And where do we find the promises
of God? We find it in His Word. And that's where we're going
to go to. I want you to turn in your Bibles to 2 Timothy chapter 1. 2 Timothy chapter 1. As you know, I'm in our Bible
study at 10 o'clock. I'm going through 1 Timothy.
And eventually I'll go through 2 Timothy. You're kind of getting
a preview of coming attractions today. The reason I was led to
this particular passage is because of some questions that have come
up with people concerning the new birth and what exactly the
new birth is, the work of the Holy Spirit in connecting spiritually
the people of God to Christ And that's what it is, you know,
when we talk about salvation. You know, salvation's a big word
in the Bible. I don't mean the number of letters,
I'm talking about the concept and what it all involves. Salvation
in some passages is portrayed as an eternal matter. If you'll
look at verse seven, or let's look at verse six of 2 Timothy
chapter one. He says, wherefore I put thee
in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God which is in
thee. Now that's the gift of God's
grace, it's the gift of the truth, the gift of preaching. He says
by putting on my hands, by the putting on of my hands, what
he's talking about there is the spiritual gifts of ministry that
were prevalent in that day before the word, the written word came
together as our final authority. And he says, for God, verse seven,
for God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power
and of love and of a sound mind. You remember in 1 Timothy, Paul
emphasized sound doctrine, sound mind, a sound mind, a mind that
is sharp, not necessarily that you have to have a high IQ or
you gotta be an Einstein, but you know the word of God. And
you judge by the word of God, judge yourself by the word of
God. And he says in verse eight, be not thou therefore ashamed
of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me, his prisoner. Paul
was in prison at this time. This is one of the prison epistles.
But God providentially enabled him to talk to people, have visitors,
and to send out letters, epistles. He says, but be thou partaker
of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God.
The afflictions of the God, that's what you and I were talking about.
The gospel is so offensive to the natural man, especially religious
people who don't know the gospel. And so, power of God, verse nine.
Now listen to this. This is my text. Who hath saved
us and called us with an holy calling. The title of this message,
a holy calling. He says, not according to our
works, but according to his own purpose and grace, and as I said,
salvation is sometimes related as an eternal matter, he said,
which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. Before the world began. I dare
to say that that's before you began. Isn't it? You know, people argue about
how old the world is. And I personally don't care. I know it's older than me, and
I know it's not older than God. I know a lot of these people,
they go crazy and they believe in evolution. That's crazy. Man
didn't start low and evolve up. Man started high and fell down.
That's what happened to him. But before this world was ever
created, God chose a people and gave them to Jesus Christ, the
second person of the Trinity. How else could you explain that?
Given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. And a lot of
preachers say, well, he gave it to us, but we won't take it.
Or we will take it, whatever. No. Look at verse 10. But it is now made manifest by
the appearing of our Savior, Jesus Christ. He came to earth,
united with sinless humanity, walked this earth in obedience
to the law, And he died on the cross, it says, who hath abolished
death. How did he do that? By his death,
the death of death and the death of Christ. And he did it for
his people that were given him before the world began. And who
are they? They're the elect of God. I know people go off kilter on
things like that, but you've got to read your Bible. This
is God's word. And he says, and have brought
life and immortality to light through the gospel. And he says
in verse 11, whereunto I am appointed a preacher and an apostle and
a teacher of the Gentiles. Well, let's go back here in verse
nine, who have saved us and called us with a holy calling. What is that holy calling? Well,
the holy calling, is a part of being born again by the Holy
Spirit. A lot of people disagree with
that. But I don't see how you can get beyond it scripturally.
And I got a lot of scripture here. And maybe I should use
the screen, Jim, because I know when I put that much scripture
in, it's gonna take too much time. But I'm gonna give you
some scripture, okay? We're not going to argue about
it. I know people know me that we don't argue about it. But
you know, there's a lot of people. You know, the new birth involves
what the Bible calls regeneration and conversion. That's the new
birth. Regeneration is when the Spirit
sovereignly gives spiritual life to a dead sinner. Ephesians chapter
two and verse one, there's a scripture. And you hath he quickened. Now that's regeneration, that
means give life. Who were dead in trespasses and
sins. And then he goes on to say who
walk not after the flesh but after the spirit. So you hath
he quickened. God by the spirit giving life
to spiritually dead sinners. See that's what we are by nature.
And that's what the Bible tells me about me and tells you about
you. That we fell in Adam. You can
go back to passages like Romans 5. What did we fall into? We fell into sin. We fell into
spiritual death. When we're born into this world
naturally, we have physical eyes to see. We have physical ears
to hear, most of us. We have a brain. Some, we have
a brain. Well, if you look at the news
these days, you wonder if some of them, but anyway, you have
a brain to think, reason, you've got a conscience, but it's all
fallen into a state of sin and spiritual death. And what the
theologians call, it's a good word, it's not a good word because
of what it describes, but it's depravity. And that applies to
all people without exception, the best, the worst, and everybody
in between. And that's why Christ said, you
must be born again or you cannot see. See what? The kingdom of
God. Where are you going to see the
kingdom of God? In the preaching of the gospel.
Now there's some people say, well, you can be regenerated
and hear the gospel later on down the road. Well, in other
words, you can see, but you can't see the kingdom of God? Because
that's related in the gospel. If you got eyes to see, what
are you seeing? If you got ears to hear, what
are you hearing? You're hearing the gospel. And
that's why regeneration and conversion by the power of the spirit come
together under the preaching of the gospel. It's not the gospel
preaching or the gospel preacher who gives you life. I could preach
the gospel to you till I'm blue in the face, and if the spirit
doesn't do the work of quickening, you'll never believe it. You'll
walk away unaffected or mad. One of the two. So this holy
calling is part of being born again by the Holy Spirit, regeneration,
the quickening, and conversion by which we're given the gift
of faith to bring us to Christ, and repentance to turn away from
self and idolatry. This holy calling. Now look at
what he says now. Who had saved us and called us,
the calling here, with a holy calling. Now there is a general
call, a general call, which goes to anyone who hears the message
of the gospel with the physical ear. But if that's all that happens,
you'll walk away in unbelief. Now 1 Corinthians 2 and verse
14. It says, the natural man receiveth not the things of the
Spirit of God, neither can he know them, they are spiritually
discerned, spiritually judged and understood and valued. So
in other words, this holy calling is a special calling for God's
people who were given to Christ before the foundation of the
world, redeemed by His blood on the cross. That's the legal
aspect of salvation there. God justified us and sent Christ
to redeem us by his blood. And when we talk about the new
birth and this holy calling, that's the spiritual aspect by
which we are personally, each one of Christ's sheep in each
generation, at different times, are brought to faith in Christ,
connected to him spiritually in our hearts. And what does
he do? He gives us a new heart that
we didn't have before. a new mind, new way of thinking. First Corinthians 2.16, I think
it says, we have the mind of Christ. We didn't have that before
we were born again. We were enemies of God in our
minds, Colossians 1 says, by wicked works. And what were those
wicked works? Well, I don't know about you,
but I grew up in religion. That was my wicked works. And
God Change my mind. That's what repentance is. It's
a change of mind. That's not just an intellectual
thing. It goes right to the center of my being. To my heart. What is the heart? It's the mind.
It's the affection. It's the will. It's the conscience.
And by faith in Christ, as Paul related in Philippians 3, remember
he said, I count all things but loss for the excellency of the
knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord. In other words, when I
saw the glory of God in Christ with these new eyes, and I turned
away from all that dung of false, self-righteous religion, and
laid my whole soul in the hands of Christ, and I did it willingly,
well, what happened? God changed my will. Man told
me one time, he said, well you preach that God brings people
dragging unwillingly. No, He changes our will. He gives
us a new will, a new heart, a new spirit. And the thing about it is, if
left to ourselves, we would never desire to come to the true Christ
of this book. And that's why Paul said, or
the Lord said rather, you must be born again. Now this holy
calling is God sending the Spirit to bring sinners to Christ by
freely and sovereignly giving them a new life, a new heart.
Give you an Old Testament passage. Turn over there, if you will,
to Ezekiel chapter 36. And in this passage, The prophet
Ezekiel is showing a contrast between the physical nation Israel,
physical Jews, who would not bow to God's way of salvation,
but insisted on making themselves right with God by their works
of the law. And so he prophesies of another
day, a future day. the day of Christ. When Christ
comes into the world and the old covenant that they misshaped
and perverted into a self-righteous system of work salvation, that
old covenant would be abolished by way of fulfillment and the
new covenant would begin. We're living in that day. And
of course that new covenant is the everlasting covenant of grace
accomplished in time. And what's gonna happen in that
day? What will God's chosen people be like in that day? Well, here's
what he says, verse 29 of Ezekiel 36. He says, I will also save
you from all your uncleanness. I will call for the corn and
will increase it and lay no famine upon you. Now he's speaking metaphorically
here. He says in verse 30, I will multiply
the fruit of the tree And you shall, and the increase of the
field, that you shall receive no more reproach or famine from
the heath, among the heath. In other words, spiritually speaking,
you're gonna be, you're not gonna hunger, you're not gonna thirst.
You remember he said, blessed are those who hunger, and those
who thirst after righteousness, they'll be filled. Well, how
are we gonna be filled with righteousness? We're gonna look to Christ, who
is our righteousness. But now go back up to verse 26.
Or verse 25, here he says, then will I sprinkle clean water upon
you and you shall be clean from all your filthiness and from
all your idols will I cleanse you. That's the blood of Christ.
But now look, as a result of being redeemed by Christ, a new
heart also will I give you. Now notice he didn't say a new
heart I'll give you if you accept Jesus as your savior. No, he
said, I'm gonna give it to you. And a new spirit will I put within
you. and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh
and I will give you a heart of flesh and I will put my spirit
within you and cause you to walk in my statues and you shall keep
my judgments and do them. You're gonna believe the gospel.
You're gonna follow Christ and his word. Not in order to be
saved, not in order to make yourself righteous enough to be saved,
but because God has saved you by his grace. And that's the
issue. Now go back to 2 Timothy 1 now.
Holy calling. You know the word holy means
separate. That's what it means. Sometimes
you'll see the word sanctify, sanctification, holy, holiness,
same word in the original language. And it means separate. This holy
calling is a separate calling in two ways. First of all, It's
a separate calling in that it's a special calling, not a general
calling. It's a powerful, invincible,
effectual calling of God's elect into the kingdom. You've heard
that verse in Matthew 22 verse 14 there, many are called but
few are chosen. That's what that means. The evangelical
call goes out to anybody who'll listen. Some, it will be the saver of
death unto death, 2 Corinthians 2. To others, it'll be the saver
of life unto life. To those to whom it's the saver
of death unto death, it's the general call. Behind that call
is not the power of the Spirit. To others, to whom it's the saver
of life unto life, it's this holy calling. that results in
their coming to Christ, repenting of dead works. It's the calling
of God's elect. We read that in Romans 8, 28.
All whom he predestinated, all whom he called, justified, all
of that. In the book of Acts, chapter
13, there were some who heard the gospel and didn't believe
it. But there were others who heard it and believed it. And
you know what he called them? He said, those who were ordained
to eternal life believed. That's the special calling. It's
a separate calling. It's a powerful calling. It's
an irresistible, invincible calling. The Bible teaches that the Holy
Spirit never fails to bring to Christ and to salvation those
sinners whom he effectually calls to Christ. Look at John chapter
six with me. And as I said, you know, and
I'll get to this in a minute, but look at John chapter six
and verse 37. I quote this verse quite a bit,
especially on our television program. Verse 37, Christ speaking,
he says, all that the Father giveth me shall come to me. When we were given him, given
us in Christ Jesus before the world began. He said in John
chapter 17, he said, that all whom thou hast given me, might
come to thee. So he says in verse 37, all that
the Father giveth me shall come to me, and him that cometh to
me I will in no wise cast out. Somebody says, well, no use me
trying to come to Christ. If I'm not one of God's elect,
he's going to reject me. Oh, no. If you come to Christ,
that automatically identifies you as one of God's elect. And
he'll never cast anybody out who wants salvation his way.
The problem is that by nature, we don't want it His way. We
want it our way. That's the problem. And he says
in verse 38, verse 38, I came down from heaven, not to do mine
own will, but the will of Him that sent me. And this is the
Father's will, which has sent me, that of all which He has
given me, I should lose nothing, but raise it up again at the
last day. Now that's clear. Look over in
John 6, 44. Now here's the problem. No man can come to me except
the Father which has sent me draw him. And I'll raise him
up at the last day. Now that drawing is a powerful,
irresistible compulsion brought on by the Spirit as He shows
us our sinfulness and our need of God's grace to bring us to
Christ in the glory of His person and in the power of His finished
work. Like I said, If it's done without the gospel, he gives
you eyes to see, what are you gonna see? If it's done without the gospel,
if he gives you ears to hear, what are you gonna hear? And
I can tell you right now, the Holy Spirit doesn't give this
special holy calling under the preaching of a lie. A good tree cannot produce evil
fruit and an evil tree cannot produce good fruit. The seed
is sown on the good ground. Well, there's none of us good
by nature. So how do we become good? Only as we are chosen,
justified, redeemed by the blood of Christ. And God prepares us
to receive the word. So he says, I will raise him
up at the last day. Look at verse 45. It's written
in the prophets and they shall all be taught of God. What are
they gonna be taught? Not a lie. We're gonna be taught
the truth, the gospel. See, this holy calling, this
special calling, this separate calling, is a gospel calling. The gospel is the power of God
unto salvation to everyone that believeth, the Jew first, the
Greek also, for therein is the righteousness of God, what? Revealed.
That means you know it, you see it. Revealed from faith to faith,
that's you know it and you receive it and believe it, for the just
shall live by faith. And so verse 45, it's written
in the prophets, they shall all be taught of God, every man therefore
that hath heard, heard with spiritual ears and learned of the Father
revealed, cometh unto me, cometh to Christ. It's a holy calling. Again, gives us eyes to see,
ears to hear. If those who claim it's done
without the gospel, You mean to me, you mean you can have
spiritual life but no faith? And if you have faith without
the gospel, who's your faith in? You mean you can have life without
repentance? And if you have repentance without
life, what are you repenting of? You don't even know. It's
irresistible as it convinces. Christ told his disciples the
Holy Spirit will come and he'll convince the world of sin and
of righteousness and of judgment. He convicts us. It's a conviction
calling, a holy calling. So it's a separate calling. But
here's another thing. This is a calling that also separates
us. It separates the elect from the
non-elect. Look at 1 Thessalonians, turn
over there. And as I told you, I've got a lot of scripture here
that I'm not reading to you, but I've got it listed here.
But look at 1 Thessalonians chapter one. Paul's talking to the believers
at Thessalonica. And look at verse four of chapter
one. He says, knowing brethren, beloved,
your election of God. I know your election of God.
Well, how do you know that, Paul? Look at verse five. For our gospel
came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and in the
Holy Ghost, and in much assurance, as you know what manner of men
we were among you for your sake. Because you heard and believed
the gospel. That's the work of the Spirit. That's a work of
God through the Spirit to bring a sinner to Christ. And go to
2 Thessalonians chapter two. Here he's talking about the end
times when there will be much religion but not much truth. And he says in 2 Thessalonians
2, he makes a distinction between the true people of God and those
who love not the truth. And he says in verse 13, 2 Thessalonians
2, 13, but we are bound to give thanks all the way to God for
you, brethren, beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the
beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the
spirit, that's separation of the spirit, and belief of the
truth, whereunto he called you by our gospel to the obtaining
of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. This holy calling is
a separate calling, a powerful, invincible, irresistible calling
of the Spirit through the gospel that separates God's people out
from the world. It brings us out from under the
kingdom of darkness and into the kingdom of light. It brings
us from a state of unbelief to a state of faith in Christ. It
brings us from a state of unrepentance to our repentance from dead works
and idolatry. It brings us from being unsubmissive
and rebellious against God's way of salvation in Christ and
brings us to be submitted to him as the Lord our righteousness. His righteousness imputed. All
of that. We could go on and on, it separates
us. This is a calling and a faith,
repentance, perseverance. I'll give you one more scripture,
then I'll stop making you work. 2 Corinthians chapter two. Oh, I'm sorry, I mean 1 Peter
chapter two. 1 Peter chapter two. And this is interesting because
When you look at the description that Peter's going to give us
there, we know that it has to do with our spiritual state before
God in Christ. It's verse 9. Well, look at verse 8. He's talking
about here those who heard the gospel with the physical ear,
that general call, but rejected it. And he says that Christ,
in verse eight, was a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense,
even to them which stumble at that word, being disobedient,
they didn't believe, whereunto also they were appointed by God. But look at verse nine. But you
are a chosen generation. Chosen by who? By God. before
the foundation of a royal priesthood. What does that mean? That means
we have the right and the acceptance of going into the very holiest
of all by the blood of Jesus Christ. You see, that's how we
approach God. And we know that as the Spirit
in this special calling, this separate calling, reveals unto
our hearts, our minds, our affections, our will, that we have no qualifications,
but to come to God washed in the blood of Jesus Christ, clothed
in his righteousness imputed. I have nothing to merit salvation. A royal priesthood, remember
the priest came into the whole, the high priest came into the
Holy of Holies with the blood. And it says, and holy nation,
that's the kingdom of God. A peculiar people, Anytime I
go to that verse, I say, well, a few of you guys are peculiar,
but that's not what that means. That means purchased, bought,
lock, stock, and barrel. And you can say the same about
me, I'm peculiar too. But we're purchased by the blood of Christ,
that you should show forth the praises of him who hath called
you out of darkness into his marvelous light. That's the holy
calling. That's the special calling. That's
the separate calling of the spirit through the preaching of the
gospel. And again, it's not the words of the preacher or the
preaching of the message itself that gives life. It's the spirit
who gives life. But he does it in that context
of truth. He's the spirit of truth. He's
not the spirit of a lie. And he brings God's people under
that gospel and he gives them eyes to see and ears to hear
the truth. and to submit to Christ for all
of salvation. I hope that's helpful to you
in understanding the scripture. All right, 359, hymn number 359,
My Faith Looks Up to Thee.