Well, good evening. If you would
turn with me to Philippians chapter 1. Philippians chapter 1. Well, here in Philippians, I
think you know that this letter that the Apostle Paul wrote to
these people there, this city, the city of Philippi, was a pagan
city full of depravity, idol worship, sorcery. Here, Paul writes to them. He
writes to a people who were, this is what Paul says in writing
to the Ephesians, but the same is true of these Philippians.
He writes to these people who, he says, were without Christ,
being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from
the covenant of promise, having no hope, and without God, in
this world. And this can be said, too, of
you here in Ashland, can't it? But now we have Paul writing
to a group of people in this city. Listen to what he says
to them and consider, once again, the wonder of God's grace. The wonder of God's grace to
these people, the wonder of God's grace to you, in the wonder of
God's grace to me. Let's just read those first seven
verses. We read, Paul and Timothy, bondservants of Jesus Christ,
to all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, with the
bishops and deacons, grace to you and peace from God our Father
and the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God upon every remembrance
of you, always, in every prayer of mine making request for you
all with joy, for your fellowship in the Gospel from the first
day until now, being confident of this very thing, that he who
has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day
of Jesus Christ. Just as it is right for me to
think this of you all, because I have you in my heart, inasmuch
as both in my chains and in the defense and confirmation of the
Gospel, You are all partakers with me of grace." How great
is that? How great is that? Well, how
did this happen? How is it that this occurred,
that Paul would write these words to these people? Well, we know
that this was brought about entirely of God. And as you know, we have
the whole account of that in the Acts of the Apostles. Paul
and this small group of men. Have you considered that? What a great work of grace, a
great work of the Gospel was accomplished in those early days
of the Gospel going forth throughout the world. Just a handful of
men going forth, preaching, and what occurred? God did great
things, didn't he? Great things. And we know how
they set out from Israel. And you know, this isn't the
time where you booked a flight on Southwest or hopped on a plane
to fly across the Atlantic. This is time where journey was
of tremendous difficulty and perilous, too. took a great amount
of time. And they journeyed across the
ocean, and they come. And as we read there in Acts,
they purposed to go into Asia, remember? And what happened? The Holy Spirit forbid them. They purposed to go to preach
the gospel, but the Holy Spirit forbid them to go into Asia. And then they considered and
purposed to go into Bithynia. And what occurred? The Holy Spirit
prevented them. Now what were they going to do?
Preach the gospel of God's glorious grace in his son. That's what
they purposed to do, but they were forbidden. And then they
were prevented. And why was that? Because God
had a people in Philippi. And you remember then Paul has
this vision, doesn't he? And what does he see? He sees
this man of Macedonia saying, come over and help us. And what did Paul conclude? Did
he wonder, well, what help? What is it that they need? What
do we need to take them? No, Paul immediately concluded
that they were called to preach the gospel there, and then they
departed for Philippi and come to this city. And you know the
story. how they went down beside that
river where these women were gathered and spoke to them. And what do we read? That the
Lord opened the heart of Lydia. He opened the heart of Lydia.
And that was the beginning of this Church of Philippi, wasn't
it? The first convert. And then her
whole household. And then the events that occurred
there where Paul and Silas are put into jail, remember, and
the dramatic events that occurred, the earthquake and the prison
doors opening, the chains loose from the prisoners, and the warden
about to take his own life. He is so terrified. He thinks
his life is finished. And Paul cries out, we're all
here. And he falls before them. What must I do to be saved? And here's the second convert,
or another convert, in his whole household. These are the people. These are the people that began
this church. How did this church come about? Entirely through
the work of God, orchestrating everything that occurred. And
nothing, God never changes, does he? He's unchangeable. That's
one of his most glorious attributes. He's the same today. And I think that possibly, I don't
know, I hope not, but possibly some of you can be a little discouraged,
thinking, well, things are waning. We're getting older. It's not
as it was. The Lord is the same today as
he ever is. And how we should rejoice, consider
what the Lord has done for you, people here in Ashland, where
he's brought you from, and what he's done for you. And I'm getting
a little off track from my message here. But I want us to consider
where these people came from and what the Lord has done for
them that Paul could write a letter like this to them that we just
read the first seven verses in the introduction. And we see
that his grace, as we just heard,
that wonderful truth, that where sin abounded, grace abounded
much more. What does he call it? Look in
the first verse. Who's he writing
to? Who's he writing to? To the saints
in Christ Jesus. That's who he's writing to. How could that be? Well, what I'd like to do is
consider what is encompassed in this term that the scripture
uses for his people. Saints in Christ Jesus. You might
be surprised to know that in the New Testament, saints is
the word most commonly used to refer to those who believe. 66 times. That should tell us
something. 66 times. The word Christian
is used three. So it should tell us that there
is something about this word saint that is very important,
and I'd like to look Just briefly, it's some of these things. We
could say that the biblical definition of a Christian is saint. And
what does this mean? And what does the word teach
us by referring to those who believe as saints in Christ Jesus? This is really the only thing
I'd like to consider tonight, so bear with me. The first thing,
then, is we are a people who have been set apart or made separate. That's the primary meaning of
the word saint. And I was reading something on
this, and the writer said, this immediately makes us ask, separate
from what? But you know, I thought, that's
true, but that's really not the key question, is it? The real
question is separated to what? Set apart to what? And the answer,
of course, is immediately supplied. Saints in? Christ Jesus. We are set apart by God to God
in Christ Jesus. And that's always the biblical
emphasis. Now, it is true that in being
set apart, we're separated from certain things. And that's important
too, isn't it? You cannot be set apart to something
without being set apart from something. We see this clearly
in Colossians 1, where we read, he has delivered us from the
power of darkness and translated us into the kingdom of the son
of his love. The emphasis is always being
set apart by God in Christ. And we're translated into this
realm of the kingdom of his son, the spiritual realm. But in doing
that, we're separated from the power of darkness, and from this
world. Right away, we can see that a
person becomes a saint by the definitive action of God, not
by a process being worked out throughout the whole life of
the believer. He has been separated by God in Jesus Christ into the
particular realm of his special grace, and favor. So the first
thing is, we mustn't think of saints primarily in terms of
the life they live. There's such a tendency to do
that. And it's important, but that's not primarily what's at
focus in what the Lord has revealed to us. This is most certainly
something that flows from this, but the essential thing about
saints is that they have been set apart by God. And this is
very important to understand because the root word translated
saint is the same root word for holy. In other words, they're
the same word, just used differently depending on the part of speech.
In Colossians 3.12, we read a very familiar verse. Therefore, as
the elect of God, holy and beloved. Holy and beloved. Put on tender
mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, long-suffering. The word there translated holy
is the same word translated saint in our text. And what does this
teach us? It's obvious. Saints are holy. They're not progressively becoming
holy. They are holy. This holiness
is not something that they themselves do, but what God does in setting
them apart in Christ Jesus. I think it'll be helpful for
us to consider what the word of God reveals to us in the Old
Testament Scriptures with respect to these things. We know to think
of the types and the shadows that are given to us. And we
know that the nation of Israel, and especially the temple worship,
were all given by God as types and figures of the spiritual
reality. The spiritual reality. They were
just copies of the truth. And the children of Israel as
a people, as a nation, were no different than any other people.
But God set them apart to himself. He chose them. He tells us. He
chose them. They were no different than any
other people. In fact, they were less than everything. But he
chose them and set them apart. And in doing that, they became
what? A holy nation. A holy nation. The temple, along
with everything having to do with the temple, was holy unto
the Lord. We read this all through the
Old Testament, don't we? It was holy unto the Lord for
the same reason. It was set apart by God. The
priests who served in the temple, they were holy priests because
they were set apart by God in the service of the temple. They
were no different. Now think. These men themselves,
they were no different than any other men of Israel. But God
set them apart and therefore they became holy. The vessels
used in the temple worship were holy vessels. Not because they
were different in some way than the other vessels in Israel.
They were the same type of vessels used all over Israel. But because they were used within
the temple, they were holy unto the Lord. They were set apart
for the worship and service of God. Now, in these types, we
also have a picture of being separated to the world. Bear
with me. The priests were set apart by
God, holy unto the Lord. And as a consequence, only they
performed the service in the temple. No one else. No one else
in the temple. nation of Israel served in the
temple except these ones who had been set apart unto the Lord.
Because they served in the temple, they did different things than
anybody else did in Israel. And the same was true of the
vessels of the temple. These vessels were set apart
wholly unto the Lord, and as a result performed service which
no other vessels in Israel performed. Well, let's look at the spiritual
reality now. Having seen the time that's held
up before us, let's look at the spiritual reality. Turn to 1
Peter, chapter 2. 1 Peter, chapter 2. In this spiritual reality, we
could look at many places in the New Testament give us the
spiritual reality of those types, but Peter brings it all together
in this passage, and it's so clear. Here we are, verse nine. This is the spiritual reality. Verse nine, but you, you, speaking
of saints in Christ Jesus, but you are a chosen generation,
a royal priesthood, a holy nation, his own special people that you
may proclaim the praises of him who called you out of darkness
into his marvelous light." There's the separation, isn't it? He's
called us to be this royal priesthood, spiritual priesthood, a holy
nation, his own special people. We're set apart by God, just
as the nation of Israel was, but in the reality, in the spiritual
reality. He called us out of darkness
into his marvelous light. He called us into an entirely
different realm of spiritual existence. Look at verse 5. We're not inanimate objects.
What are we? Living stones being built up
a spiritual house. And as priests, we're not unregenerate
men. but ones who've been born of
the Spirit, having life in Christ and serving in the newness of
the Spirit. Verse five, you also as living
stones being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood to offer
up spiritual sacrifices, not the time, but spiritual sacrifices
acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. Well, how is it? that we are
set apart as a holy nation into this spiritual realm, which the
word describes as marvelous light. And the answer, of course, is
in Christ Jesus. And there we have the answer
to one of the greatest stumbling blocks to the understanding of
any believer with respect to these things. We look, how can
I be holy? Isn't that true? Haven't you
thought about that many times? How can I be holy? We look at
the law of God, which is holy, just, and good, and we know we're
none of these things. We look at ourselves, at our
own sin, and how it pollutes everything that we do, even as
the Lord's people. But the word of God tells us
that we are holy, and that it's a holiness sufficient
to enter into the presence of a holy God with boldness, to
offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to him. Think of the
wonder of that. How can this be? How can this
be? Because we enter into his presence
in Christ and offer up spiritual sacrifices through Christ. In Hebrews 9, 24, we all know
these texts, don't we? They have meaning, don't they? Listen, listen again. For Christ
has not entered the holy places made with hands, which are copies
of the true. See, the holy places, Made with
hands, yes, holy in the type, but they're just copies. They're
just copies of the true. For Christ has not entered the
holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true,
but into heaven itself now to appear in the presence of God
for us, for you and for me. This should make it clear to
anyone that our holiness is not a result of anything that we
do. How could it be? The saint is holy for one reason
and one reason alone. He's a saint in Christ Jesus. He's holy in Christ Jesus. Our
holiness is entirely of Christ and is solely due to our spiritual
union with him for no other reason. This is the reason we read in
Hebrews 10, having boldness to enter the holiest by the blood
of Jesus. Let us draw near. Here, here
is the confidence then we can have as a result of that. Let
us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having
our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies
washed with pure water. We draw near with full assurance
of faith, knowing what? That we're holy, that we're accepted
in the Beloved. God is holy. Anything short of that is not
holiness. There is no partial holiness.
There are no degrees of holiness. The idea of progressive sanctification
is an idea that's wholly foreign. to the scriptures. Christ is
holy. There is no other type of holiness. And it's those who have been
made partakers of his grace who have been made partakers of his
holiness. These are the saints in Christ
Jesus. When do we become partakers of
his holiness. That's an important question,
isn't it? When is it and how is it that a person becomes united
to Christ? When do we become saints in Christ
Jesus, as Paul puts it? Well, we have already been seeing
answers to these questions in the text we've been reading,
haven't we? We're set apart by God in Christ when the Holy Spirit
comes in power, through the preaching of the gospel, and the Lord,
God, the Holy Spirit, takes that word and applies it to our hearts,
speaks to our hearts, and takes away that stony heart of the
flesh, and gives us a true heart, a new heart, a heart of faith,
and opens our understanding to see and believe in Christ. This is a spiritual work so great
that the Word of God uses striking language to convey to us the
enormity of this work of grace that's accomplished in bringing
us into union with our Savior. In Ephesians 2, turn there, Ephesians
chapter 2, turn there for a moment. Ephesians chapter 2. And we read, Ephesians chapter
2, beginning there in verse 4. But God, who is rich in mercy,
because of his great love with which he loved us, even when
we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. Together. Now, listen. has made
us alive together with Christ. By grace you have been saved
and raised us up together and made us sit together in heavenly
places in Christ Jesus. Here we're told that the richness
of God's mercy and the greatness of his love, which results in
infinite blessing, upon the people of God who were dead in trespasses
and sins. It comes to us when we're brought
together with Christ. How is it that these blessings
are bestowed upon these people of Philippi, upon you here in
Ashland, upon all the Lord's people in his time? These blessings
come to us through our spiritual union with Christ, don't they?
this tremendous emphasis in this verse, together, together, together,
raised up together with Christ, made to sit together with Christ,
together in heavenly places. These people, they're in Philippi,
and you and I have been called out of darkness into his marvelous
light. I don't think there's any greater
contrast than the contrast between darkness and light. In fact,
I know that's the case. The word of God tells us there
is utter incompatibility between the two. There is no fellowship
between darkness and light. No fellowship. Later in his epistle
to the Ephesians, Paul writes, for you were once darkness, That's
to the Ephesian saints. You were once darkness, but now
you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light. Who
are we? Who are we as saints in Christ? We're light in the Lord. We're
not trying to become light in the Lord, are we? We're light
in the Lord. That's who we are. That's who
a saint is. walk as children of light. The Word of God, too, in 1 Corinthians
1, I think, again, a familiar passage to us all, puts things
in a slightly different way. There we read, God is faithful,
God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship
of his Son. That's what union with Christ
brings us into. fellowship with his Son, Jesus
Christ our Lord." What a statement that we, as these people who
were dead in trespasses and sins, would be brought into fellowship
with Christ. A saint doesn't become holy by
living a certain kind of life. That's what this is all saying.
A saint is holy because he's been translated into the realm
of spiritual light. He's light in the Lord, and because
he's holy, he walks as a child of light. He's been called into
the fellowship of the Lord Jesus Christ, and he lives a life very
different than the life he lived when he was in darkness. I think
there's a common misunderstanding that the believer When he sins,
what a grief that is, isn't it? There's this belief that when
a believer sins, he's walking in darkness. But a believer never walks in
darkness. In the first epistle of John,
chapter one, we read, if we say that we have fellowship with
him and walk in darkness, we lie. and do not practice the
truth. You see, being set apart by God
in Christ Jesus is such a dramatic spiritual work of God. When you read those words, believe
them, we've been delivered from the power of darkness and translated
into the kingdom of the son of his love. We walk in that light. We walk in that kingdom. But you say, I sin. And when
I sin, how can I be walking in the light? We've all experienced this, haven't
we, continuously. Well, let me. Just give you an
illustration of a time when I was preaching on some of these things
in New Guinea, and I was preaching to some of the brethren there,
and I said, well, you know, before you were saved, before the Lord
saved you, if you were coming back from the rainforest in the
bush where your guards are, and you passed your brother's land,
and you saw a banana, stalk there just right, ready, ready to harvest. And you're hungry,
and it's the end of the day, and you've been working, and
you think, oh, that would be nice to take home and cook up
in the fire, and I'll enjoy that. And what do you do? You go cut
it down. It's your brother's. You steal it. You take it back,
and do you think twice? No. Do you enjoy those bananas? Yes, you do. I said, but now,
now, what do you do? You come back. You're coming
back from your garden. You're hungry. You see this stalk
of bananas of your brother. Do you cut it down? Do you still
do things like that? They were looking at each other
like this. I'm not kidding. And then one said, yes, we do. And I said, that's true. It's
true. We do. I was teaching them on
these things. And I said, but you cut it down. When you take it home, do you
think about it? Yes, we do. Do you enjoy it? No, we don't. Why is that? Because the word of God speaks
to us. And when we do things like this,
the word of God speaks to us. And we don't feel, literally
this is what they say, we don't feel good. And I said, yeah,
that's true. That's true. And I said, two,
what do you think about? When you think about the word
of God in situations like this, what do you think about? And
this is what they said. They said, we think about Christ,
that he died for me, that his blood was shed for this sin, as well as for all my sins, and
were, I don't know how to, were, How would you say it? That we're
just... distraught, I guess, is the best
way of putting it. That we're distraught when they
think about that. And that's true, isn't it? Why
is that? Because we walk in the light. We have an understanding, don't
we? Given to us. We know Him who
is true. And we're in him who is true.
And yes, we do sin. And his word reveals to us that
if you say you have no sin, you're a liar. And the truth isn't in
you. Yes, as a Lord's people, it's a grief. We do sin. But
the word of God also reveals to us that our holiness is in
Christ. It's not in ourselves. and were
perfectly holy before him in love. In Titus 2.14 we read,
who gave himself for us, that he may redeem us from every lawless
deed and purify for himself his own special people, zealous of
good works. Do you believe God does that
for his people? He does. He does. I just can't
think of myself as zealous of good works. Can you? But God
does, and he does this work in us. And there we see the close association
of purity to those who are saints. We know the blood of Christ cleanses
us from all sin. John writes, if we walk in the
light as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another,
and the blood of Christ cleanses us from all sin. Here's what
Paul writes to the saints in Corinth again. Do you not know
that unrighteousness will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do
not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters,
nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor
covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will
inherit the kingdom of God. But listen, but such were some
of you, and such were some of you, but you were washed, but
you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of
the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of God. A saint is one who has
been washed in the blood of Christ's substitutionary sacrifice. He's
sanctified fully and completely in him, just as surely as he's
justified fully and completely in him. It is true, where sin
abounded, grace abounded much more. Well, just turn, in closing,
just turn over a few pages to Colossians 1. Colossians chapter
one. And in verse nine, Paul, writing
to these saints, says, for this reason also, since the day we
heard of it, well, heard of what? Heard of what? Do not cease to
pray for you, And he goes on to pray for them. But why is
he praying for them? Because he's heard of their faith
in Christ Jesus. That's what he tells them up
above. He's heard of their faith in Christ Jesus and all of these
wonderful things that God has done for these people. He's heard
of that, what God has done, and so he prays for them. Listen
to what he prays. Verse 9, to ask, to ask. Now, Paul, in praying, is making his request known to
God, isn't he? He's asking for good things,
for spiritual things, things he knows are the will of God
the Father for his people, for these saints. Listen, to ask
that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all
wisdom and spiritual understanding, that you may walk worthy of the
Lord, fully pleasing him. There's the Christian life, isn't
it? Fully pleasing Christ, fully pleasing him, being fruitful
in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God, strengthened
with all might according to his glorious power for all patience
and long-suffering with joy. Well, why would Paul have any
expectation that this was going to happen, that this is going
to happen to these people in Colossae or for anyone? because
he knows what God has done. And he thanks the Father for
this wonderful work of grace. Look at verse 12, giving thanks
to the Father who has qualified us. He's qualified us to be partakers
of the inheritance of the saints in the light. He has delivered
us from the power of darkness and translated us into the kingdom
of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through His
blood, the forgiveness of sins. Amen.