God and Sinners Reconciled
Colossians 1:21–23
© Mike Riccardi
Introduction
Well, we return to our series in Paul’s letter to the Colossians. So please turn with me in your Bibles to Colossians chapter 1. Now, I know that it’s not even Thanksgiving yet, and so technically it is illegal to mention Christmas this far in advance. But it is November 16th, which means we are officially less than forty days away from Christmas.
And of course it is never too early to begin tuning our minds to meditate upon what is among the greatest of all the mysteries of the faith—that most wonderful of miracles: the incarnation of God the Son. That God has become man in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ; that the eternal, immutable, Second Person of the Trinity assumes finite, mortal humanity into personal union with the divine nature, all without changing or shedding His divine nature; and all to redeem helpless, guilty, undeserving sinners from the bondage of our sin and death.
And I do confess, one of my favorite parts about celebrating the incarnation at Christmas is singing the Christmas carols. My favorite carol is Hark! the Herald Angels Sing. The triumphant, celebratory tone, wedded to some of the richest theology in verse, is just majestic. “Veiled in flesh the Godhead see.” See the invisible divine nature veiled in the human nature of our Savior! “Pleased as man with men to dwell.” It is not a pleasant thing for the infinite God to be subjected to the limitations of creaturely existence: of pain, and suffering, and sadness, and death. And yet “Jesus, our Emmanuel”—our God with us—was pleased to dwell with men, out of His great love for sinners!
But it’s in that first verse of that familiar hymn that we read a line that introduces us to our text this evening. “Hark, the herald-angels sing: / ‘Glory to the newborn king! / Peace on earth, and mercy mild; / God and sinners reconciled!” “God and sinners reconciled”! There is the Gospel in miniature. Sin separates man from God. We who were created for intimate friendship and fellowship with our Creator have become His enemies. We have been deprived of the blesséd light of His countenance, bereft of His consoling presence, alienated from the sweetness and security of His love. And our transgression against infinite holiness required an infinite punishment: eternity in hell under the wrath of omnipotent vengeance. No man could ever pay that infinite penalty. And yet no one but man could ever righteously offer an atonement on behalf of man. Only God Himself could ever atone for sin. And yet only man’s sacrifice would be accepted on behalf of man. No one ought to pay but man; no one can pay but God. And so to reconcile man to God, God would become man.
Because of the cross, we who were separated from the God we were created to know and worship are reconciled to loving fellowship with Him. First Peter 3:18 says, “Christ also died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous”—so there is the judicial reality of the cross: Christ pays the penalty of our sin as our Substitute. But then the next phrase tells us the “why” of the atonement: “Christ died once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, so thatHe might bring us to God.” That’s what salvation is about. That’s the goal: Restoring us to the all-satisfying, unspeakably glorious, consummately delightful God that our sin cut us off from. Propitiation, redemption, justification, forgiveness, freedom from punishment—all of those glorious doctrines just get stuff out of the way so that we can get to Him. So that we can have “access to the Father,” Ephesians 2:18 says—“in whose presence,” says David, “is fullness of joy,” and “in whose right hand are pleasures forevermore” (Ps 16:11).
You see, what makes the Gospel good news is not simply that our sins are forgiven, or that we get out of hell, or that we don’t feel guilty anymore, or that we get to see our friends and family in heaven. The bottom of why the Gospel is good news is because it reconciles us to the God who makes heaven heaven. Our sin had cut us off from Him—this magnificent treasure, this ocean of delight. And the cross of Christ overcomes the alienation and hostility that exists between us and God, and purchases the reconciliation that brings us back to Him.
And that reconciliation is the subject of our text in Colossians this evening. Paul has been writing to safeguard the believers in Colossae against the false teachings of interlopers, who are at bottom attacking the supremacy and sufficiency of the person and work of Jesus Christ. And after a very purposeful introduction, in which Paul thanks God for His grace to the Colossians, and lets these brethren know how he is praying for them, he pens a hymn of praise to the supremacy of Jesus in and above all things.
In verses 15 to 17, Paul celebrates Christ’s supremacy over the present creation. He is God Himself, the eternal Creator and Sustainer of everything that exists, and the one for whom everything exists. In verses 18 to 20, which we considered last Sunday night, Paul celebrates Christ’s supremacy over the new creation. He is the head of the church, the author and founder of the new, resurrected humanity, who, by His own conquering death, resurrection, and ascension into heaven, has triumphed as the One who has first place in everything. He is the incarnate God, the embodiment of God’s presence among men. And He is the One through whom the Father has undertaken to atone for the sins of His people, to destroy those who refuse to bow the knee to Him, and thereby to restore the entire cosmos to a state of peace. And this reconciliation is accomplished, verse 20, “through the blood of His cross.”
But now, as we come to verses 21 to 23, Paul moves from these transcendent, cosmic, third-person, universal truths about Christ and restoring the cosmos, and he applies it in the second-person to the Colossians in particular. He tells them the story of their own testimony—of how this cosmic reconciliation accomplished once for all on the cross has reconciled them to the Holy God of heaven, whose enemies they had become because of their sin. And in doing so, he tells us the story of our testimony—and the testimony of every Christian, for what was true of the Colossians is true of each one of us.
And he tells them this, once again, because he wants to guard them from the false doctrine of the false teachers, who are seeking to woo them away from the supremacy and sufficiency of Christ. He urges them—and by implication He urges us—to remain steadfast and firmly committed to the Gospel that they had received, to the Christ they had believed, and to give no quarter in their hearts to any kind of spiritual supplement or substitute. Let’s read our text. Colossians 1, verses 21 to 23: “And although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds, 22yet He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach— 23if indeed you continue in the faith firmly established and steadfast, and not moved away from the hope of the gospel that you have heard, which was proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, was made a minister.”
And in these verses we find four aspects about the reconciliation between God and man that Christ has accomplished— four truths that stir our hearts to worship our Savior, and that settle our affections to rest in His sufficiency, so that we seek spiritual sustenance and power nowhere else.
I. The Need for Reconciliation (v. 21)
And that first aspect of reconciliation that Paul addresses is, number one, the need for reconciliation. Verse 21: “And although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds.” In order to stir them up to joy-filled love and enduring devotion to Christ, Paul starts by reminding them of that state of sin from which Christ had saved them. He speaks of what they “were,” “formerly,” before the Gospel that Paul and Epaphras preached had brought them news of this great Savior.
Just as the beauty and glory of the stars are only enjoyed against the dark contrast of the night sky, if we are to have any hope of properly apprehending the beauty and glory of God’s work of salvation, we need to see that glory set against the black backdrop of our sin. Even that language of “salvation” means nothing unless we understand from what we have been saved. And so Paul tells the Colossians—and he tells us—what we were, before Christ.
And what we were points to the need for reconciliation. We were alienated. Our sin—our breaking of the law of God—not only makes us guilty; it doesn’t only arouse God’s holy wrath against us. That genuine guilt and that impending wrath has effected and become the ground of an enmity and hostility between us. And that alienation is pictured vividly throughout Scripture. In Genesis 3:8, after Adam and Eve have sinned, the text says, “They heard the sound of Yahwhe God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of Yahweh God among the trees of the garden.” That is one of the saddest verses in all the Bible. The word for “presence” in Genesis 3:8 is literally the word face. God and man would have face-to-face communion in the cool of the day in the Garden of Paradise. Adam and Eve would hear the sound of God walking in the garden and they would say, “Is Yahwehcoming? Is now time for more face-to-face fellowship with our loving and bountiful Creator? Amen! ‘My soul thirsts for God, for the living God; when shall I come and appear before God?’” (Ps 42:2). But after sin, instead of that joyful, eager anticipation, their immediate instinct was to hide themselves from the Delight of their eyes—to avoid fellowship with the source of all satisfaction. Sin had alienated God from man. And eventually, they were driven out of Eden, expelled from the Paradise of God’s holy presence, which was guarded by angels wielding a flaming sword (Gen 3:24).
Sin separates man from God. Ephesians 2:12 calls us, in our natural state, “separate from Christ, … strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world.” Ephesians 4:18 says, we are born “excluded from the life of God.” And the prophet Isaiah comments on this broken relationship when he says in Isaiah 59:2: “Your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden His face from you so that He does not hear [you].” So often I speak to people who confess some vague, general belief in “God,” but who have plainly not bowed the knee to Jesus. And they say something like, “Well, I talk to God. I know He hears my prayers.” Dear unbelieving friend: No, He doesn’t! Your sins have hidden His face from you! Your iniquities have made a separation between you!
And it gets worse. We weren’t only alienated; we were “hostile in mind.” We who were created for intimate friendship with our Creator have become His enemies, Romans 5:10. In Romans 8:7, Paul says, “The mind set on the flesh”—which is to say the fleshly human mind in its natural state—“is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.” There is no neutrality, here. Unbelief in Christ is not some innocuous difference of opinion. “I hear what you’re saying. And I respect that. It’s just not for me.” No, no. The mind is hostile to God! Contemptuous! Romans 1:30 calls us “haters of God.” The natural man hates that God exists, hates that He is just, hates that He will hold us accountable for sin. He hates God’s sovereignty and that He doesn’t order the circumstances of providence more to our liking. He hates that He blesses others and seems to withhold blessing from us. The natural man hates God. He would kill God if he could.
And notice: the natural man’s hostility to God is not superficial. We were “hostile in mind.” Dianoia. This is a term that was often used in the Greek translation of the Old Testament to translate the Hebrew word for heart. This is the mind-set. Man’s hostility pervades all the faculties of the soul. Ephesians 4:18 speaks of a darkened mind and a hardened heart. Job 15:16 speaks of the bondage of man’s will when he says man “drinks iniquity like water.” As God prepares to drown the whole earth in judgment, He gives that famous diagnosis of man’s natural condition in sin in Genesis 6:5: “Every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.”
Man’s depravity is not, as the Roman Catholic Church has taught, limited to the inferior faculties of the soul, like the appetites and passions. It extends to the mind, the heart, and the will—so that all that man is is hostile to God (Calvin, 158; cf. Gill). And that deep-seated hostility cannot but break forth into man’s behavior. So Paul continues and says, “engaged in evil deeds.” The external actions are a fruit of the internal heart attitudes. The sinful fruit follows from the sinful root. Our enmity and hostility in our hearts against God finds expression in actual works of disobedience and rebellion, contrary to the good and holy law of God.
What a miserable condition! Man’s sin is in mortal conflict with God’s holy justice! And the result is that man is not only hostile toward God, but God is also hostile against man. Psalm 5:5 says God “hates all who do iniquity.” John 3:36 says the wrath of God abides on the one who does not believe in and obey His Son. And that wrath will break over us unless the ground of that righteous hostility is done away with.
II. The Accomplishment of Reconciliation (v. 22)
And it is precisely here, in the depth of our need, that the saving grace of God meets us with sovereign power. We’ve seen the need for reconciliation. We come now, in the second place, to the accomplishment reconciliation. Verse 22: “And although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds, yet He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death.”
And I want us to consider several facets of this accomplishment of reconciliation. First, consider the author of reconciliation. This reconciliation is a work of God, not man. It is a work of God accomplished in Christ through the efficacy of His atoning death. Again, verse 22: “Yet He has now reconciled you.” Paul speaks of this same truth in 2 Corinthians 5:18, and there he says, “Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself.” The next verse, 2 Corinthians 5:19 says, “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.” God is the subject of those sentences, not man. And man is the object in those sentences, not God.
This means that sinful human beings do not undertake to achieve reconciliation with God. Everywhere Scripture speaks of reconciliation, God is the active reconciler, and man passively receives reconciliation from God. Romans 5:10: “While we were enemies,”—continuing in open rebellion against God, persisting in hostility against God—“we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son.” That’s the passive voice, which means the action is done to us, not performed by us. And the next verse, Romans 5:11, says, “through [Christ] we have now received the reconciliation.” And so this ought to be plain: reconciliation is a work of God, not man. Man does not accomplish reconciliation; man does not even cooperate with God to bring about reconciliation. Reconciliation is what man receives as a gift of sovereign grace from an unspeakably merciful and longsuffering God.
Then, second, consider the means of reconciliation—namely, the atoning death of Christ on the cross. Verse 22 again: “He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death.” And just before this, in verse 20, which we looked at last week, Paul says that God has “made peace through the blood of [Christ’s] cross.” “Through death,” “through His blood,” “in the body of His flesh.” This speaks of the means by which reconciliation is accomplished.
Do you understand what was happening on the cross? The cross was not just a marvelous example of Christian love, by which Christians are called to imitate Jesus by living sacrificially and meeting one another’s needs. The cross was not merely a demonstration of God’s love for humanity, as if the main goal of the cross was to testify to our worth. The cross is an example, and it is a demonstration of love, but it is so much more than that.
The death of Christ was what’s called an expiatory sacrifice. Jesus took away our sin and our guilt by bearing its punishment in our place. The cross is also a propitiatory sacrifice, which means Christ’s substitutionary death satisfies God’s righteous wrath against us. But one step further: because of those realities, Christ’s atonement is also a work of reconciliation, whereby the ground of the enmity and hostility and alienation between God and man is removed, and peace is accomplished. By standing in our place, and suffering in Himself the alienation that was due to us, receiving in Himself the wrath of God that falls upon God’s enemies, our dear Savior does away with the ground of the enmity between God and men—namely, the guilt of sin and the wrath of God—and He overcomes our alienation and accomplishes peace in its place.
In Colossians chapter 2, and verse 14, Paul speaks about Christ’s reconciling death as our Savior “having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.” The law of God, which we have all broken, had become a certificate of debt against us. The broken law was hostile to us and demanded our death. But the Lord Jesus Christ, who perfectly obeyed every demand of God’s law, satisfied its demand for justice by bearing the curse of the law in our place. He paid our debt that separated us from God. He nailed it to the cross, so that we who were once far off are now brought near once again to our dear Father.
And then, related to that, thirdly, consider the nature of this reconciliation—namely, that it is a finished work. This reconciliation is accomplished “through [Christ’s] death,” verse 22. Peace was made, verse 20, through the blood of His cross. Romans 5:10 says, “While we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son.” We receive that reconciliation in time, by faith, but that reconciliation was accomplished for us 2,000 years ago. And its accomplishment infallibly secures its application. One commentator wrote, “Reconciliation was finished in Christ’s death. Paul did not preach a gradual reconciliation. He preached what the old divines used to call the finished work. … He preached something done once for all” (Forsyth, The Work of Christ, 86).
And then, not only the author, means, and nature. Consider, fourth, what I’m calling the physicality of this reconciliation. Paul emphasizes that Christ has reconciled us “in His fleshly body”—or literally, “by the body of His flesh.” That’s a striking phrase, and it shows that Paul is going out of his way to draw attention to the genuine humanity of Christ. Why is that?
Well, because the Colossian heretics denied that Christ could be truly human. The false teaching that had begun springing up in Colossae was a precursor to a heresy that came to full flower in the second century, called Gnosticism. And we’ve spoken about it a couple of times in our series on Colossians. The second-century Gnostics were called Docetics—from the Greek word dokéo, which means “to appear.” They taught that Christ only appeared to be human, but that He didn’t have an actual physical body of flesh.
The reason for that was because the Gnostics were philosophical dualists. They believed that spirit was inherently good and matter was inherently evil. The mind and the spirit were the noble parts of man’s nature, imprisoned by the lower, sensual appetites that were rooted in the physical body. A popular maxim in this philosophical tradition was soma sema—which translates to, “The body, a tomb.” The body was just a prison for the soul to escape, and so it was regarded as base, lowly, and dishonorable.
No truly divine figure, then—and certainly not the true God Himself—could ever properly subsist in material flesh! And so these heretics taught that Jesus only appeared to be human. The “body” he inhabited was a spiritual phantasm. But Paul takes direct aim at that falsehood and emphasizes that the reconciliation that Christ as accomplished for sinners was accomplished through death. And there could be no death without “the body of His flesh”! And so what does the Apostle John say, in 1 John chapter 4? “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God; and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist.” If you deny that Christ has come in the flesh, you are a false prophet! You are an antichrist!
Why so severe? Why is the true humanity of Christ an essential doctrine of the Christian faith? Well, because of what we spoke about at the beginning. Sin was committed by man, And so if there is going to be any atonement for sin, manis going to have to bring it. Satisfaction has to be made in the nature in which sin was committed. Hebrews 2:14: “Since the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise also partook of the same, that through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death.” The incarnation is real! Christmas is worth celebrating! God the Son has assumed our human nature into personal union with His divine nature, so that He could stand in man’s place and bear man’s curse unto death, and thereby accomplish reconciliation between God and man.
III. The Purpose of Reconciliation (v. 22c)
Well, we’ve seen the need for reconciliation, and just now the accomplishment of reconciliation. That brings us to a third aspect of reconciliation that we find in this text. Number three: the purpose of reconciliation. Look again at verse 22: “He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach.”
And this is truly glorious. The reconciling work of Christ does not merely accomplish the sinner’s new legal standing before God, so that his record is wiped clean and the righteousness of Christ is credited to him—though in one sense, that miracle would be enough! But here were learn, that the whole purpose of reconciliation—the very goal at which forensic, justifying righteousness aims—is our perfected sanctification. In other words, this Gospel that Paul does not want the Colossians to “move away from” (v. 23) not only wipes away our objective, legal guilt; it also purifies us, progressively, from our natural, inherent corruption and pollution, so that on that great day when Christ comes in His glory, He will present to Himself a pure Bride that He is worthy of, cleansed from every trace of sin!
In fact, that’s precisely what Paul says in Ephesians 5:25–27. “Christ [has] loved the church and gave Himself up for her.” Amen! He has died in her place to accomplish her reconciliation to God. But for what purpose? “So that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that He might present to Himself”—same word, paristemi, that’s in Colossians 1:22—“the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless.”
There is a presentation that’s coming! When the Lord Jesus returns to destroy His enemies and bring consummate salvation to His people—when He comes to restore the cosmos to its original God-intended purpose—the people whom He had reconciled on Calvary’s cross in AD 30 will then be presented before Him. And by that time, precisely because part of what Christ accomplished on that cross was to purchase our practical holiness, by that time, the Spirit of God will have so worked in our hearts that we will not only be counted righteous, but that we will actually be righteous, according to God’s purifying grace.
Friends, on that great day, we will be “holy,” the text says. Hagios: finally separated from sin and fully set apart unto God. No longer common and profane, but sanctified and cleansed. Can you think of it? Us? You and me? Finally and truly and actually holy? I hear it, and I think of myself and my own heart, and I say, “Me?” “Filthy? Yes. Defiled? Yes. Spoiled by my own wickedness: yes.” But oh, dear friends: on that day: Holy. Not a spot or a wrinkle.
In fact, we’ll be “blameless.” Ámomos. This was the language used of the sacrificial animals of the Old Testament. The animals that Yahweh accepted from Israelite worshipers as atonement for their sins had to be “perfect to be accepted”; Leviticus 22:21 says, “there shall be no defect in it.” Without blemish. Paul says: That is how the Christian will be on the last day. And you say, “No, Mike, if there’s one thing you can say about me, it is that I am full of blemishes! I am not blameless; I am blameworthy. My guilt is proven beyond a shadow of a doubt.” And I say, I know exactly how you feel. But Paul says that because of this Gospel, you and I, fellow sinner, will stand before the holy God blameless. The doxology of Jude begins by celebrating this very truth: “Now to Him who is able…to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless [and] with great joy.”
And then: “beyond reproach.” Anégkletos. And I just think: “Oh, I am one big ball of reproach! Spiritually speaking, I am the leper of Luke chapter 5, from whom polite society hides away! The spiritual outcast you throw stones at to ensure he be kept at a distance, who must cover his face and call out ‘Unclean! Unclean!’ to announce his defiling presence, so as not to contaminate others!” But on that day? In the presence of the omniscient and holy God: beyond reproach. It’s almost unthinkable. But then: “Who will bring a charge”—a “reproach,” same word [engkaléo]—“against God’s elect? God is the one who justifies; who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us.” Nothing can separate us from the God to whom we have been reconciled by Christ.
Revelation 19:7–8 gives us a preview of the marriage supper of the Lamb, when Christ’s bride is presented to Him. And the Apostle John says there, “It was given to her,” the church, “to clothe herself in fine linen, bright and clean; for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints.” Brothers and sisters: our Savior does not only justify us; He sanctifies us. He does not only give us His own pure white robe of righteousness. He labors with us our entire lives to weave for us a garment of bright and clean fine linen, so that we become actually holy, in a manner that He is worthy of.
Dear people, the purpose of our justification is our sanctification. The purpose of our reconciliation is our purification. What then? Let us live according to the purpose for which we’ve been given this new life: holiness.
IV. The Perseverance of the Reconciled (v. 23)
Well, we have seen the need for reconciliation, the accomplishment of reconciliation, and just now the purpose of reconciliation. One final aspect of reconciliation that Paul teaches us in this text is, number four, the perseverance of the reconciled. Colossians 1:22 says, “He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach—” And wouldn’t it be glorious if that was the end of the sentence! We say, “Amen! Praise God for the work of Christ!” But we get to verse 23, and we find something quite unexpected. There’s an “if.” Verse 23: “…if indeed you continue in the faith firmly established and steadfast, and not moved away from the hope of the gospel that you have heard.”
You see, the Colossians were in danger of being wooed away by these false teachers—being duped by phony-Christian heretics—into abandoning the sound doctrine of the Gospel of Christ’s supremacy and sufficiency that they had heard from Epaphras, and embracing the errors of Jewish ceremonialism, and pagan mysticism, and philosophical dualism. And Paul says, “If you go that way, it’s going to destroy your soul.” All the blessings he’s spoken about—this glorious doctrine of reconciliation—all of that will prove to be utter vanity and uselessness for you if you don’t continue in the faith that you’ve received.”
And you say, “Wait a minute. Is Paul saying it’s possible for them to lose their salvation?” No, he’s not saying that at all, because that would contradict mountains of other passages of Scripture. In John 6:39, Jesus says, “This is the will of Him who sent Me, that of all that He has given Me I lose nothing, but raise it up on the last day.” Jesus takes it as a personal responsibility, as the Shepherd of the Sheep, once the Father has given those sheep to Him, to lose none of them. And so it would be a blight on the character of the shepherd if He were to lose any one of His sheep. He says, “I lose nothing.” And we could multiply texts: John 10, Romans 8, Ephesians 1, Philippians 1. True believers are eternally secure.
And so you say, “So why talk about the possibility of not continuing in the faith?” And the answer is: not everyone who claims to be a believer is a true believer. Matthew chapter 7. Jesus says, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter.” And what is the will of His Father? That you believe truly and enduringly upon the One whom He’s sent—that you are not moved away from the hope of the only true Gospel. First John 2:19 tells us that those who fail to continue in the faith were never true Christians to begin with: “They went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, so that it would be shown that they all are not of us.” There are people within the fellowship of the visible church, who are not truly of us. And one of the definitional evidences of genuinely belonging to the people of God is that you remain with us.
And so: it is necessary for the reconciled to persevere. And this emphasis pervades the New Testament! In 1 Corinthians 15:2, Paul calls us to the perseverance of the reconciled when he says: “You are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain.” Failing to hold fast the word of the Gospel that Paul had preached to them would mean you had “believed” in vain—in emptiness, in a way that reveals that your “faith” was not true faith at all. In Hebrews 3:14, the author says, “We have become partakers of Christ if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end.” We must persevere in faith.
Now, some of you are saying, “That just sounds an awful lot like you’re telling me my reconciliation depends on my perseverance. Are you saying that Jesus reconciles me, but I’ve got to keep myself reconciled?” Good question. No. I am not saying that. Listen to Hebrews 3:14 again. The text does not say, “If we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end, we will become partakers of Christ.” It doesn’t say that. It says, “If we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end, we have become partakers of Christ.” You see the difference the verb tense makes. “If A is true of you, B will have been true of you. If A happens now, it means that B happened some time in the past.” Our perseverance in faith does not win us salvation; it confirms and evidences that prior to our perseverance we have truly been granted salvation. Enduring to the end is the evidence that the faith we had was real, and not phony. Because true, saving faith perseveres. Phony, spurious faith dwindles away.
And so, no, our perseverance does not save us. But we will not be saved without persevering. Enduring, persevering faith in the true Gospel of Christ is absolutely necessary for salvation. And those who become enamored with false teaching, those who become hardened by the deceitfulness of sin, those who entertain notions of being “moved away from the hope of the gospel that [they] have heard,” they are not those whom God has reconciled to Himself through the blood of Christ’s cross.
But the point is: the reconciled do indeed persevere, precisely because the Good Shepherd loses none of His own! And so, Paul calls us to go on clinging to that Good Shepherd! Hold fast to Jesus, and you can never go wrong. Go on cultivating and acting faith upon Him, and you will be “firmly established and steadfast.” These are both architectural terms that tell us that Christ is the sure and steady foundation upon which we may rest our souls and be sure of safety. I’m always so helped by the comments of the great Bible teacher John Gill. On this verse he says, “…grounded and settled; not on the sandy foundation of man’s own righteousness, and peace made by his own performances; but upon the foundation and rock, Christ, against which the gates of hell cannot prevail; and so [we] shall never finally and totally fall away, being rooted and built up in him, and established in the faith of him, in the doctrines of faith, respecting peace by his blood, justification by his righteousness, and life by his death; and so [we] continue steadfast and immovable, always abounding in his work.”
“Don’t be wooed away from the Gospel that you have heard Epaphras preach, just to go after the poison these heretics are peddling. Remember, this Gospel has been ‘proclaimed in all creation under heaven,’ verse 23. It has borne fruit ‘in all the world,’ chapter 1 verse 6. Believers in Jerusalem, in Corinth, in Athens, in Ephesus, in Thessalonica, in Rome have all had their lives changed by this very same message! The message of the false teachers is just a parochial folk belief from their small corner of the region. But the message that you heard from Epaphras—the message of which I, Paul, was made a minister—that message has changed lives throughout the known world. Don’t be moved away from the only message that brings the sure and steadfast hope of salvation. Press on. Be firmly established and steadfast. Don’t turn to the right or to the left. Redouble your trust in the sound doctrine of the true Gospel of Jesus Christ.”
And that is the call for us as well, tonight, friends. This glorious Gospel of the reconciliation of God and man through the fleshly body of Jesus Christ and the blood of His cross—that is the message from heaven. That is the Gospel that saves sinners, that furnishes believers with the righteousness of God, that unites us to the God-man, so that all of His law-fulfilling life and His wrath-satisfying death counts for us. If only we believe, and if only we press on in faith.