Thinking about ways of getting
rich, there are various ways of getting rich. There are ways
that are very hard work. There are ways that require incredible
dedication. You know, lots of people in business
like to think that they've got their wealth, if they are wealthy,
by incredible hard work compared with what others are prepared
to do. You can get rich by crime, but they say it doesn't pay.
Well it ought not to pay and that's not a good way to get
rich. But what is the easiest way to
get rich? Well I guess it's probably by
inheriting some money, isn't it? You know, somebody that you've
never heard of to whom you are related dies and leaves an estate
which is worth a lot of money and you are the only, you're
the next living relative in line and they trace you and they find
you and you suddenly go from having nothing to being rich.
You've inherited something that you didn't earn and you've inherited
that richness by being named in a will. Think about it, if
you were to acquire lots of money, now I know, I know, because I'm
the same, your flesh thinks, oh wouldn't that solve a lot
of problems, oh wouldn't that make life much easier, you know,
if there was suddenly an awful lot of money, would it solve
all the problems? Think about the record of those
that have won large amounts, the prodigal wastage that goes
on, the ruination of lives that results. Flesh finds it all too
easy to covet the sudden acquisition of great wealth by winning lotteries
or whatever other prizes it might be. And the flesh finds it very
easy to covet it. But how corrupting that is. And
how corruptible it is. Lots of money. You know, as I
mentioned in the prayer earlier about the line in Proverbs about
give me neither poverty nor riches. Oh, you think, oh yeah, please
don't give me poverty, but riches will be right. No, don't give
me riches because if I have lots of money I will only learn to
covet the more voraciously. Give me neither poverty nor riches. You see, when you have riches,
how bad it can be for your mind and for your soul. You look at
the very rich people and you look at the children of some
very rich people and you see what a complete mess it's made
of their lives because they've never had to do what others have
had to do which is learning and getting in a position where you
can earn some money and going and making something. You see,
riches are so facilitating of sloth and of greed and of insatiable
covetousness Now Peter, in his first epistle, he sets out before
believers, believers are people who trust the Lord Jesus Christ
for salvation, for their eternal destiny, he sets out before believers
a heavenly inheritance. Not a worldly inheritance of
great material riches, but a heavenly inheritance which is to be coveted
in a very good way. Look at verses one to six of
the first chapter of 1 Peter, with me. 1 Peter, chapter one. Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ,
to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia,
Asia, Bithynia, elect according to the foreknowledge of God the
Father through sanctification of the spirit unto obedience
and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ. Grace unto you,
and peace be multiplied. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, which, according to his abundant mercy,
hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus
Christ from the dead. to an inheritance incorruptible
and undefiled, that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for
you, who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation,
ready to be revealed in the last time, wherein ye greatly rejoice,
though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through
manifold temptations. He talks about a heavenly inheritance,
an inheritance reserved in heaven for you. Let's look at it together. Firstly, the inheritance. Then,
those who inherit it, the inheritors of it. And thirdly, the guarantee
of it. First of all, the inheritance.
Here it is, let's read it again. To an inheritance, he's begotten
us again, it says in verse three, begotten us again to a lively
hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, begotten
us to an inheritance, incorruptible and undefiled, that fadeth not
away, reserved in heaven for you. What is this heavenly inheritance? What is it? Be clear, it's not
like any earthly inheritance at all, except in this respect. Just as an earthly inheritance
is not something you earn as wages, but you inherit by the
fact of your position in a family or whatever else it might be.
You don't work for this. You don't work for it. This inheritance
isn't wages. It is not wages. You see, Paul
says to the Romans, the wages of sin is death, but the gift
of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus, our Lord. It isn't
wages. It generally goes to heirs, a
worldly inheritance goes to the heirs, those who are relatives
by virtue of their relationship with the deceased who's left
their inheritance. But this is different. This is
different from a worldly inheritance. Jesus said to his disciples in
Matthew 6, that's the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 6 verse
20, lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth
nor rust doth corrupt and where thieves do not break through
nor steal. You see this heavenly inheritance
is of an eternal quality. The things that we touch and
feel and see in this world that seems so permanent are of a passing
nature. They're not of eternal quality.
How many of these things are subject to moth and rust? You children might not know this
because you won't remember, but when some of us were much younger,
In your wardrobe you hung these things that were made of naphthalene
with a funny smell. They were moth balls that you
hung amongst your clothes because clothes moths used to get in
and the little grubs that they laid, the eggs that they laid
on your clothes used to hatch into little grubs which used
to chew holes in your clothes. And some of us can remember that,
can't you? You know, you hadn't had a particular garment out
of the wardrobe for some while. You got it out and it would be
full of holes because the moths had got at it. The moth grubs
had got at it. Well, he says, lay up treasure
in heaven, where moth nor rust does not corrupt. Cars don't
rust quite like they used to do. They do still rust, but not
quite like they used to do. I remember the first car that
we bought back in the early 1970s, and within about two years it
was it was just a pile of rust, because rust had corrupted it.
Things of this world get corrupted, they fade. But the inheritance
that Peter is talking about is of eternal quality. So we know
it is not like earthly treasure. This heavenly inheritance, which
Peter says to these, he's writing to these, he says, you've been
begotten again to an inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, fading
not away, reserved in heaven for you. It's not like earthly
treasure, but what is it? What is it? Well, think about
Abram. You know this verse, Genesis
15 verse 1. God said to Abraham, when he
was still called Abram, the reason he was called Abraham was God
said you're going to have many offspring, and that's the difference
in the name, from Abram to Abraham. He's going to be the father of
many nations. He says, fear not, Abram. He said, aye, this is
God speaking to him. Right? God does speak. I am thy
shield and thy exceeding great reward. What am I going to get
out of this, O Lord, says Abraham, as it were, and God says, you're
going to get me. I am thy shield and thy exceeding
great reward. The inheritance of God's people
is God himself. I think, is that all? What? Is
that all? What more can there possibly
be? What more could there possibly be? God who fills the universe,
who is above all things, and beyond all things, and in all
things, and the cause of all things. The inheritance of the
people of God is God himself. Revelation 21 verse 7. This is
the end of Revelation, remember. He that overcometh. He that believes
to the end. shall inherit there's the inheritance
again shall inherit all things and this is God speaking I will
be his God and he shall be my son let me make it quite clear
when God speaks about sons here he's not talking about gender
he's not talking about male and female for in Christ Jesus there
is neither male nor female nor bond nor free no he's not talking
about gender he's talking about relationship You ladies here,
if you're in Christ, you can say you are a son of God, because
it's a relationship thing. If I inherit God himself, listen,
think of this. Now, here's a thought to take
away with you and to chew over and to think about. If I inherit
God himself, everything that he is and has becomes mine to
enjoy eternally. It does. That's what the scriptures
teach us. This firm foundation that we
have in the word of the Lord. 1st John chapter 3 and verse
2, John's first letter, beloved, writing to disciples, to believers,
to followers of Christ. Beloved, now are we the sons
of God. What I said again, relationship,
not gender. Now are we the sons of God. And it does not yet appear what
we shall be. We don't know at this stage what
things will be like beyond the grave in heaven, or after Christ
has come again. We don't yet know what we shall
be, but we do know this, that when He, Christ, shall appear
when we shall either appear before him in glory after we die or
when he shall come to take his people out of this world, when
he shall appear we shall be like him for we shall see him as he
is. What are we going to be like?
We're going to be like Christ. Who is Christ? Very God of very
God. We're going to be like him. We're
not going to be God, obviously, in terms of sovereignty and authority. He is God. But as he made man
in the beginning, Adam, he made him in the image of God. Right? He made him in the image
of God. We're going to be restored to that image of God. We shall
be like him, for we shall see him as he is. Is that your hope? Believer, is that your hope?
Is that your confidence? Oh, let's be in no doubt. However
strong a believer you are, I know that there is a fear of death
in a certain way. The flesh always recoils from
the thought of death. It always does. There's always
a feeling that the process is not going to be a pleasant process,
just like when you know that you, do you remember when you,
I don't know if you still do it now because I haven't been
to a swimming pool for such a long time, but I remember at Lancaster
Swimming Pool, where the water in the pool was quite pleasant.
But before you could get into the water in the pool, you had
to go through this absolutely freezing cold shower. So you
take your nice warm clothes off in a nice warm changing room,
and then you had to go through this kind of foot dip and an
overall shower that was absolutely freezing cold. I don't know how
they managed it, before you could then get in the warm water. And
it was always like, I'm longing to get into there, but there's
this horrible thing I've got to go through. I know that's
a poor illustration, but it's one that John Bunyan used with
Pilgrim, because when Pilgrim was to leave this life and to
go to the celestial city, the river that he had to cross was
chilly, it was cold, and so it is for flesh. None of us in our
flesh relishes the thought of dying. No, there is a fear of
death in the flesh, but for the child of God there is the certainty,
there is the confidence, there is the assurance of eternal bliss,
possessing everything that is God. Possessing everything that
is God. It's the destiny of God's people.
He says he has made us unto our God, kings and priests to our
God. He says Romans 8 17 he says that
the people of God the children of God believers are heirs of
God and joint heirs with Christ so in other words everything
that Christ the Son of Man the Son of God become man so he's
the Son of God and the Son of Man everything that Christ inherits
of the Godhead, because it's all his to possess. He thought
it not robbery to be equal with God. He didn't take anything
away from God that was not rightfully his. He is God, and everything
to which he is heir, the believers, the people of God, the children
of God, are joint heirs with him. But what attributes of God
will we experience in that state? You see, here and now, we live
in a space-time state. Time rolls on. We live in three
dimensions of space. We move around in it. And we
experience God as believers in various of his attributes. You
see, we experience his mercy. As spinners, we're conscious
of the mercy of God. We're conscious of the grace
of God. In this time state, we're conscious of the providential
guidance of God, where he orders all things. All things work together
for good to those who love God, who are the called according
to his purpose. Why do all things work like that?
Do they just happen like that? No, God orders them like that.
God orders all things for the good of his people. He's patient
with us. He's long-suffering with us.
He understands our frame. He knows that we are dust. He
knows how weak and frail we are. These are all attributes of God
that we experience in this space-time state, but in heaven, there will
be no need for those, for sin will be no more. There'll be
no more remembrance of it. The only things that we will
be conscious of is the love of God and the holiness of God. Those things never change. Those
are the eternal abiding experiences of the people of God in a state
of glory. 1 John 4 verse 8 says this, What
is God? God is love. As simple as that. God is love. God is the ultimate,
the perfect, the definition of what it means to love. He is love. And also, Exodus
15 verse 11, God is glorious in holiness. He cannot set that
aside. He is always glorious in holiness. And this Love and holiness of
God constitutes the eternal happiness of heaven. Heaven's going to
be a gloriously happy place. You don't ever think, what are
we going to do? Like John says, it doesn't appear
what we shall be, but we know that when he shall appear, we
shall be like him, for we shall see him as this. But it will
be a perpetually, eternally, timelessly happy state to be
in, eternally. and it will be in the love and
holiness of God. You know how when Adam sinned
they hid themselves from the presence of God because they
knew what they were like now and they were ashamed and they
tried to make coverings for themselves out of fig leaves and they tried
to hide themselves and you know it's all in figurative language
but we know the power of what it means that is what sin does
to us but there, there will be no sin we will be in the eternal
happiness of heaven wallowing as it were the holiness and the
love of everything that God is, possessing everything that God
is. He is our God and we as his people. And that is in stark contrast.
Let us not try to brush over this. This is in stark contrast
to the unending sin and enmity that constitutes the eternal
misery of hell. Why do you have to talk about
that? Why do you have to go and spoil it by talking about that all
of a sudden? Because the Lord Jesus Christ in his earthly ministry,
he said more about hell than he did about heaven, to warn
us in our sin state in the flesh that this is a real thing. That
the God who is holy and God of love is a God who is just and
cannot abide sin, as we saw in Habakkuk a couple of weeks ago.
He's a purer eyes than to behold iniquity. He cannot look upon
sin. So look how this inheritance
in God is described in this verse. It's incorruptible. It's undefiled. It fades not away. It's reserved
in heaven for you. It's incorruptible. Unlike earthly
inheritances, unlike wealth that's acquired by inheritance, this
heavenly inheritance is incorruptible. You see, inheritances on earth
are acquired by all sorts of corrupted, corrupt ways. So much wealth that changes hands
in wills was acquired by sin, by greed, by exploitation of
others. Don't say that that is just something
from the era of the novels of Jane Austen where you see it
or the novels of Dickens. No, no, it's today. It's today. I'm not here to make political
statements, but it occurs to me in these days that we're in
no better condition than they were when chief executives and
directors of big companies are paid hundreds of times more than
the average worker in the company. Oh yes, they should be paid more,
no doubt, but hundreds of times? It's corrupt. It's unjust. It's unfair. It's exploiting
of the workers who work and do their bit and get paid so relatively
little. It's completely wrong. So much
earthly wealth that is passed on is acquired by sin and greed
and exploitation. But in this way also, you see,
all sorts of corrupt ways, but also having got it, earthly wealth
is corruptible because it's vulnerable. Everything you own in this life
is vulnerable. It's vulnerable. It's vulnerable
to theft. It's vulnerable to providential
removal. Remember Job, who was a very
rich man, and was very well blessed, and you read the first two or
three chapters of Job and you'll see how everything that he had,
including his physical health, was taken away from him. Riches
in this life are vulnerable to providential removal. There were
many, many rich people in the 1920s who were rich on stocks
and shares. They kept having these great
big bubbles of economic boom. And one day in the 1920s, late
1920s, there was the New York, the Wall Street crash when the
shares, everybody suddenly panicked and got out of the shares, they
realised that what was underpinning this huge notional wealth was
actually nothing other than fresh air, well not even fresh air,
corrupt air. And people committed suicide
because providentially in a day that which they thought was their
riches was turned into nothing other than worthless bits of
paper. Worthless bits of paper. in various times, there were
times when I remember reading the history about what it was
like at times between the wars in Germany when the mark then
was so devalued that people used to take a wheelbarrow full of
banknotes to go and buy a loaf of bread and even while they
were carrying the wheelbarrow with the notes in there the money
had devalued so much that they still couldn't buy a loaf of
bread with it That's the sort of providential removal that
happens, it does happen, it can happen. Theft and disaster, it's
vulnerable to all these things. As we read, Matthew 6, 19 and
20, don't lay up treasure on earth where moth and rust corrupts. The things of this, the things
of As my physics education taught me, entropy always increases.
Things always become disordered. You start off with something
nice and shiny and as time goes on it gets more and more disordered
until it finally rusts and rots away and needs to be replaced
with something new. The heavenly inheritance of the
people of God is not subject to any of those things. It's
incorruptible. It is not touched in any way
by any of the things of sin that touch the things of this life.
And it's undefiled. Undefiled? when you're trying to keep some
clothes clean, and there's just a little job to do, and it's
just a bit, I mean I always find this, that I've just put a clean
shirt on, a clean pair of trousers, and I just think, oh, just that
thing out in the garden just needs to, it won't take me a
minute, and I come back in and my good wife says to me, look
what you've done, look, you know, dirty hands on your shirt, I
didn't do it. Oh, well, I must have done. There's
the fingerprints. They're defiled, you see. It becomes defiled.
Things in this life are defiled. They're dirtied with sinful handling. Inheritances in this life are
dirtied by sinful handling. Not this heavenly inheritance,
not that one, it's undefiled. And the things of this life,
they fade away. But this one in heaven never
fades away, because there's no time in heaven, it's eternity. And time doesn't change that
inheritance in heaven. It's newness never diminishes. Just as things in this life,
their newness always diminishes. And the more valuable a thing
is, it's a testimony to how long-lasting it is. You know, long-lasting
jewels and gold and platinum and diamonds and things like
this. The value in them is that they tend not to change much. But even them, they're not. utterly
incorruptible, they're not utterly preserved forever, they do eventually
fade in respects, and it's reserved in heaven for you. Reserved means
it's kept secure in God's own utterly safe keeping until we
go to possess it. This is the nature of the inheritance
of those who are the people of God who believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ. Some of you who are young, to
you, death is far away. Others of you who are older,
death is much nearer. It's just a fact of life. As
we grow older, we get a day nearer to the day of our death. What
a blessing to be confident that whenever death comes for you,
it is but an entrance into a glorious heavenly inheritance. But here's
the second point, the inheritors. Who are those who are destined
to inherit it? Because for sure, unlike the
false thinking of the religious world, it is not everybody, without
exception. Who are those destined to inherit
this heavenly inheritance? Whose names are included on the
will that is to be read out? Who are the you? You know when
Peter writes to you, to you, to you, reserved in heaven for
you, when he writes to you, who is he addressing? Who is he talking
to? Remember this is Peter, an apostle. In verse one he says it, Peter,
an apostle, a messenger of Jesus Christ, a special messenger,
a once only messenger, just for the start of the New Testament
church. Twelve, twelve, not thirteen, not Matthias, Paul the Apostle
was chosen in place of Judas Iscariot, and Peter was an apostle,
just one of them, one of the twelve, ordained of God and inspired
by the Holy Spirit to bring the truth of the gospel of God's
grace. Peter is an apostle. He's not
the Pope, he's not the first Pope, he never was. Peter is
a man who is not infallible, as was claimed of the Pope. No,
Peter was a man who knew. He said to the Lord Jesus Christ,
depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man. When he saw When
it was revealed to him who the Lord Jesus Christ was, who that
man was, depart from me, Lord, I am a sinful man. He knew he
was weak in himself. I will never betray you, he said,
the night before the crucifixion. And Jesus said, I tell you the
truth, Peter, tonight before the cock crows, you will deny
me three times. And so he did. three times. That bravado rapidly turned to
cowardice and he denied the Lord Jesus Christ. He was hypocritical
even as an apostle he knew his weakness because Paul had to
confront him and withstand him to the face over his hypocrisy
that he used to eat with the Gentile believers and then when
some Jews who were Judaizers came from Jerusalem Peter withdrew
himself and wouldn't eat with the Gentiles anymore, and Paul
said to him, you're completely wrong, because you're denying
the Gospel in what you're doing. No, this is a man who knew his
own weakness, but he was an apostle, a messenger of Jesus Christ.
That weak man was transformed into a powerful preacher on the
day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit came upon him. and he
is a man who knew that he was nothing but for the grace of
God but here he is writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit
and he's writing in verse one to strangers scattered throughout
various places scattered strangers but then look what he calls them
in verse two elect elect. Chosen. Specifically chosen,
meaning specifically chosen by God, according to the foreknowledge
of God the Father. Not chosen because God stared
into a crystal ball and saw that they would be the people who
would choose him, not at all. Jesus said, you did not choose
me, I chose you, and that's always the way it is. God chose his
people. Chosen in Christ Blessed be the
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, says Paul to the Ephesians,
who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in heavenly
places in Christ, just as he chose us in him. He made a choice. There are some that I will have
and there are others that I will pass by. He made a choice. That's the foreknowledge. It's
not crystal ball gazing. It's intimate choice in love. set apart by the Spirit, look,
through sanctification of the Spirit, that's setting apart
of the Spirit, unto obedience, and sprinkling of the blood of
Jesus Christ, redeemed by the Son's blood. Here we have the
Trinity working in salvation. Before the beginning of time,
the Father, the Son, and the Spirit covenanted together. One
God in three persons covenanted together to save a people from
their sins, for their own glory, for a bride for the Son, to be
with Him in heaven in perfect bliss, and each one of them covenanted
to do their part. The Father in love choosing,
the Son in grace coming, and in humility standing as substitute
and paying the penalty to the justice of God for the sins of
his people and the Spirit in time calling each and every one
of them out. Verse 3, blessed then, blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, worthy of
praise the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the God
of Scripture, the God who is revealed in Scripture, the Covenant
God, the God who in the Old Testament is known as the God of Abraham
and Isaac and of Jacob. Why? Because that's the covenant
name of God, because of the covenant he made with them. But in the
New Testament he's known as the God and Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ. You see, for God to redeem his
people from the curse of the law the curse of the law the
soul that sins it shall die the soul that sins it shall die the
justice of God insists for God to redeem his people from that
curse to satisfy divine justice so that divine justice says I've
examined the case and there is no case to answer and that justice
says the soul that sins it must die For God, to redeem his people,
whilst justly justifying those sinners who he redeems, he himself,
God alone, must come and pay the penalty to the offended law
of God. He alone is able. There's nobody
else able. He alone is able. Nobody else
could bear the sins of another. Each one of us is a sinner. All
we can ever do is pay for our own sins in an eternity of hell. But he, the infinite God become
man, the son of man, he taking on him flesh, is able to do it. You see, deity, the Godhead,
himself, cannot suffer and die. God cannot die. God cannot suffer
and die. So the second person of the Trinity,
God in Christ, just as the children he came to save, says Hebrews
2, were partakers of flesh and blood, are we not all? You cut
yourself, you'll bleed, there's blood in there. Flesh and blood. Just as we took on flesh and
blood, it says he himself, the Son of God, Christ, took on flesh
as the Son of Man. And that's what we celebrate
when we have communion, the broken bread and the shed body. is a
reminder to us that the basis of our acceptance with God is
that Christ came and as a substitute in our place, His body was broken
and His blood was shed so that the offended law of God says
there's no case to answer. Because the debts have been paid,
I'm satisfied, the sins have been paid for, there is nothing
more to pay. And so, nothing more to pay,
God justly justifies those people for whom Christ died. And he
particularly bought his people. Paul says to the believers in
Corinth, he says, you are bought, you're not your own, you are
bought with a price. Believer, if you know that you
trust the Lord Jesus Christ, you do not belong to yourself.
You've been bought. you've been bought out of the
slave market of sin where you were Satan's property and you
belong to another who is Christ and just as we read in Numbers
about the Levites the Levites were particularly exchanged for
the firstborn remember the firstborn coming out of Egypt at the time
of the Passover the firstborn belonged to the Lord the firstborn
of them all the families and the animals all it says belong
to the Lord but he exchanged them for the Levites and there
was a difference 22,000 Levites and 22,273 firstborn of the rest
of the tribes and he didn't just swap them and say well that's
near enough God said, as we saw in that reading, there were 273
for whom had to be paid five shekels of redemption money per
person, per firstborn. And they were redeemed. And the
money was given to Aaron. Do you see? It's symbolical. Try not to be confused by it.
The point is this. The redemption that God has accomplished
in Christ is a very specific redemption. Christ came to die
for whom? The people the Father gave to
him before the beginning of time. That's a fact. Oh, that's not
fair. You go and argue it with God, but that's what his word
declares. And if you trust him, you know
that you're amongst them. So it was a very precise redemption,
and God the Father elected a particular people, elect according to the
foreknowledge of God. The Holy Spirit sanctified them,
the Son redeemed them precisely, and Peter writes to them, scattered
strangers. To the world, they're nothing. What are we who believe to this
world around? Insignificant. Look at the news,
look at what goes on, look how the world conducts its affairs.
Believers are nothing in the eyes of the world. but to the
God who created all and sustains all. They're the apple of his
eye. In other words, They're a point
that he's very keen to, you know the apple of your eye, it's the
bit right in the middle, right. If I say to you now, open your
eyelids wide and poke yourself in the eye, you can't do it,
can you? Because it's such a tender, sensitive point, you can't even
stand to poke yourself in the eye, never mind get accidentally
poked in the eye, you just can't do it. God says he regards his
people as that point, he will not have them touched. He will
not. They're the apple of his eye.
But how do I know that I'm numbered among them? Is this not the key
question? How do I know that my name? You see, there is a
book in heaven that none of us have ever seen in. It's called
the Lamb's Book of Life. In Revelation 20, towards the
end of it, we talk about the judgment falling, but there were
those whose names were written in the Lamb's Book of Life and
they were taken into glory. But how do I know that my name
is written in the Lamb's Book of Life? There's only one way.
And it's by the testimony of this firm foundation that we
have in front of us. How firm a foundation, ye saints
of the Lord. What does it tell us? It's only
by the word of truth's testimony. Look in verse 5. Who is it that
are written in the Lamb's book of life who are to inherit this
heavenly inheritance? You who are kept by the power
of God through faith. unto salvation, ready to be revealed
in the last time. You are kept. The word there
is garrisoned. You know, like a military garrison,
a military fort that is there to protect? You are kept. God,
the God of the universe, keeps you, garrisons you, powerfully
protects and preserves you. Jesus said to the disciples,
none can pluck the people of God out of the Father's hand.
He said, my Father is greater than all. None can overcome him. We are kept, we are garrisoned.
And how are we garrisoned? Through faith. Through faith. How do you know you're amongst
the elect of God? How do you know that you are
in the Lamb's book of life? You have the faith of the elect
of God. You believe the Gospel of Grace
as He has revealed it exactly here. You do not corrupt it with
Baal worship, which is all around us in the name of Christianity,
which is a false, false religion. The religion of God is the religion
of this book, and it is a book of particular redemption. And
we know we possess it by faith, like the Thessalonians. Beloved,
we are bound to give thanks to God for you. Beloved of the Lord,
for God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation. How
do I know? through sanctification of the
Spirit and belief of the truth. You believe the Gospel and you're
set apart for His service. And so we see, spiritually, and
we know God's secret. The fear of the Lord, remember
Psalm 25, wasn't it? The fear of the Lord is with
them that fear Him. Sorry, the secret of the Lord
is with them that fear Him, and He will show them His covenant.
We know what it is, truly, as a child, as a son of God, to
fear him, to be constrained by his love, to be constrained by
his gospel precepts. This is what it is. This is how
you know that you're in the Lamb's Book of Life. Are you aware of
being kept, garrisoned by the power of God, through faith,
unto salvation? Yes, you're saved when you believe.
You know you're saved when you believe, but you're finally saved.
This is why it says somewhere, the redemption of our bodies
is nearer now than it was before, because finally it's accomplished
when we're taken from this life into eternity with Christ. That's
when salvation is finally accomplished. Kept by the power of God through
faith to salvation. If that's your experience, then
you're entitled to rest confident in the knowledge that this heavenly
inheritance is yours. And finally, just in a few words,
what's the guarantee of it? It's the resurrection of Christ.
Begotten us again, verse 3, unto a lively hope by the resurrection
of Jesus Christ from the dead. The guarantee of it. The guarantee
of an earthly will is a legal document. held by a lawyer, a
solicitor somewhere, and it's got your name on it. And if you
live in a country like the country we live in, which is such a blessed
still country to live in compared with many in the world, because
the rule of law applies in this country, not who you know and
who you are and how big your dad is and how you can bully
others, no, the rule of law, that's the guarantee of the legal
will that will give you the money that you inherit from a relative.
What about the heavenly one? guarantee of it is the historical
fact of Christ's resurrection. It's a historical fact, it really
is. Do you know there was a man some
time ago, I can't remember his name, he set out to disprove
the resurrection and he researched and he was going to write a book
and he ended up writing a book called Who Moved the Stone? which
was an affirmation of the truth of the resurrection, because
the more he looked into it, the more God the Spirit spoke to
him and convinced him that Christ did rise from the dead. The apostles
believed that Christ rose from the dead. They didn't do what
they did in order to get rich in worldly terms, of course not.
All they got for this was persecution, but it says in Acts 4.33, with
great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of
the Lord Jesus. In Romans 1.4 it says, that Christ
was declared to be the Son of God with power according to the
spirit of holiness. What declared that? By the resurrection
from the dead. It was his resurrection that
proved it. In Ephesians 2, verse 5, talking about your being brought
to a knowledge of the truth. When we were dead in sins, hath
quickened us together with Christ, by grace ye are saved, and hath
raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places
in Christ Jesus. The whole of Scripture testifies
to the truth of the resurrection of Christ and that is our guarantee.
He is the firstfruits. You pick the firstfruits of the
season and you know more's coming. And the more to come are the
people of God. We have confidence. We could read 1 Corinthians 15
but we haven't got time. Confidence. Confidence. Verse
six, verse six, wherein ye greatly rejoice. You rejoice despite
the difficulties of this time, you rejoice, but we're destined,
if you're a believer, you're destined for a heavenly inheritance
which is glorious, irrespective of worldly status. Irrespective
of being scattered strangers, irrespective of being those in
the gallery of faith in Hebrews 11 who were so badly treated,
you're blessed with all spiritual blessings in Christ. Heirs of
God, joint heirs with Him.