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Hope
Unlimited
Chapter
18: Why Believers Persevere
THE HOPE which filled the heart of Paul concerning the Corinthian
brethren we have already seen to be full of comfort to those who
trembled as to their future. But why was it that he believed that
the brethren would be strengthened unto the end?
I
want you to notice that he gives his reasons. Here they are:
`God, who has called you into fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, is faithful.
(1Corinthians
1:9)
The
apostle does not say, "You are faithful." Alas! the
faithfulness of man is a very unreliable affair; it is mere vanity.
He does not say, "You have faithful ministers to lead and guide
you, and therefore I trust you will be safe." Oh, no! if we are
kept by men we shall be but ill kept. He puts it, "God is
faithful."
If we are found faithful, it will be because God is
faithful. On the faithfulness of our promise-keeping God the whole burden
of our salvation must rest. On this glorious attribute of God the
matter hinges. We are as variable as the wind, frail as a spider's web,
weak as water. No dependence can be placed upon our natural
qualities, or our spiritual attainments; but God is always faithful.
He is faithful in His love; He knows no variableness, neither shadow
of turning. He is faithful to His purpose; He does not begin a work
and then leave it undone. He is faithful to His relationships; as a
Father He will not renounce His children, as a friend He will not
deny His people, as a Creator He will not forsake the work of His
own hands. He is faithful to His promises, and will never allow one
of them to fail to a single believer. He is faithful to His
covenant, which He has made with us in Jesus - that covenant which
was ratified
with the blood of His Son. He is faithful to His Son, and will
not allow His precious blood to be spilled in vain. He is faithful
to His people to whom He has promised eternal life, and from whom He
will not turn away.
This
faithfulness of God is the foundation and cornerstone of our hope of
final perseverance. Believers shall persevere in holiness, because
God perseveres in grace. He perseveres to bless, and therefore
believers persevere in being blessed. He continues to keep His
people, and therefore they continue to keep His commandments. This
is good solid ground to rest upon, and it is delightfully consistent
with the original title of this little book, "all of grace." Thus
it is free favor and infinite mercy which ring in the dawn of
salvation, and the same sweet bells sound melodiously through the
whole day of grace.
You
see that the only reasons for hoping that we shall be strengthened to
the end, and be found blameless at the last, are found in our God;
but in Him these reasons are exceedingly abundant.
They
lie first, in what God has done. He has gone so far in blessing us
that it is not possible for Him to run back. Paul reminds us that He
has "called us into the fellowship of his Son Jesus
Christ." Has he called us? Then the call cannot be reversed; "for the gifts and the calling of God are
irrevocable" (Rom 11:29). From the effectual call of His grace the Lord
never turns. "those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also
glorified:" this is the invariable
rule of the divine procedure.
There is a common call, of which it is
said, "Many are called, but few are chosen," but this of
which we are now thinking is another kind of call, which indicates a
special kind of love, and necessitates the possession of that to which we
are called. In this case it is with the called one even as with
Abraham's seed, of whom the Lord said, "I have called you from
the ends of the earth, and I said to you, You are my servant; I
have chosen you, and not cast you away."
In
what the Lord has done, we see strong reasons for our preservation
and future glory, because the Lord has called us into the fellowship
of His Son Jesus Christ. In other words, into partnership with Jesus
Christ, and I would have you carefully consider what this means. If
you are indeed called by divine grace, you have come into fellowship
with the Lord Jesus Christ, and this means that you are joint-owner with Him in all
things. From this time on you are one with Him in the sight of the Most
High. The Lord Jesus bare your sins in His own body on the tree,
being made a curse for you; and at the same time He has become your
righteousness, so that you are justified in Him. You are Christ's
and Christ is yours. As Adam stood for his descendants, so does
Jesus stand for all who are in Him. As husband and wife are one, so
is Jesus one with all those who are united to Him by faith; one by a
marriage union which can never be broken.
More than this, believers
are members of the Body of Jesus, and so are one with Him by a
loving, living, lasting union. God has called us into this union,
this fellowship, this partnership, and by this very fact He has
given us the token and pledge of our being confirmed to the end.
If
we were considered apart from Jesus we should be poor perishable
units, soon dissolved and carried away to destruction; but being one with
Jesus we are made partakers of His nature, and we are endowed with His
immortal life. Our destiny is linked with that of our Lord, and
until He can be destroyed it is not possible that we should perish.
Dwell
much upon this partnership with the Son of God, into which you have
been called: for all your hope lies there. You can never be poor
while Jesus is rich, since you are in company with Him. Want can
never assail you, since you are joint-proprietor with Him who is
Possessor of Heaven and earth. You can never fail; for though one of
the partners in the company is as poor as a church mouse, and in
himself an utter bankrupt, who could not pay even a small amount of
his heavy debts, yet the other partner is inconceivably,
inexhaustibly rich.
In such partnership you are raised above the
depression of the times, the changes of the future, and the shock of
the end of all things. The Lord has called you into the fellowship
of His Son Jesus Christ, and by that act and deed He has put you
into the place of infallible safeguard.
If
you are indeed a believer you are one with Jesus, and therefore you
are secure. Do you not see that it must be so? You must be
strengthened to the end until the day of His appearing, if you have indeed been
made one with Jesus by the irrevocable act of God. Jesus and the
believing sinner are in the same boat: unless Jesus sinks, the
believer will never drown - and Jesus will never sink. Jesus has taken His redeemed into such
connection with himself, that He Himself will have to first be smitten, overcome,
and dishonored, before the least of His purchased ones can be injured.
His name is at the head of the company, and until His name can be
dishonored
we are secure against all dread of failure.
So,
then, with the utmost confidence let us go forward into the unknown
future, linked eternally with Jesus. If the men of the world should
cry, "Who is this that comes up from the wilderness, leaning
upon her Beloved?" we will joyfully confess that we do lean on
Jesus, and that we mean to lean on Him more and more. Our faithful
God is an ever-flowing well of delight, and our fellowship with the
Son of God is a full river of joy. Knowing these glorious things we
cannot be discouraged: no, rather we cry with the apostle,
"Who shall separate us from the love of God which is in Christ
Jesus our Lord?"
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