“Honoring, not Earning”

Let us start of tonight with a word of prayer.

In the recent weeks, we’ve been talking about the basic doctrines of our Christian faith. We’ve talked about:

The attributes of the Holy Spirit.

What scripture says about prayer.

The biblical meaning of faith.

God’s perfect word, the bible.

And last week, the clear understanding of the gospel.

This week we are going to talk about living the Christian lifestyle in order to honor God instead of living the Christian lifestyle as an attempt to earn our salvation or to earn blessings from God.

Tonight, we are assuming, that we’ve all been saved by grace, through faith, in the Lord Jesus, because last week we learned exactly what we need to believe, for our salvation and to have eternal life with Christ. We learned that we are saved as a free, undeserved, gift from God and that there is nothing we could possibly ever do by works to earn that salvation and eternal life. But yet so many Christians once they know, or at least think they know, they’re saved, fall back into that mindset that they have to do good works in order to keep their salvation. The bible clearly teaches that once we are saved there is nothing we could ever do to loose that salvation. Of course we will want to do good works, but not to earn anything, but to honor God and the Lord Jesus for the grace we’ve received when we were saved. There’s a BIG difference between earning and honoring. The first out of necessity and fear, and the latter out of Love and joy. Wouldn’t you much rather live your life feeling peaceful and content rather than feeling anxious and afraid?

Why is it so many people in the church today still have this mindset of having to earn their way, or work their way, into heaven? That’s a good question, because the bible is clear that salvation today, during this age of grace is a free gift from God to everyone who believes the gospel.(Ephesians 2:8–9 “8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9 not of works, lest anyone should boast.” ) And we made it clear last week just what the gospel is that we have to believe. (Romans 10:9 “9 that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.”) I haven’t been able to really put my finger on the answer to that question, why so many people think they have to earn their way to heaven. Maybe it’s that people have trouble believing that God has made it so easy. Or maybe they believe we have to adhere to all the Jewish laws that God laid out for Moses in the old testament for the nation of Israel. I’m just not sure.

I have a suspicion though. As the church today, we don’t explain clearly enough the difference between God’s program for the nation of Israel and his program for us, the church, or as Paul calls us, “the body of Christ”. The bible makes it clear that God has two separate roads or programs to eternal life. One for his chosen people, the nation of Israel, and one for us, the body of Christ. We have to keep those two programs separate in our minds or we will never be able to understand the bible. The tendency today is to mix the two programs together, put them in a blender, turn it on high, and what we end up with, is a blended mess of confusion. When God was dealing with his chosen people Israel, He was using a program of Law, the ten commandments, and all the other 603 Jewish laws He gave to Moses on Mt Siani. When Israel didn’t recognize or accept Jesus as there Messiah, they fell temporarily, as a nation of people, and today are not considered as God’s chosen people.(Although they will be again at some point in the future, God hasn’t forgotten about Israel). So God turned to the rest of the world, the gentiles, to be His chosen people and that means us, along with individual Jews. For today, both Jews and Gentiles have the opportunity to become His chosen people through belief in the gospel of grace or His program of grace. So we have to understand the difference between God’s program of law and His program of grace in order to understand what God is doing in the world today. We aren’t going to dive into those differences today, we can do that another time. But we will look at what the bible says about honoring God.

In the bible the words honor and glory can be used almost interchangeably. Whenever you read the phrase “bringing glory to God”, you can replace the word glory with the word honor and not change the meaning of scripture at all. So again lets look at what the bible says about bringing honor to God.

Two of my favorite verses in the bible about honoring God tells us that we are to honor Him in everything we do. Paul writes in Col 3:17 and 1 Cor 10:31:

Colossians 3:17 NKJV

17 And whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.

1 Corinthians 10:31 NKJV

31 Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

Paul also tells us we are to honor God with our bodies. He writes in 1 Cor 6:19-20:

1 Corinthians 6:19–20 NKJV

19 Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? 20 For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.

Paul tells us that we are to honor God by following the examples of Christ in Eph 5:1-2:

Ephesians 5:1–2 NKJV

1 Therefore be imitators of God as dear children. 2 And walk in love, as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma.

Paul writes that growing in our faith and in our knowledge of the bible is another way to bring honor and glory to God. He says in Phil 1:9-11:

Philippians 1:9–11 NKJV

9 And this I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in knowledge and all discernment, 10 that you may approve the things that are excellent, that you may be sincere and without offense till the day of Christ, 11 being filled with the fruits of righteousness which are by Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.

Even the writers in the old testament told us we are to give honor and glory to God. David writes in Psalm 86:10-12:

Psalm 86:10–12 NKJV

10 For You are great, and do wondrous things; You alone are God. 11 Teach me Your way, O Lord; I will walk in Your truth; Unite my heart to fear Your name. 12 I will praise You, O Lord my God, with all my heart, And I will glorify Your name forevermore.

The old testament profit Jeremiah tells us that we should honor God by telling everyone that we Know God, and we have a personal relationship with Him. He says in Jeremiah 9:23–24:

Jeremiah 9:23–24 NKJV

23 Thus says the Lord: “Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, Let not the mighty man glory in his might, Nor let the rich man glory in his riches; 24 But let him who glories glory in this, That he understands and knows Me, That I am the Lord, exercising lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth. For in these I delight,” says the Lord.

You know, I would like to kinda wined this message down tonight by saying I hope we’ve learned that there never has been, or never will be, a way to earn or keep our salvation. But we are to HONOR God forever because He’s given us the FREE gift of Salvation for simply believing the gospel of His GRACE. Here are three ways we can always honor God if we practice them. I would like to challenge you to think about these three things after you return to your rooms tonight.

Loving God first and foremost.

Jesus said the greatest commandment was to love the Lord God with all your heart, with all your strength and with all your mind, and the second was to love your neighbor as yourself. The whole law is met in these two commandments. This means we rank all our earthly treasures below Him and loving others. Nothing should compare to the devotion we have for God. As we grow in faith, we realize everything here is temporary, but our relationship with God is everlasting. Things like possessions, fortune, relationships, and health, changes over time, as we all know to well, and never completely fulfills us. Ending our quest for the things of this world brings heaven’s treasures into sharper focus. Loving Him above everything else declares His worth in our lives and honors Him as our creator.

Praying.

In our prayer life we can bring honor and adoration to God also. Prayers are simply conversations we have with God. In prayer we can ask Him to reveal the things He has chosen for us to do for Him in this life. We can give Him praise and thanks for all the blessings He has given us out of His mercy and grace. And we can also let Him know we trust Him in all of our circumstances that may come our way. By expressing our gratitude, and even our needs, for the power of God, all of our prayers bring Him glory and honor.

Growing in the knowledge of God.

The best way to get to know God more and more is through Jesus. After all Jesus Christ is God in the flesh, and His life on earth models how God wants us to live. If we study Jesus’ words and actions in the Bible on a daily basses, then, through the help of the Holy Spirit, we will receive increased understanding of God’s character and the knowledge of his will for our lives. This is stated so clearly in the Bible, and brings honor to God because our actions show we value Him, and what He has to teach us.

Let us pray together.

As we are singing our last song tonight, and as we’re thinking about the things we’ve learned tonight, if you’ve never honored God by asking the Lord Jesus to come into your life and be your personal savior, this would be a perfect time to do just that. God has made that so easy for us, all you have to do is just DO IT. The Bible says it’s fool proof. The Bible says that anyone, and I mean anyone, who calls on the name of the Lord WILL BE SAVED. It doesn’t matter what your past may look like, all the Lord cares about is your future. And He wants all people to spend eternity with Him in that place called heaven. Don’t wait another second. If you have any doubt at all about your eternal security, what’s going to happen when you die, I beg you to get it taken care of right now, right here. Right where you are sitting, quietly, with heads bowed, and your heart’s toward God, just pray a little prayer like this..............