Well that's, I think, one of the biggest questions
for many Christians. I dealt with that with an older saint on Sunday
evening. After the sermon, we spent some time together
talking. We had a wonderful conversation and really
struggling with that question. And the question that many Christians ask
was a question I asked for many years of my life, and I couldn't find a good resource
on it. I couldn't find something really helpful dealing
with the theology of assurance. And so, I put together a little book with
some friends and Dr. Sproul wrote the forward to that book called "Assured by God," trying
to help Christians with this answer. And of course, many have written on it. Dr. Joel Beeke has done a great deal of work
on it academically as well. But that's a significant question, and it's
not as simple as I think we sometimes want to make it, because we have to also deal with
not only lacking assurance, but we also have to deal with false assurance. And we could say that both are problems, but
I would, I would actually suggest that false assurance of salvation is in some ways a bigger
problem. People who think they're Christians, but actually
aren't. They go through a lot of the motions, they
go through a lot of the actions, but they are not truly resting in Jesus Christ and
His work for them. And that's sort of the warning we hear from
Jesus in Matthew 7 in the Sermon on the Mount, "There'll be many who come to Me in that day,"
Jesus said, "I never knew you." And they were focused on what they were doing
for God, what they were doing for Christ rather than on what Christ did for them. And I think that's really sort of the center
point, the focus of our assurance is, are we looking to Christ? Because if we're looking to our own works,
we will always be disappointed. If we're looking to our own hearts, we will
always be sad and fall into despair. But if we're looking to the cross, if we're
looking to what Christ did for us that objective reality that He didn't just come to make salvation
possible, that He didn't just come to offer salvation, but He came to actually accomplish
salvation, that it's a redemption that has been accomplished and applied, as John Murray
said. That Christ actually did something, He affected
something. He actually saved people in His atonement,
and that atonement was a substitutionary atonement for sin. And God imputed Christ's righteousness to
all who put their faith in Him, and He imputes our sin to Christ on the cross, and that sin
has been paid for fully and finally, once for all on the cross. And so the question is, the question is of
course, "Do you believe Christ?" And if you believe Christ, then you can know
that you have eternal life. Right now you can know you have eternal life,
and I think there's been a great deal of confusion in many churches and in many denominations,
in many circles where they want to add to that. They want to put more on top of that. Now the reality of it is, if we have faith
in Christ, if it's real faith that real faith will bear real fruit. If there is no fruit, if fruit never comes,
then we can say there's never been real faith. But if there's real faith, there's going to
be real repentance, there's going to be real fruit in our lives. And so when we feel like we're lacking fruit
or we're not exhibiting or demonstrating the fruit as we might like and in one sense, if
we're being honest with ourselves, that's every day of our lives. We're never demonstrating or manifesting all
the fruit that we would like to be. But the question is, are we living a life
of repentance and faith, trusting Christ and Christ alone, because it's all by the grace
of God alone and faith alone. Some people though, I think this is important,
I know this is a lightning round but let me just go on here for just a moment. Too often the question that saints ask, that
Christians ask is this, "How do I know, how do I know if my faith is strong enough?" And I think that's where many Christians are
really wrestling with this, "Is my faith strong enough?" They're not asking, "Is it real?" because
if you say, "Do you believe in Jesus?" They'll say, "Yes, I believe in Jesus." "Do you love Christ?" "Yes, I love Christ." "Do you love the Lord? "Yes, I love the Lord." "Do you repent of your sins?" "Yes, I do, but I don't feel that my faith
is strong enough." And as I said to this dear, wonderful saint
on Sunday evening as our friend and mentor of mine, Sinclair Ferguson, has said and many
throughout history have said something like it that whether we have a weak faith or a
strong faith, we get the same strong Christ. Because ultimately it's not our faith that
saves us; it's Christ who saves us. Faith is that instrument or that means of
salvation. And so, we need to be reminded of that. That at times our faith will feel weak to
us, it will seem weak and sometimes it might feel strong, but the strength is in what Christ
has done, not in the strength of our faith.
