Principles of Position, Lesson 9
Courtney Hemenway · May 15, 2016
Principles of Position, No. 19
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4926533111429

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Alright, lesson 9, right? Did we get past question 4? Yeah, I think we got down to 6, right? Now this ought to be kind of interesting. What I wanted you to do is I wanted you to read these verses and decide which of the following, whether the following verses are positional or conditional. So let's start with the first one. It will get you engaged right away. Colossians 2, 6-10. Somebody go ahead and read that. See how much of this positional stuff you are learning. Colossians 2, 6-10.

As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, walk in Him. Having been firmly rooted and now being built up in Him, and established in your faith just as you were instructed, and overflowing with gratitude. See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception according to the tradition of men or according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ. For in Him all the fullness of deity dwells in bodily form, And in him you have been made complete, and he is the head over all rule and authority. So did you read 3-1? No, 2. 2-6? 6-10. Okay. Why have I got something else going on? That's the last one on that page is 3-1. 3-1. Oh, okay.

So Colossians 2, 6-10, therefore have you received the Lord Jesus, so walk ye in him, etc, etc, etc. Is that a position or a condition? Both. Why? Because it says you received him, which would be position, and then walk in is condition. Okay. How do you walk? Carefully. Now that I'm getting older. Nice try. Wrong answer.

How do you walk? Faith. You walk by faith. Faith in what? The work of Christ. Stick it together with what we're studying. It's faith in the position. Do you see that? So, have you received Christ Jesus? The answer is yes, I have. So therefore, walk in Him. Don't you find it interesting that God never asks you to do anything that He hasn't already done and prepared you for it at first?

I notice that everywhere that I read, especially in Paul's epistles, that's the way it is. So having been firmly rooted and now being built up. So the having been firmly rooted, is that a position or a condition? Having been and now being built up, position or condition? Not bad you guys. And established in your faith, position or condition? What do you think? Faith is my side of the ledger, right? What did you say? Would you say that being built up, established in your faith. Do you have your Greek thing open? Established would be a verb. It's a passive voice. So it's being done to you. You don't have to be a Greek scholar, but it's really cool if you learn the Greek tenses.

Those alone will help you understand, especially Paul's epistles, a lot. A guy said one time that God owns all the verbs. So would you say being firmly rooted, being built up in Him, established in your faith is a condition, isn't it? Sure, it's something being done to you. just as you were instructed, overflowing with gratitude. Now, let's back up and do something else here. As you have received the Lord Jesus, so walk in Him, being firmly rooted and being built up in Him and established All of those things are something God did and is doing. See that? The last part is something you do. What do you do?

Believe. What? Believe. No, what's it say? Overflowing with gratitude. That's you do, what you do. Now most of the time you're going to hear sermons to tell you to overflow with gratitude. Rejoice, always. Again, I say rejoice. But if the first part isn't in play, there isn't any overflowing with gratitude that hasn't been pumped up out of self where you think you ought to be doing it. On the other hand, when you have gone through this educational process from the Lord, you can't help but respond. Do you see that? You can't help it.

Because the grace is overwhelming. This fits perfectly with grace. The only thing you can do is say thank you or have gratitude. So at the end of all the process, it's still a process of grace. All I can do is say thank you. Yeah, that's exactly right.

And I think you can be told that and we can discuss it, but I think the Spirit of God brings you along where you just rejoice once in a while or you're overflowing with gratitude because of what he's already done and you know that he's working it into you. See that? So there's a response that God expects but it's all based on what he's done. And who he is. Sure. He didn't do what he did unless he was who he is. Yeah. His purpose. Yeah. Okay.

So, then he says, see to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception according to the traditions of men. Position or condition? Condition. It's condition. And you're to see to it that nobody grabs you, sucks you in to very interesting philosophy Craig Case has the best definition of philosophy, and I can't remember what it was, but it was really... And empty deception.

This would describe the political process in our country, wouldn't it? According to the traditions of men. Why is that such a big deal, the traditions of men? That's the law, huh? Well, it can be, but a tradition... What is a tradition? Do it over and over? Produced by man? Produced by man, and we've always done it that way. We always sit in the same pew. Oh, better move around now. If you grow up a Catholic, you always genuflect before you go in the pew. That kind of stuff. It's easy to get caught up in that kind of thing. Really easy.

Is it true when we say walking, when we say walking hand, that's condition one. Say that again. Where it says therefore you have. You have received Christ, Jesus our Lord, as the walk in Him. That's the condition of the walk in Him part, right? Sure, the walk is an act of voice. It's something you do, which means it's got to be a condition. Although, in Him would be position. In Him is a position. The walk is something that you would do based on your position, okay? You know, Holly Hills and everything.

How do we meet on Sundays? You know, we take that as, you know, we meet this way and we have the Lord's Supper once a month. And we have. And, you know, if you don't do that. Oh, well, where is it spelled out? How we meet when we meet, you know, the attitude. Well, we elders figured that out. Yeah.

But I mean, we are we are not free from the traditions that we get locked into. And if you don't show up on Sunday, Yeah, tradition is incredibly, we're such copycats about everything, you know, about, pick anything that, you know, why do Bronco jerseys sell so well? Isn't some of that the infirmity of the flesh, though?

Like, you sit in the same place so you know where you sit, where you are, right? Well, I sit in the same place because I get lost. But it's kind of built into us, you know, to do the things. You know, sometimes I criticize somebody and I say it's really their parents' fault they didn't teach them. But according to deceptions, I mean, some of the traditions are, you know, well, we do this because God's going to bless us. So you come into Christ or you grow up in a very traditional denomination and someone starts to introduce you about grace, the paradigm shift in your mind has got to be drastic. My goodness, you know, I'm free. Well, I'm free to do what I want. No, I'm not. But I am free from all of that.

You know? Yeah. And one of the things my brother John was telling me was that, like, I'll say, well, the Bible doesn't say that. It says, well, we, Catholic Church runs on traditions that have passed down through the church. Hallelujah, there it is. That's it. The Bible doesn't matter a whole lot, I don't think, to a lot of Catholics. It doesn't, it doesn't. It depends on what... If the priest is saying it, it does. I read an article last night, Sports Illustrated, about Vin Scully. Anybody know who Vin Scully is? He's the broadcaster for the Dodgers, and he's been their broadcaster for 67 years. And he's a good Catholic.

And the Catholic tradition is part of what he does every day. I was just going to say, it's hard to figure out what traditions are being talked about here because, as you mentioned, not every tradition is harmful to our walk, our faith. And just looking, I kind of looked up that term.

Mark 7, 8 talks about the contrast of the commandment of God medieval to the tradition of men. And so that term, it's not just traditions, it's traditions of men. And it has to do with that authority being taken away from God and placed in the possession of men. So it's the traditions where man is in authority, and against what God has said. And that's how we should evaluate those traditions as being something that has stumbling block to our faith. And I think in the context we're looking at, the traditions that men have created in order to make themselves righteous. That's really where it comes from. And also talking about our meetings. Under grace, there's authorities that have been designated, elders over a body, and they can determine that. There's nothing wrong with how we meet.

It's just when you think that that's scripture, I mean, it's something that we have to meet, or it's not in the scriptures, but we make it scripture by tradition. And that's where I think it's, as you say, it's by man, man-created. and we hold that as scripture. I'm most familiar with Catholicism because that's where I grew up and actually was educated in. There's these traditions that if you violate them, the solution is you're going to hell. It's real simple. You don't go to church on Sunday. Or you confess it to a priest, and that's a whole other tradition.

Yeah, all of that is, like J.D. is saying, man created it to control the righteousness of those that are under him. I don't know what the Methodists or those people do, but they all have it. The tulip thing we did and the reformed guys, that's what they're all about. That's exactly what they're about.

It's you have to either gain or maintain your righteousness before God by your efforts. And they can give you biblical verses to back them up. Important for us to realize though that God is very careful in what he's done. He lays out our position very carefully and then he begins to describe what the behavior pattern is based on the condition and what he wants you to do about it. What he wants you to do about it is to believe. And from believing comes the walk. And it's effortless.

But you read sometimes in scripture, he'll say, like we were on Wednesday night, we were talking about rejoice always. Again, I say rejoice, right? Well, let's get with the rejoicing, you guys. Rejoicing is something that you definitely could not do at all on your own.

You'd have to fake it. But the way God has set it up for us to learn our position, like in Philippians, and then grow in the knowledge and grace of the Lord Jesus, it's like here. It's overflowing with gratitude. You can't fake that. Christians try to. They think that music is all about this kind of thing. It's not. First he starts off with a reason for rejoicing. That's exactly right.

How did you begin? How did you begin your walk? How did you begin in Christ? How did you do it? By faith. So he says, here we go. It's real simple. As you receive Christ Jesus, how did you do it? By faith. So continue to walk. Same way. Don't change anything.

And then he talks about what's being done. You've been rooted, and you're being built up in Him, and you're being established in your faith. Just as you were instructed then you overflow with thanksgiving. But God does everything up front. Does that make sense? Verse 9, For in him all the fullness of deity dwells in bodily form, position or condition.

And in him you have been made complete, position or condition. How many say condition? Howard's. How many say position? Yeah. And he is the head over all rule and authority. Position? Absolutely. Okay. Next one. Doing pretty good. So you're right. The answer to these verses were both.

2 Corinthians 5.17. Somebody read that.

Somebody other than Wayne. Position or condition? Position or condition? Position. In the end a little condition. Where? At the very end. Where? What was the... New things have come? And what's after that? Well, the new things, you know, could be kind of conditional. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, that's a position. Has to be, right? But it talks about what the new position is. That he's a new creation, and the old things have passed away, and behold, new things have come. All position. Totally position. Okay? No arguments? Cool. Moving fast.

Romans, or Ephesians 2.10. Do I have to call on people? For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. For we are His workmanship.

Position? Huh? Position, right? And that position, we were created in Christ Jesus. Okay? Kind of cool when you think about it. For what purpose? Good works. Would you say that that was a condition? Answer no. Well, it means so that we can do works that He considers good. I would say it's more than that. Created in Christ Jesus for good works is totally a position. That much of it. And which God prepared beforehand, position, that we should walk in them. Still position. We will though.

I mean, was it a couple of years ago when we were, I forget if it was Helen or Francis or somebody was in here and we were talking about the Bema Judgment and talking about it's a place of rewards and when you get there that God is going to reward those who really performed and if you didn't really perform you're going to suffer loss. But then I quoted this verse to her and I said, now look, and let's say God had 641 good works that he's going to perform through you. Are you going to show up with 640 or 642? I think 641.

We might walk. We might walk in them. Yeah. Will we? We may or we may not. That's what I said. We may not. But when we get there, I think that he foreordained everything he's going to reward us for. Yeah. refers to he's enabled us. It's not that we may or we may not, but it empowers us. OK, well, let's talk about that. Our translation is wood. It's an aorist active, so it's a fact. It's not an iffy thing. So the word might not be the right word for it.

I don't know if you view it the way I view it, but I think that it takes the pressure off of me. that God is going to do what he's going to do in and through me, and he's going to reward me for what he did, and all the crap that I did myself, all the self-righteous, goody-two-shoes, religious nonsense is going by the wayside. What he did through me, I mean, I like the deal, don't you? God says, look, I did all this stuff, so I'm going to reward you for what I did. That's a great deal if you can get it.

So I think that the fact that God has foreordained the works that we're going to walk in and do, and trust me, He's very busy. You're not going to get left out. And the other thing about that, the other thought I had about that was years ago, The Lord took my brother home when he was a year older than me. He was 42. And he had a brain aneurysm. Bang! He's gone. So I'm complaining to the Lord. He's my brother. I love him. We grew up together. We slept in the same room together until we split the house. We fought every day. I have a hundred stitches in my body thanks to him. He was like J.D. He was a red-headed firebrand, you know?

But I loved him, you know, he was my closest buddy ever in the world. And, you know, complaining to God driving down the highway one day, well, you know, my brother John's gone. And I got this message that said, he's with me. And I love him more than you do.

And he was done. He finished what I had for him to do. And when you're finished down here, you get about a nanosecond, and I take you home. Because this is where you belong. I want you with me. I thought, well, that's okay. I can live with that. But I've been a Christian longer, and why do you take him first? Was he raising the troops, too? Oh, sure. Oh yeah.

Romans 6.6. Somebody read it.

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. Okay, I want you to do something, and you probably think I'm a heretic, but I want you to cross out the word self and put man in there. Because the word is anthropos, meaning man. My old man was crucified with him. Okay, so knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him, position? And what's the purpose? Why was the old man crucified with him? It says here, in order that the body of sin might be, this version says, done away. Is done away the right translation? What does your version say? Destroyed. What else? Rendered powerless. Rendered powerless, put out of business, taken offline. That we would no longer be slaves to sin, position or condition. Yeah, it's a position. Now probably, as a growing believer, there's no more important verse as you're going along and growing than this one.

Because this is the answer to the source of your sins. Do you see that? If this doesn't happen, If all God did was, through Christ on the cross, was pay the penalty for your sins, then you got a big problem because he didn't deal with the source. You know, watch Vinny's book in the Normal Christian Life. He talks about, a metaphor he uses is the whiskey bottles in the whiskey factory. You know, Christians who only know justification go around breaking all the whiskey bottles that they can find.

But what God did via this verse is He put the factory out of business so that the production of sin would stop. So it has to be a position. And it's designed specifically that sin would be rendered mute. That's why. And so with that example of the whiskey bottles and stuff like that, it seems like that if you go around breaking all the whiskey bottles, that's kind of like your work. You're going to still keep trying to break all, and you're not reconciled to God You can't be because you're going around doing your own thing still. Well, it's interesting because you have, again, back to Catholicism, that's why they have that whole thing about the sacrament of confession.

And they take it off of your dad's favorite verse, 1 John 1.9, if you confess your sins, God is faithful and just to forgive your sins.

Let me ask you a question. What if you don't confess your sins? Are you forgiven? Yeah. So why do it? It seems like if you don't confess him to God, you're still trying to hide him. You're not recognizing that he's right and you're wrong. Okay, you're recognizing that. What's the problem with this sin? Is there a consequence? Fellowship. Yeah, there's fellowship. You lose it. Well, that's what I mean.

You're hiding. You're like Adam in the garden. Who sought out who? God said, hey, where are you, Adam? And that's the way he is. You talk about something that demonstrates his character. There he is. He's in the garden thinking, oh, gee, who told you you were naked? That guy didn't know you sinned. Yeah, he did. Why are you hiding?

So God has put into play a position that allows us to, as we grow in the knowledge and grace of the Lord Jesus, to literally start to get free from sin itself. To me, there's no greater revelation I've ever had was this, because again, growing up in a denomination, sin's the issue and you're fighting it all the time. And there comes a time when you think, well, is this ever going to stop? Sin and confess, sin and confess, sin and confess. Pretty soon I get tired of confessing, and then I hide the sins and I'm moving on. And God says, yeah, yeah, I did something about that.

Romans 8.3 says that what the law couldn't do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son, in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, what did he do? He condemned sin in the flesh. So did he forgive sin, the sin nature, did he forgive it? No, he didn't. What did he do? He condemned it.

But your sins, the penalty of your sins have been taken care of. But this position of knowing that you were your old man and you were crucified with him is the pathway to being free from sin on a conditional basis. I don't know if I got it. Bless you. I'm going to add one.

Romans 6.11. What's it say? Even so, consider yourself saved in the life of God. So reckon yourself dead to sin and alive to God, in position or condition. Totally conditioned. Totally conditioned, based on the first ten verses of Romans 6 that are in position. See that? Totally conditioned.

Therefore, love the word therefore, what's the word therefore, therefore? You reckon yourself dead indeed unto sin and alive unto God. Why? Because you've been crucified with Him. Job at home in 7 where it says, for when we died with Christ we were set free from the power of sin. So you were crucified, you died. For he that is dead is freed from sin. Is that a position or a condition? It's got to be a position, right? You guys all remember when you were crucified with Christ? Were you there? Yes, you were. Yes, you were. So if you're dead, you are free from sin, right?

Here's an anecdotal example I use of that. When my mother died, she loved to play bridge. So her body's down at the funeral home, right? I can't go down there and shuffle the cards and say, OK, Mom, it's your deal. Why not? She's not there. So when sin comes along and says, hey, it's your deal, the reaction is, wait a minute, I'm dead to you. I don't have to respond. Okay.

2 Peter 3.18. Let us grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.

Position or condition? Condition, right? So here's a command, but you grow in grace. It means you've got to hump it to get into that grace, right? Do you? Let me ask you this, but grow, that part of it, is that a position or condition? It's a condition. In the grace. Position or condition? Position. It's a position. You're already in the grace. So you grow in that environment.

And the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. Why are those two things really important? That you grow in the grace and that you grow in the knowledge? Why is the knowledge so important? Because what is the knowledge? Yes, you know your position. So then you have an object for your faith, you've got something to reckon on. And, why grace in there? What does grace represent? The knowledge is pretty simple to comprehend, but why is it in grace? not in grace, and it would be by works.

So we're going to define it by the opposite? So grace would be the operating principle. Sure, it's the operating principle. And so not only do we need to know the position of truth, but we need to know the principle under which God operates. Lots of believers, especially theologians, can give you a position about things, but very few of them understand how grace works.

Very few of them. That's right. But the condition always needs to change. If you've listened or read Louis Barry Chafer's book on grace or listened to Chet McCauley on his tapes on grace, he makes a very interesting point that no human being knows what grace is until they're saved. They have no idea. They have no experience because everything outside of Christ is a give and take. I do, you do. You rub me, I rub you. I want change.

Starting with salvation is based solely on grace, and that's the first understanding that a human being has of what grace is. God acting with unlimited and unmerited blessings towards us, towards me, towards you. And it's based on what somebody else did, what Christ did on the cross.

Nothing up until that point is ever based that way. There's always a you gotta, or a response, or I ought to. But grace isn't like that. So you start to learn grace from the beginning, and he says you never stop learning it up until the very last minute you're on the planet. And I think he's right about that. You have to learn all the little nuances as you go along.

Oh yeah, this is grace. Oh yeah, this is grace. Oh yeah, this is grace. And it's all being done to you. All being done to you. Do you respond? Can you respond to grace? What do you think? Respond? What do you mean? Can you respond to the grace? Gratitude? Is that the response? Gratitude is a good word. Can you walk because you're responding to the grace? Can you believe? Can you stand fast? Can you reckon because you're responding to the grace? Yeah. In fact, that's how you do respond. And in the Greek language, the word for grace is the same word as thank you. They're both charis. great verse, both in grace and knowledge of Him.

Knowledge of Him is knowing who we are. If we're placed into Him, knowledge of Him is knowledge of who we are now. Oh, I see what you're saying. And the other half of that, I think, which the Lord's really pushing on me, is the knowledge of Him or the intimacy with Him, which is John 17, the union that we have with Him. That then is the faith part. If you know him, you trust him. The more you know him, the more you trust him. And that's the basis of faith.

Do we trust Him or not? Do we know Him or not? And I think this is kind of a two-edged knowledge. Knowledge of who we are in Him, but also knowledge of Him so we have that faith. The basis of our faith is trust in Him. I agree. And the intimacy with Him is what He calls us to do. And that's where the faith is based on. And that intimacy is where you learn the grace. That's where you learn it.

Because you can read it and think, oh, that's kind of a cool concept. I'm going for it. But grace is something that's personal. It's very personal. And it's so much based on resting in Him and waiting on Him. But you know what? The resting and the waiting, I'm not the causer of that. The resting and waiting is because I do know Him and His grace. I know He's sovereign. I've learned of Him so I can trust Him. You know, I trust Donna with a lot of stuff that I would never trust anybody else because I know her. Right. And typically, to him be the glory, well it should be, he's doing everything, both now and the day of eternity.

Okay, Galatians 3.26, I'll read it. For you are all sons of God through faith in Jesus Christ. Position or conditions? Yes, position. Every one of us is a son. 1 John 3, 2. See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God, and such we are.

Position or condition? Position. For this reason the world does not know us because it didn't know him. Position or condition? Position. It's a position. You wonder why the world doesn't understand who you're about? There it is. The natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God. He can't know them. They're foolishness unto him. Can't know them.

They love it. Now we are the children of God. Position? No. And it has not appeared as yet what we will be. What do you think? Is that a position or a condition? I'll go with position. Since it's already known. What we will be. It will be our condition. Yeah, that's what it will be. And here's the, because here's what we know. Here's what we already know. That when he appears, we will be like him. Because we shall see him just as he is. That's when our position and condition will be. Yeah, the same. Let's get rid of condition. And trust me, this doesn't happen in Boise. But after I asked him a million obnoxious questions, then it worked out. Okay, Colossians 3, 1, 2.

Therefore, there's that word again, if or since you have been raised with Christ, is that a position? Absolute position. Is it true? Most of you don't look raised. Since you have been raised with Christ, is that true? Yes. Keep seeking the things above, where Christ is.

Position or condition? Condition. It's condition. Keep seeking the things which are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Now, I'm sure that you all woke up this morning and said, boy, today I'm just going to seek the things that are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God. Right? There's an honest person right back there.

But it's interesting, you won't seek unless you're persuaded you are risen. Do you understand that? So the risen part is a position, the working of that position into your understanding and your rest in it is something that the Spirit of God does. And as you grow in the knowledge and grace of the Lord Jesus, You think, oh, this is really true, and not only that, I can do this thing. I want to know Him. Set your mind on things above and not on things of the earth.

Condition or position? Condition. And then the next verse, which isn't down here, says, for you died and your life is hid with Christ and God. Position or condition? It's a position. So hopefully through just looking at these verses, we get a greater understanding of how important the principle of position, what it is, and how the position and condition thing works as you study the Word.

It takes a lot of pressure off of you because you recognize that, wow, we start with a position and we start with grace and we work from there. We don't start the other way. We're not working into a position. We're not working into righteousness. We're not working into completeness. We're not working into anything. We're working from what is already in place, which is our position.

So as you read and you see things, the Spirit of God will put that, I think, that thought in your mind, oh, this is a position. This is really cool. Okay, let's close. Father, how we thank you for your word. We thank you that you have divinely devised a system whereby you have done everything. And it's our job to rest by faith in what you've already done. And to recognize that you're working into our lives on a daily basis what you've already accomplished in your Son, the Lord Jesus. And we pray in his precious name. Amen.