Life Commenced, Death Abolished

Invite you to open your Bibles to the Gospel of John chapter 17.

This is not my text for the message this morning, but this does provide the keynote for the entire conference. So let's take a look in John chapter 17 at verse three. While you're finding that, let me say what a joy and delight it is to be here. I really enjoyed the saints that I met last year at the Bible conference in Ocean City who were from Beacon Hill and have looked forward to being here since then. I feel a little bit bad that the name of my church is so much cooler than the name of your church. I should just say I acknowledge that and let's just get that off the table that the name Bullet Lick is really probably the coolest Baptist church name in the United States. And it's named after a man whose last name was Bullet, B-U-L-L-I-T-T, so it's not really the projectile. But let me just say if a shooter shows up at the Bullet Lick Baptist Church, the biggest danger is crossfire.

The name is not after the projectile, but it's definitely a people who love the Second Amendment. And I'm delighted to be there. It's just I've been there for two years and the Lord is blessing. I believe the Lord is going to bless us here this week.

I have confidence that you have been praying and I know that I have been praying about this time and I feel like the Lord is going to do some gracious work in my life and in your life during these few days that we have together. In John chapter 17 and verse 3, the Lord Jesus is praying to his father and he says, and this is eternal life that they know you, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. So this week I'm going to be talking to you about living life like sons and daughters of God. These are people who possess eternal life. I think that we have had a tendency to think of eternal life as something that is wholly exterior to us. And the emphasis of all the messages this week, one of the emphasis will be that eternal life is something that shapes us. It's not just something that is a gift that is given to us.

It is our our capacity to receive and enjoy that gift. So if you think of eternal life as the hand of God reaching down, think of yourself as a believer, as a lump of clay that receives the impression of his hand in your life. In fact, it's a biblical metaphor that we are like lumps of clay, and so the Lord shapes us into vessels that are fit to receive his eternal life. The greatest evidence that you and I are going to one day live in heaven is that even now we are being prepared to live there happily. Let me give you a definition of eternal life. I'll explain it and then say it again.

Remember, all this is just preparation for the whole week. So eternal life is not merely a matter of how long you live. And eternal life is not even a matter of where you live. Eternal life is your being made capable of living in harmony with the God who is eternal.

Your being made capable to live in harmony with the God who is eternal. One of the 10 books that you ought to read before you die is Henry Skugel's book, The Life of God and the Soul of Man. It's a little book. I think that it's less than 100 pages and very thought provoking book.

And as a matter of fact, I think that Reformation Heritage has them on sale for $5 each right now. So it's great price, half price, The Life of God and the Soul of Man. It was the little booklet that was used to convert George Whitefield.

So very, very powerfully used. It's amazing what God uses and who God uses. Henry Skugel, sickly man, died when he was 26 years old, left this little tiny book behind.

But then it influenced George Whitefield. But that's the principle of The Life of God and the Soul of Man. That little book is that eternal life is something that shapes and changes you. So in my definition of eternal life, I said eternal life is not merely a matter of how long you live. Because even the damned in hell exist forever. So eternal life is not simply eternal existence.

Neither is it a matter simply of where you live. So it's not just a matter of you're going to go to heaven one day. But instead, it is your being made capable of living in harmony with God, the eternal God. It is the life of God in the soul of man. And so this morning, we're going to see how that life is commenced.

It's stated both negatively and positively. Negatively, Christ has abolished death. Positively, he has brought life and immortality to life through the gospel. So now you can turn your Bibles to John chapter 17.

And I'm sorry, 2 Timothy chapter 1, 2 Timothy chapter 1. And this will provide our text for this morning. We're going to be thinking about our being made capable of living in harmony with the eternal God. Jesus said, this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.

Do you know God? I got up early this morning and was sitting in the dark, meditating on this text. And my wife got up and came through the kitchen. We're staying in the missionary house. She came through the kitchen.

I was sitting in the little study area off the garage. She said, what are you doing sitting in the dark? I said, I'm enjoying eternal life. I'm enjoying, I didn't say this, that's all I said to her, but enjoying fellowship with God. Thinking of thinking about eternal things, thinking about the truth of God, enjoying it. And that is that's the essence of eternal life, that you are able to be in the presence of God and enjoy being there.

And if that doesn't happen now, it's not going to happen later. So this passage of scripture, let me turn there in second Timothy, chapter one. The pastor has already read the first 12 verses, and so let me just read verses nine and 10. God, who saved us and called us to a holy calling. Not because of our works. But because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began. And which now has been manifested through the appearing of our savior, Christ Jesus. Who abolished death.

And brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. Several years ago, I was pastoring a church in the hills of West Virginia. And while there, enjoyed the many outdoor recreational opportunities that were afforded in my area, became an avid hunter. And in those days, it was legal to hunt deer from a canoe or a boat, as long as it never had a motor on it.

I don't know what the law is now, but back in the late 80s, early 90s, when I'm talking about when this story took place, it was legal to do that. And so one morning I got up in the dark and loaded up my canoe on top of our van. And drove the eight or ten miles to a place where I could put the canoe into a place where a creek branched off of the canal river. And so I put my canoe in. Beautiful day.

Bright, sunshiny day. It was December. It was muzzleloader season.

I was holding out for a buck. And so that day, I saw many, many deer, but nothing that I wanted to shoot. I spent half the day going up the creek.

It was a calm, easy paddle. And then a little past noon, I turned the canoe around and came back. Beautiful day.

Sunshiny, bright, enjoyable December day. And it was becoming dark when I came to the mouth of the creek. And in order to get to the landing, I had to go out onto the canal river. And just at that time, there was a barge that was going by on the canal river, going north towards Point Pleasant. And so if you've ever been in a canoe or kayak on big water where barges or big boats go, you know, it'll toss you around.

So I anticipated that coming, but I wasn't fearful that it was going to capsize me. But I had this question that came into my mind in that darkness. Is this what death is like?

All day, I've been on a small, familiar, comfortable creek, enjoyed the day. And now I'm going out onto the big, dark, dangerous, foreboding river. Is this what it's like to die? I'm confident that thoughts like that may have been influenced in me by a poem that I had admired. I'm not sure if I had it memorized then, but I do now.

It's short and I'll tell it to you. So I offered Lord Tennyson and he describes death like this. Sunset and evening star and one clear call for me and may there be no moaning at the bar when I put out to sea. But such a tide as moving seems asleep, too full for sound or foam when that which drew from out the boundless deep returns again home. Twilight and evening bell and after that the dark and may there be no sadness of farewell when I embark. For though from out are born of time and place, the flood may bear me far.

I hope to meet my pilot face to face when I have crossed the bar. Is that what made me think that death is like moving from a nice, comfortable, familiar creek out onto the dark, rolling waters of the big, dangerous river? A little more than 100 years ago, the most famous maritime disaster of modern times took place when the Titanic hit an iceberg. And that ship, which was thought to be unsinkable, sank.

And it's very famous. All of you probably knew that it sank because it hit an iceberg. And an iceberg is a big piece of ice that has broken off of a glacier and is floating in the ocean. The word iceberg is from a root, which means ice mountain.

Berg is an old, old word in another language for mountain. And so, like a mountain, there is a tip and you can see the tip, but underneath the surface of the water is this the rest of the mountain. You see the tip of the iceberg, but the rest of the mountain is underwater. And I believe that an iceberg is a fitting representation of what the Bible means when it talks about death. There is a part of death that we can see, and that is the cessation of biological function.

That's when things that were once animate and moving stop being animated and they stop moving. And that's what we call death. But there is something far bigger and far more dangerous that lies beneath the surface of what we can see. And that is the most dangerous and deadly part of death. And so you read this text here in Second Timothy when it says that our Savior Christ Jesus has abolished death. And it may occur to you, well, if Christ has abolished death, then why did the pastor at the commencement of this service read a card of appreciation from a daughter who's expressing her appreciation for the love that you showed when her mother died?

Someone that you know, someone who had been a faithful member of this church, someone who was an earnest believer. If Christ has abolished death, then why did she die? If Christ has abolished death, then why did I stand beside the bedside of my parents in the last 10 years and hear both of them gasp out their final breaths? If Christ has abolished death, then what's going on there?

And what I will maintain in the next few minutes is that what we see is just the tip of the death burg. Christ has abolished and decimated the really dangerous part that lies below the surface. So what is the essence of death? There really are just two points to this sermon. And the first one is what is the essence of death? And then the second point will be how is it that Christ has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel? So first of all, what is the essence of death?

And it's really quite simple. The essence of death is that we as humans are estranged from God so that we no longer like him and that that's the first part, really two parts to death. The dangerous part is that we don't like God and we are estranged from him. And the second part, even more dangerous, is that God does not like us and we are estranged from him. So there is a human side of death and then there is a divine side of death. And then we'll see how Christ takes care of both of those things in his abolition of death. So from the human side, we no longer enjoy life in the presence of God.

We no longer want to be around him and it's really no wonder because there are certain desires that we have before Christ does this work of abolishing death in us. There are certain desires that we have and things that we want to do that we know God doesn't really approve of. I can remember when I was a little boy, I reared in a pastor's home, taught the responsibility to pray. And so I felt an obligation to pray. And it was not my usual habit to endeavor to pray through the Lord's Prayer. But this particular night that this story takes place, I was trying to pray through the Lord's Prayer. And so I started off, Our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. And thought I was doing pretty well until I got to that phrase, Thy will be done.

And then a shaft of light broke through the cloudy darkness of my little boy mind. And I said to myself, listen to what you are getting ready to say to God. You're getting ready to tell God, do whatever you want to do with me.

Now, do you really want to do that? At the time, I probably was aspiring to be a professional baseball player. And I thought, what if God doesn't want me to be a professional baseball player? What if my mind went on? What if he wants you to go be a missionary in a place where you'll live in the mud huts?

And then I really remember it this way. What if he wants you to marry an ugly woman? Because there is just no telling what he's going to do if you say, do whatever you want.

Because there were certain things that I wanted. You know why I didn't I could not say to him, do whatever you want. I didn't trust him. I didn't trust him. I maintained that no one ever truly and genuinely says thy will be done until they have repented of their sins and are ready to turn their hand their life entirely over to God.

I believe every born again child of God gets to the place where he says, well, I may have been against it up to now. I've been afraid of you up to now, but now things have changed and I want your will to be done. But before that, light comes into the world that men love darkness rather than light.

Why? Because their deeds were evil. The things that we want to do that we don't want God interfering. You don't want to be around people who persistently disapprove of the things that you like.

You can't be friends with those people. And that's how it is as long as we are in the throes of spiritual death. We are valuing ideas that are contrary to the truth. We are wanting to pursue pleasures that ultimately are destructive to enjoy in the way that we want to enjoy them.

And as long as we are living a life that is characterized by things that God doesn't approve of, we want to stay away from God. And this is one of the characteristics of spiritual death. There is a separation between the dead and the living. Now, I've already said that biological death is just a small part of the big overall package of death, the big death burg. Biological death is just a very small part of it. But biological death does give us insight into some of the devastation that is brought about by spiritual death. And one of those devastating things is dead people have lost their power. Dead people have lost their strength. And that is a picture of what happens to us spiritually. It's not that we're totally inactive sometimes in our zeal to make the point that people are dead and trespasses and sins. We'll say, you're not doing anything.

That's not true. You as a dead person, spiritually dead, when you were dead, when I was dead, we were active, but all of our all of our activity was carried on in the realm of death, even the good things that we did. Imagine that if in my neighborhood there was an old, dilapidated, falling down treehouse and I said to my girls, I have six daughters, I said to my girls, now don't play in that treehouse. It's dangerous. Keep out of the treehouse. And then one day I'm walking through the part of the neighborhood that has that old treehouse and I hear one of my daughter's voices in this treehouse. And she's in there talking to one of her little neighborhood friends.

And so I don't want to embarrass her in front of her friend. I wait until that evening and I say, honey, did I hear you in the old treehouse? The one I told you not to be in? She said, well, yes, Daddy, I was in that treehouse. But, you know, I was I was in there with Rachel, the neighbor girl, and I was inviting her to come to church. That's good.

And Rachel scraped her leg getting up into the treehouse and I I doctored her leg a little bit while I was up there. Honey, that's good. I'm glad that you had compassion. But everything that you did that I like, everything that you did was carried on in a place where you were not supposed to be. It was all carried out in a sphere of disobedience to your father. And that's the way it is with every good thing that we do before we are given new life in Christ Jesus.

It all is carried out in the treehouse of disobedience. It all is carried out in with an attitude of God, if I do this, will you get off my back? God, if I if I do this good, if I go to church, if I read my Bible, if I pray, will that make you happy? Will you give me some nice things?

Will you quit pestering me? It's kind of the whole attitude of the way that we do our good works. So it's no wonder that the Lord says without faith, it's impossible to please God. I mean, as long as you are rejecting the way of salvation that God has provided through Jesus Christ, it's like going to a mother whose son has been killed in the service of our country and saying to her, I don't have any respect for your son, but would you nevertheless do this favor for me? As long as we are rejecting Christ and trying to hold on to our sinful lifestyles, God is not pleased with us.

But don't get all don't get all upset. You're not pleased with God to start with. But then the other side of spiritual death is also true. There's not just a problem on the side of humanity that we are separated from the living God.

But God is also displeased with us as long as we remain in our sinful rebellion against him. Maybe you have heard of an ancient story called the Epic of Gilgamesh. It's very interesting story. People who read the Bible and who know Bible stories will be interested. Some of the stories that are in the Bible are also in the Epic of Gilgamesh.

No, no need to be fretful about your faith. If there was a worldwide flood, it makes sense to me that would be reproduced in in many ancient documents. And it is in the Epic of Gilgamesh. But Gilgamesh is the hero of the Epic of Gilgamesh. And he has a friend named Enkidu.

And, you know, their friendship is just a wonderful thing to behold. But Enkidu gets killed. And Gilgamesh is just beside himself with grief. And so he doesn't bury Enkidu. He keeps Enkidu out until and the story goes into more detail than I'm going to go into right now, until it becomes obvious that if he does not bury Enkidu, Enkidu is going to become incredibly obnoxious. In his decay.

And so that's only when Gilgamesh decides that he's going to go ahead and bury Enkidu. The fact of the matter is there is a separation between the dead and the living. And the dead become obnoxious to the living. And the living God, the eternal life, the source of concentrated life in the universe, the eternal God, created human beings in his image with the capacity of having fellowship with him. And humans said, not what I want most. And humans continue to say that's not what I want most. And instead I'm going to choose faithfulness. I'm going to choose dedication to the philosophy of living in this world that is propagated by your most deadly enemy. I am going to live life as if there were no God. I'm going to live life as if the life of the flesh is the only life that there is. And that's spiritual death. To live as if there is no God. If eternal life is living with the capacity and the enjoyment of living in harmony with the eternal God, then spiritual death is the opposite of that. I am not living in harmony with him.

It may not be deliberate. But when you choose to live life as if there is no God, you're choosing to live a style of life that God finds detestable. It's an incredible waste of a human being to live when you have the capacity to know and enjoy God, to live life for the purpose of enjoying a little bit of money or enjoying a little bit of pleasure. Or a little bit of fame or just a position of honor or a position of power.

I can just have these things. I'm reminded of a farmer many years ago who was hiking in the mountains and came across an eagle's nest. There were several eggs in the eagle's nest.

And so he did then what would be highly illegal today. He took one of those eagle's eggs and he took it home and he put it under one of his hens who was sitting on a clutch of eggs. And when the little chicks hatched out, then the eagle hatched out, too, and the eagle thought he was a chicken. And so, you know, the eagle's pecking around the barnyard. Great, big, enormous eagle pecking around the barnyard eating eating stuff. Somebody comes by one day and says, how come that eagle's in your barnyard eating seeds? Well, he thinks he's a chicken.

You find something wrong with that? The visitor said, well, no, there's nothing wrong with that, but it's a terrible waste of an eagle. And I can imagine that as the angels and heavenly beings look down upon humans just pecking around in the dirt and scratching for a little bit of fame, a little bit of wealth, they just shake their heads and say, that's a terrible waste of an eagle. That's a terrible waste of a human being. And that's the way God feels about it.

That's a terrible waste of a human being. And so from the human side, we are committed to principles of thinking and principles of living that leave God out. And God looks upon that and he says, I am not going to pretend like that's OK. That is the philosophy that has been perpetuated by the devil. You are living in such a way that you are demonstrating that you are the children of the devil. Repent.

Repent. Your sins are separating between you and me so that I cannot hear you. And that is the essence of spiritual death. There is a separation between the dead and the living. The dead are not going to get better unless there is a supernatural intervention.

But that's what our text tells us happened. There was a supernatural intervention. We were dead in trespasses and in sins. But God, before the foundation of the world, decided that he was not going to leave all mankind to perish in the estate of sin and misery. And so he sent his son to become a savior who would abolish death and bring life and immortality to light through the gospel. And so the Lord Jesus came. And in order to turn God's just displeasure away from dead human beings. Jesus took upon himself human nature. And the way that I'm going to present this may make it sound like God was not the initiator of it, but God was the initiator of all of this. And when Jesus took upon him human nature, then he turns to God and he says, Father, I know that you have been displeased with all of your people who have departed from you and they are justly under your wrath and curse.

But now. Put all of that wrath, all of that displeasure, all of that unhappiness that you have towards your elect. Put all of that on me. Pour out your anger against sin. On me, your anger against sinners, pour that out upon me. They deserve to go to hell. But, Father, now that I, your son, am standing here, take all the punishment that they would deserve to get in the torments of hell. Put that punishment on me and I will bear it away.

I will satisfy your righteous indignation. And that's what God the Father did. God made him who knew no sin to be made sin for us so that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.

God poured out his wrath upon Jesus Christ. And Isaiah Chapter 53 says, He shall see the travail of his soul and shall be satisfied. You can imagine that a sinner appears before God's courtroom and asks, Is there any place for mercy for me? And God's justice speaks up and says, No, there will be no mercy for sinners granted gratuitously in order for sinners to be forgiven. Someone must bear the punishment that is due to the sinners. Justice says, No. And then Jesus Christ steps forward and says, I'll take all of the punishment that is due to all of your beloved elect.

I'll take it all. And Jesus takes it all. And now we with with grateful eyes turn from the cross of Christ and the empty tomb of Christ and say to God's justice, Justice, are you happy now? And justice says, wiping a tear from his own eye. Oh, yes, I'm happy with that.

I'm happy with that. And the cross of Christ is the one thing that will satisfy a conscience that is functioning properly. If your conscience is working right, as long as you're just doing the best that you can, your conscience will say, How do you know that you've done enough? If you're trying to please God through keeping the law of God, then your conscience will say, Well, you didn't do it perfectly. You messed up and your conscience will just accuse you and accuse you. But when you receive the Lord Jesus Christ and the offering that he has offered on behalf of sinners, then you can turn to your accusing conscience and say, Conscience, is that enough for you? And your conscience will say, Oh, yes, that will do just fine.

That will do. Now, who will lay any charge against God's elect? Christ Jesus. It's Christ who died more than that, who was raised to life. The spirit of God? Oh, no, it's the spirit who intercedes with us with groanings that words cannot express. God the Father? Oh, no, he looks upon the travail of the soul of his son, and God the Father is satisfied and his wrath is satisfied. And so the God side of spiritual death has been taken care of by our savior, Christ Jesus, who abolished the wrath of God against sinners.

But what about that other side? What about the unhappiness that sinners have towards God and the desire that we have to live life, not under his direction and not even under his view, if we can possibly avoid it? Well, when the Lord reconciles us to his father, he gives us the new birth. Creates in us a new nature. He removes the heart of stone, replaces it with a heart of flesh so that now we want to be with God. We long to have fellowship with God. And no, it's not as strong as it should be.

It's not as consistent as it should be. But look into your heart. And ask yourself this question and try to answer it as best as you can. Do I really want to live in harmony with God? Am I happy to receive God's forgiveness and God's life on his conditions?

Am I happy to do that? And if your soul answers yes, then I dare say that God has done a work of grace in your heart. And he has changed you from someone who was a death loving, dead in trespasses and sin sinner.

Into a born again child of God. Our savior, Christ Jesus, has abolished death and he's brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. Many of you will be familiar with the name Martin Lloyd-Jones. He was a very powerful preacher and had great influence years ago.

He died about 1980. I read a book, a little small booklet written by one of his daughters, Elizabeth Catherwood, where she tells about a conversation that she had with her father about the poem that I quoted to you by Alfred Lord Tennyson at the beginning of this sermon. Sun set an evening star and one clear call for me.

May there be no moaning at the bar when I put out to sea. And so she presented it to her dad, maybe read it to him, maybe had him read it. And then she asked him, isn't it beautiful? And he said, it's not true. Death for the Christian is not a putting out to sea. It's a coming into harbor. And I think she said this, I may have made this up myself.

If he didn't say it, he should have. He said, coming closer to the truth is Charles Wesley's hymn, Jesus, lover of my soul. Let me to thy bosom fly. While the nearer waters roll. While the tempest still is high. Hide me, O my savior, hide, till the storm of life is past. Safe into the haven guide. O receive my soul at last. So that night when I loaded up my canoe.

Put it on the top of the van. I drove the eight or 10 miles to get back to the house and. When I got there. And there were yellow lights coming out of the windows of that little parsonage.

When I pulled up, there were little girls who came running to the door and flung it open and said, did you get anything? And gone were those foreboding thoughts is death like leaving the narrow, comfortable confines of a familiar creek and going out onto the deep foreboding river? No, that's not what like death is like. That's not what death is like for the Christian. Instead, death is like pulling up into the carport. With the yellow lights. Good smells coming from the kitchen. People who love you coming to greet you. Because death for the Christian. Is coming home.