Major Bible Themes

So this is where we were yesterday, last Sunday. And what we talked about was the Holy Spirit's coming. We're in the midst of a series of, I guess we've got four weeks left counting today, of classes on the Holy Spirit. So last week we talked about His coming and His ministry, where His abode is today, which is here on the earth. About His ministry to the unbelievers, which is one of conviction, simply that. And then his ministry to believers, we talked about just a smidge. So, if you look at the way that the chapters are laid out, it's just very sequential, looking at very, very thin slices of the Holy Spirit's ministry.

So today we're regeneration, which we'll spend probably on the order of five to ten minutes on, and then move on to other things. If you look ahead a couple lessons you'll see his baptism and we'll spend about maybe five or ten minutes on that today. So if you haven't gotten to that chapter you'll get a great head start because we'll talk about that ministry today as well. But the way that Hal and Roger laid out this class I guess a decade ago now is nice because it looks at a fuller picture of what the Holy Spirit's ministry is.

And so this is the way that they laid it out, was looking at what is God's eternal purpose for us. And God's eternal purpose is simple, to declare his glory, to share it, reveal it, and in the end to be glorified. And so the Holy Spirit's ministry ought to line up with this. So the way that we'll divide the next four class periods up is on each one of these line items.

So today we'll be talking about how he's shared Christ's glory with us as his completed ministry. So this is something that has been done, it is done, we get ongoing benefits from it, but it's not something that's continually going on and on and on. This is a completed ministry. The completed ministry speaks to our position in the Lord, so what is unchangeable about who we are now that we've come to believe in this set of very simple truths. So when we move on in the next weeks, we'll be talking more about the Holy Spirit's ministry in our lives, conditional as we walk on this earth.

And the way that Hal explained it, I'd like to steal from his analogy because it was a good one. in software engineering by a profession. And there's a simple mantra, which is, whenever possible, steal code. Which just simply means don't reinvent the wheel over and over and over. If somebody's done something well, just take it and move on so that you can get further faster. And so here I am. I'm going to steal Hal's analogy this morning because it was a good one. And that is amnesia.

So if somebody has amnesia, what can we say about them? I can't remember. So Courtney has amnesia. What do we know about Courtney? Well, amnesia, you forget who you are, what you are, and what you stand for. Exactly. So, no sense of identity. Courtney is a particular person, and that has not changed simply because he's forgotten who that person is. But nevertheless, he does not know who he is.

So, who he is, that's something that's kind of set in stone. That's the completed work of the Holy Spirit. So who we are, we're positioned in Christ, we're seated in the heavenlies. Okay, that's done. Okay, but what's this walk about? God would love for us to have our walk line up with who we actually are. And that is what this continuing ministry of the Holy Spirit is about. It's about reminding us, OK, let me help you come out of your amnesia of sorts. You don't know who you are. So let me start with very simple. You are baptized into Christ. Now let me teach you about Christ. So one, you can have a relationship with him. Two, you can know who you really are.

And so that's what the next lessons are going to be on. But today's position. be clear what the red map looks like. So keep reading the chapters because they're good, but they're going to be thin slices. Okay, so completed ministries. If you'll remember the first class that we had on the Holy Spirit we went through basically the equivalent of Bible verse speed dating and we went through 60 verses in one class period to look at the overall spectrum of what the work of the Holy Spirit is.

And so this was one of those four pages that we looked at and each one of those four pages corresponding to He shares God's glory with you Don't. He shares God's glory with you, continuing. He reveals God's glory to you, continuing. He glorifies God. So each one of those four pages corresponded to one of those four steps. Today we're going to look at this one.

But since we've already gone through and done the Bible verse speed dating, we're not going to run through each one of these individual verses. But instead, we'll drill down into the first four, what those actually mean, and look at some more scripture about those. So we'll be going over how the Holy Spirit called us, chose us, regenerated us and baptized us. Okay, and we'll skip over the rest of those.

To do the Holy Spirit justice is probably a half year class and we've got six weeks. A little bit about coloring conventions. So I went through and highlighted some verses in different colors just so you can know. Hopefully nobody's colorblind. If you are, just holler and I'll point out what's actually going on.

Anyway, when we go through scripture, because God is Christ, and God the Father, and God the Holy Spirit, one God, when we go through scripture, sometimes we'll see, you know, baptized by God. Okay, it's not immediately clear that that's by the Holy Spirit. And so it would be nice, as we go through a lesson on the Holy Spirit, to be able to point to particular verses, as we cover the first four, that say, He called you. Okay, is that God calling? Is that calling through the Holy Spirit? How does that relate to the Holy Spirit?

So if you see a blue verse, it's a verse that is incredibly clear that this is the work of the Holy Spirit Himself. So for example, if he baptized you, just flip over to 1 Corinthians 12, 13. Ooh, I was already there. For by one spirit, we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one spirit. So by one spirit, we were all baptized into one body. So that clearly ties Holy Spirit to the baptism. So if you see blue, that's what's going on.

There are a couple other places where you're going to see red, and for those of you who have the slides already, you're going to want to make a note, because what I've put in red are corrections. On to the first one, which is, he called you. So, call, kaleo in the Greek, has two meanings. The first meaning is to invite, and the second meaning is to appoint. So, the invitation is a simple one. For example, you might invite somebody over to dinner, and that person might choose to accept the invitation, or they might choose to pass up on the invitation. The second one is a point, and this is a selection that is not declined. So this is more specific. So let's go through each one of those two meanings and see how they apply to people groups. This calling, who knows what the Calvinists believe about this calling? Nobody. Okay. You can be called and you can be uncalled. You can be called and you can be uncalled. Yeah, you can lose it.

I didn't realize the Calvinists, you're shaking your head no. Okay, so. I was just a guess. I hear you're speaking up this morning, that's good. I think the Calvinists believe that Christ's death only paid the penalty for the sins of the specific called. to the sins of others. That's right. So the calling applies to only a select group of people, and Christ died on the cross for those people's sins, and so if you're not in that original cult set and really, you know, you've got no way to control that, then you're just out of luck and you were born without any hope, which is pretty contradictory to who God is as a person.

So I think if we've got John 3.16 up there, which is the first verse that we teach just about any child, for God so loved the world, not for God so loved 23% of the world, but so God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son that whoever, does that sound like 23%? That whoever would believe shall be saved. And I'm going to steal my thunder a little bit.

Can we jump ahead to 1 John 2.2? Because I think it's relevant to what Mike just said.

1 John 2.2 talking about Christ.

And he himself is the propitiation for our sins. So he's satisfying those sins. And not for ours only, but for those of the whole world. So did he die on the cross for the sins of the 23% who were magically chosen through a good luck roll of the dice? No. So Christ died on the sins for everybody and consistent with God loving the world, this invitation is available to everybody. So let's flip over and see how that invitation comes. This would be 1 Corinthians... What do I have up here? 1 Corinthians 1, but let's start in 18. And then we'll skip ahead. What, 118 or 18? 1 Corinthians 1, 18. Okay.

For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing. So those who are perishing, do they have the word of the cross available to them? Okay, so for the Word of the Cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to those of us who are being saved, it is the power of God. So we start in verse 18 where the Word of the Cross is available to everybody, and for God so loved the world.

So this is a general sort of invitation. Look, anybody. may have this, but then as we jump ahead to these called, but those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, so still a pretty inclusive bunch, Christ, the power of God, and the wisdom of God, because the foolish, let's skip to 26, so for consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise, according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, And probably not many mobile then either. So you start off in verse 18 and you've got a calling that's available to everybody.

You make your way down to 26 and it's to not many. So how do you sort of reconcile these? And it's simple. Those who accept this calling by simple belief in the Lord Jesus Christ and His completed work, now moves from the simple dinner invitation to the appointment, which is a very specific.

And so the question is, that I just sort of gave the answer in highfalutin terms, is, OK, so everybody gets this calling. So you're all called, everybody. Everybody is invited. What's required to move into this next set, this specific caller appointment? stated right there. Well that's good, so maybe I should hide my slides.

The only thing that's required is simple faith and the great example of this is that passage in Acts 16 where you've got the prison guard, so Paul and others are in jail and They're singing, having a merry time, because they know the Lord, so they're pretty unconcerned about this whole thing. There's an earthquake, and all the doors open to the jail, and the jailer is scared out of his mind, because if his prisoners get out, even in the event of an earthquake, he's toast. So he's scared, and all of a sudden, he notices that nobody's left whatsoever, which is weird, and they're still happy and singing, which is weirder, and he realizes that something special is going on here. He says, tell me what I need to do to be saved. What do I need to do? And Paul's answer is very simple. Belief. That's what you need to do. He's like, cool. And he believes. And at that moment, he's saved. So that's the specific response. So let's see how this specifically relates to the Holy Spirit. We'll go to our blue verse here, which is 2 Thessalonians 2, 13 and 14.

But we should always give thanks to God for you, brethren, beloved by the Lord, because God has chosen you from the beginning for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and faith in the truth. So this has so much stuff packed into just a very small you know, set of words. Number one, we're beloved by the Lord, which is an amazing position to be in now, and certainly contradictory to where we were in stark contrast. So God has chosen us, and this is this word, through sanctification by the Spirit. So this is the process by which it happens. And how do we get this involvement of the Holy Spirit?

Simple, faith in the truth. And the truth here is the simple gospel, which is that Jesus Christ died on the cross for our sins and was raised the third day. And so as we're appointed, you can see that we're appointed to share his glory, we get to fellowship with him, and we're appointed to holiness. You'll find out on the next slide that we're not only chosen for holiness, or called for holiness, we're chosen for holiness. Any questions on called?

Okay, chosen. So, chosen is actually two Greek words put together. Oh, it says eklego, but it's actually eklegomai. So that should have been a red. So, legomai means to choose, to pick. Ek is a preposition that means out from. So in Greek you put these two together and you make a new word which is to choose out from for oneself So you can just you know kind of picture you're reaching into this little box That's got five puppies in it and you grab one and you hold it close to you That's a leg of mine.

You've selected out pulled away from for yourself okay, and pretty amazing that this is the position that we have and based on a simple belief. Okay, so election. We can go back to our friends, the Calvinists, and what do our friends, the Calvinists, believe about election? It's the same thing about the calling, which is that there's this very select few who have been elected, and we can find in scripture that we were elected from the beginning of time. Before time existed, we were elected We get really excited about that because we're part of this really elite tiger team group that gets to be hanging out with God.

We start to walk around like this and look at the people who are not. But that is not what God would want for us and that's also not accurate whatsoever. So I think I'll involve other people to start reading. So Laura, can you read Ephesians 1, 4 for us?

According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame for him in love. OK. So we're, by the way, we're chosen out of that we might be holy. So called for holiness, chosen for holiness, same thing. But what were the two most important words in that verse? Yes, exactly. In him.

So certainly we were chosen before the foundation of the world. Scripture says that clearly. He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world. So God always had this plan. It wasn't as though Adam sinned. God said, What am I going to do now? I know. Christ is going to die. This was part of the plan from the get-go. And so he knew that those who would accept Christ, who would say, yes, I absolutely believe the simple gospel, would be saved. And in that manner, we are elected from the beginning, before the foundation of the world.

It's not... Yes, sir? We're elected because he knew what we would do? It's an interesting question. We're elected because he knew what we would do. Our election is not because of God's knowledge of what we would choose to do. Our election is in Christ. Christ is the elect.

Our position in Christ is based on the simple belief And so, did God know that we were going to believe? Yeah, I think he did. Could you say that God knew you in Christ then? Yes. So, for those listening to this later who might not have heard, God knew that we would be in Christ, and he knew us in Christ before the foundation of the world. He knew us personally? Yes.

So then why are all these other people running around that have no faith, and he knew ahead of time that they would never? And no matter what he did, they were not going to believe in him. So why did he even create them? Oh, interesting. Why did God create people who wouldn't believe in him? Since he knew ahead of time that they wouldn't. It was glory. Well, they're not giving him glory. But those who do believe are giving him glory.

And the response that Hal always gave to this question that I liked was, God loves the world, right? For God so loved the world. How loving would it have been to create a bunch of marionette puppets that didn't have free will to choose him? So God ends up, in this scenario, becoming the great manipulator, which is not his character. And so God created people, knowing some would choose him, knowing some that would not choose him, but giving them the free will to make that choice.

Did you have something, Mike? Every one of those folks has the grace given to them, or put it this way, the salvation of Christ is available to them. Whosoever will may come. Every single person. And they have a will to exercise faith in the person and work of Christ. I think once you start down in Ephesians and some of these other verses, the viewpoint changes from being outside of Christ to being inside of Him. So that you now look back and recognize, gee, I was a chosen, I was chosen before the foundation of the world. It isn't a matter of un-choosing those guys, and like Courtney and I talk about a lot, you get into the Well, if God's only attribute was fairness, everybody perishes. Everybody. And so it isn't a matter of fairness that if man was, if the Holy Spirit did not act on a man, nobody would come to Christ. Because the overwhelming control of the sin nature in a man comes to Christ. Nobody. That's right. And if the Spirit doesn't call, nobody's coming.

That's right. And that call goes out to everybody. Miles Stanford used to say it this way, that on the gates of heaven, when you're approaching them, there's a big sign that says, whoever so will may come. But if you believe in Christ and you go through and you look back, up on the back it says, chosen from the foundations of eternity. Right. So it depends on your chosen. I also, and I don't mean to pick on you Monique, this is a common argument made. I don't like the perspective and where the blame is placed in the question.

Simply because we sent him. Who's to blame for that? We're to blame for that. But God chose us. Let me walk through this. So we sinned, right? So we're to blame for that. And God decided, I'm going to send my son to die on the cross, my beloved, my precious son, to die on the cross for the sins of everybody. Okay, now I'm happy with the sins issue.

But then there are these people here who still love the sin nature. They're still firmly attached to that. But I'm going to arrange it such that through one very simple non-meritorious act, belief. Anybody who wants to believe, it can be saved. Just like that.

So we're to blame for the sin. God's arranged a very simple way that every one of us can be saved. And by the way, once we're saved, we get all sorts of stuff that we as sinners don't deserve in any way, shape or form. And here, I give you free will so that you can choose that or not. And there are lots of people who don't choose that. Whose fault is that? Theirs. But the common question is to say, well, there are all these unbelievers, they're going to hell, therefore it's God's fault.

Who sent? We did. Who created an alternative that anybody can participate in? God. Who didn't? We didn't. Who's to blame? We are. Not God. Does that make sense? I think Monique's point there is that he's the manipulator, the marionette, the robot. He didn't create us that way. He gave us the free will and he didn't create us so we would just be robots and do exactly what he, you know, originally created us. He gave us this choice and we sent.

And you're looking at it from the perspective of why did you, at the very Where would the glory be if we were all robots? And that's the point. That's the point. He wants fellowship with us. He doesn't want a robot. He wants that fellowship, that intimacy. So it's not a robot. You don't want a robot.

Mike, you're digging around in your Bible, are you? Oh, I was just thinking as Monique's talking that the great verse in Romans 4.16 says that therefore it is of faith.

Meaning salvation is of faith. in order that it might be according to grace. And I think if you look at choosing an election from anything other than a grace standpoint, your sense of personal righteousness says, now wait a minute, God to be able to offer salvation to mankind.

And when he offers it, he offers it solely on the basis of grace, not deserving. Because if he offered it not deserving, everybody perishes. So he offers it on the basis of, I have taken care of the entire thing. But I think the thing that we We'll just wise up some day, make the right decision, and we'll be cool. That's not true. Every single person would curse God and die without the work of the Holy Spirit on them. That's right.

And there'll never be a time, even at the Great White Throne Judgment, where a person will look at Christ and say, you know, I got screwed in this deal. You should have chosen me, and if you had, I would have come. They won't say that. They will say, it's a good thing you didn't choose me, because I don't want you now, and I wouldn't have wanted you then. So, that's the way it'll be.

We have a tough time with that because we think everything ought to be fair. Well, I'm really glad God isn't fair. Yeah, for sure. For sure. Okay. So, we are chosen because we are in Christ. We are in Christ because we believe the simple gospel. Let me see if there's anything on here. Yeah.

Let's look at Colossians 3.12.

So this is the chosen, this is the elect, this is us because we're in Christ. And think of how hateful we were. And because of our position in Christ, because of this choosing, here's our position today, which is, so as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved. So that's what we are now, holy and beloved because of the work of God.

That is grace. That's astounding grace. Because we're chosen, we are chosen to share the glory of Christ. If you look at that John 17 passage when we've got the real Lord's Prayer, when Christ is talking to the Father and saying, the very glory you have given me, I have given them.

That's where we are now because of this choosing. So, regeneration. This word for regeneration means, again, we've got a preposition and another word and we're going to stick those two together and create something new. So we've got again and birth and we put those together and we get born again or some translations have born from above. Let's look at the John 3 passage. This is when Jesus is talking to Nicodemus. So Nicodemus comes to him and says, you know, I know you're this fantastic teacher. And I know you're here from God.

And so Jesus responds saying, truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. And this born again has got to seem incredibly weird to Nicodemus. And you can tell it's complete and total disconnect, which is, how can a man be born when he's old? He can't enter a second time into the mother's womb and be born, can he? So you can see pretty clearly Nicodemus is thinking of birth as physical birth. And that's not the birth that we're dealing with here. So Jesus answered, truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. So this is a spiritual birth. a different sort of birth, and it immediately raises the question, well, why do I need to be born spiritually? Where's the need for that? And the answer is in the... Do I have it up there? Yeah, I'm sorry, I was expecting to see it in Colossians. It's Ephesians 2, 1 through 5.

Which talks about the state of man spiritually before this spiritual birth. So, you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world. According to the prince of power of the air of the spirit that is now working in the sorts of disobedience So what where were we before this spiritual birth? We were completely and totally spiritual spiritually dead and Here in this earth spiritually dead was our father our father was the father of lies the the prince of the power of the air.

Among them we too all formerly lived in lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, being rich in mercy because of his great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ. By grace you have been saved, and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus." So, why did we need to be spiritually born? Because we were spiritually dead. We were completely separated. And so until we have this spiritual birth, we have no communion with the Lord whatsoever because we're dead. This passage does a good job of contrasting where we were, indulging desires of the flesh and of the mind, with where we are now, which is raised up with Him, seated in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.

So from complete, stark despair, horror, to holy cats, are you kidding me? Really? That's amazing. And that's the regeneration. That's what that spiritual birth does for us. Takes us out of this, puts us into that. So, we're running shy on time, so I think that's all I'm going to say about regeneration, unless there are questions. Okay.

So, baptism. Baptizo, in the Greek, means complete and total immersion. So when I've got my sword heated and I'm beating it out and I take it and I thrust it all the way into the water up to the hilt, that's baptizo. It's complete and total immersion and it's a fusion. We talked first about how, several slides ago, about how the Holy Spirit is responsible for that baptism, but now we should be talking about what exactly we have been baptized into, because it's pretty amazing. So, first, why is baptism necessary?

The answer is, right now, we're few. Well, right now. I don't think so. You don't think what? That baptism is necessary. Oh, OK. You're talking water baptism. Yeah, what were you talking? Spiritual. Oh, spiritual baptism. Sorry. But let's put our finger right there on the water baptism. And we'll come back to it here in about five minutes after we get done talking about spiritual baptism. Because water baptism actually is pretty cool. I mean, it is cool. Necessary? No. Cool? Yes. Quiet. So, why baptism?

Before somebody believes in the simple gospel, that Christ died on the cross for our sins and was raised, that person and their sin nature completely fused. We saw in 1 John 2-2 that when Christ died on the cross for sins, plural, He died for the sins of everybody in the entire world. And the question Mike always asks is, OK, so if Christ died for the sins of everybody in the world, why is this guy, who's stuck to the sin nature, still going to hell? And the answer is, because the sin nature is something that's been condemned. The sin is something that has been condemned. So sin nature's got to go to hell, and if you're stuck to it, guess where you're going?

So something has to happen to create a separation here, to pull these guys apart. And that separation occurs at the cross. And it occurs through this baptism. And so let's look at Romans 6, 1 through 10. Actually, I'm going to back up to the back part of five, because this is where we find out that no matter how much we sin, grace abounds that much more. So it brings about a logical question, which is, well, if I'm sinning a bunch, and the more I sin, the more grace abounds, and I like grace abounding, why wouldn't I just sin a whole mess and then we'll get grace and grace and grace, right? And so That's Paul's question here at the beginning of 6, which is, what shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase? And it's a really logical question, and he deals with it in a very terse Greek expression, which basically means, not possible. So, it just couldn't happen.

Because you're filled with the Holy Spirit. So then you automatically wouldn't do the things that you would have done before you had this phone experience. I completely agree with you. Yeah, that's why. It's not who you are anymore. Right. Yeah. And it's not who you are because you've been saved. So, may it never be.

How shall we who died to sin still live in it? So exactly what you're saying, Monique. Or do you not know that all of us have been baptized into Christ Jesus? So here we had sin nature, us. Over here now we've got Christ, us. We're completely separated. Here's sin over here, here's us with Christ over here.

Therefore we've been buried with him through baptism into death so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father So we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have become united with him in the likeness of his death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of his resurrection. Knowing this, that our old self was crucified with him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin. So we've been completely separated from this condemned sin nature and placed into Christ, into his death, into his burial, into his resurrection, and now we are alive in newness of life.

For he who has died is freed from sin. Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him. knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again. And do you guys know why that's important? Christ never dying again?

Yeah, exactly. So here's our old man. Here's our sin nature. They're stuck together before we believe, right? So what happened at the cross? At the cross, the old man was done away with. And we're now alive in Christ. So we're separated from that sin nature. But now we're stuck to Christ. So what happens if Christ dies? Well, now we're floating again. Right? Now where's our salvation? Are we chosen before the foundations of the world in Him if there's no Him?

I mean, this is really essential, the fact that Christ is eternal. Because our salvation depends on that. So, death is no longer master over him. For the death that he died, he died to sin once for all, but the life he lives, he lives to God. So, Christ living forever. So, there are, I guess, two ways in which we could get stuck back to the sin nature again, right? So, number one, Christ dies a second time.

That's not going to happen, scripture says. That's not going to happen. The other way would be for this whole process to get reversed. And so for the process to get reversed would mean that Christ would have to get unburied, undead, back off the cross. And we're not going back around that road again. So our salvation is completely eternal. You can't undo it.

So that's baptism. We're stuck there. So here are all the different things that we've been baptized into by the work of the Holy Spirit. We're now in Christ. We've been baptized into His death, burial, resurrection, ascension. And as such, we're now in Christ's body, which is the Church. OK.

One last slide, just going through the completed work of the Holy Spirit, His ministries, what can we say about them, just definitively. So number one, His completed ministries to you are not repeatable. So if you feel, you know, the need to be called every Sunday down to the altar to re-receive the Holy Spirit, to re-commit yourself, to re-dedicate yourself, not necessary. Done deal. Finished. Holy Spirit has baptized you into Christ.

There's no undoing that. So there's no need to redo that. All right. Number two, not retractable. For them to be retractable, we just ran through it. Either Christ has got to kick the bucket, which we know is not going to happen, or we've got to somehow undo that process, which is also not something that's going to happen. So baptized into Christ together, you are in Him, in the heavenlies, and it's eternal. No part of this can be changed, and they don't depend on your merit or faithfulness. And this is a very important point.

Why is God satisfied with you now? Is it because you are one sweet individual, or is it because of this relationship that you now have with Christ? How did you get this relationship with Christ? Was it because you were one sweet individual, or because you believed what God did? This is not because of your merit. And that's, I think, scary for some people, that they can't earn this.

But it's fantastic for me because it talks about who did the action. So if I'm saved by my own merits, then my being saved is as permanent and successful as I can possibly conjure up. Versus, if my being saved is the work of God, It is as eternal and as secure as what God can offer. So clearly, better deal there. I would much rather it be by grace than by works, because I like my salvation.

But faithfulness? It says merit or faithfulness. Okay, but you have to be... Here it means... day-to-day sort of faithfulness. So having been saved based upon my belief, is my faithfulness to God now an essential component of my continuing to be saved? And the answer is absolutely not. If it were, then I could somehow jump out of Christ again simply by disobeying God. Does that make sense? Maybe it's the word that's... how about adherence to exactly what God would have for me in my day-to-day life.

And all of these things are permanent position in the Lord Jesus Christ. So with that and our second bell, let's go ahead and pray. Lord, thank you so much for all that you have accomplished on our behalf and that all that you ask from us is that we would believe that. And thank you also for giving us the will that you left us enough not to create us as robots. It's in Jesus' name I pray. Amen.