Salvation
About this series:
The kingdom of God is not a static subject, but a dynamic reality. The presence of God and his reign with his people makes an experiential difference and while that should be clear throughout the whole series, this section should especially emphasise that. Martyn Lloyd Jones’ comment about this is helpful: ‘The Christian life after all is a life, it is a power...That is the thing we so constantly tend to forget. It is not just a philosophy, it is not just a point of view, it is not just a teaching that we take up and try to put into practice. It is all that, but something infinitely more.
The topics we’ll cover are (though not necessarily in this order -please see further below):
Power (introduction - the Christian life is a life of power!)
Healing: theology
Healing: practice
Gifts: prophecy
Gifts: speaking in tongues
Salvation
Freedom
Suffering
The reason for including a week on suffering is that, as God said to Paul, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness" (2 Corinthians 12:9). We all know that one of the greatest evidences of God's kingship as displayed in the life of his people is his power that sustains us when we suffer - it's definitely a mark of his reign.
About this talk:
By nature, every person, though precious and made in the image of God, is, “dead in...transgressions and sins...disobedient...deserving of wrath” (Ephesians 2:1-4). Outside Christ, we were all, “ungodly... sinners... God’s enemies” (Romans 5:6-10). In short: we were spiritually dead and without hope for becoming spiritually alive. The fact that anyone is born again, becoming a new creation in Christ, is a miracle; an act of God’s mercy in making the dead alive (Ephesians 2:4-5). The greatest possible demonstration of power in the kingdom of God is salvation.
And though the experience of salvation, of becoming a follower of Jesus, almost always feels as though we are in control and making the decisions, behind our movement towards God is his movement towards us moving us to move towards him. The Bible makes it clear that every person who is saved does so as a result of God’s prior choosing and initiative:
John 3:6-8: “Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”
John 1:13: “To all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God - children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.”
Colossians 1:13: “He has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves
John 6:43-44: “Jesus answered. ‘No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them.’”
1 Peter 1:3: “In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.”
The passage in Romans 1 states that the gospel (the good news of what God has done for mankind in Jesus) has inherent power to bring someone to salvation: “it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes.” And of the many terms we find in the New Testament describing salvation, here Paul speaks of righteousness. “In the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed” refers both to God’s own righteousness being shown in God’s plan to rescue us and his gift of righteousness by which we are rescued.
However, it is not that we are merely passive recipients of new birth - salvation is, “to everyone who believes.” God works in those he has chosen by engaging their mind, emotions and will in their experience of moving towards him. ‘When I was coming to Christ, I thought I was doing it all myself, and though I sought the Lord earnestly, I had no idea the Lord was seeking me’ (C. H. Spurgeon). An analogy to show two things being true at the same time may help: our experience as people living on planet earth is of the sun orbiting us. The earth, to us, is static, while the sun rises in the east and sets in the west each day. What's truly going on, however, is that the earth is moving through space at 67,000 mph as we orbit the sun. And the earth (at the equator) is spinning at roughly 1,000 mph. Which is the reality? Both, at the same time. It’s just that our very real experience is not the whole story.
So while we work and pray to be witnesses empowered by the Holy Spirit, we also pray that God will work in the lives of those he has chosen, bringing them to repentance and faith.
Audio only
