I've entitled today's message,
Faithful by the Will of God. Faithful by the Will of God. Now this chapter, and I wanna
go through the chapter with you. I'm just gonna read through it
with you, but before I do that, I wanna read just a couple of
verses here. He says in verse one, Paul, an
apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God. That's where I get
that part of the title, The Will of God. And Timotheus, our brother,
to the saints and faithful brethren in Christ, which are at Colossae,
grace be to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus
Christ. And then he says in verse three,
we give thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
praying always for you. So just taking those first three
verses here, we see that the apostle Paul was commissioned
by the Lord Jesus Christ. He's an apostle sent one of Jesus
Christ, but that was by the will of God. Oftentimes in scripture,
The order in which things occur and the commissioning is not
given from a tops down view, but is given in this case from
the bottom up. Paul was sent, the Lord Jesus
Christ sent him, and the Lord Jesus Christ sent him by the
will of God. Now we know that God's will encompasses
everything, all things. And we'll see more of that in
a moment here. But since God's will does include
all things, we wonder then why does Paul mention the will of
God here? It's a universal control over
everything that happens throughout all time and eternity. Why then
does he attribute his apostleship to the will of God? Well, even
though God's will controls all things, and he turns what men
design for evil into good by that super overarching will of
God, so that he controls everything, yet when he speaks of the will
of God here, he's speaking of that special will, that approving
will, which he declares here as his apostleship, Paul's apostleship,
of Jesus Christ sent by him to declare Jesus Christ, and this
was by the will of God. And I say all this to draw attention,
first of all, to the will of God. But under that will, we
see the Lord Jesus Christ. And then under that, we see the
Apostle Paul being sent. And in fact, as sent, he's writing
this to the Colossians here. And I think in order for you
to appreciate some of this, I think it helps us to step back and
think about our life a little bit in the experience of it as
I experienced this past week. I wake up in the morning. My
thoughts are empty. I don't seem to be able to put
two thoughts together. I just woke up. And when I try
to think of the Lord and the things of the Lord, it seems
like, wait a minute, I have to try to bring up to my memory
what I thought I knew. And then I find myself asking
the Lord to help me. And I'm wondering through this
whole process, how is it that I'm so empty like the creation
was in Genesis when the Lord first spoke light into the darkness?
How is it that my mind could be so empty and void in the darkness
of it? And how is it that the Lord is
going to give me this light And the answer, of course, comes
that we only know what is true through the word of God. Now,
that's very, very profound and fundamental at the same time. It's fundamental and it's very
profound because what it means is that we can't think of spiritual
things correctly. We can't even imagine the way
things are. And we certainly can't go to
God in prayer without taking God's own word. in our heart
and in our mouth and in our minds when we go to Him and when we
think of Him. If we don't think according to truth, then we think
according to error. And the only truth there is,
is the truth concerning God and Christ and that's revealed in
His Word. And truth doesn't originate in
man. It's not like somebody over here
has an idea and says, aha, I've got it. Or somebody over there,
I thought of this first. No, not at all. Truth has always
been truth, and God has always been that truth. So no one comes
up with anything unless God reveals it. The natural man cannot know
the things of God unless they're revealed to him. So as I experienced
that this week, I began to think about this chapter and the whole
book, in fact, the whole Bible. And how God wrote this by this
man, Paul, sent by Jesus Christ to declare Jesus Christ by the
will of God and it's by this message that God sent from Jesus
Christ concerning himself and God in Christ through the Apostle
that we have these words written here. Written words, God's own
mind and truth revealed, His will, His word, Himself revealed
by His word. Now that's meant to help us to
appreciate the fact that unless we have this word given to us,
we're completely void. We have no way of knowing the
truth. We can't go to God in prayer. We don't have anything
to bring. But it also teaches us that if
we do hear the Word of God, and if it does open our spiritual
understanding and spiritual hearing and enable us to lay hold on
it with spiritual hands, as it were, embracing it, then that
is a gift of God, that is grace from God. And we need to realize
that it came from the will of God, through Jesus Christ, through
his apostle, in his written word, and here it is for us. And we're
so dependent upon this that we must avail ourselves of it at
all times. We get distracted. We get busy. We think about what we're going
to do, who we're going to be with, and how we're going to
work together to do something, or to spend time together, and
how we're going to prepare for that, and all the logistics,
and the things that are involved in that. And we find ourselves,
wait a minute, where's God? Where's the truth? Well, it's
revealed to us from his word, and that's why this is so essential.
It's so foundational. We have to have, we have to take
in God's word as we sang there. Break thou the bread of life,
the Lord Jesus Christ, dear Lord to me, as you broke the loaves
beside Galilee. Then I will, then I'll be able
to see, then I'll, everything, my burdens will lift and my bondage
will cease. And so that is what's given to
us here, God's word written. And I've said this over and over
again, but here's another thing I find in scripture, is the truth
of scripture repeats the truth. And that seems also God's long
suffering, God's patience, that he would continually, like a
parent, repeat the instruction to their children. And so the
Lord repeats it to us, and he writes the same things to us
in many ways, and in various ways, in different ways, and
sometimes the same ways, and repeats the conclusion of those
meanings to us. And one of those is the will
of God, the will of God. At the very top, everything below
God on his throne follows God's will. And I'm gonna look at that
with you in a minute. But first of all, I want you
to see here in verse three, we give thanks to God and the Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you. So the Apostle
Paul here is beginning this chapter to the Colossians. He's never
seen these people. He never met them personally.
He heard about them through Epaphras, if you see in verse seven. And
he loves them because he hears something. He hears that God
has blessed his word, the gospel, to them. And they were given
this grace to believe it. And now they love Christ's people. And so Paul is moved. He's excited
because this is the purpose for which Christ sent him as an apostle,
to carry forth this gospel to the Gentiles. And here are these
Gentiles in Colossae, the Colossians. who have heard the word of the
truth of the gospel, as he says in verse five. And so he begins
this letter to them and he lets them know, I heard about this.
I heard about this of you. And this is why I was sent by
Christ. And this was the will of God.
And now I'm taking God's will and Christ's sending of me and
this grace back to him in prayer. And I'm asking God, first of
all, thanking God the Father for this, which he has done.
And I'm thanking him for you and all these things. And he
says that. And let me just walk through this chapter now with
you. So we see that before we get into the will of God, our
faithfulness by the will of God. Look at verse look at verse four. He says, I think I'm praying
always for you. I'm giving thanks to God, the
father. Notice verse four. This is the
first thing he says, since we heard of your faith, Faith is
the gift of God. He says in scripture, not all
men have faith. In fact, he also says in Romans
11, 29, God has concluded them all in unbelief that he might
have mercy upon all, meaning not every individual throughout
the world. to give every individual faith,
but to give faith to His elect, which is what Romans chapter
8, 9, 10, and 11 is all about, God saving His people in Jesus
Christ, by Jesus Christ. And so not all men have faith.
In fact, all men by nature have no faith in God, not saving faith,
not faith that is defined by how God defines faith. And we'll
get to that in a minute here. But Paul is thanking God first
and foremost for their faith. And the one thing to know about
faith before we know anything else is faith is towards the
Lord Jesus Christ. So Paul doesn't attribute, he
doesn't credit the Colossians for believing, he credits God
the Father. I give thanks to God the Father
and of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you since
we heard of your faith. And notice also in verse three,
I give thanks to God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. So
again, you see the hierarchy within the Godhead. Christ is
God. He's co-equal and co-eternal
with God the Father. And yet, within the Godhead,
there is this order that God is describing for us here, that
God's will from the Father is given to the Son, and the Son,
Jesus Christ, executes, performs, accomplishes that will, and then
He gives the results of His victory, His triumph, His obedience to
His people through His Spirit. And in that, Christ himself gives
faith to them. And the faith that he gives is
faith in himself, but he does it through his spirit according
to the will of God. So you see the unity of the will
of God in the Godhead, and the work, and the people, and the
purpose, it's all consistent. But it comes first and foremost
from God the Father, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ, and it comes in that hierarchy. God is telling us
here that when we think of our salvation and our Savior, we
need to understand that this is according to the will of God
as our Father. What blessing that is, our Father.
And so we could go on and on, but looking at verse four, he
says, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus, so that's
what faith is, and of the love which you have to all the saints.
We love one another. If we believe Christ, it's love
that comes as a result of faith. We don't love until we know we're
loved. We love him because he first
loved us. 1 John 4 19. So we understand
that the love of God is because it flows out of faith. Faith
works by love. And so love is the result of
faith, and faith is the result of God's gift, and that gift
is life, and that life is given because of righteousness, and
all these things stack one upon the other. And so Paul thanks
God the Father for their faith and for their love. These are
the two commandments the Lord has given his people, that you
believe on his son and that you love one another. And so he thanks
God for that. And then in verse four, What
else does he thank Him for? He thanks Him for the hope of
eternal life and eternal glory through the Lord Jesus Christ.
Look, verse five, for the hope, this is what he's thanking Him
for, for the hope which is laid up for you in heaven. You see,
God the Father has laid up this hope, this promise, this inheritance,
and this inheritance is greater than any mind can possibly comprehend. And what is it? That all that
God the Father would give His Son for His obedience and His
offering of Himself in sacrifice for the sins of His people, to
glorify God. That reward to Christ is the
inheritance. that he speaks of, and it's called
a hope. But not only the hope itself, but the holding to that
in expectation and anticipation. That's all the gift of God the
Father. Our hope, our subjective hope in the eternal hope was
given to us by God the Father. That's what verse five is saying.
And how did we learn of this? Well, we didn't just conjure
it up. We didn't just think of it and had some bright bulb go
off in our head. No, it came to us through the
means of, he says in verse five, the word of the truth of the
gospel. God's word is truth. God's word
of truth is revealed to us. The meaning of it, the saving
grace of it is in the gospel. And so that's what they heard,
that's what they believed, that's how they knew about this hope,
that's how they knew about the Lord Jesus Christ and believed
him and therefore loved his people because of him. And then in verse
6, notice, he goes on, he's continuing his thanksgiving and his prayer
for the Colossians. He says in verse 6, which has
come to you as it is in all the world. So he's thanking God the
Father that the gospel that he gave came to them. Verse 5 and
6. And he also thanks him because
that gospel that he gave through Christ to the Apostle in the
preaching which they heard, he says, it brings forth fruit as
it does also in you since the day you heard of it and knew
the grace of God in truth. Why does God produce fruit? To
glorify himself. As the vine dresser in John chapter
15, the husbandman is the father and he brings forth fruit to
his own glory through the Lord Jesus Christ, the vine, as the
sap of Christ's grace flows to the branches and they bear fruit. And here, Paul is thanking God
the Father for this fruit that his gospel given to him from
Christ, in which Christ fulfilled, produces fruit in them. And then
in verse 7, as you also learned of Epaphras, our dear fellow
servant, who is for you a faithful minister of Christ. So not only
did they heard, but Paul is thanking God the Father for Epaphras,
the pastor of this church, the preacher they heard the gospel
from. You heard it, you learned it from him, and he is a faithful
minister, a servant of Christ. In this, he's serving Christ,
how? By giving you the truth of Christ,
from Christ, concerning Christ. And then in verse 8, who also,
Epaphras, also declared unto us your love in the Spirit. So
Epaphras has not only brought the truth to them, But Epaphras
loves these people and he's declaring he's speaking well of them because
of his love for them and his admiration of God's grace working
in them. This is God's fruit. Look at
this, their love in the spirit. And then in verse nine, for this
cause, we also, since the day we heard, do not cease to pray
for you. God's will. through Christ, to
the Apostle, with the Gospel, unto their salvation, and yet,
he's thanking God for this, and yet he goes on to thank Him and
to pray for them. It seems like, wouldn't you say,
enough's enough? The Lord has done all these things,
why would you go on praying for them? Well, there's this principle
in Scripture that Jesus mentioned in the Gospels. To the one to
which much is given, much is going to be given. Him that hath,
more shall be given. It seems opposite. You would
think, no, if you've given him a lot, you've given him enough,
stop. No, that's not the way God's
grace works. He lavishes it. Jesus said, whoever's
thirsty, come to me and drink, and out of his belly shall flow
rivers of living water. An unceasing, abundant supply,
so that when the spirit of God in us is always ministering to
us, the love, the abounding grace of God concerning Christ in his
work for us. And so he asks further. He takes
what God has already revealed in the gospel and which he has
blessed to them, and he asks more from the Father on their
behalf through Christ. He says in verse nine, for this
cause we also, since the day we heard of God's grace to you
through Epaphras, he says, do not cease to pray for you and
to desire that you might be filled with all the knowledge of his
will and all wisdom and spiritual understanding. Notice, filled
with the knowledge of his will. You see, this is what he said
at the beginning. Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ,
by the will of God. You need to get your mind focused
on the truth. You owe everything to the Father.
God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who sent His Son. This
was the will of God. And now I'm praying for you that
you might be filled with the knowledge of His will in all
wisdom and spiritual understanding. This is important. This is why
the gospel is given. And notice, he says this to those
who have already believed the gospel. Because when God blesses
his word, he not only produces that initial faith in Christ,
but he continues to nurture it, like newborn babes desire the
sincere milk of the word that you may grow thereby if you've
tasted that the Lord is gracious. So he nurtures it, and he waters
it as it is. with His Word and His Spirit
so that Word produces fruit in us and it grows and our understanding
of the will of God increases. And that results in a greater
faith, an increase of faith, and an increase of faith, a greater
worship of God the Father because of Jesus Christ, and a greater
love for Him and for His people, and a greater humility of ourselves,
a realization that we're nothing. And God has done all this out
of His goodness and His grace. And so that's what the will of
God teaches us, wisdom and spiritual understanding, not things about
creation. Men, we were just talking before
church, men spend their fortunes and their energies and their
lifetimes trying to harness creation, and they neglect and completely
miss the creator. Unbelievable. Man idolizes his
own works. He boasts in His ability to harness
the physics of creation, which are all because of the Word of
Christ. And He loses sight of the Creator
and His revealed truth in His Word for our salvation. What sinfulness is in us and
what grace we need from God to understand His will. And he says
in verse 10, in order that you might walk worthy. He's praying
for this grace, that you might walk worthy of the Lord to all
pleasing, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the
knowledge of God. Notice, strengthened with all
might according to his glorious power unto all patience and long
suffering with joyfulness. This strength that God gives
is strength to endure, strength to continue, strength to suffer
long, because we know the will of God. If we didn't know God's
will, how could we hold under the patience of enduring and
long suffering, knowing that this is the will that's being
worked out by God himself? With joyfulness, the one who
works it out is the Lord himself. And so he says in verse 12, he
builds on this now another layer, giving thanks to the Father which
hath made us meet, he has made us acceptable, suitable, fitted
to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light." Now
he's really getting into the meat here. Inheritance, that
refers to our eternal inheritance with all of his saints in light,
in the presence of God. Verse 13, He has delivered us
in contrast to the light. He has delivered us from the
power of darkness and has translated us into the kingdom of His dear
Son. Now we see the Spirit of God
obviously expertly is guiding the Apostle Paul as he unfolds
this. It's like one of those books
as kids when you unfold the pages of it and the pages are made
to stick up. And it's like, wow, look at that,
a 3D picture in front of me. And here it's a spiritual 3D
popping up. And the picture is the picture
of God's work by his son. He says he's delivered us from
the power of darkness and translated us into the kingdom. Notice,
his dear son. And he goes on, this son, this
son of God, equal, eternal, co-equal, co-eternal with God the Father.
Notice what he does. He takes the one who sits and
occupies the highest and he reaches down to the lowest, he says,
in whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness
of our sins. And he spends the next few verses
exalting Christ. And I'm not going to go through
all those right now. But you see, you can get the flavor of
this now, can't you? And you can go through this.
He's exhorting them to continue. And he's giving them these truths
in order to shore them up and build them up and strengthen
and establish them in the truth of Christ in order to defend
them against the error that they were experiencing. And he addresses
in this book of Galatians. So the truth of God builds up
the believer and defends the believer, arms him. as a shield
and as a sword against the onslaught of those who would take away
that faith God has given us in Christ. This is the will of God,
the will of God. Now, I wanna consider these two
things with you just briefly. The will of God, first of all.
I'm gonna read a verse to you, but while I'm reading this verse,
turn to Isaiah chapter 46. And as you're turning to Isaiah
46, I'm gonna read to you from 1 Samuel, chapter 15, verse 29. He says this, Samuel is talking
to King Saul, and he says, the strength of Israel, referring
to God himself, the strength of Israel will not lie. He will not lie, nor repent,
he won't change. For he is not a man that he should
repent. To repent means to change your
mind. Now that's a very important verse. The strength of Israel. God our Savior. He will not lie. He can't lie. And he will not
change his mind. Now, consider that with Isaiah
chapter 46. I want to look at these with
you. This is dealing with the will of God, the will of God. And I just want to touch on these
things that are obvious here and then help you to see through
this, tying it into Colossians chapter 1, the grandeur of it,
the grandeur of it. Here, look at Isaiah 46. And
verse nine, it says, remember the former things of old, for
I am God and there is none else. If you look at the context here,
look at verse one. Bel, that's an idol, boweth down. Nebo, another one, stoopeth. Their idols were upon the beasts. They had to be carried. And upon
the cattle. These men made idols and they
couldn't move themselves, so they had to pick them up and
carry their idols. Your carriages were heavy loaded with their
idols. They are a burden to the weary
beast, all their idols. They stoop, the beast do, they
bow down together. They could not deliver the burden.
but themselves are gone into captivity. Those who trust the
idols are gone into captivity with their idols. And what he's
showing here in the context is that God is comparing himself
to the ridiculousness of man's idols. And so the idols couldn't
carry themselves, they couldn't move about. They had to be carried
by those who made them and worshiped them. And the idols couldn't
deliver, they couldn't save themselves. The men who made them had to
deliver and save their idols, their stupid idols. And I say
that with emphasis because that's what our natural mind is stupid,
spiritually dead in sins and stupid and enamored with idols
instead of the truth of the true God. And so he says at the outset
of this book, he's saying, listen, your idols, you've reversed the
role. False gods have to be carried.
False gods have to be saved. Only the true God carries his
people and saves them. And so verse nine, he says, remember
the former things of old, for I am God, and there is none else. There's only one God, and the
Lord that speaks is that God. I am God, and there is none like
me. Not in any way. not in his wisdom,
not in his goodness. Remember Jesus said, there's
none good but God. None righteous but God. None
holy, none holy as the Lord. So he says in verse 10, and I
want to focus on this verse for a minute. He says, this is God
declaring the end from the beginning. And from ancient times, the things
that are not yet done, saying, my counsel shall stand, and I
will do all my pleasure. Now, I want you to notice these
phrases here. He says, from the beginning,
God declares the very end. He declares the outcome before
there's any progress towards the outcome. He declares the
outcome before there's anything created. Before God made anything,
he determined everything. That's what he's saying here.
That's the difference between God and everything else. He's
omniscient. And he's omniscient because he
declares what he himself determines. It's His will He's speaking of
here. The end, He declares, is what
He determined would be. And so He knows all that will
be because His foreknowledge determines what shall be and
His will is the determination of it, is the decree of it. So
God declares the end from the beginning. It shows His foreknowledge
is eternal. His will is eternal. Everything
that happens in the end is what He determined from the beginning.
When we get to heaven and we're there before the throne and we're
praising God and all those gathered, they will be there because God
determined them to be there. Before the dawn of time, Jesus
said in Matthew 25, 34, come ye blessed of my father, receive
the kingdom prepared for you of my father from before the
foundation of the world. That's the end. to glorify his
son, to save his people. And he goes on, he says, from
ancient times, from eternity. He says in Acts 15, 18, known
unto God are all his works from eternity. God does nothing in
time but what he determined to do before time. Ephesians 1 11
says he works all things after the counsel or according to the
counsel of his own will. Not influenced by creation because
it was established before creation. Not affected by creation as if
he has to make a course change. No, his will is fixed, steadfast,
unmovable, un-invariable, no shadow of turning, he says in
James 1.17. No shadow of turning. Because
his will is just God willing. In other words, God himself can't
change. He doesn't seek wisdom, he is
wisdom. He doesn't learn, he teaches. Others bow to him. He bows to
none. He's the sovereign. That means
he does everything that he wants and no one can redirect him,
no one can impede him, hold him back, no one can keep him from
his will. It flows from his mind and from
his almighty power. And it's all holy, it's all righteous,
it's all good, because God is good. And if anything that God
did, and was done in everlasting ages, if anything ever failed
that God determined to do, or was not right, then God himself
would cease to be God. If he determined to do something
and wasn't able to do it, he wasn't almighty. If it wasn't
good, then he wasn't holy and righteous. And all the onlooking
universe is going to look at what God has done and they won't
find anything short of absolute highest perfection in everything
that he did. And it will be completely consistent
with all of his perfections. It will be consistent with God.
He's the measure, He's the truth. And that's what He declared from
the beginning. So He says, I declare from ancient times the things
that are not yet done, saying. Notice, this is God's word now. Not only is God and His will,
but His word also. It expresses His counsel, saying,
My counsel God's will, God's determination, His decrees shall
stand. It's fixed. It's established. It's unmovable. You can't change
it. God Himself doesn't repent. He
doesn't change His mind. He looks at all things and he
determines what will be. That's God. And he says, I will
do all my pleasure. I will do it. God himself brings
to pass his own will, and it's called his pleasure. Now, think
about these things, God's sovereign will. A lot of times when you
read this verse and the things around it, in fact, let me go
on to verse 11 and read through that. Calling a ravenous bird
from the east, speaking of Cyrus who hadn't yet been born, the
man that executes my counsel from a far country, yea, I have
spoken it, I will also bring it to pass, I have purposed it,
I will also do it. All right. So now, you see, all
of this is usually taken by those who love to hear about God's
sovereignty as saying, see, God is sovereign. He controls everything
at all times and all places and no one can change it. And then
they get into these mind wars. Well, let's see now, if God is
sovereign, what does that mean about man? I mean, it seems like
I can decide whether to wear a blue shirt or a white shirt.
Is God sovereign over that? I mean, what if I decided the
white shirt and he meant for me to wear the blue one? And so
they get into these silly thought experiments about the sovereignty
of God and they focused in on the minutia of it. and they miss
the most profound part of it, the most fundamental teaching
of this sovereignty of God. And what is that? It's the will
of God that Paul refers to, the will of God concerning Christ,
the gospel preached, the gospel accomplished, those to whom it
was sent and the salvation by which Christ saved them from
their sins. That's the whole purpose of these
things. So what God is saying that, as
he says in Revelation 13, 8, Christ is the Lamb slain from
the foundation of the world. God's will, fixed, known from
eternity, established in eternity, fulfilled in time, and revealed
in everlasting ages in its consummation, that will concerns fundamentally
the Lord Jesus Christ and the salvation of His people by Him,
who will be with Him and be given all things because of Him, with
Him, in eternal ages they will be made the heirs of God, the
children of God, and joint heirs with Jesus Christ. And so He
teaches us these things in order to show us that in order for
God to declare His will and do His will and to reveal it to
us, He Himself had to hold Himself accountable to answer His own
requirements in order to magnify His greatness and His goodness.
And how did He do that? But in the salvation of sinners,
The one who is sovereign over all, who is higher than the heavens,
who has to stoop to humble himself to look upon the things in heaven
and earth. He himself to whom all bow and he bows to none,
whose will is always done and we submit to it. He himself. gave Himself for our sins, He
stooped and took our nature and made Himself a servant, and as
a servant obeyed His own law and fulfilled it in obedience
and sacrifice in order to satisfy His own justice and uphold His
holiness and to make known His perfections and His glory and
save those who were an offense to Him. from their sins, and
to make them His sons, and to lift them from the dunghill and
the ruin of their sins to the highest place of glory, with
His Son, and give them all things. That's the will of God. And that's
what the Apostle Paul is saying. I pray that God would give you
this understanding of His will in all things. Reading it from
verse 9, that you might be filled with the knowledge of His will
and all wisdom and spiritual understanding that you might
walk worthy of the Lord and to all pleasing. Not in order to
earn acceptance. But to be in admiration and adoration
that God, who is sovereign over all, higher than immeasurable
incomprehensible heights, stooped to the lowest incomprehensible
level to bear the sins of His people in His own body on the
tree. and then answer for those sins
and fulfill everlasting righteousness in his obedience to his own law
and magnify that law and establish his holiness and righteousness
declared to us in the gospel. What an amazing God we serve. No wonder the apostle was thanking
him. No wonder He was speaking to
these people. They were made saints by God
the Father. He set them apart when He chose
them in Christ. And they were made saints by
Jesus Christ when He sprinkled them with His blood, pouring
out His blood and offering to God, sanctifying them before
God in glory and in their conscience when He applied it through the
gospel to them. And so he says, in Colossians
now, in verse two, he says, I'm writing to you, this was by the
will of God sent by Jesus Christ, and I'm writing to you, the saints
and faithful brethren in Christ. Faithful brethren. You see that
word faithful? What does that mean? What does
it mean to be faithful? Well, let's let scripture define
it for us. There's many things about faith,
and I can tell you that I have had myself wrapped around my
own mental axle, and I've had people try to wrap me around
these axles of thought about what faith is, and it's led me
to frustration many times. There's different ways that men
define faith. Men will take a view of faith
in terms of how we mentally function when we believe. They'll say,
well, faith is understanding. And some will say, it's just
understanding. And they'll say, no, no, it includes this understanding
with this assent or this agreement to what's being understood. And
it goes no further. And others will say, no, no,
it has to include trust as well. So they get into this whole psychological
analysis of how we believe. And they go off on that. This
is the definition of faith. And they nail it to their doors.
And they say, if you don't adhere to this, then you're a heretic.
And then there's the other view of faith. No, no, faith is the
way it makes me act. It's what I perceive. It's the
subjective experience of it when I believe I have this persuasion,
and I'm convinced of spiritual things. So they take that subjective
view of faith and say, no, faith gives me this present enjoyment
of future things, and there's nothing wrong with that. And
faith is evidence of things I can't see with these physical eyes,
and there's nothing wrong with that. And then there's this explanation
of faith given in scriptures, like in Hebrews 11. Faith is
the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not
seen. But I want to take faith here to understand this faith
here in a simpler way. I want to see what we are to
believe. because faith in its essence
is the substance of what we believe. It's called the faith of God's
elect in that sense, the doctrine, the one we believe, what God
has said about him, what he accomplished, his work. In other words, the
faith that Christ, the object of a faith that Christ is. So
when we talk about faith, we have to talk about this. Now
let me remind you of these things for sake of time. When God tells
us, when he preaches the gospel, what is his commandment to us?
Remember the Philippian jailer, he breaks in, he's worried he's
gonna lose his life because the prisoners surely have left, and
the earthquake, and the darkness, and Paul says, no, no, no, don't
do yourself any harm. And he runs in, he says, sirs,
he's trembling, the Philippian jailer, what must I do to be
saved? And what did the apostle say
to him? Believe. Is that what he said? Well, he
did say that, but that's not all he said. Believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ. So faith is not saving unless
it's on the Lord Jesus Christ. And the difference between saving
faith and not saving faith is just that, who we believe, who
we believe. And I've given this illustration
before many times because I like it, I think it helps. A lot of
times we wonder, do I believe enough? Is the difference between
saving faith and non-saving faith a degree to which I believe?
Maybe I've seen other people are zealous and seem to be constantly
committed and surrendered and I don't find that in myself nearly
to that degree. In fact, I find a lot of times
the opposite. Do I believe? Maybe I need to
move my faith from this red zone to the yellow and then to the
orange and finally to the green. Is that what it means to finally
get to the green? Is there degrees of faith where
we finally reach a level of believing where now I believe right? No,
no. Saving faith isn't determined
by the measure of our faith, but by the object, the one we
believe, the truth of Christ revealed in scripture. If we
don't believe what God has revealed concerning Christ according to
the scriptures, then we do not have faith, not saving faith. And so I underscore that, that
we believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. How many times in the
Gospel of John did the Lord Jesus tell the people he spoke to,
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. He said to Nicodemus, whosoever
believeth on me, whosoever believeth on me, him that believeth on
me hath everlasting life, he that believeth not shall never
see life, but is under the wrath of God. So many things he says
about believing on Christ. Acts 20, 21, faith towards our
Lord Jesus Christ. So it's always Christ is the
object, the author, the finisher, the source, and the one we believe. It's so essential. So essential. When the Lord opens our eyes,
spiritual eyes, to Christ, that's when he saves us. And so in that,
let me build on that for a minute. Look at Hebrews chapter 11, Hebrews
chapter 11. So there's the object of our
faith is Christ. And then there's the subjective
experience of believing. And I'll show you a couple of
biblical definitions of faith in this way in Hebrews chapter
11. And let me give you the background
before we read verse 11. He says here about Sarah, Sarah,
was barren and never had a child. And now she's 90 years old. She's
passed even for those who could have children. As a woman, she
could not have children. Too old, besides the fact that
she never could. And yet the Lord said, you're
going to have a son, Isaac. And through him, Christ is going
to be born. And through Christ, God is going to justify the heathen.
And notice in verse 11 of Hebrews 11, through faith also, Sarah
herself received strength to conceive seed. Let's see what
the essence of that faith was. And she was delivered of a child
when she was past age because, notice, here it is, she judged
him faithful who had promised. You see what faith is? Faith
is crediting God with the ability. Faith is looking to the one who
promised, not to the one who received the promise. Faith doesn't
add my part in order to bring God's promise to pass. Faith
looks to God to do it all. Look at verse 13. A very excellent
definition of faith is given here in verse 13. Notice. It's
very pictorial. These all died in faith, not
having received the promises. So they didn't experience the
fulfillment of what God promised, yet they believed. So you don't
have to receive in your lifetime what God has promised. the experience
of it in order to have the result of that because they had faith.
And faith was the substance of that. But notice he says here,
here's the four things. But having seen them afar off,
so faith is spiritual sight and the object seen is Christ and
him crucified. So faith sees them afar off and
was persuaded, they were persuaded of them. Faith is that God-given
persuasion of the truth concerning Christ. It's not just, yeah,
I understand, yeah, I can see historically how that could happen.
No, no. This is a full persuasion. This is a getting on board, if
you will. This is taking as a hungry beggar
all that Christ is to my soul. He says this in verse... He's
being persuaded of the truth of it. And he goes on. And they
embrace them. That's the hand of faith. The
eyes of faith see. The understanding of faith is
persuaded. This is the truth. This is what
God said. It's true. God is true. His word is true.
He can't fail. And here's the embracing of it.
It's mine. I'm leaning on this. I'm trusting
Him. I'm relying on this. And notice, and they embraced
them. They embraced them and they confessed. They confess this, the mouth
speaking what is believed in the heart. They are strangers
and pilgrims on the earth. My affections are set on things
above. That's faith, isn't it? Look
at one more example of faith in Romans chapter four. And I'll
draw this to a close here. Romans chapter four. Romans chapter
four is using Abraham in order to teach us the gospel. And Abraham
was the same as Sarah. He couldn't have Isaac, not by
himself. And Sarah couldn't have Isaac
because her womb was barren and because she was too old. And
so together, they were dead to having children. Now, that's
the context here. And notice this. He says in verse
16, Therefore, and I'm gonna go back
in a minute, but he says, therefore, it is of faith. that it might
be by grace. The principle of faith is that
it's not of faith unless God does it all out of grace to the
undeserving, the ill-deserving. Unless He gives salvation that
He Himself performs and provides out of unmerited, uninfluenced,
divine, sovereign, eternal will, then it's not grace. And faith
was God's means to make sure that it remained all of grace. So faith can't take any claims,
can't take any credit to itself. Faith, in fact, divests itself
of all worth and credit and gives it all to Christ. That's what
this is saying. It is a faith that it might be by grace to
the end. that the promise might be sure
to all the seed, because the strength comes from God, the
faithfulness, not to that only which is of the law, not to the
Jews who have the law and try to keep it, but to that also
which is of the faith of Abraham. Abraham believed God before the
law, who is the father of us all, as it is written, speaking
of Abraham. I have made thee, notice the
past tense, I have made thee a father of many nations before
him whom he believed, even God, God. God who? God, what do you mean? God who
gives life to the dead, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things
which be not as though they were. That God, the one who calls out
of nothing all things whose will determined the end from the beginning,
and does everything according to his will, that God who gives
life to the dead. Speaking of dead, Abraham and
Sarah, and you, O sinner, who against hope, Abraham, against
all human, strength and hope, he believed in hope, looking
for God to fulfill his will according to his promise, that he might
become the father of many nations according to that which was spoken,
so shall thy seed be. And being not weak in faith,
notice, he considered not his own body now dead when he was
about 100 years old. So God is emphasizing this deadness
and life out of death. to this believer. Neither yet
the deadness of Sarah's womb. He staggered not at the promise
of God through unbelief because he measured God's ability to
perform on his own ability to fulfill part of what God said
or contribute to it. No, he's dead. But he was strong
in faith. Notice what faith does. Giving
glory to God. He gives all credit to God. And
he doesn't waver. And being fully persuaded. There's
that persuasion. that what He had promised, He
was able also to perform. That's faith. God promised, who
cannot lie, who cannot fail, whose will will be done, who
calls things which are not as though they were, who raises
the dead, He promised, He's able to perform it, and I'm fully
persuaded of that. And that's as far as I need to
go. Notice back in verse 5 of Romans 4, to him that worketh
not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith
is counted for righteousness. You see, that's faith. Faith
doesn't do anything to make myself acceptable to God. Faith looks
to God. in Christ to do everything, the
sovereign, almighty, unbowed creator of all things and giver
of life to all things, himself out of his goodness, stepped
to fulfill his own holiness. in order to save sinners from
the dunghill and to raise them up as heirs of God, kings and
priests. And he says, those who occupy
that place are those who do not work. in order to attain to it,
but believe on Him who justifies the ungodly. That's faith. And that faith is given to us,
and that is by the will of God. How stupendous is God in all
of His goodness that we would be so enabled by His grace to
be faithful, to believe the truth, not a lie, but the truth, and
to look to Christ and call on Him. Father, thank you for being so
good and so great and sending your son who is so good and so
great in order to save us who are so foul and filthy and ruined
and helpless and should be and deserve to be cast out. But in
your wisdom, out of your goodness and your grace, the Lord Jesus
took from us the sins we committed against you. And he bore those
sins in his own body on the tree. so that his sacred head was wounded
and he stood before God in our place as we should have stood,
bearing the entire deserved wrath of God to satisfy God's justice
and to glorify God in his obedience and his sacrifice of himself
for us. And now by this wisdom, Lord,
by this grace, incomprehensible and immeasurable, this love eternal
without bounds we see that you have done all to make us acceptable
to make us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints
in light so that what Christ deserves is given to us out of
your unbounded incomprehensible grace help us to fall down on
our faces in our hearts and worship you with all that we are and
have believe you by your grace and to thank you. And we ask,
Lord, that you would make known your will to us, that we might
walk worthy of the Lord. In his name we pray. Amen.