FAITH:
The Fear of Not Persevering
One of the great obstacles to getting old to the glory of God is the fear that we will not persevere in treasuring Christ and loving people—we just won’t make it. We won’t be able to say with Paul in 2 Timothy 4:7-8, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that Day, and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing.” The reward of final righteousness will come to those who have loved his appearing, that is, who treasure him supremely and want him to be here. So this treasuring of Christ must be included in and part of the fought-fight and the finished-race and the kept-faith. Faith includes treasuring Christ and his appearing. You don’t have faith if you don’t want Jesus.
So one great obstacle to getting old to the glory of God is the fear that we can’t maintain this treasuring of Christ. And so we can’t bear the fruit of love that flows from faith (Galatians 5:6; 1 Timothy 1:5). We’re not going to make it. And the main reason that this fear of not persevering in faith and love is an obstacle to getting old to the glory of God is that the two most common ways of overcoming this fear are deadly.
Two Deadly Ways to Overcome This Fear
There are two opposite ways to ruin your life in trying to overcome this fear. One is to assume that perseverance in faith and love is not necessary for final salvation. And the other is to assume that perseverance is necessary, and then depend on our efforts in some measure to fulfill that necessity and to secure God’s favor. Let me show why both these are devastatingly misguided and deadly, and then what is the biblical way of growing old to the glory of God.
1) Deadly: “Perseverance Is Unnecessary”
It’s a mistake to think that perseverance in faith and love is not necessary for final salvation. A deadly mistake. Jesus said in Mark 13:13, “You will be hated by all for my name’s sake. But the one who endures to the end will be saved.” Hebrews 12:14 says, “Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.” In Galatians 6:8-9, Paul says, “The one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.” So notice that the two reapings are corruption on the one hand and eternal life on the other hand. Then he says in the next verse, “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap [that is, reap eternal life], if we do not give up.”
So clearly persevering in the furrows of faith sowing to the Spirit and bearing his fruit of love is necessary for final salvation. “God chose you,” Paul says in 2 Thessalonians 2:13, “. . . to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth.” “Saved through sanctification” means that sanctification—the path of love—is the path on which saved sinners go to heaven. And it’s the only path that leads to heaven.
So it is a tragic and deadly mistake to try to overcome the fear of not persevering in old age by saying you don’t have to persevere.
2) Deadly: “Perseverance Puts or Keeps God on Our Side”
But the other misguided way of overcoming the fear of not persevering is just as dangerous. It is the way that says: “Yes, perseverance in faith and love is necessary and that means I must wait till the last day for God to be 100% for me, and I must depend on my efforts to secure God’s full favor. God may get me started in the Christian life by faith in him alone, but perseverance happens another way. God makes his ongoing favor depend on my efforts.” That, I say, is deadly and leads either to despair or pride. And certainly not to perseverance.
When Does God Become 100% on Our Side?
What’s wrong with that? You can see what’s wrong if you ask this question: When does God become totally and irrevocably for us—not 99%, but 100% for us? Is it at the end of the age, at the Last Day, when he has seen our whole life and measured it to see if it is worthy of his being for us? That is not what the Bible teaches.
What the Bible teaches is that God becomes 100% irrevocably for us at the moment of justification, that is, the moment when we see Christ as a beautiful Savior and receive him as our substitute punishment and our substitute perfection. All of God’s wrath, all of the condemnation we deserve, was poured out on Jesus. All of God’s demands for perfect righteousness were fulfilled by Christ. The moment we see (by grace!) this Treasure and receive him in this way his death counts as our death and his condemnation as our condemnation and his righteousness as our righteousness, and God becomes 100% irrevocably for us forever in that instant.
The Moment of Justification: God Is 100% For Us
“We hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law” (Romans 3:28). “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1). “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). So in Christ Jesus—in union with him by faith alone, by receiving all that he is for us—God is totally, 100% irrevocably for us. And the implications of that are spelled out in Romans 8:31-35:
If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?
And the answer to that question is, Nothing! Which means that all those who belong to Christ will persevere. They must, and they will. It is certain. Why? Because God is already now in Christ 100% for us. Perseverance is not the means by which we get God to be for us; it is the effect of the fact that God is already for us. You cannot ever make God be for you by your good works because true Christian good works are the fruit of God’s already being for you.
Good Works: The Fruit of God Already Being For Us
“By the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me” (1 Corinthians 15:10). My hard work is not the cause but the result of blood-bought grace. “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (Philippians 2:12-13). Working out your salvation is not the cause but the result of God’s working in us—God’s being 100% for us. “I will not venture to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me” (Romans 15:18). If we are able to do anything by way of obedience, it is because Christ is already 100% for us.
If every exertion you make in the discipline of perseverance is a work of God, then these exertions do not make God become 100% for you. They are the result of his already being 100% for you. He is for you because you are in Christ. And you cannot improve on the perfection or the sacrifice of Christ. If by faith you are in Christ, God is as much for you in Christ as he will ever be or could ever me. You don’t persevere to obtain this. Because of this, you will persevere.
So when the fear of not persevering raises its head, don’t try to overcome it by saying, “O there is no danger, we don’t need to persevere.” You do. There will be no salvation in the end for people who do not fight the good fight and finish the race and keep the faith and treasure Christ’s appearing. And don’t try to overcome the fear of not persevering by trying to win God’s favor by your exertions in godliness. God’s favor comes by grace alone, on the basis of Christ alone, in union with Christ alone, through faith alone, to the glory of God alone. He is totally, 100% irrevocably for us because of the work of Christ if we are in Christ. And we are in Christ not by exertions but by receiving him as our sacrifice and perfection and Treasure.
Overcoming the Fear of Not Persevering
So what is the right way to overcome the fear of not persevering in old age? The key is to keep finding in Christ our highest Treasure. This is not mainly the fight to do but the fight to delight. We keep on looking away from ourselves to Christ for his blood-bought fellowship and his help. Which means we keep on believing. We keep on fighting the fight of faith by looking at Christ and valuing Christ and receiving Christ every day.
Kissing Away the Fear
Spurgeon says that God kisses away the fear of aging with his promises. Philippians 1:6: “I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.”
1 Corinthians 1:8-9: “[He] will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Jude 1:24: “[He] is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy.”
Romans 8:30: “Those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.” No one is lost between justification and glorification. All who are justified are glorified.
The point of telling us that is to kiss away all fear. If God is for us, no one can successfully be against us (Romans 8:31).
FRIENDS:
Father, I pray that I will not grow weary but will, with your help and strength, finish the good work you started in me. I pray that I can build relationships with people and show them how to remove the strife and isolation that exists between them and God. I want to show them how to have God call them his friends. In Jesus name, Amen.
DAILY BIBLE CHALLENGE
APRIL 16
Mark 6:30-44; 1 Cor 11:1-16; Psalms 86; Judges 9
APRIL 17
Mark 6:45-56; 1 Cor 11:17-34; Psalms 87; Judges 10-12
FOOD:
Simple Southern-Style 'Unfried' Chicken
1 (3 1/2) pound broiler-fryer chicken, cut up
1/2 cup KRAFT LIGHT DONE RIGHT! Ranch Reduced Fat Dressing
1 (6 ounce) package SHAKE 'N BAKE Extra Crispy Seasoned Coating Mix
Remove skin from all chicken pieces except wings. Place chicken in resealable
plastic bag. Pour dressing over chicken in bag. Seal bag, turning to coat all
chicken pieces well. Refrigerate at least 30 min. to marinate.
Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Place contents of seasoning packet on plate.
Remove chicken from bag, one piece at a time. Dip chicken in coating, turning to
coat lightly. Arrange on baking sheet. Sprinkle any remaining coating from plate
over chicken.
FUN:
Dear Friends:
You've heard about people who have been abducted and had their kidneys removed by black-market organ thieves.
My thighs were stolen from me during the night a few years ago. I went to sleep and woke up with someone else's thighs. It was just that quick. The replacements had the texture of cooked oatmeal. Whose thighs were these and what happened to mine?
I spent the entire summer looking for my thighs.. Finally, hurt and angry, I resigned myself to living out my life in jeans.. And then the thieves struck again.
My rear end was next. I knew it was the same gang, because they took pains to match my new rear-end to the thighs they had stuck me with earlier. But my new rear end was attached at least three inches lower than my original! I realized I'd have to give up my jeans in favor of long skirts.
Two years ago I realized my arms had been switched. One morning I was fixing my hair and was horrified to see the flesh of my upper arm swing to and fro with the motion of the hairbrush. This was really getting scary - my body was being replaced one section at a time. What could they do to me next?
When my poor neck suddenly disappeared and was replaced with a turkey neck, I decided to tell my story. Women of the world, wake up and smell the coffee! Those 'plastic' surgeons are using REAL replacement body parts -stolen from you and me! The next time someone you know has something 'lifted', look again - was it lifted from you?
THIS IS NOT A HOAX. This is happening to women everywhere every night.
WARN YOUR FRIENDS!
P. S. Last year I thought someone had stolen my Boobs. I was lying in bed and they were gone! But when I jumped out of bed, I was relieved to see that they had just been hiding in my armpits as I slept... Now I keep them hidden in my waistband.
The Fear of Not Persevering
One of the great obstacles to getting old to the glory of God is the fear that we will not persevere in treasuring Christ and loving people—we just won’t make it. We won’t be able to say with Paul in 2 Timothy 4:7-8, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that Day, and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing.” The reward of final righteousness will come to those who have loved his appearing, that is, who treasure him supremely and want him to be here. So this treasuring of Christ must be included in and part of the fought-fight and the finished-race and the kept-faith. Faith includes treasuring Christ and his appearing. You don’t have faith if you don’t want Jesus.
So one great obstacle to getting old to the glory of God is the fear that we can’t maintain this treasuring of Christ. And so we can’t bear the fruit of love that flows from faith (Galatians 5:6; 1 Timothy 1:5). We’re not going to make it. And the main reason that this fear of not persevering in faith and love is an obstacle to getting old to the glory of God is that the two most common ways of overcoming this fear are deadly.
Two Deadly Ways to Overcome This Fear
There are two opposite ways to ruin your life in trying to overcome this fear. One is to assume that perseverance in faith and love is not necessary for final salvation. And the other is to assume that perseverance is necessary, and then depend on our efforts in some measure to fulfill that necessity and to secure God’s favor. Let me show why both these are devastatingly misguided and deadly, and then what is the biblical way of growing old to the glory of God.
1) Deadly: “Perseverance Is Unnecessary”
It’s a mistake to think that perseverance in faith and love is not necessary for final salvation. A deadly mistake. Jesus said in Mark 13:13, “You will be hated by all for my name’s sake. But the one who endures to the end will be saved.” Hebrews 12:14 says, “Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.” In Galatians 6:8-9, Paul says, “The one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.” So notice that the two reapings are corruption on the one hand and eternal life on the other hand. Then he says in the next verse, “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap [that is, reap eternal life], if we do not give up.”
So clearly persevering in the furrows of faith sowing to the Spirit and bearing his fruit of love is necessary for final salvation. “God chose you,” Paul says in 2 Thessalonians 2:13, “. . . to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth.” “Saved through sanctification” means that sanctification—the path of love—is the path on which saved sinners go to heaven. And it’s the only path that leads to heaven.
So it is a tragic and deadly mistake to try to overcome the fear of not persevering in old age by saying you don’t have to persevere.
2) Deadly: “Perseverance Puts or Keeps God on Our Side”
But the other misguided way of overcoming the fear of not persevering is just as dangerous. It is the way that says: “Yes, perseverance in faith and love is necessary and that means I must wait till the last day for God to be 100% for me, and I must depend on my efforts to secure God’s full favor. God may get me started in the Christian life by faith in him alone, but perseverance happens another way. God makes his ongoing favor depend on my efforts.” That, I say, is deadly and leads either to despair or pride. And certainly not to perseverance.
When Does God Become 100% on Our Side?
What’s wrong with that? You can see what’s wrong if you ask this question: When does God become totally and irrevocably for us—not 99%, but 100% for us? Is it at the end of the age, at the Last Day, when he has seen our whole life and measured it to see if it is worthy of his being for us? That is not what the Bible teaches.
What the Bible teaches is that God becomes 100% irrevocably for us at the moment of justification, that is, the moment when we see Christ as a beautiful Savior and receive him as our substitute punishment and our substitute perfection. All of God’s wrath, all of the condemnation we deserve, was poured out on Jesus. All of God’s demands for perfect righteousness were fulfilled by Christ. The moment we see (by grace!) this Treasure and receive him in this way his death counts as our death and his condemnation as our condemnation and his righteousness as our righteousness, and God becomes 100% irrevocably for us forever in that instant.
The Moment of Justification: God Is 100% For Us
“We hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law” (Romans 3:28). “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1). “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). So in Christ Jesus—in union with him by faith alone, by receiving all that he is for us—God is totally, 100% irrevocably for us. And the implications of that are spelled out in Romans 8:31-35:
If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?
And the answer to that question is, Nothing! Which means that all those who belong to Christ will persevere. They must, and they will. It is certain. Why? Because God is already now in Christ 100% for us. Perseverance is not the means by which we get God to be for us; it is the effect of the fact that God is already for us. You cannot ever make God be for you by your good works because true Christian good works are the fruit of God’s already being for you.
Good Works: The Fruit of God Already Being For Us
“By the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me” (1 Corinthians 15:10). My hard work is not the cause but the result of blood-bought grace. “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (Philippians 2:12-13). Working out your salvation is not the cause but the result of God’s working in us—God’s being 100% for us. “I will not venture to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me” (Romans 15:18). If we are able to do anything by way of obedience, it is because Christ is already 100% for us.
If every exertion you make in the discipline of perseverance is a work of God, then these exertions do not make God become 100% for you. They are the result of his already being 100% for you. He is for you because you are in Christ. And you cannot improve on the perfection or the sacrifice of Christ. If by faith you are in Christ, God is as much for you in Christ as he will ever be or could ever me. You don’t persevere to obtain this. Because of this, you will persevere.
So when the fear of not persevering raises its head, don’t try to overcome it by saying, “O there is no danger, we don’t need to persevere.” You do. There will be no salvation in the end for people who do not fight the good fight and finish the race and keep the faith and treasure Christ’s appearing. And don’t try to overcome the fear of not persevering by trying to win God’s favor by your exertions in godliness. God’s favor comes by grace alone, on the basis of Christ alone, in union with Christ alone, through faith alone, to the glory of God alone. He is totally, 100% irrevocably for us because of the work of Christ if we are in Christ. And we are in Christ not by exertions but by receiving him as our sacrifice and perfection and Treasure.
Overcoming the Fear of Not Persevering
So what is the right way to overcome the fear of not persevering in old age? The key is to keep finding in Christ our highest Treasure. This is not mainly the fight to do but the fight to delight. We keep on looking away from ourselves to Christ for his blood-bought fellowship and his help. Which means we keep on believing. We keep on fighting the fight of faith by looking at Christ and valuing Christ and receiving Christ every day.
Kissing Away the Fear
Spurgeon says that God kisses away the fear of aging with his promises. Philippians 1:6: “I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.”
1 Corinthians 1:8-9: “[He] will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Jude 1:24: “[He] is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy.”
Romans 8:30: “Those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.” No one is lost between justification and glorification. All who are justified are glorified.
The point of telling us that is to kiss away all fear. If God is for us, no one can successfully be against us (Romans 8:31).
FRIENDS:
Father, I pray that I will not grow weary but will, with your help and strength, finish the good work you started in me. I pray that I can build relationships with people and show them how to remove the strife and isolation that exists between them and God. I want to show them how to have God call them his friends. In Jesus name, Amen.
DAILY BIBLE CHALLENGE
APRIL 16
Mark 6:30-44; 1 Cor 11:1-16; Psalms 86; Judges 9
APRIL 17
Mark 6:45-56; 1 Cor 11:17-34; Psalms 87; Judges 10-12
FOOD:
Simple Southern-Style 'Unfried' Chicken
1 (3 1/2) pound broiler-fryer chicken, cut up
1/2 cup KRAFT LIGHT DONE RIGHT! Ranch Reduced Fat Dressing
1 (6 ounce) package SHAKE 'N BAKE Extra Crispy Seasoned Coating Mix
Remove skin from all chicken pieces except wings. Place chicken in resealable
plastic bag. Pour dressing over chicken in bag. Seal bag, turning to coat all
chicken pieces well. Refrigerate at least 30 min. to marinate.
Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Place contents of seasoning packet on plate.
Remove chicken from bag, one piece at a time. Dip chicken in coating, turning to
coat lightly. Arrange on baking sheet. Sprinkle any remaining coating from plate
over chicken.
FUN:
Dear Friends:
You've heard about people who have been abducted and had their kidneys removed by black-market organ thieves.
My thighs were stolen from me during the night a few years ago. I went to sleep and woke up with someone else's thighs. It was just that quick. The replacements had the texture of cooked oatmeal. Whose thighs were these and what happened to mine?
I spent the entire summer looking for my thighs.. Finally, hurt and angry, I resigned myself to living out my life in jeans.. And then the thieves struck again.
My rear end was next. I knew it was the same gang, because they took pains to match my new rear-end to the thighs they had stuck me with earlier. But my new rear end was attached at least three inches lower than my original! I realized I'd have to give up my jeans in favor of long skirts.
Two years ago I realized my arms had been switched. One morning I was fixing my hair and was horrified to see the flesh of my upper arm swing to and fro with the motion of the hairbrush. This was really getting scary - my body was being replaced one section at a time. What could they do to me next?
When my poor neck suddenly disappeared and was replaced with a turkey neck, I decided to tell my story. Women of the world, wake up and smell the coffee! Those 'plastic' surgeons are using REAL replacement body parts -stolen from you and me! The next time someone you know has something 'lifted', look again - was it lifted from you?
THIS IS NOT A HOAX. This is happening to women everywhere every night.
WARN YOUR FRIENDS!
P. S. Last year I thought someone had stolen my Boobs. I was lying in bed and they were gone! But when I jumped out of bed, I was relieved to see that they had just been hiding in my armpits as I slept... Now I keep them hidden in my waistband.
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