Video Transcript: Your Past, Present, and Future

Transcription of Your Past , Present and Future

One of the most common ways of advertising is to give a before and after. For instance, if you're trying to advertise a new diet, you will give a before where a person is very, very heavy, and an after, where she can stand in the pant leg of her old pants. And if you look at this before, and after you say, Wow, what could make that kind of difference? I want that if I'm trying to deal with a weight problem. And so the before and after that appeals to ladies who want to lose weight may go something like this. 

For men, there were the old Charles Atlas ads, and ever since then, ads to men have been kind of similar. They take people who start out as little geeky wimps and turn them into macho human. What's my job? I manufacture weaklings into men. Before they are weaklings afterward, they are men. And so still today, many kinds of advertising directed at Boys will be taking the old Charles Atlas approach of how they're going to sell you this piece of exercise equipment or that nutritional supplement or whatever, and turn you into somebody who has bigger muscles on your pinky than most people have in their arms. So before and after, is a very common method of advertising. And sometimes it's kind of a hokey method of advertising. But it is recognizing the fact that some of us are in one condition and really want to be in quite a different condition. Now the Bible has a before and after, as well. And it's not just a bunch of hokum, or salesmanship, it's a statement of fact, “and you who once were alienated and hostile in mind doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in His body of flesh, by his death, that is by Jesus death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him. If indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard”. (Colossians 1:21-23) 

So you see the before alienated, hostile mind doing evil deeds, and then after a tremendous transformation, here's how it goes. In your past, you were alienated and hostile in mind doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in His body of flesh, by his death. In order to present you this is your future holy and blameless and above reproach before him. So you have the past in sin, you have the present where you reconciled to God in Jesus death and resurrection, and your future where you're going to stand before Jesus perfect. 

And then there's a big F, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard. So let's think about our past, present, and future and that big if, in the past, you were alienated, if that means distant, far from God, it hostile and minds, in mind means hating God as an enemy, your thoughts and your attitudes are opposed to God. Now, you may not consciously say, I hate God, there are people who may do that. But many of us take thoughts and attitudes that are completely opposed to everything God stands for. And the only reason we don't say I hate God and consider him our enemy, is because we've manufactured our own little idol, instead of the living God. But if confronted with the righteousness and goodness and character of the living God, were at odds with him, doing evil deeds, that's another part of the past, before people are saved, defying God, doing what God hates. And that's just a bunch of disgusting and destructive decisions and deeds. So that's the past, far from God, hostile to God, doing bad stuff. 

And then in the present, he has reconciled us in His body of flesh by his death. Now, Romans 5,says something very similar where it speaks of the past, as well as this present of being reconciled. For a while we were still weak at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. God shows His love for us and that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. For if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by His life? Now, notice again, the description of the before that occurs in this passage, weak or some translations put it helpless or powerless, so weak, powerless, helpless, ungodly, wicked sinners, enemies member hostile in mind as same idea, enemies that's the before but then the present is that Christ died for us and rose again, and we're reconciled to God by the death of his son and we are saying Saved by His Life, what a tremendous difference between the wicked fallen past and the saved present of those who belong to Jesus Christ. 

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation, the old has passed away, behold, the new has come, there's a before and after for you, a new creation, the old is gone, the newest come all this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself. In Christ, God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them. For our sakes, God made Him who had no sin, to be sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. God made Jesus Christ to be sin, even though Jesus knew no sin, so that we could become the righteousness of God, that great exchange where all of our evil is laid on Jesus, all of his goodness is credited to us makes it possible for us to be reconciled. And when we're reconciled, we become a new creation in the present and the old is left in the past. What's that word reconciled mean? Well, it's more than just a ceasing of hostilities, let's say you've got a husband and wife, who are at odds with each other, who are bickering now, if they stop hating each other, if they stopped fighting, and the way they do that is by getting a divorce by staying separate by agreeing to divide the goods equally, and then not to bicker with each other anymore. That is not being reconciled. That's just learning to keep your distance and not fight anymore, to be reconciled, means to come together, and to love each other, a husband and wife who are reconciled to each other, belong together. Or take the example of Jesus parable of the prodigal son, the son finally stumbled back because he was starving to death. And he thought, well, maybe I can go back and get on with dad as a servant, even though I've offended him and done all sorts of terrible things. But when he comes back, his father races out to meet him and throws his arms around him and kisses him and has the best rope put on him and the family ring, put on his hand that's reconciled. He didn't just take the kid back as a slave and say, Okay, I'm not going to punish you anymore. And you can work for me, he took him back into his embrace as a son.

In the case of a judge pictured this way, a judge does not just declare not guilty, and then release somebody. And then he's reconciled. A judge could do that. And it's always great if the judge lets you off the hook. But reconciled means more. It's not just being declared not guilty. It means that the judge embraces you, that the judge befriends you, that you are drawn into relationship with him. So it is a great thing to be declared not guilty, and to be released from all the penalties of your crimes. But it's an even greater thing to be reconciled and embraced by the one who is the judge and ruler of the world. Okay think of it in terms of nations, nations can end a war, they can stop attacking each other, they can sign a treaty, sign a non aggression part, and not attack each other anymore. But that's not quite being reconciled. being reconciled means that the nations become friends. And for Christians, being reconciled means we're welcomed to live in God's nation, as citizens of his kingdom. We're not left in our own kingdom, in our own nation to do our own thing without us fighting against God and him fighting against us. No, we're drawn into citizenship in God's kingdom. And these are just some of the things that reconciled means It means being drawn into a warm, friendly relationship, not just keeping our cool distance and not hurting each other, but actually being drawn close to one another. 

Now, when we think of salvation, some of compared salvation to a bar-code that you see in stores sometimes, and when you go through the checkout, and a machine scans the bar-codes it reads that bar-code in a certain way, and then interprets it and then puts the price or understands what is being put out. Now, if you took a bag of steer manure, and you put on that steer manure, a bar-code from a bouquet of roses, the scanner would think that the manure was actually roses might not smell like roses. It might not be roses, but it's got the bar-code of roses and so the scanner will read manure as roses and some say Well, that's what God does. We're just a sack of you know what, but God takes a bar-code earned by Jesus and stamps it on us and how God's scanner reads us as though we smell like roses even though we really stink pretty bad. Now there's an element of truth in that whole bar-code picture. It is true, that our standing with God depends on God's decision to justify us, and not on the quality of our being to earn his salvation. But it can also be misleading, to view salvation strictly in bar-code terms, where God takes something that's totally stinky and opposed to him, and just gives it a new bar-code and, and that's that, and that's all there is to salvation. Now, salvation is more than justification. Justification is vital. It's absolutely important. But it's not the only thing of salvation and salvation doesn't stop there. Salvation also includes regeneration, in which God gives us a new heart and a new spirit, and we are born again. 

So it's not just something where God puts a certain code on us. But also he does something inside of us to change who we are, so that we are a new creation. It involves reconciliation, a close relationship, and ongoing relationship. We don't want to just get bar-coded into heaven, we want to start living in relationship with God. Now, and the Bible says that anyone who is saved is reconciled, and does live and walk in a relationship with God now. And then there's sanctification, growing in goodness, becoming more and more like Christ. So while there's a hint of truth in the idea of the bar code that God simply declares, based on Christ's merit, that we're acceptable to Him and received by him, God never just leaves us there. He causes us to be born again. He reconciles us to himself, he transforms and sanctifies us and that's all part of salvation. He adopts us into His family and makes us his sons and daughters. It is too cold. To just talk of salvation in bar-code terms, it's maybe a helpful picture for a very limited aspect of salvation, but regeneration, reconciliation, sanctification, adoption, in the God's family, all these things can't be explained strictly in terms of God, looking at us in a certain way. And then our future. God does this in order to present you holy, and blameless and above reproach before him, he does not just leave you, as a sack of steer manure with a new bar-code on you, he changes who you are, and he changes you more and more to be pleasing to Him until that day when you stand before Christ and your holy and blameless and above reproach. Jesus died not just to forgive your sin, but to put you on the path to perfect holiness. God accepts, he justifies and reconciles you now, as soon as you trust Christ crucified, even though you still have sins to fight, so he doesn't accept you just based on how good you've already become. He accepts you as you are, but then he doesn't leave you as you are. 

Our final future is to stand with Jesus before the Father with nothing to be ashamed of, with character, as pure as Jesus. And this too, is part of the work of God and salvation. This is part of what we must proclaim, and live and thus and we must not neglect it, our past our present and our future of holiness. Without holiness, no one will see the Lord. That's what the Bible says. And so we are being made holy, if we're truly born again, and being made more and more like our Lord Jesus Christ. And that brings us to the big if, if indeed you continue in the faith, if you want that future, then you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard. You need to stick with the hope of the gospel in a steady way, and continue in the faith, and then that future will be yours. Now, that kind of a warning where it says, if you continue in the faith, and you must continue in the faith, and you must not fall away, or you will be lost. What are those warnings mean? And how do they apply to whether we are once saved, always saved and whether we are secure in the Lord? Well, let me just mention three views of how these warnings function.

First, there's the loss of salvation view. Our Millions would hold to this people who have an Armenian view of salvation. The loss of salvation view says that believers can and do sometimes abandon their faith and lose their salvation. There are people who are saved but then they actually lose their salvation again, and the warnings of the Bible are raising doubts about receiving the prize. That's not the position One that I hold. That's not the position that I believe is taught in the Scripture, but it is one view. Another view is that you don't lose your salvation. But you can lose rewards believers can and do abandon the faith, some believers, even genuine believers will abandon the faith according to this view. But even then they can't lose their salvation. The warnings refer only to the loss of rewards. So there are some who say you could abandon the faith, you could stop believing in God completely. But if there was ever a time, when you said, Jesus, I believe in you, please forgive my sins. If there was ever a time like that, and you felt like you meant it, well, then you're saved and you can't lose it. And then any subsequent warnings in the Bible are referring to losing some of the rewards of heaven, but not referring to missing out on heaven itself. I think that view is also deeply mistaken.

The view that I hold to, and that Wayne Grudem and many others would hold to as well as the means of salvation view that the warnings of the Bible are part of God's means of helping you to continue in the faith. Those who profess faith, but then abandon it did not have real living faith and they were never saved in the first place. The warnings of the scriptures are given to believers to keep those true believers on the path to final salvation. Now, this understanding this means of salvation view is explained perhaps best in a book titled The Race set before us by Thomas Shriner, and  Odel Candidate. And the title of the book comes from these words of Hebrews 12:1 “let us run with endurance or run with perseverance, the race that is set before us”. And it goes into the whole biblical theology of perseverance and assurance, and I heartily recommend this book for those who want to get into the matter in greater depth, we need to run with endurance, the race that is set before us. 

Now speaking of running the race, let's go back to the 1980 Boston Marathon. In that 1980 Boston Marathon, Rosie Ruiz was the first woman across the finish line, and she came across the line in record time. She ran 25 minutes faster than her time in the New York Marathon the previous year, she cut 25 minutes off her time in that race, and she broke the record for the marathon. However, after all the celebration and the amazement at what she had achieved, it was noticed that she really wasn't even coded that much with sweat or panting hard like all the others who had run those 26 grueling miles and although she was in decent shape, her thighs looked unusually flabby for a marathon runner. Another thing none of the women running in the front group of women are the fastest runners could ever remember seeing Rosie Ruiz at all during the race. And the women who had been first and second in the later stage of the race, didn't remember Rosie Ruiz ever passing them. Well, after the discussion continued, there were two men who had been watching the race along the route of the marathon. They've been watching that race and they had seen Rosie Ruiz burst out of a group of spectators a half mile from the finish line. It turned out that she had started the race at the starting line. Then she had sneaked away down the side street to the subway, and took it to a spot less than a mile from the finish line. And then she went through some spectators and jumped back into the race. No wonder she broke the record. She didn't run the whole race. She wrote the subway. Well, Rosie Ruiz was disqualified and her metal was taken away. And it was later learned that she had also taken the subway for most of the New York Marathon. Maybe it's a trial run for breaking the world record in the Boston Marathon. Now, in that story of Rosie Ruiz is salvation basically a matter of pulling a Rosie Ruiz Do we just show up at the starting line, and then not bother running the actual course of the race marked out for us by God and then all of a sudden show up at the finish line and say, Here I am in heaven and claim all the prizes and and win the victory? Well, not quite. The Bible certainly indicates that there is much more to salvation than had making an initial decision for Christ and then showing up in heaven there is a race to be run. 

Now some Theologians such as Zane Hodges and Charles Riley dimension just too, they say that if there was ever a time you admitted you are a sinner and had a belief in your mind that Jesus was your savior, then you have eternal life and you can't lose it. They say that even if you go on sinning as before, and never Change one thing, even if you never pray or walk with God or listen to the Bible. And even if you totally later on, totally quit believing in God at all, and never turn back to Him, you will still make it to heaven, though you will lose some rewards. All that matters is if there was some point when you said a senator's prayer and had the thought in your mind that you were forgiven by Jesus. However, faith that doesn't change you. And that doesn't keep you going to the finish line is not real faith, you will go to Hell, if you don't continue in the faith. Christians can't just show up the starting line and then hop a subway to the finish line without running the race. Between the starting line the point where we become Christians. And the finish line, the moment when we enter heaven, there's a race to run. And the only way to get from the start to the finish is to run the race to follow the narrow road that leads to life as Jesus told us. Maybe you've read Pilgrims Progress, or maybe not. In John Bunyan's classic Pilgrims Progress, there's a man named ignorance, and ignorance thinks that he can make it to the celestial city by shortcuts. He wants to go to heaven, the celestial city, but he doesn't want to enter by the wicked gate, the narrow gate, and he doesn't want a scroll. He doesn't want the Word of God's promises to go with it. And he doesn't want to stick to the main path. And so he travels here and there he takes his little shortcuts, and then he shows up, expecting to be received into the celestial city. But ignorance is turned away from heaven and thrown into hell. 

Now the Scripture teaches that we must continue in the faith and Jesus himself makes it absolutely clear. I am the vine you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit apart from me, you can do nothing. Yes, anyone does not remain in me. He's like a branch that is thrown away and withers. such branches are cut down, thrown into the fire, and burned. Is that sound like a loss of a few rewards? Is that sound like if you don't remain in Jesus, things will just turn out okay. Anyway, talks about fire and burning. Jesus said the same thing. In the Sermon on the Mount. In a tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. You must continue in the faith, or you will be lost forever. 

Now in Colossians, it speaks of being stable and steadfast, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, stable means you're well grounded. You've got good foundations, you're built on something solid, or as Jesus put it, you're built on the solid rock and not on the sand. Steadfast means you're not blown here and there. You're not carried along by this wind of doctrine by that brand new teaching, and you're not blown away by troubles. You are steady, and you keep on going. Now our age, prizes, novelty. And thrills, every new product that comes on the market says new and improved. And even the old products are always trying to pretend they're new and improved. And even in church life. Many wants a church that stirs their adrenaline that stirs their emotions. But they're not interested in a church that provides a strong foundation and produces a community of stable and steadfast people. Beware, when you live in an age that doesn't prize what is stable and steadfast because stable and steadfast is part of the very essence of walking with God and living out the truth of the gospel. Not shifting, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard. Now think about this. Jesus is the path. Jesus is the prize. How could you receive the prize if you abandoned Jesus? If you leave the path, you lose the prize? Don't let go of your confidence in the Gospel of Jesus. God appoints the way as well as the end result. He appoints the wonders of Heaven and the joys of heaven, but he also appoints the path to get there. Jesus is the path and walking with Christ and life in Christ is the path that leads to the prize of beholding Jesus face and living with him forever. It is ridiculous and contradictory to say that you can go through like not walking with Jesus and then end up with the price of living with Jesus forever. What price would that be? You don't want to live with it. In this life, how could you want to live with him in the life to come? Now,

God told Paul, on one occasion that everybody on board would survive a shipwreck, you might remember the story, if you've read Acts 27. And there is a terrible storm going on that lasts about two weeks. And finally, the ship is getting close to land, but it's gonna get pounded to pieces on the rocks before anybody can actually get to land. And it looks like people are just going to die. But God speaks to Paul and makes it clear that everybody on board is going to survive the shipwreck. So that's pretty obvious that it doesn't matter what anybody does then right, because God says they're gonna make sure, well, not quite at one point, there are some of the sailors on the ship who decide they're going to try to get away from the rest of the people on board. And, and these crew members are going to grab their own lifeboat and sneak away from the ship and leave everybody else to what happens. And Paul says, Unless these men stay in the ship, you cannot be saved, they all had to stay together. And they needed the crew to manage the ship till the last minute. And so they cut the lifeboat loose on the orders of the captain. And they all stayed with the ship. And sure enough, the ship went down, but every last person on board made it to shore. Now, notice, they had a promise that they would survive. But then there was also a way that was given to them, they had to stay with the ship and not split up in different directions. And so it is in relation to our salvation, you can't shift away from the hope of the gospel, and then expect to receive the blessings of the gospel. At the end of the day. There is an appointed end, survival. But then there is an also an appointed means walking with Christ until the end. 

So we have this big if God protects believers from falling away, and we need to understand that that's the doctrine that we will persevere to the end the doctrine of eternal security. And one way he protects us. Now let's get back to those warnings. One way God protects us is by warning us what would happen if we fell away, those warnings are a means for our salvation. Now, when God gives us warnings, he's not saying to Christians, true believers that we will fall away. In fact, he's using the warnings to keep us from falling away by stating what the result would be if we did fall away. Now, if I'm walking along with my children, and we're going on a big hike, and on some pretty steep territory, and I tell them, I'll be very careful, if you walk off that cliff, you'll die. I'm not expecting them to walk off the cliff. I'm not expecting them to die. I'm just giving them a warning. And my warning is the means I'm using to keep them on the path and to protect them from walking off the cliff and perishing. If I point to them a bottle and I say no, you that's poison. And if you drink that poison, it will kill you. I'm not saying they're going to be dead. I'm not saying they're going to drink the poison. I'm just saying that. If they drink it, it will be fatal. And so they better not drink it. And scripture is saying if you fall away, hit will be fatal. So don't fall away. If you abandon Christ, you'll be lost forever. So don't abandon Christ. And by these warnings, God is keeping you in salvation. He's keeping you in salvation by warning that if you don't continue to believe the gospel and abide in Christ, you will perish. This does not mean true believers can lose their salvation. It means that God uses those warnings to keep them in their salvation. The warning is not that you'll lose your salvation anytime you do something wrong. Or anytime you have an impure attitude, if that were the case, all of us would perish. We do need to be aware of those sins and confess them and fight against them. But it is not a warning that every time you do anything wrong at all, you will be lost again. 

The Warning basically in the Bible is against apostasy, abandoning the faith, choosing something else instead of Jesus Christ, choosing to walk a different path than his path, choosing something different than his future. You need to live by faith in his future. Paul speaks of Christ in you the hope of glory, He speaks of struggling with all God's energy that he powerfully works in me. And it is these things that help us to continue in the faith. Now, this is what the Scripture reveals about our past our present or future. How bad is sin? Well, you are alienated and hostile hating God doing evil deeds. And then what a wonder the present is Jesus has reconciled us in His body of flesh by his death. And his resurrection guarantees our resurrection when we trust Him. Our future is that he's going to present as holy and blameless and above reproach before him. Then keep in mind that they give, if indeed you continue in the faith if you abide in Christ, if you walk with Him, if you run the race marked out for you, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard