Welcome to our program. Now today
the title of the message is Your Election of God. Your Election of God. Now I've taken that title from
the book of 1 Thessalonians in the New Testament, 1 Thessalonians,
that's the Apostle Paul's epistle or letter to the church at Thessalonica
And in 1 Thessalonians chapter 1, if you'd like to follow along
in your Bibles, I'm going to talk about your election of God. Paul writes here as he opens
the letter to the church at Thessalonica, he speaks in verse 4, he says,
knowing brethren, now that's key to understanding election
of God, knowing brethren, beloved, your election of God. Now many people when they hear
this term election or the biblical doctrine of election as they
see it or as they think about it, are immediately turned off
by that term. And the reason is, is because
on the whole people are very confused about the doctrine of
election. People are very ignorant or confused.
They've heard so many negative things from so many preachers.
They want to talk about the free will of man and that is not a
scriptural doctrine and I'll show you that. But I want you
to think about this now. Election is a gospel doctrine
and it's a doctrine of joy and peace. And I want to show you
that if God had not chosen or elected a people, there would
be no salvation. Now the reason is this, the Bible
teaches from Genesis to Revelation that man fell in Adam And that
as a result of that fall, sin spread through the whole human
race. Man was brought under condemnation, under the curse of the law in
Adam, when Adam fell. For by Adam, in Adam all die. Adam was the representative of
the whole human race. And when he fell, I fell, you
fell. You say, well I wasn't there. Not personally, but you
were in a representative and his name was Adam. Now it was
God who chose Adam to be the representative of the whole human
race. Adam was the first man. And the
Bible teaches plainly that when Adam fell, when man fell, brought
under condemnation, that the whole human race, we fell in
Adam. As a result, when we are born in this natural state, human
flesh, we are born spiritually dead in trespasses and sins.
And that means we cannot choose God because we will not choose
God. Man has the mental capacity to
do so. He has a mind, he has affections,
he has a will. But the Bible teaches that man
will not come to God, will not seek after the Lord, will not
come to Christ on his own will. And the reason is, is because
of our own sinfulness, our selfishness, our self-righteousness. That's
the problem. You see, sin is a matter of the
heart. And that's what we call total
depravity. It doesn't, total depravity does not mean that
every person in the world is as bad as we could be. For God
has his restraining hand on some, many of us. If God removed his
restraining hand from us, we would be just terrible, terrible
people in every way to the depths of depravity and sin. But God
holds us back, you see, for his purposes. He overrules us. But
total depravity means this, there are none righteous, no not one,
in and of themselves. and there are none who can attain
righteousness by their works. By deeds of law shall no flesh
be justified." Well, the Bible teaches that before the foundation
of the world, God chose a people in Christ. And that he set, having
set his love upon them unconditionally and freely, without a cause in
them, because by nature we're all in the same boat. None of
us deserve salvation. None of us can earn salvation.
But God chose a people out of this mess of humanity, and he
conditioned all of our salvation upon Christ. Now the Bible teaches
this doctrine of election in the book of Ephesians chapter
1. It says in verse 3, Blessed be the God and Father of our
Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings
in heavenly places in Christ. according as he hath chosen us
in him before the foundation of the world, that we should
be holy and without blame before him in love, having predestinated
us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself according
to the good pleasure of his will." Now that's what the Scripture
says, and the Bible teaches it plainly and often. Now somebody
says, well that leaves me out then. No, now listen to me. There
are basically three ways. You know, whenever we come to
passages of scripture or truth in the Bible that we cannot completely
understand in our logical minds, in our finite minds, men have
a tendency to deal with them in one of two ways. Some will just simply deny the
truth of it altogether. Now, for example, one way of
dealing with the doctrine of election that I've heard is people
say, well, that was just for the Jews in the Old Testament.
But here Paul in 1 Thessalonians 1, he's talking to Gentiles and
Jews who made up the church at Thessalonica and he says, knowing
brethren, beloved, your election of God. God chose you, that's
what he's saying. I know God chose you. And he's
not saying, well I know you Jews, now just the Jews in Thessalonica,
God chose you. No, he says, knowing brethren,
beloved of the Lord, beloved, your election of God. So it's
not just for the Jews, it's for God's elect people known as spiritual
Israel. That's every believer in the
Lord Jesus Christ. That's who Paul's talking about
here. Brethren in the faith. So some people, in order to deal
with it, they just deny it. They say, well, it's not true.
God didn't choose us. We choose Him. Therefore, man
is the captain of his own faith, the determiner of his own destiny,
and salvation is conditioned on man's choice and not God.
Well, my friend, that's works religion. Other people take that
such a doctrine and they say, well, man is not responsible
at all then. He's a robot and he can't do
anything. Now listen to me. That's not
what the Bible teaches. And you say, well preacher, how
do you explain these things or make them work in our minds?
I'm not trying to do that. I'm just trying to teach you
what the Bible says. And I know this. The Bible teaches
that God is absolutely sovereign and man is totally responsible. Now that's what the Scripture
teaches. The doctrine of election, the truth of election, the preaching
of it, the revelation of it, does not shut you out of the
kingdom of heaven. If you're shut out of the kingdom
of heaven, you do it because you refuse to believe in the
Lord Jesus Christ. Now, you may say, well, I can't
make that all fit in my mind. Well, welcome to the club. Nobody
can. That's not the issue here. But here the Apostle Paul says,
knowing brethren, beloved your election of God. Now, here's
the question that I want you to consider. How can I know that
God chose me? How can Paul know here that these
people were elect of God? And he begins in verse 5 to give
the evidences of election. And that's what this message
is about. And what I pray, and what I hope that when you hear
this message, that it will motivate you by the power of the Holy
Spirit to seek the Lord and believe on Him. That's what I want. You can argue about election
till you're blue in the face and you won't get anywhere. If
you stand in opposition to God and His election of grace, then
you stand in opposition to God, you'll have no one to blame but
yourself. I hear preachers say, well that
means only the elect can come to God and all of this and that
leaves everybody... Listen, the Bible nowhere commands
you, or me, or any sinner, to sit around and find out who the
elect are, who the non-elect are, whether or not you can be
elect, or whatever. It commands you to seek the Lord.
And you're hearing what I'm saying right now. You're fully responsible
and accountable to do so. Now, here's what Paul says. He
says in verse 5, here's the first evidence. He says, "...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." What Paul is simply
saying there is that I know your election of God because you believe
the gospel of Christ. The gospel was not just mere
words that you heard with the physical ear. It wasn't just
in word only, but it was in the power of the Holy Spirit who
came to you and gave you a heart to believe in Christ. The gospel
here is the good news of salvation by God's free and sovereign grace
in Christ. It involves how God saves sinners
by His mercy and His grace based solely upon what Christ accomplished
at Calvary in His obedience unto death. The gospel is the power
of God unto salvation, Paul wrote in Romans 1 16, to everyone that
believe it. You see, if you hear the gospel
that I'm preaching to you, but you refuse to believe it, then
I can tell you that the gospel has not yet been made the power
of God unto salvation unto you. But when you come to see the
glory of Christ, the glory of God in the salvation of sinners,
how God can be both a just God and a Savior, a righteous Judge
and a loving Father, based solely upon the shed blood and the righteousness
of Christ imputed, which you receive by faith, which is the
gift of God, then I can tell you that the Word of God came
to you in power. It's the power of God and the
salvation to you. Now that's what Paul's saying,
knowing your election of God because you believed in Christ,
you've embraced Christ, you've reached out to Him. My friend,
listen to me very carefully here. There has never been and there
will never be any sinner who comes to God for salvation who
does not receive it. I can tell you that because that's
what this Word says. God says, if you'll seek me,
you'll find me. Now, it's true that those who
seek Him, it's because He sought them. Christ said that. He said,
I came to seek and to save that which was lost. The lost sheep
of the house of Israel, He's speaking of His elect among the
Jews. And you see, that's who he died
for. He was the representative of a people. He went to the cross
of Calvary, having their sins charged to his account. And he
established a righteousness by his obedience unto death, which
God charges to the account of every one of his people. And
His righteousness demands that they be born again. That's another
way of saying this. He says, for our gospel came
not unto you in word only, but also in power. That's the new
birth. That's the work of the Holy Spirit
in a sinner. To bring that sinner under conviction
of sin and to drive that sinner to Christ. Now, will you believe
in the Lord Jesus Christ? That's the issue. Will you seek
Him for mercy? You cannot save yourself. You
cannot work your way into God's favor. You cannot, by deeds of
the law, make yourself righteous. There's only one way that you
can be made righteous, and that's in Christ and Him crucified.
A man asked me one time, and he was studying the doctrine
of election himself, and he said, well, where does that leave me?
And my answer to him was simply this, and it would be the same
to you who have that question. It leaves you where you need
to be, at the mercy of God. My friend, there's no better
place to be than at God's mercy. Because He is a merciful God.
But now listen to me. His mercy is in Christ and Him
crucified. His mercy is in nowhere else.
If you seek mercy in the church, or in the baptismal waters, or
in any other way, in your works, in your tears, you won't find
it. Mercy is at the mercy seat. And the mercy seat is Christ
and Him crucified. So come unto me, Christ said,
all ye that labor and are heavy laden. Are you labored and heavy
laden? Are you burdened down with religion and works, people
trying to get you to work your way into God's favor? He says,
I'll give you rest. Do you want the rest and the
peace and the assurance that can only come from Christ and
him crucified? Remember, Paul wrote here, he
says, for our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also
in power and in the Holy Ghost and in much assurance. You see,
I know your election of God, he says, because you're resting
in the person, the God-man, the Lord Jesus Christ, and his finished
work at Calvary for all your salvation. And all that the Holy
Spirit does within us in the new birth is the fruit and the
result of Christ's work on the cross to save us from our sins. And he says, you know what manner
of men we were among you for your sake. In other words, you
know what kind of people we were when we come in and preach the
gospel. Paul's saying this. He said, I wasn't promoting myself. I wasn't trying to gain a following
for myself. I was like John the Baptist.
I pointed you to Christ. And that's the preaching of the
gospel. It's the gospel of God's grace. Are you a sinner? The
Bible says Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.
of whom I am chief." That's what Paul wrote, and that's what I
say. God, the Holy Spirit, in the new birth, He circumcises
the heart, the Scripture says, spiritual circumcision. And that's
when He brings a sinner to conviction of sin, to show him his guilt
and his depravity, even the depravity of his own will, and to drive
that sinner to Christ. You see, salvation is not the
result of a choice you make. Salvation is the result of God
bringing you to conviction. Now, we do make choices. Don't
get me wrong. Somebody says, well, don't we
choose Christ? Yes, we do. But only when we see our need
of Him. And it is God, by His revelation,
through the Spirit and the Word, the Gospel, that shows us our
need of Him. I'll give you an illustration
of that. If you had a dreaded terminal
illness, and you were dying, but you didn't know it. Now that's
possible, isn't it? You didn't know about this disease,
but it's in your body. It might be heart disease, it
could be cancer, whatever. But that disease is going to
kill you. But right now you don't feel
any symptoms. Well, you're not going to go
to the doctor and seek a cure for a disease that you do not
know you have, even though you have it. It is only when you
realize by the symptoms that you have the disease that you're
going to seek the cure. And my friend, it's the same
way here in this thing of election and salvation and believing.
If you understand what sin really is and how much of a sinner we
are and how much we are so far away from God in ourselves that
we cannot be saved by our best efforts to keep the law. Then
we see that Christ and Him alone, His blood, His righteousness
alone, is our only hope of salvation. Then we'll seek Him, and when
we seek Him, we'll find Him. Now I'm telling you to seek the
Lord. Now Paul says in verse 6, he says, And you became followers
of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction,
with joy of the Holy Ghost. The next evidence of election
is you became disciples of Christ. Now Paul wrote here, he says,
you became followers of us, but he doesn't mean you just became
followers of them, but you became followers of us and of the Lord.
What Paul is saying is simply this, you followed me as I pointed
you to Christ. In other words, you weren't really
following me as a person, I'm not your Savior, but you followed
Christ as I pointed you to Him. So in other words, it's not just
to make a profession of faith, Your election of God is not evidenced
by just simply saying that you believe something or in someone. Your election of God is evidenced
by being a continual follower and a disciple of Christ. You
see, faith in Christ is a lifestyle. It's a life walk. It's a life
vocation. It's not just a one-time thing.
Many people that come in and talk to me about salvation will
always go back to an experience they had back when they were
young, whether they were 12, 13, they walked an aisle, they
got baptized, and they call that their profession of faith. And
some will say, well, they had a dream or they have all kinds
of experiences. Well, my friend, that's not salvation.
Salvation is a lifetime. It's an eternal lifetime. It
doesn't stop here in this life because when we die, we go to
be with the Lord and we'll live with him forever. But it is a
continual following of Christ. He said, when he said, come unto
me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, I'll give you rest.
He said, take my yoke upon you. He said, for my yoke is easy,
my burden is light. And he says, learn of me. That
means be a disciple of me. That means that his word, which
has been implanted into your heart, and the Spirit who indwells
you, continually points you to Christ and to his word for your
guidance and your lifestyle. And then Paul says in verse 7,
he said, here's the next evidence, he says, so that you were in
samples or examples to all that believe in Macedonia and Achaia. Macedonia and Achaia were other
places close to Thessalonica. And what he's saying to these
believers is that you were born again by the Spirit, You became
disciples of Christ, continually believing on Him, and then examples
to others in Achaia and Macedonia. In other words, in your area
where people see you and know you and you live your lives,
you were witnesses of the grace of God, examples of the grace
of God. Now many people have a misunderstanding
of what it is to be an example. Certainly it is to be moral.
Certainly it is to be kind and loving. but it's also to testify
of the good news, the gospel. We must be witnesses for Christ,
not witnesses showing off for ourselves. And then in verse
8 he says, for from you sounded out the word of the Lord. Now
this is what Paul's saying here. He's showing you specifically
how they were examples to all that believed. For from you sounded
out the word of the Lord, not only in Macedonia and Achaia,
but also in every place. Your faith to God's word is spread
abroad, so that we need not to speak anything." In other words,
you were witnesses of the gospel. You know, over in Matthew chapter
5 verse 16, in the Sermon on the Mount, Christ said, Let your
light so shine before men that they may see your good works,
and glorify your Father which is in heaven." The light there
is not the good works. The good works are the work of
God in His people. And it's the light that shines
on those works so that we can see that they're good. You see,
the light is the gospel of God's grace. The goal is to glorify
the Father, not the man. So that when we let our light
shine, we're doing what the Thessalonians did here, we're sounding out
the word of the Lord. Not only in this place, but in
other places. And Paul says in verse 9, For
they themselves show of us what manner of entering in we had
unto you. And how, now listen to this,
here's the next one. How you turn to God from idols to serve
the living and true God. Now when you turn to God, from
idols to serve the living and true God, that's repentance.
Whenever a sinner is born again by the Spirit, whenever the Word
of God becomes the power of God unto salvation, and that sinner
turns to Christ for all wisdom, righteousness, holiness, and
redemption, whenever that sinner rests in Christ and finds his
peace and hope in Christ, He also turns away from every other
refuge, every other false way. He repents, as the book of Hebrews
puts it, from dead works and former idolatry. The Apostle
Paul described this in the book of Philippians chapter 3, when
he was talking about how believers, those who are the circumcised,
spiritually speaking, of the heart, worship God in spirit,
that is, as God reveals himself, and from the heart, the heart
that God gives us, and that sinner who is circumcised and worships
God in spirit, he says in verse 3 of Philippians 3, is one who
rejoices in Christ Jesus. Now that's having confidence
in Christ, and he has no confidence in the flesh. That's repentance.
And Paul has a list there in Philippians 3. You can read it
sometimes that he lists. He said all the things that he
thought recommended him unto God. His heritage, his pedigree,
his works, his zeal, his religion. He said, I count them all but
dumb that I may win Christ and be found in him. He said, when
I saw what God requires of a sinner to be saved, I found that everything
that I thought recommended me unto God was now dead works,
even dumb. And the God that I believed accepted
those things was an idol, or is an idol. So what did he do?
Well, he turned from idols to serve the living and true God.
My friend, have you repented of your own works and have you
turned to Christ to rest in his work accomplished at Calvary?
Verse 10 says, And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he
raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath
to come. What Paul is saying there is
an evidence of your election of God is that you live your
life in expectation of the world to come. Who is Jesus Christ? He is God in human flesh. What
did he do for his people? He obeyed unto death and paid
their sin debt in full paid the debt in full, and established
righteousness by which God is enabled to justify the ungodly. He redeemed His people from their
sins. He ensured the eternal well-being
of all whom He represented and for whom He died. He was buried
and He arose again the third day for our justification. And
now he is ascended unto the Father, and he's seated at the right
hand of God, and he ever lives there as God in human flesh to
make intercession for his people so that he is our advocate continually. Now, he's coming back again.
He's coming back for two things. He's going to judge this world
in righteousness, and they're going to be damned forever. but
he's going to gather his people together unto himself and we
shall all be glorified. We'll all be changed in the twinkling
of an eye because this corruptible, this fleshly body must put on
incorruption, a new glorified body. So your election of God
is evidenced by these things. Now what I say to you is believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ. Don't wait another minute. Don't
sit around and wrestle with these hard questions and make them
your excuse for not coming to Christ. If you do, you'll have
nobody to blame but yourself. I'm telling you, there'll be
no sinner in heaven who'll say, God, I wanted to come to Christ,
but you wouldn't let me. No, sir. And there'll be no sinner
who stands before God in Christ and who will rise up and say,
well, God, I did it all. It was of me and not of you.
No, sir. Salvation is of the Lord. And
I hope that you've enjoyed this message. I hope this helped to
give you some light on this subject of Your Election of God. That's
the title. And if you'd like to get a copy
of this message, just listen to the announcers. He'll give
you the details to order. Your Election of God is the title.
and I hope you'll join us next week for another message from
God's Word.