I am a Christian! … Now What?
2/28/04
Introduction.. I am a Christian! …….. I am ….
I am happy to say that I have been born again as the Bible specifies in John 3:3
I have been purchased with the blood of Christ Jesus as shows in Revelation 5:9,
I have been saved by grace as the Bible emphasizes in Ephesians chapter 2 among other places….
Jesus is preparing a place for me in heaven as stated in John chapter 14…
Many people have seen the Movie this week entitled “The passion of the Christ” .. it is a tremendous portrayal of the physical agony that Christ endured on my behalf… not to mention the mental and spiritual suffering he underwent which was the worst of all……
If you didn’t see the movie, maybe you have read the book….
If you haven’t read the book, maybe you have heard the Story in Church, In Sunday School, from your parents…
In John 1:14 The Bible says that the word became flesh and made His dwelling among us….
Jesus Christ left the glories and splendor of heaven and came into this sinful and diseased world… He became flesh by allowing himself to be born unto a virgin…
HE did that for YOU….
Jesus Christ lived that physical life for 33 ½ years during which time he knew the trials and felt the same temptations that we feel in our lives… as shown in Matthew and Luke chapters 4 and verse 1 among other places….
He lived a perfect and absolutely sin free life… as stated in 2 Corinthians 5:19…
That same verse among others shows that Christ lived this sin less life and then took Our sin upon himself….
And He took our sin upon himself as He was being crucified….
Because of MY SIN… He was betrayed… He was accused… He was spit on…. he was mocked and taunted…
Because of Our sin… He was beaten….
Because of MY sin, he was scourged and the flesh was torn from his body to such a degree that He was virtually unrecognizable…
Because of OUR sin He was Crucified… the most horrible form of torturous execution ever dreamed up by the sadistic mind of a human being…
He took the sins of the world from histories beginning to end…. And he willingly placed all the wickedness of mankind upon himself..
In John 10:18 Jesus himself said that NO ONE is taking his life from Him, but He is laying it down of His own accord….
1st John 2:2 tells us that Christ became the atonement… He became the propitiation… He became the replacement for me… He became the sacrifice on the alter of God….
He paid the penalty that was laid down for mans sinfulness…
“Jesus paid it all…. All to Him I owe…..
The Gospels tell us that Jesus defeated death and rose on the third day..,
Christ has paid the penalty… and offered the free gift of eternal life to any who would trust in him, and call upon his name just as the Bible states in Acts 2:21….
And Jesus is alive and well and sitting at the right hand of the Father
We are told this all throughout the Bible, but I like the way the author of Hebrews put it in Hebrews 12:2 when he said…
Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Christ did all this for you… Christ did all this for me…
I am a Christian… I have a home in heaven waiting on me…
and if you are here today and you have never called upon Christ… if you are here today and you are not a Christian… then you will be given the opportunity to make a commitment to Him before we leave here this morning…
If you so desire, I will help you understand HOW to call on the name of the Lord, I will help you understand How to be saved….
So ,,,,
I AM A CHRISTIAN
…………… NOW WHAT?…………..
Now what?
Do I just look back upon the day of my salvation… a glorious wonderful day, do I just look back on that day and say Thank God I am saved…
I mean, I know we are to live this life in the knowledge and expectation of the eternal glories we have to come…
I know that even through all the trials and troubles we face, we are to look forward to the blessed hope and assurance that we have because of the sacrifice Christ made…
But is that IT?
As we walk through this life, are we to only look back upon our day of salvation, and look forward toward the day of our heavenly reward?…
Well, there are three theological terms that will help us with this… I think you have probably all heard them before…
There is the term “Justification”…. Justification is the act that takes place at the time of our salvation…
That is the act that takes place when we first come to Christ…
I can look back on my life at a time in November of 1992 as I was driving down the road and as I spoke to Jesus Christ as if he were sitting in the seat next to me…. Because he was sitting in the seat next to me….
And as I spoke to Jesus I told Him that I realized my need… understand that this had been a long process,… God had been dealing with me for some time…
So their at that moment as I was driving down the road I asked Christ into my life… and INSTANTLY I was saved…
2 Cor. 5:17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!
That my friends, is justification… that is an absolute instant transformation… we become new..
Then there is the act of glorification… this is the act in which we will receive our new bodies in heaven, spiritual bodies that never get sick, never grow old, and are perfect in every way…
Paul said in 2nd Corinthians 5:1
Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands.
Referring to our glorified bodies… so the Bible teaches about salvation as a one time act.. we are instantly saved and made into a new creation guaranteeing our place in heaven…
But the Bible also talks about a future salvation.. in the act of us receiving new glorified bodies when we come into our place in heaven…
But we have left out the act of sanctification… where by salvation is also an ongoing continuous spiritual act upon our lives…. We are set apart in the Christian life to grow and mature…
It has been put like this… I have been saved… I am being saved… and I will be saved…
In other words… when we first receive Christ.. the gate to heaven is open to us and we are guaranteed a place in heaven for all eternity.. we Immediately become new.. but we don’t immediately become mature… there is a growth process there…
I can look back on the day of my salvation and I remember that God instantly made some changes in my life… but then there were other things that changed in my life as I began to grow and mature…
Just to give an example…
Denise and I were both saved the month of the presidential elections for the year 1992.
Now, You have all heard what I have had to say about the coming elections… You have all heard me say that I will not vote for any candidate that stands for abortion…. You know that I say we must look at the person and their moral stand when making a decision….
And as I stood in that voting booth and made my choice back in 1992 just days after receiving Christ and becoming a new Creation… my vote had NOTHING to do with morality…
Now, soon after that, I had matured to the point to where I was kicking myself and saying, “How could I have made such a decision”
But it is a growth process.. and I am still in the process of growing.. and we are all still in the process of growing..
We are instantly changed.. yet we are still changing as we look forward to that final change when we come into the glories of heaven…
Metamorphosis is the word used in nature… a change from the inside out.. like a caterpillar into a butterfly…
As Christians, We are to live a life of constant continual growing and maturing in our faith… we are to live a life of continual transforming change…
How Is that possible?
Well, it is a way that we find hard to understand.. we have been taught in our nation that we must look out for ourselves.. take care of number one first!
But the apostle Paul shows us something quite different in Ephesians chapter 4 and that is where our focal passage of scripture is today.…
Take your Bibles and turn to Ephesians chapter 4 please…
In Chapters 1-3 Paul is showing us the act of justification… He is showing us that the moment we become a Christian we become a new creation… he shows us that we are instantly sealed with the holy spirit.. we are adopted with Christ…
Paul discusses how Jew and Gentile are alike and he talks about this thing called the Church….He talks about how the same power that raised Christ from the dead now resides in us.. every spiritual blessing becomes available to us… IMEDIATLEY all of these things happen to us when we come to Christ and he shows us these things in chapter 1-3… we are BRAND NEW…
and then in chapter 4 Paul says it is time to change…..
Read Ephesians 4:1-6
it is time to start the transformation process…
the act of sanctification is now ready to begin.. it is time to live this life in everything, in our family, in our marriage, in our jobs, in our speech, in our thoughts… in everything….
and in verse 1 shows us that this is a command…
As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I Urge you.. this is a command… to live a life worthy of the calling you have received…
We are commanded to live out what we have already believed…
We must allow our behavior or cause our conduct to align with that which we have believed…
We must do whatever is necessary to live a life.. or literally to walk in a way that is worthy of that which God has already given us…the original wordings are beautiful, we are to do whatever is necessary to bring our life into, or to live our lifestyle in the manner of what we have been called to do… we are to grow in holiness..
We are to Walk a certain way….
Now that word is interesting in what it shows us.. The NIV says we are to live a life, the KJV says we are to walk… which is actually a better translation… and a wonderful word picture…
For one thing it shows us that this Process is not instantaneous, it takes time..
Our daughter, little Kelsey, turned one year old a little over a week ago… and she is not walking yet…
All of our other kids were walking by her age… and Kelsey is not even trying.
I told Derek yesterday that I know why she is not trying…
Because we will take her wherever she wants to go…. With six other people in the house someone will pick her up and she points in the direction she wants to go….
Walking is a learning process.. and to be able to do it, Kelsey is going to have to move out of her comfort zone, .. she is going to have to be willing to fall down a few times as she grows and matures in this process…
And it is the same with our Christian walk… we must move out of that comfort zone, and be willing to fall down a few times to grow and mature…
I love that song that came out a few years ago that said a saint is just a sinner who falls down and gets back up….
You see, the Christian life is not us trying to be good and living by a certain code..
the command of the Christian life is to let Jesus live his life through us…
The Christian life is not trying to earn Gods’ favor.. It’s not coming to church, it’s not reading the bible.. The Christian life is not giving of my tith, or giving my time..
The Christian life is for us to understand that the spirit of God has given the life of Christ in us and we now have the same standing with God that Christ has..
We have been instantly justified be accepting the grace…
God has made us as if we had never sinned
Far To many people try to live a life good enough to earn Gods’ favor by performing..
But the Christian life is actually to walk in a manner worthy of that to which we have been called…. living the life which we have already been given..
Now, how can we do this… How does the process work..
Well, Paul tells us in vs 2
Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.
We must live our lives in relationships that focus on others, not on ourselves..
Understand this… A major part of our transfiguration into the image and mind of Christ… is by being in relationships with others..
We will not grow and mature alone.. look at words that Paul used...
For all of these things he tells us to be, humble, gentle, patient, bearing one another…. All of these things take a relationship…..
We need to be involved… in a church,…. in a group,… a community.. we need to have friends where there is some accountability to each other, where the relationship is centered on God and his word, where our primary goal is to help each other mature and grow in faith in Christ…..
we must help each other become like Jesus..
The church must be open….. we must be open….
I feel that one of the problems in the Church of America today is the total LACK of Freedom people feel to open up to one another when they have a problem…
The Church should be the ONE PLACE people feel free to open up if God leads them, to share a struggle they have had or are having in their lives..
The Church should be the place people feel loved and accepted no matter what…
Let us make this church a body of believers that lives THAT kind of life…
Paul says we should be completely HUMBLE…
Now understand, humility is not piety… humility is not thinking of ourselves in a low position, or a high position…
In Romans 12:3 Paul says.. For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you.
Humility actually has nothing to do with our selves at all… it is a view towards others instead….
It is a view towards serving others..
Jesus himself washed the feet of his disciples as recorded in john chapter 13.. He humbled himself.. by serving others…
And we can not humble ourselves and serve others if we are all alone…
that can only happen around people, in a community setting such as the Church, or at least a small group..
We need to consider ourselves as servants… and when we do, something begins to happen…
We can then practice gentleness…
That word gentleness is a wonderful word…
Gentleness means power under control.. gentleness is a willingness by choice to yield our life.. to exercise restraint…
In the Greek, the word was used for a horse that was once wild but had now been tamed.. it now had a bit in its mouth ..
That is power under control..
This is what Jesus had… Gentleness.. He had Power under control…
As Christ stood before Pilate, the Bible says that he was quiet…..
Now, he was not quiet because he was week… no.. he could have called legions of angels down upon all who were there…
He was quiet because he was STRONG.
When we sit quietly… quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to become angry, when we have power under control, that brings us to patience..
Patience is the ability to endure,…. to suffer.
Patience is when we put others first, we put their needs above our needs...
Then when we put others first and get our resources from God.. we change..
And we are able to bear with one another in love…
We are able to put up with other peoples failures..
We are able to put up with idiosyncrasies.. we are able to put up with their harsh words..
The grace of God changes us.. then we are to practice relationship centered on others, not on ourselves...
Then we make every effort to maintain this unity…
Vs 3 says…
Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.
Make every effort.. focus our energy, make it a priority…
We have this bond together as believers, and we are to make the effort to keep that peace…
My family is a family of believers, of Christians, and as a father and husband, my role in the family is for me to practice humility, gentleness, patience and to bear each other in love, to focus all my energies on this so that my family demonstrates in practice, what is already true of us by what Jesus has done…
Now, I’m not saying I always do good at what I am supposed to do, but that is my role…
We don’t do these things in an effort to produce change.. but in an effort to live out that which we already are…
Instead of I’m going to try to be good,
I’m going to try to go to church more,
I’m going to read my Bible more..
I’m going to try to stop cussing,
IM going to try to lose weight..
Instead of TRYING to do all these things, we are to focus on living the life that God has already given us….
IT is like we spend all this time and energy trying to be Christians….
And Paul says.. if we have trusted Christ, we are a Christian… we need to bring our beliefs and our actions in line with one another…
we need to walk in the power that God has given us, to live out the life that reflects who we already are…
I am a Christian…
Now, I must walk, I must continually grow in the process of becoming more like Christ… and I need your help to do that.. and you need mine.
We need each other.
Lets be that normal Christian church, even if it causes us to be abnormal for our day and time.
Lets be that church, that body of believers that has Christ at the center, and our goal is to help each other become more like HIM!
And if you are here today and you have never trusted in Christ, if you have never given your life to him.. the Bible says Today is the day of salvation… do not wait till tomorrow, for tomorrow may not come…
{NOTE-- some of the ideas on Philippians chapter 4 from this message were gleaned by listning to Chip Ingram on the Radio Program "Living On The Edge"}
