2013_03_31 Making It Personal

The drama that we watched this morning ends with that dramatic question, "Will you
make it personal?" That is to say, will you apply the benefits of the death and the
resurrection of the Lord Jesus to your own life? I was thinking about that question a
little bit this past week as I was preparing for this morning's message, and it occurred
to me that the question, "Will you make it personal?" Very closely parallels a question
asked by the Heidelberg Catechism many years ago. Lord's Day 17 puts it this way, "How
does Christ's resurrection benefit us?" In other words, "How do you make it personal?"
You see, these ancient events of many years ago are only relevant for us. This many hundreds
of not thousands of years later, if we can't, in fact, make it practical and if indeed
it applies to our lives. And if the scriptures are to believe, the events of Good Friday and
the events of Easter many years ago are simply the most important event in history since
the creation of the world. I say that because the Apostle Paul, in 1 Corinthians chapter
15, verses 3 and 4 puts it this way, he says, "For I delivered to you as of first importance
what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures,
that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures."
What later on, in verse 17 of that passage, he says, "If Christ has not been raised,
your faith is futile." Means useless. You are still in your sins. And then two verses
further down in verse 19, "If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be
pitied more than all men." I delivered, he says, "As of first importance to you, that
Christ died and was raised according to the scriptures." So let's take a little bit
of time this Easter Sunday morning and talk about the benefits of Christ. What does it mean
to make His resurrection personal? Well, the catechism goes on to give us a threefold answer
to the question, "What, how does Christ's resurrection benefit us?" It says, first
of all, by His resurrection, He has overcome death so that He might make a share in the
righteousness He won for us by His death. Second, by His power we too are already now resurrected
to a new life. And third, Christ's resurrection is a guarantee of our glorious resurrection.
So let's look at each of these in turn. First of all, the resurrection of Jesus makes
me righteous before God. Listen again to how the catechism puts it, by His resurrection
He has overcome death so that He might make a share in the righteousness He won for us
by His death. Now we're accustomed to thinking that is the death of Jesus on the cross that
makes us righteous before God. And there is some truth to that. The death of Jesus on the
cross paid the penalty for our sin. Second Corinthians 5.21 says, "God made Him who had
no sin be sin for us so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God." And one
John 2.2 echoes that same theme. It says concerning Jesus, "He is the atoning sacrifice for
our sins and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world." In His death
on the cross, and we celebrate with that on Good Friday, Jesus died to pay the penalty
of all our sin. Our sins are forgiven. But understand with me this morning that having
our sins forgiven does not make us righteous. If I've been a criminal and I have to be
punished for my sins or my crimes and I serve my time, then my sins are forgiven. That
doesn't mean that I'm righteous and it doesn't mean that you want me for your friend,
does it? Because who knows? But I might revert back to my old ways. So there is a second
side to becoming righteous and that is the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. Listen very carefully
to how Paul puts it in Romans 4.25. He says concerning Jesus, "He was delivered over to
the death for our sins." That's the forgiveness that we were talking about. And He was raised
to life for our justification. It is the resurrection of Jesus that justifies us. And the word
justifies means just as if I'd never sinned. Jesus was without sin. That's why death
could not hold Him in its grip. That's why we can sing up from the grave he rose with
a mighty triumph for his foes. When I, by faith joined to Jesus, I not only share in
his death on my behalf, I also share in his resurrection. And so when I have confessed
my sins, when I have come to Christ by faith, now the righteousness of Jesus has become
my righteousness. And so by his resurrection God declares me righteous. The word is the
righteousness of Christ is imputed to me. That is to say it is charged to my account.
We are justified by faith. The implication of that are enormous, far bigger than most
of us can grasp most of the time because it means that I no longer have to try to be good.
It means I no longer have to worry, am I good enough? Do my good deeds outweigh my bad
deeds? No. It means that in Christ I am as good and as righteous as ever I'm going
to be. That's incredible good news because it means that my position before God is
secured. As I said, theologically, that's known as justification. That's the first benefit
of the resurrection of Christ. If you're a Christian this morning, if you are in Christ,
there is no condemnation. God looks at you and He says, what sin? I don't see any. It
is a legal position. You are a child of God. But there is a second benefit then of the
resurrection of Christ. And that is this. It helps me to live righteously before God.
Because notice again how the catechism goes on to say, by His power, we too are already
now resurrected to a new life. Paul writing to the Corinthians says, if anyone's in Christ
is in creation, the oldest past away behold all things have become new. This righteousness
of Christ that we've been talking about is not only imputed to me, it is also imparted
to me. And the difference is huge. As I said earlier, to have the righteousness of Christ
imputed to me is to have His righteousness charge to my account. He's paid the bill. I
don't have to pay the bill anymore. To have the righteousness of Christ imparted to me
means that He comes to live in me by the power of His resurrected life. And He imparts
righteousness to me and inside of me. Because the genius of the new covenant is that God
not only tells me here is the law. This is how I want you to live. Only for us to discover
all the time we can't measure up anyway. The genius of the new covenant is that Christ
comes to live in me. And the power that enabled Him to overcome sin and death and hell is
now the power that comes to be part of my life. That is new testament, new covenant Christianity.
It is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me. And when Christ comes to live in me,
the presence of His Holy Spirit empowers me to do two things. It enables me to recognize
sin, begin to hate it and begin to put it off. And secondly, it enables me to recognize
these righteousness, begin to love it and then learn progressively how to put it on. And
so Paul, writing to the Colossian Church, expanding on the riches that we have in Christ,
puts it this way. And these next two passages are fairly lengthy but stick with them because
they are so profound in the new life that we have in Christ. Colossians chapter 3, beginning
at verse 5, Paul having talked about the fact that we're seated with Christ in heavenly
places. Our citizenship is up there. He says because your citizenship is up there, learn
to live for that creation, not for the present one. And so he says put the death there forward
belongs to your earthly nature. Sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires, and greed which
is idolatry because of these, the wrath of God is coming. You used to walk in these ways
in the life you once lived. But now you must rid yourselves of all such things as these,
anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other since
you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self which is being
renewed in knowledge in the image of its creator. Notice how in this passage he doesn't say well,
you know, try harder to be better. No, he says you are already better. You are already a citizen
of the kingdom of God. And now because you are in Christ already a citizen of the kingdom of God,
put off old behaviors. The example that I have sometimes used is when I was a youngster, we first
came to this country after five years, we went to citizenship court and we became naturalized
Canadian citizens. Didn't mean that we spoke the language, ate the food, or behaved like bonafide
Canadians, but it meant that now that we were citizens here, we would put off old practices,
and we would now learn to put on new practices and so Paul continues in this passage. Therefore,
as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness,
humility, gentleness, and patience, bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you
may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you, and over all these virtues put
on love which binds them together in perfect unity. In Christ, the power of sin that drives us
has been kneeled to the cross. In Christ, the power of His resurrection has been allotted to us.
And as by faith we embrace Him, and as by faith we learn to listen to the voice and the power of
the Holy Spirit, then the Holy Spirit inside us makes us recognize more and more what are the
patterns of sin. Gives us more and more a desire to be rid of these things, shows us what it is,
the righteousness that God is looking for, and gives me a desire. Gives me a desire to love God,
and to love my neighbor. And throughout life I grow then in this process that is known as
sanctification. It's the test, by the way, of whether or not we really are in Christ. And I've
come to believe over the years that the key to growth in Christ is a surrender to His Lordship.
I was listening just the other day to a pastor from Dallas, Texas. He pastors the church,
they're called Gateway Church. His name is Robert Morris. He was told in the story of how as a
youth he had grown up in a very dysfunctional family, but he had gone to church for most of his youth,
and believed in Christ intellectually, and really wanted to get to know him, but it just never,
ever really clicked. It seemed, in fact, to him that his life was under recursion. He tells the
story of how he was part of a youth group, and they had a rather innovative youth pastor,
and one of the things that they were supposed to do was, one day he had made these little
boats that have dairy-queen banana split containers, you know, what they looked like, and he had put a
candle, melted it in the bottom of these little boats, and lit the candles, and all the kids were
supposed to launch these into the lake, and they would drift towards the cross on the other side of
the lake. And this was an indication of their commitment to Christ that they wanted to serve him,
and so Robert, or Robert is his name, he let all the other kids go first because
in the past his experience with this stuff hadn't been very good, but he really wanted
his boat to get to the cross, and so he pushed it, and wouldn't you know all the other boats were going
straight, but his boat drifted off to the side like this, and that's how it kept on going,
and kept on going. And so this youth pastor is talking away to all these kids about giving their
life to Christ, and everybody's looking over his shoulder, all their boats are going in a straight
line to the cross, and the other end of the lake, and his boat is going off in an arc like this,
and then he says not a word of a lie, his candle fell over. His boat caught fire,
and sank. And he said, you know, God really doesn't want me, and so he plunged deeper and deeper
into sea, and until one day in an active desperation, he ate a motel room next to another man who
shared the gospel with him, and Robert's response was, well, I've heard this gospel many times over,
I've grown up in church, and it's not working for me. And a man said to him words that changed his
life. The man said to him, it's not about just knowing it, it is about giving him control.
Have you made it personal? Have you given him control? In the divine providence of God,
obviously, one of those divine moments, it caught. And he humbled himself before God,
and he said, God, I don't know how to change my life. I have tried you know that I have tried
I surrender to you. And he says that it was like the Lord Jesus, and this doesn't always happen
in the same way for all of us, but it certainly did in his life. He said it was like the Lord Jesus
reached down into his life, lifted him up, and he said to him, you are my child.
He changed his life, and he's a powerful preacher to this day who tells the gospel of Christ.
You see, the resurrection of Jesus makes me righteous before God. The resurrection of Jesus
Christ gives me resurrection power so that I can at least begin living a new life sanctification,
as you know, it's a lifelong process. Nobody ever arrives fully, but by God's grace, we can
certainly bear fruit and become more and more like Jesus. But then thirdly, the resurrection of
Christ gives me hope. The Catechism says, Christ's resurrection is a guarantee of our glorious
resurrection. If you've ever taken seriously the claims of Christ's discipleship,
if you've ever taken seriously the biblical admonition to put off sin and to put on righteousness,
then you will know that sometimes for all the grace that God gives us and promises,
that journey can be incredibly difficult. Sometimes it feels as if you take one step forward
and you take two steps back, isn't that true? One of the reasons for that, of course, is that
the more we grow in Christ, the more we become aware of sin, most of us were wonderfully ignorant
of what sin was until we met Jesus, isn't that true? But when you get to know Jesus, it's like a
light shining into a dark room through a pinhole in the blind and what do you say? All the dust begins
to show up. Another reason is that as we become more like Christ, we experience the opposition of
the devil and the world and the flesh with increased ferocity. And so sometimes we become weary
in well-doing. Aren't there days when you say to yourself, who needs this discipline? Who needs
this loving, my enemy? Who needs this loving God and trying to be good and to live His way?
Let me just fall back into my old life because it was a lot easier. I think if we're truthful,
sooner or later, all of us find ourselves there. What's the antidote? The antidote is the hope
of the resurrection. Peter put it this way. I love the way that he puts it. This is to a persecuted
church. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. By His great mercy we have been
born and new to a leaving hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and to an
inheritance which is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, capped in heaven for you. What keeps
God's people going is the realization that there is an end to the struggles we're going to make
it by God's grace and when we make it the reward will far outweigh anything that we have ever
experienced in the process of getting there. How do we know because Jesus was raised from the dead?
For the joy that was said before him, he endured the suffering and the pain and the shame
with the cross and today is exalted at God's right hand. I love the way Matt Redmond puts it in a
song. Did we sing periodically around here? The song, as you never let go? And I can see a light that
is coming for the heart that holds on. How glory is light beyond all compare and there will be an
end to these troubles but until that day comes we'll live to know you here on earth. It's very
significant therefore that the Apostle Paul, after all his teaching in 1 Corinthians chapter 15
about the importance and the urgency and the significance of the resurrection of Jesus Christ ends
with his incredibly practical pastoral word. 1 Corinthians 1558, therefore that is to say
in light of everything that I have been saying about the centrality of the death of the resurrection
of Jesus. Therefore my dear brothers stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves
fully to the work of the Lord because you know that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.
What does the resurrection of Christ benefit us? It makes me righteous. As righteous as I will
ever be, regardless of who I am, where I come from, how twisted I may have been put together
or what my personal history may have been. God looks at me. He sees the righteousness of Christ.
How does the resurrection of Christ benefit me? He gives me the power of a new life. I don't have
to be defined by my past. I don't have to be limited by my heritage, by my genes, by my
faults and flaws and character issues and by my history because in Christ I'm a new creation.
And God can make something beautiful out of ashes. How does Christ's resurrection benefit
me? It gives me the hope that one day I'm going to make it. One day I'm going to shine like the
stars of the heavens. One day my character will be fully transformed so that I am perfected in love.
I will love God and I will love my neighbor and the power of death and hell and sin will no longer
be able to tear me to what a day that's going to be. And when that happens I'm going to share
with Christ in his new creation for all eternity. Now most of us know this. For any of you that have
come to this church for a length of time that's the gospel we preach Sunday after Sunday the question
is can we make it personal? Have we been to the cross? Have we come to that place that says,
you know, I thought I was pretty good. I thought I could do it on my own. I thought I could change
my own life. But I've discovered that I can't. And I don't know how Jesus can do it or is going
to do it. But he is my only hope. And so I bend the knee and I give him my life and I trust that he
will raise me up to live for his glory. Now to make that personal and to show you how that works
in the real world I've asked Penny and Powell Slimmans to come up this morning. And I'm going to share
with you just a little bit of their journey before we bring the service to a close this morning.
Now Penny some time back when you made profession of faith you shared a little bit
of how you came to this community. Review that for us if you please.
I was having I was having a lot of struggles in my life and I've been brought up in
church and I've just felt so much self-condemation and Powell and I when we married had decided to
marry and always do what God wanted us to do. But the wheels fell off that way and we're both
struggling and I was struggling at that point spiritually and emotionally and I kept going by this
church and I remember looking at the sign and I think it said something like God loves messy
lives God heals messy broken people and I went by that sign. I don't know how many times it must
have been for months. Yeah and I kept praying to God I hadn't stopped praying to God but I had
finished going to church because I was finished with I could never be good enough. I was in so much
shame and condemnation and I kept looking at that sign and one Sunday morning I woke up and it
was like God took me by this graph of my neck and said you are going to that church this morning
and I remember rolling over and Powell said where are you going and I said I'm going to marry an
Athah and he didn't say a word. Pretty strong-minded he just turned back over and went to sleep and
off I went to church and tried to be ignored by everybody and sat in the back and I continued
to go to come to this church and tried to be ignored and all the time praying most of my time
through my struggles and I'm sorry I'm just emotional it brings it all back to when you people
first started to embrace me and love me and God starts showing me differently and I sat at
the back of the church must have been for about three months and praying God I don't know how I'm
going to do this I've never been able to do it properly I'm such a big sinner and I am unworthy
and I just can't I can't do church I can't do it I'll never be good enough so half the time at
night I was praying that I wouldn't wake up my soul wasn't such struggle and half the time I was
praying that I would wake up because I was afraid to die because I didn't really realize what the
cross meant I had not I had not really got the message that I was already forgiven
so one morning I got up and I just said God you've got to help me here please please help me
and I was about the middle of this middle section here and Pastor John made a an alter call
and he said he was talking about broken people broken lives and he said just make your way
down to the front right here and he said well discuss it if you are finished with brokenness
and I stood there and I said to myself I said to God God please do not play just as I am
I was brought up in a penny-costal church and I heard that song and I regained my life to God so
many times and I just did not want to hear that song and wouldn't you know I didn't hear it before
that and I only hear it well I heard it last Sunday as affirmation or last Friday as affirmation
that yes penny do this for me which means being up here and the after the first three chords I
knew that song was playing and I felt sick to my stomach and I pondered and you know when
when the Holy Spirit is upon you it's really hard not to do what it says so grab me by this
gruff on my neck again and down went my feet and I landed right there and I just waited there
and Pastor John put his hand on mine and he said let's talk this over what's going on penny
and I just broke down and cried and then he gave me a book to read and said call me
when you're finished reading that that was Super Bowl Sunday and I spent all day and all the next
day reading it so that on Monday I called him good and early in the morning he said if you
if you identify with anything in this book then you may need some help and I had highlighted
most of the book and I was really excited that there may be some hope for me so we started
he called me in and we started some counseling and that was the first time I realized what the
love of God could do for me it was the first time I knew that God truly loved me and wanted to have
a personal relationship with me and that I wasn't too broken to be fixed and he started to work
on my life and the scripture that always comes up for me and I have it written in the Bible and
I saw it again on one of the songs this morning is Luke 1910 that the Son of God came to see
him saved that which is lost and this is what was lost and he did come and saved me I just had to
accept that that's what he had done on the cross thank you how did that change your life how
did that affect your relationship with Powell because it wasn't all that easy as I recall
it made it worse for a while because then when I was a bit further along and knew that I was
saved and nothing could take that from me I didn't have there's nothing I could do to make God
love me more and there was nothing I could do to make God love me less then I wanted to start to
work on our marriage because Powell had his hurts and he wasn't coming to church as many of you will
remember I was like the widow in the in the role without a husband and we decided to start to pray
for Powell for God to work in Powell's life and then I started to pray into my husband's life
that which I wasn't seeing and I just started praying that those things were already so
and that he I just say thank you for for Powell coming to church thank you for him being that
godly husband thank you for restoring our marriage and the wheels fell off again and I had to really
really have faith even though I wasn't seeing that I kept praying and eventually that's Powell's
story eventually Powell did start to come to this church with me talk a little bit about your
marriage Powell from your perspective and how the wheels came off as as Penny said because that
was a very very difficult stretch not not only did the wheels fall off the axles and the whole
undercarriage and everything fell off it was disastrous I'd always been what I thought to be the
man and the family to take control to drive the bus but that's not what God had intended for me
it was hard life was not easy in the close the closer we got to God got to Jesus the more Satan
would poke and pull that and tear apart only through his divine power can we be here today
this has been a wife describes a journey when your marriage came to its end the gauntlet had been
thrown down I'd been given an ultimatum to when it wasn't even really an ultimatum it was
get out and I did and I thought I'm going to get as far away from this place as I can
because I do not feel loved I do not feel accepted and I thought I jumped to my truck and I said
I'm going south I got to get warm somewhere I don't know anybody I was an hour and a half away
ready to cross the border into the states and I heard this voice
say go home fight fight for this
God said I'm not done with you yet you get home you fight
and at the same time I had I had decided it was over and to show you out a state where I was
I had made the statement the only one I when I threw out I said the only thing that's going
to change when you leave is I'm going to have to find someone to plow the snow and I look back
at that now and think I was not the godly wife I was still having my struggles and so I told God
my plans and I figured God would be okay with that because I was doing what I could I was submitting
to God I thought and I said God this is this is what's happened I've kicked Powell out now
what are you going to do and God said no he said we are going to work on this together
and my heart just dropped I thought I don't see how this is going to happen this can't be this is
not what I want this is it'll be got it figured out here this is is gone we've just got to start
a new and but I do want a surrender to you God and he said then we are going to work it out you're
staying where you are and this is we are just going to work this out together and so we started
to work it out together and I had always felt unloved and this is my third marriage and I always
chose men that could prove to me that I was unloved and unworthy and I kept thinking I knew what
I wanted and I'd I'd ask for it this is what I need and then if I just had that then I would be
happy well when Powell came home and he decided to be that loving godly husband after about six
months I realized I had everything God had restored everything to me he was a godly husband
and I kept thanking him every morning for being my godly husband but then I came face to face with
the fact that now I had what I wanted and I didn't know what to do with it that I wasn't loved
and so after thinking about it for a while I decided I had to be honest and
I went one night and he was on the couch and I sat on his knee and I said honey I have to tell you
something I said I don't think I love you in fact I don't think I can love anybody
and he looked at me and I remember he said that's okay honey if God's brought us this far he'll
let you fall in love with me again and only by God has he let me fall in love with the husband
that I first married and restored everything and more I couldn't have asked for a better husband
than this and I couldn't ask for more than what's God God is doing in our life right now
and it continues to be painful sometime means what he breaks down he makes new and it's better than
it was in the first place but it can be painful and totally worth it and I give all that glory to God
for us being here. Amen. Amen and amen.
[Music]
[Applause]