Scattered.
Good morning, saints.
Good morning.
So, we are not going to have lunch today, so you know what that means.
Great, great. I can go as long as I want.
No, I am not going to do that. I would like to read a few verses to begin the time, if I could. And if you have your Bibles—I like how the Indians say that, you know, “Do you have your Bibles?”—or your phone, if you have to have that.
I would like to begin with a portion of Scripture from Hebrews 6:1. I think most of us are very familiar with this little piece here. It is about in the middle of the verse.
Let us press on to maturity.
Let us press on to maturity. Then, if you would switch over to 2 Peter 1:13—this is going to be the latter part of the verse. My version says, by the way, I am reading out of the New American Standard Version. That is a ’95; I am reading ’77, so it might be a little different.
To stir you up by way of reminder.
Then, if you would turn over to the book of 1 Timothy, we are going to read three passages there. The first is 1 Timothy 1:15.
It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all.
That is Paul writing. Then go forward a little bit to 1 Timothy 3:1. You are going to see a pattern here.
It is a trustworthy statement: if any man aspires to the office of overseer, it is a fine work he desires to do.
Then go forward one chapter, if you will, to 1 Timothy 4, beginning in the latter part of verse 7. I think a lot of us are very familiar with this section.
Discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness.
For bodily discipline is only of little profit, but godliness is profitable for all things, since it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come.
It is a trustworthy statement deserving full acceptance.
Then, if you would flip over one book to 2 Timothy 2:11:
It is a trustworthy statement:
For if we died with Him, we shall also live with Him;
if we endure, we shall also reign with Him;
if we deny Him, He also will deny us;
if we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself.
Lastly, go over to the next book, Titus 3:8.
This is a trustworthy statement; and concerning these things I want you to speak confidently, so that those who have believed God may be careful to engage in good deeds. These things are good and profitable for men.
Let us just have a word of prayer.
Lord, we do want to come now and bow before You as we continue in Your presence. We want to commit this time into Your hands. We want to commit Your Word to You, Lord.
Lord, except You anoint it, except You send it forth in power, Lord, we are wasting our time. So we look to You because You are faithful. We ask Thee, Lord, to grant us that anointing, both to speak and to hear.
And Lord, we will give You all the glory, because You are the only One deserving of it. We just pray in Your name. Amen.
Well, it is probably kind of obvious from maybe the first verse, if not the verse right after that, what my burden is. It is that we would press on to maturity.
I think this is the day and age in which this is very, very important. The time of the Lord’s coming is soon, and we need to be ready.
And so my desire was to stir you up—or I should say, the Lord’s desire is to stir you up. I cannot stir anybody up. I cannot even stir myself up. But the Lord would want to stir you up by reminding you.
I was caught by that phrase, “by way of reminder,” because I thought, you know, we have been a very blessed, blessed people. We have a very, very rich heritage here. We have heard—I want to say—everything. We have heard the whole counsel of God out of this place here and out of the conferences.
So all I can do is just remind you of some things. That is basically really all I am going to do.
I was drawn to these five trustworthy statements because I think they point out some things that are essential to the Christian life. I believe we are all going to know what these are, so you will have to bear with me. But it is interesting because all of these were given by Paul. Four of them were given to Timothy, his son in the faith, and one to Titus.
In your versions, if you have a different version, instead of “trustworthy statement,” you may have “faithful saying,” “faithful word,” or “sure word.” That word “statement” in the Greek is the word logos. I think we are all familiar with that, right? The Word of God.
So from here, I just want to proceed right into the first one, the first trustworthy statement that we find in 1 Timothy 1. I am going to back up a little, if you will allow me. I am going to back up to verse 12. I am hoping my co-pilot here can hang in there with me, for those who may not have a Bible, so you can see this too and not just have to listen to me.
We are going to read 1 Timothy 1:12-17. Again, this is Paul speaking.
I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has strengthened me, because He considered me faithful, putting me into service.
I think that is remarkable, that he was strengthened because the Lord considered him faithful. Because, then again, the Lord is not locked in time like we are. He sees the beginning from the end. I often sometimes think, “I wish I could,” but sometimes I think, “I am not sure I want to,” if you know what I mean.
Even though I was formerly a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent aggressor. Yet I was shown mercy because I acted ignorantly in unbelief; and the grace of our Lord was more than abundant, with the faith and love which are found in Christ Jesus.
Weymouth, if you are familiar with that New Testament, says this about that: “The grace of the Lord came to me in overflowing fullness,” and I like how he says this here, “conferring faith on me, and the love which is in Christ Jesus.” Conferring faith on me and love.
Then we come to verse 15:
It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all.
That is what Paul said. He said, “I am the foremost of all sinners.” And he said that because he was. He just ravaged the church. He wanted to destroy the church.
When the Lord met him on the Damascus road, he realized how wrong he was. He saw and tasted of the mercy and grace of the Lord, realizing that probably he should have been killed.
But anyway, that is very interesting. He says, “I am the foremost of all.” Some versions you might read say, “I am the chief of sinners”—the chief of sinners.
Previously, he had said in 1 Corinthians 15:9 that he was the least of the apostles first, right? Then, in Ephesians 3:8, he said he was the least of all the saints. But here, it has progressed to being the chief of sinners—the chief of sinners.
That is the way it is. It is kind of a paradox of the Christian life. Somehow we think that when we are a believer, we are going to be elevated, but actually, we really go down, do we not? We go down. But the life of the Lord goes up.
Here is Paul, at this late place in his life, saying, “I am foremost of all the sinners.” It is for this reason. Look at verse 16:
And yet for this reason I found mercy, in order that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate His perfect patience as an example for those who would believe in Him for eternal life.
I just want to say here: if you know somebody—they may be a family member, a friend, or a coworker—and they are very adverse to the gospel, they might be downright mean and crude, but there is hope for them. Do not give up praying for them. Do not give up reaching out to them.
Paul might have been one of the worst, and yet look what happened to him. He has become one of the—if not the—greatest saints the Lord has ever had. That is wonderful.
I like how he ends it in verse 17:
Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.
I think this first trustworthy statement is so fitting that it comes first, because that is the way it is in our Christian life, is it not? We come to that point where, by the mercy and grace and love of God, He reveals Himself to us, and He saves us out of whatever we have been in.
Truly, it says in the Word, “He who is forgiven much loves much.” Paul saw this. It is true of us too, is it not? We have been forgiven much—very much.
We are simply the objects of the mercy of God. As our brother Kenny talked about when he went through Romans, we are the objects of His mercy. None of us deserve it.
Thus, this ought to create what I think of as an attitude of gratitude. Do you have an attitude of gratitude? You should.
That is why we come to the table every week: to remind us that we should have an attitude of gratitude, because it is real easy to lose that. Very easy.
So we find this becomes a great motivation in our life, in coming to the Lord and going on with the Lord.
With that, I want to move on to the second one, which was in 1 Timothy 3:1:
If any man aspires to the office of overseer, it is a fine work he desires to do.
Darby says this: “If anyone aspires to exercise oversight.” I like that better. I do not like to hear the word office as much as I like to hear the word function.
Maybe that is because I worked in a bank for many years. I may have shared this before, but banks are so big on titles. They love to hand out titles. They do not give anything else with it, but they will give you a title.
They offered me an officer title once, and I was glad to take it because I got an extra week of vacation. But outside of that, I did not get anything else.
I am not big on titles. I think the natural man is. He likes to appear as something.
I do not want to spend a lot of time on this statement regarding church government, but I do want to say this to the young brothers in our midst: if you are willing to lay down your life for the Lord and serve His people, it is a good thing. It is a very good thing.
We have some here who are doing that. I am grateful for that.
But anyway, let us move on to the third one. I am going to camp here a little while on this third one. I think there is a lot here, and I am just going to scratch the surface, so bear with me.
The third one is in 1 Timothy 4, beginning in verse 7, in the latter part of it. Pay attention to this too, as it is up there. This is so important to our Christian life.
Discipline yourself unto godliness.
Some versions use “exercise”: “Exercise yourself unto godliness,” such as Darby, the King James Version, the American Standard Version, and Young’s. Quite a few use that. But some versions use “train” or “training”—not train like on a track, but train or training.
Weymouth uses that. The Amplified uses it. Rotherham uses it. The NIV uses that. We get the word gymnasium from the Greek word here translated as discipline or exercise, et cetera.
So it says, “Discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness.” I like what J. B. Phillips says in his translation:
Take time and trouble to keep yourselves spiritually fit.
Take time and trouble to keep yourself spiritually fit. There are a whole lot of people who do that to keep bodily fit, do they not? I have known a few people in my life who are extreme in what they put their bodies through.
But it does say in verse 8:
For bodily discipline is only of little profit.
It is of some profit. I believe the Lord would have us doing some kind of exercise. I remember Brother Kong, I believe, used to walk around in his house. I do not know if he ever went outside, but he used to walk around. I do not know how much he walked.
Plus, he liked going up the stairs. If you have ever been to the house, it is quite a staircase, and he liked to go up that staircase to stay in shape. So there is some profit to bodily exercise, but it is little. We will talk about that in a minute.
I remember back in the seventies—some of you were not alive then, but most of us were. Back in the early seventies, when I was a teenager and trying to advance in tennis, a lot of people were getting into all sorts of activities: running, walking, going to the gym, et cetera.
A lot of people took up tennis, which I was not real happy about because in my hometown we did not have a lot of tennis courts. All of a sudden, they were crowded. It went from hardly anybody to being packed.
But like a lot of things that come along, it died out in time.
Anyway, bodily exercise is of little profit, but it says:
Godliness is profitable for all things, since it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come.
Your bodily profit is only good for now. Someday it is going to go back to dust, and that is the end of it. Thank God, we will get a new body. I am looking forward to that now that I am getting up there a little bit.
But I like what the Rotherham version says about this: “Having promise of life, the present and the coming.”
This discipline unto godliness brings a promise of life, and that life there is the word zoe. In other words, when we go through this process, we are going to be gaining more of that—well, we already have eternal life, right?—but it is going to become more and more our experience to live out and taste that.
That is a promise: having promise of life, the present and the coming. Then it says in verse 9:
It is a trustworthy statement deserving full acceptance.
Then he goes on in verse 10 to say, “For it is for this we labor and strive.” Labor and strive for this. This is something we need to labor and strive over: this discipline unto godliness.
Now, we did mention that there is another translation for this word discipline, which is train or training. I know there are many here who go to the gym. I wonder, when you first went to the gym, did you just go there and pick out what you thought you should do?
Did you just go and say, “Well, I will lift these weights,” or, “I will walk on this”? The reality is that can be very dangerous, especially me at my size. If I went in there and tried to lift these big barbells, I would probably snap myself in half.
Unless I had somebody say, “No, take three or four of those off that bar. Start with a children’s version.”
But anyway, when you go to the gym, you need something. You need a trainer, do you not? You need a trainer because they know exactly what you need to get you to your end goal, whether it is lifting weights, doing staircase things, or whatever it is.
The same is true in this spiritual exercise. We need a trainer. We need Someone who can direct us and show us how to do this. And guess who that is?
The Holy Spirit. He is the trainer. He is the One who knows all that is necessary in bringing you to your end goal.
So what is the role of the trainee? The trainee needs to cooperate with the trainer. In other words, the trainee needs to listen to and be obedient to the trainer.
In Hebrews, it says three times regarding the Holy Spirit:
Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your heart.
Three times it is in there. In the book of Revelation, it is repeated to all the churches:
He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.
It is very important that we be trained to hear His voice, to acknowledge it. When it says “to hear” in the Scriptures, it does not mean just to hear only. It also brings in the fact of responding to what you hear.
I am afraid—and this might be true a lot in the western part of the world—we are pretty good over here about hearing the Word and feeling like, because we hear it, we have it. Is that not true? I have been there. I have done that, and was proud of it.
Because knowledge puffeth up, does it not? But love edifies. And the love comes through experience. It comes through responding to that little voice.
James 1:22 says:
But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves.
Ooh, deluded when you hear but do not do, thinking you are there when you are not there.
This makes me think of our sister Dora. She prays a lot for us to enter into spiritual reality. I do not know if you have noticed that. How important that is: to enter into the truth, not just know the truth up here, but let it get down here and become reality in our lives.
There is an interesting verse in Revelation 10:10. This is where John was told that the angel was going to give him this little book out of his hand. It says in Revelation 10:10:
And I took the little book out of the angel’s hand and ate it; and it was in my mouth sweet as honey. And when I had eaten it, my stomach was made bitter.
Interesting verse, is it not? God’s Word certainly is—and it should be—sweet as eating honey. But do you not sometimes find that it is hard to swallow when the reality of a verse hits you?
That is part of the discipline we have to go through.
When you are in the gym—and, by the way, I do not go to the gym. I have to admit, I have never liked the gym. Even when I was very avid in tennis, I did not like to train. I only liked to play the game.
There was one great player like me. His name was John McEnroe. He never practiced; he just played, and got upset a lot, if you knew him at all. “You cannot be serious,” for those of you who know that little incident.
But anyway, sometimes when you are in the gym and you are with the trainer, he is going to ask you to do something that you do not really want to do. Particularly maybe when you have had an injury and you are going through therapy, and they tell you, “You need to move this, and you have to bend that,” and it is very painful.
It is very painful, and it is hard to do. Because of that suffering and pain, we do not want to do it, but it is essential that we go through that if we want to reach the goal.
There used to be a saying: “No pain, no gain.” I am still thinking about that one a little bit, but there is certainly some truth to that.
Spiritually speaking, we need to have a mind to suffer, do we not?
When I think of these saints in Pakistan, I believe they have a mind to suffer, considering what they go through. We sympathize with them; we feel for them. But it is probably one of the best things they can go through spiritually: that suffering.
We know when we go through it, it is very, very difficult to the flesh. Our flesh would rather take time and effort to do other things that are pleasing to it.
But the reality is, disciplining ourselves unto godliness requires the matter of denying ourselves, does it not? To me, that is the hardest thing in the Christian life: denying ourselves.
Particularly when you have been quite a while not a Christian and you have gotten to the point where you are used to gratifying yourself, then all of a sudden you come to the Lord and He is calling you to lay down your life. You are kind of going backwards a little bit about it, maybe, but it is essential. It is very essential.
We need to remember that this matter of denying ourselves, this willingness to do so, comes from the Lord. It comes from the Lord. Do not try to drum it up in yourself. It is not going to happen. It comes from the Lord.
Because Philippians 2:13 says:
For it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.
That brings me a lot of hope, a lot of hope.
Now, the other thing trainers do is use very specific tools to assist in bringing ones to the goal, do they not? This is true spiritually too.
The Holy Spirit uses two major tools to bring us unto godliness. You probably know what those are. One is the Word of God, and the other is the cross. These are the two major tools the Holy Spirit uses in our lives.
Or we can put it another way: the Holy Spirit gives us revelation through the Word of God, and the other is the discipline of the Holy Spirit. That is another way of saying the Word of God and the cross.
We will speak to the cross in the next trustworthy statement, but in this one we will look a little bit at the Word of God. I want to read a couple of verses from Hebrews 4:12-13. We are all very familiar with this passage.
For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
Often we get in a place where we do not even really know the intentions of the heart, do we? We think we do, but sometimes we do not. The Holy Spirit will reveal to you that your motivation, your intention, is not pure.
It comes like a sharp sword and slices between the spirit and the soul. But it is so liberating to allow the Holy Spirit to do that, to bring you to that place.
And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.
No creature hidden from His sight. Keep that in mind, okay? Do not try to play games with the Lord. You are just fooling yourself if you do that. He knows us through and through. But remember, He still loves us, even though He knows us through and through, and He is working toward our good.
So the Holy Spirit uses the Word. He uses the rhema—that is the Greek word for that living Word—to direct us in this matter of spiritual exercise.
Again, our part is very simple in a way: it is just to cooperate by responding when He gives us light, or when He gives us illumination, regarding any issue in our lives.
A very important piece of this is that it requires having a clear conscience before the Lord. We have to have a clear conscience, because if we do not, we are not going to understand; we are not going to hear. There is going to be a blockage there.
So we have to keep ourselves, as it were, on the altar constantly—constantly keep ourselves on the altar. The Trainer, the Holy Spirit, will use the Word as a sword to do that dividing, to do that sifting, that will bring about that growing unto godliness.
James 1:21 says:
Therefore, putting aside all filthiness and all that remains of wickedness, in humility receive the word implanted, which is able to save your souls.
Also, 1 Peter 2:1-2 lines up with that former verse:
Therefore, putting aside all malice and all guile and hypocrisy and envy and all slander, like newborn babes, long for the pure milk of the word, that by it you may grow in respect to salvation.
Grow in respect to salvation. So essential is the Word in this training unto godliness. The end is the dealing with the self-life and the forming of the character of Christ in us. Our brother last week talked about that, did he not? He spoke often about that.
In 2 Timothy 3:16-17, I bet a lot of you could quote this:
All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.
That is the work of the Word of God by the Holy Spirit—that end.
So the reality is, apart from spiritual exercise, we cannot grow unto maturity. But remember this: we have a throne of grace to come unto, that we may find mercy in time of need.
When is that time of need? It is always. It is always, brothers and sisters. It is not just when you think you need it. It is always. Do not let your guard down. We always need the grace of God.
Max spoke on these verses recently. What wonderful messages those were. Titus 2:11-12 says:
For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing—or training—us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires, and to live sensibly, righteously, and godly in this present age.
The grace of God will enable us to do that. Praise the Lord for that.
Well, let us move on to the fourth trustworthy statement. We will probably camp here a little bit. Do not get scared, though. The last two I am going to be kind of quick with.
The fourth one is in 2 Timothy 2. We are going to look at verses 1-13. I am just going to kind of peruse over this a little bit.
So, 2 Timothy 2:1-13 begins with this. Paul is speaking to his son in the faith:
You therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.
I like how Weymouth has a footnote for this. He says, “Be ever gaining fresh strength from the grace that is in Christ Jesus.” Ever gaining fresh strength from the grace that is in Christ Jesus.
He goes on in verse 2:
And the things which you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, these entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.
Do you sense Paul’s urgency here? This is 2 Timothy. Paul does not have a lot of time left, and he knows it. He wants to pass that torch on to those who are faithful to the Lord.
He is speaking to his son in the faith. He is counting on Timothy to carry this out, and, of course, Titus.
He goes on and says in verse 3:
Suffer hardship with me, as a good soldier of Christ Jesus.
Here we are again. We mentioned in the previous one how you have to have a mind to suffer. He says, “Suffer hardship with me.”
Then verse 4:
No soldier in active service entangles himself in the affairs of everyday life, so that he may please the one who enlisted him as a soldier.
That word entangles means to entwine, like in a spider web—to become mutually involved. No soldier in active service entangles himself in the affairs of everyday life because he does not want to be bogged down.
A major characteristic of a soldier is that his life is not his own. Now, I was not in the military, but I learned this from my dad, who was in the army. The soldier realizes his life is not his own. He becomes the property of the military.
We find this interesting verse in 1 Corinthians 6:19-20:
Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?
For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body.
Is that not wonderful? The Holy Spirit is in you. That is the reality for us as Christians. We have been bought. We are not our own. We do not belong to ourselves anymore. We are His property.
Another interesting thing about soldiers is that everything in the soldier’s life and circumstances is arranged and ordered for him. Who his superior officer is, who his fellow soldiers are, his base camp, and the task he is to carry out—they are all arranged for him.
That is what the Holy Spirit is doing in the lives of believers. He is arranging our circumstances exactly fitted for you personally. My circumstances are not your circumstances, and vice versa.
The Lord knows us so well. He knows the circumstances He needs to put us through so that we can be brought unto maturity. He is arranging your circumstances. That is the work of the cross in the life of the believer.
Go on to verse 5:
And also if anyone competes as an athlete, he does not win the prize unless he competes according to the rules.
There are stories of runners who have tried to use shortcuts in races and found themselves disqualified because they did so. I read about that recently in the Mexico City Marathon. I am not familiar with it, but I happened to come across this.
They have said there have been as many as eleven thousand runners disqualified from that marathon. Can you imagine? That is over a number of years, like a decade—over ten years—but eleven thousand have tried to use shortcuts to try to win that race.
I could tell a story on this boy. I guess I will. None of you know who he is. He lived near us years ago, and he was friends with our boys.
He was so competitive, this kid, that he would do anything to try to win. I remember he was playing in a golf tournament with one of my sons. I was watching my son, but I looked over at this boy. They were on the green, if you know much about golf, getting ready to putt.
While one of the boys was putting, this boy I am talking about was over there, looking around, and he kind of moved his ball a little bit toward the hole. I looked at that and wanted to say, “You are cheating.”
But I knew this boy. He had cheated. I played with him once, and I will not go into the details, but he cheated. I thought, “We are not competing, we are not playing for money or anything, and you are not even half my age.”
But anyway, if you do not play according to the rules, you can be disqualified.
There are no shortcuts to be used in this matter of spiritual exercise. That is what I am trying to get at. We must run the race according to the way God has designed for us.
I want to look at a couple of verses in Philippians, just to point this out a little more. In Philippians 3:14-18, this is Paul speaking. What a heart our brother had.
I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
Let us therefore, as many as are perfect—really, that word means mature—have this attitude; and if in anything you have a different attitude, God will reveal that also to you.
However, let us keep living by the same standard to which we have attained.
Brethren, join in following my example, and observe those who walk according to the pattern you have in us.
That is what my version says. I do not know what yours says.
Then, in verse 18:
For many walk, of whom I often told you, and now tell you even weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ.
Paul is talking here about believers. He is not talking about unbelievers here. He is weeping over these ones because they are enemies of the cross of Christ.
It is very possible for us as believers to become enemies of the cross. How often we have probably tried to sidestep the cross. I know I have. There have been things that have come in my life, and I just wanted to push it away. I wanted to get away from it.
I have had bosses who made me want to quit my job. It was so hard being under them. But that is part of enduring. That is part of that discipline unto godliness: when you are willing to remain under something like that which the Lord brings into your life, and you do not try to run away from it.
It brings about endurance. It brings about patience in your life if you endure through it by the grace of God.
The sad thing, too, is that if we try to sidestep the cross, it becomes a spiritual loss to the Lord. It is a spiritual loss to the Lord, and obviously to us too, if we are not willing to lay down our lives.
Again, the cross is absolutely necessary. Why? Because it is needed to deal with the old man and the flesh—the old man and the flesh.
Our Lord said in Luke 14:27:
Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple.
That is strong, strong words. Very serious, strong words, but very true.
Verse 6 says:
The hard-working farmer ought to be the first to receive his share of the crops.
This is some good news here—not that any of the prior is not—but this takes a little of the pressure off. I remember Jim, when he shared recently, talked about farming with some plants and what he had to go through in doing that.
I thought of that when I read this verse: how it requires such hard work, diligence, and patience to get that fruit of the crop.
Thus, in this pursuit of godliness, we find from this verse that the overcomer will receive his share of the prize according to the measure of fruit produced. Is that not wonderful? That is good news.
When you go through something, allow yourself to take up the cross and go through it, and fruit comes out of that, there is going to be a prize for that one day.
Let me go on to verse 7:
Consider what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything.
All of these examples we spoke of require commitment, diligence, labor, striving, endurance, and patience. Thus, why we need the mercy and grace of God. It is so essential.
He goes on in verse 8:
Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, descendant of David, according to my gospel, for which I suffer hardship even to imprisonment as a criminal; but the word of God is not imprisoned.
For this reason I endure all things for the sake of those who are chosen, that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus and with it eternal glory.
Is that not wonderful? For the sake of those who are chosen, that they may obtain salvation. Now, the question is: what salvation is he talking about here?
He is not talking about initial salvation. He is not talking about coming to the Lord the first time and being born again. What he is talking about is this. Hebrews 10:39 says:
But we are not of those who shrink back to destruction, but of those who have faith to the saving of the soul.
He is talking about the salvation of the soul here. That is what he is talking about. That is one of the things Paul is striving and laboring for: that his fellow believers can obtain the salvation of the soul.
I would like to read 1 Peter 1:3-9, but I am not going to; we do not have time. But I will point out verse 9. Peter says:
Obtaining as the outcome of your faith the salvation of your souls.
Read that sometime when you have time. That equates to Hebrews 2:10:
For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory.
To bring many sons unto glory, because that is what Paul said: that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus, and with it eternal glory.
I want to hop into Hebrews a little bit, but I am not going to. We are really out of time. I was going to point out the fact that that whole letter speaks about a great salvation, does it not?
That great salvation, in the context of that verse as well as that whole epistle, has to do with the salvation of the soul. That letter is a very relevant, important message to the believer about gaining that glory, gaining that salvation of the soul.
That is all I want to say about that because we are about out of time.
But I will say this about the salvation of the soul. One more thing about Hebrews: this is so important to the Lord, the salvation of the soul. How do we know that?
It is because in that epistle to the Hebrews, there are five major warnings. You are only going to make a major warning to someone about something that is very important, because there is something that could be potentially lost.
Very important. Because this bringing about of the salvation of the soul will qualify the believer to be able to co-reign with Christ in the kingdom. That is why it is so important.
Revelation 3:21 says this. The Lord is speaking:
He who overcomes, I will grant to him to sit down with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne.
That is what the Lord wants for us. He wants us to sit down on that throne with Him in the age to come, and to reign and rule with Him. He is working toward that. He does not want to sit on that throne alone. He wants a companion. He wants that bride to be with Him.
But anyway, we come to verse 11, where it talks about the trustworthy statement. If you can give me a few more minutes, I will try to breeze through this, because these next few verses really just come alongside what we just talked about.
It is a trustworthy statement:
For if we died with Him, we shall also live with Him;
if we endure, we shall also reign with Him;
if we deny Him, He also will deny us;
if we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself.
That is such a paradox of the Christian life. We have to die to get life. We know that death is speaking about death to the self-life, right? That is what it is speaking about there.
Then it says in verse 12, “If we endure,” or continue, “we shall also reign with Him.” We see the type of this in Adam and Eve.
When God created Adam, He wanted to give Adam dominion of this earth, but He did not want Adam to reign or have dominion alone. So He created Eve out of the side of Adam so they could reign together.
That is such a perfect picture of Christ and the church. The church came out of His side. Why? For the purpose that they could reign with Him.
That is the major purpose of man: to become that helpmeet with the Lord Jesus. That is going to go on through the ages of ages too, but in particular in the coming age of the millennium.
It goes on to say, “If we deny,” or we could say, “refuse,” “if we deny Him, He also will deny us.” Deny us of what? Salvation? No. It is not salvation. He will deny us of reigning with Him.
If we deny Him, if we do not follow Him, we will miss out on that opportunity to reign with Him. It is very serious to the Lord. Serious words.
Paul Billheimer, in his book Destined for the Throne—I strongly recommend you all read that if you have not—said that now is the preparatory training ground for the coming age and the ages to come.
We are in the school of Christ. We are in the training now.
I will leave it at that. Verse 13 says, “If we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself.” He remains faithful. That brings such comfort to my soul, to know He remains faithful to the end.
Hudson Taylor said this:
It is not by trying to be faithful, but looking to the Faithful One, that we win the victory.
Big difference, is it not? Big difference.
Well, let us go to the last one. I probably only need about two or three minutes, and we will be done. The last one is in Titus 3. We are just going to read verses 3-8.
This is going to remind you of the first one that Paul gave, the first trustworthy statement in 1 Timothy 1:15. But here he is speaking about all of us. He is bringing us into that same picture that he painted for himself.
For we also once were foolish ourselves, disobedient, deceived, and slaves to various lusts and pleasures, spending our life in malice and envy, hateful, hating one another.
But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared, He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior; that being justified by His grace, we might be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.
Here it is again: love, mercy.
This is a trustworthy statement; and concerning these things I want you to speak confidently, so that those who have believed God may be careful to engage in good deeds. These things are good and profitable for men.
So here we come full circle, back to the mercy and grace of God, which flows out of His love for us. Paul wants to point out again the proper response to the love, mercy, and grace of God.
It ought to stir us up to be engaged in good deeds. What good deeds? The good deeds that were prepared beforehand for us. That is Ephesians 2:10.
These are simply byproducts of your spiritual exercise. That is all that is.
We see the result of this is, then again, we already talked about it: we will become co-heirs with Christ. We will become co-heirs with Christ.
There is a word in Romans 8. Our brother went through this when he was in chapter 8. In Romans 8:16 and the first part of verse 17, it says:
The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him.
That latter part is speaking about being an heir with Christ: “if indeed we suffer with Him.” If indeed we go on in this matter of discipline or exercise unto godliness, we will become that companion of His that it speaks of in the Scriptures.
Well, I would like to end with this one word from Watchman Nee. I think it was within the last few days. I get the daily devotional from Watchman Nee from CFP. I am just going to read a little bit of it. It is actually a big paragraph; I just chopped it up because I did not want to read the whole thing.
He said:
May we be runners who run the race to the end. Even if during the running we may be wounded, having from the hands of men suffered opposition, misunderstanding, and rejection, we must stir up our spirit and keep on running.
Why? For the sake of the Lord Jesus. For the sake of the Lord Jesus.
Lord, we just do commit this word back to You, Lord, to do with it what You want.
Lord, we know that apart from You, we can do nothing. But Lord, we look to You because You are the Faithful One. We know that we can come to that throne of grace to receive mercy and grace in time of need, Lord.
We know it is more Your desire than ours, Lord, that we would cross the finish line, that we would be brought to that place where Your character is formed in us, Lord, and that we could be vessels fit and useful for You, Lord.
So we just commit ourselves back to You, Lord, and thank You for Your great love, Your mercy, and Your grace toward us. We just pray in Your precious name. Amen.