the front row. It's like, oh, it's raining outside inside. Let's have you here this morning. And it's one of those mornings where I could just go on singing all morning.
Actually, if you look at the clock, we did. So we will do what we can to get you out. It's raining outside, so just be comfortable. It's warm inside.
It's dry, so we'll spend some time looking at the Word of God. Let's pray. Thank you, Lord, for your great love to us. We thank you for our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, and for the life we have in Him.
And Father, the fact that we could be called the child of God is an amazing thing. And it's all because of our Lord Jesus Christ, because He was willing to give Himself for us. And to make a way for us to be saved from our sin. We just pray as we open your word and as we look at it, as your word is open in Sunday school as well, that it will have its effect.
Or you make promises of your word, that one you exalted even above your name. And you also say that it is quick and powerful to two-edged sword. And it penetrates our lives and our hearts, and I pray that it's your Word, not my words, my perfect way to our hearts. And I pray, Lord, that you would help us as we study this morning to come out of here, walking with you.
And if there's anyone here this morning who does not know Jesus Christ as their Savior, may the Holy Spirit impress upon their heart their great need, and they repent of their sin, and turn to the one and only living Savior as the Lord Jesus Christ. But we ask all of these things in His name, amen? So, if you were here at Easter, the message was, but God raised Him from the dead. And that was going to be my second message in this series.
And this is one from snowstorm back in March. The Lord has this way of doing things, doesn't he? So I go back and I thought, okay, this is gonna be an easy, easy weekend. I'm just gonna go back at those notes so that I had ready for merch.
I'll read through them, I'll do some highlighting. I'll just kinda work with it a little bit, and I'm good to go. Well, by 2 a.m. on Friday or whatever night it was, I thought this is a lot more reading and highlighting than I ever thought it was gonna be, because Lord completely changed that message, and I think the first one was for me.
The next one, hopefully, was the one that he wants me to say today. And who knows why delays come, but they do. So the last one I entitled, but God raised him from the dead. And I thought about this, was really actually when I was just about to close up last night, and I looked and I thought, but God raised you from the dead.
That really speaks to what this passage was. And I apologize to Andrew, I kinda sprung this on him just before we came up. I was going to actually text Stephen on Friday and said, you think Andrew could read this passage for me on Sunday morning? And then I saw on Facebook that he's preaching just about everywhere in the country, over the last couple of days and leading studies everywhere.
And I thought, I'm not gonna bother Stephen, he's got an awful lot on his plate. I'll just ask Andrew if he's there on Sunday. And then I completely forgot. And then I walked out from the washroom, and I said, oh, there's Andrew.
And so he had like, he did really, really well with like no notice. So I really appreciate that. He's a great reader, that's why I wanted to have him do it. So the words that we're gonna look at again, in this little series, there's gonna be a couple messages on this one.
But God, they're simple words, powerful truth. And I did this when I spoke at Easter time, I mentioned this, it speaks of a powerful truth. Just in two simple words, they point us to the one I will call the great interrupter, the one who can powerfully and graciously interrupt our lives with his plans to change our lives forever. It's found 45 times in the Bible, depends on what version you use, I suppose.
And it's always followed by something happens, and followed by a radical change. Martin Lajones, a great Bible commentator, said that these two words in and of themselves contain the whole gospel of Jesus Christ. I would agree with him. He says, no matter who you are, no matter what you've done, no matter how you've lived, no matter what mistakes you've made, or what failures you've had, what addictions you may find yourself in, there can be a but God moment that radically changes who you were and who you are.
It's one of those things that you use the word but, all the time, and I use it all the time. Tell people at work. We didn't have a bad year, but, oh great, there are no raises or bonuses this year. Oh great.
I had a great vacation, but it rained the whole time. So when we use the word but, it usually mentioned something negative is coming afterwards. However, when you take the word God and add it after but, it means that the impossible is about to happen. Something that you never expected is going to happen, but God.
So he read this morning, I'd have read this passage this morning, and in the middle of it, in verse four, it says, but God, being rich in mercy, because of his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ. So I want to focus on that a little bit this morning as we go through. So the first thing that we understand when we read verse one, it says, and you were dead in your trespasses and sins. Now this is before we were saved.
Now if you're here this morning and you've never come to Jesus Christ, and if you've never trusted him as your Savior, and you don't know him, you are still in that state. You are dead in your trespasses and sins. You're not alive. You are not spiritually alive, and you need life.
You're separated from God. The unbeliever is dead and lacks the capacity and desire to respond or understand spiritual things. I'll give you an example in my own life. I went to church from the time I was carried in, and we didn't have a little cra...
We didn't have car seats, what am I kidding? One of my aunt held me under a lap and drove and brought me in. And so from then for 20 years, I went every single week. And I heard the gospel.
And there were times that every night for 12, 14 weeks, I heard the gospel every night, every night. And I sat and I listened and I heard it, but you know what, I could never understand. I could not understand it at all. It was a spiritual truth, and I was spiritually dead.
I'm not getting this. And I could preach a message. I could tell a person how to be saved by myself. I was dead.
I couldn't understand. So it says here that we're separated from God, the unbeliever we're dead, we lack the capacity. When did spiritual death start? It started with Adam.
Remember when God said to him about the tree, the day that you touch it, and even if it's fruit, you will surely die. And Satan came and said, yeah, right, you're not gonna die. But they did, they died spiritually, instantly. At that moment, as soon as they ate of that tree, that's when sin came.
It says in Romans, you read by one man, sin entered into the world and death by sin. So death passed upon all men. That's spiritual death, as well as physical death. Physical death came later, they started to decay.
And they started to go downhill and die. You see the thing about a dead person? And a lot of people go to religion to try to improve their condition. A lot of people try to do things that, this maybe this will help.
Maybe if I take the self-help thing, or maybe if I buy these rocks and gems and crystals and line them up on my windowsill, I'm not joking about that. We were just down in Maine and New Hampshire, and I'll tell you what, there are way more rocks and crystal shops that are gonna supposedly save you from all the ails of life and spiritism and everything else. There's way more of those than Bible stores. In fact, we did not find one Christian bookstore, not one, all the way down from here to Boston, none.
But all kinds of stores selling crystals and rocks and gems and things that are gonna just radically change your life. I'm sorry, but it won't work. All it's gonna do is make a really dead person more poor because they're like, go with me, I'll collect rocks with you. It'll be free, but you buy them in these stores, it's gonna cost you a fortune.
All you become is a poor dead person. You are not gonna change. You maybe turn to religion. Maybe you think if I do this, if I read my Bible more, if I pray more, if I go to church more, if I give money to the church, that will fix my dead condition.
It won't, you need new life. Jesus says there's only one remedy. And as he spoke to a man named Nicodemus, he said, Nicodemus, you must be born again. You need life injected into you, spiritual life.
And if you're not born again, he says you will never see the kingdom of God. Very important truth. You are dead in your trespasses and sins. Now, there's two words here.
Trespasses and sins. The word for sin, there's the Greek word right there. Hammeratia, I guess, or hammeratia, or something like that. It means to miss the mark.
It's kind of an archery term. So I put the bullseye thing there. It could be unintentional or it could be intentional. It's found 173 times in the New Testament.
Sin, we all know what that is. We've all sinned in some way or another. We've all told a lie, taken something that was now ours, said something bad about somebody that wasn't maybe true, looked at another woman to lust after her or another man to lust after him. We've all done some of that stuff.
That's a sin. And sometimes we've committed sins that we didn't even know about. Sometimes our mistakes, but they're still sins that make you fall short of the glory of God. They're still offenses to God.
And then there's the word trespass. And I thought about trespass. What is that? Well, trespass is crossing a known boundary.
And actually, when I looked up the Greek word for it, it means the sidestep. You know where you're supposed to go. You know where you're not supposed to go. And you go there anyway.
That's a trespass. A sin could be, I know Clyde needs prayer, and I don't pray for him. Scripture says that. It could be a sin, and I pray for somebody.
And you need to pray for them. But a trespass is worse. A trespass is when you willfully and intentionally do something. Remember, years ago, I know there's probably some Dalhousie students here, and I probably am risking telling the story.
But under a Neath Dalhousie, under University Avenue, all the way up from the Tupper Building, right up to the Kilum Library, there are heating tunnels, and they're really cool. All these heating pipes and cockroaches are all in these tunnels that run up through there. And I found out about this because we had a geology class, because they had all mapped out like a mine, and we were going down there mapping stuff, and I told the guys in residence, and said, hey, you know what, guys, there's tunnels. No, that's what all those things are on University Avenue.
There are entrances and exits to the tunnels. No, yeah, yeah, yeah. I know how to get in. Really?
Yeah. And because I teach a lab, I have a key, a master key. They get into a whole bunch of places. So maybe, well, why don't we go down, and we'll go through these tunnels.
So I went down to the Tupper Building, down into the parquet, and went over to where the heating tunnels, Dave, you know all of these heating tunnels are short. Dave's going to be trespassing tomorrow. So you go into the Tupper Building, and you go in, and as well as these cool things, there's a light switch. You turn off the ones behind, you turn on the ones and you keep going through.
Now, again, that's 35 years ago. So it's probably a lot different now. But we were down there, and decided this is really cool. We walked up through, and we were just a bunch of guys just messing around.
And we got to the end, and I said, OK, let's get out here. So we climbed up the ladder, this little steel ladder, and flipped the little blocks or whatever. Flipped the thing open, and standing over me was Dell Security. And I came out, and three other guys came out, and he said, what are you guys doing?
And I tried to make up some stories. I do a geology lab over at Dell. I was thinking Dell's going, no, no, no. It's Friday night, it's 1130 at night.
You were not teaching a lab in that tunnel. I said, no. So we ended up over at the Dell Security office. And when he said to me, he says, you know what?
I can have you charged with trespassing. Now, would he be right? Absolutely. Wasn't willful on my part?
Absolutely. So that's what trespass is. When we willfully go out of our way to offend God, or offend another, or act against God. That's a trespass.
And before we are saved, we are dead in those things. You see, unbelievers, they're not sick, they're dead. One said that you can take a person, put them in therapy, and they'll just come out of a well-adjusted sinner. Or you can put a person in a church, and they'll just come out of a religious sinner.
The only thing that can put a person right is that they are placed in Christ, and then you have a saved sinner. See, that's what's going to take care of our trespasses and sin. I think I went back in my notes. The next part that tells us here in verse one, it says, you walked according to the course of this world.
You walked according to the course of this world. The word for walk here is peripatto, I think it is. I don't know. I'm really, really poor at pronouncing Greek, because I grew up in Cape Breton.
I think that's probably why. Which means to order your behavior. To order your behavior. Or to actually, the word here for walk is to also could be translated as to tread all around.
And it could be interpreted as one says as meandering. You just kind of wander without goal or purpose. It's like, you're going to go to a store, and you're just killing time. You know, your wife is somewhere, or sometimes when I travel, I just try to get away from everybody, and I'll pop on a bus, and I'll go up to the square one mall in Mississauga, which is like a huge massive mall.
It's a big as Dartmouth. And you're walking through the thing, because you can get 12, 15,000 steps just walking this mall. And you're wandering around, just wandering, browsing, looking, and I always end up going, why am I going back on the bus with this bag of stuff? I didn't even want.
Why did I buy that shirt? Why did I buy that, whatever it is? And you're thinking, I was just wandering around. I was meandering.
And so it kind of talks as if you're kind of browsing the shelves of the world and picking things that you want, that you don't really want, but you end up with them. And that's kind of the way sin is for us. You're just wandering around and just picking, and now you're carrying bags and bags and bags of it. You hardly walk because you've collected so much from the world.
So we had this propensity, all of us do. In fact, in Isaiah, and that was read this morning, Isaiah chapter 53, it, you may read, all we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way. But, but all that stuff you've carried, all that stuff you've picked up from wandering around, the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
You can be freed from all of that baggage from wandering around, browsing the shelves of the world, and just filling your life with a collection of sin. You can be freed from that by Jesus Christ. Paul's point is you're just looking for what the world has to offer. It's a nature that we all have.
I'm gonna tell a story here. And I think John Wells may have shared this at the break of bread one day, but there's a man named Robert Robinson. And at age 20, he came to Christ and he became a preacher, and he wrote some songs in the 1700s. And he wrote this song, and I would say almost more often than not, we open up the break of bread with this song.
Come now, I found of every blessing. Tune my heart to sing that grace. I don't know if there's any song that we sing at the break of bread to start off more than that song. And then in this song, he wrote this line, prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love.
Some years later, Mr. Robinson found himself wandered far, far, far away from God. That propensity to wander is in us all, to just wander away. And it says that we lived our lives, it says in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the Prince of the Power of the Air, and the Spirit is now working in the sons of disobedience.
That's the way we walked all our lives. We don't wanna walk that way. There's good news coming. In verse, the next verse we read, in verses four and five, it says, but God being rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us.
Even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ by grace, if you haven't saved. Now that's not bolded in your Bible, I did that for emphasis. But God, James Montgomery Boy says, understand those words and it will save your soul. If you understand what it means by but God in this verse, it will save your soul.
If you don't know Jesus Christ as your savior, you can understand just from this verse right here, but God, you were dead, you were weighted down with a load of sin, but God has found a way and provided a way to take that all away and to give you life, to give a dead person life. It contains the whole of the gospel, as Martin Lloyd Jones says. A saved person has a but God moment in their life, every one of us do. It might be in a different place for you, it might have been a different way for you, it might have been a different way for me.
But if you are a person who is saved and going to heaven, you had a but God moment in your life. I'm so thankful, and I'm so thankful for the but God moment in my life. I was a religious guy, I went to church all the time, then I walked away from it, I was a rebel, I was lost. But God, on the 21st of December, 1981, but God, save my soul.
And I think everybody here would have a testimony of some sort like that. Warren Shocker, he'll tell me the story. I was reading a track, wasn't it, Warren? But God, I was doing this, but God.
Well, back to work, I was a changed person. But God, but God can save you. But God can make you alive. If you're here this morning and you are dead in your sins, those words, but God bring great hope to you.
If you understand, the Holy Spirit will open up your heart to understand and know your needs, and repent of your sin and turn from it, and trust in God through Jesus Christ, you will be made alive. Now why did God do it? Why did he do it? It says right in the verse, because he's rich in mercy.
Now, I don't remember everybody's sermons. I know what he may spoke on last week, or Freedom in Christ. We before Clyde spoke on something about Mother's Day. Sorry, Clyde.
And so we don't remember, but we take little nuggets of things, and some things we hear through the years, and we never, ever forget them. And I remember something about mercy. You know what I'm saying? One evening, Brian Doman, speaking, unfortunately it was the evening, most of you weren't here.
But it was in the evening, we were sitting here, and he said, yeah, in Brian's way, grace is for the guilty. But mercy is for the miserable. Never forgot that. Hopefully never will.
Misery is mercy. Mercy is for the miserable. Because of his great love with which he loved us, being rich in mercy. We're rich in misery.
He's richer in mercy. That's the great thing. Lamentations, three, verse 22 says, through the Lord's mercies we are not consumed. Really, our sin.
Our sin is so great. One sin is so great that O'Fans God, that we should be thrown out of his presence forever. But because he is rich in mercy, he will forgive. He will save.
He will give life. It says, because of his great love, no greater verse than John chapter three, verse 16, for God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whoever believes in him should never perish but have everlasting life. You can't find a greater love than that. Nowhere, because of his mercy and his love, God loves you.
And when you discover his love for you, it's a monumental but God moment. It totally changes you. You see, people go through because they're misinformed and they have this thing, God's with the get me, God's mad at me all the time. Why don't we get that idea?
He's not, God loves you. God wants to see you come to him and be his child, that he can bless you. You see, when we are made alive in Christ, when we are given our life, we recognize that God has changed our life and the way it was gonna go, because of his mercy and his love. So what did he do?
What did he do? He made us alive together, it says, in this verse. He made us alive together. King James Version, Dave asked if anybody reads King James Version, I do.
So it says quickened, quickened. And I'm not even gonna try to pronounce that because it has zeds and a couple of double zeros and a P and those funny things over the top of it. That's a Greek word. It means reanimated, conjoined with, made alive, reanimated.
Remember, when I was a kid, the thing scared me to death was watching the Frankenstein movie, this monster that was in the thing and then they put all this power through them and then he came out and he became a monster. That's reanimated. I mean, Frankenstein was made from a bunch of dead people's parts and he was, and he was, good thing the kids went downstairs. And then they ran this vault of power through them and he became this living monster.
But we haven't become monsters, I hope. But he has given us life, he has reanimated us. We were dead, but now we're alive. And you know what, when did God love us?
Did God love us when we cleaned up our life, when we came acceptable to him, when he looked at us and said, you know what, now I'll put my love on you. No, it says in Romans, in Romans chapter five verse eight, it says, but God demonstrates his own love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. God showed his love to us before we were cleaned up, before we were saved, before we were his. While we were still sinners, while we were still enemies, while we shook our fist in his face, he still loved us.
And he demonstrated that love by sending Jesus Christ to die for us. He loved you when you hated him, he loved you when you ran from him, he loved you when you had no thought of him at all. And as a result of all of this, we're in a new place. In six and seven it says, and he raised us up.
Okay, first of all, he made us alive. And now he raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that at the ages to come, he might show the surpassing riches of his kindness, his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. Paul uses this term in Christ, 85 times in his writings. It says here that we've been put into a new place.
Now these notes and that, they're not even close, but that's okay. So he's taken us now, positionally, we were dead, we're made alive in Christ, and now immediately and positionally, we are seated in heavenly places right now in Jesus Christ. I'm in Christ. He uses that 85 times, he says, you're in Christ, you're in Christ.
My life is hidden in Christ and Christ in God. It's like this double barrier of protection I've got around me. I'm in Christ, positionally, that's where I am. Now, literally am I in heavenly places?
No, you're here at North Purple Bible Chapel. But you will be, if you're a believer, the promise is that you will be in heavenly places literally, forever, living in heaven. You know, I don't know about you, but that's kind of an exciting thing. When I come to realize that this isn't my home, my home is heaven.
We were at the C. Dave in the hospital this week, and boy, I'll tell you, he's not doing well. And you know, he witnessed his doctor, he wants his doctor to go to heaven. He's, every time I've spoken to Dave, he says, you know what?
My great hope is that I'm going to get a new body, I'm going to be in heaven, all these problems, all these struggles will be over. How often, how many of you have spoken to Dave's Bible? And he said that to you. But yeah, his hope, his eye is in heaven.
He lives in view that heaven is my home. This is not. I'm traveling here. I'm in a hotel, and I can't wait because I'm going home.
That's the way he thinks. That's the way he lives. That's the way we should all live. That's the way we need to think.
You know, we don't get too excited, but we should be really, really excited about going to heaven. That is our home. And you know, Paul writes as if we're already there when he writes this. He says he's taken you from a dead person, made you alive, and now seated you in him in heavenly places.
So if I'm in him and he's in heaven, and that's going to be my home, that's where my heart is, and that's where my heart should be, and I should be longing for that place. Never mind the stuff that you just want to accumulate here. That's all going to go away. It's not the wrong with stuff.
But don't get too attached to it because it's temporary. You're in a hotel room. You're going home. We should be thinking about that.
In fact, in a font too small for me to read at the bottom, it says, in Philippians chapter three, verse 20, it says, for our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. 1 Thessalonians 1, 10, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead. That is Jesus who rescues us from the wrath to come. And in Titus chapter 2, verse 13, looking for the blessed hope.
You wonder where that term comes from. It comes from people talk about the blessed hope. There it is. It's from scripture.
Looking for the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. There's so much can be said from that verse that says right there, God and Savior, Jesus Christ. He is God. You could spend a whole day just speaking on that verse.
But we are to be looking for that. We are to be looking for that home. You see, we are to look for the Lord Jesus Christ for his return. It's not an event.
Sometimes I look for the rapture. I'm actually looking for him. It's a person we're looking for. It says in Revelation that he will be with them and we will be with him.
That's the joy of heaven. It doesn't really matter what's there. He's there. And we will be there with him.
We should be longing for that moment. We should be longing for that time. Not an event that's going to take us out of here. I don't long for the airplane ride when I'm coming home.
I long for home. So that's the way we should be thinking of these things. We will be with him. And then what it says here in this verse, it says that in the ages to come that he might show the surpassing riches of his grace and kindness toward us in Jesus Christ.
You know what? I read that and I get really excited. Because what are the ages to come? In heaven there's not really ages because it's eternal.
It's going to go on forever. So like a thousand years from now, he's still showing me the riches of his grace in kindness. A million years from now. A billion years from now.
A trillion years from now. A trillion years times 10 from now. He is still going to be showing me the surpassing riches of his grace in Jesus Christ. Just think of that.
Think of how deep the Father's love is. That it's going to take forever to show us his love, his kindness and his grace. There's a quote from C.S. Lewis.
He said, the person who was looking for the eternal world, he says, and continual looking forward to the eternal world is not as some modern people think a form of escapism or wishful thinking. But one of the things a Christian is meant to do, if you read history, you will find that there are Christians who did the most for this present world were just those who thought most of the next. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this one. You think about heaven, you'll be very effective in this world.
That's why the guys go out on the streets. That's why you talk to lost souls. Because you're thinking of what's ahead for them and what can be ahead for them. Finally, the fifth point, we are his workmanship.
This verse 10 here has two parts and you know I have skipped the verse and it's not verse 6 and 7, this is what happens when you do these things in the middle of the night. Verse 10 says, for we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand so that we should walk in them. There's two parts. First one is God's work in you, his workmanship.
Now that word is sort of like poem, poem, poem, poem, poem, poem, poem, poem. And it means an exquisite masterpiece that is made from fabric. You know, there's a story that's told of Michelangelo, and Michelangelo is that great sculptor who did some really magnificent work. And one time he had this rough piece of stone and he was just chiseling away at it.
Somebody came up to him and said, what are you doing with that rock? And he said, I'm liberating an angel from this stone. Which is kind of a cool way to say because I'm sure it would be a masterpiece. You know, that's kind of what God's doing with us.
We're rough stones. But as he works on us, as he is working in you, as he's working on you and developing you through his word, through us, you know, iron sharpening iron as one should do to another. As we pray for one another, as we challenge one another, as we seek to grow and go forward, he is working in you, he's changing it, he's developing you. If you're a believer, God is working in you.
You're his workmanship. Believe it or not, you're his exquisite masterpiece. You don't feel like that, but you are. God is the master sculptor.
And he liberates masterpieces from rough stones. Then the second part is God's work through you. You were created in Christ to do good works, which God has prepared for you. We were created in Christ to do good works.
What's interesting in this is there's not a day that you say, okay, at some point in time you'll be qualified to do some good works for God. You're qualified if you're a child of God. He's working on you. It says that he has created us in Christ Jesus for good works, which he prepared beforehand, so that we would walk in them.
He has prepared us to do good works. I love this verse in I, in 1 Corinthians 1 verse 27, it says, God has chosen the foolish things of this world. You know what, I qualify. I love verses when I read stuff like that.
I come across something that says, I'm godly, yeah, I qualify. I read stuff that says foolish things, yeah, I qualify. He has chosen the foolish things of this world to put the shame the wise. God has taken us, put us in Christ, not only to work in us, but to work through us.
You see, I'll give you a really rough illustration of this. If I were to sit down at that piano and try to play, you'd leave. You wouldn't sing, you would leave. You'd probably scream and put your hands over your ears.
But if I were able to sit at that piano and somehow Mary could put her talent in me and work through me to play that piano, to move my hands just the right way, it would sound beautiful. So, you say, what's the point of that? If I go out and just try to do good works, if I just try to do it in and of myself, it's probably going to be just lame and ineffective and so on. But if I say, God, I can't, I'm not up for this.
I can't do this. You know what I am? I'm just that rough stone that you're chiseling away at. But if he works in me and he works through me and I say, okay, work through me so I can do good works, he will do that.
And you will be effective. You will be working for him. But it's something very important I want to tell you here. You're saved for good works, not by good works.
I left a verse out here because it would take me the whole day, I've taken more than enough time. But it would take me way more time if I did verses 8 and 9. For grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not a result of works so that no one can boast. No one can ever go to heaven and say, God, I'm glad you recognize all the stuff that I did to get myself here.
That won't happen. That will never happen. Not it works. Nobody's going to be walking around heaven saying, oh, wow, didn't expect to see you here.
And they say, yeah, well, I'm not tired. It's good to the neighbors. You know, Canada shovels their snow all the time, you know, stuff like that. Big cookies for them.
And I recognize all that hard work. Here I am. That will never happen. Not in a gazillion years.
That will never happen. You cannot be saved by good works. You will never get to heaven by good works. But if you are saved, God will do good works through you.
You will do good works for God. End of slideshow. 20 more points. No, I'm just kidding.
You know, when Paul was walking along the Damascus road and he was saved, he asked two questions. Do you remember that? A bright light shines. Paul's walking with his friends.
And then a bright light shines around him. And he says, whoa, who are you Lord? Who are you Lord? And he said, I am Jesus who you are persecuting.
And then he says what? Anybody help me? What did he say next? What would you have me to do?
What would you have me to do? So if you're a believer, if you are saved, that second question is an important one. What would you have me to do? So what are the good works that he has prepared for your life?
So no matter what your propensity or occupation to serve, whatever it is, your calling is to serve him and to reach people, to serve one another. If you're a believer, if you've been saved, if you've been saved, if you've been that moment, who are you Lord? I'm Jesus who you're persecuting. Whoa, Lord.
I'm not the one who left you. I'm a sinner. I'm saved. And your next question should be, Lord, what would you have me to do?
And no matter how hard it may seem to you, he will make it easy for you to do. He will give you the ability to do, I won't say make it easy. He will give you the ability to do it. You know evangelism is not easy.
I'm just picking on evangelism. It's not easy. And I've hardly ever done any of it. And I remember back when, I think Warren spoke one Sunday morning and he said, you know, the first tract of the day is always the hardest to forgive of.
Oh man, is he ever right on that? Is he ever right on that? But Lord, what would you have me to do? I want you to give the gospel to people in toll booths.
I want you to give the gospel to people on the streets. And the first one says, what's this? That didn't go well. But you know what?
As he goes on, he's like, hey, do you want to talk to you about something? If you exercise what God wants you to do, it will become easier for you to do it. God wants to use you. He wants to make you a masterpiece.
He wants, if you're not a believer for you to have a butt-god moment to go from being a dead person, but God made you alive to give you life. It may be open this morning and honest before God. And if you have been a believer, maybe for a long time, maybe a short time, and you have not served him. You think I'm just about coming to church on Sunday and then I just go back and do whatever I have to do the rest of the week.
I know I'm saved and I'm going to have no problem there. But get involved, get to do stuff. Yes, that's what he wants you to do. Think about that.
Think about that in your own life and be honest with him. And he will give you the ability to do it. Father, thank you this morning as we look into your words for the great promises of your words. God who is rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us.
And when we were dead in our transgressions made us alive together with Christ. Thank you, we have been saved by grace. Father, we thank you for these promises where you have raised us up and seated us with him in heavenly places. If we're already there, help us Lord to surrender to you, to allow you to work in us, to change us, to shape us, that we may go out and do your work in this world around us.
We want to pray this morning for our brother David Spidell in the hospital. I pray Lord that you would give him strength. I pray that you would help the doctors as they treat him. And I pray for your will in his life.
I pray for special strength and encouragement for Murna. And I pray that you would just undertake in a very difficult situation. Something that seems medically impossible. However, we trust you the great position for healing.
We look to you as the one who has the power of life in your hands. And we look to you for all the answers in these difficult things. Thank you for the Lord Jesus our Savior, his name, amen. You have to sing one more song.
Probably you sing one more. Okay, good. We'll sing Lord I need you.