Victory in the Ring! - Part B

You may be filled with fault, but God says, I am declaring you, pronouncing you as faultless.

That's justification. He makes a declaration because Jesus took our sin and God treated Jesus like you and I deserve to be treated so that God could treat us like Jesus deserves to be treated. When we give our lives to Christ, we begin a new life full of joy and hope. Connect with Skip Heitzig today as he shares about an important and victorious declaration God has made about you. Right now, we want to tell you about a resource that will help you grow stronger in your faith. Here's what Norm Geisler said about the book Tactics.

There is no better book to equip Christians to think clearly. Here's Skip Heitzig on the need to engage in active spiritual warfare. You'll never fight God's battles from a sofa.

You'll never contend for what really matters by just cruising in your La-Z-Boy all day. You're going to have to decide to get up as part of the house and join the fight. Become a contender for biblical truth with Fight for the House, a six message series through the book of Jude with Skip Heitzig. This teaching series on CD equips you to get in the ring to defend the gospel and guard against false teachings. And it's our thanks when you give to connect more people to the truth of God's word. And when you give $35 or more today, we'll also send you the book Tactics by Gregory Kochel to help you speak the truth about Christianity with confidence and grace.

Call 800-922-1888 to give or visit connectwithskip.com. Now we're in the book of Jude as we get into the message with Skip Heitzig. He who saved you will be he who sustains you.

He keeps you. This happens to be one of the great promises in Scripture. And the reason he is so animate that he will keep you is because he was the one who saved you. You had nothing to do with salvation. All you did is accept it, receive it, believe.

So if you had nothing to do with that, then you'll really have nothing to do with this. He who saved you is the one who keeps you. Now let's just kind of look at it from two different angles. The road to heaven has always been dangerous from a human perspective. Our journey from earth to heaven has always been a dangerous journey.

There are potholes in the road. There's litter and there's roadblocks. There's all sorts of things that happen to the Christian. We have trials. We have temptations.

We have accusations. We can be subject to false teaching. So it seems to be a very perilous journey because we are special targets of Satan. Even Paul, when he spoke to the people of Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch in the book of Acts, we are told, strengthen the souls of the disciples, exhorting them to continue in the faith saying, we must through many tribulations enter the kingdom of God.

Speaking about all the potholes in the road. From a human perspective, this is a dangerous journey. But from God's perspective, this is a very safe and secure journey.

From God's perspective, the road is totally safe and absolutely secure. We don't keep ourselves. He keeps us any more than we save ourselves. Now that word in verse 24, keep, is a military term. It means to guard or to watch over. And the picture that is painted by the word is that God is at His post. He is standing guard over you, over your soul to ensure eternal safety. There are so many texts of scripture that speak to the security of the believer. I don't have time to go through them all, but to tell you they're there in abundance.

But I do want to take you to one in particular. And you don't have to turn there, but you'll remember it when I say it. In John chapter 10, Jesus speaks of himself as the good what? The good shepherd. And the good shepherd is watching over his flock or his sheep. So the analogy, the picture is Jesus is the shepherd, we are the sheep.

And listen to this promise. 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. I've always been fascinated by the fact that of all the analogies Jesus could have given of our relationship to God, He chose this one. And that of all the animals to relate us to, He chose sheep, not lions, not elephants, not tigers, not bears, sheep. Anybody who knows anything about sheep knows this. They are not known for their persevering.

They are not known for their endurance. Sheep are not great survivors. In fact, sheep without a shepherd are called dead.

They don't make it. The care of sheep is totally dependent on the quality of care provided by a shepherd. Sheep are helpless. Sheep are helpless if you leave them alone.

You know that if you leave a sheep alone, they can often get off balance. They can roll to their side, and when they roll to their side, they can't get up. And if they try to get up, they find themselves on their back with their feet straight up in the air. They can't manage like a dog or a cat to get back up. It's called being cast, C-A-S-T, a cast sheep gets on its back, and eventually it cuts off the circulation.

It stops breathing, and it dies. That's pretty helpless, right? So if you leave a sheep alone, it's helpless. When a sheep gets attacked, it's helpless, because sheep don't call their friends.

Help! In fact, sheep do nothing. They stand there. They don't even have one little bleat, just not even a, ah, help, none of that. They just stand there and get beaten up and attacked and chewed up by the predator. Also, sheep are helpless when they eat, because they're indiscriminate about what they eat. They eat anything. They eat everything.

They'll even eat poisonous roots, and they die. So if that sheep is going to persevere, going to endure, it has to be kept by a shepherd. And that's the point of Jesus saying, my sheep is going to die.

Sheep hear my voice. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, neither shall anyone snatch them out of my hand. Now go back to the book of Jude, verse one, where we started a few weeks back. Jude here writes to his audience, and he calls them called, sanctified by God the Father, and what's the next word?

Preserved, and preserved in Jesus Christ. So he begins the same way he ends, or I should say he ends the book the same way he begins. He begins by saying, you're preserved by Jesus Christ, in Jesus Christ. Now unto him who is able to keep you from stumbling. This is a beginning to end promise. What he begins in your life, he will carry to completion. Whatever God starts, God finishes. Philippians 1, verse 6, he who began a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.

Do any of you have any unfinished projects at home? Yeah, you're going to get to it. You tell yourself that.

You've told yourself that, some of you, for years. You'll do that one day. You'll finish that project. It might be in the Millennial Kingdom that you'll finish that project, but you'll get to it. Do you know that God has no unfinished projects? What he starts, he finishes. He is the author and the finisher of our faith. He who began a good work in you will complete it till the day of Christ. What that means is, God will never give up working on you until you are like Christ in his presence, which we'll get to in a minute, like Christ.

God never looks at your life and says, I'm done. I quit. I've tried to work with you, and you are just so hard to work with. Go ahead and get cast.

Go ahead and get stuck. No, he's the good shepherd. It's like this. When you come to Christ, he hangs a sign over your life that says, under construction. And he doesn't take that sign off until the day you're glorified. So now to him who is able, has all the ability, the power to keep you from stumbling. Now that does not mean you'll never make a mistake. It doesn't mean you'll never fall down.

You'll never slip up. This is not a guarantee that you'll never have an ethical failure, or for that matter, a moral failure, or for that matter, a doctrinal failure. It does not mean that you'll never have an ethical failure.

It does not mean that you should feel secure if you have ongoing patterns of unrepentant sin. But it does mean that every true believer is kept by God and preserved to the end. Now some in hearing this would say, yeah, well, what about Judas Iscariot? Why wasn't he kept? Why wasn't he preserved until the end? Didn't Jesus promise he would keep his sheep? Didn't Jesus pray that the Father would keep them just like he kept them? Well, listen to what he said in John 17. This is his prayer to the Father. He said, while I was with them in the world, I kept them in your name. Those whom you gave me, I have kept, and none of them is lost except the son of perdition that the Scripture might be fulfilled. He's referring to Judas Iscariot. You see, Judas never was one of Jesus' own. The 11, they were the real deal.

The other 11 of the 12, they were the real deal. Theirs was an authentic belief. Judas never had that, never made that.

It was always about himself, except the son of perdition. So he will keep you. You know, but you have to want to be kept. He's able.

You need to be willing. Paul the Apostle, 2 Timothy 1, said, I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that he is able to keep what I have committed to him until that day. That's Paul's way of saying, I know I'll make it true to the end because I know him. I know the kind of God he is. I know the character of this God.

So he protects us, he preserves us, and he'll present us. Look back at verse 24. Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy.

I hope you have noticed the change here. Verse 24 is on earth. Verse 20, the first part of verse 24 is on earth. The second part of verse 24 is in heaven.

Do you notice that? Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling, that's now, that's here, that's earth, and present you faultless before the presence of his glory, that's heaven. Now look at how this is written. And to present you faultless. Does it say you are faultless? It didn't say that. It didn't say you're faultless. It doesn't even say that he'll make you faultless or produce you as a faultless person. It says he'll present you faultless.

That's very different. I hope you know that you'll never arrive on this earth. You never on this earth will get to a place where you ever have to say, I don't need to grow anymore. I've arrived. I've made it. I'm sinlessly perfect. You know, there are some who believe in that doctrine called the doctrine called the doctrine of sinless perfection. I've never met a sinlessly perfect person.

I've met a couple who claim to be, but I know they're not because they just lied to me. Funny, Spurgeon once said that he met a man who said he was sinlessly perfect. Spurgeon proceeded to take a pitcher of water and pour it on the man. The man started cursing and Spurgeon said, I thought so.

We never arrive. Even Paul, the apostle said, not as though I had already attained, neither were already perfect. But he will present you as faultless because he has already pronounced you faultless. Now listen carefully to this because I just described to you the doctrine of justification.

If you've ever read the New Testament through once, you've come across the word justification. And if you've come here, you know what that means. It means a pronouncement, a declaration. It's a legal term.

It's a forensic term. It's like a judge puts the gavel down and says, you're not guilty. Even if you are, you may be filled with fault, but God says, I am declaring you, pronouncing you as faultless. That's justification. He makes a declaration because Jesus took our sin and God treated Jesus like you and I deserve to be treated so that God could treat us like Jesus deserves to be treated.

And that's justification. He makes that proclamation or declaration that you are righteous. You are just, you are righteous.

You are justified. So he pronounced you and one day he'll present you in his presence, faultless. Now I just gotta again tell you how monumental this is that a human could ever stand in the glorious presence of God at all. This is so counterintuitive to both the nature of God and the nature of humanity. For fallen man to stand in the presence of God's glory strikes terror into our hearts.

Let me give you an example. Isaiah the prophet had a vision of God. And this is how the story goes. Isaiah chapter six, in the year the king Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on sitting on his throne high and lifted up and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above it stood seraphim each having six wings with two he covered his face with two he covered his feet with two he flew and one cried to another holy holy holy is the Lord of hosts the whole earth is filled with his glory and the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of the one who cried out. So here's Isaiah seeing God in his glorious throne room hearing the angelic praise and the very next verse Isaiah says so I said woe is me I am undone for I am a man of unclean lips and I dwell amongst the people of unclean lips but my eyes have seen the Lord of hosts.

What's going on? He's recognizing that I as a sinful person am seeing a holy God and I'm saying wow is him woe is me. That's typical.

That's normal. Same thing in the New Testament. Jesus gets in Peter's boat one day and he says put out just a little bit from the land so Jesus stands in the boat and preaches to the crowd on the shore like a natural amphitheater he gives a sermon and then after the sermon after the amen he says Peter launch out into the deep let's go fishing and I'm just going to kind of impose how I think Peter said it. Lord listen we've fished all night we've caught nothing. We've fished all night we've caught nothing. You're a great preacher but I'm a pretty good fisherman. I know the Sea of Galilee we fish here at night and if you don't catch anything at night you certainly don't catch anything in daylight.

We fished all night and caught nothing. Nevertheless at your command we'll do it. So he goes out to humor the preacher lets down his nets you know what happens he catches so many fish the net begins to break and when the net begins to break Peter turns to Jesus and says depart from me Lord I'm a sinful man. Whoa what just happened Peter just recognized who he's dealing with. Now Peter recognized not only who he's dealing with but who he really is as a man. You're perfect you're not what I thought you were you must be somebody more than just another guy and I recognize I am sinful in your presence. Happened to the apostle John. John gets a vision of God in the book of Revelation it says when I saw him I fell down like a dead man before his feet. That is typical.

Why such a reaction? Because they knew they were not faultless. They knew the only way to stand before God in his glorious presence is by being faultless. One day you will be presented before God faultless sinless in a glorified body. So part of your salvation is justification but there's another part of your salvation in the future called glorification. One day Skip Heitzig will stand before God not even having a sin nature not even able to commit a single sin in a glorified body that will be Skip 2.0. Actually maybe Skip 3.0 maybe 1.0 was me before Christ 2.0 is the day I was born again 3.0 is the glorified body. I'll be presented faultless will be raised up resurrected in a glorified body in the presence of God. A boxer had his friends put on his tombstone these words you can stop counting I'm not getting up.

That's novel. You can stop counting I'm not getting up. Well I want want you to know I am getting up. I am going to be resurrected and when I'm resurrected I'm going to be standing before God faultless. And something else go back to our verse he'll present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy. Now of course that'll be the happiest day of our lives. Of course it almost goes without saying we're going to be joyful. We're going to be stoked out of our minds joyful. But in looking at this verse this does not seem to be a reference to our joy but a reference to his joy. That's the way it is linguistically without getting in through all the weeds the joy that he writes about isn't our joy in his presence it's his joy having us in his presence as faultless.

A one scholar says Jesus will have the special joy of presenting his bride the church. Now think about that and I found this verse this morning as I was getting my thoughts together again. This is Zephaniah chapter 3 the Lord your God in your midst the mighty one will save he will rejoice over you with gladness he will quiet you with his love he will rejoice over you with singing. Do you ever think about the Lord singing?

He must have a good voice but the idea is he will sing for you he will sing over you with joy. That's the joy I believe it's talking about. By the way it was this joy that helped Jesus endure the cross do you know that? Hebrews chapter 12 verse 2 who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross despising the shame. It's as if he went to the cross being able to just slightly taste what that joy is going to be like when you and you and you and you and me are going to be in his presence presented before God the father as faultless and he would be so joyful as faultless and he would be so joyful that he would sing over it. So yeah I'm so the purpose of salvation isn't just to rescue you from hell it's also to present you in heaven you you will be a salvation trophy that will bring him joy.

That concludes Skip Heitzig's powerful message for you from the series Fight for the House. Now if you love Bible study a trip to Israel is a life changer your Bible study will never be the same. Skip has lived in Israel and led tours many many times here he is to invite you on his next tour. You know there's always something new to see and experience in Israel and I'm so excited to let you know that I'm taking another tour group to Israel next spring in 2022. You're in for an incredible time as we travel throughout Israel and experience the culture that's so unique to that country. We'll start on the Mediterranean Sea and head north seeing places like Caesarea and Nazareth the Sea of Galilee and the Jordan River. We'll spend several days in and around Jerusalem and see the Temple Mount, Calvary the Garden of Gethsemane and the Mount of Olives and much more. This remarkable itinerary is made richer with times of worship Bible study and lots of fellowship. Now I've been to Israel a number of times over the years and I can honestly say that visiting the places where the events of the scriptures unfolded where Jesus lived taught and healed it just never gets old. I can't wait to see you in Israel.

Start planning and saving now to tour Israel with Skip Heitzig. Information at inspirationcruises.com slash c-a-b-q. That's inspirationcruises.com slash c-a-b-q.

The Apostle Paul likened the Christian life to a race but it's not a sprint it's a marathon and the heart of this ministry is to equip you and encourage friends like you as you run your race but that's only possible with support from friends like you and through your partnership today you'll help keep broadcasting messages like the one you're hearing today to people around the world. Simply call 800-922-1888 to give right now. Again that's 800-922-1888 or visit connectwithskip.com slash donate. Connectwithskip.com slash donate. Thank you for helping further God's Word around the world. Come back again tomorrow as Skip Heitzig begins a new series called Now Streaming and explains how you can wield your thoughts in order to overcome bad habits. Connect with Skip Heitzig is a presentation of Connection Communications connecting you to God's never-changing truth in ever-changing times.