God In The Flesh: Our All
The Godhead • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
Greetings…
Theme: The Godhead
Hope: To draw closer to God the Father, Son, and Spirit through a better understanding of how the Godhead are united and their individual roles.
Last week we looked at how Jesus the Christ is “Our Savior.”
How he suffered & died for us.
How he offers us redemption.
How he pleads our case before the Father.
Today, we are going to bring this series on “The Godhead” to a close by looking at…God In The Flesh: Our All.
There is a song we called “He Is My Everything” and the lyrics go like this…
He is my everything, he is my all.
He is my everything, both great and small.
He gave his life for me, made everything new.
He is my everything, now how about you?
Some folks may ask me, some folks may say.
Who is this Jesus you talk about every day?
He is my Savior. He set me free.
Now listen while I tell you what he means to me.
As I first started preparing for this lesson and the scriptural concept around the idea of “Jesus being our all” that song stayed in my mind over the last several weeks.
Unfortunately, it’s not in our song books but it a most wonderful spiritual song with other powerful stanzas as well.
So this morning I want us to consider what it means for God the Son to be “Our All.”
But before we dive right in we must first understand what Satan has been doing since Jesus’ sacrifice, resurrection, ascension, and start of his kingdom.
We must first examine…
Satan’s Lie.
Satan’s Lie.
The Great Misdirect.
The Great Misdirect.
One of the great lies or misdirects of Satan has been getting people to believe that when they obey the gospel that they are “still themselves” but just a “better version.”
By that I mean they have not actually changed all that much and can go about their daily life in much if not the exact same way “except” for they might or might not forsake the assembling of the saints as much (Hebrews 10:24-26).
Jesus gave the parable we often call the “Sower & The Seed” found in Matthew 13:1-23.
In it he describes two types of soil or souls that hear the word, but due to Satan and/or a desire for their old life quickly lose the word of God that first pricked their hearts to obedience (Matthew 13:19-21).
This is the “great misdirect” that Satan and his messengers preach.
That if you are going to obey the gospel that all you are doing is creating a “better version you.”
It’s better, not because of any significant changes made, but because Jesus is your Savior now and you have been saved.
But is that really all that obedience to the gospel is?
No, when one obeys God’s plan of salvation it means…
A Major Change Happened.
A Major Change Happened.
The scriptures clearly teach over and over that once one obeys the gospel there is a dramatic change in a persons life.
God tells us that we are a new creation with our old selves passing away.
17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
6 We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.
22 to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires,
9 Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices
14 But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.
Summary
Summary
We certainly only scratched the surface of all the passages wherein God explains what happens when we Obey God’s plan of Salvation which culminates in a rising out of that water grave of baptism into this “new creation.”
There are countless other passages that either directly explain such or imply it by what is being said.
The question is however, “What does that mean to have crucified the old self and to become a new creation?”
It means…
Jesus Is My Everything
Jesus Is My Everything
He Is My Lord.
He Is My Lord.
We don’t always like to think of it in these terms but when we sign the contract to have our sins washed away and become this “new creation,” we are signing a contract that says “I except Jesus as my Lord.”
In Acts 10 when Peter learns that all mankind should have access to Jesus we read this in Acts 10:36…
36 As for the word that he sent to Israel, preaching good news of peace through Jesus Christ (he is Lord of all),
The word “Lord”, in its most simplistic definition means master.
And if Jesus is “everyone’s master” he most certainly is “our master” when we obey the gospel and become new creations in his kingdom.
1 Paul and Timothy, slaves of Christ Jesus, to all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, together with the overseers and deacons.
33 So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.
Now, some might think this is a bad thing but consider this…
We are either slaves to Satan and sin or slaves to God and righteousness.
This illusion that we are free is just an illusion.
16 Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? 17 But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, 18 and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.
Why is having Jesus our master and being slaves to Jesus better than slaves to Satan?
Because a life in Christ is far better on this earth than a life in this world.
28 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
3 For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome.
Some might say, but Jesus limits my choice in what I “might want to do because I might want to sin.”
This is true but righteousness is far easier than unrighteousness because it is not progressive.
Notice how in modern times you cannot consistently make anyone happy through progressiveness i.e., sinful lusts. This behavior in “never satisfied” because it must always progress.
God and righteousness is not like this; it is constant and unified.
8 Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.
Summary
Summary
If we sign that contract by sacrificing our “old self on the cross” to have our sins washed away by the blood of Christ and become a “new creation” we are saying Jesus is my Lord which means every decision I make should be filtered through that decision.
Is going to a volunteer meeting, a fundraiser, a ball game, a livestock show, a vacation, or anything else I might do more important to me than meeting with the saints to worship or study God’s word?
Is having family or friends that do not agree with God’s word on truth more important that telling them the truth about God’s word when it contradicts “their doctrine or their lifestyle.”
Conclusion
Conclusion
Do we honestly think that that we can ignore “the right thing to do” and God not notice.
James the brother of Jesus said…
17 So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.
Can we honestly say that choosing to do the things I just mentioned or things like them “are the right thing to do?”
If not then it is sin to “Know the right thing to do and fail to do it.”
Is Jesus “Your All?”
Or is that simply just something you say to others and yourself but still are the same person you were before you obeyed the gospel?
20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
Invitation
1 Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save, or his ear dull, that it cannot hear; 2 but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear.
6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.
17 So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.
6 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.
30 The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent,
32 “Therefore whoever confesses Me before men, him I will also confess before My Father who is in heaven.
8 in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.
1 Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, 2 and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. 3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures,
3 Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. 5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.
7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.