Great Expectations

Well, we're going to continue to look at the resurrection and what that means to us. The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the central issue of the Christian faith. Without the resurrection, we are still in our sins, our faith is of no value at all, so resurrection is everything. Part of this series is getting us to the point where the resurrection is central to our day to day living. It's not just a fact that we adhere to. It's not just a fact that we can quote, but it's the central issue of our daily life. So that's what this series is all about. Today's message is titled, "Great Expectations". No, we're not going to look at the book--this isn't an English class. We're going to look at the great expectations we can have as individuals as a result of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Well, let's go to the Lord in prayer. Dear Heavenly Father, we're so grateful that You have given us new life. That you have raised us to that we could experience something so radically different, so something so new. Something the world has never seen before. We thank You for that. We thank You that the resurrection of Jesus is central to our faith. We pray that that truth will be central in our day to day lives. Thank You in advance as Your Spirit teaches us this morning. Takes the things of the Lord Jesus and makes them known to us in certain ways. We pray all of these things in Christ' name, amen. So Great Expectations. Number of years ago, my mom under went knee replacement surgery. James Mitchel has experienced that, several others in here may have experienced knee replacement surgery. Well, whenever you do something like that, you want to find out what this is going to mean to you on a day to day basis. How is that going to change your life? What expectations can you have after the surgery is completed? For Mom, she was having trouble just walking. Walking up stairs was an absolute nightmare for her. But with this surgery, her physician said, you can expect to resume playing tennis, you can expect to take hikes; just to enjoy life like you've never enjoyed it before. So Mom went into the surgery, knowing it was going to be painful, knowing that there was going to be some tough times in the recovery but she did so, with the expectations of what this surgery was going to mean to her in day to day living. So we ask the question, the fact that we've been raised from dead spiritually in Christ Jesus, what expectations can we have as individuals for our daily lives. Can we have expectations? I think we can, and I think those expectations are great. Well let's do a quick review of what we've discussed the last several weeks First of all, Jesus was raised from the dead. It happened. It is a historical fact. The evidence is overwhelming. Jesus was raised from the dead. Also looked at the point that resurrection refers to something that does die, and is then given new life. So something does die; Jesus died, his body died. That body was placed into a grave, and then that body was raised to new life. There was something different, qualitatively different with Jesus after the resurreciton than before the resurrection. The body had put on immortality, the body was now incorruptable, imperishble. Those were the things that were true of Jesus' body. Now this event is the cornerstone of our faith. Without the resurrection we are still in our sins and our faith is totally useless. So this event is the cornerstone of our faith. And last week we talked about the fact that resurrection is linked to hope. Resurrection is our hope for change, here and now. Because that's true, we can great expectations about life. Not unrelalistic expectations, but realistic expectations that exceed our wildest imagination. So, we were dead in sin, then we died in Christ; and when we did die, we were raised to walk in the newness of life. So you and I have experienced a spiritual resurrection. Now what does that mean to us? Well the first thing it means is that we have become a new creation. Most of us probably know this verse in II Corinthians 5:17, "Therefore, is anyone is in Christ;" that's the key operative phrase here, "if you are in Christ then you are a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come. " So are you in Christ? Have you responded to that gospel message by faith the fact that Jesus died to take away your sins; the fact that Jesus was buried, the fact that he was raised from the dead so that you could have life everlasting? Has that gospel message penetrated your heart? Has your heart responded in faith? If so, you are in Christ. If you are in Christ, then you are a new creation. Now this word 'new'; it's an interesting Greek word, it's "Kainos", and it means to be qualitatively new. It's contrasted to another Greek word "Neos", which means temporarily new. So what we have been made as a new creation, we're qualitatively different than what we were before. Friday tornadoes swept through the major portion of the United States, from Louisville, Kentucky down to South Georgia, all areas in between. Houses just totally demolished. Lots of lives, ruined. In those situations you see the desperation, and the folks that have lost everything, but also you get this sense of hope. They're going to rebuild, they're going to make things new. But what's going to happen there is, "Neos". They're going to build new houses on old foundations And once they've moved back into those new houses built on old foundations, they're going to get a sense of freshness about life. But that's just temporary, because it's their old life they're moving back into this new structure. It's just a temporary newness. But with us, totally different. It's qualitatively different. We're new creations in Christ Jesus. The old has gone, the new has come. This word 'old' is an interesting word as well, it means "That which was from the beginning" So everything that we got at birth, that's physical birth; that's what this word 'old' refers to. We got an empty way of life. Peter wrote about that in his first letter. He talked about the life that our parents handed to us. And he describes that life as empty. That was an empty way of life. We came into this world with an identity: Sinner. That was who we are in God's sight: Sinners. That was our identity. We came into this world with a very rotten condition. We were dead in sin. All of that was from the beginning. We inherited that, day one. An empty way of life; an identity, a sinner, a condition called dead in sin. We were governed by this Old Covenant, the wages of sin being death. All of that is gone. All of that old stuff is gone. We don't have an empty way of life anymore. Jesus Christ has come inside of us, and has given us new life. We finally feel complete, whole as human beings. That's what Paul writes, 'In Christ, you are complete' What God has created you for has finally happened. But, in you, you no longer have that identity as sinner, you are a child of God. So that old identity is gone, you have a new one. That condition of dead in sin; that's gone! You're now alive in Christ Jesus. You're no longer under the Old Covenant, now you're under the New Covenant. So the old has gone, the new has come. Again this word, 'new' is qualitatively different. It's pretty amazing stuff, isn't it? Now, this is the very reason that the vast majority of Christians today struggle. Because they've never truly grasp what has happened to them in Christ. How many of you were taught that salvation is merely getting your sins forgiven? We could probably all raise our hands can't we? That's what we thought salvation was. I say a prayer, I walk an aisle, and I get my sins forgiven. And along with that comes a golden ticket that grants me into heaven when I die. You've seen the bumper that says, 'We're not different, just forgiven'. Hogwash! That's what it is; it's not true. We ARE different. We are different! But if you think that salvation is just forgiveness; if you think that's all you've obtained through faith in Christ is that your sins are taken away; nothing has really happened on the inside, then you have no expections for change, or transformation here and now. You're going to be stuck in this same old same old. And guess what? That's where the vast majority of Christians live today. They struggle; they try to improve; they try to make changes; they try to become different. But they're doing it out of the energy of the flesh. They don't realize what Christ has accomplished in them. They don't realize that the old has gone, and the new has come. They're still living from the basis of the old way of life. They haven't entered in to the new. So it's vitaly important that we understand this This isn't just a nice verse to memorize, this isn't just a nice verse to cross stitch and hang on a wall. This is our reality. This is truly what Christ has accomplished for us. He has made us a new creation in Christ. All the stuff that plagued us, that haunted us. that kept us up at night, is gone! We're new in the Lord. Let this sink in. Let it really perculate inside. Let it take root because when it does, you will see your entire thinking changed. You will look at life through Godly expectations. If it's just forgiveness, there are no expectations. You're just going to plod along until you die. When you die, that's when the good stuff comes. But I'm telling you, the good stuff is already here in Jesus. We have been made qualitatively different in Jesus than what we were before. So what's new? If this new life is qualitatively different, what's new? Well your spirit has been raised to life, that's what new. Dead spiritually; dead in sin. Now you've been raised to life. A brand new life. God's spirit now lives in you. Did you have God's spirit living in you before you knew Jesus? That's why you were empty. That's why you felt like there was this giant hole in your heart. That no matter what you did to fill it, it just ran out again, and you remained empty. But now, because of God's spirit living in you, you are complete, and that hole is gone. Your relationship to the Law has ended. You're no longer governed by the Law of sin and death. You were once governed by that, but no longer. That relationship has been severed. You live in the New Covenant. There's a new will that governs your life. It's this new covenant that Christ ushered in through His death on the cross. A covenant which God remembers your sins no more. A covenant in which you truly know God. Not just know about him, but know him. A Covenant in which you are truly one of God's people. You're no longer on the outside, you're on the inside A covenant in which God writes His Laws on your heart and minds. You have the mind of Christ in this new covenant. Did you have the mind of Christ before? No! But now in Christ, you have His mind. What is that going to do to our thinking? Change it, right? That's one of our expectations: We can know that we can start thinking differently. Boy we need to think differently don't we? We're a messed up lot, apart from Christ. But in Christ, these brains can start functioning as God truly intended them to function. We can actually think the thoughts of God. Wow! That's huge, isn't it? So that's what's new. So what can we expect? What can we expect? I think I've put together 5, there's hundreds of others; but these seem to hit me this week as the important ones. What can we expect? Assurance of salvation. That's the first thing that we can expect, now that we've been made new in Christ. Now that we have a new identity, now that we have a new condition. We can expect to live in the assurance of salvation. Number one issue talked about on People to People; how can I know for sure that I'm saved? It's a question that haunts folks. It's no wonder. I mean, it's not a mystery that that question gets asked time and time again. We all still blow it, don't we? We still have crazy thoughts that race through these heads of ours. You stop back and think, "where did THAT come from??" But, it's there. And you think, with all of that, am I really saved? I mean, is this normal for a Christian to have those kinds of thoughts racing through their heads? Is that normal? How many of you have asked that question? We've all asked that question: is this normal? Why do I keep giving in to the same sin, time and time and time again. Is THAT normal? And you start really thinking on those questions, and it leaves you to doubt. "I don't even know if I'm saved!" But, that's human thinking. That's fleshly thinking. Now that we've been made new, now that we're in Christ; now that we have His Law in our hearts and minds, His spirit living inside of us, we can expect God to erase those doubts inside of us. We can expect Him to put us on the solid foundation of eternal security. And we know this, because of what Paul wrote in Romans 8: The spirit himself, remember the spirit now lives in us; the Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children. The Spirit testifies. There's a testimony in your heart. It's not your testimony it's not based on all the wonderful things that you have done it's a testimony of God revealed to us by His spirit. From deep within. us. And that Spirit testifies that we are God's children. That we truly belong. He's going to keep pounding and pounding and pounding until that becomes our reality. Expect it! Welcome it; let God put you on that firm foundation. If you're struggling with your eternal security, wondering if you're saved at all, let today be the day that you drive the stake... that God drives that stake for you. That you truly hear the voice of God's Spirit saying, "You are a child of God" and then move forward with ears wide open to hear God's Spirit saying that to you, day after day after day. Because He wants you to know it. So expect it. Expect it. The second thing we can expect because of the resurrection, because we've been made new in Christ, because we've been raised to walk in the newness of life is this: We can expect to have a genuine love for God. Two greatest commandments in the Old Covenant, to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul and mind; and to love your neighbor as yourself. They had no expectations of actually carrying that out. In their history, the history of the Jewish people, the nation of Israel, is evident that they've failed miserably. Whenever another kingdom introduces a foreign god to the people of Isreel, their hearts were pulled in that direction. Every single time. When we were lost, and maybe we grew up in church and we heard about the good news of Jesus Christ and we heard about the gospel message and even said we believed it. But then when the world introduced us to something that looked fascinating, intriguing, mesmerizing our hearts just drawn to what the world was offering. And we knew we shouldn't go there, but we couldn't help it. We just couldn't help it. Why? Because we hadn't been made new yet. We were still under the control of sin, and our affections for the things of this world. Isn't that right? You been there? But that was before you'd been made new. Before I had been new. Now, something's happened on the inside and my affections are toward God. To the people of Israel, Moses said that at a point and time you're going to experience a circumcision of heart and you're going to see a difference. Well in Christ we've experienced that circumcision of heart. We've been given a new heart, and that heart leans toward God. That's our spiritual affections today. That's what's natural for us as children of God. That's why the world, when we get pulled into the world's direction, it just seems yuck to you. You have a different take on it. So we can expect to have a genuine heart felt love for God. Paul wrote this, "and I pray that you, being rooted "and established in love, may have power together with all the saints, to grasp how wide "and long and high and deep is the love of Christ." We can know that! "and to know this love that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled "to the measure of all the fulness of God. " Expect God to work His love into your heart. Expect your now-natural affections to be toward the God of this universe. Expect it! Couldn't have a love of God while you were lost. Can't have a love of God when you're under the Law, fearing God's punishment. It can't happen. If you're afraid God is going to punish you, you have yet to know the love of Christ. It's when forgiveness hits that human heart, and you know that God has taken away your sins. That's when you have a moment of clarity concerning the love of God. That's when you truly know that He loves you, and that's when that heart can respond back in love to Him. Expect that. To have a love for God. Expect to say no to sin. Some of you might be saying, "But I don't want to", But if you're in Christ, expect to say 'no' to sin. If you think that salvation is just forgiveness of sins nothing has changed qualitatively for you. It's the same old life, but just lived in the knowledge that forgiveness is there. Here's what's going to happen: You're going to sin, you're going to feel bad about that sin. You're going to pray to God to either forgive that sin, or help. You're going to feel good about yourself for a few minutes, then you're going to go out and do the sin again; and then you're going to pray to God again, and you're going to through that cycle quite a number of times, and then finally you're going to reach a point where you say, "I give up," I've been trying to fight this with every ounce of strength I have inside of me. I can't win, so I'm going to give in." Write that down, "I can't win, so I'm going to give in That's something, right? I can see some prosecutor maybe saying that. But that's true, isn't it? We reach our limit, we're tired of giving it everything we can, and we just give in. Just give in. Think, "well, I'm just going to do it anyway, so I might as well embrace it," but not in Christ. Not as a new creation. Expect God's grace to work inside of you to bring you to that point where you are genuinely saying, 'no' to sin. That's what Paul says, the grace of God, it teaches us to say no to ungodliness and worldy passions. To live self-controlled upright and godly lives in this present age. That's a work of Christ inside of you. That's not you gutting it out. That's not you staring sin in the face and saying, "I'm going to beat you!" That is a work of God's grace inside of you, bringing you to that point where you just say, 'no'. Expect it! That's what God is going to do inside of you. Why? Because your life is qualitavily different. Sin doesn't fit anymore. Sin doesn't go along with who you are in Christ. That's the old way of living. God has called us to something new. This new, we can expect God's spirit to teach us to say, 'no', to ungodliness and worldy passions. 2 Peter: "through these, he has given us his very great and precious promises so that "through them, you may participate the divine nature and escape the "corruption in the world caused by evil desires. " What can we expect To participate in the Divine Nature, and when we do, to escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. Saying 'no' to sin and 'yes' to Jesus Christ. Saying 'no' to ungodliness and wordly passions, and 'yes' to the spirit of God. Being able to see self-control flow through these bodies of ours. Expect it. Why? Because God's the author of it. Did you get that? Expect it, because God's the author of it. When you say 'no' to sin, it is God moving in your hearts to bring your lips to that point where of saying, 'no'. It's a work of God inside of you. Say 'no' to sin you can also expect experiencing the fruit of the spirit. But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control, against such things there is no law. God's spirit lives inside of us, what can we expect? To experience the fruit of the spirit. It's called transformation. True change. And again who's the source of that fruit? Who produces it? Not us. We simply bare it in our lives. So the fruit of the spirit is love we can expect to experience love for God. and love for others. We can expect to experience joy. Joy in life, regardless of our circumstances. Why? Because we're new. Because our lives are qualitatively different. We can expect to experience peace. Isn't the world looking for peace? Man, if I could just rest and have a sense of peace, this world is a chaotic place. Man, it moves us at a frenzy pace and we feel like we have to keep up, and we lose all sense of contentment and peace inside of us, and we come to a point and we say, "Time out; help!" But in Christ, regardless of the circumstances, expect to experience peace, patience expect it! Why? Because the one who is the author of patience is alive, living inside of us. We get in situations where it's like, "how am I going to respond? "Yet, you see God working patience in you. Kindness, that's a rare commodity in the world today, isn't it? Not a lot of kindess out there. Why? Because the world isn't attached to the source of kindess. But we are. We've been raised to walk in the newness of life. Expect kindness to flow out of you. Goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Expect those things! You're not living the old life anymore, you've been rescued. That old life died in Christ... and then you were raised into a brand new life. Different from that old one. So expect these things. There's no law that's going to teach you how to do that. This is just the work of God's spirit. "For this very reason, "make every effort to add to your faith, goodness, and to your goodness, knowledge, and to knowledge, self control, "and to self-control, perseverance, and to perseverance, godliness, and to godliness "brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness, love." Expect transformation. Expect to see God adding virtue upon virtue upon virtue, until you see your very existence. Expect it! If you don't see that happening, you know Peter says? That you have forgotten something. That you have become near sighted and blind, and that you have forgotten that Christ has taken away all of your sins. That your past sins have been forgiven. So if you're not seeing these things being added to you by God's spirit, it's because you're still struggling with forgiveness. You haven't finalized that in your heart. You haven't come to that point and said, "It's done. I am a forgiven person." But if you've been there, expect transformation. Expect these qualities to start growing inside of you. Expect it! and then expect to be involved in good works. Expect it! For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works. Which God prepared in advanced for us to do. We're God's workmanship. It goes right back to our opening verse: We've been made a new creature in Christ. We're a new creation. Who's workmanship are we? Well, we're God's. God made us new. We can't make ourselves new. We've tried. And maybe we've dressed ourselves up, we've changed how we look on the outside. We may change some of the things we do on the outside, but on the inside we're the same old guy. That's the lost world. But in Christ, we've been made new on the inside. And that newness is going to start expressing itself on the outside. And that newness is going to start expressing itself through good works. We had an interesting question on the radio broadcast last week about sowing and reaping. You know, you sow something, you're going to reap something. And the context of that question was about giving. We're to give something with the expectation of getting something back. And usually when that's presented, it's a 'financial' blessing. I give $100, I can expect a $1,000 back from God. That's if your faith is really big (chuckles). Others may be thinking, "I'm just going to get $600 back, or $300 back. But God wants you to have that $1000 faith. So give $100, expect a $1,000. So why do we give? To get! I want something in return. Why do I put money in a slot machine? Because I'm expecting something in return. Right? It's why we do that. Well, so many people have made that same premise, that same foundation for why they give. "I'm giving to get". But that's not what sowing and reaping is all about. We sow our resources we give and we give with the expectation that God is going to give that resource and reap a bounty of harvest in someone else's life. That's called a good work. I'm not giving for me, I've been blessed with every spiritual blessing in Jesus. Haven't you? Don't you have His spirit living inside of you? Don't you know Him personally and intimatelly? Aren't you seeing the fruit of His life expressed in you? Aren't you experiencing peace and joy and contentment in the Lord? That's because you're a new creation. So I'm not giving to get all of that. It's already there! I'm giving so somebody ELSE can experience newness of life in Jesus. And I can give with the highest expectations that God is going to take that measly gift! I mean, we could give $1,000,000 and still in God's sight it's a measly gift, right? Compared to His riches in glory? But He can take whatever we give and use it to benefit someone else. I'm sowing into the gospel, the power of the gospel to change lives. I can expect that that gospel will do just that. We can live in that expectation. That's a good work. I can make myself available in situations like what just occured Friday with the tornadoes. There's lots of people who need aid right now. Who need food, water, all of those things. I can make myself available to help meet those needs, but with the expectations that God is going to use that availability in spiritual ways. That will quatitavitly change the lives of another human being. Not just put food on their table, not just give them water. But to give them a chance to experience Jesus and to be raised so that they, too, can walk in the newness of life. It's good work. It's what God has prepared us to do. Think back on the day when forgiveness broke through your heart. and you realized that you were totally forgiven. Think back on that day what was it like? Man, did you feel this mountain of guilt being lifted? Did you feel like you'd just been scrubbed, inside and out Have you ever experienced the blessing like that? You know how it came to you? Because somebody was doing a good work, to invest in the gospel. Maybe you were driving and scanned across a radio dial and hit a program where forgiveness was made clear to you. Why did that moment happen? Because somebody expected God to use them in a powerful way. They invested in their time and resources, because God had prepared that for them to do. That was the good work, and it reaped a harvest of righteousness in your heart. So when God moves in us to give us our resources, to give of our time, to volunteer to help, We can expect great things to happen. Not because we've done it, but because we're attached to the Resurrected One. Attached to the one who can bring change into this world. We're attached to the one who can truly make a difference We're attached to the one who gave us a brand new life. and we know that he can do the same for others. Expect it! Expect it. That's what resurrection calls us to. We can live every single day with Godly expectations. If they're Godly expectations, they're realistic expectations. God can do some supernatural crazy stuff in this world. Let's expect it to do so. Just as He's done in us. Great expectations; that's what resurrection is all about. Well, let's pray together. Dear Heavenly Father, thank You that we've been qualitatively different. You just didn't forgive and say "Good luck with that old life... see ya in heaven some day," You made us different right now. Old is gone, new has come; we're new creations. in Christ. We have Your spirit living inside of us. There are those here today or tuned in via internet that haven't yet realized what resurrection has done for them. Let today be the day that they see true that they have been made new in You. They have a brand new life altogether. For those of us who.. resting in that, raise our level of expectations because of what You've done in and through us. What You will do in and through us. Help us to see that You are the God of supernatural things. That You can change others, and You can do so by using us. We thank you for that. We pray that if there are those listening who have never come to Christ by faith, that today would be the day. They would see themselves placed in the death of Jesus Christ and even more important, being raised to walk in the newness of life. I pray that today will be your day, when you're made new in Jesus. Lord, we thank You, we thank You that resurrection leads to great expectations. Help us to live in those expectations each and every day. We praise You for this and thank You in Christ's matchless name, Amen.