But God...

the following message by aleister begg is made available by truth for life for more information visit us online at truthforlife.org our scripture reading this morning is from ephesians chapter 2. reading from the first verse and i encourage you to follow along as i read ephesians chapter 2 verse 1 and you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked following the course of this world following the prince of the power of the air the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh carrying out the desires of the body and the mind and whereby nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind but god being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us even when we were dead in our trespasses made us alive together with christ by grace you've been saved and raised us up with him and seated as with him in the heavenly places in christ jesus so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in christ jesus for by grace you have been saved through faith and this is not your own doing it is the gift of god not a result of works so that no one may boast for we are his workmanship created in christ jesus for good works which god prepared beforehand that we should walk in them thanks be to god for his word gracious god we thank you for the bible we thank you for the work of the holy spirit who illumines its pages to us we thank you for that divine dialogue that you conduct whereby your spirit in and through and beyond human instrumentation speaks into the very core of our lives calling us out of our deadness to life out of our enslavement to freedom out of our condemnation to the joy of your presence accomplish your purposes gracious god we pray for jesus sake amen well we come to verse 4 now in our studies in our previous study we were confronted by what we refer to as the divine diagnosis of the spiritual condition of all men and women outside of the lord jesus christ we saw the diagnosis to be clear to be comprehensive that there are no exceptions no excuses and it was also a diagnosis that was manifestly grave some of us have had occasion to be confronted in physical terms by a diagnosis that was quite inescapable and our immediate reaction was to ask is there any way to fix this perhaps to address the physician himself or herself and to say is there any way that you are able to fix this and of course the saddest of all is when they have to say to us i'm sorry that there is nothing that can be done at least nothing that we know about well of course humanity as it confronts the predicament of the human condition has all kinds of suggestions as to how it can be fixed but that is in large measure because contemporary notions of the state of man are frankly unprepared to give any credence at all to this diagnosis which is not only here in ephesians but runs throughout the bible whereby the bible tells us that outside of christ we are dead we are enslaved and we are condemned it doesn't sound very good and it isn't good and fine it is dreadful and it speaks to the issues of our state every day that we live our lives every newspaper that unfolds before us every broadcast that come acro comes across our screen confirms the reality of what gk chesterton observed that whatever else may be in doubt man is not what god intended for him to be and so the explanations that are given are fairly routine the trouble is that man is simply sad or perhaps he is dysfunctional or we may be prepared to acknowledge that he is sick that's why he does these dreadful things why he kills and maims and rapes and turns in upon himself this is explained in terms of sickness the one thing that is almost wholesalely rejected is the diagnosis that the bible gives here namely that man is sinful and the reason that this is so crucial is because a superficial view of the human condition results inevitably in attempts to fix the condition in similarly some superficial fashion so that for example uh we may try if man is simply misguided to cure the predicament by increasing the level of education if he is sick by increasing the amount of medication if he's just rebellious then perhaps by legislation or even by indoctrination or domination and the story of social and political history throughout our world this morning uh can be understood in terms of all these different categories different ways in which society as a whole and towns and cities and families and sports teams and businesses and academic institutions try and do something about the fact that man is messed up now that's why it's such a wonderful thing to have a bible and to read it and to read it and to ask god to speak to us through it because the bible declares that we are spiritually dead on account of our trespasses and our sins and that only god is able to raise the dead paul then goes on to say and that of course is good news because that is exactly what god has done and beginning here in verse 4 he is going to explain to his readers and we are his readers now what god has done and then why he has done it now let me remind you that what we are by nature in our fallenness in our sin magnifies what we are then by grace and if we have a trivial and superficial view of what we were before we turn to christ then probably our expressions will bear testimony to that there are three things in particular that we should note under this heading what has god done and they're there in the text and i can point them out to you first of all god has made us alive with christ made us alive together with christ now don't worry about verse 4 we'll come back to that later but for now notice that little phrase made us alive together with christ the testimony of the believer is not that god has helped us to feel better about ourselves or somehow or another has improved our circumstances or our living conditions because in actual fact some of us having professed faith in jesus christ have found that our circumstances have actually got worse some of us would testify to the fact that it is ever since we began to take seriously the story of the bible that uh we we just have not enjoyed many of the benefits that we once knew some of the friendships that we'd enjoyed so much have gone away we used to be in absolute harmony within our home but we have now become followers of jesus and our spouse doesn't follow jesus and we wish that he or she did and it is always there all day every day as an underlying issue so the idea that somehow another jesus comes simply to add to the sum of our total happiness to clean everything up to make everything absolutely better we can testify to that we're not supposed to testify to that no the story of the believer is i was dead and jesus has made me alive we sang about it last sunday night i once was lost in darkest night but thought i knew the way we're so lost that we didn't know we were lost now we needed to be shown that we were lost before ever we were found because you don't need to be found if you're not lost so you come to a talk like this and you listen and you sit and you say well i don't know who this refers to but it certainly doesn't refer to me until you understand that it does refer to you and then you say i once was lost in darkest night and i thought i knew the way but of course i didn't you see at that point in our experience christian things actually seemed pretty foolish and the reason for that the bible tells us in romans chapter 8 paul explains the condition of life he uses a contrast between the natural man and the spiritual man or the flesh and the spirit you can read it for yourself and he says in verse 6 of romans 8 incidentally that's why you bought those bibles so that you can look up and see whether what i'm telling you is in the bible for to set the mind on the flesh is death but to set the mind on the spirit is life and peace that's the contrast death life death and life for the mind that is set on the flesh which is the mind by nature the mind that emerges from the womb it is it is pre-programmed set on the flesh to please itself for the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to god and it does not submit to god's law indeed it cannot and those who are in the flesh cannot please god that's what it says in first corinthians paul is making very much the same point and illustrating the way in which we find ourselves outside of christ first corinthians 2 verse 14 the natural person man by nature does not accept the things of the spirit of god for they are folly to them to him and he's not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned it's quite a statement isn't it in other words spiritual things the thing that we read in the bible the story of jesus and particularly this notion that in his death or his life and that in him exclusively and solely there is life and peace and there is freedom from our enslavement and there is triumph over all that holds us in its grip and someone says no i'm sorry that just seems absolutely foolish to me well why would it seem foolish well because by nature it is foolishness to us the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing who are they everybody but to those who are being saved who are they those who have been raised up to life it is the power of god so in other words when the bible is proclaimed when the gospel is proclaimed it inevitably divides it inevitably causes us to say on which side do i find myself i is my mind at enmity with god am i hostile to these things do i naturally turn away from them do i believe this well if you're in christ then you do because this is what god has done he has raised us up prior to that we were both deaf and we were dead until god called us to our senses i say to you again this is not a nice diagnosis but it is the biblical diagnosis if you take luke 15 you have a lost coin you have a lost sheep you have a lost son in fight you have two lost sons one is lost in his self-righteousness and the other one is lost in his abandonment one is it one is slaving in his father's house when he should be enjoying the benefits of the provision and the other one has run away from his father so i was thinking that if he could only get out from underneath that then he would find everything that he longed for then he would be free then he could do what he wanted then he could be with anyone he wanted he could sleep with everyone he wanted he could do what he wanted and then it says that after he had he had spent all of his stuff he began to be in want and nobody gave him anything none of his friends now he's busted and he went and joined himself to a citizen of the country who sent him into his fields to feed pigs and he would certainly have just eaten the pig slop if if if if he could and then he said when i came to my senses when i came to my senses i said to myself i i will arise and i will go to my father and i will say to him father i have sinned against heaven and in your sight they say it's not like i'm in a pigsty and uh things are not going as well as i'd hoped could you please advance me a little more cash my circumstances have taken a down turn but i'm sure i'll be out of them before too long now i've sinned against heaven and in your sight i'm no longer worthy to be called your son i'd be happy if you give me a position as a servant in your household well you know the rest of the story if you don't you should read it in luke 15 it's quite fantastic it is the wonder of the call of god into his life in that situation you know there's a wonderful illustration of it as well in a story that many of you will know the story of lazarus people who don't know much about the bible know there was somebody called lazarus and of course lazarus had a couple of sisters martha and mary uh lazarus wasn't well the sister sent for jesus uh jesus from the sisters perspective delayed in his arrival as a result of his delay uh lazarus had died and had already been buried uh he is then chided lord if you'd been here my brother wouldn't have died and jesus said all right jesus himself cried at this scene and then we read in verse 38 of john 11 then jesus deeply moved again came to the tomb it was a cave and a stone lay against it and jesus said take away the stone martha the sister of the dead man said to him lord by this time there will be an odor for he has been dead for days in the king james version it says lord he stinketh that's very graphic it's also very honest decomposition has already set in what possibility is there for anything other than the resealing of that cave jesus said to her did i not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of god and so they took away the stone and jesus lifted up his eyes and said father i thank you that you've heard me i knew that you always hear me but i said this on account of the people standing here that they may believe you sent me and when he had said these things he cried out with a loud voice lazarus come out and the man who had died came out he speaks and listening to his voice new life the dead receive when you get to chapter 12 there is a dinner party at the house in bethany where lazarus lived whom jesus had raised from the dead and so they gave a dinner for him there and martha served and lazarus was one of those reclining with him at table what a d what a dinner party have you ever thought about what that must have been like you get invited and you go maybe you've been out of the area for a while and you come back and you sit down and everybody is introducing themselves hello yes i'm simon hello and your name is lazarus oh okay uh so how's it going with you lazarus um and what what's been happening lately i mean the usual kind of dinner time conversation hadn't been going on he said well i don't know if you believe this but i was a dead man i was dead and buried you got to be kidding me what are you talking about no jesus here jesus raised me he came and called my name in fact if he hadn't called my name if he had just made a generic call who knows how many people would have come out of the grave he simply called out lazarus and i came out and they took all my clobber off me and here i am tonight and i'm having dinner with you this is a wonderful illustration loved ones of what happened when you were converted if you were converted if you are you were dead i was dead physically alive i was part of the walking dead i heard his voice he called me into life we sang about it again last sunday night should have been here i was blinded by my sin had no ears to hear your voice didn't know your love within had no taste for heaven's joys then your spirit gave me life opened up your word to me this is what has happened this is the amazing wonder of the transforming power of jesus and paul says this is what you were by nature and look at what has happened to you now god has called now when you think about the idea of god calling to us there is a call in creation isn't there there is there is that which within the framework even of a springtime morning like this calls somewhere into the recesses of us and says you know in all of this beauty and all of this grandeur and all of the budding of these flowers and so on there there's it speaks to us of a glory beyond here in your scientific work in your lab work in the intricacy of the universe in the joy of wonderful music there is a call from creation there is a call also in our consciences each of us by conscience is aware of god god has made us with an innate sense of right and wrong that is why when we go wrong we know inside of us we are wrong that is why we want either to try and cover up the fight that we're wrong or to figure out a way to be put in the right or to justify ourselves it's the call of god making us aware of the fact there is also a call that comes in the preaching of the bible when the bible is proclaimed it is as if there is a knocking on the door of our hearts but the real effectual call of god the inner call of god is that which unlocks and opens the door of our hearts that's why we often say don't we i think i probably said it last week i say it to redundancy that my voice can unlock nothing can unlock no heart i can say to you as i'm saying to you now you know creation speaks your conscience speaks the bible speaks and you can still sit there and go i don't think so no until god speaks till god takes up his word and calls you by name speaks into your life says to you i'm talking about you this generic description of humanity actually finds its focus in you you know this to be true that's something god does that's what he did in the life of lazarus he called him by name he was deaf but he heard him he was dead but he was alive that is the transforming power of jesus and all of this is accomplished on account of the fact that christ rose from the dead and sat down at the right hand of god we have been made alive with christ i spent too much time on that secondly notice we have been raised with christ raised with christ now notice that each of these verbs is in the past tense in the past tense because all of this has already taken place all of this was accomplished when christ rose from the dead and he himself then sat down at the right hand of the father you see what paul is doing here is quite magnificent he's pointing out the fact that christ was dead and buried for our sins and he was raised he ascended he was seated and now he says in christ that is what has happened to you if you are a believer first of all you have been raised with christ past tense romans chapter 6 and verse 6 or so 6 6 we know that our old self was crucified with jesus in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin for one who has died has been set free from sin here we go now if we have died with christ we believe we will also live with him we know that christ being raised from the dead will never die again and death no longer has dominion over him and therefore death no longer has dominion over us if christ does not return first we will physically die but to die is to fall asleep in the arms of jesus and to waken up and discover that we're home that what we fear most we will never experience why because our life is now hidden with christ in god because when we died with him we were then raised with him and we have as we're going to see in just a moment being seated with him that's our position in christ it's an amazing thing tonight when we have baptisms when they open up the baptismal bull he up here beside me and people testify what they're going to really say is going down into the water it is a picture of death and coming out of the water is a picture of life i died with christ i have been raised with christ he called my name and i'm here tonight not to talk about myself but in order to tell you about the amazing truth that jesus has actually done what he said he will do that's why incidentally when we sing the hymn before the throne of god above we have the line in it one with himself i cannot die do you ever wonder what that actually means that ontologically it is impossible for us to die ultimately because we have been united with christ in his life when he was raised we were raised with him remember how ephesians 1 has started you were chosen in him before the foundation of the world before there even was a world before there ever was this god did this he's not looking out of the window as it were trying to discover some nice people that he can include in his group he is the god who has taken an initiative from all of eternity and as christ was raised as the head was raised so the body was raised with him because we're placed into christ into his body saved individually set apart together it's a great wonder one with himself i cannot die or in the the wesley hymn alive in him my living head what does that mean alive in him my living head what his reference saying is right here we he says who were dead who were enslaved who were condemned who had no possibility of fixing ourselves this god has raised us up with him having made us alive with christ raised up from spiritual death our sins being pardoned and our life the very life that jesus promised i have come that they might have life and that they might have it in all of its fullness here is the life that is really life and thirdly and finally what has happened here is that we have been made alive verse five and we have been raised verse six and i'm doing this from memory now because i turned to john and we have been seated with him i think it's there isn't it in verse six still yeah raised up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in christ jesus what does that mean the heavenly places in christ jesus we're in cleveland for goodness sake how could it be how could we be in the heavenly places well we are both in cleveland and we're in the heavenly places what are the heavenly places that are well the heavenly places is just a it's just another way of talking about the unseen world of spiritual reality the unseen world of spiritual reality when we did our studies in daniel we said there are evil forces that are at work in our world if we could ever actually see the the the the reality of this presence it would be overwhelming to us we see the impact of this presence people say well no that's not why but they have no real explanation for all the rape for all of the hatred for all the heinous crimes where does all this come from well the evil one dragging people with him in his wake and says paul having been made alive and raised we are now seated with him in this world of spiritual reality in verse 3 of chapter 1 he said this is the place of blessing we've been blessed in christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in verse 20 of chapter one this is what he worked in christ when he raised him from the dead and seated in his right hand in the heavenly places in chapter six if we ever get there he's going to tell us that it is in the heavenly places that we wage war that the church engages in spiritual warfare not wrestling against flesh and blood but against the rulers and the powers of the authorities against the cosmic powers over this present darkness against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places that's why you see to become a christian is to be reconciled to god and to be antagonized to the evil one we're now antagonized to the evil one as long as we were simply going down broad street with him he didn't really care one way or another as long as we were simply going down broad street and seeking to be as ethical as we could or as nice as we might he was quite content to leave us on our own but have you discovered now that since you started to read your bible since you started to say i believe in jesus since you were baptized since you decided to make a commitment to these things since you discovered new life springing up within you did you discover now that all hell has been let loose against you did you realize this why is this because we have been placed in a realm and in this realm he says chapter 3 this is the realm in which the church the church that is the people of god chapter 3 and verse 10 so that through the church the manifold wisdom of god might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places you get it that in the church big c god's people throughout the entire world the manifold wisdom of god the triumph over enslavement the victory over death the pardon over sin the life that is really life might now be made manifest so that the forces of evil recognize that that is actually the case says john start and this is not a piece of meaningless christian mysticism no it bears witness to a living experience brought to new life we were dead brought to a new victory we were enslaved let me try and wrap this up in this way this morning because we're not going to have time to go to the the why god has done this in the 60s some of you will remember depending on your vintage that jimmy and carol owns who were songwriters in the united states wrote two celebrated musical pageants as it were for the church to sing and one was called if my people and the other from memory was called come together you may have participated in one i know i did at the royal albert hall in london when i was still in my late teens and i remember being struck by the melodies i remember being struck by the great crowd that was there i remember feeling greatly encouraged just to be part of a significant number of people all declaring in the very heart of london the victory and the triumph of the lord jesus christ and uh one of the songs that we sang together goes like this and right out of this text keep it keep looking down you're seated in the heavenlies god's mighty power has raised us over all keep looking down above all principalities for we have died and risen with our lord now we often say to one another don't we that we want to distance ourselves from a kind of superficial form of triumphalism and we do from ever suggesting to people that jesus takes us into the realm of freedom from sickness and from disappointment and so on we shouldn't say that because it's wrong to say that and it's very unhelpful to say it because it just isn't true so in distance ourselves from a superficial triumphalism we dare not stand back from what the bible actually says is true concerning us namely that this is the case that we have been raised made alive and seated the musical went on to these words you are the children of the kingdom of god you're the chosen ones for whom the savior came you're his noble new creation by the spirit and the blood you're the church that he has built to bear his name and then came the refrain and the gates of hell shall not prevail against you and the hordes of darkness cannot quench your light and the hosts of god shall stand and fight beside you till your king shall reign triumphant through his might that's why we often sing at the end of a day so be it lord your throne shall never like earth's proud empires pass away why do we say that because it is guaranteed to us part of this message this morning needs to say to some of us let's get our chins out of our chests let us start to live in the light of what is true of us as individuals and as a church in a nation that largely has turned its back on god in an environment where the hosts and the hordes of evil seem increasingly oppressive move amongst the average church member you'll find them either angry or depressed why because we're not actually living in the light of the work of the spirit of god within our hearts and lives keep looking down you're seated in the heavenlies so that we might see now of what god has done sending his only son his is the name of all majesty he's the savior of calvary he's the source of all sovereignty what god has done and then he goes on to tell us why god has done it we don't have time to go there now four words will encapsulate it for us mercy love grace kindness well when you think about the call of god and you think about the people that god uses in calling out to us he doesn't always use the preacher does he he uses the preached word that's his plan but he has his agents remember when naaman who was a mighty man of valor but had leprosy receive news from a little girl who had been snatched away from her family home and put in service of the king of syria when he heard from a little girl about the prophet who was the representative of almighty god and so the little girl said to her her mistress uh if only if only my lord would go and see the prophet so he went to see the prophet but he went on his own terms he went magnifying who he was in contemporary terms he would have gone in a few stretched limousines he would have had an entourage with him he would have carried with him gifts and offerings and things so that the prophet would know what a significant and wonderful person he was and he arrived and he announced i'm here and the prophet didn't come out the prophet just sent a message with one of his servants said tell naaman to go and dip himself in the jordan seven times and big smarty pants naaman decided he's not up for that kind of nonsense obviously the prophet doesn't know who he is this might have a ring for some of you you know i'm not sure jesus knows how significant i really am and so he went away in a huff and the word of god came to him how through his servants my lord if the prophet had asked you to do something hard wouldn't you have done it and that rings for some of you as well that's why you're a philanthropist that's why you're an ethicist that's why you're trying to make your situation as obviously wonderful as it possibly can be because you've got the notion that god is just waiting for you to show how significant you are and you don't want to hear any story about a dying jesus being the only answer to your deadness just like naaman all he said to you naaman was go and wash and you will be clean and naaman heard the voice of god and he was washed and he was cleansed today if you hear god's voice do not harden your heart father thank you for the clarity of your word any dullness and confusion is obviously on our part but we know that while the knocking may come through the voice of a mere man the external call and the voice of the preacher the internal call that raises the dead and unstops the deaf ears and sets us free from condemnation and brings us into the reality of life that is really life all of this and more besides is only accomplished by you and we know that your word will accomplish its purposes even this morning even this talk and hear our confidence lies do as you have planned father we pray for your name's sake amen this message was brought to you from truth for life where the learning is for living to learn more about truth for life with aleister begg visit us online at truthforlife.org you

Channel: Alistair Begg

Views: 10,291

Rating: 4.9096775 out of 5

Keywords: JEsus Christ, Regeneration, Salvation, union with Christ

Id: v7_Mqz7pmiM

Length: 39min 18sec (2358 seconds)

Published: Wed Jul 28 2021