John MacArthur: Becoming a Better You?

That was, as I said, a prosaic, well-crafted, extremely useful presentation of how things really are, very useful, with an overview, a kind of bird's-eye view. I have been assigned the task of observing the worm. Crouch and crawl a little in the mud and catch a person. I'm not sure why I've been assigned this task, but by the time I finish the introduction to this little talk, you may feel like you need to be washed with a fire hose because you'll no doubt have had some of the dirt splashed on you a bit. . But I hope it is useful to do this.

I certainly affirm everything that Michael Horton said. I think it is an absolutely accurate analysis and, from a historical perspective, there is not much new. It's the same old thing, but we just turned it into a high art form in America. We all understand that and have had an overview of the fact that this is part of church life. It can be noted in these general observations, but also in others that are much more specific. In fact, in recent years I have had people come to me and tell me how greatly and spiritually they were changed by reading a book called The Secret.

You may have seen it in an airport bookstore, written by Rhonda Byrne. It sold, and still sells, by the way, in double-digit millions. For a while, it was up to 150,000 books a month, which is pretty good. The Secret is a book based on Eastern pantheism, I guess you could say. All things are one. You are one with the universe. We are the light. We are the “I am”. We are the truth. We are God. It's some of that Eckhart Tolle nonsense. But the appeal of The Secret is that you have within you the strength, energy and power to create any kind of life you desire.

You can now find this book in Christian bookstores, but if your Christian bookstore doesn't carry it, they will probably be happy to order it from you. But they may have another book there that will serve them just as well. It's called The Cabin. Now I've had Christian people, who have been Christians for a long time, sit down with me – one recently over dinner – and say, “Did you read The Shack? I thought it was a great Christian book.” And my food at that time was totally ruined because this is a… this is a person who has been a believer for like 40 years.

Another multi-million dollar seller written by William Young, and there are a couple of other types of ancillary products written by some other authors on the topic of finding God at The Shack. The message again is this. You have so much power in you that you can literally create reality by speaking it. The inner creative power that resides within you can be released in words, and these words have supernatural energy that literally creates the world as you want it to be, that literally gives you circumstances and situations and relationships and achievements and achievements and the achievements and satisfactions you desire.

Now, there are some problems with The Shack that are obvious. God is not an obese African American woman. That would be a problem to consider in the book. But there are other problems in the book that I find troubling. One is that the heart of the book is called the law of attraction, the law of attraction. That is, your thoughts and your words control the universe by attracting the things you speak to you. The operating principle that makes the universe you live in the way you want to work according to the laws of attraction. You speak a certain thing and by saying it, you have the absolute power to attract it and literally make it come true.

Here's how to do it, in case you were wondering. One, know what you want. I mean, you have to start there. You can't attract anything until you know what you want to attract. Number two, believe that you will get it. And this is really the important one because if you just can't believe you're going to get it, you're not going to get it. So faith is the true power, faith in yourself, in believing that you can create your own reality. Know what you want. Believe that you will get it. Visualize the very experience of fulfillment as if you had it.

And then speak out loud, and at that moment you will have released enough power to draw this reality to you. Here's a line from The Secret. “It works at all times and in every person... and in every person. Just place your order and it will be yours.” And you say, “Well, how can anyone believe that? How can anyone be stupid enough to believe that? That your thoughts and your words create the world to accommodate you, that reality is literally the result of your own decision, what you think, what you believe, what you visualize, what you speak will really happen?

That's what he says in The Secret and that's what he says in The Cabin. You will rearrange the universe. To put it another way – perhaps borrowing some theological terms – you are in charge of providence. God is not. You have the power. "You have the energy of the universe." – These are quotes. – “You create your world. You are the designer of your destiny. You are the author of your story,” or of your movie, as well as the star. "The result is what you choose." So faith is this powerful, personal, creative force, this supernatural energy that overcomes all restrictions, objections and resistance, and literally gives you exactly what you want, how you want it.

And you can have whatever you want. And by the way, have you ever checked the wish list? Do you know what appears on that list? I have checked it and I don't see humility. I don't see brokenness, penitence, virtue, holiness, worship, sacrifice, altruism, love, heaven – no, not so much. Health, wealth, success, all those things that are temporary, material and perishable. Now, if that all sounds familiar and you've never read The Secret or The Shack, then you've been watching TBN. Yes, you have because that's where you became familiar with this. Yes. Unfortunately you have been exposed to this type of garbage in a vast religious Ponzi scheme that makes the people at the top of the Ponzi heap filthy rich.

It comes in forms like this: the word faith movement, the prosperity gospel, the "name it and claim it" movement, and names like Hinn and Hickey and Price and Meyer and Copeland and Hagee and Tilton and Koontz and Roberts and Hagin and Crouch and many More lesser lights, if you can be a lesser light. They all claim that each so-called Christian has the personal power to recreate the reality of life exactly as he wants. The only thing they add is that they include the name of Jesus. And Jesus is simply waiting to be activated by you, knowing what you want, believing you are going to get it, visualizing it and saying it.

It is a very successful Ponzi scheme. These people are really good at what they do and they prey the most on the desperate, the lonely, the isolated and the ignorant. And I always think of the Lord Jesus in the temple in the last week of his life when he sat there, he says, and saw a widow come and put two coins into an offering receptacle in the temple. In the shape of a trumpet, there were thirteen in the courtyard. And he came to a woman and put her two coins into the temple, and it was all she had.

Remember that? And we think that's an example of sacrificial giving. That is not an illustration of sacrificial giving. It is not a virtue to give everything you have and go home and die. That's not what God asks of you. But that's what the system asked of him. And the next words that came out of Jesus' mouth were these: “In this place not one stone will be left upon another.” This religion that does this is falling. God sat in judgment that day as Christ watched that widow drop her last two coins in a final effort to buy God's blessing and buy heaven and buy eternal life, because that's what that intriguing system offered, which He was making the people at the top, namely the corrupt Sadducees, filthy rich at the expense of the people.

And no wonder our Lord cleansed that place twice. Any religion that takes advantage of the sick, the poor and the weak comes under divine judgment. Well, all of that brings me to the star of the day, Joel Osteen. I'm sorry you replaced me on Larry King. He drives me completely crazy. Mike Horton in Christless Christianity, page 68, said: “Osteen has achieved the dubious success of making the teaching of Kenneth Copeland and Benny Hinn popular and claimed as mainstream.” There is absolutely some truth in that. Pat Robertson praises Joel Osteen. Of all people, Max Lucado, the best-selling Christian author, praises Joel Osteen.

Ed Young, Jr. praises Joel Osteen, a Southern Baptist pastor from Dallas. That's pretty common. Let me see if I can set the record straight. Joel Osteen is a religious pagan, legalist and quasi-pantheist. I have not finished. This is my pulpit. I can be here as long as I want. Now, on the other hand, Jesus Christ is a footnote to satisfy his critics, included at the end to get rid of people who are irritated by the absence of Christ in his ministry. And what is he saying? What is his message? We are saved from all the things we don't want, from all the things that are wrong in our lives by our own inner power of divine faith.

That's their entire operation. In his book, Your Best Life Now, and by the way I want to hasten to say that he is absolutely right. If you believe what he says in that book, this will be your best life. It will be much

better

than the next one. You are absolutely right. But if you want to have a

better

life now, opt for his theology. If you want to have the best life forever, avoid it. What does it say in Your Best Life Now? He says that we are able to create by our faith and our words the dreams we dream and the desires we have, health, wealth, happiness, success, all the same temporary things as always. (quote) “If you develop an image of success, an image of health, abundance, joy, peace and happiness, nothing on earth can take those things away from you.” (end of quote) Here's another one: “We are all born for earthly greatness.

You were born to win. “You were born to be a champion.” Tell it to handicap 20. “God wants you to live abundantly. He wants to give you the desires of your heart. Before we were formed, He prepared us to live abundant lives, to be happy, healthy and complete. But when our thinking becomes contaminated, it is no longer in line with the word of God.” By the way, when he says the word of God, he is not talking about the Bible. He is speaking from what you intuitively believe is the voice of God speaking to you, he tells you what you should be and creates your wish list. “Think positive,” he says, “and He will make your wishes come true.

He considers you a strong, brave and successful person. You are on your way to a new level of glory.” Now how is this done? Here is his list: create, visualize, speak out loud. The same list, you have to know what you want, believe it, visualize it, say it out loud. Your words literally release this life-giving power. Here are some more quotes. “Friend, there is a miracle in your mouth.” Isaiah might have a problem with that, I think. Here is Joel Osteen's prayer: “I thank You, Father,” this is his own prayer: “I thank You, Father, that I have Your favor.” Does it sound familiar to you?

Luke 18: “I thank you, Father, that I am not like other men, not even like that publican.” Here's another quote. “I know these principles are true because they work for me and my wife.” Of course, you're on top of the Ponzi pile. Everyone sends you their money. And then he says, “How do I know they work? Because I found a perfect parking spot at the mall.” That's deep. What about the poor old lady who was waiting behind you for that parking spot? Now, the good news is that all of this has some theology behind it, some theology itself.

He says, “God has already done everything he is going to do. The ball is in your court." This seems to be hyper-Pelagianism, Pelagianism on steroids. Well, at this point I think we've heard enough to recognize the true source of his religion. Do you have a problem with that? He's a mouthpiece for Satan. He's an agent of Satan. How do I know that? Because it offers all the things that the unregenerate heart already wants. 1 John 2 says, “Do not love the world, nor the things that are in the world. world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life, it is of the world and it is happening.

That is Satan's strategy. Think about it in Matthew 4 and Luke 4 when our Lord was being tempted by the devil. , what did he appeal to the desires of the Lord's heart apart from God's will for the moment. “You should not be hungry. You should not be rejected. insignificant. You should rule the kingdoms of the world. I will give you everything you want.” And every time He responded with Scripture, right? This is not the first time nor the last nor is it an isolated situation in which someone pretends to be a minister of Jesus Christ and is actually a minister of Satan because we know from Paul's letter to the Corinthians that the devil himself is an angel of light and His agents are disguised in the same way, right?

Why are these people so successful? Because Satan is behind the enterprise and is appealing to what is the natural desire of the unregenerate heart. All the unconverted sinner wants is what these people offer in the name of Jesus Christ. This is a fake Christianity from hell. All of Satan's temptations are aimed at fallen corruption, selfishness, pride and indulgence. In this system, there is no biblical understandingof God, there is no biblical understanding of man and certainly no biblical understanding of sin. If we were to talk about the doctrine of total depravity for a moment, we could understand it simply as the universal inability and unwillingness of man to come to God.

He is both unable and unwilling. No man seeks God, nor has any man any ability to approach God. He is both unable and unwilling. He has no interest in God. He is much more interested in what Satan can give him in this life, right? That's why all this is attractive. All men are neither willing nor able to offer anything worthy to God that could in any sense please God or cause God to bless them. This notion that you have so much goodness in yourself that you can literally express your desires, and God somehow jumps out of the little Genie lamp and gives you everything you want because you are a very noble person, created to be a winner. and a champion, it's a lie out of hell.

And the movement does not understand depravity, and that is where any understanding of the doctrines of grace must begin. The doctrine of total depravity, the inability and unwillingness of anyone to come to God, is the doctrine most attacked, whether on purpose or through ignorance. The most attacked doctrine is the one that says that man can do nothing, because all the other religions of the world, except true Christianity, say that man can and must do something. There are only two religions in the world: divine achievements and human achievements. Divine achievement is true biblical Christianity. Every other religion is some form of human achievement.

The most attacked doctrine, and we hear that it was attacked and continues to be attacked by those people who are descendants of Finney and others. The idea that man is dead, blind, helpless, hopeless, that he is an eternal loser is something that men do not want to recognize. However, it is the most distinctive Christian doctrine because if it is true that only the gospel is the truth, this is fundamental to the gospel. It is the only area where you will find a truly distinctive view of man as totally depraved. It is also the most contrary Christian doctrine because it goes against the dominant internal human trait, which is self-justification, self-defense and pride.

Men do not want to recognize that they are bad to the core, that they are corrupt to the core, that they are incurably hostile to God and good, that they are fatally self-centered, that they deceive themselves. They are superficially willing to acknowledge their sins. They are sinners in their sins. They will admit it. But they will not see themselves as sinners in their goodness and they will not see themselves as sinners in their religion. Their thoughts about God, they do not believe to be sinful but noble. False religion then becomes the most deceptive and heinous of all sins and is, of course, a violation of the first and great commandment.

Religion does not nullify the doctrine of total depravity. It proves it. I think preachers like Joel Osteen and others must hate the true God. They wouldn't say that. I think they hate the true God. I think they hate the real Christ. That is why they mask the true God. That is why they hide the true Christ from the eyes of his followers and put in his place an idol of his own creation. I can't think of anything worse than that. According to the Scriptures, the Lord does not offer sinners what already enslaves them, their own lusts and desires.

The Lord offers the sinner the gospel, and with it the hope of being rescued from what enslaves him. The gospel calls the sinner to flee, deny himself, flee judgment, die to all that is in the world, escape hell and gain heaven. In the movement of God's own, you change your own life. You don't need God. You don't need Christ. You don't need the cross. You have the power in you to do it all. In the book Your Best Life Now, Osteen says, “God wants this to be the best time of your life. Happy, successful, fulfilled people have learned to live their best lives now.

If you put the principles found in these pages into practice today, you will start living your best life now.” If that doesn't sound like Satan, I don't know what does. That's what the devil would say. This is your best life now. Does that sound like “eat, drink” so what? "Be happy." That's all. By the way, Christ is not mentioned in that book. He's not part of it. Satan offers the pleasures of sin for a time. But if you are a child of God, forgiven and headed to heaven, this life is not the best. This is good.

This is not our best moment. In fact, I don't even want to put too much hope in what this life can be. You? It's quite disappointing. And I have experienced the best of it, but the older I get, the greater the accumulation of disappointments becomes. Sometimes people tell me, "You're not as funny as you used to be." And my answer is, "Life isn't as fun as it used to be." Of course, I was funny when I was 18. Everything was fun when I was 18. And it was pretty funny when I was 25. It's not so funny now. And it's not because of what happens at a distance.

It's what... It's what I've experienced in my life. This is not my best life right now. My best life is yet to come. And I want to take you to a text of Scripture. I really do, and I'm going to do it right now, 1 Peter 1, and of course, I had the resurrection on my mind preparing for next week. This passage is so wonderful, 1 Peter 1:3-5. I want to turn the corner, forget what we've heard up to this point, and look at a text of Scripture that puts our focus where it needs to be. . For those who are truly children of God in Christ, this is the worst we will ever know, this is the worst we will ever experience.

Our best life will come when this life ends. And whatever this life is, it's not worth comparing, is it? That's why the apostle Paul says, "We look forward to what is to come." I love that whole section in 2 Corinthians chapter 4 and beyond chapter 5, where he celebrates the life to come, but so does Peter. Let me read these verses. This is... This is essentially a doxology at the beginning of his epistle. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to his great mercy has caused us to be reborn to a living hope, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to obtain an incorruptible, undefiled and eternal inheritance. does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

Now you know where we're going, right? Peter writes to some scattered believers. They are foreigners, and he identifies them as foreigners from the very beginning of this chapter: “To those who reside as scattered foreigners, who are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God.” Such are the elect, those who are dispersed. They are strangers in the world. They are clearly under persecution. That comes out throughout the entire epistle. Chapter 2, verse 20. “What merit is there if when you sin and are treated harshly, you endure it with patience? But if you do good and suffer for it, and endure it with patience, this will find favor with God.

For this is what you have been called,” called to suffer for the sake of righteousness. And that becomes a theme throughout this epistle. Chapter 3, verse 13, “Who can harm you if you are zealous for what is good? But even if you suffer for the sake of justice, blessed are you.” And he repeats the same thing in chapter 4, and then culminates his look at that in 5:10: “After you have suffered a little, the Lord will make you perfect.” So he is writing to some harassed, hated, abused, bullied and troubled chosen ones, who are outside their normal environment, who live in very serious difficulties and who have their lives at stake.

He doesn't tell them, "By the way, if you can somehow find the power within yourself to envision a better life, you can create your world the way you want it to be." That's ridiculous. Rather he asks for a doxology. He calls you to lift up your hearts in praise, joyful praise, joyful adoration to God, who has promised you eternal joy, eternal blessing. He is calling you and He is calling us to worship God now for the life to come. Now the doxology focuses on a big reality, and it's at the beginning of verse 4. Let's just notice the phrase “get an inheritance,” and in the original the verb is not there.

He is focusing on our heritage. The word essentially means “a gift fully realized and possessed.” It does not refer to the title of something but to the current nature of it. You have an inheritance. It is an inheritance already possessed. He is calling these troubled believers, now living their worst lives, to suffer patiently, to suffer until maturity or perfection, to wait with hearts full of exuberant praise for the eternal inheritance that the Lord has promised them, the inheritance that Christ has bought for them. them. And this is a call to exuberant joy, songs of joy in the night of despair.

In this our worst life, we are children of God, heirs of God, joint heirs of Christ, and we live in the hope of an eternal and unimaginable inheritance. We are like a – I don't know – like a childish prince, who is the possessor of the kingdom because the king has died, but until he matures, he will not be able to understand the enormity of his inheritance. We only have a little understanding. As children of the great eternal king, we do not have a real and full understanding of what we will receive in God's time. Too many expectations in the present will rob you of that joy.

Sometimes when we talk to pastors, we talk about ministry burnout. And some people have suggested that it's a problem of disappointment in people. This is a problem because some pastors feel harassed by the way they are treated. In my assessment of ministry burnout, burnout from doing good is not so much about what people do to you, but rather what you expect them to do to you. And the lower your expectations, the less likely you are to be disappointed. And if you understand from the beginning that you are a clay pot, that helps. 2 Corinthians 4: “We are a clay vessel.” And in case you're wondering, compare it to what Paul wrote to Timothy.

He said: “In a house there are vessels of gold and silver, valuable, and then there are those of wood and clay.” And gold and silver are vessels for honor. With that the food is served. And those made of wood and baked clay are to dishonor. It's not that its use is limited. They are used for dishonorable purposes. The good thing is the food. The bad takes away the results. You understand? This is a world before plumbing. I want to help you with this. And when the apostle Paul tries to identify what it is, he does not say, “I am a plate of gold or a plate of silver,” but, “I am a garbage can.” Now, with those kinds of expectations, it is very unlikely that one will be very disappointed if things don't go well.

By the way, that's what was said about Luther. It was a toilet. And he probably would have agreed. You just don't want to invest too much in this life of expectations. This is not your best life right now, but if you want to make the most of it, understand that and don't fool yourself into the idiocy of thinking that through visualization and some faith energy in yourself, you can recreate your world. or you will crash and burn badly. And please stop sending money to the people at the top of that plan if you're doing that. Paul says in Ephesians 1:18, “I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, that you may know what is the hope of his calling, and what are the riches of the glory of his inheritance…” Paul says, “I'm not telling you, you should look for anything here.

You need to seek everything in the next life. “I want you to control what awaits you.” What is this inheritance linked to? It is an inheritance – if you jump to verse 5 – that is described as a “salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” I think we all understand that salvation has three dimensions, right? We have been saved from the penalty of sin by the work of justification at the time of faith and regeneration. We are being saved from the power of sin through the process of sanctification by the Spirit of God through the Word. One day we will be saved from the presence of sin through glorification.

We understand the full scope of salvation, so we understand what it means when it says it is a salvation ready to be revealed, fully revealed only at the last moment, right? We have not yet entered into fullness. “We are closer,” says Paul, “than when we first believed,” but we are not there yet. However, what we want to do is keep our focus, our eyes, the eyes of our heart on that final glory, the riches of the glory of his inheritance. What will that mean? You hear all kinds of things when you talk to people about heaven.

Some people say, “I don't know what heaven will be like. I would get a little bored after a while. I don't know what we'll do up there. If we play a game, everyone will win. Everyone knows... I can't show up at a party and tell something that no one has heard. I can't explain something that no one knows. What are we going to do? It sounds boring". And I've heard people say, "Well, I... I think when we get there we'll be surprised who's not there and who is." And my answer to that is: I don't think that's the problem.

I think when we get there, we'll be surprised to be there. I'm going to be surprised. How did this happen? Grace beyondcomprehension. But what does it mean to go to heaven? When people ask me, what's so attractive about the sky? I agree with pearls as doors and, you know, the cubic city of the New Jerusalem, layers of transparent gold and all that kind of stuff. But what attracts me most to heaven is the absence of curse, the absence of sin, the absence of decay, all the effects of the fall and corruption, the absence of conflict, pain, suffering, sadness, tears, discipline, hatred . , misunderstandings, weakness, failure, all that.

I can only describe heaven in negative terms because I don't know what a positive description of the absence of those things would be except perfect holiness and perfect joy, unlimited joy, unlimited holiness, unlimited peace ready to be revealed in the last time. Paul comes to the end of his life in 2 Timothy 4 and, you know, he's been through a really difficult time. People have been abandoning it, right? He says there: “In my first defense no one was by my side.” That's a little hard to believe, isn't it? Everyone who converted, you know, in the Gentile world, was in some way related to Paul.

And he in fact says to Timothy: “Everyone in Asia Minor has abandoned me, except the house of Onesiphorus.” And then he says: "No one supported me in my first defense." But in 2 Timothy 4:18 he says, “The Lord will deliver me from evil and bring me safely into his heavenly kingdom.” That has to be our perspective. Our inheritance is a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time, in the final epic. For us it is the death or the triumphant and glorious return of Christ. This is cause for praise. And then we go back to the beginning of verse 3, “Blessed be…” and he continues with this wonderful doxology.

Let's look at it a little closer. “Blessed be God.” That is a very Jewish expression: blessed be God. I think of Psalm 103: “Bless the Lord, my soul.” Or Psalm 34: “I will bless the Lord at all times.” This was a very common expression that the Jews gave when presenting their worship. But there are some components that later emerge from that beginning. “Blessed be…”, and now I want to show you some points here, just so you can hang your thoughts on these hooks. We read about the source of our heritage. We offer this praise for our heritage. Let's break it down into the source, motive, means, nature, duration, and even the guarantee of our inheritance.

The source of our inheritance: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. In the Old Testament, God is known as the Creator. God is known as the Redeemer of Israel. He is known as the God and Father of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. But now God must be known as the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. That is a repeated designation of God throughout the New Testament epistles, particularly to Ephesians, Corinthians, and even in Hebrews, “The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” What he is saying is that God is the God who is one with the Lord Jesus Christ.

It is essentially an expression that follows John 10:29: “I and the Father are one.” The God we worship is the God who is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. In other words, you do not worship the true and living God unless you identify Him as one with Christ. This is the true God who is one with Christ. Some of the Master's College students took a spring break trip to Salt Lake City to witness to the Mormons, and they were at the Mormon Temple. And the counter… the counter to these young witnesses were some agents of Mormonism who went out and were distributing articles about their supposed theology.

And there were papers exalting Christ as Savior. Surprisingly, our students took a look at these items a couple of weeks ago and they had quotes from John MacArthur on the front. Now what we need to know is that they didn't know they were students at our university. This is the standard material they distribute in front of the Mormon Temple in Salt Lake City. Now, I met in this church with the leaders. The head writer, Robert Millet, who writes the theology for him, you don't get a lot of opinions on his theology because you have these nine guys who decide everything that's true, but he writes it all.

And we sat for hours and the conclusion we came to is that you have a different God, you have a different Christ, you have a different gospel, but other than that. The God of the Bible is a created being. The Christ of the Bible is a created being. The Spirit of the Bible is a created being. And Jesus is not the same as the supreme God. He is a created being. Well, the source of our inheritance, by the way, is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be that God who has provided this inheritance.

That again speaks to the source. It is not the result of our desire. We don't activate it. We did not generate it. We didn't make it possible. Wine from God. We understand that as sovereign salvation. Why did he do it? What is the reason? “Who according to his rich mercy” – eleos – “according to his rich mercy,” this is such a wonderful word. This word refers to someone who is so pitiful and so helpless, in such a horrible condition that he has no hope. Matthew 17:15, “Lord, have mercy on my son,” the man said. Blind Bartimaeus: “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.” What could a father do when faced with a lunatic son who kept throwing himself into the fire?

What could Bartimaeus do about his blindness? What can the sinner do about his sin? The other in Luke 18 beats his chest and the publican says, "God, have mercy on me, a sinner." And that's the one who went home justified. And of course, Micah 7:18 says, “God delights in mercy.” “His mercy on him,” says Psalm 108, “is far above the heavens.” He is called Father of mercies. “And his mercies,” says Jeremiah, “are new every morning.” In that great second chapter of Ephesians, “being rich in mercy, because of his great love with which he loved us, he gave us life in Christ, with Christ.” So the source of our eternal inheritance is God Himself.

The reason is mercy. And the only response we can have to mercy is to give it glory, right? To give him praise. We make no contribution to the extension of mercy. What is the means of this inheritance? The media is also given here. He gave us birth again to a living hope, literally in Greek anagenesas, “having regenerated us.” Again, this is a divine work. We were regenerated by the power of God. God regenerates the dead soul. Going back to Ephesians, “you were dead in trespasses and sins.” I love the meeting between Jesus and Nicodemus because Nicodemus says, "What do I need to do to be born again?" Now you understand that this is an analogical discussion taking into account spiritual realities.

Is not stupid. He knows that he is talking to the teacher in Israel. And when Jesus tells him, "You need to be born again," he knows he's not talking about coming back and being reborn. But he responds with analogies. How I do this? How can I be born again? That is such a basic question. How can I do that? And Jesus says this: “Well, what is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be surprised that he said to you: 'You must be born again.'” But as for how to do that, “The wind blows where it wants, and you hear its sound, you don't know where it comes from, where it goes. “So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.” That?

What is his response? His answer is that you can't do anything more than you can control the wind. You cannot control the Holy Spirit. But if you have been born again, you have been regenerated by the power of God, the will of God, and the purpose of God. But how does it happen? Isn't there a context in which it happens? Yes, 1 Peter 1:20-23, you are begotten again by the Word of truth, hearing the gospel as we heard it from Mike before. Faith comes by hearing the word of Christ, hearing the gospel. And in that moment, the wonderful regenerating power of the Spirit of God, because He wants, gives us life.

And this is the means that produces in us living hope, a hope that never dies. We are not like all the most miserable men because we have a hope that dies. Look, all the hope you have in this world will die. All the people who follow Joel Osteen never get what they want, which is 99% of the time, and if they are high enough on the list to get what they want, it eventually goes away. If everything is in this world, if all your hope is here, it will die. If he hasn't died, he will die. But we have a hope that will not die, a living hope that has been given to us because we have been given life, we have been regenerated, we now have eternal life.

And for us to die is simply to gain entry into the fullness of that life. The source is God. The reason is mercy. The means is regeneration. And then just a word about the nature of our inheritance, the nature of it, look at verse 4, is incorruptible, undefiled, and will not fade away. If I had time, I could read those words. Suffice it to say that everlasting means exactly what it says. Spotless means exactly what it says: undefiled, spotless, will not fade away. That is, it is not subject to deterioration. That word would be used to describe flowers that wither and rot.

This inheritance we are waiting for never dies. We have a living hope in a living inheritance. It never diminishes, it never loses its supernatural glory. For how long? Its duration, the fifth thought, well, its duration is forever. It is reserved in heaven for you. It is reserved for you in heaven, safe in the eternal place. Heaven will never be invaded. Your treasure will never be looted, devastated, defaced or stolen. Jesus said it this way, if you store up your treasure in heaven, never what? Oxide. Thieves will never steal it. And you, by the way, will never be disqualified because your inheritance, verse 5, and you along with it are protected by the power of God through faith.

The faith He gives you to believe is a permanent faith, not a temporary faith. This is the perseverance of the saints, the security of the believer. The doctrines of grace just pour out through this wonderful, wonderful text. Well, we have all of that: this glorious inheritance with all of these components laid out for us in this doxology. What is the warranty? The guarantee at the end of verse 3, “through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” The cross is validated in the resurrection. The stupendous historical event opens heaven to all the chosen ones, establishes their inheritance and their eternal joy.

This is provided to us through the cross and validated in the resurrection. Scripture repeatedly says, “God raised Jesus from the dead,” and by raising Him he secured the inheritance of all who died in Him and were resurrected in Him. The lie is that this is your best life now. This is not everything. We have just seen what the life to come is and is. And the longer I live and the older I get, the sweeter this becomes to me. My faith grows stronger as the years go by because as he says a little later in that same section, every time faith is tested and survived you know you have supernatural faith.

That's what tests your faith. Someone said to me today, “You know, so-and-so is struggling to have the assurance of salvation.” And I said, “Well, that's probably because that person hasn't had enough tests.” Because? “Rejoice,” says verse 6, “for, if necessary, you have been afflicted for a little while in various trials, so that the trial of your faith, being more precious than gold, which perishes, although tested by fire, can be confirmed. resulted in praise, glory and honor in the revelation of Jesus Christ.” Do you know what you want from this life? You want trials and you want suffering because when you come to the other side and know that your faith is intact, God's gift to you is the assurance that your faith is authentic.

Father, we thank you for the time we have been able to spend together in this passage and for lightly scratching the surface of this. We do not hesitate to name and speak of those who are a danger to the cause of Christ and to the reception of the kingdom in this time and place. We know that the Scriptures warn against false teachers and also name them, and Lord, we simply…we ask that You exalt those who are faithful. Exalt truth, Lord, and destroy error. Make it clear. We thank you for the gift you have given us by giving us the Holy Spirit, and with the Holy Spirit comes discernment.

We have been delivered from error to truth, as Paul expressed it in Romans. Thank you for these days of fellowship and learning and days of enhanced and enriched worship and praise. Because that comes from a deeper knowledge of the truth. We want to worship you in spirit and in truth. So fill us with truth so that our worship may be informed. The more we know about You, the more praise will arise from our hearts for Your glory. That is our prayer. We pray in the name of Christ. Amen.