God Gives Better Gifts

Today begins the 7 days of Ann. Since she has a birthday within a week of Christmas, I try to make her feel uniquely celebrated. Actually, her curiosity got the best of her so she opened a gift on Thursday which is extending the celebration to the 10 days of Ann. Each of these days is marked by a gift that is not a bird in a fruit tree.

When I was a kid, Sesame Steetwas more about numbers and letters. Some of you will recall that each episode was brought to the viewer by a particular letter of the alphabet and a number. Today’s message is brought to you by the letter “H”. If you read through these 4 verses and underline all the time you find the letter “h”, you may find the main points I am trying to highlight in this message.

Chuck Swindoll is known to say that only 2 things are everlasting: people and the Word of God. Since I am unaware of any of us who would claim to speak for God, unless your Christmas giving includes pregnancy, none of us will be giving everlasting gifts this Christmas.

God, on the other hand, wants you to experience an Even Better Christmas than you imagined, by giving better gifts than we can give.

Today’s text reveals the best gift-giver is the triune God. To understand the pronouns him in v. 11, we must look back to v.3. The Blessings are from God and Father, the blessings are in Christ, and as we will see in v.13 they are guaranteed by the Holy Spirit.

Transition: The first gift that this passage describes is that…

God provides an Inheritance (vv.11-12)

Dr. Larry Crabb, a pastoral counselor who passed away earlier this year, wrote that the 2 basic human needs are security and significance. I believe the inheritance God offers addresses both of these needs.

Our Inheritance is Secure (have obtained)

1. Hope is a good perspective, but it is woefully inadequate when it comes to the condition of our eternity. When you think about eternity, and we all do from time to time, God does not want you to hope that you will go to Heaven! He has made provision so that we may know we have eternal life (1 Jn 5:13)

2. The we in vv.11-12 speaks of Jewish believers (first to hope). Gentiles are added in v. 13 - you also. One evidence of our future confidence is the way that the Hebrew people have been protected as God’s Chosen people for centuries even though Semites have been (and continue to be) despised by others.

3. The counsel of His will is the message conveyed throughout the entire Old Testament—that God protected the Messianic line.

Our Inheritance grants Significance (hope)

1. Our familial standing means that our lives are not meaningless. We are destined for a rich future.

2. Hope is a concept that transcends time!

a. Hope is separated from wishes/dreams in that it is rooted in something that has already happened.

b. Hope is a word that essentially looks forward to a resolution.

c. Hope’s future outcome changes our present by providing optimism and endurance.

Transition: If hope is rooted in past accomplishments, the root of our hope is…

God offers the gospel of salvation (v.13a)

Some have claimed that the very concept of the divine is the product of man’s imagination. But Paul says that the work of God is not merely human speculation. The Gospel is not something that we imagine, it is something of which we are informed.

We are informed of God’s part (heard)

D.L. Moody is quoted as answering when asked what role he played in his salvation, “My part was to do the sinning and His part was to do the saving”.

1. Many who have a false understanding of the Gospel believe that man is basically good and he does the best he can to merit eternal life, then God’s grace simply fills in the gap.

2. The teaching of Scripture is that apart from God’s grace..

Psalm 14:1 ESV:2016

1 The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, they do abominable deeds; there is none who does good.

Psalm 53:3 ESV:2016

3 They have all fallen away; together they have become corrupt; there is none who does good, not even one.

One of Moody’s stories recounts: “Suppose I was going over London Bridge, and saw a poor miserable beggar, bare-footed, coatless, hatless, with no rags hardly to cover his nakedness,--and right behind him, only a few yards, there was the Prince of Wales with a bag of gold,--and the poor beggar was running away from him as if he was running away from a demon, and the Prince of Wales was calling after him, “Oh, beggar, here is a bag of gold!” Why, we should say the beggar had gone mad, to be running away from the Prince of Wales with the bag of gold! Sinner, that is your condition. The Prince of Heaven wants to give you eternal life, and you are running away from Him. “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life.”

3. I’m not saying that you are any more evil than I am, or anybody else listening to this message. The gospel mentioned in this verse is the better gift that God offers! Every single person who has ever lived (besides the first couple) has been born in a guilty and separated condition. God loves you so much that He does not wish for you to remain in that separated and hopeless condition, so He sent His only Son, the 2ndperson of the Trinity, to come as a babe, live sinlessly, die sacrificially, and rise from death to remedy our alienation, so that you may not perish, but have eternal life.

We are inspired to do Our part (believed)

1. A gift transfer is not complete until it is received.

If I told you a paid for gift is waiting for you at Best Buy or the Jeweler, it does you no good until you act upon the information and receive it.

2. You won’t come to understand God’s plan through mere human reasoning. But even though preaching has its weaknesses, if you hear what is being said and respond with volitional belief, your inheritance can be secured!

1 Corinthians 1:21 ESV:2016

21 For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe.

Transition: You may be wondering what evidence I can offer to support a claim that belief in truth proclaimed through a weak sermon is reliable. If you believe what you have heard…

God promised (and delivered) the Holy Spirit (vv.13b-14)

We have Him now

1. There are 3 verbs in v.13 and they all are in a tense that means it was a process that has been completed.

a. You heard until the message was complete

b. You wrestled with the decision until you chose to believe

c. The Holy Spirit has transferred you from a lost condition to a secure position within the finished work of Christ.

I have owned 2 houses during my lifetime. In each of those purchases a title search was done, a deed was compiled and registered with the proper authorities. It was a process that concluded with a legal certainty.

2. Because of the 3 past things in v.13, v.14 states a present reality—is.

3. No matter who may challenge a deed, the security of our salvation has been recorded by the very persons of God Himself.

He seals us now

This is the time of year when many of us send greeting cards. Some cards are sealed with a lick, some are sealed by a machine, some are SWAK, some may be sealed by a sticker, and some may even be sealed with hot wax and a personal imprint. I have received some envelopes where the sender signed his or her name across the seal so that if anyone tampered with the intent of the sender it would be evident to all.

Just as Pilate’s seal was placed on the stone at the mouth of Jesus’ tomb to attach Pilate’s authority to anyone who disturbed it, God has sealed your salvation, so that anyone (including you) who attempts to disturb it will be challenging God Himself. This is why each of us can confidently claim

Romans 8:38–39 ESV:2016

38 For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

His presence guarantees a future possession

In the days before “pay at the pump” or “pre-pay” gasoline. It was common practice to fill the tank then pay for the fuel. There have been 2 times when I put gas in the tank then realized my cash and debit card were not in my wallet. One time I was at a station that was only a block from our home. I explained the situation, gave the clerk my Driver’s License as a guarantee that I would be back, then went home to get my payment. The second time I was a little further from home, the clerk did not know me, and I didn’t even have my wallet in order to leave my Driver’s License. In that situation I left our son Michael in the store while I retrieved my wallet, then returned to finish the transaction. Which guarantee was mor sure, my Driver’s License or my son?

The Spirit of God Himself, the 3rd person of the Trinity, has been left to guarantee that possession will be made complete.We have Him now

Conclusion

This is the time of year when retailers try to compel us to give lasting gifts.

Jewelers claim that a diamond is forever. But if Swindoll is correct, and I think he is, then you will be separated from that diamond upon your death.

Car dealers are holding a sign-and-drive event so that you can obtain a gift now and pay for it later. The best vehicle eventually wears out.

Even a fruitcake that gets regifted 20 times will eventually lose its attractiveness.

Rather than gifts that result in separation, need replacement, or lose their attraction, God offers gifts that TRULY Last—gifts that can satisfy our souls, and the greatest gift that we can offer to others. God’s gifts lead to an Even Better Christmas!