The greatest witness to the power of the Gospel is a
changed life.
There are times when I reflect back on my life. On the sin, the ignorance, the futility. I reflect on my life and I look back at a sea
of wretchedness. A sea of self. A sea full of waves tossing between heaven
and earth, between spirit and flesh. As
I look back at that sea of sin, I see now that it was encompassed in an ocean
of grace, moving me toward recognition of my own wretched condition and the
only thing that could ever save me from it.
God looked upon me at my most hideous and said, "I can fix that. And I will, because you are worth
fixing."
Every human soul is a treasure to God. Every human soul needs to be fixed and is
worth fixing to God. We cannot fix
ourselves, only Christ can. Only Christ
can deliver us from the sea of sin and self that every human is afloat. We must come to the Cross carrying only our
repentant heart in our hands. We must
recognize our wretched condition and cry out to the only One Who can save us.
I fear that if we come to the Cross in any condition
other than brokenness, we are only inoculated with the idea of Jesus rather
than liberated by the power of His Lordship over our lives. There are so many inoculated Christians in
America. People who have come to the
cross, but not in repentance seeking salvation from self and sin, and thus have
been delivered from neither. People who
have been inoculated with the notion of Christianity, which has made them
immune to the delivering power of it. People
who have repeated a prayer after someone and been assured that their repetition
of that prayer saved them from eternal damnation, when the words they repeated
were not said from their heart, and therefore, no transformation ever took
place and they continue along with their life, still adrift the sea of sin and
self in a sinking boat of false assurance.
Paul prophesied that this would happen. He said in the last days, there would be
people who would have a veneer, a facade, or a seeming appearance of godliness;
that there would be people who would claim Christ by their mouth but deny Him
by their lifestyle and by their lack of spiritual pursuit of a relationship
with Him. They would have a superficial
devotion to the notion of Christianity, but they would deny the power of it, "...having a form of godliness, but
denying its power" (2 Tim 3:5).
They would deny the power of the Holy Spirit to transform them from
death into new life, and thus, would be devoid of eternal life. They would deny the power of the Holy Spirit
to transform the human soul into a new creature in Christ (2 Cor 5:17). If there is no transformed life, then there
is no salvation. If there is no longing
for Christ, then there has been no genuine faith placed in His saving
power. I say this because we can't
afford to get this wrong. Paul warned
the Corinthians that because some of them lived lives that did not bear witness
to the work of the Spirit within them, to "examine
yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. Do you not
realize that Christ Jesus is in you--unless, of course, you fail the
test?" (2 Cor 13:5).
The power of the Gospel is "Christ in you, the hope of glory" (Col 1:27). It is the power of the Spirit of the living
God, working within you to transform you from sinner into saint, from hideousness
to holiness, from being spiritually dead in sin to being spiritually alive and
dead to the power of sin. A.W. Tozer
said, "The Holy Spirit never enters a man and then lets him live like the
world. You can be sure of that."
That is because the greatest witness to the authenticity of a person's
faith is a changed life "by the
power of God for salvation" (Rom 1:16).
"Jesus answered him, 'Truly, truly I say to you,
unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.'" (John 3:3)
"By their fruits you will know them. Do people pick
grapes from thorn bushes, or figs from thistles? Just so, every good tree bears
good fruit, and a rotten tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad
fruit, nor can a rotten tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear
good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. So by their fruits you
will know them." (Matt 7:16-20)
"Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' will
enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of My Father in
heaven." (Matt 7:21)
"To the Jews who had believed in him, Jesus said, 'If
you hold to My teaching, you are really My disciples. Then you will know the
truth, and the truth will set you free.'" (John 8:31,32)
"The kingdom of heaven may be likened to a man who
sowed good seed in his field. While everyone was asleep his enemy came and
sowed weeds all through the wheat, and then went off. When the crop grew and
bore fruit, the weeds appeared as well. The slaves of the householder came to
him and said, 'Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where have the
weeds come from?' He answered, 'An enemy has done this.' His slaves said to
him, 'Do you want us to go and pull them up?' He replied, 'No, if you pull up
the weeds you might uproot the wheat along with them. Let them grow together
until harvest; then at harvest time I will say to the harvesters, "First
collect the weeds and tie them in bundles for burning; but gather the wheat
into my barn."'" (Matt 13:24-30)
"For the creation waits in eager expectation for the
children of God to be revealed." (Rom 8:19)
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