Romans 1:16-17 Part 6
The Gospel unto Salvation: Present Tense–Who’s Your Keeper?
I Peter 1:5
Remember: We saw in Vs 3-4 several “Eternal Anchor” words in which our present tense salvation is lived out. The election according to the Foreknowledge of God the Father, sanctification of the Spirit, and obedience and sprinkling of the Blood of Jesus Christ (Vs 2) sets the stage for outworking of Eternal Will of God. That, in itself establishes the nature of our salvation as Eternal. Even in the here and now, Eternity Rules! This Mercy is God’s very Eternal Nature–His Mercy endures forever!. (Ps. 100:5; Ps. 136). Our Hope is an Eternally Lively Hope through the Resurrection of our Lord, the victory over death. Our Inheritance is incorruptible and undefiled and cannot fade away. It is reserved in heaven for us. All of this speaks of an Eternal Soil out of which our present day salvation grows.
Vs 5 Foundational to the “foreknown” ones in their pilgrimage on this fallen earth is Peter’s little phrase, “Who are kept by the Power of God....” One of satan’s most heinous assaults on the people of God is in their “assurance of salvation”. He has fertile soil for these arrows of wickedness in this day of humanistic “theological” thinking. With current evangelism and “christianity” starting from man and god’s plan for MAN (punctuation & spelling intended), people are bound to feel their security is at least partially up to them. As we have said before, the problem isn’t one of security but one of salvation in the first place. Ignoring our Lord’s Parable of the Soils leads to pews full of stony and thorny ground hearers. Consider the contrast in Peter’s thinking and it’s support from Scripture.
Remember Vs 3: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Who has begotten us again to a living Hope.” The “begetting is Divine and the Hope is Divinely Eternal. And the source of Biblical assurance is Divine as well!
John 10:27-30 “My sheep hear My Voice, AND I KNOW THEM, and they follow Me. And I give them ETERNAL LIFE, AND THEY SHALL NEVER PERISH; neither shall anyone snatch them OUT OF MY HAND. My Father, WHO HAS GIVEN THEM TO ME, IS GREATER THAN ALL; and no one is able to snatch them OUT OF MY FATHER’S HAND. I AND MY FATHER ARE ONE.” And of course, the Pharisees took up stones to kill Jesus because they understood that He was claiming to be God!!
Vs 27 gets quoted a lot, not entirely in the correct instances, or at least in the right spirit. But it must be kept in it’s context!! God’s sheep are a gift of the Father to the Son and they don’t need batteries nor do they get lost behind the couch!!! The Giver and the Receiver are the sole determiners of the value of the Gift and the price paid assures They won’t lose any!!! Now remember, salvation flows out of the Father’s Bosom of Will and Purpose, and He has worked out this Will through His “exceeding Power toward us who believe according to His Mighty Power which He Worked in Christ when He Raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His Right Hand in the heavenly places.” (Eph 1:19-20) Salvation of the sheep is God’s work!!!
This is the message of Matthew 18:10-14, and its final word is, “Even so it is not the WILL OF YOUR FATHER WHO IS IN HEAVEN that one of these little ones should perish.” This is not just some sentimental children’s story, THIS IS THE DECLARED WILL OF OUR HEAVENLY FATHER!!! We are all like sheep who have gone astray!! This means all of us. Isa 53:6
Isaiah 54:17 “No weapon formed against you shall prosper, and every tongue which rises against you in judgment you shall condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD, and their righteousness is from Me, says the LORD. And why is this true? Because our God is a Covenant Keeping God.
Jeremiah 32:38-41 God refers to Himself 12 times in 4 verses, and He has every Right to talk about Himself and His doings. Notice Vs 29 “then I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear Me FOREVER.” Vs 40 “And I will make an EVERLASTING COVENANT with them, that I will not turn away from them doing them good, BUT I WILL PUT MY FEAR IN THEIR HEARTS SO THAT THEY WILL NOT DEPART FROM ME.” And the end of Vs 41 seals His Covenant, WITH ALL MY HEART AND ALL MY SOUL.”
Romans 8:31-39 This text is at the end of the “Holy Spirit chapter”.The Holy Spirit is the INDWELLING GOD Who continually, without interruption administers the Keeping Power of the Most High God in the hearts of His People. He is our Eternal Life, and He is One with the Father and the Son. He is the Eternal Life that continually Proceeds from the Father. (John 15:26) He is the Indwelling Assurance that nothing shall separate us “from the LOVE OF GOD WHICH IS IN CHRIST JESUS OUR LORD.” It is the Love of God that we are wrapped up in and it is found only in Christ Jesus our Lord. You would have to “ungod” God to tear us away from the Bosom of His Beloved Son, our dwelling place.
Philippians 1:6 This is Paul’s confidence: “being confident of this very thing, that HE WHO HAS BEGUN A GOOD WORK IN YOU WILL COMPLETE IT UNTIL THE DAY OF JESUS CHRIST.” If you are Foreknown and begotten unto an Eternal Inheritance, then the Father always Finishes what He has Started. His workbench doesn’t look like mine!!!
And “until the Day of Jesus Christ” brings us to the rest of Vs 5.
1. We are being kept by the Power of God, through faith!!! “But without faith IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO PLEASE GOD, for he who comes to God MUST BELIEVE THAT HE IS, AND THAT HE IS THE REWARDER OF THOSE WHO DILIGENTLY SEEK HIM.” (Hebrews 11:6) “Lord I believe, help thou mine unbelief”. (Mark 9:24)
2. Notice the Eternal context–“salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” Present tense salvation is by faith, filled with hope, anchored in God’s Covenant Word, but it lives with a longing anticipation. This isn’t all there is to it, Praise God.
Titus 2:13 We are to “live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present age, looking for the Blessed Hope and Glorious Appearing of our Great God and Savior Jesus Christ.” Our present behavior is to be inseparably linked to our anticipation of the fulfillment of our hope at our Lord’s appearing!
I Timothy 6:14-15 “that you keep this commandment without spot, blameless until our Lord Jesus Christ’s appearing, which He will manifest in His Time.....
I John 3:2-3 Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, FOR WE SHALL SEE HIM AS HE IS. And everyone who HAS THIS HOPE in Him purifies himself, just as He is Pure.
Biblical salvation in the present is always anchored to Eternity by it’s lively, future Hope. Perhaps this is a big part of the reason for the sad state of behavior among the professed people of God, especially the young people. Our evangelism is focused on “felt needs”, present issues, and a Jesus who makes you feel better. Eternity is for old people to think about!! Such a message is suspect and it’s salvation defective at best.
Hebrews 7:24-25 “But He, because HE CONTINUES FOREVER (Is Eternal), has an unchangeable Priesthood. Therefore, HE IS ABLE TO SAVE TO THE UTTERMOST those who come to God THROUGH HIM since HE ALWAYS LIVES TO MAKE INTERCESSION FOR US.”
You may say, “but I thought Jesus said , ‘it is finished’. Yes, His Atoning, propitiatory work is finished, but the secured benefit goes on for Eternity. Salvation is continual and perpetual! He ever lives before the Father as our Man, the perfect human satisfaction that the Father requires and desires. And we will Eternally come to the Father, Only through HIM. A salvation without an Eternal High Priest is no salvation at all!!! The Eternal High Priest is our ultimate, eternal security!
The Gospel unto Salvation: Present Tense–Who’s Your Keeper?
I Peter 1:5
Remember: We saw in Vs 3-4 several “Eternal Anchor” words in which our present tense salvation is lived out. The election according to the Foreknowledge of God the Father, sanctification of the Spirit, and obedience and sprinkling of the Blood of Jesus Christ (Vs 2) sets the stage for outworking of Eternal Will of God. That, in itself establishes the nature of our salvation as Eternal. Even in the here and now, Eternity Rules! This Mercy is God’s very Eternal Nature–His Mercy endures forever!. (Ps. 100:5; Ps. 136). Our Hope is an Eternally Lively Hope through the Resurrection of our Lord, the victory over death. Our Inheritance is incorruptible and undefiled and cannot fade away. It is reserved in heaven for us. All of this speaks of an Eternal Soil out of which our present day salvation grows.
Vs 5 Foundational to the “foreknown” ones in their pilgrimage on this fallen earth is Peter’s little phrase, “Who are kept by the Power of God....” One of satan’s most heinous assaults on the people of God is in their “assurance of salvation”. He has fertile soil for these arrows of wickedness in this day of humanistic “theological” thinking. With current evangelism and “christianity” starting from man and god’s plan for MAN (punctuation & spelling intended), people are bound to feel their security is at least partially up to them. As we have said before, the problem isn’t one of security but one of salvation in the first place. Ignoring our Lord’s Parable of the Soils leads to pews full of stony and thorny ground hearers. Consider the contrast in Peter’s thinking and it’s support from Scripture.
Remember Vs 3: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Who has begotten us again to a living Hope.” The “begetting is Divine and the Hope is Divinely Eternal. And the source of Biblical assurance is Divine as well!
John 10:27-30 “My sheep hear My Voice, AND I KNOW THEM, and they follow Me. And I give them ETERNAL LIFE, AND THEY SHALL NEVER PERISH; neither shall anyone snatch them OUT OF MY HAND. My Father, WHO HAS GIVEN THEM TO ME, IS GREATER THAN ALL; and no one is able to snatch them OUT OF MY FATHER’S HAND. I AND MY FATHER ARE ONE.” And of course, the Pharisees took up stones to kill Jesus because they understood that He was claiming to be God!!
Vs 27 gets quoted a lot, not entirely in the correct instances, or at least in the right spirit. But it must be kept in it’s context!! God’s sheep are a gift of the Father to the Son and they don’t need batteries nor do they get lost behind the couch!!! The Giver and the Receiver are the sole determiners of the value of the Gift and the price paid assures They won’t lose any!!! Now remember, salvation flows out of the Father’s Bosom of Will and Purpose, and He has worked out this Will through His “exceeding Power toward us who believe according to His Mighty Power which He Worked in Christ when He Raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His Right Hand in the heavenly places.” (Eph 1:19-20) Salvation of the sheep is God’s work!!!
This is the message of Matthew 18:10-14, and its final word is, “Even so it is not the WILL OF YOUR FATHER WHO IS IN HEAVEN that one of these little ones should perish.” This is not just some sentimental children’s story, THIS IS THE DECLARED WILL OF OUR HEAVENLY FATHER!!! We are all like sheep who have gone astray!! This means all of us. Isa 53:6
Isaiah 54:17 “No weapon formed against you shall prosper, and every tongue which rises against you in judgment you shall condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD, and their righteousness is from Me, says the LORD. And why is this true? Because our God is a Covenant Keeping God.
Jeremiah 32:38-41 God refers to Himself 12 times in 4 verses, and He has every Right to talk about Himself and His doings. Notice Vs 29 “then I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear Me FOREVER.” Vs 40 “And I will make an EVERLASTING COVENANT with them, that I will not turn away from them doing them good, BUT I WILL PUT MY FEAR IN THEIR HEARTS SO THAT THEY WILL NOT DEPART FROM ME.” And the end of Vs 41 seals His Covenant, WITH ALL MY HEART AND ALL MY SOUL.”
Romans 8:31-39 This text is at the end of the “Holy Spirit chapter”.The Holy Spirit is the INDWELLING GOD Who continually, without interruption administers the Keeping Power of the Most High God in the hearts of His People. He is our Eternal Life, and He is One with the Father and the Son. He is the Eternal Life that continually Proceeds from the Father. (John 15:26) He is the Indwelling Assurance that nothing shall separate us “from the LOVE OF GOD WHICH IS IN CHRIST JESUS OUR LORD.” It is the Love of God that we are wrapped up in and it is found only in Christ Jesus our Lord. You would have to “ungod” God to tear us away from the Bosom of His Beloved Son, our dwelling place.
Philippians 1:6 This is Paul’s confidence: “being confident of this very thing, that HE WHO HAS BEGUN A GOOD WORK IN YOU WILL COMPLETE IT UNTIL THE DAY OF JESUS CHRIST.” If you are Foreknown and begotten unto an Eternal Inheritance, then the Father always Finishes what He has Started. His workbench doesn’t look like mine!!!
And “until the Day of Jesus Christ” brings us to the rest of Vs 5.
1. We are being kept by the Power of God, through faith!!! “But without faith IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO PLEASE GOD, for he who comes to God MUST BELIEVE THAT HE IS, AND THAT HE IS THE REWARDER OF THOSE WHO DILIGENTLY SEEK HIM.” (Hebrews 11:6) “Lord I believe, help thou mine unbelief”. (Mark 9:24)
2. Notice the Eternal context–“salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” Present tense salvation is by faith, filled with hope, anchored in God’s Covenant Word, but it lives with a longing anticipation. This isn’t all there is to it, Praise God.
Titus 2:13 We are to “live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present age, looking for the Blessed Hope and Glorious Appearing of our Great God and Savior Jesus Christ.” Our present behavior is to be inseparably linked to our anticipation of the fulfillment of our hope at our Lord’s appearing!
I Timothy 6:14-15 “that you keep this commandment without spot, blameless until our Lord Jesus Christ’s appearing, which He will manifest in His Time.....
I John 3:2-3 Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, FOR WE SHALL SEE HIM AS HE IS. And everyone who HAS THIS HOPE in Him purifies himself, just as He is Pure.
Biblical salvation in the present is always anchored to Eternity by it’s lively, future Hope. Perhaps this is a big part of the reason for the sad state of behavior among the professed people of God, especially the young people. Our evangelism is focused on “felt needs”, present issues, and a Jesus who makes you feel better. Eternity is for old people to think about!! Such a message is suspect and it’s salvation defective at best.
Hebrews 7:24-25 “But He, because HE CONTINUES FOREVER (Is Eternal), has an unchangeable Priesthood. Therefore, HE IS ABLE TO SAVE TO THE UTTERMOST those who come to God THROUGH HIM since HE ALWAYS LIVES TO MAKE INTERCESSION FOR US.”
You may say, “but I thought Jesus said , ‘it is finished’. Yes, His Atoning, propitiatory work is finished, but the secured benefit goes on for Eternity. Salvation is continual and perpetual! He ever lives before the Father as our Man, the perfect human satisfaction that the Father requires and desires. And we will Eternally come to the Father, Only through HIM. A salvation without an Eternal High Priest is no salvation at all!!! The Eternal High Priest is our ultimate, eternal security!