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“ Summary, Part 4 (final) ” 3. WE HAVE A RESPONSIBILITY TO BE CHRIST’S AMBASSADORS TO THE WORLD [40:55]. Our proper attitude is to love our enemies, and 2 CORINTHIANS 5:9-11, 17-21 lays out the essentials: (a) we must know the Lord savingly (verse 17); (b) Christ has entrusted us as new creatures to a mission as His ambassadors and committed to us a message of salvation to this lost world (verses 18-19); (c) we are to plead with those in the world to flee from the wrath to come by believing the gospel so that they can be reconciled to God (verses 20-21). The terror of the Lord is a gospel motive. One day, grace will end and accounting will begin. God did for us what we can’t do for ourselves, and we’re to tell of what He has done. It’s as simple as that.
Ian Migala (3/2/2014)
from Minneapolis, Minnesota
“ Summary, Part 3 ” 2. WE MUST NEITHER LOVE NOR SEEK FRIENDSHIP WITH THIS WORLD [31:20]. 1 JOHN 2:15-17, JAMES 4:4 – for John, a Christian cannot truly love God and love the world; for James, friendship with the world is spiritual adultery. The one who loves the world makes himself God’s enemy; God is either everything to us or nothing to us. We must consider a couple of questions about the world: what is it that we must neither love nor seek friendship with, and what does it mean to love or seek friendship with it? In Scripture, ‘world’ carries three different senses: its material reality, humankind, and its powers and principalities: the spirit that causes it to oppose the Kingdom of Heaven. Here, we’re most concerned with the latter sense. Our second responsibility to the world flows naturally and inevitably out of our first; we do not seek the world’s praise because it doesn’t praise Christ. Christ must always be between us and the unsaved. If they can’t suffer Him, then we can’t suffer them. The church today needs a new infusion of this conviction. GALATIANS 6:14 – our only glory is the cross; it is incompatible with the world’s interests.
Ian Migala (3/2/2014)
from Minneapolis, Minnesota
“ Summary, Part 2 ” 2 CORINTHIANS 10:3-5 – the nature of our warfare. Too many churches forget this, and thus don’t edify their flocks spiritually. Christ fed the masses, but then also preached to them. Our identity in Christ defines our mission in this world. Our objective is not to transform the culture, but to save souls; culture can be transformed without a soul being saved (e.g. Constantine). There is too much history of the church using the gospel for impure ends. That the church is not a part of this world, but is rather the light of the world, means that it must not adopt or attempt to sanctify the world’s fads and fashions, its music, or its entertainment. 1 CORINTHIANS 1:17-21, 3:19, 2 CORINTHIANS 4:2 – Paul sternly warns us against surrendering the gospel to this philosophy of this world since the world’s so-called wisdom robs it of its message of purity and power (COLOSSIANS 2:8). Further, we should be wary of the world, since the world has no love for Christians. JOHN 15:18-19 – the world hates Christ, and so it rejects us. Christ called us out. We are not to use the world’s methods to bring the gospel. We can’t be faithful to Christ and to men’s souls. We must remember James’ statement about pure religion (JAMES 1:27).
Ian Migala (3/2/2014)
from Minneapolis, Minnesota
“ Summary, Part 1 ” In this fifth message of this series, we continue with how, II. OUR EXPERIENCE OF GOD’S FAITHFULNESS REMINDS US OF OUR RESPONSIBILITIES AS A CHURCH, and move on to how, C. WE HAVE RESPONSIBILITIES TO THIS WORLD [starting at 2:25 of the audio]. Salvation is not glorification. After we’re saved, we’re still here, still fallen, but being sanctified. What are these responsibilities? Today we consider three: 1. WE HAVE A RESPONSIBILITY TO NOT RECKON OURSELVES A PART OF THIS WORLD [4:05]. JOHN 17:14, 7:7 – Christians are people of the word, not the world. JOHN 18:36 – we do not meet the world on its terms, but on Christ’s (cf. MATTHEW 26:52, PHILIPPIANS 3:20). Because we are free from the enslaving influence of the world, we are to be ‘those who use the world, as though [we] did not make full use of it; for the form of this world is passing away’ (1 CORINTHIANS 7:31). Our principles and practices are higher because they are holy. Our kingdom is spiritual and eternal; the world is material and passing away. Our weapons are spiritual, not carnal (cf. EPHESIANS 6:12). As solders of Christ, as warrior-members of the church militant, we are forbidden from getting entangled in the affairs of this world.
