Faithful Until Death

He did NOT say, “If you are faithful a few short years I will give thee a Crown of Life”.

There are times the devil tells us that as Christians, we are wasting our lives serving the Lord. But I can assure you, based on the Word of God, that we are doing the smartest thing a person can do with our lives, when we faithfully serve Him each day.

God has promised to bless those of us who serve Him each day, with the CROWN OF LIFE, when we stand before Him at the Judgment Seat of Christ! If we are going to win this CROWN OF LIFE, there are some things we need to consider, such as:

I. THE PROBLEMS OF THE FAITHFUL.

As John, in our text, is talking about the Crown of Life, we need to consider two things:

1. THERE IS SOMETHING HE WAS NOT TALKING AB0UT.

WHAT IS THAT? When John spoke about winning the Crown of Life, he was not talking about WINNING SALVATION BY OUR WORKS.

The Bible makes it crystal clear, we are NOT saved by works.

Ephesians 2:8-9, “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God. Not of works, lest any man should boast.” An astounding number of ministers that preach salvation by grace, hardly get the words out of their mouths, before they start talking about salvation by works. For example-

Illus: A television preacher that pastors a large church in Columbus, Ohio, was preaching a good, solid sermon on separation from the world. He said we are saved by grace, and then he used this illustration: He and his girl friend were both Christians in high school. Just before the senior prom, she said, “We have kept ourselves pure all the time we have been dating, but on prom night, we are going to go all the way”. Her reasoning was, all the other kids do it and so would they. But she failed to recognize she was dating a young man that had some Christian character, and he looked her in the eyes and said, “No way, I am not going to do that, and before I do, I will go to the prom alone”.

He is to be commended for taking such a stand. However, he then gave the reason why he was not willing to defile himself in the back seat of a car. He said that if he did what she wanted him to do, that before he got home, the rapture might take place and he would be left behind.

WHAT WAS THE TELEVISION PREACHER SAYING?

He was giving a clear illustration of salvation by works. That is, salvation for him was based on what HE DID or DID NOT DO in the back seat of that car. If that logic is true, that means if the Lord had came back that night, every young person, that did not defile himself/herself in the back seat of a car, would have gone to heaven. But the fact of the matter is, if the Lord had come that night, all that had not receive the Lord Jesus as their personal Saviour would have been lost.

While it is commendable that young people will not do such a thing in the back seat of a car, THAT DOES NOT SAVE THEM!

When will millions in this country realize that we are saved by grace through faith. It is not what WE DO, it is what HE DID ON CALVARY. Once we become a child of God, we become a new creature in Christ Jesus.

The reason we, as Christians, do not live in sin is not because we are trying to acquire salvation, IT IS BECAUSE WE HAVE ACQUIRED SALVATION THROUGH CHRIST JESUS.

But we hear this salvation by works being preached all the time.

Illus: In a funeral service for a woman, the pastor stood before the congregation and told of the many good things this woman had done in her life. When he got through enumerating the many good things she had done in her long life, he closed by saying, “If anybody made it to heaven, she did!”

But the fact is, this woman could have done all those things and many more, and still died and gone to hell, if she did not trust in the redemptive work of the Lord Jesus, provided on Calvary.

Why? Because the Bible says, “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast..”

We hear a lot of ungodly men today, bragging about what they have acquired, but in heaven, all the bragging is going to be centered on the Lord Jesus.