Doctrine of the indwelling Christ part 17. Implications of the indwelling Christ.

Title: Doctrine of the indwelling Christ part 17. Implications of the indwelling Christ.

 

Turn to Col 1.

 

/Point 6: The Implications of the Indwelling of Christ.

 

a.The indwelling of Jesus Christ is a sign of royalty. \

 

/b. The indwelling of Jesus Christ is a guarantee of our portfolio of invisible assets because we are fellow heirs with Christ, ROM 8:17.\

 

/c. The indwelling of Jesus Christ is a guarantee of eternal security.\

 

/d. The indwelling of Jesus Christ is a guarantee of the existence of your escrow blessings.\

 

And this is where we left off last night:

 

/e. The indwelling of Jesus Christ is the motivation for continued momentum in undeserved suffering at spiritual adulthood.\

 

At spiritual self-esteem you have personal love for God the Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit. Knowing Jesus Christ indwells you becomes the motivation you need to advance to spiritual autonomy and to spiritual maturity.

 

The reason is that at each stage there is undeserved suffering, which God allows under His permissive will. You were protected from this type of suffering up to the stages of spiritual adulthood because you were not strong enough to handle them.

 

What’s going to keep you going and what’s going to prevent you from quitting? Christ in you, the confidence of future blessings and glory.

 

COL 1:27 to whom God willed to make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope [confident expectation of the future] of glory.

 

Each one of these stages is accompanied by the divine administration of undeserved suffering. It must be made clear that God does not make anyone suffer, but rather allows it as He is the Master of all circumstances which He has decreed in EP.

 

Job was tested, but satan administered the suffering, which God allowed. Paul was tested, but those who beat him and robbed him and wouldn’t support him administered the suffering. Christ was tested, but those who scorned Him and whipped Him administered the suffering. God didn’t make any of these evil creatures do this, but He allowed them to when His heroes were ready to forgo the suffering and stand strong on God’s word and power to the maximum glory of God.

 

Motivation must be maintained during this maximum amount of pressure and adversity if it is going to be your finest hour.

 

/Spiritual self-esteem must pass providential preventative suffering to advance to spiritual autonomy; spiritual autonomy must pass momentum testing to reach spiritual maturity; spiritual maturity must pass evidence testing to glorify God to the maximum.\

 

Therefore, there must be some motivation, in addition to metabolized doctrine, to go through undeserved suffering. The specific motivation is the application of the indwelling of Christ.

 

This becomes the motivational virtue for the advance through each stage of spiritual adulthood.

 

There must be a strong personal love for God that continues to get stronger. It is occupation with the person of Christ that becomes the important motivating factor beginning at spiritual self-esteem, HEB 12:3.

 

/HEB 12:3

For consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you may not grow weary and lose heart. \

 

/f. The indwelling of Jesus Christ emphasizes our relationship with God rather than people.\

 

The unique factor of every member of the Godhead indwelling your body provides a different emphasis and a new priority for the new creature in Christ which is God emphasis over people emphasis.

 

If you emphasize your relationships with people over your relationship with God then you will eventually find yourself under self-induced misery.

 

/Our God is a jealous God who is not attempting to attain status or authority, but by His very essence He is status and authority. \

 

God is righteousness. To put a person above Him therefore is unrighteousness. God is happiness. To put a person above Him is misery.

 

/Deut 4:24

For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God. \

 

/Deut 32:21

They have made Me jealous with what is not God;

They have provoked Me to anger with their idols.

So I will make them jealous with those who are not a people;

I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation, \

 

Believers today are constantly seeking counsel about human relationships. In most cases, the problems exist because of wrong priorities:  people emphasis over God emphasis.

 

/Right experience with God (life in the PPOG) results in right relationship with people. Negative experience with God results in wrong experience with people.\

 

Because of the indwelling of Jesus Christ, the Church Age believer cannot put relationship with people before relationship with God. It just doesn’t fit.

 

/Your priorities are established by those who are closest to you:  God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, who indwell you!\

 

Therefore, your priority must be God emphasis before people emphasis because of who you are. The key to right priorities is the indwelling of Christ.

 

There has to come a point in every positive believer’s life where he truly recognizes that he is the temple of God. At that point the wisdom of doctrine becomes a recognition of a reality.

 

/A positive believer will learn about his destiny, but there comes a point where he must become his destiny. \

 

This is the great importance of the indwelling of Christ. Can Christ fellowship with darkness, which is the cosmic system? No. If you emphasize people over God then darkness and cosmos will be your home.

 

There are only two choices. Light or darkness? Abide or not? Don’t fool yourself, it’s fairly black and white.

 

Emphasis on the plan of God develops personal love for God, which is motivational virtue and virtue love towards people, which is functional virtue.

 

/The key to successful relationships with people is impersonal unconditional virtue love. \

 

If you put relationship with people ahead of relationship with God, you’re insecure, subjective, and will have a miserable life because you will be a slave to people’s whims.

 

The Trinity are all invisible to you. Therefore, the persons of the Godhead can only become the objects of your personal love through a consistent intake of pertinent Bible doctrine. When that occurs you have confidence in your relationship with God, which lands you at the first stage of spiritual adulthood, SSE.

 

Spiritual autonomy, characterized by the functional virtue of impersonal love for all mankind, provides capacity for love in romance, friendship, marriage, social life, etc.

 

But impersonal love always rides in tandem behind personal love for God and therefore depends on it. So then, relationship and experience with God must precede relationship and experience with mankind.

 

Also, in the communion service, we must be focusing on Christ and not ourselves or someone else. We keep on doing this in remembrance of Him. The cross is where we began and occupation with Christ is our never ending goal.

 

Metabolizing doctrine is a never-ending function during the believer’s sojourn on earth.

 

2 Peter 3:17 You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard lest, being carried away by the error of unprincipled men, you fall from your own steadfastness,

 

2 Peter 3:18but grow [keep on growing] in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.

 

HEB 12:1 Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance, and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,

 

HEB 12:2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

 

HEB 12:3 For consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you may not grow weary and lose heart.

 

The humanity of Christ, in His prototype plan of God gave #1 priority to His relationship with God the Father, as illustrated by His prayer at Gethsemane, “Nevertheless not My will but Thy will be done.”

 

There’s our pattern. No one ever faced so much hostility from people as did our Lord during the First Advent. But it never deterred Him from His mission in going to the cross and being judged for your sins, because His priorities were always straight.

 

The weariness described by this verse is that which comes from putting people first in your life. This is weariness from being disappointed and let down by people. This is often your fault, because you assign to others your standards.

 

Did the Lord put His priorities in the disciples? How would have that worked out? The perfect picture is the Lord in Gethsemane praying, “not my will,” and the disciples fast asleep. One was a traitor and the others asked silly questions desiring the kingdom and not the cross.

 

You put people first and then when they disappoint you, you get discouraged and disillusioned. Weariness, discouragement, disillusionment are exactly what the believer demands by putting relationship with people before relationship with God.

 

John 14:20 "In that day you shall know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.

 

 

John 14:21"He who has My commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves Me; and he who loves Me shall be loved by My Father, and I will love him, and will disclose Myself to him." 

 

/ “keeps” - terew[tereo] - to guard what belongs to you and is precious to you. “commandments” = categorical doctrines. \

 

/You guard doctrine by guarding your positive volition. You guard your positive volition by avoiding the many distractions in life. \

 

/A distraction is a thought that invades the soul and causes a change in priorities.\