He Started It He Will Finish It

2024 Spring Branch

Philippians 1:6

He Started It. He Will finish It.

When I was a child… this was a very well know saying: “He started it! He started it and I finished it!” With Momma… we may have said “Well, he started it!” But she would reply, “Well I am finishing it now!” You started the foolishness, broke my whatever, and now I am going to end the foolishness.”

And we all may have experience this and some PTSD from this.

Now: For Some of us, we use this expression like this: Some attitudes are like this: “Anything I start, I am going to finish.” I think this is a wonderful attitude, conviction, habit and behavior that we want to teach and exemplify…

We love this - We want to see people give their all and to work hard, fight hard, and come through the obstacle. And whether this has been our practice or not… this is your desire: to be like this.

Why? Because it honors and glorifies our God. It points to Him. It points to His character and nature.

What do we see? Our God is not a God who quits. Our God is not a God who begins a good work and gives up. Our God is a God Who had a plan in the beginning… And He is going to do everything that He has planned. He is going to do everything He desires to do.

He is going to finish that which He starts…

Verse 6 - Paul was confident. It what? In Whom? Paul was confident in God.

What is confidence? The feeling or belief that one can rely on someone or something; firm trust; conviction; feeling certain. What does it do? It gives assurance, courage, and boldness. Can confidence be misplaced? Absolutely!

We can trust in something or someone, and have confidence in that something or someone that does not deserve it.

They have not been proven and tried. We did not look at their track record.

We placed confidence in a financial advisor who had no experience, no background, no degree… not competent in that area. We shouldn’t do that...

Just like we shouldn’t chose a surgeon who has killed 9 out of 10 people, after doing a toe transplant.

This is extreme… But Maybe… we have placed too much confidence in people… maybe we have thought too much of people and have exalted them beyond their abilities… that happens.

And, maybe we have placed too much confidence and have placed too great of an expectation on ourselves.

Now, when it comes to our tasks, our labor, our work… the things that we want to be great at and do well…. We understand that confidence will come with competence.

That is, we will grow in confidence as we grow in our understanding and knowledge of our craft, of our abilities, and what we are to do.

When our knowledge and skill grows… Our confidence grows. But when it comes to salvation, spiritual growth, eternal promises… We are not the masters here. We are not the experts. So… How can we grow in our confidence as Christians?

Our ultimate confidence in found in God. We are trusting in His knowledge, His ability, His power, and expertise… Not ours. In other words, we acknowledge this: God is competent. God can do it. And the more we learn about God, the more confident we will become.

Foundationally, when it comes to our salvation, we cannot find confidence for ourselves if we are looking to ourselves or to our own abilities.

So, it is like this: If my salvation is not secure in God, I will be, and you will be insecure forever. If my confidence is not in Christ, I will be, and you will be without confidence forever.

*And that is where many Christians may be today: Walking without confidence:

1. Why? Because you do not believe that God is competent.

2. Or, today you believe that you started it.

Listen… if I believed that salvation was my doing… I will be its undoing. If I believed that my salvation was contingent upon me… I would live in fear and I would lose my salvation.

Verse 6 – I am confident in God of this very thing… that He Who began a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.

It’s not, “Ryan started it, and I will finish it; Not... I started it and He will finish it, or, He started it and I will finish it…”

It is this: He started it, and He will finish it.

Who is God? Author and Finisher (Hebrews 12:2). Alpha and Omega (Beginning and End) of everything.

“Well… What is His tract record? How Do I know He is competent?”

1. God created everything in 6 six days, made man in His image, and began making promises/covenants with His people. We see God being faithful to His people over and over again remembering His promises with Adam and Eve, with Noah, with Abraham – He is the father of many nations, God saves a people for Himself out of Egypt, does miracles all throughout their lives, feeds them with bread from heaven, water from rocks, splits the sea and the rivers, defeats the armies, provides refuges and homes, delivers them from the oppressors, makes promises about a Messiah who will come to do a new thing, establish a New Covenant, and in the fulness of time Jesus Christ is born through a virgin named Mary.

If you want to see God’s history of faithfulness, read your Bible. God said it… and that was it, that settled it. God was going to do what He said He was going to do. And when He said He was going to do it, you could not stop Him from doing it.

But what do we do? We take our own experiences and place them on God. “This is the way I am. This is the way my family is. This is the way the world is… therefore… God must be the same way.”

That is not the case with God. That is not the truth. That is the wrong conclusion.

Confidence will come when we take God for who He is.

Then you will be confident. Then you will walk without fear. Then you will be safe and secure, and walk with peace and victory

2. Also, we can live out of this reality in another way:

We should be like God in this way. We should imitate Jesus in this way. We should be consistent, show integrity, let our yes be yes and our no be no, make a promise and keep it with one another… We should be a people who are characterized as people who keep their word (James 5:12).

Do what you say you are going to do. Complete what you say you are going to complete. Put your hand to the plow and don’t look back. Do your work with all your might. Do not give up. Do not quit. Finish the race that you have entered into… Ministers… keep up the good work you are doing.

And you will be imitating your Father in Heaven and His Only Begotten Son.

And you will make a positive impact and godly progress and you go.

You say, “Yea, but, I am going to mess up. My work will not be perfect.” Yes! Our imitation will be pale in comparison to the perfection that we see in our Heavenly God.

He alone is the Perfect One. We look to Him to follow. We look to Him to make progress.

God knew what would happen before anything was created and He allows us to see throughout His Word… that He is working through all things, even our failures, to bring about His good works.

*Is He working through my failures? Yes. Is He working through my success? Yes. Is He working through the pain, through the chaos, through the battles, storms… and everything else? Yes.

Romans 8:28 – And we know… that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purposes.

God is putting all things together. He is putting you together. He is working in your life today. He will be working in your life tomorrow. God will be working in your family, in our church, in our nation… in this world…

God started it… God is going to finish it.

You will grow in Christ-likeness. You will be like Him in the end. Christ will come and there will be a new heavens and a new earth.

God is never going to quit. God is never going to quit on you. 1 Thessalonians 5:24 – Faithful is he who calls you, and He also will bring it to pass.

**What does that do for you?

1. I have confidence today. I have assurance today. I have a trust today in God’s ability. I have a helmet of salvation.

2. I can rest today in Christ. He is the Author and Finisher of my life and salvation. The Lord is my Rest. No fear.

3. I can hope; I have a Living Hope, and my hope/future is in His hands. John 6 and John 10 - He will lose none. The Father and the Son has their Hands on you...

4. I can persevere because I know that God is going to persevere. God is going to be faithful, even if I am unfaithful at times. God is going the distance on me and for me… Time to get back up!

5. As I imitate God in this way… I choose to finish what I start: I will follow Christ; I will serve my family…

6. As I imitate Jesus in this way… I will persevere. I do not want to give up on my Lord or my loved ones… I want to be a finisher, a good finisher.

7. As I imitate my Lord… I resolve to put my hand to the plow and not look back – For my Lord, for my family, and for my Church. God’s faithfulness drives me to be faithful to everyone else.

In light of this Good News about God: We desire and chose to never quit on God and to never quit on one another.

I will finish the race set out before me. Not trusting in my ability, but trusting in God’s. And for those who set their hearts in this… they will be kept eternally secure, and peace can flood their soul.

And these precious souls will make progress and will make much of life.

*Dear loved ones… do you know God in this way? Do you want to know God in this way? Do you want this confidence, assurance, and hope? Do you want to live out of this and finish this Christian life well?

Jesus is here for you.