Noble Ambition #2

There is no Christianity without the cross. There's no cross without suffering. Paul says I embrace that.

I want to be in honored partnership with Him. Justification, sanctification, and glorification. Those are terms you've likely heard at one time or another in your walk with Christ.

But do you know what these terms really mean? Hi, I'm Bill Wright, and thanks for joining us on the Truth Pulpit with Don Green, founding pastor of Truth Community Church in Cincinnati, Ohio. Today, our teacher will explain the meaning behind those terms and a whole lot more as he wraps up his series in Philippians called That I May Gain Christ. We have part two of a message called Noble Ambition. So if you've got your Bible open, let's join Don right now in the Truth Pulpit. In Matthew chapter 5 verse 6, our Lord said, Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.

And it's describing an ongoing experience. Those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they and they alone shall be satisfied. There's this desire, there's this ambition, there is this priority, wanting to know Christ and to know Him better. And so I just, you know, I just have to stop and ask you whether that's in your heart or not, because this is what true Christianity is.

It's not about preeminently and primarily or only just showing up on Sunday. We're talking about the whole reason that you exist and what you understand and what you want out of life. And Paul goes on to explain the active force in sanctification.

What is it that drives that? He says, I want to know Him and the power of His resurrection. Power, you could say, is the ability to overcome resistance, the ability to overcome obstacles, the power to conquer, you might say. What Paul is saying is he wants to know the power of the resurrection in a way that overcomes any obstacles or any hindrances that would keep him from knowing Christ the way that he desires. He wants to know that power of the resurrection. Look over at the book of Ephesians, turn back a couple of pages to Ephesians chapter 1. This book also, like Colossians and like Philippians, written at approximately the same time, the same season of life by the Apostle Paul, and so it helps us understand something about what he has in mind as he talks about these glories that have been revealed to us. And so in Ephesians chapter 1 verse 18, he talks about the power of the resurrection to help us conquer sin.

He says in verse 18, I pray that the eyes of your heart would be enlightened so that you will know what is the hope of his calling, what are the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints, and what is the surpassing greatness of his power toward us who believe. And what is this power? It's in accordance with the working of the strength of his might, which he brought about in Christ when he raised him from the dead resurrection and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and every name that is named not only in this age but also in the one to come. Power laying the foundation for what would come in the later chapters of Ephesians about transformation in the daily life.

Look at chapter 2. In other words, power for sanctification. What else did this resurrection do for us? Ephesians chapter 2 verse 4, the resurrection of Christ is the power behind our regeneration, the power behind our new birth.

Verse 4, God being rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ, by grace you've been saved, and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ. Resurrection power being the driving engine, being that which supplies the power for a man or a woman to be born again. Resurrection power being that which provides the transforming impact of sanctification once a man is saved. All rooted in the power of God, the power of Christ, the power of the Holy Spirit as expressed supremely in the resurrection of Christ. You know anybody that's raised themselves from the dead?

Not a one. No one has that power. This is supernatural. This is something that God alone must do and can only do. And so what Paul is saying as he speaks about this power of the resurrection is, I want to know in an experiential, personal way the God that has power like that, and I want that power to be unleashed to change me and sanctify me even further in my Christian life.

And it goes on. Keep going back to 1 Corinthians chapter 15. The centrality of the resurrection to the Christian faith can never be overstated.

A man could spend 50 years preaching only on this theme and not exhaust it and not give too much emphasis to it. In 1 Corinthians chapter 15 verse 20, the resurrection of Christ guarantees the future resurrection of the believer. Verse 20, but now Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who are asleep. For since by a man came death, by a man also came the resurrection of the dead.

Watch this. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive. Looking to the future, one day Christian brother, Christian sister, we will be bodily raised from the dead. We will be with Christ and be like him not only in the spiritual aspect of his resurrection but with a body like his after his own resurrection. I don't know what all the details of that's going to be like.

I just know this for sure. It's going to be glorious and it's going to be better than anything I can think. And Paul says, think about it. What Paul's saying here in Philippians chapter 3 is that God has done all of this for us. Regeneration, justification, sanctification, ultimate glorification, all of it premised on the power of the resurrection of Christ.

He says, this is so far greater than anything on earth. Earlier in Philippians 3 says, I count all things to be lost for the sake of Christ. Everything about my earthly righteousness, everything about my earthly life, it's lost. It's a liability by comparison to the asset of having Christ and knowing him. And as a result of understanding that, as a result of that being in his heart by the power of the Holy Spirit, Paul says, these things of earth grow strangely dim in the light of the glory of his grace, in light of the power of his resurrection.

This is the preoccupation of my life ambition going forward. For his people, in his death, burial, and resurrection, Christ won victory over sin, over death, over Satan, over hell. And all of these things are so magnificently glorious, Paul says, that's what I want to know.

I want more of that. I want it more animated in my heart, and I want it to more and more control my thinking. Union with Christ gives us resurrection power over sin, death, and Satan himself. And there's another aspect of this sanctification of which Paul desires.

Look at it there in verse 10. He says that I may know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings. The word fellowship in this context has the idea of an honored partnership with Christ in the sufferings of Christ. You see, my friend, when God saves us, when Christ makes us his own, he does something that affects not only us but the world around us. Whereas before we were in the world and we were of the world, and we walked according to the world, according to the lusts of the flesh, the boastful pride of life, Christ, when he saves us, takes us out of that realm and puts us in the realm of his kingdom. Well friends, let me ask you this, just in a very basic sense, what did the world do when they had Christ in their hands? They killed him, they crucified him, they contradicted him, they reproached him, they persecuted him. Christ suffered the hands of the world.

He literally suffered in his physical body at their hands. And Jesus said in John chapter 15 verse 20, you know, if they persecuted me they'll persecute you too. And what Paul is saying is, I embrace that. If the world hated Christ, I embrace suffering at the hands of the world just so that I can be in an honored partnership with the one who loved me and gave himself up for me. Everything about what Paul is saying here, every aspect of it, is a complete contradiction of the moralistic therapeutic deism that animates the pulpits of the majority of so-called evangelical churches today.

God loves you, he's gonna make life easy for you, call on him, he'll fix your problem, then he'll get out of the way and let you get back to what you're doing. Paul would have nothing to do with a theory with a religion like that. Paul would have nothing to do with a religion that said, I'll exempt you from everything of suffering in your life.

Paul contradicts the whole spirit of all of that. He says, I embrace, I want the fellowship of his suffering, that's what I want. I want to be identified with him and I want to enter into the experience of what it was like for Christ in his suffering. My friends, for us to be in Christ, to be truly in Christ, is to be put into the relationship that Christ had with the world and it was a relationship of hostility which the world directed against Christ even though Christ loved the world and was giving himself for it.

Unrequited love, hostility, evil in return for the good that Christ offered and spoke to them. Paul says, I'll take that. If it will put me into a closer experiential walk with Christ, I'll take that.

That's what I want in life. In other words, you could put it this way, Paul gladly accepted, he sought the cross as well as the crown. The instrument of suffering for Christ, he said, you know, if you want to follow after me, take up your cross, follow after me.

It's part of the deal. It's part of what real Christianity is. To leave that out is to teach a false gospel, a false religion, even done in the name of Christ. There is no Christianity without the cross, there's no cross without suffering. And Paul says, I embrace that.

I want to be an honored partnership with him. Look back at Matthew 5 again. Matthew chapter 5 verse 10, Jesus says that this is an aspect of Christian life, of being his disciple. Chapter 5 verse 10, he says, blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Theirs and theirs alone is the sense of it. Verse 11, blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad for your reward in heaven is great for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you. The Apostle Paul in his sufferings and in the persecutions joined in that statement of Christ which was made before the conversion of the Apostle Paul. There's this partnership, there's this noble sharing in the suffering of Christ and those that have followed him in the centuries that have gone before us.

Paul says, it's a privilege. I desire that. I want to be intimate with Christ, including the experience of suffering for the sake of righteousness just like my Lord did. Maybe it comes, maybe it doesn't, that's in the hand of the Lord. Paul's ambition is, I'm willing to share in it.

Ultimately it cost him his head. Go back to Philippians chapter 3. Philippians chapter 3, he says there at the end of verse 10, I want to know him, power of his resurrection, the fellowship of his sufferings, being conformed to his death, indicating a process of being conformed to his death. In his inner man being conformed in that way, Christ died for sin, believers die to sin. And so what Paul is expressing here is that in sanctification a Christian increasingly grows by the power of the resurrection and he says that's what I want.

While God gives me breath here on earth, that's what I want. I ask you my friends whether you know whether something like that moves in your heart or not. If this is utterly foreign to you, if you don't know this, you've never known this and you can't understand why I get animated talking about it, then maybe you haven't been born again. Maybe you need to ask Christ to open your eyes.

Say I must be missing something here, all of this is foreign to me. I'm cold, I mock these things Lord, what must be the state of my soul if I'm so cold and indifferent to the things that Paul said pulsated in him and made his heartbeat? How could I be with Paul and with Christ if that's all foreign to me? There's even more glory that Paul desired and that brings us to our second point, the goal of glorification.

The goal of glorification. Paul says I want this sanctifying impact of the power of resurrection on my life. Verse 11, in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.

Christian friend, even if these dormants have sometimes lain dormant in your soul but you find them being reinvigorated, take courage, take heart, be encouraged by the fact that that your heart is responding to these things even if you strayed from them. It's an indication that the work of God is not yet dead in your soul. If you're a true Christian, the work of God will never be dead in your soul because he saves everybody that he justifies.

He perfects the work that he begun. But what Paul is doing here in verse 11, he's looking ahead to the bodily resurrection of believers. What Paul does here is he's saying I want this sanctifying work in me now during my earthly life and I want the ultimate end product of that which is the bodily resurrection. Paul accepts suffering now for the sake of the eternal life that is going to be revealed to him in the end. Now Paul did not know exactly when or how he would die at this point.

His life was uncertain as he was awaiting his audience with Caesar's court. But here's the thing my friends, by whatever means it took, Paul says I want to be there. That's my ultimate destination. That's my goal. That's what I care most about. I want to be in that number that is resurrected with Christ from the dead at his coming. His eye is fixed on the bodily resurrection from the dead and in that transformation that God is going to give to each one of us that are true Christians, in that transformation we are going to be set free from sin, set free from bodily disintegration. We are going to be set free from earthly sorrow. We are going to be set free from the specter of impending death. All of it's going to be taken away in the resurrection. Christ having been raised once is never to die again. Christ perfected in glory according to his eternal nature we are going to be swept up and identified with that exact same kind of experience.

We will not be made God but we will be made perfect and we will have a body fit to live in heaven forever, not subject to sin and temptation, no more memories of our prior wicked life to haunt us, no more hostility from the world to discourage and cause us to stumble, no more false philosophies to refute, all of the other things that make life on this earth so often difficult and wearisome it's all going to be gone, replaced with that great vision, the great presence of Christ with him, accepted by him, him loving us, blessing us, welcoming us into his presence and us joining with Saints throughout the ages in returning honor and giving glory to him and flinging our crowns like a Frisbee at his feet. Paul says that's what I want, that's my ambition, that's what I'm after, that is the goal of my heart, that's the noble ambition, the goal of glorification, the ultimate outcome. You know these false prophets of moralistic therapeutic deism with all of their earth-centered approach and earth-centered teaching on the pseudo Christianity that they teach, they put blinders on people and they say just look at the here and now, look at what you want now and God will help you with what you want now, you know what I don't want you to think about the here and now, look beyond, look to the glorious vision of heaven that awaits us and set your heart there like Colossians 3 told us to do, your life is hid with Christ, seek the things above not the things on the earth, that's not diminishing the importance of earthly life, that's giving the one thing to earthly life that makes it worth living and that enables us to persevere because the process of sanctification comes with its setbacks, we have conflict with the world, with the devil, with self, sometimes with each other and it gets kind of wearying, doesn't it? What Paul shows us by his example here in these inspired words of Scripture, he shows us to keep our eyes on the prize though it may be veiled, we may see it only darkly in the moment, beloved if you are in Christ resurrection power is at work in you to guarantee that you will enter into this goal of glorification, you will not miss it, God is making sure that your life arrives at that destination if you are in Christ and so one day as we saw at the end of chapter 3 here in Philippians, one day we will be raised from the dead and given new bodies in that state we will be free from sin, we will be like Christ 1st John 3 2 because we will see him as he is. Justification leads to sanctification leads to glorification.

So what do we do with this noble ambition? Martyn Lloyd-Jones said it well, I quote him a lot, I ought to quote him more than I do, it's good to quote better men than you, meaning myself not you but better men than me is what I mean by that. Here's what the great doctor said, he said Christ lived the perfect life, he died the atoning death, he was buried in a grave, he has risen and entered glory. All who are in Christ are certain of the same glory.

The extent to which we realize this is the extent to which we shall know what it is to long for it and to say that everything else is rubbish by comparison. What is the world and all its glories when I think of that other glory? He continues, therefore my ambition is that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead and an entry into that glory. My friend, do you know Jesus Christ in the manner of which we've been speaking here today?

Does the noble ambition animate your heart and life? Amen and may that noble ambition burn like an unquenchable fire in our hearts. Don Green will have more from God's holy word next time on The Truth Pulpit and we hope you'll join us then.

But now Don, how about sharing one or two closing thoughts that you'd like to have our listening family come away with after this series? Well Bill, I guess I would summarize it with things that I've said a couple of times throughout this series is my friend, you cannot be good enough to earn the favor of God. He is too holy and you are too sinful. And so you need to go another direction if you're trying to earn your salvation by what you do or by the religion that you follow. The Bible makes it very clear. We do not receive forgiveness of sin through our efforts to be a good person.

We can't do that. Salvation is found in a completely different way. It is by grace through faith in Jesus Christ, not as a result of works lest any man should boast. And so my friend, I leave you with this question as we finish this series. Is your faith in yourself and what you do and in being good enough for God to accept you into his heaven? Oh my friend, go to the book of Romans, go to the book of Ephesians and pick up and read because you're on the wrong path. But my friend, if your faith is in Christ alone, let me assure you of his love. He will keep you to the end because he perfects and completes what he begins and that includes your salvation. You can go in peace. You can go in joy because of the faithfulness of Jesus Christ to his own. Thanks, Don. And friend, thank you for being with us today. Remember, you can find all of Don's teaching when you go to thetruthpulpit.com. Again, that's thetruthpulpit.com. I'm Bill Wright and we'll see you back here next time when Don Green presents more from The Truth Pulpit.