Proverbs 18:24 – “A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.”

Friends,

I’ve had a burden lately for those who are far from God.  My heart hurts for those who know God, know they are a sinner, are broken over that, but unsure what to do.  Often times, we try to satisfy our soul’s needs and longings in the most expedient way possible, patching them with whatever is readily available, rather than what God has provided.  I’ve been there, I’ve done that, and I still fight against that.  One of the most common ways I find myself drifting from God, is by surrounding myself with people who are far from God themselves.  When my close friends are not battling with me to grow closer to God, I have lost the joy of relationships God meant for me to have.

Man was not made to be alone – we see that from the very beginning of creation in Genesis 2:18 – “Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.”  Certainly God had in mind marriage, the most important of all relationships for someone – but at our core, we were made for relationships – we yearn for good friends and fellowship, to be known, cared for, and loved.  This is because we were made in the image of God – who although One God, exists in three persons in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  These three were created to perfectly know one another, perfectly serve one another, and perfectly love one another.

So relationships are good as they were designed by God, why then does proverbs say “a man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother”  This is because, we want to be accepted without judgment, we want to feel loved, and sadly, we believe that the best way we can do that, is by surrounding ourselves with people who will accept and perhaps even encourage sin in our life.  So we have relationships with people who instead of pushing us closer to God, simply make us feel “comfortable” about the sin in our life.  These can be friendships, romantic relationships, or even marriages.  These types of “companions” that surround a person, may lead a person away from God completely.  The reality is that sin is not without consequence, not just before God, but here, now, in the world, sin leads to brokenness, shame, isolation, depression, and a host of other painful things.  Why would we want to deaden our soul to feel “comfortable” in that, when God has a better plan for our lives?

Like most issues of the heart, the gospel of Jesus is the answer.  Do you believe that Jesus accepts you today, fully, even with all your junk and sin you’re still struggling with?  Most of us have a hard time with that.  Most of us believe we’re letting Jesus down, and He can’t love us like we are – but that’s not the gospel.  The gospel of Jesus says, that “God shows is love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom 5:8)  There’s not a “better version” of you, that God will delight in.  Jesus knew your sin – past, present, and future, and paid for it all on the cross.  The Holy Spirit quickened your heart to believe on Jesus for salvation, and “I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 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.” (Rom 8:38-39).  That is the gospel of Jesus.  That is God’s Truth.  You are fully known (better than you know yourself) by God, and perfectly loved by Him, because “if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.  All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself” (2 Cor 5:17-18)

God’s plan for our close relationships is to surround us with people who share in God’s Truth.  People who do not care what sin you’ve fallen to, they will press you into the gospel and towards God.  There is no judgment in these friendships, because the judgment fell on Christ.  They will remind you – Jesus paid for all your sin, mourn the sin in your life, but know that you are redeemed – walk like a son or daughter of God, because that is who you are.  They’ll finish by saying, guess what, if you’re in the same position tomorrow, I’m going to say the same thing to you.  They are there to model the companionship that exists within God, they do not leave you when you fall, they love you ahead of their own good, and they want the best for you.  Sadly in the modern church where church discipline is gone, daily fellowship is gone, and there is a portion of body of Christ that is simply there for cultural reasons, it can be difficult to find truly gospel centered friendships.  It’s much easier to find friends and relationships with people who won’t talk with you about God, especially not in a way that would challenge you.  Don’t settle for that.  It’s worth the effort – even if you find one friend who will love you the way God intends His love to be modeled out from the gospel, it’s worth it.

If you’re far from God today, know that God loves you right where you are.  Before you move on, just press God’s word and the gospel truth back into your heart, and settle it – As you believe on Jesus, know that He loves you, He has redeemed you – it’s done.  You’re completely pure, perfect, and righteous.  You have the perfect righteousness of Christ clothing you, that is what God sees today, right now, when He sees and thinks about you.  Part of God’s love for you, is that He’s given you means to grow closer to Him for your joy.  That is primarily through His Word, through prayer, and through gospel-centered relationships with other Christians.  Those friends, will stick closer than a brother, they will be with you, loving and encouraging you every step of the way, because they know you’ve been redeemed already, as they have.  If you don’t have that, pursue it through the Church; reach out to me if I can help in any way.  Life will always bring trials, and sin is present to tempt us away from God every day.  We have an enemy trying to take us down every day “though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him—a threefold cord is not quickly broken.”  (Eccl 4:12)

Know you’re loved and prayed for.

Grace and Peace,

Adam

Psalm 78:1-8 – “Give ear, O my people, to my instruction; incline your ears to the words of my mouth!  I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings from of old, which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us.  We will not conceal them from their children, but tell to the generation to come the praises of the Lord, and his strength and His wondrous works that He has done. 

For He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which He commanded our fathers that they should teach them to their children, that the generation to come might know, even the children yet to be born, that they may arise and tell them to their children, that they should put their confidence in God and not forget the works of God, but keep His commandments, and not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation that did not prepare its heart and whose spirit was not faithful to God.”

All of Creation has an innate relationship with our Creator, God.  By Him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.  Man was the pinnacle of God’s creation, unique, being called an image-bearer of God.  The perfect goodness, love, justness, and joy of God was meant to be reflected in man.  Instead of trusting in the goodness of God, man chose to reject God, seeking joy apart from Him.  Everyone born through man since has been born with the same inclination of the heart, pursuing joy apart from God, selfishly seeking self-fulfillment above all else, but finding only emptiness, pain, separation, and loss.  The consequences of sin.  The deception of sin is not that there is no happiness to be found; anyone who says sin is no fun at all is a liar – it will offer pleasure for a time.  No, the deception of sin is that it promises lasting joy without pain or consequence, and in that it has proven a liar time and time again; a horrible substitute for what man was created for; lasting joy in God.  The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.  As an all powerful Creator, it would seem just for God to simply destroy all of man, but although God’s justice demands a punishment for sin, it is the love of God that led Him to bear it one behalf of man.  God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.  God took on flesh as Jesus, came, lived a perfect life, and was crucified on a cross as punishment for sin that was not His own.  He made it His own.  The physical punishment was severe.  His appearance was so marred, beyond human semblance, and his form beyond that of the children of mankind.  The wrath of God poured out on Jesus, was likewise beyond what we can imagine.  He was forsaken, not simply by men, but by God, for God cannot be in the presence of sin, His holiness is an all consuming fire.  The infinite value of Jesus’ sacrifice was more than enough.  He conquered death; the sin he bore could not hold him in the grave, because His holiness was greater still.  The justice of God was satisfied, Jesus’ death was more than enough to justify all those who would come to God in faith.  The love of God triumphed over the wrath of God that man’s sin required.  Jesus Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God.  Jesus makes His appeal to us every day – come.  There are no more barriers, no more guilt and shame for sin, just come.  There is no intellectual theological puzzle to figure out first, there is no sin that needs cleaning up first; there is no sin that has not been completely paid for, even the one’s yesterday, even the ones a moment ago, even the ones in the future, just come.

I’ve been writing over the past couple of years through Romans in a series titled “Reconnecting with the Gospel”.  My hope was that as we saw through God’s Words what the gospel was, what it was not, what man’s predicament was before God apart from the Gospel, and what freedom and joy man has with the Gospel in Jesus Christ – affections would be stirred in our hearts to greater devotion to God.  So today I want to look at specifically, if someone is saved, what is their response to the gospel?  What is the response of someone who is not saved?

I’m going to be working out of a passage in Colossians primarily, but I also want to look back to Romans 6:1-11

Colossians 1:21-23 – “And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven”

Paul is speaking to those within the Colossian church who have believed the gospel.  They, like us all, were at one point at enmity with God, by nature disobedient, and following after whatever fleeting pleasures we could find apart from Him (Ephesians 2:1-3).  But God, being rich in love and mercy, even while we were sinners died for us (Rom 5:8).  We were reconciled to God by the blood of Jesus Christ, the righteous for the unrighteous that we might be brought to God (1 Peter 3:18).  What is the hope of the gospel that was heard by the Colossians?  The forgiveness of sin, the reconciliation to God their Creator, and a future hope of eternity in a fullness of joy in the presence of Jesus (Psalm 16:11, John 17:13,24)

All of the promises of the gospel, specifically one’s reconciliation to God, is true of someone “if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard”  

Sometimes people will ask me if I believe someone can lose their salvation.  It’s funny to me that if you say someone might not be saved, you will be attacked saying – “you can’t know that, you’re not God”, yet when I say to someone that they likely are saved, I never hear those words.  The Bible does not speak of salvation as a one-time event, and neither do I.  It speaks of “being saved by the gospel” as an ongoing process.  1 Corinthians 15:1-2 – “Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain.”

So I’ll wrap up this point here – for someone who is genuinely saved, there is an affection for God, a new hope in the gospel, that they hold onto.  Life as a Christian is not a sprint, but a steady, marathon.  When someone is genuinely saved, there is still sin their life, but they no longer are enslaved to it.  They are free to pursue joy in God instead, and their heart longs for Him.  As temptation, suffering, and tribulation come up, trying the faith of a Christian, trying to shift their hope onto money, other people, addictions – someone whose heart has been saved by Jesus will not let go of Him, and will run to Him, not every time; but over time.

What does the response of someone look like who is not saved?  It can look like a great many things, but essentially it is the opposite of what was just described.  It is someone who might not want to go to hell, might like the appeal of “guilt-free” living, but they have no love for God.  Their hope ends with whatever God can give them, instead of Himself.  If they’re honest, if Jesus wasn’t in heaven, it wouldn’t be that big of a deal to them.  Ultimately, they do not consider themselves dead to sin and alive to Christ (Romans 6) – they are content to continue in disobedience towards God.

So if you come to me asking whether or not you’re saved – I’m going to ask you to tell me about your life.  Where were you 5 years ago, where are you now?  Where do you want to be 5 years from now as a Christian, and what are you doing now to prepare you?  What do your actions say about what you value – do you value God above all else, or is there something else that you value above Him?  If I preach the gospel to you right now, will your initial response be to pursue joy in God in righteousness, or be a feeling of relief that you can pursue joy in licentious sinning without guilt?

Ultimately, my answer doesn’t matter much.  What does your own heart tell you?  The good news of God, is that He is in the business of making new creations, of redeeming people.  Today is the day of salvation.  (2 Cor 6:2) Choose today who you are going to serve (Joshua 24:15), and know that a prayer to God asking for affections for Him, wisdom to live rightly, a clean heart before Him, and greater repentance from sin will not be ignored.  (Matthew 7:11)  If your heart has seemingly strayed from God, preach the gospel again to your own heart and hold fast to your hope in Jesus.

Lamentations 3:19-24 “Remember my affliction and my wandering, the wormwood and bitterness. Surely my soul remembers and is bowed down within me.  This I recall to my mind,
Therefore I have hope.  The Lord’s lovingkindnesses indeed never cease, for His compassions never fail.  They are new every morning;  Great is Your faithfulness. “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “Therefore I have hope in Him.”

Hosea 6:1-3 –

Come, let us return to the Lord. For He has torn us, but He will heal us; He has wounded us, but He will bandage us. “He will revive us after two days; He will raise us up on the third day, That we may live before Him.  “So let us know, let us press on to know the Lord. His going forth is as certain as the dawn; And He will come to us like the rain, Like the spring rain watering the earth.”
Grace and Peace,

Adam