Alright brethren, Colossians
chapter 1. Our text begins with the most
comforting statement to God's saints. This statement is so
very comforting to God's saints. This is not the word of man.
This is the Word of God. This is God's Word. It's God's
Word. The Holy Spirit of God gave this
Word to the Apostle Paul. This Word is to God's saints,
to you who He's given faith to trust Him. This Word's to you. This Word's not to everybody.
This Word is to those God's made to hear this and be able to say,
Amen. Amen. This word speaks of sanctification
by God alone. Now listen to this statement,
Colossians 112, giving thanks unto the Father which hath made
us meet. to be partakers of the inheritance
of the saints in light. God hath made us meet fit. God declares, this is his word,
he declares that he has made each one that he has sanctified
meet fit. to be partakers of God's light
in heaven. To partake of God's light in
heaven, even as fit, even as meet as those saints that are
already there with him in life. That's how fit it's made you
that he's sanctified. We give thanks unto the Father.
Why? Because it's all of him. We give
thanks unto the Father. The meekness, the fitness is
of God the Father. He hath made us meek. It was
accomplished by God's Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and it's been
worked in us by the Spirit of our Lord. It's all of God. There's nobody else to thank
but God, our Father, through His Son, through the Holy Spirit.
It's all of God. It's a work already accomplished.
Within each believer, it's a work God has already accomplished,
giving thanks unto the Father which hath made us meet. It's past tense because it's
done in you who've been born again of God. It's done. This
statement, right here, this statement should end all the vain notions
of men that teach that the believer contributes to our fitness for
heaven. This statement should end that
vanity. It should just end it. It should
end the vain teaching that the believer is gradually making
himself holier, more fit for heaven by his works. That's the
devil's doctrine taught by the devil's messengers, is what that
is. Concerning his saints, God declares, he hath made us meet. Meet to be partakers of the inheritance
of the saints in light. Sanctification, to be made holy,
to be consecrated to God, is accomplished and finished entirely
alone by God. God hath made us meet to be partakers
of the inheritance of the saints in light. The inheritance was
prepared by God from before the foundation of the world. That's
what Christ said he's gonna say to us in that day. Come, inherit
the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.
The inheritance was prepared by God to give to those he chose
in the Lord Jesus. It's the inheritance of the saints,
the inheritance freely given to those God himself has sanctified
through the blood of his Son, through his Holy Spirit. Now
listen, 1 Timothy 6.16 says, God only hath immortality, dwelling
in a light, in thee light, which no man can approach unto, whom
no man hath seen nor can see, to whom be honor and power everlasting. God is light, and he's the father
of light, and no sinner can approach unto God and His light. None can. None can even see Him.
None can behold Him. Angels cover their faces before
God because of His light. He's holy, He's pure, He's perfect,
and you and me are not. We are everything but that in
ourselves. It has to be perfect to be accepted
of God. Only those that God alone has
made meet by Christ through the Spirit can enter into His light
and dwell with God and God receive us and we have communion with
God. The inheritance will be that we will be able to approach
unto God in his light and he shall receive us and dwell with
us. That's the inheritance. Now for
you saints who can say amen, for you who can say amen, who
give all the thanks and glory to God our Father, God declares
to you, he hath made us meet. to be partakers of the inheritance
of the saints in life. Now that's the most comforting
word you can hear. He's done it. He has done it. Now he's gonna tell us how he
did it, and there's three things here I want you to see. Number
one, God our Father did it. He said in verse 13, who hath
delivered us from the power of darkness and hath translated
us into the kingdom of his dear Son. Number two, Christ Jesus,
the Son of God did it. He said, in whom, speaking of
his dear Son, in whom we have redemption through his blood,
even the forgiveness of sins. And number three, the Holy Spirit
of our Lord did it. Verse 21, and you that were sometime
alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now
hath he reconciled. He made you personally be reconciled
to God by showing you Christ already reconciled you to God.
Look, in the body of his flesh, through death, to present you
holy and unblamable and unapprovable in his sight, if you continue
in the faith, grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the
hope of the gospel which you've heard and which was preached
to you. Well, what's that? Verse 27 at
the end, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Whom we preach. wanting every man and teaching
every man in all wisdom that we may present every man perfect
in Christ Jesus. Now we'll look at these three
things. First of all, for you who he has made meet, God did
it. God our Father did it. Verse
13, God hath delivered us from the power of darkness and hath
translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son. Every sinner
comes into this world under the power of darkness. The power
of darkness. Due to Adam's sin, due to us
being born of, conceived in sin, We came forth under the power
of the devil, the power of darkness. We could not do anything pleasing
to God. And no sinner in that state can
of himself do anything pleasing to God. He can become religious. He can speak the name Jesus and
the name Lord, and he can speak of grace and he can speak of
godliness, but he can't do one thing pleasing to God. Can't
believe God, can't trust God, can't do one thing pleasing to
God. The devil blinded our minds. Second Corinthians 4.4 says,
the God of this world has blinded the minds of them which believe
not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the
image of God, should shine unto them. Our understanding and our
hearts were darkened. We were aliens from the life
of God. You don't have, you know, speak
of regeneration, being born again, it's this, Christ is life. And until the life enters, we
don't have spiritual life. We were alienated from the life
of God. Our mind and our understanding
was darkened. Ephesians 4.18 said we had the
understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God
through the ignorance that was in us because of the blindness
of our heart. But God now. You who believe
in Him, here's why. God hath delivered us from the
power of darkness. We did not deliver ourselves.
It says here, God our Father in His Son hath delivered us
from the power of darkness. It's done. It's done. Now listen, in Isaiah 49, let's
look at this, Isaiah 49, We're gonna look at this next time
from Isaiah when we get to this, but look here in Isaiah 49, verse
24. Shall the prey be taken from
the mighty or the lawful captive delivered? That's who we are, we're the
prey, we're the lawful captive by nature. Thus saith the Lord,
even the captives of the mighty shall be taken away, and the
prey of the terrible shall be delivered. For I will contend
with him that contendeth with thee, and I will save thy children. God said, I will do it. How does
he do this? By shining his light into our
hearts. By shining the light of the gospel
into our hearts, He gave us faith in our Savior. He gave us eyes
to see and an understanding heart to see the Lord. Verse 13 says
in our text, Colossians 1.13 says, God hath delivered us from
the power of darkness and hath translated us into the kingdom
of His dear Son. I love this word, hath translated. Hath translated. When Paul spoke
of having faith to remove mountains, the word remove is the same word
here translated. God translated Enoch that he
should not see death. It means God bypassed death,
the process of dying. He just bypassed that and he
delivered Enoch from life into glory. And that's what translated
means. It means to take from one place
and put in another place. This doily right here, it's over
here on the right side of this pulpit. I'm gonna take it and
I'm gonna put it here. I just translated it from that
side to that side. It's not over here now, is it?
It's not there anymore, is it? It's over here now. God has translated
us out of the power of darkness, out of the captivity of the devil
and sin and our own vile nature. He's translated us out of it
into the kingdom of His dear Son. That's done. That's accomplished. That sanctification
is done. God hath delivered us from the
power of darkness and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear
Son. We give thanks to the Father
because he made us meet. because He gave us an understanding,
because He translated us, He delivered us from the pile of
darkness and translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son.
He hath done it. He's the only one to praise.
He did it. We didn't do it. He did it. He did it. That's
why God, that's why He accomplished His work in you. is so you give
him all the thanks and all the praise and all the glory. That's
why. Look over at 1 Peter 2. That's
why he does it this way. 1 Peter 2.9. Listen to this. And these words I'm about to
read here in 1 Peter 2, 9. If you go back over there in
Exodus 20 and you read whenever the Lord gave the law at Sinai,
the Lord told them, if you keep my law, He told them, this is
what you'll be. All these things He's fixed to
say here, He said, that's what you'll be if you'll keep my law.
They said, oh, we'll do it. And already had broken it. But
Christ came and did it. And now this is what you are.
You are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation,
a peculiar people, and here's why God delivered you and translated
you and He did it all, that you should show forth the praises
of Him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous
light, that you should give him all the praise and all the glory,
which in time past were not a people, but now are the people of God,
which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.
Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims." That's
what you are. You're no longer of this kingdom
and nation, you're of his kingdom and nation, so you're strangers
and pilgrims here. I beseech you as pilgrims and
strangers, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul,
having your conversation, your conduct honest among the Gentiles,
that whereas they speak against you as evildoers, they may by
your good works, which they shall behold, glorify God in the day
of visitation. Now we recognize what are obvious
lusts of our flesh. We recognize those. But brethren,
you remember, the Apostle Paul said, the lusts of our flesh
is when you become subject and subject yourself to the vain
doctrines and teachings of men that command you to touch not,
taste not, handle not. He said that's the commandments
and doctrines of men and he said all that is is the lust of the
flesh, all it does is inflame your flesh and it wars against
your soul. Here's what the Lord's gonna
make his child do. Instead of trying to constrain men to do
and not do, he's gonna make you preach Christ and exalt Christ
before those that he assembles. And he's gonna make you try to
stay invisible and stay out of the way and do nothing to distract
from it. And when He visits them in grace
and sanctifies them and delivers them from the power of darkness
and translates them into the kingdom of His dear Son, they're
going to glorify God and they're going to thank you for the works
you did because you didn't try to constrain them, you preached
Christ and waited on Him to do it. That's how you're going to
give Him praise. Now, go back to our text. Number two, for you who have
been sanctified and made meek, Christ did it. The Father did
it, and our Lord Jesus, His Son, did it. Verse 14 says, In whom
we have redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of
sin. Redemption is to be ransomed
from the law. To be ransomed from the law.
We were held for ransom. It was the law that lawfully
demanded a price be paid because God is holy, because he's just,
because his law must be honored. The law demanded a ransom price
be paid and the price it demanded was your death and my death. Listen, the devil, God, he delivered
us from him. But he didn't give the devil
something to deliver us from it. He gave it to the law. He
gave the law what the law demanded. But the devil used the law to
keep you and me personally in bondage, fearing death. That's what 99% of religion is. It's the devil using the law
to keep people in bondage. The devil's the greatest legalist
there is. He knows the law better than anybody. And he is the greatest
legalist there is. The devil's the accuser of the
brethren. He used the law and he used our
sins to accuse us to God night and day. And he used the law
to accuse us in our own conscience. And then he would use the law
and any so-called righteousness that we did to puff us up and
make us proud. And so he kept you in constant
bondage under the law by his conniving, deceitful use of the
law. He had the power of death over
us. The devil had the power of death
over us. He used the law to accuse us
and keep us in bondage. Now you be warned, brethren,
by that. When a man accuses one that God
justified, or when he tries to puff up one by comparing him
to another, that man's taking sides with the devil. That's
so. Never do that. Never do that. Listen to Isaiah 49, 25 again. The Lord said, even the captives
of the mighty shall be taken away, and the prey of the terrible
shall be delivered. For I will contend with him that
contendeth with thee, and I will save thy children. That's why
Hebrews 2.14 says, for as much as the children were partakers
of flesh and blood, the Son of God also himself likewise took
part of the same, that through death he might destroy him that
had the power of death, that is the devil, and deliver them
who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to
bondage. That's why Christ came. Now,
I want you to get this. In Ezekiel 18, 20, we quote this
sometimes, but if you go read the context to this, it says,
Thee so that sinneth, it shall die. Thee so that sinneth, it
shall die. And here's what the context is
declaring. The father can't bear the sin of the child and deliver
him. The son can't bear the sin of
the father and deliver him. No man can pay this ransom price
for another man to deliver him. Why? Because we're all sinners.
We're all sinners. And the soul that sinneth, that
very soul must die. Now here's the good news. Our
Lord Jesus Christ, when God the Father chose his people and his
Son, we were created in Christ Jesus. And when the Son of God
came into this world and took flesh, we were in his loins. We were in him and what he did,
we did. Just like Levi was in Abraham's
loins and when Abraham paid tithes to Melchizedek, Abraham paid
tithes to Melchizedek. We were in Christ, one with Christ. The soul that sinneth, it shall
die. That's how one we are with Christ.
Christ came and completely, totally represented His people. The sinless
one who could not die because he never sinned and never knew
sin and never would sin. He willingly went to the Father
and He made Him sin for us. That was me there. That was each
of God's elect child. That's how God saw it. It was
that one soul that had sinned, that one elect child, that's
who Christ was on that cross. And when He died, we died in
Him. When He bore that wrath of God,
we bore that wrath of God in Him. And when He satisfied justice
and paid that ransom price, He redeemed us. He paid the price. He purchased us with His own
blood. And Allah said, I'm satisfied.
And now, when the Lord come and he shined his light in your heart
and he gave you an understanding, he made you to see what the Lord
Jesus Christ had done for you. He made you see what Christ had
done for you. We've been made meek to enter
into God's majestic light and glory because in Christ we have
redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins.
Now listen, that means the devil has no more power because there's
no more sin for any of God's elect children. There is no more
sin that the devil can take and go to God and say, look, they
broke your law. That's how real Christ put our
sin away. That's how real he fulfilled the law for us. The
devil cannot take any sin of yours and go to God with it and
try to accuse you to God with it. God will say, my son already
bore that sin away. My child has fulfilled that law
perfectly in righteousness. That's exactly what was taking
place when Joshua the high priest had sinned and the devil went
to God trying to use the law to accuse Joshua the high priest.
And the Lord interceded for him and God would not charge Joshua. He would not charge him. He took
the dirty garments off of him and he covered him in the robe
of Christ's righteousness and put a crown on his head and he
received him. Because that's what Christ accomplished
for his people. When the devil sends one of his
little minions around you, and that little minion is speaking
evil of one somebody Christ died for and Christ justified, and
backbiting and whispering about him, you declare from the rooftop,
who is he that will lay charge to one of God's elect? It's God
that justified him. It's Christ that redeemed them.
It's Christ that took God's right hand and interceded for them.
You go lay charge to them, that man's taking side with the devil.
And don't do it. Don't do it to your brethren. Christ died for them. Christ
laid down his life for them. Christ justified them. You've
been made meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints
and light, because God your Father has delivered you from the power
of death. He has translated us into the kingdom of his dear
son, and in Christ we have redemption through his precious blood, even
the forgiveness of all our sins. Oh, they say, you confound sanctification
and righteousness. You can't separate them. You
can't separate them. I know there's two aspects of
it, but you can't separate them. You can't separate them. Three,
for you that have been sanctified, the Spirit of Christ did it. The Spirit of our Lord Jesus
did it. Verse 21. And you that were sometime alienated
and enemies in your mind by wicked works. Now we're going within
us. We're talking about what we were.
There we were. In our minds, God was our enemy. Oh, we loved
our sweet little Jesus that we could mold and handle and do
with Him what we would. Our little idol. But we hated
that if you heard the gospel, you hated the true God. You hated
the God that declared you didn't sanctify yourself. I hated him
too. We were enemies in our minds.
We were alienated by our wicked works. And those wicked works
wasn't just that you was out getting drunk in the bar and
laying up with harlots. It was that you thought you was
righteous and holy by something you did. Me too. And yet now, that he reconciled
us. He made you to see that. Made
you to know that. He made you be reconciled to
God. He made you to see. He did it
in the body of His flesh through death to present you holy and
unblameable and unreprovable in His sight. Well, what must
I do? There's only one thing. And you're
going to do it by the grace of God the same as you did it in
the first hour and you're going to keep doing it by His grace
and power working this work in you. Here it is. Verse 23, if
you continue in the faith, grounded and settled and be not moved
away from the hope of the gospel which you've heard preached.
And here's that hope, verse 27, which is Christ in you, the hope
of glory. See, our Lord Jesus said, when
I've gone to the Father and I've finished this work of redemption,
I've gone to the Father, I'll intercede with the Father. He'll
send the Holy Spirit and He'll speak of me. He'll declare what
I've done And He will guide you into all truth. I want you to
see this in Acts 26. Very important. Acts 26. This is what the Lord gave Christ
the glory to work through the Holy Spirit. Look here now. The
Spirit of Christ entered into us. Christ Himself, Christ in
you, the hope of glory, He entered in in Spirit and He gave you
faith in Him by doing so. And here's why He worked there,
this is what God gave Him the glory to accomplish, Acts 26.18.
He said, to open their eyes and to turn them from darkness to
light and from the power of Satan unto God that they may receive
forgiveness of sins and inheritance among them which are sanctified
by faith that is in me. That's sanctification apart from
any work of your hand. That's sanctification by believing
Christ is your sanctification. Sanctification is to be separated
and consecrated to God. Do you realize how separated
and separate that is from what the whole religious world preaches?
The whole religious world preaches that it's a co-effort between
you and God. That by the works of your hands,
you're sanctifying yourself. Nope. Christ is formed in His
child, and He makes you see He's already done all the work. You
have forgiveness. He's going to present you holy,
spotless, unreprovable, without blame before God, and He brings
you to believe Him. That's how He sanctifies His
child. He opened our dead spiritual
eyes. He created a new man in us. He
made us behold we were already reconciled by Christ. He already
put our sin away. He already made us the righteousness
of God in Him. And He gave us faith by that
to stop fighting against God. He gave you faith to be reconciled
to God, to stop being the enemy of God and considering God your
enemy and to just come and bow down and praise Him and thank
Him for doing all this for you so freely. And He gave you this
faith to trust Christ. Get it there. Look what He said.
That Christ shall present us to God holy and unblameable and
unapprovable in His sight. That's what Christ is going to
do. You see, if you contribute one thing to this, Christ doesn't
get all the glory. He doesn't get all the praise.
That's why God's not going to permit you and me to contribute
to this work. Sanctification, this perfect
meekness God has made us is by the Spirit of God making Christ's
sanctification unto us, giving us faith to trust that He shall
present us perfect in Him. Well, what about from the day
He calls you till we get to glory. You got a long wilderness to
go through and a lot of trials and troubles you got to go through.
How are we going to be holy through all that? By Christ dwelling
in us, Christ is going to keep His preacher preaching this good
news of Christ our sanctification. And through this gospel, Christ
is going to keep His child sanctified. Now look at it, look at this.
He said, if you continue in the faith, grounded and settled,
so that we're never moved away from the hope of the gospel,
which is Christ in you, the hope of glory, look at verse 28, whom
we preach, warning every man, teaching every man in all wisdom
that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus, whereunto
I also labor, striving according to his working, which worketh
in me mightily. He's going to keep his preacher
preaching Christ, and through that message, he's going to keep
you continuing in the faith, trusting Christ is all your sanctification. That's what Christ is gonna do.
That's why he saves this way. Now, when it says that we may
present every man perfect in Christ Jesus, it's not that you
do something to be perfect in Christ Jesus. That's not what
it means. It's that God keeps you believing
that you are perfect in Christ Jesus and that Christ shall present
you perfect in his person, in his work. That's what it is.
The only way God's preacher is going to preach this good news
and the only way you're going to continue believing this good
news is by Christ working mightily
in us both. That's the only way. Now brethren,
do not give your ear and don't even bother trying to reply to
blasphemous doctrines of men that say sanctification is a
co-effort between you and God. Just don't waste your time. Don't
listen to men that say it's by your works that you're becoming
holier than others. Don't listen to them tell you
that the purpose of sanctification is that you, by your works, are
getting a little more perfect and a little more perfect. You're
just a perfectly plump, ripe apple, perfect for the picking.
That's rotten fruit. That's all that is. And any man
that claims to have been sanctified and trusts Christ and returns
to that vomit was never sanctified by Christ in the first place. Instead, here's what you do. You give thanks unto the Father
which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance
of the saints in light. You know what, Christ, this is
the picture of the Sabbath. When Christ gave the Sabbath
day, he said, you're going to observe my Sabbath. Well, here's
what he does. When he gives you this faith
in Christ, he makes you see Christ is your Sabbath rest in whom
the whole law is fulfilled. I love how the Sabbath, the law
of the Sabbath comes right between the table toward God and the
table toward man. And right there in that law is
Christ our Sabbath rest where we rest and both tables are fulfilled. And God said, here's why I'm
going to do that. Here's why I'm going to make you rest in
Christ my Sabbath. He said that you may know that
I am the Lord that doth sanctify you. That's why. Isn't that what
he said in our text this morning? When I've done this, you're going
to know I'm the Lord your God. You're going to know that. Now,
so here's the application. Colossians 2 verse 6. Now Colossians
2.6, as ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, and we
just saw how you received him, God did everything to you and
gave you faith, so walk ye in him. Trust in his by his grace,
his power, his mercy, his keeping through faith in him. Walk in
him, rooted and built up in him, established in the faith, as
you've been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving. Beware,
lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after
the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, that's
the law, and not after Christ. For in him dwelleth all the fullness
of the Godhead bodily, and ye are complete in Him, which is
the head of all principality and power. It don't get no better. That's just all there is to it.
You can't get better than complete. And Christ is going to present
you perfect in Him by what He's done. You keep trusting Him. I pray you're blessed, Ted. All
right, Brother Adam.