is God who is pleased with that, and it's God who will see it through.

Now, we don't know exactly what God's final design specifications are. We don't know that. But we do know what his word says we should be like. We do know what the fruit of the spirit is in Galatians 5 .22.

God will see it through. The other word is a good work. He who began a good work in you. Everything God does is good. In God is only light, no mixture of darkness, no variation that could suggest any change in his purpose or his nature.

The work begun is the bestowing of salvation, the changing of heart and soul. The word Paul uses here is only used one other time in the New Testament. Galatians 3 .3 asks if the Galatians, having begun, that's our word, begun in salvation in the spirit, will they try to finish in the flesh?

Will they try to finish the work in their own effort? No, salvation's a good work, a work that can only be begun by God, a work that can only be completed by God. So as we put ourselves in the will of God, be sure it's God who will bring us through.

He will complete it. It says he who began that work in you will complete it. John MacArthur translates complete as perfect. He who began that good work in you will perfect it until the day of the Lord Jesus Christ.

I think that fits better, what Paul's saying. It's a strengthened form of the word our Lord used from the cross when he said it is finished, telestai, it is complete, it is finished, it is made perfect, nothing left to add, nothing left to do.

Now Jesus, of course, talking about the work of atonement that had been brought to its complete and final fulfillment, it is perfect. Our word in Philippians 1 .6 is, if you can imagine that, a bit stronger.

It means God will fully complete what he started as he always has and as he always will. So what does this verse tell us? Why am I preaching this to you on the first Sunday of 2016? Let me paraphrase it this way for you.

Paul says to the church, for I am completely persuaded without even the slightest doubt of this, knowing that it is God who began in you the good work of salvation, I know that he will finish what he began from the day of your new birth until the day Christ returns or calls you to be with him.

That's what Paul's saying to you. This tells us the task of salvation is God's, cannot be earned. It is God's through faith in Jesus Christ and that alone. This tells us that the salvation he has bestowed is without repentance on his part.

God will complete the work in us from now up to the moment we're called to him. It's God. It's his nature that's involved here. This speaks of the confidence that we have in salvation being made complete.

If we do good deeds in order to hold open the door to heaven, what are we saying? I think God's promises are weak. That his word needs our help, that our good deeds need to supplement what God has already promised.

If we come to church, give to the poor, pray and read our Bible, any act of religion or piety, no matter how good, in order to make ourselves worthy of salvation, what are we saying? Confident in ourselves, not God.

Outside this full, complete confidence and persuasion that Paul has. Now he's confident that the church, the individuals, that you, that myself, will grow and be in that image. But is he confident because I'm such a good little Christian?

That I'm so consistent in my prayer life and my Bible study? No. I'm gonna have to do those things. I am to have a prayer life. I am to study the scriptures for my own benefit and for others. But where's the confidence placed?

In God, who began the work. Now I think what often happens to us, we can't quite grasp what God has actually done, and what he promises to do. The idea of our holy God desiring such as us to be with him forever, is really, if you think about it, it's incomprehensible.

Why would God choose me to be the recipient of his perfect, sinless son, the righteous one, as he's called, his suffering? His work? Why would he choose such as me? And so what do we do to make up for it?

Well, we strive. We work. We resolve things in our own strength. We look at the scripture and say, well, I'm so far from the image of Christ. I'm infinitely far from his image. I need to work harder to be in that image, and that's a good way to leave the scripture, to say, I've got a long ways to go.

But then, we often, we too often, we so often try to make ourselves worthy. Do good deeds so that God will be pleased with us. Make greater strides in holiness and sanctification and piety so that God will be impressed, so that we will somehow deserve what Christ has done for us.

Brethren, it's impossible. Nobody deserves it. Nobody ever deserved it. Why did God choose you or me or anyone else? We only know this, for his glory's sake. That's all we get. So don't strive. Don't count on yourself.

That's what this whole verse is about. It's about the nature of God. Count on him to do the work. Count on him to empower you to execute your responsibility in that work. We don't just sit there passively in our homes and say, okay, God, here I am.

I'm open to your sanctification. Beam me into it or something like that. No, we have to work at it. It takes great effort. It takes constant effort. But it is God who's behind it all. Be confident in him is the whole point here.

There's so much to do in the kingdom. God works through means. He works through people like you and me. There's plenty to do. Church attendance, charity, Bible study, prayer, these are all part of it.

But they must be the heartfelt response of the saint who desires to please God and to know him better for what he has done. Not to persuade him to do something, but as a response to what has been accomplished.

It is better by far to keep the various parts of salvation where they belong. 100 God, 0 man. All of God, none of you. All given to us by faith, which only God can give. If God can do that, if God has done that, be confident he'll do the rest.

Do we have a part in this? Of course, I've been saying that. We can't just go along in our affairs as we did before we were saved. Nowhere are we able to justify that in scripture. Read what Peter says about how you used to run in that flood of dissipation.

And you've left it behind so cleanly. You made such a break with it that your friends look at you and say, what's the matter with this guy? Or this gal? No, there's much to do. We do have a part in it.

Rather than go through a long list of good works that are befitting of true repentance, I want to demonstrate the means God uses to make us fit for the tasks that he has for us. Ephesians 2 .10, I alluded to it before.

We are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. Verse 13 of Philippians 2 says, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to do for his good pleasure.

Is that so much like verse 1 .6 of Philippians? Who's doing the work? It's God. Who has to perform the activities of that work? That's us. Who's the one who laid out the works? God. Who walks in them?

Us. Who are we confident in? God, who from start to finish is the agent of all of this. Paul's speaking here in this letter of obedience in general to the gospel. Unity and accord in the church in verses 127 and 2 .2 are so important to him.

Seeking the good of others ahead of our own in verse 2 .3. Humility towards each other in verse 2 .5. Life, or living without complaining in verse 2 .14. Rejoicing always in the Lord, chapter three in verse one.

All of this going against our human nature, doesn't it? For me to put your needs ahead of mine, for me to be rejoicing always in the Lord when I have so much to complain about, being humble towards others, goes against everything in the flesh.

But our desires must be to do only those things that give God pleasure. Not us. It has to give God pleasure according to what his word says he's pleased with. Philippians 2 .13 speaks of our will and the things that our will leads us to do.

It is God who works in you to will and to do for his good pleasure. Here's a paraphrase. For it is God who is now working within you to desire his pleasure in what you do. That's what Paul's saying. God is doing a work in you.

He's changing you so that your desire is his pleasure. So that what you do is so that he'll be pleased. Not yourself. It's radically different, a will, an inner man than what we had before God's conversion of us.

When we were without Christ, our wills were in total bondage to sin. A free will is a myth. I'm not gonna go into an excursus on free will, but you can read Bondage of the Will. You can read Martin Luther's discourse on the will.

Compare him to Erasmus if you want, but I'm not gonna get into it that deeply. It's a little bit dense. Let me just sum it up this way. Free will is a myth. It's the highest manifestation of human pride.

The will cannot be free without God working salvation in a person and thus restoring to you true freedom, that true freedom that man was created with. If you have not Christ, if your faith is not in him, your will is in bondage.

You are a slave to sin, says the scripture. If you don't know Jesus Christ personally, don't even begin to think that you have free will. It is God who works in you to will and to do for his good pleasure.

And other than that, your will is completely the opposite. So what does Paul say? Paul says that God is currently, right now, working in the converted soul, shaping the desires of the converted soul to be as his own.

This is how we can do the things that please God. He is at work in us. He's changing our heart. That's the only way we can ever even want to please him. As the psalmist says, delight yourself in the Lord and he shall give you the desire of your heart.

The desires of our heart, which is the Hebrew thought of the will, the inner man, are for God only when God is our delight. So how does God do this? Again, he works in us. He makes us want to do his pleasure.

It's the fulfillment of the promise of Ezekiel 36, 25. I will take out, excuse me, 36, 26. I will take out the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. Excuse me. I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and you will keep my judgments and do them.

It is God who removes the heart that cares only for itself. It's God who replaces it with a heart that pumps out real life. It's God who sees that renewed, recreated, revitalized heart and then furnishes his Holy Spirit to guide and direct what the child of God will do.

How does he do this? The heart is a gift of God. It's able to respond in gratitude and love, able to delight in God and desire only what he would deem to be good. So have you done anything that would be pleasing to God?

I mean, to God be the glory if any of us can say yes at any moment because it is he who works in you. It's he who made it possible. It's he who made you even want to do his goodwill. There's one implication of all this and I really will conclude with this.

The psalmist says be still and know that I am God. God keeps his word. God finishes what he starts. Be still, be calm, be confident in who he is. We've plenty to do. There are good works for us to walk in.

And Jesus said, blessed is that servant his master finds so doing. In other words, when the Lord Jesus Christ returns, he should find us doing what? His will. Now a specific example there in Luke, he's talking about a man who didn't beat his servants because he thought, well, the master's delaying.

But this one knew the master would come and treated his servants rightly. In other words, following the will of God, doing as he said the things that would please him. Blessed is that one that his master finds so doing.

But in all our effort, in all our striving towards the heavenly goal, remember that it's to be done with confidence in him, confidence in Jesus Christ. It doesn't leave us wondering who's responsible for these things.

He doesn't leave us wondering what the final outcome will be. We talk about security in the Lord. Security of the eternal salvation that's been granted. That God doesn't change his mind. I think of so many who have this idea that you can bounce in and out of salvation.

The Nazarene Church, I think, is the most common example where you can fall in and out of grace in a very Arminian kind of way. This is what Arminius really did right. That you can fall from grace and then come back in.

How do you move on with confidence in that? How do you make any resolution to be more like Jesus Christ? If you have it in your mind that you can fall off that wagon and God's done with you until you get yourself back on.

Is that what Paul could mean when he says he's confident in this very thing? That he who began that work will complete it until the day of Christ Jesus? Or is it we who are doing the work? Obviously, it has to be God.

A Muslim imam once told me this about salvation in the Islamic sense. He said, it is sinful to presume that Allah will save you. It is wicked to think him so evil that he won't. How about that? Well, how would that coincide with a verse like this?

Philippians 1 .6, where Paul would have us be confident, be certain, have no doubt about not just what God is doing but the God who's doing what he is doing. What this imam meant explicitly was that you found out if you're okay with God after you left this world.

While here, you strive and you do and you do and you do. And you make yourself worthy by doing and doing and doing. And in the end, you find out if Allah is pleased. And then this man wants us to think that Allah is not some capricious God like the Greek gods of mythology.

That's so antithetical, that's so opposite what Philippians 1 .6 would say to the Christian. I'll go on because Roman Catholic doctrine is really not much better. They teach that as you do good works, you fill, the illustration is a goblet.

You fill it with wine and the wine represents the good works and when you see God is revealed to you, whether there's enough in there for you to be in heaven and avoid purgatory. And I hear that and I say, well, what does that have to do with Paul being confident, absolutely certain of this very thing?

No, it has nothing to do with what the scripture says. That's not the God of Philippians 1 .6. He began the work of forming Christ in you. He will bring that work to its intended end and he gets all the glory for it.

And this ought to free us to grow into Christ because it takes away the fear of failure. It's not you who's doing it. Have you made a resolution to be more like Jesus Christ? Trust that as your resolution comports with what the word of God reveals to us about Jesus Christ, that that pleases God, that puts you in his will and he will bring you to that conclusion because as you do the things that the scripture tells us, you know that you're in the will of God.

It has to free us. There's no fear of failure because it's God who's taking responsibility for it all. It's the kind of freedom that multiplies our effort and our determination because while we have great responsibility, the issue is ultimately in his hands.

So I say to us, do not strive, but rather pray. Do not grasp after something as though your effort's going to get you there. But for God's glory, reach for the goal that is Christ Jesus in his image. It's common to make resolutions and I think it's a fine practice.

Whatever resolution you might have made insofar as it promotes godliness and holy living, I say may the Lord bless you. But more helpful to us would be to start this year pondering God's resolution, the resolution that must be the basis for our own.

It's God who resolved to complete the work that he began of growing us into the image of his son. We can make resolutions and some of us are better at them than others, whether they be for things in the world, like mowing our yard more carefully, more often, or more important matters of being like Jesus Christ.

Let's be confident in the God who Paul is pointing us to in Philippians 1 .6. It's not let go and let God. I've never said anything like that. But it's God who's doing the work. Therefore, your confidence that as you're resolved to be like Christ, it comports with his word, with his will, know that he will do it.

Psalm 121 and Confidence in God’s Preservation

I wanna close just by reading Psalm 121, appropriately called one of the pilgrim psalms that Israel sang on their way up to Jerusalem for the end gatherings. The psalmist says, I will lift up my eyes to the hills.

From whence comes my help? My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth. He will not allow your foot to be moved. He who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he who keeps Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.

The Lord is your keeper. The Lord is your shade at your right hand. The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord shall preserve you from all evil. He shall preserve your soul. The Lord shall preserve your going out and your coming in from this time forth, and even forevermore.

Amen, Happy New Year. Heavenly Father, we again do praise you and thank you for the day you've given us. And we ask, Father, that you would give us full confidence in you, in this work that you began in us, knowing that it is you, Father, who will complete it.

Do pray, Lord, that you would show us clearly the path that we should be on, the works that you have laid out for us, these things that we could do that would be pleasing to you, good deeds to others, and great strides toward the image of Jesus Christ.

Lord, give us a heart, give us the energy, give us the strength in the inner man to accomplish all this, knowing that it is you who will bring it to fruition. And for all this, we thank you and glorify you in Christ's name, amen.