For the last couple of weeks, I have been listening to Pastor Colin Smith preach on the anatomy of faith. He goes through the ears of faith, the hands of faith, the mouth of faith, and the voice of faith. The anatomy of faith is acting like God is telling the truth; faith is acting like it is so even when it is not so so that it might be so simply because God said so.
The Oxford Dictionary says that the word anatomy means: a study of the structure or internal workings of something:So faith is the opposite of sight, acting and judging things based solely on what we can see and perceive with our human senses. Faith always involves your feet. It is an action of your life, not merely words from your lips. A person can feel like they lack faith but still be full of faith if they choose to obey what God has revealed to do or say. Faith is not merely a feeling; it is an action in response to God’s revealed will.
Hebrews 11: 1-3 says: Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For by it, the people of old received their commendation. By faith, we understand that the universe was created by the word of God so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.
Verse 6 of Hebrews 11 says: And without faith, it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.
Remember that faith always involves your feet.
Let’s listen to Pastor Colin Smith take the part of the anatomy of faith called the feet: Walking in Obedience to Christ and what that looks like. Here’s Pastor Colin Smith:
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Welcome to Biblical Talks Podcast with Michael Tolliver, this podcast is dedicated to biblical teaching and having world views discussions from a biblical perspective. Here is today’s Podcast.
Each month, Elder Tolliver offers a spiritually encouraging book to help you in your walk with Christ for any size donation. Please go to biblicaltalks.com website to take advantage of this opportunity.
Thank you for listening to Biblical Talks. This Podcast is solely supported by listener donations. Please go to biblicaltalks.com to support this podcast and have a blessed day.
For the last couple of weeks, I have been listening to Pastor Colin Smith preach on the anatomy of faith. He goes through the ears of faith, the hands of faith, the mouth of faith, and the voice of faith. The anatomy of faith is acting like God is telling the truth; faith is acting like it is so even when it is not so so that it might be so simply because God said so.
The Oxford Dictionary says that the word anatomy means: a study of the structure or internal workings of something:So faith is the opposite of sight, acting and judging things based solely on what we can see and perceive with our human senses. Faith always involves your feet. It is an action of your life, not merely words from your lips. A person can feel like they lack faith but still be full of faith if they choose to obey what God has revealed to do or say. Faith is not merely a feeling; it is an action in response to God’s revealed will.
Hebrews 11: 1-3 says: Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For by it, the people of old received their commendation. By faith, we understand that the universe was created by the word of God so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.
Verse 6 of Hebrews 11 says: And without faith, it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.
Remember that faith always involves your feet.
Let’s listen to Pastor Colin Smith take the part of the anatomy of faith called the feet: Walking in Obedience to Christ and what that looks like. Here’s Pastor Colin Smith:
Thank you for listening to Biblical talks. To support this podcast please go to biblicaltalks.com Have a blessed day.
Welcome to Biblical Talks Podcast with Michael Tolliver, this podcast is dedicated to biblical teaching and having world views discussions from a biblical perspective. Here is today’s Podcast.
Each month, Elder Tolliver offers a spiritually encouraging book to help you in your walk with Christ for any size donation. Please go to biblicaltalks.com website to take advantage of this opportunity.
Thank you for listening to Biblical Talks. This Podcast is solely supported by listener donations. Please go to biblicaltalks.com to support this podcast and have a blessed day.
Welcome to Biblical Talk. I am Elder Michael Tolliver. The last couple of weeks I have been listening to Pastor Colin Smith preach on the anatomy of faith. He goes through the ears of faith, the hands of faith, the mouth of faith and the voice of faith. The anatomy of faith is acting like God is telling the truth. Faith is acting like it is so even when it is not so, in order that it might be so, simply because God said so. The Oxford Dictionary says that the word anatomy means a study of the structure or internal workings or something. So faith is the opposite of sight, acting and judging things based solely on what we can see and perceive with our human sense.
Speaker 1:
Faith always involves your feet. It is an action of your life, not merely words from your lips. A person can feel like they lack faith, but still be full of faith if they choose to obey what God has revealed, to do or say. Faith is not merely a feeling. It is an action in response to God's revealed will. Hebrews 11, verse 1 to 3, says Now, faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen For. By it, the people of old received their accommodation. By faith, we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible. Verse 6 of Hebrews 11 says and without faith it is impossible to please him. For whoever will draw near to God must believe that he exists and he is a rewarder of those who seek him. Remember that faith always involves your feet. Now let's listen to Pastor Colin Smith. Takes part of the anatomy of faith called the feet, walking obedience to Christ and what that looks like. Here's Pastor Colin Smith.
Speaker 2:
And please have your Bible open at Romans, chapter one and verse five. Here's Pastor Colin Smith, that biblical faith is clearly more than signing off on certain beliefs. After all, the devil knows that Jesus is the Son of God, he knows that he died on the cross and certainly knows that he rose from the dead. Saving faith is more than accepting that these things are true. It is more than a decision. It is more than saying a prayer. We are learning that faith is the bond of a living union with Jesus Christ, in which a man or a woman comes to love him and to trust him and to serve him. That's what faith is, and we are using the analogy of a human body to help us think about what faith does. Faith has ears, hearing the word of Christ. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ. Faith has hands serving with the love of Christ. Faith has a mouth feeding on the bread of Christ, a voice declaring the praise of Christ and knees. Last time we looked at praying in the name of Christ, and today we're getting down to the business end of the series, as it were feet, feet walking in obedience to Christ, and that's why we're in Romans, chapter 1 and verse 5. Look at that verse with me, if you would. It's through Christ and for his namesake. Paul said that we received grace and apostleship to call people from among all the nations to the obedience that comes from faith, or, as some translations have it, simply the obedience of faith. Now you notice that in that simple phrase, the obedience of faith, we have a what and we have a how. We have an end and we have a means. We have an objective and we have a path on which it is pursued Obedience, faith.
Speaker 2:
Now, the gospel always lives in the presence of two enemies. I'm going to give you their names. Don't worry about the names If you're not familiar with them or aren't interested. You'll soon recognize the reality. One is called legalism and the other is called antinomianism. Legalism simply says obey God's commands so that you may believe his promise. Or, to put it another way, you have to start keeping the law in order to come to Christ If you're going to become a Christian. In other words, legalism says clean up your life first, leave your sins, in order to come to Christ. Don't think that you can come to Christ unless and until you do Now.
Speaker 2:
The problem here is very obvious. If you have to clean up your life in order to come to Christ, how will anyone ever get to the position where they're able to come? Now, antinomianism is the opposite error, and antinomianism says that you are to believe God's promise so that you can ignore his command. Or to put it another way, if you come to Jesus, you don't need to worry about keeping the law. Trust in Jesus and don't worry about cleaning up your life. As long as you believe in him, as long as you've said the prayer and made the decision, really nothing else matters. Believe in him. As long as you've said the prayer and made the decision, really nothing else matters. And again, the problem in this error should be obvious.
Speaker 2:
Paul deals with it in Romans, in chapter 6. Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? And the answer to that is no way. Well, why not Answer? Because through the bond of faith, we are united to Jesus Christ in his death and in his resurrection, so that by Christ in us, we are brought into newness of life. Now, as I say, don't worry about the names, but the reality matters.
Speaker 2:
In every congregation, in every church, there will be folks who fall into one of these two errors, and here's what it looks like. There will be some in every church who, having made a decision for Jesus, live carelessly and sin presumptuously, and they carry on doing it because they think that it really doesn't matter. Then there are others who, feeling defeated by a sense of their own failure, falling many times for the same temptation, are overwhelmed by a sense of their own unworthiness, lack of progress. Answer to both of these conditions is found in the gospel of Jesus Christ, which says to us believe God's promise so that you may obey his command. Now, these two enemies of the gospel, these two conditions of soul that are so often the ditches on either side of the truth, as it were, into which many people fall, they're both wonderfully addressed right here, in these very words in Romans, chapter 1 and verse 5, that are open before us the obedience of faith. And I want you to simply see these two very obvious facts and I hope that they will become profoundly helpful to us that the answer that the gospel gives to antinomianism is that God calls you to obedience, and the answer that the gospel gives to legalism is that God calls you to faith.
Speaker 2:
So let's start here. Then God calls you to a life of obedience, the obedience of faith. Big picture. God created Adam and Eve in his image. They reflected his glory. They lived under his blessing, by listening to his word, they walked in fellowship with him and were kept from all evil.
Speaker 2:
Then Satan comes into the garden. His great objective is to recruit the man and the woman and all who will follow from them into his own great rebellion against God. He wants to destroy every expression of the glory of God in the universe. He wants you to hate God. He wants you to defy God. He wants you to live as your own God. And this is why he came into the garden stalking our first parents. They listened to him, were seduced by him, they disobeyed God and in that act of disobedience, the power of this thing that the Bible calls sin got into them and through them it has got into all of us.
Speaker 2:
Sin, in its essence, is disobedience to God. It is more serious than your mistakes and your failures. It is more damaging than our shortcomings and our lapses. The essence of sin is that we trust ourselves more than we trust God, that we love ourselves more than we love God, and that we serve ourselves more than we serve God. And because of this, god's glory is obscured in us more than it is reflected in us, which is why the Bible says all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. This is what we need to be saved from.
Speaker 2:
But God knew what he was doing when he let the serpent into that garden. He knew that a redeemed creation would display the magnificence of his glory far more than an innocent one ever could. He had determined God had determined from before the beginning of time that he would redeem sinners through his son, who would come to us through a human birth, who would redeem us by an atoning death and would lead us into newness of life through the power of his resurrection. God's plan is that he will display the glory of his grace like light reflected through the facets of a diamond story. What you see is this gathering of this great multitude.
Speaker 2:
End of the Bible story. What you see is this gathering of this great multitude, god's glory on display everywhere, among his redeemed people who have experienced his grace, in whom the full glory of the image of God is now being reflected as we come to love him and rejoice in him forever. No one will be there who hates God. No one will be there who defies God, no one will be there who is their own God, and that is where history is headed. That is what God's purpose will look like when it is complete in the new heaven and in the new earth.
Speaker 2:
Now, here's the point what God will complete, then, he begins now. What God will complete then, he begins now, and so the evidence that you are a person in whom obedience will be complete is that you are a person in whom obedience is begun. Think about this God completes in heaven what he begins on earth. Or, to put it another way, he begins on earth what he completes in heaven. The obedience and the holiness that will be complete in heaven is begun on earth, and God calls us to pursue it now the obedience of faith. It's good to know that God calls, and I hope that when he calls, we hear him, because this is a verse about the call of God, of God. God calls you to a life of obedience.
Speaker 2:
Now I want you to see how clear this is in the scripture, because it really is a truth that has been widely lost among evangelical Christians. Why is it that so many people really live in the illusion that, if I just said a prayer, if I just made a decision that everything's all right with me, no matter how I live my life, and that is rampant in churches across our country. So will you follow with me? Let me just point you to scriptures. I just want to get a sense of the clarity of God's call to obedience that runs all the way through scripture. Let's start with the way that it's put here in Romans, chapter 1 and verse 5.
Speaker 2:
The obedience of faith. In verse 5, the obedience of faith. If you look at the end of the book of Romans, you'll find that Paul uses exactly the same phrase at the end as he uses at the beginning, chapter 16 and verse 26,. The gospel that is now revealed and made known through the prophetic writings by the command of the eternal God, so that all nations might believe and obey him. Just slightly different translation might believe and obey him. Just slightly different translation. But the words that Paul actually wrote, words that are there in the Greek, are exactly the same in Romans 1.5 and in Romans 16.26. The beginning and the end of the book. It's about calling people from all nations to the obedience of faith. In other words, that single phrase frames the beginning and the end like bookends of the book of Romans. This is what the book is all about, what living faith in Jesus Christ is and how it leads us into newness of life.
Speaker 2:
That's what Hebrews 11 is about the obedience of faith. You know that chapter well, how it goes through. Men and women of faith, you know. By faith, noah built an ark. There's his obedience by faith. Abraham went to another place. By faith, moses refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh's daughter, and so forth and so on. Faith, the obedience that arises from faith, that's the first way in which it's put. Second, have you ever noticed that the scriptures call us not only to believe the gospel but also to obey the gospel? To obey the gospel, for example, romans, chapter 6 and verse 17. Thanks be to God.
Speaker 2:
Paul says there that, though you used to be slaves to sin, say that you used to be slaves to sin. You wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted. The gospel is not only to be believed, the gospel is to be obeyed. You have the same thing in 1 Peter 4.17, where Peter is speaking about judgment. That begins with the house of God and he says how will it then be for those who do not obey the gospel of God. See, it is not as if Almighty God sends his son into the world and kind of says you know, I've got something on offer for you guys. You know if this is right for you, you know, whatever you think, no.
Speaker 2:
Acts 17,. God commands all men everywhere to repent. Acts, chapter 2 on the day of Pentecost, this Jesus who you crucified, peter says God has made him Lord and Christ. So the message is not you know, what do you think you're going to do? How are you going to respond? And so forth, and so on. The gospel is not only promised to be believed, the gospel is to be obeyed.
Speaker 2:
Obedience to the gospel A third way in which this is expressed. Have you seen in the Bible that if you are a Christian believer, if you are in Jesus Christ, God has chosen you for the purpose of obedience? That's 1 Peter, 1.2. Peter introduces himself as an apostle of Jesus to God's elect strangers in the world who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God, the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit. For what? For obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood. God calls us to pursue a life of obedience and it is for this purpose that we are sprinkled with the blood of Christ, made clean so that you may live holy.
Speaker 2:
Number four not only are we chosen for obedience, but if we are in Christ, we have been redeemed for obedience. It is for this purpose that the Lord Jesus Christ shed his blood. Romans 8, verse 4. Romans in chapter 8 and verse 4. Having spoken about our justification by faith, paul says God condemned sin in sinful man in order that. So here's now the purpose of Christ's redeeming death, that the righteous requirements of the law may be fully met in us who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit. Now it's wonderful that the righteousness of Christ has been given to us and that redemption is accomplished for us on the cross. But Paul is saying now, the purpose of this is that now, by the Spirit, he says that the law of God might be fully met in us who live according to the Spirit. That's why you're redeemed, that's how it'll be in heaven, and what's complete there has begun. Now, number five the Holy Spirit is given to us for the purpose of obedience. You know well Ezekiel, chapter 36 and verse 26, where God makes this marvelous promise I'm going to give you a new heart. He says I'll give you a new spirit. And then he says I will put my spirit in you. Why? To move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep all my laws. So God gives the spirit, so that gladly and freely, we will walk in new paths of obedience.
Speaker 2:
Number six obedience is the evidence of our love for Jesus Christ. What is it to love Jesus Christ? Simply to say that we love Jesus Christ? No, the Lord Jesus makes this very clear. John 14, 15, if you love me, he says, you will obey my commands. 15, if you love me, he says you will obey my commands. He says it this way in chapter 14, in verse 24, he who does not love me will not obey my teaching. In other words, you don't love Christ. You'll never get into this life of obedience. Again, in John 15, 10, if you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my father's commands. Jesus says and I remain in his love.
Speaker 2:
2 John, chapter 1 and verse 6, the apostle puts it this way this is love that we walk in obedience to his commands. And then seventhly, in the New Testament obedience is clearly the evidence that the new life of Christ is in us Again. You see this most clearly in the first letter of John. We know that we have come to know him. Just pause there, see. How do we know that we've come to know him? There's a clear statement in 1 John we know that we have come to know him if we obey his commands. So a life pursuing obedience is the evidence that the new life of Jesus is in you and that you know him. 1 John, chapter 3, verse 24,. Those who obey his commands live in him and he in them. This is all through the scripture. It couldn't be clearer. God calls you, me, to a life of obedience.
Speaker 2:
I was reading a Puritan writer with the delightful name of William Gurnall. I would like to have been called Gurnall rather than Smith. You might understand, but I wasn't. But he was, and he has this marvelous little statement that just catches it, I think, really well. He says do not say that you have royal blood in your veins and that you are born of God, unless you can prove your pedigree by daring to be holy, because God calls you to obedience, and a man or a woman who cares little or nothing about obedience is not born of God. It's only words, only words.
Speaker 2:
Saving faith is the bond of a living union with Jesus Christ, and so, by definition, if it's a living union with Jesus Christ, and so, by definition, if it's a living union with Jesus Christ, it has to change not only what you believe, but also how you behave. So I want to give to you this challenge today If you are comfortable with a known sin that you, even now, are accommodating in your life, I want you to hear this challenge If you are at peace with God, you are at war with sin, and if you are at peace with sin, you are at war with God. Seek the Lord while he may be found. Isaiah says Let the wicked forsake his way way and the evil man his thoughts. Let him turn to the Lord and he will have mercy. Now I plead with you today.
Speaker 2:
If you are someone who just made a decision and said a prayer, but you are living a life that is in disobedience to what God calls you and accommodates knowingly what God calls sin, and you are thinking that everything is all right, I'm here to say to you today it is not all right. Jesus said, because it's not just words, it's deeds. Jesus said because it's not just words, it's deeds. Not everyone who says to me, lord, lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father in heaven. God calls you to a life of obedience. There may be that today for some in a special way. You just know that God is speaking to me. He's calling me right now to repentance and to forsaking that which I have accommodated, cherished, justified and defended and hidden, thinking that it's all all right. And today I see from the Bible it's not.
Speaker 2:
God calls you to a life of obedience. To a life of obedience Now, at this very moment. You may be asking but how is this possible, colin? You don't realize my sins have power over me. How am I going to live this life of obedience? You have no idea how difficult it is what you're saying for me. You have no idea.
Speaker 2:
Listen, as soon as you see from the scripture that God calls you to a life of obedience, as soon as you see it, as soon as your eyes are open to it, as soon as you get that the Christian life is going to be a relentless war against sin. If you're at peace with God, you're at war with sin. If you're at peace with sin, you're at war with God. As soon as you see that God calls you to this life of obedience, satan will change his whole strategy for tempting you. He will flip you, and he can do this in a moment. He will flip you from the casual presumption that all is well with you. That may have been where you were 20 minutes ago, but as soon as you see that God calls you for a light to a life of obedience, he will flip you to a sense of despair that now there may be no hope for you. And I say it can happen in a moment, maybe what you're experiencing right now.
Speaker 2:
So we need to hear the second part of what Paul says to us here as well as the first that God calls us not only to obedience but also to faith, and that the two are not separate, but that they are joined together, for the obedience that he calls us to is precisely the obedience of faith. So just as the gospel answer to antinomianism is that God calls you to a life of obedience, so the gospel answer to legalism is that God calls you to a life of obedience. So the gospel answer to legalism is that God calls you to a life of faith. Look at the scripture again with me. Through him and for his name's sake, we received grace and apostleship to call people from among all the Gentiles to the obedience that comes from faith.
Speaker 2:
You say now, wait a minute. What is faith? Remind me again. Faith is the bond of a living union with Jesus Christ. So the obedience of faith is obedience that flows from the bond of that living union. It is precisely what the Lord Jesus was talking about when he said I am the vine and you are the branches. It's what the apostle Paul was talking about when he said I've been crucified with Christ and I no longer live. But Christ lives in me and the life that I'm living in the body. I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and who gave himself for me. And this is a life of faith. You see, not just a moment of faith or a decision of faith or a prayer of faith or whatever. We walk by faith. We live by faith, not by sight, and a life of obedience flows out of a life of faith. Or, to put it another way, the obedience to which Jesus Christ calls me this week that lies ahead of me can only flow out of faith in him, out of that living union, his life in me Now.
Speaker 2:
You will see, then, that the obedience of faith is very different from the obedience of works. The obedience of works is simply you making a bigger effort next week and that'll not get you terribly far, because you're still working with the same resources or absence of them. But the obedience of faith is the obedience that lies from the bond of a living union with Jesus Christ, which is why the New Testament says Christ in you is your hope of glory. Christ came to save his people from their sins, not just from the consequences of their sins in hell, but from their sins. That means he came to make obedience possible. That means he is able to deliver you not only from sin's guilt but also from its power. That deliverance will be complete in heaven. The war will be over then. But what is complete in heaven has begun here and now, and the obedience of faith is about pursuing, in the power of Christ now, the obedience that will be complete then by his grace in glory. Now, when you see this immediately, it opens the door of hope for all of us, and especially those of us who are despairing of ourselves, which is what happens as soon as we see God's call to obedience. God does not call you to obey so that you may come to Christ. God calls you to come to Christ so that you may obey. All the difference in the world the obedience of faith On an important point. It's always wonderful to see it expressed well.
Speaker 2:
One of my favorite writers is a man by the name of Professor Donald MacLeod, and he says it so well. Let me quote to you from him. He says Christ is offered to us simply as sinners, not as prepared sinners, not as seeking sinners, not as interested sinners, awakened sinners, reformed sinners or anything else. He says we need not, indeed we must not delay coming to Christ until we have put away sin. If we do, we will never come. See what he's saying. If you say, well, I've got to deal with what's wrong in my life in order to come to Christ, you will never come to Christ. We must not delay coming to Christ until we have put away sin. If we do, we will never come. Sin can be conquered only in union with him. It cannot be conquered before we come to him. Obedience of faith Now.
Speaker 2:
This is expressed very beautifully in some of our best evangelistic gospel hymns. I quote one of my favorites to you. Do you know this one? Come you sinners, poor and needy, weak and wounded, sick and sore. Jesus ready stands to save you, full of pity, love and power. Do we know that hymn? Maybe not. Well, I'll tell you about it then. Okay, all right, let me quote a couple of verses from it. It's a great hymn. We need to sing it sometime then.
Speaker 2:
Let not conscience make you linger, nor of fitness fondly dream. All the fitness he requireth is you feel your need of him. You see what the hymn writer is saying here. Someone says I've got a bad conscience, and he says don't let your bad conscience keep you from Christ. Your bad conscience is a reason to come to Christ. Let not conscience make you linger, nor of fitness fondly dream. You see, there are folks who think like this. You know, here are all these wonderful people in this congregation. They've all got their lives so wonderfully sorted out, and one day I'm going to get my life wonderfully sorted out and then I'll be a Christian too. You're fondly dreaming of fitness and you think you'll come to Christ when you've got yourself sorted out. You will never come to Christ on that basis.
Speaker 2:
The same hymn writer goes on in these words come you weary, heavy laden, bruised and ruined by the fall. If you wait until you're better, you can almost finish it. For me, you will never come at all. And there are some of us, I think, who have been waiting until we were better, and we're still waiting until we're better. And if you go on waiting until you're better, you will never come at all to Christ, him that you definitely know really well. Same point, just as I am, and waiting not to rid my soul of one dark blot to thee whose blood can cleanse each spot. O Lamb of God, I come Now. You see how this opens the door of hope. As long as you think that somehow Christ calls you to obey in order that you may come to him, you'll never get there.
Speaker 2:
The marvelous truth is that the gospel invites you to come to Christ so that you can obey, and so I want to end here on this very simple and yet this most important point, that Romans 1.5 doesn't only describe the obedience of faith. In the scripture, god calls us to the obedience of faith. Notice it just one more time as we pull this together. It's through him Paul says, and for his name's sake, that we received grace and apostleship, to call people from among all the nations to the obedience of faith. God calls you to the obedience of faith in his son, jesus Christ. Today, he calls you to find in Christ what you do not have to receive from Christ, what you cannot offer to accomplish through Christ, what you cannot do. So today, what I want to invite you to do is to believe in order that you may obey. That's the gospel.
Speaker 2:
Are you holding back because you think you cannot change? Here you are, you're trapped in habitual sin. You're holding back because you think you cannot change. You'll be there forever. Listen, come to Christ. Put your trust in Jesus Christ. Faith is the bond of a living union with Jesus Christ, not just believing things about him, it's his life. In you you come to the bond of living union with Jesus Christ. You will soon find that you begin to hate what you used to love and love what you used to hate. Through this bond, christ in you think about that he will give you new desires, new affections, new strength, new life.
Speaker 2:
Are you holding back because you've got problems? Are you holding back because you've got hurts? Are you holding back from Jesus Christ because you've got wounds? There are thousands and thousands and thousands of people in our country who have wounds and hurts, and they're looking for the answer in themselves and they've been doing it and they'll go on doing it for years. And I'm here to tell you today that self is an empty, powerless idol and what you need is not union with self, you need union with Christ.
Speaker 2:
You look away from yourself now. You've been trying to sort yourself out all these years. You look to Jesus Christ. He's able to do for you what you cannot do for yourself, to bring to you what you do not have in yourself. Turn from the empty idol that has no power. God is calling you today to faith in Jesus Christ and to the obedience that will flow from this living union. Are you holding back because you have doubts and questions? Bring your doubts and questions to Christ. How do you think you're going to resolve them all? Standing out here on your own? Remember the man who came to Jesus and he said Lord, I believe, help me in my unbelief. That's a great way to come to Jesus Christ. How else do you think you're going to sort all this out?
Speaker 2:
Is there someone here and you are holding back from Jesus Christ because you do not think you need him. In your heart and with your conservative moral life, you think well, it's great that Pastor Colin says all these things, because I'm sure there's many people who need to hear them. But in your heart of hearts you feel that you are a very good and respectable person. You just do not see your need of Jesus Christ. At least not you. You're not that bad. Listen, my friend. Your sins are much worse than you think and your obedience is much less than you think.
Speaker 2:
And you look at the Son of God, heaving, sweating, agonizing on a cross, the Son of God, the Savior of the world, and you say you do not need him. Could there be anything more offensive and defiant and arrogant towards God than what you're saying in your heart? If you hold back from Christ because you say you do not need him, god calls you to Christ today. You say you do not need it. God calls you to Christ today. And then, lastly, is there someone here and you are holding back for the opposite reason. You know that your sins are many. It's just all too clear to you. And, boy, you feel so weighed down by it all that it passed to the extent of my failure, the depth of it, the length of it. Your sins are many. You know it.
Speaker 2:
Look to the cross, look at the Son of God with royal blood in his veins, and that blood is being shed for you. He is there for sinners. He is there for sinners. He is there for sinners. He is there for sinners, and that means he is there for you, and the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ has the power to cleanse you from every sin. This Savior is able to take you from the slimy pit in which you find yourself and set your feet upon the rock. He is able to present you faultless on the last day, with great joy in his presence, and that redeeming work that he will complete then. He is able to begin in you now. He calls you to the obedience of faith. Will you bow in prayer with me together If you'd allow me to lead your thoughts just in?
Speaker 2:
God calls you to obedience. It means there's stuff to confess. Lord, I see my sins, I can name them and today, because I hear that you're calling me to obedience, I see that I must turn from them, and that is exactly what you're calling me to do. Let the wicked forsake his way and the evil man his thoughts and turn to the Lord. As we confess our sins before the Lord, let us look up to him in faith.
Speaker 2:
The Lord calls you not only to obedience. The Lord calls you today to faith. So look to this Christ, crucified for you, risen for you, sending the spirit to all who will draw near to him and trust him. Lord Jesus, the life of obedience to which you are calling me is impossible if it is me alone. But if your life, your spirit should be in me, if your power should be made perfect in my weakness, the whole thing changes. So as I draw near to find peace with you through the blood of the cross, I thank you for the strength of your spirit, by which I am able to declare war on sin, so as to walk in the path of obedience, and to do it by faith. Lord Jesus, today I believe your promise so that I may obey your command. Lord Jesus, save many today, for your name's sake, and on that day when your glory will be on magnificent display in all your redeemed people, grant that we may be among them, in all your redeemed people. Grant that we may be among them For Christ's sake.
Speaker 1:
Amen. Thank you for listening to Biblical Talks. To support this podcast, please go to biblicaltalkscom. Have a blessed day.