This time let's turn in our Bibles to
2nd Corinthians chapter 5.
Paul talked about how he was constantly facing
death for the cause of Jesus Christ.
But though he was constantly facing death, various
perils, it didn't really trouble him, for he
had a correct understanding of death.
And I think that this is something that
we as Christians need to have, a correct
understanding of what death is for the child
of God.
And it is because we often do not
have a correct understanding, we hear such statements
made when a person dies, oh what a
shame, he was so young.
Oh how tragic, he had his whole life
before him, as though death is some tragedy
for the child of God.
Now, Paul faced death but he didn't worry
about it because he knew that if our
earthly house, this tent, were dissolved, we have
a building of God, a house not made
with hands, eternal in the heavens.
So, Paul realized that the real me is
spiritual, I dwell in a body, the body
isn't me, it's the house in which I
live, and here Paul reduces it from the
house to the tent.
Now, whenever you think about a tent, you
don't think about a permanent place to live.
There's always something very transient and temporary about
a tent.
And we should look at our bodies as
tents, they are not permanent dwelling places for
my spirit.
My spirit is dwelling presently in this tent
while my house is being prepared.
Now, you that have been around Calvary Chapel
for any length of time, know what it
is to dwell in a tent while we're
waiting for the building to prepare.
We dwelt for two years in a tent
while we were building this facility.
We know that when this earthly tent is
dissolved, when my body goes back to the
dust, that I have a building of God.
It's not made with hands, eternal in the
heavens.
And so, your contrast, the tent which is
always thought of in temporal terms and the
building of God not made with hands, which
is eternal in the heavens.
This tent in which I presently live is
a composite of the genes of my ancestry.
And I have picked up certain brown-eyed
genes and certain bald genes and the physical
characteristics and so forth have been passed down
to me from my parents and grandparents and
all.
So, I become an interesting composite of these
combination of genes.
But being passed down to me through this
progression of generations back to Adam, back to
Noah, back to Adam, Noah's family back to
Adam.
I've received, of course, a lot of interesting
type of characteristics, weaknesses and strengths.
But flawed at the best.
Because it didn't come to me directly from
God.
He wouldn't make a mess like this.
But I do have a new building that
I'm going to move into.
It's a building of God.
It's going to come to me directly from
God.
It's not made with hands.
It's eternal compared with the temporary in the
heavens.
So, for the child of God, death is
moving out of the tent.
And at this point, I'd say the worn
-out tent into the beautiful new house, building
of God, not made with hands, eternal in
the heavens.
You remember Jesus said to His disciples, Let
not your hearts be troubled.
You believe in God, believe also in Me.
For in My Father's house there are many
mansions, and I'm going to prepare one for
you.
Now, our minds immediately go to Beverly Hills,
perhaps.
And some of these beautiful estates, large column
porches and all.
And we think, Oh my, you know, the
Lord's going to take me by the hand
and lead me up Glory Road and we'll
turn left on Hallelujah Lane.
And halfway down the lane on the right
-hand side, He's going to show me this
beautiful white home with these large columns in
front.
And He's going to say, Chuck, that's your
new mansion.
Not so.
Hate to disappoint you.
The new body that I'm going to get
from God is not going to need sleep.
So why would I need bedrooms?
There are a lot of characteristics of this
new body that I'm going to have, that
it won't require a house to live in.
The mansion that the Lord is talking about
is the new body He's got for me.
I'm living in this tent.
But one day I'm going to move into
a mansion.
And one of these days, should the Lord
tarry, you no doubt will pick up your
paper and read, Chuck Smith died last night.
Pastor of Calvary Chapel, etc, etc, etc.
Don't believe it.
That's poor reporting.
If they're going to tell the truth, they're
going to have to say, Chuck Smith moved
last night out of a decrepit old holy
tent.
Leaky tent into a beautiful new mansion.
Hey, you don't need to weep for me
because I've moved out of the tent into
the house, the building of God not made
with hands, you see.
Death for the child of God.
And that's why Paul said, hey, you think
I'm worried about being bound for Christ?
I'm ready to die for Christ.
Because he understood what death was to the
child of God.
It is the moving from the tent into
the house.
Now he goes on to amplify that.
For in this we groan, or while we
are still in these bodies, we groan, earnestly
desiring to be clothed upon with our house,
which is from heaven.
These bodies, subject to weakness, subject to fatigue,
subject to pain.
In Romans, the 8th chapter, Paul talked about
how we groaned, and all of creation was
groaning together with us as we were waiting
for the manifestation of the sons of God
to wit, the redemption of our bodies.
That new body, I'm yearning, I'm desiring to
have that new body, that building of God,
not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.
If so be that being clothed, we shall
not be found naked.
Now this completely eliminates any concept or thought
of soul sleep.
For Paul goes on to declare, for we
that are in this tent do groan, being
burdened, not that we would be unclothed.
I do not desire to be an unembodied
spirit.
Now of course the goal of the Buddhist
is to someday progress into nirvana.
For all of the problems come to us
because of these bodies.
And hopefully we will progress from one body
into another, into a higher state, until finally
we are freed from the body and we
enter into that unity, bliss of the eternal
spirit and we become an essence.
But that isn't the hope of the Christian.
We are going to move out of this
old tent into the building of God, the
house not made with hands, eternal in the
heavens.
And my desire is not to be unclothed,
not to be an unembodied spirit, but to
be clothed upon with that new body that
mortality might be swallowed up of life.
Now we have a lot of difficulty in
understanding the state of the believer between now
and the rapture of the church.
Have their spirits gone to be with God,
their bodies in the grave awaiting a renewing
of that body?
It is interesting that Paul the Apostle, when
he was talking about the resurrection in his
first epistle, likened the resurrection to a seed
planted into the ground and dying.
But then Paul made an interesting statement.
He said that the body that comes forth
from the ground is not the body that
you planted because all you planted was a
bare grain.
And God gave to it a body that
pleased Him, so is the resurrection of the
dead.
Now there are a lot of people that
are hoping for some kind of a resurrection
of this body in which they are presently
living.
I am personally looking for a far superior
model, not a renewing or rejuvenating or whatever
of this body.
I'm ready to move out of the tent.
I'm ready to move into the new house,
the building of God, not made with hands.
A couple of things.
First Thessalonians chapter four is one that people
often question because Paul there seems to be
talking about the order of the resurrection.
And there Paul declares for the Lord himself
shall descend from heaven with the voice of
the archangel, the trump of God, the dead
in Christ will rise first and we were
alive and remain shall be caught up together
with them in the air to meet the
Lord in the air.
And so shall we ever be with the
Lord.
And so it brings confusion to them thinking
that somehow our spirits may be with God,
but there will be a reuniting of our
bodies and our spirits at the time of
the resurrection.
Somehow this body is going to be rejuvenated.
Of course, there are some atheists that have
really found some real problems with this.
What about a person who has a heart
transplant in the resurrection who gets the heart?
These bodies are made up of chemicals, molecules,
elements, the same 17 elements in the dirt
outside of the same 17 elements that make
up your body.
And when your spirit moves out of this
body, this body goes back to dust dust
and to dust, I'll shut return spoken of
the body, not of the spirit.
As what was a long fellow said, tell
me not in mournful numbers.
Life is but an empty dream for the
soul is dead.
That slumbers things are not what they seem.
Life is real.
Life is earnest.
The grave is not your goal.
Dust out art to dust.
Returneth was not spoken of the soul, spoken
of the body.
No.
Back in the days of the wild West,
when a man was buried, where he was
shot, the body was buried in the ground,
decomposed, went back to dirt and back to
the basic chemical elements.
Prairie grass grew.
The roots went down, took up some of
the same chemicals that once made it up
a part of a person's body.
The cows grazed, took those chemicals into their
systems, created milk, which was drunk by others.
And so the chemicals that were once a
part of another person's body now become a
part of my body.
As my body assimilates those chemicals that makes
it a part of my body.
So who gets the chemicals in the resurrection?
Which body do they get to go with?
And in reality, they say that you have
a new body every seven years.
Anyhow, you know that through this process of
rejuvenation of cells and so forth and, and
the recreating of the cells that every seven
years you actually go through a major change.
You're not the person you were seven years
ago, chemically speaking.
So which one of the bodies that I've
dwelt in during the last 50 plus years
do I get?
I would opt for one that I had
back 25 or 30 years ago.
In fact, I'd opt for the one that
I had before I injured my knee in
college football.
That is, if I had to make a
choice of this body, but thank God I
don't.
I've got a whole new building of God
not made with hands eternal in the heavens.
Now the Thessalonian believers were troubled because Paul
had taught them the fact that Jesus was
coming to establish his kingdom.
But after Paul left, some of the believers
there had died and the rest of them
were disappointed.
They said, oh, what a shame.
They died before Jesus came.
They won't have a chance to enjoy the
kingdom now.
How tragic.
They can't enjoy the kingdom of God because
they died before Jesus came.
So Paul was writing this section in chapter
four as comfort to those who were concerned
over their loved ones who had died before
the Lord had come back for the church
and established his kingdom.
Now concerning those that have gone asleep in
Christ, I'm going to write unto you that
you sorrow not as those who have no
hope.
For we know that if Jesus both died
and rose again, so then those that are
asleep in Christ shall he bring with him
at his coming.
Now the Bible teaches that the Lord is
coming for us in the clouds of the
air.
When he comes for us, those who are
asleep in Christ will be coming with him.
For we who are alive and remain unto
the coming of the Lord will not precede
them which sleep.
The word prevent there is a poor translation
really as far as our present day understanding
of the word.
The Greek word is precede.
We are not going to precede those.
They have preceded us for the Lord himself
shall descend from heaven with the voice of
the archangel and the trump of God and
the dead in Christ shall rise first.
That's correct.
They have risen first.
We're not going to precede them.
Then we who are alive and remain will
be caught up when the Lord comes with
them in the clouds of heaven to receive
us.
Then we will be caught up together with
them to meet the Lord in the air
and so shall we ever be with the
Lord.
As Chuck Missler so ably points out on
many occasions, God dwells outside of time.
We dwell within the framework of time presently.
But one of these days I too will
move outside of the time domain.
I will no longer be bounded by time
for I will move at death into the
eternal which is outside of this time dimension.
In the eternal there is no past, present
and future.
In the eternal there is only present.
As God sought to describe it through his
name, I am that I am.
Now our minds are so bound by the
time dimensions that we cannot even think apart
from time, apart from a beginning and an
ending.
My mind cannot even grasp or conceive the
concept of timelessness.
But I will as I enter into the
eternal.
Now being in the eternal where everything is
now in the present, I am, all of
time then is bound up in it.
And you'd be able to look at the
beginning and the ending of time at just
one glance, one view, which God can do
because he's outside of time.
And God proves that he can because he
tells you of these things are going to
be happening down here, though maybe we are
only at this point.
Yet God goes ahead and speaks of things
that are going to be taking place out
at this point because he can see them
as already existing.
And God oftentimes speaks of things as existing,
though they haven't yet existed in the framework
of time because God knows they're going to
exist.
And so he speaks to them being God
as though they already existed.
God spoke of Isaac as existing before Isaac
was ever born.
But God can do that because outside of
time he looks down and as far as
God is concerned, Isaac was already born.
And I married Rebecca and the whole thing
was all complete as far as God was
concerned, because he could see the whole thing.
Of course, I'm sort of encouraged by that
because God looking at the whole thing speaks
of me being glorified.
Now that hasn't happened yet, but God spoke
of it in the past tense because he's
outside of time and he can see that
completion of my redemption through Jesus Christ and
I've been glorified together with him.
That's comforting that God would speak with such
assurance of my future.
I'm comforted by that.
Because God knows it's going to be.
Now, when I die, I leave the time
dimensions.
I enter into the eternal where everything is
now.
So anything that will ever be is already.
So you can't say, well, in the future,
you know, when the whole body is made
up, then the Lord's going to bring me
into the heavenly scene because I'm into the
heavenly scene.
I've passed into the eternal.
I've passed out of time.
And so I've left this time zone thing.
I've entered into the eternal.
The moment my spirit leaves this body, it
is my body that holds me within the
time framework in the time dimension.
And so those who are asleep in Christ
have left the time dimension.
They've entered into the eternal where the completion
is already.
Now we'll catch up with them when we
leave the time zone for we too will
enter into the eternal.
So he that hath wrought us for this
self, same thing is God.
God is, is the one who has created
me for this.
He is, he has purposed this for us.
Who also has given to us the earnest
of the spirit, the down payment, so to
speak, or as they refer to earnest money,
show me you really mean it.
You want to buy my car?
Well, look, I've got an ad in the
paper, fella.
You say you're going to come back in
15 minutes.
How do I know what if someone calls
me in five minutes, wants to buy the
car, has the cash to say you really
want to buy it.
Give me some earnest money.
Show your intentions.
God showed his intention of your full redemption
by giving to you.
Now the Holy spirit, of course, Paul refers
to this also in the second chapter of
Ephesians being sealed with the Holy spirit of
promise, which is the earnest of our redemption,
earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of
the purchased possession.
So we are always confident knowing that while
we are at home in the body, we
are absent from the Lord for we walk
by faith and not by sight, but we
are confident, I say, and willing rather to
be absent from the body and to be
present with the Lord.
That's what I really desire.
Now I know that as long as I
am living in this body, I'm at home
in this body or this body is my
home.
I'm absent from dwelling there in the kingdom
of God, but I would rather, I'm willing
rather to move out of this old body
that I might be present with the Lord
in his kingdom.
So death releases me.
It releases my spirit from this body that
it might move into the new house, the
building of God where there I will dwell
with the Lord forever.
Wherefore we labor that whether present or absent,
we may be well pleasing unto him.
So my desire is that my life might
be pleasing to God while I'm living in
this body.
And when I ultimately move out of the
body, my chief desire is that my life
be pleasing to God.
Again, that Jesus might be able to say
to me, well done, thou good and faithful
servant.
Thou has been faithful in the little things.
Now I will make thee ruler over many
enter into the joy of the Lord.
The desire, the real driving purpose behind my
life is to be pleasing to God.
Paul, in writing to the Philippians said that
Christ might be glorified in my body, whether
by life or by death, I really don't
care.
I just want to be pleasing.
I want the Lord to be glorified through
me.
For we must all appear before the judgment
seat of Christ that everyone may receive the
things done in his body according to that
which he has done, whether it be good
or bad.
Now, this is not to be confused with
the great white throne judgment of God in
Revelation chapter 20, where the sinners will all
appear before the judgment bar of God.
That's something entirely different than the believers coming
before the Bema seat of Christ.
This Bema seat of Christ is much like
the Olympics judges seat.
Where the participants in the various contests would
come before the Bema seat and the judges
would lay on their heads the wreaths, laurel
or olive to indicate their success in their
particular event.
Instead of the gold, silver and bronze medals,
they received something far more corruptible in those
days of the Olympics.
They received these wreaths made out of laurel
or out of olive branches and all, and
they were placed on their head.
And that's what Paul was talking about, how
that they train, they exercise, they discipline their
bodies for a corruptible crown, but we are
working for an incorruptible crown.
But how they put us to shame in
the discipline that they exercise for that corruptible
crown and how carelessly so often we run
the race for the incorruptible crown.
The Bible teaches that our works are going
to be judged by fire and those works
which are wood, hay and stubble will be
consumed.
Those works of ours which can survive this
fire, we will then be rewarded for.
A lot of things that are done in
the name of Christ will receive no reward
at all in heaven.
Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount, beginning
the sixth chapter, said, take heed to yourself
that you do not your righteousness before men
to be seen of men, for I say
unto you, you have your reward.
Our works are to be judged what sort
they are or what the motive was behind
them.
And Jesus illustrated this principle in how we
pray, how we give, how we mortify the
flesh.
There are two ways of praying.
One is to pray to be heard of
men and to be known by men as
a man of prayer, to receive the approval,
favor, awe of men because I am a
godly man of prayer.
Or there are prayers that are unto God,
prayers in the closet, the secret prayers, and
I'm not really concerned about man hearing me
pray but about God.
Now, if I'm praying for the effect that
it will have on men, so men will
say, oh my, what a wonderful man of
prayer.
Then Jesus said, you have your reward.
Everybody knows what a wonderful man of prayer
you are.
But you should rather pray to your father
which sees in secret and then your father
which sees in secret will reward you.
Now, it all depends on where you want
to get your perks.
If you want to get them from man
now, then you can go ahead and live
your religious life in such a way that
everyone can see and know what you're doing
and all acclaim what a marvelous, wonderful person
you are.
You can do things in such a way
as draw attention to yourself.
Oh, there are several ways by which you
may cleverly just call attention to people of
the depth of your own devotional life.
Even your tone of voice, even the way
you sort of get an ethereal look on
your face, sort of a saintly look as
you begin to talk about things in spirit,
you sort of sigh, you know, the Lord
has been, you know, and you can get
the message across how close you walk with
God, how deeply spiritual you really are, the
body gestures and all, you know.
Subtle little ways by which I let people
know how spiritual I really am.
But the problem is, as I am doing
that, I'm really fouling up my future.
As far as the rewards from God are
concerned, my works are going to be judged.
I will stand before the judgment seat of
Christ.
There will be a fiery judgment and those
works coming from the wrong motivations will be
burned.
Those that endure the fire, I'll be rewarded
for as the Lord gives to me that
crown of righteousness and my position in the
heavenly kingdom will be determined much by my
faithfulness and to the responsibilities that God has
given to me now.
Now, do not confuse this with salvation.
Salvation is God's gift to you through your
faith in Jesus Christ.
By grace are you saved through faith, that
not of yourself.
It is a not of works, lest any
man should boast.
So don't confuse this with your salvation, which
many people do.
There is nothing I can do of works
to enhance my salvation.
That's complete.
My righteousness is complete in Jesus Christ.
And yet my works are to be judged
before the judgment seat of Christ.
Then I might receive the reward or in
some cases the loss of reward because of
the improper motivations behind the works.
So those works which remain after the fiery
judgment, they're put in the crucible of fire
and they're determined what sort they are.
Those gold and silver refined, God will say,
well done, blessed, you know, here's your reward.
Now you can have Hawaii.
I'm hoping he doesn't say Baghdad.
We must all appear before the judgment seat
of Christ that everyone may receive for the
things that were done in his body according
to what he has done, whether it be
good or bad.
As far as my works for the Lord,
knowing therefore the fear of the Lord and
the word terror is, is a old English
word which has lost its, it's come to
a totally new meaning.
The word is, is the fear of the
Lord.
And I don't think that we really properly
understand the fear of the Lord.
You see, for many years, I feared that
the Lord might hurt me because I had
a wrong concept of God.
Now I fear that I might hurt the
Lord.
And I think that that's what the fear
of the Lord really is.
The fear that I might hurt him by
my failure to do what he wants me
to do.
My failure of living up to his expectations
or desires.
He doesn't have his desires for me knowing
therefore the fear of the Lord.
We persuade men, but are made manifest unto
God.
And I trust also are made manifest in
your own consciences for we commend not ourselves
again unto you.
Now, again, the false teachers that had followed
Paul in Corinth, those Judaizers and others who
were sort of speaking in a degrading
way of the grace that Paul had taught.
They also were putting down Paul himself as
an authority.
They had challenged his apostleship.
He's just some renegade.
He's a Jimmy Jones.
And they were saying mean things about Paul.
But Paul said, I don't have to have
letters of recommendation to you as others need
letters of recommendation.
You are my letters of recommendation.
Your faith in Christ bears witness to the
authenticity of my ministry.
You, your faith in Jesus really validates my
apostleship.
So we are not commending ourselves again unto
you, but we give you an occasion to
glory on our behalf that you may have
somewhat to answer them that glory in appearance
and not in heart.
So for those who were loyal friends of
Paul, Paul said, look, I'm writing these things,
not that I'm commending myself to you, but
when these guys come along and give their,
you know, wild stories and reports about me,
at least you'll have something to answer them
with those men who glory in appearance.
And there are unfortunately a lot of those
people today who still glory in appearance and
not in heart.
They'd accused Paul of being crazy.
They said that guy's crazy.
It's interesting that, um, Paul on other occasions
was also thought to be crazy.
You remember when Paul was making his defense
before Agrippa, uh, Festus finally cried out, Paul,
you're crazy.
You're much learning has made you mad.
And so that was something that followed Paul
around because he was a radical and his
detractors were saying, oh, the guy's crazy.
And so Paul said, if I am crazy
and that word beside ourselves is a, it
means that a person who is to the
point of talking to himself.
So I say, yes, I want to go
there.
Are you sure you want to go there?
Yes, I want to go there.
Well, why do you want to go there?
Well, I just want to go there, you
know, and a guy gets to talking to
himself.
He's beside himself.
There's two persons, you know, and so here
I am and here I am and, and
we're having a conversation back and forth and,
and he's beside himself.
So Paul said, if I'm beside myself, it
is to God or whether I have a
sound mind, it is for your cause.
So, uh, Paul answering the detractors, he goes
on to declare for the love of Christ
constrain us.
Now Paul introduces here the subject of the
love of Christ as a constraining force within
his life.
He's not really talking here about motivations to
ministry, though we so often hear this taught
as motivation to ministry.
Whenever Paul talked to the love of Christ,
he was thinking of one thing, the cross
of Jesus Christ.
The only way God has ever sought to
show or to prove that he loved you
was by sending his son to die for
your sins.
And whenever God wants to declare his love
for you, he always declares it through the
cross here in his love.
Not that we love God, but that God
loved us and sent his son to be
the propitiation for our sins.
For God commended or demonstrated his love towards
us in that while we were yet sinners,
Christ died for the ungodly for God so
loved the world.
He gave his only begotten son and always
God's love for you is tied up in
the death of Jesus Christ for you.
And they never thought of the love of
God apart from the cross, because that is
God's demonstration, his supreme demonstration of his love.
Greater love has no man than this, that
a man will lay down his life for
his friends.
And so as Paul says, for the love
of Christ constrains me, his mind is now
taken to the death of Christ for mankind.
For we thus judge that if one died
for all, then were all dead.
The love of Christ forces me to this
conclusion.
The fact that he died for all indicates
that all men then were dead.
Paul said in Ephesians two and you have
he made alive who were dead as the
result of your trespasses and sins.
All have sinned and come short of the
glory of God.
The soul that sinneth it shall surely die.
If those scriptures both be correct, then the
assumption must be made that all natural men
are dead.
That is spiritually dead, which is the separation
of a man's consciousness from God.
Jesus said, if you live and believe in
me, you will never die.
That's why I say, don't believe it.
If the paper's right, I've died.
I cannot die.
I will move.
Yes.
Thank God for that.
But I won't die for.
I will never be separated from God because
of Jesus death for me.
Never for a moment will I be separated
from him.
And that's what real death is.
Physical death, the separation of your consciousness from
your body.
You're not to worry or be fearful about
that.
But what you really need to fear is
the separation of your spirit from God for
eternity.
That's what you ought to be concerned about.
Now, it's interesting that the opposite is true
in most cases.
Most people are so concerned about their physical
deaths, but think nothing of spiritual death.
But Jesus said, don't be afraid of those
who can kill your body and after that
have no power, but rather fear him who
after the body is dead, is able to
cast both soul and spirit into Gehenna.
I send you fear ye him.
So we thus judge.
We come to the logical conclusion.
If Jesus died for all men, then it
must be that all men were dead and
that he died for all.
That they which live should not henceforth live
unto themselves.
Now, that is the mark of the flesh
life.
Even as there is physical death and spiritual
death, there is physical life and spiritual life.
And we have passed from death into life
through the work of the Holy Spirit and
as the result of the work of Jesus
Christ.
And you have he made alive who were
dead in your trespasses and sins.
Now, having come into this new life, I
now have a new center and that is
God.
The old life of the flesh was centered
around me.
It was a self-centered life, but Christ
died for me that I would no longer
be living for myself, no longer living this
self-centered life, only seeking to gratify the
needs of my own body.
But now living a God-centered life, the
life of the Spirit in fellowship with God,
I am living to satisfy and to please
God.
Before I live to satisfy and please myself.
The life of the flesh.
The life of the flesh creates the mind
of the flesh.
If my body is ruling, if I am
body, soul and spirit and the body is
ruling, then my mind is under the control
of my body and what I am thinking
about is the body needs.
That's what occupies my thinking.
What shall I eat?
What shall I drink?
What shall I wear?
If I am living the new life after
the Spirit, a God-centered life, then I
have the mind of the Spirit and I'm
thinking about God and my relationship with him,
my love for him, his love for me,
worshiping him, aware of him, conscious of him
in all the things around me, God-conscious.
Oh, what glory it is to have a
mind quickened by the Spirit of God.
Heaven above, a deeper blue.
Earth around, a deeper green.
Something lives in every hue that Christless eyes
have never seen.
I never saw that before.
The beauty of the flower, the glory of
the colors, the fragrance, the mind quickened by
the Spirit.
We become aware of God and just all
around us as Paul declared ultimately, in him
we live, we move, we have our being.
And I begin to be aware of that.
I'm surrounded by him in my heart, living
in worship and fellowship with him day by
day.
The mind of the Spirit resulting from the
life of the Spirit, a life that is
controlled by the Spirit, a life that is
a God-centered life.
Now, that's why Christ died for you.
That you might be freed from the bondage
of corruption, the bondage of your flesh.
That you might be able now to live
a whole new life in a new dimension,
in the dimension of the Spirit.
For the mind of the flesh is death,
but the mind of the Spirit is life
and joy and peace.
Now, for this cause, Jesus died, that we
should henceforth not live to ourselves, but live
for him who died for me and rose
again.
And so as Paul the Apostle said, for
me to live is Christ.
He said, I have been crucified with Christ,
nevertheless I live, and yet it is not
I, but Christ who is living in me.
And the life that I now live, I
live by the faith of the Son of
God who loved me and who gave himself
for me.
That we should no longer live unto ourselves,
but now live for him who died for
us and rose again.
Wherefore, henceforth, know we no man after the
flesh.
From now on, Paul said, I'm not concerned
in the fleshly man, the exploits, whatever.
I'm not concerned in knowing a man after
the flesh, though this is how he said,
I once knew Christ.
At one time, Jesus Christ was to Paul
the Apostle, a heretic, a leader of a
new sect that was a threat to Judaism.
And he went about to stamp out this
new sect.
He once knew Christ after the flesh, but
no more, he said.
That's not the way I know him now.
He now knows him after the spirit, and
he has received that life and power from
him.
Therefore, if any man be in Christ, he
is a new creature or creation, and the
old things have passed away.
Behold, all things are become new.
These are direct positive statements.
Now, John tells us that many times a
person can say something, but yet their life
isn't in harmony with what they're saying.
It is possible for a man to make
glorious professions.
And as you go through the first epistle
of John, you'll find over and over, John
says, if a man says, if a man
says, if a man says he abides in
him, then he ought to also walk even
as he walked.
If you're abiding in Christ, you're going to
walk like Jesus walked.
If you say you're abiding in Christ and
you're walking after the flesh, you're a liar.
You're deluded.
You're living in deception, self-deception.
If a man says, I love God, oh,
what a glorious thing to say.
But if at the same time you hate
your brother, you're a liar.
How can you love God whom you have
not seen and yet hate your brother who
was made in his image, whom you have
seen?
If a man says, hey, I have no
sin, then you deceive yourself.
The truth isn't in you.
And so all the way through John's giving
us little things that men profess, but he's
saying, hey, you're only fooling yourself.
You're deceiving yourself.
It isn't what you profess.
It's what you are.
And if any man is in Christ, he
is a new creature and the old things
have passed away.
And if the old things have not passed
away, then you have no real proof that
you're in Christ, no matter what you say.
Your professions are empty and false and deceptive.
And the tragedy is you're the one who
is deceived the most.
So many people in church are deceived in
the thinking that their attendance at church is
going to buy them a place in the
kingdom of God.
Their giving to the church is going to
secure their place in heaven.
Their faithfulness to the church, church attendance, church
membership, church contributions cannot do anything towards your
eternal life.
And these things can be a deception.
Oh, well, I pray.
Well, Isaiah said.
The God's hand is not short that he
cannot save, neither is his ear heavy that
he cannot hear.
But your sins have separated you from God.
And if you are regarding iniquity in your
heart, the Lord doesn't even hear you.
It's like cutting the telephone line that comes
to your house and then going in and
dialing the number and talking to your sweetheart
and telling her how much you love her
and all the glorious things you think about
her.
Well, it's not going anywhere.
You've got a broken connection.
It's going into the ground.
The wire is grounded outside.
And no matter how beautiful or persuasive you
may be expressing yourself, your heart, your love,
it's not doing anything, not getting any results.
And so prayer.
If you're regarding sin in your heart, sin
breaks your connection with God.
And prayer is meaningless.
Oh, it's worse than that.
It's deceptive because you have a tendency to
still rest on the fact, well, I pray,
you know, I know I'm not doing what
I should.
I know I'm not living like that, but
I still pray.
But prayer becomes in that case, a deceptive
thing.
It's the changed life.
It's the new life manifested by the fact
that the old things are passed away.
You cannot continue to live after the flesh
and walk after the flesh.
The life of the flesh and the life
of the spirit are mutually exclusive.
Be not deceived.
God is not mocked.
Whatsoever a man sows, that shall he also
reap.
And if you sow to the flesh of
the flesh, you're going to reap.
And if you sow to the spirit of
the spirit, you will reap.
But the works of the flesh are manifest,
which are these.
And Paul gives us that horrible list.
The works of the flesh of which, unfortunately,
we are all too familiar.
Strife, envying, deceit, murders, lies, fornication, adultery.
But Paul said, let no man think that
if he is doing these things, he is
going to inherit the kingdom of heaven.
You better read that list over again.
Read it prayerfully and read Paul's conclusive remarks.
If you are living after the flesh, don't
think you're going to inherit the spiritual kingdom
of heaven.
If any man's in Christ, he's a new
creature.
The old things have passed away.
Have they?
That's the question.
Let a man examine himself because you're going
to stand before the judgment seat of Christ.
And if you will judge yourself now, then
you will not be judged.
Then how much time do you spend living
after the spirit?
And how much time do you live, spend
living after the flesh?
He's a new creature.
The old things are passed away and behold,
all things are become new.
All things are now of God.
Not some of the things of my life.
Well, God has his place.
I, I believe that God should have his,
you know, have the place in every man's
life and every man should make a place
for God.
No, he wants more than a place in
your life.
He wants the totality of your life.
All things are of God who has reconciled
us unto himself by Jesus Christ and has
given us the ministry of reconciliation to wit
that God was in Christ, reconciling the world
unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them
and have committed unto us the word of
reconciliation.
Now, then we are ambassadors of Christ.
As though God did beseech you by us,
we pray you in Christ dead, be ye
reconciled to God.
Now, some people talk about God being reconciled
to us.
Never.
God didn't leave us.
God didn't turn his back and go away
from us.
We are the ones that need to be
reconciled to God.
We're the ones that turned our back on
him and walked away from him.
We're the ones that need the reconciliation.
And so Paul's plea and he said, I'm
doing it in Jesus's place in his stead.
As for God, I'm doing it.
I'm an ambassador, a representative of God.
I'm speaking on his behalf in his debt,
be reconciled unto God.
So this glorious work of reconciliation, God in
his love, created man, created man in his
image, in his government of light and life,
that man might live in fellowship with God
and know the glory, the joy, the beauty
of living in fellowship with God.
But man turned from that, turned his back
on God, walked away from God.
And he began to experience the miseries of
life without God, the emptiness, the hopelessness, the
despair of life without God.
God so loved the world that he sent
his only begotten son to die for man's
sins in order that through the death of
Christ, man might be brought back to God
or reconciled to God.
And so Paul said, I'm God's ambassador and
I'm here representing Jesus Christ and I'm saying
for him, be reconciled to God.
Come back into fellowship with God.
Come back into the government of light and
life.
Know again the joy, the glory, the blessing
of walking in the Spirit, the life of
the Spirit, the life after the Spirit.
For God has made him, Jesus Christ, to
be sin for us who knew no sin
that we might be made the righteousness of
God through him.
Here is one of the most glorious Scriptures
in the New Testament.
As we see what God has done for
us in Christ, in reconciling us to himself,
all we like sheep had gone astray.
We turned every one of us to our
own ways and God laid on him the
iniquities of us all.
God made him to be sin for us
who knew no sin.
I sometimes start to read in the paper
some horrible, vicious crime that has been committed
and I just can't read it.
My being just revolts against it too strongly.
I sometimes have been given reports from the
Social Welfare Department of child abuse and some
of the things that are done to these
little one, two, three-year-old babies.
And when I read of some of the
abuses of these little children, I have to
quit reading.
I can't stand it.
My system just won't take it.
I just have to set it aside.
I get sick.
I cannot conceive a person doing such horribly,
ugly, vile things.
And my whole being just is revolted by
it.
And I'm not that righteous a person.
I have my own flaws.
I've done some pretty terrible things myself.
Jesus knew no sin.
Absolutely pure.
Absolutely holy.
Absolutely righteous.
But God laid on him every horrible, vile
deed that has ever been done by perverted,
fallen man.
Now, can you imagine what a shock that
must have been?
No wonder he cried out, My God!
My God!
Why hast thou forsaken me?
As he tasted of death for every man,
that separation from God, that spiritual death, that
cry that came from his lips upon the
cross was made in order that you might
not have to make it for eternity.
There, as God laid upon him our sins,
he was reconciling man to God.
And so he became what we were in
order that he might make us what he
is.
Love, divine, all loves excelling.
The love of Jesus Christ, who was willing
to take all of my ugliness, all of
my sin, and bear in his body there
on the cross my sins.
The love of God, who was willing to
allow his son to become sin for us,
he who knew no sin, and die in
our place.
Now you see why the greatest sin that
any man can ever commit is the sin
of rejecting this love of God offered to
him through Jesus Christ.
You see, that's the only sin for which
a man will ever be judged.
You won't have to face the great white
throne judgment of God because you were a
cheat, a thief, a liar, a prostitute, a
murderer, an adulterer, fornicator.
You'll face the great white throne judgment of
God if you have rejected the love of
God offered to you through Jesus Christ.
That's the greatest sin.
Jesus said, I didn't come into the world
to condemn the world, but that the world
through me might be saved.
And he that believeth is not condemned, but
he that believeth not is condemned already, seeing
he has not believed on the only begotten
Son of God.
This is the condemnation that light came into
the world, but men would not come to
the light.
That's what it's going to be.
God has offered salvation, but you didn't take
it.
God has offered love, but you rejected it.
No hope, for there remains no further or
no other sacrifice.
There's nothing else you can do for the
atoning of your sins, for being reconciled to
God.
No other way you can be reconciled to
God.
That's why Satan hates the cross.
That's why your cults hate the cross.
That's why the liberals hate the cross.
The cross declares to mankind there is only
one way by which you can be reconciled
to God, and that's through the cross and
the death of Jesus Christ.
And if you reject that, there remains no
other sacrifice, only the fearful looking forward to
the fire indignation of the wrath of God,
which will devour his adversaries.
For if they that despise Moses' law died
because of the witness of two or three
of how much worse punishment, suppose ye he
to be accounted worthy, who hath trodden underfoot
the Son of God, and hath counted the
blood of his covenant, wherewith he was sanctified
an unholy thing, and has done despite to
the Spirit of grace.
For we know him who has said, Vengeance
is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord.
And again, it is a fearful thing to
fall in the hands of a living God.
I'll tell you what, if I were God
and did that much to redeem man, offering
my son and giving my son, and man
would reject and cast him aside and do
despite to that Spirit of grace, I would
do as God does, and God will do.
I would say you want to live in
darkness, that shall be your sentence, and I
would cast you into outer darkness throughout eternity,
which God is going to do to the
fearful and the unbelieving.
Those who fail to receive his grace and
offers of love through Jesus.
So in Christ's stead, as ambassadors of Christ,
we encourage you be reconciled to God.