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Christ and Heaven Our All

6/22/2019

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We ought not to first seek security and safety and comfort for ourselves in this world. Our Lord and Savior in whom we trust has said, “Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you” (Matt. 6:33). Therefore, set your eyes on Christ and put your house in order to seek Him first, and trust that He will take care of everything else. Since you confess that Christ and His kingdom is the treasure of your heart, arrange everything in your life to align with your treasure (Mat. 6:21).

Rick Warta

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"Be not weary in well-doing" (2 Thess. 3:13)

6/22/2019

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Romans 8 was written to assure the weakest believer that salvation in Christ is eternally certain because it is the work of our triune God. There is no condemnation in Christ (v1). God accomplished in Christ’s life and death what the law by our life and death could never do (vv. 2-4). We died with Christ to sin’s guilt and the curse and bondage of God’s law (Rom. 6:3-11; 7:4). By this we are justified before God. Though in our natural mind we are hostility itself towards God (v7), nevertheless we have been raised in spirit; the Spirit of Christ and of God now lives in us (v10). Our spirit now lives because Christ lives in us and He is our life (Col. 1:27; Gal. 2:20; 2 Cor. 3:6; Eph. 2:4). He has given and will yet give us all grace to trust and hope in Christ unto the end, to lead us ever onward in this walk of faith until He raises our bodies in the totality of our redemption (vv. 5-11). We are therefore happy debtors to Christ for His saving grace. We are not slaves under the law. We are not slaves to our flesh. We are glad servants in the grace of Christ, our great God and Savior (vv. 12-13). We are sons of God. This is by the will and predestinating purpose of God our Father (James 1:18; John 1:12-13). This is by the incarnation and redeeming blood of the Son of God in our nature (Heb. 2:9-10; 9:12-15; 10:7; Eph. 1:4-7; Gal. 4:4-5). This is by the indwelling, life-giving Spirit of God (John 3:6-14; Rom. 8:9-10; Gal. 4:6). But though we are now the sons of God, we have not yet received the promised possession of eternal glory; it does not yet appear to our sight what we shall be (1 John 3:1-2; Heb. 10:35-36; 11:8-16; Rom. 4:13-25). Therefore, we both hope and patiently wait for the salvation that is ours in Christ (Lam. 3:22-26; Rom. 5:1-10; Gal. 5:5). Christ has obtained eternal glory for us (Heb. 1:3; 9:12-16). He has taken possession of our inheritance that is ours with Him (Rom. 8:17; Heb. 6:20). By God-given faith in Christ, heaven is our present possession (Heb. 11:1; Acts 18:27). We not only trust Christ by the grace of the Spirit of Christ in us, but we also hope for glory, which is the reward of Christ’s righteousness (Rom. 8:19-25; Col. 1:27; 2 Tim. 2:10). As if that weren’t enough to ensure our victory, the Spirit of Christ also helps our infirmities (vv. 24-25). In all of our weaknesses, He makes intercession for us (v26). He knows the will of God. We are indivisibly joined to Him (1 Cor. 6:17). His intercession and groanings in us causes us to groan in our spirit. Though in ourselves do not know what to pray, His intercession in us perfectly expresses the eternal will of God in every detail of our lives (v. 26). Christ, on His glorious throne of grace, searches the hearts of all men, but especially the hearts of His blood-bought people to know the mind of the Spirit for us. He makes intercession for us at the right hand of God in all the efficacy and glory of His blood and righteousness, which He offered and fulfilled in our behalf (Rev. 19:13). This mysterious operation of God by His Spirit in us, and Christ on the right hand of God for us, is according to the eternal will of God the Father (vv. 27-28). It pleased the Father to save us by Christ as our Substitute. And it pleased our Father that we would come to the completion of this salvation through a life of faith in Christ and the expectancy of hope in Christ, all through the operation of His Holy Spirit in us, and by Christ on the throne for us (v27; Gal. 5:5). Thus, all things in time and life and death and this world and heaven itself, even in hell beneath, work together for our good, to conform us to the image of God’s dear Son (vv. 28-29). There can be no failure in one thing God determined and Christ purchased for His people (v32). This has been His will from eternity (v30). He will make known to the onlooking universe that we are His, that we are Christ’s, that we are the sons of God, that He has justified us, that Christ died for us, that He rose for our justification and is seated in glory to make intercession for us to bring about all that He established and purchased in the blood of His everlasting covenant of grace (vv. 28-34; Heb. 9:12-16; 13:20). He will save to the uttermost all who come to God by Him (Heb. 7:25; Rom. 5:9-10)! The great conclusion is drawn for us in preeminent climax: nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord; He is the sovereign Lord of heaven and earth whose will and word and work cannot fail (vv. 35-39)!

Therefore, since our all-wise and all good God and Father has ordained that we live and are saved in this grace of faith and hope in Christ, “let us have grace that we may serve God in reverence and godly fear” (Heb. 12:28). “Be not weary in well-doing” (2 Thes. 3:13), but “be ye steadfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord” (1 Cor. 15:58). If nothing is impossible for our God and Father, if He has given His Son up to judgment for us; if He has given us who are the epitome of weakness His Spirit of grace, and revealed to us His eternal purpose and work in Christ; if He has promised to give us all grace in Christ; then we are free as sons of God to embark in every work and endure every trial looking to Christ and hoping to the end as we run this race, knowing we cannot fail because our Rock is Christ (Deut. 32:31). He is immovable and unfailing (2 Tim. 2:10-13; Matt. 7:24-26).

Rick Warta

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"Faithful is He who called you, who also will do it" (1 Thess. 5:24).

6/22/2019

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“Jonathan said to the young man that bare his armour, Come, and let us go over unto the garrison of these uncircumcised: it may be that the LORD will work for us: for there is no restraint to the LORD to save by many or by few” (1 Sam. 14:6).

When I was 16, I undertook rebuilding the six-cylinder engine in my 1964 Chevy pickup. I would have never begun that work with any hope of completing it unless I was confident my father was willing and able to help me if I got into any trouble. I did, and he did.

Believers undertake every task in patient and confident expectancy (hope) because we know that our heavenly Father is able and willing and shall without fail save us to the uttermost by Jesus Christ to His great glory (Heb. 7:25; Php. 1:6; 4:13; 1 Thess. 5:23-24). Thus, though we are weak and unprofitable servants, though there be few of us, we labor in hope; we wait in confident expectancy that God will do as He has said. As Jonathan told his armor bearer, “There is no restraint to the LORD to save by many or by few” (1 Sam. 14:6). There is no limitation in God because of our infirmities that would prevent Him from saving us to the uttermost and accomplishing His eternal will by Christ. In spite of our weaknesses (Rom. 8:24-27), therefore, let us live in the patience of hope because our God and Father, who cannot lie, promised eternal life to elect sinners in Christ before the world began (Titus 1:1-2; 2 Tim. 1:9; 2 Thess. 2:13-17; Heb. 6:10-12). Though we are unprofitable servants, the Gospel is not an unprofitable work. It is the power of God Almighty to the salvation of sinners by Jesus Christ. God’s grace cannot fail to save His people (Isa. 55:11; Rom. 1:16-17). He made Christ sin for us and so made Him all of our righteousness (Rom. 4:5; 2 Cor. 5:21). His exceeding great power raised us from spiritual death to life and faith in Christ (Eph. 1:19-2:6). If , when we were enemies, He reconciled us to Himself by the death of His Son, how much more now that we are reconciled and justified by Christ's blood, shall He save us by His life (Rom. 5:9-10)? All strength and all success is from God for Christ's sake, all by His grace alone. We therefore may undertake great things, knowing our Father is willing and able and shall without fail fulfill His will to bring us to Himself and glorify His Son for His grace to us who are without strength.

Rick Warta

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Christ in you

6/21/2019

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Christ dwells in believers by His Spirit (John 14:16-8; Rom. 8:2, 9-11; Gal. 2:20; 2 Cor. 3:6; 1 Cor. 6:15, 19; 2 Cor. 13:5). And we who believe in Christ are also in Christ by His Spirit (Rom. 6:3; 2 Cor. 12:13; Gal. 3:27). We are therefore united to Him, one with Him (John 17:22; 1 Cor. 6:17). The evidence that we are in Christ and that He is in us, is that we live upon Him by faith, who in His substitutionary, sin-atoning death, and justifying righteousness, saved us from our sins and justified us in the sight of God (Gal. 2:20-21). This also is our communion with the Son of God, that we eat and drink by faith from His successful, redeeming work (John 6:56).

Rick Warta

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Glad servants of Christ

6/21/2019

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The people Joseph saved asked that they might find grace in his sight, and gladly submitted to his rule. “Thou hast saved our lives: let us find grace in the sight of my lord, and we will be Pharaoh's servants” (Gen. 47:25). All whom the Lord Jesus Christ saves ask to find grace in His sight and gladly submit to His rule as their only and all-sufficient Savior and sovereign Lord. “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation” (Rom. 10:9-10).

Rick Warta

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All Promises Established in Christ

6/21/2019

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All of the promises of God in Christ are established by God. Joseph told Pharaoh that because God gave him two dreams, which repeated the same meaning, the thing was established by God. God doubled the message to emphasize its certainty and nearness. How much more certain and near, then, are all of the promises of God in Christ revealed in the Gospel (Heb. 6:16-20)? Christ is the subject of the entire roll. His work is certain. It is done! How can any change history? The volume of the book of God throughout is about Him! Not one thing in that volume of God’s word can fail (Matt. 24:35)!

Rick Warta

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Boundless Gospel

6/21/2019

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No sermon or series of sermons can ever exhaust the Gospel of God's grace in Christ. That is because the Gospel of God concerns the infinite person and eternal accomplishments of the Son of God, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ (Rom. 1:1-4). Full comprehension of our Savior surpasses human understanding (Eph. 3:17-19). The Gospel, therefore, must surpass anything close to our complete comprehension. Though our Savior is infinite in His being, and though to search out the work of God is a never-ending task, yet we are able to believe the Gospel with our limited understanding. It is not the quality of faith, but the object of faith that saves, the One and whose words and work we believe. Faith understands the truth of Christ and relies on Christ and Him crucified (Rom. 3:24-25). But faith is never a complete understanding, nor is trust in the best of saints ever perfect (1 Cor. 13:12; Luke 17:5; 2 Thess. 1:3). It helps to compare how men in this life continuously search out God’s work in creation. They never come to a complete understanding of this temporal and finite creation. How much less can a man fully comprehend in this life the eternal purpose and work of God in our eternal salvation, taking ungodly sinners from the depths of sin to dress them in the robe of Christ’s righteousness and bring them in Christ to the heights of glory as children of God and joint-heirs with Christ? We know our God and Savior (John 17:3), and yet we never cease seeking to know Him (Isa. 55:6-7; Php. 3:10)!

Rick Warta

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Hope

6/21/2019

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Hope is that God-given grace of expectancy. It looks for the fulfillment of God’s promises in Christ (Col. 1:27; Gal. 5:5). It not only comforts and supports us in the troubles and disappointments and afflictions of this life, it also does something for us when we enjoy ease and abundance in this life: it detaches our affections to things in this world and sets our affections on things above, attaching our affections to Christ (Col. 3:1-5; Rom. 8:25).

Rick Warta

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All sins forgiven for Christ's sake

6/20/2019

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I am sure I am not alone when I say that the pain of my sins is often a burden too heavy for me to bear (Psa. 38:4). To everyone so burdened, the glad tidings of God from Christ Jesus our Lord is the sweetest news ever heard. “Her sins which were many are forgiven” (Luke 7:47). She was a woman with many sins. Her sins were many! Yet Christ forgave all of her many sins! Christ not only forgives many sins, but He forgives great sins. “For thy name's sake, O LORD, pardon mine iniquity; for it [is] great” (Psa. 25:11). I cannot rest unless I know God has forgiven all my sins for this very reason: because my sins are many and so greatly evil!

David, guided by the Spirit of Christ our great Comforter prayed, “Look upon my affliction and forgive all my sins” (Psa. 25:18). Sin on the conscience is great affliction (Psa. 32:1-2). Only forgiveness from Christ can remove it. The best news this sinner has ever heard is that “the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin” (1 John 1:7). The Lord Jesus Christ, as our High Priest, took all of the sins of all of His people from off of us and confessed all of them as His own, putting Himself under that load of guilt and shame before the justice of God (Lev. 16:21-22; 1 Pet. 2:24). As our High Priest, He made our sins His own, putting them upon His head as the Lamb of God. All of our sins were then lifted from us. They became His then, at the cross (2 Cor. 5:21; 1 Pet. 2:24; Psa. 31:5, 10; 40:6-8, 11; 69:4-7; Isa. 53:3-12; Matt. 1:21; John 18:8)! Christ owned them before God. He bore them as His own under the judgment of God’s wrath in our place, instead of us, bearing the wrath that we deserved (Matt. 26:28; Rom. 5:9; 1 Pet. 2:24). The Judge of all took the sins of His guilty people and bore the judgment of His own law against Himself (Gal. 3:13; Heb. 7:27; 9:26, 28). He died for our sins (1 Cor. 15:3-4). He made a full end of them. He made such an end of them, that by His one offering of Himself to God for our sins, He perfected forever all those God the Father set apart as His sons and entrusted to Christ as Surety from eternity (Gen. 43:8-9; 44:32-34; Heb. 7:22, 27; 10:14-18). Having died for our sins, Christ was buried. Our sins were thus removed. He rose from the dead. Our sins were left in the grave. The body of our sins was put to death and put away in the death and the grave of our Surety and Substitute. We are now justified from all sin (Acts 13:39; Rom. 6:6-7, 11; 8:1, 34; 2 Cor. 5:14). When Adam sinned, we became guilty before God; we were condemned then (Rom. 5:12-19; 1 Cor. 15:22). When Christ restored God’s honor by answering justice and fulfilling God's law by His obedience, culminating in His death, we were justified before God at that point in history. Before God, we were made holy and perfected when Christ fulfilled the precept and penalty of God’s holy law in our behalf as our Surety (Rom. 5:12-21; Isa. 45:21-25; Heb. 1:3; 9:12; 10:10, 14; 13:12, 20). Because our sins became His, we bear our sins no more. He made an end of our sins in His death (Dan. 9:24). God has forgiven us for Christ’s sake (Psa. 103:10; Eph. 4:32). God has removed our many sins and our great sins from before His face as far as the east is from the west (Psa. 103:12). He will not remember our sins because Christ bore the stroke justice demanded, appeased and removed the wrath of God due to us, and blotted out God’s account of our sins against Him (Isa. 43:25; 44:22). Christ loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood (Lev. 16:30; 1 John 1:7; Rev. 1:5). We are clean before God. Though a search is made, God Himself will not find sin on His people (Jer. 50:20; John 8:11; Rom. 8:1, 33-34). When Christ appears the second time, it will be without sin unto salvation because He put away our sins by the sacrifice of Himself (Heb. 9:26-28). God is faithful and just to cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). He will present us faultless in the presence of His glory in love with exceeding joy (Jude 24; Eph. 1:4).

As a great sinner I find this to be the best of all news! This news disarms my hostility against my God whom I offended (2 Cor. 5:18-21)! It is good news from heaven (Isa. 52:7). It is good news from God our Father. It is good news from the Lord Jesus Christ our Savior. It is good news from the Spirit of God, who recorded the Gospel of Christ's redeeming work in scripture and bears testimony to it in our conscience (1 Cor. 15:1-4; Heb. 9:12-14). His work is finished (Heb. 1:3; John 19:30). It is complete. It is perfect. Christ’s answer for our sins with Himself is enough for God!

By the blood of the covenant God made with Christ, He has sent forth the sin-laden, law-cursed sinner out of the pit wherein is no water (2 Tim. 1:9; Rom. 5:12-19; Zech. 9:11). He gives faith to every chosen, redeemed sinner to enable them to receive this proclamation of pardon and forgiveness that produces God's peace and joy in their hearts (Rom. 5:1-2; 15:13).

There is no good news in the pit of sin. There is no life or peace or hope or good news in the pit of man’s free will, or in the pit of our own personal obedience and worth before God. But there is good news in the covenant of promise, made in the blood of Jesus, the Surety of the everlasting covenant made in His blood (Heb. 7:22; Matt. 26:28; Heb. 13:20). Christ is all my hope. He is all of my salvation. He has made Himself known to me in the Gospel of His grace. He is all my desire (2 Sam. 23:5). Every time I hear God’s Gospel by the Spirit of His grace, it is as if I’ve heard it for the first time again. Nothing from me the sinner is required. God has provided all and accomplished all in Christ my Savior. He has chosen His Son, appointed His Son and made His Son the Christ, the Son of Man, that in His life and death and exalted place in glory, He would be my wisdom, my righteousness, my sanctification and my redemption (1 Cor. 1:30). What could be more glorious (Rev. 5:1-13)? God has provided all in Christ by His grace alone! I must now go to Him at all times for all grace, even and especially this faith by which I see and take from Him and live upon Him (Gal. 2:20)!

Rick Warta

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Christ and Heaven Our All

Rick Warta

"Be not weary in well-doing" (2 Thess. 3:13)

Rick Warta

"Faithful is He who called you, who also will do it" (1 Thess. 5:24).

Rick Warta

Christ in you

Rick Warta

Glad servants of Christ

Rick Warta

All Promises Established in Christ

Rick Warta

Boundless Gospel

Rick Warta

Hope

Rick Warta

All sins forgiven for Christ's sake

Rick Warta

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