October 20, 2009

• Letter 8 on assurance and fighting for joy (sin, assurance and the joy of our salvation)

  I'm continuing to write about assurance and fighting for joy...If you have not already done so, I would recommend you read the previous letters in this series.

  
  

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  My dear friend covered by the precious blood of Jesus Christ,

  I have been amazed at the joy God has given me as I have reflected on those first things about our salvation, particularly what I wrote you here and here. I am hesitant to move on, but feel I must. I must talk about things that are harder for us to hear now. Whenever we sin we grieve, quench and limit our Savior like Israel in the wilderness and therefore we are unable to experience the fullness of joy He has for us. You know when Israel had seen His miracles and yet doubted He could provide. That horrid day they turned from Him and worshiped the Golden Calf. The day their stomaches craved more than Him and they asked whether He was among them or not and they provoked Him. We can read of their behavior in Psalms 78 and 95 (yet we also see God's grace continuing to reach out to them). O, yet we both know we have done the same thing as well. O, we who have known His love for us in Jesus Christ still sin and it grieves us as we see how our heavenly Father is grieved by our sin.

  Whenever we sin we are not welcoming the Holy Spirit. There is no other way around it. God is holy, is He not? Whenever we sin, we are acting in a way that is opposed to God's desire for us to be holy as He is holy. How can light dwell with darkness? The call to Christ is a call to holiness.

  The cross saved us not only from the penalty for our sin, but also from the power of sin. God's intent for us is to be holy and blameless before Him and be a praise in the earth.

  How can we ever begin to argue that our sin has no affect on our relationship with God? He is holy. His Spirit is holy. How can sin not affect our fellowship with the Holy One of Israel? In regard to joy then, our sin blocks our experiencing His joy in our lives. How can it not? Joy comes from His indwelling Spirit, does it not? And when we sin, are we not saying in effect to the blessed Spirit, "You are not welcome here." How can we experience the joy of the Lord so long as we remain in sin and fail to confess it? When we talk about sin, how can we not think of David and his words in Psalms 51 and 32?

  For I know my transgressions,
  and my sin is ever before me.

  For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away
  through my groaning all day long.
  For day and night your hand was heavy upon me;
  my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer.

  I know I've felt very much like David. There have been times when there's been no sense of joy whatsoever. God won't allow His children to continue to enjoy sin. That's why David prays for God to restore to Him the joy of His salvation. There was enjoyment in his sin for a season, but now as God has opened his eyes through Nathan, David has seen his sin for what it really was. How can we truly enjoy sin when our sin takes us out of the will of the One who wants to give us pleasures forevermore, the One who is our true Joy?

  Lest we ever become proud and deceived and think we could not fall, let us never forget that we are all prone to sin at any point in time. The apostle Paul tells us that in I Corinthians 10, using the example of the Israelites, as does the author of Hebrews in chapter 3. We must always take heed, lest we fall. I've written about that in regard to Joseph here and here. Our enemy is great; he is always prowling. We must be students of ourselves and seek to know what are our temptations, so we might be always be alert and on guard against the schemes and wiles of the devil. He knows our weaknesses. Do we know them? Let us never forget that he appears as an angel of light. Yes, He who is in us is greater, of course, nevertheless we must continue to draw on the Lord's strength and power. We are no match for the devil apart from the whole armor of God, nor should we ever put ourselves in the way of temptation. We must be wise and vigilant for the tempter continues to entice us to drink strange waters rather than our being satisfied with the living Water.

  Once the Holy Spirit has shown us we have sinned, that is prime opportunity to Satan to steal our joy, is it not? Remember I wrote that since it is Jesus' desire our joy be full, Satan is working to undermine that. Indeed we have broken the fellowship we have with our Father through Jesus Christ, yet, let us remember this: even though we have sinned, we are still the children of God. We cannot unbirth ourselves from of the family of God. We have been born again by the incorruptible seed. Incorruptible. Is the life God has breathed into us by His Holy Spirit going to die? Is the Holy Spirit's seal going to fail? Is the Spirit Himself not our assurance of salvation, the promise and guarantee of our inheritance to the praise of God's glory? This is where Satan wants to trip us up, especially those of us who have sensitive consciences. We begin to think we cannot be forgiven or we can lose our salvation. We need to go back to the truth of God's Word.

  Let us remind ourselves of God's great and precious promises of eternal life and forgiveness and cleansing through the blood. That's why I wrote all those posts about dealing with past sins and guilt and failure. I was being oppressed and overwhelmed by guilt over past sin. Satan is the accuser. If he can't get us to persist in sin (which no true child of God can continue in), then when we do confess our sins, the father of lies will bring doubts into our minds as to the love of our heavenly Father and the sufficiency of Christ's sacrifice for us. Satan will continue to hound us, to whisper to us that we are unclean time and again, even though we have received cleansing and forgiveness through the blood of Christ. We will take showers endlessly hoping to cleanse ourselves from sin, but, of course, that does us no good. Satan heaps up false guilt upon us, he throws stones at us and we throw them at ourselves, even though Jesus has no stones to throw at us. We continue to attempt to atone for our sin. O, my friend, once we have repented and confessed our sin, let us trust God's precious promises to us that we are forgiven. Is God a liar? Are His words in I John 1:9 not to be trusted?

  If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

  Aren't John's words for us in I John wonderful? John reminds us we will sin, but then he assures us we have an Advocate, the Lord Jesus Christ. Those words are written for the believer who has begun to doubt that he can be restored to fellowship after he's sinned.

  Our relationship to God is like ours to our spouses. We may do something to offend or hurt our spouses, but does that mean we are divorced from them? No. The marriage is still intact, though our relationship, our fellowship, will certainly be strained. It is the same way in our relationship with God through Jesus Christ. We are still Christ's bride, but our relationship is strained when we sin. Our sin does not undo our Father's sovereign election. Our sin does not undo Christ's saving work on the cross. Our sin does not undo the Spirit's seal. Christ's righteousness was imputed to us by grace through faith, not by our works. We were saved by grace. We are kept by grace. Our works did not save us. Our works do not unsave us. When we do sin, God stretches His arms of mercy and grace out to us to welcome us back into fellowship with Him once more through confession and repentance of our sin. In fact, we can only confess because His kindness leads us to repentance. He hedges up our way and woos us back to Himself. O, how He longs to have fellowship with us once again when we have sinned.

  Thanks be to God, we do have the full assurance God will restore the joy of His salvation to us when we confess and repent of our sin. He has promised we will receive His forgiveness and cleansing through our Advocate, the Lord Jesus Christ. The Christian cannot continue in sin. God will lead us into the light so we might confess our sin, and then He will give us His strength to purify ourselves as He is pure so we might make our calling and election sure. Let us never take our sin lightly. May God show us our sin so we might be restored to fellowship with Him. How can we ever really think of sinning against the Lamb who became sin for us and was punished for us in our place?

  Let us remember these truths about our salvation. Who can bring any charge against us? Jesus is our Judge, yes, but is He not also our Advocate? Amen! Yet, how often do we need to remind ourselves of His love for us. Yes, our sin ought to grieve us, but we cannot let it keep us down. When we confess our sin, yes, even before we confess it, God is reaching out to us always with grace, grace greater than our sin. His kindness is what leads us to repent of our sin. His grace abounds to the chief of sinners. Is His grace not sufficient for us always? Satan wants to bind us up with false guilt over sin we have already confessed and repented of.

  Of course, I do not mean by this that we take His grace in vain or for granted. You know that, but we must be clear on that point. But when we have sinned (oh, yes, my friend, we will sin ), let us come humbly yet boldly to throne of grace to receive His promised mercy and grace. Our heavenly Father has promised that if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. We come and take His gifts to us with a bold humility. We deserve nothing, but we take from Him what only He can give us and what is ours as His children to receive. Forgiveness. Cleansing. A clear conscience.  Sanctification by the Spirit. He has said He will remember our sin no more. Therefore, let us no longer remember it either! He has said as far as the east is from the west, so far has He has cast our sin from us. East - West. Will they ever meet? No. Let us not go fish in the sea into which He has cast our sin!

  Yes, we should and we must grieve our sin (is that not a sign we are His children...we hate sin and we desire holiness), but let us ask Him to restore to us the joy of our salvation. Ask Him. Have you ever asked Him? We cannot work up that joy. It is a gift from Him. We put ourselves in His presence. We open up His Word to us to fill our minds and hearts and souls with His great and precious promises to us. We go to Him and eat and drink of Him. What good do His promises do for us if they remain in a closed book? What good do the treasures of His grace do for us if we don't open the treasure chest. He has given us the key: the veil has been torn, has it not; the Spirit has come to dwell in us to lead us into all truth. Let us go and open up His Word. We must read His promises to us so He can write them on our hearts and minds. How wonderful are Paul's words, that the Spirit bears witness with our spirits that we are the children of God. What a wonderful gift He wants to give each of His children: His words of assurance spoken straight to our souls. How many of God's children do not ask Him for that gift or even think such a thing is possible? God does not want us to be overwhelmed by guilt once we've confessed our sin to Him. Such false guilt keeps us from experiencing the fullness of joy He desires for us. Let us remind each other of His sure promises to us when we forget! We must! A joyless Christian is an oxymoron. Yes, we do mourn and grieve our sin, yes, we must, and certainly we cannot speak peace to ourselves when there is no peace. We must be honest about our sin with Him and with ourselves. But we do not remain there. We are children of God, let us live like it! It is our privilege to receive forgiveness from our King. Isn't that why He died for us? Did He not give His life so we might have eternal life and fullness of joy? Did Jesus ever doubt He was God's Son? Did He not have full confidence in His sonship? Should not we have that same confidence since we are His joint-heirs? After we have confessed and repented of our sin, let us go boldly to ask and receive His assurance of forgiveness. He gives beauty for ashes and oil of joy for mourning. He wants us to know the joy of His salvation. Is it not to His glory for us to see that He is just and justifier and that grace and truth came through Jesus Christ! Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Shall be comforted, not might be comforted! He is the God of all comfort after all!

  Read Psalms 32 and 51. David is broken over his sin. He fully acknowledges it. He confesses his sin. He is honest and brutal with himself. He's not minimizing or overlooking his sin. He's been humbled. He's contrite. He's broken. He's mourning. But is he content to stay there?

  No, see how David is fighting for joy here:

  12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
  and uphold me with a willing spirit.
  13 Then I will teach transgressors your ways,
  and sinners will return to you.
  14 Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God,
  O God of my salvation,
  and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness.
  15 O Lord, open my lips,
  and my mouth will declare your praise.

  David knows he can't work up that joy. God must restore it to him. And notice David's very bold here.

  The same for us. We can't work up that joy. We must ask God to restore the joy of our salvation. Will He not do so? Yes! Even after the most heinous sin we could imagine. For Jesus' sake God must restore to us that joy. It is our inheritance. We are His children. Jesus' desire is His joy might be in us and our joy might be full. So we can be bold. We must be. How can we not be? We are His children. Does He not want to give us good gifts? Will He fail to keep His promises to us? Remember how I wrote of the angel's message of good news of great joy for all people! Great joy! God never promised us we would not sin, but He did promise that He would forgive us our sins! By His grace working in us, we strive for holiness, oh yes, but when we fail, we go to our knees and receive His complete cleansing and forgiveness, which includes freedom from guilt and shame and fullness of joy. God's mercies are more than enough for us, are they not? As Richard Baxter prayed: "O Lord, it must be great mercy or no mercy, for little mercy is of no use to me!" We are great sinners in need of great mercy, are we not? Is our God not great enough to provide such great mercy for us?

  We can look at Peter's three denials and see how Jesus met with him for a breakfast of fish and restored and commissioned him. Or look at Moses who murdered the Egyptian, yet God met him at the burning bush and called him to bring His people out of Egypt. There are plenty of examples of grace abounding to the chief of sinners.

  Satan wants us to think that our sin disqualifies us from being of any use in the Kingdom of God. Tell me, my friend, which one of us is not a sinner?

  And very much related to that – one more thing we can't help but notice here – look at David's reason for praying that his joy be restored. It isn't merely for himself and his own well-being, though of course, that's part of it, for sure. Look at what David longs to do: teach, sing, declare God's praise!

  When we receive God's forgiveness, when the joy of our salvation is restored, then we can sing aloud of God's righteousness and His great salvation. No, God does not condone our sin, nor does He cause us to sin, nor does He tempt us to sin. And no, we can never use this as a reason to sin: As Paul wrote in Romans 6, should we continue in sin that grace may abound? God forbid! But yet when we do sin, we have opportunity to receive God's mercy and grace and see once again how totally undeserving and unworthy we are of His salvation and then we cannot help but sing His praises. I sometimes wonder why God allows us to sin. I don't know. I don't understand these things. His ways are higher than ours. But let us remember that He is working all things for His glory. As we receive forgiveness for our sin and our joy is restored and we praise His Name for it, is He not glorified? I don't really get that, yet in all things He will be glorified: in spite of our sin! No, it doesn't give us license to sin, not at all, yet we can trust God is sovereign over all things, even over our sin. What we must remember is that God desires we be holy and we can neither enjoy Him nor glorify Him so long as we continue in sin.

  When we do sin, my friend, let us hurry to His throne of grace and confess our sin and ask Him to restore to us the joy of our salvation for He is a great God, His mercy is great and His grace is greater than all our sin!

  Grace, grace, God’s grace,
  Grace that will pardon and cleanse within;
  Grace, grace, God’s grace,
  Grace that is greater than all our sin.

  Amen.

  Karen

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  Related posts:
  
  Please see my posts on dealing with past sins and guilt and failure. You may especially find these posts helpful among those:
  

  • Dealing with past sins & guilt: Micah 7: False guilt vs. godly guilt
  • Either we accept the atonement of Christ or we repeat it
  • Dealing with past sins & guilt: God does not despise the broken & contrite heart
  • Dealing with sins & guilt: A Bedtime Benediction from Spurgeon: "Thou art greatly beloved."
  • Forgiveness & cleansing of sin leads to God's Commission: "Penitents should be preachers"

  
  Other related posts:
  

  • Christ's atonement and assurance
  • the priest shall make atonement
  • God be merciful to me, a sinner.
  • my new song: "My soul is clean"
  • Bible Reading: Ezekiel 7–"But where sin abounded, grace abounded much more"
  • Bible Reading: Ezekiel 34-The True and Good Shepherd's Promises for the Scattered Sheep
  • Postcards from God in England: sanctification is gloriously messy!
  • "Satan tempted me to hold my tongue..." (Whitefield)

  • 5:21 PM
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