The Gift of God, Part 4

You know, we trust that over the last few weeks you've had the opportunity to understand more about the great gift of God. That's the topic for this month of Christmas as we celebrate God's glorious gift of eternal life. Understanding that God's gift that He gives to us centers around who He is as a person. That His gift is that which is glorious, gracious, and good. And because it is, it is indescribable, incorruptible, and it is that which truly is the greatest of all gifts. And not only that, that gift is forgiving, it is fulfilling, and it is forever.

Simply because the gift is God's gift of eternal life. And I told you at the very beginning that we give you 12 words to describe that gift. And even though we give you 12 words to describe the gift, you really can't truly understand and comprehend the magnitude of that gift. Because it comes from an infinite God that grants us a gift that is forever and fulfilling because it is eternal. So today I want to conclude looking at this great gift and then on Christmas Eve talk to you about the compelling reasons God gives to us as to why we are to receive that gift.

But to know the gift is to know that the gift is transforming, true, and tremendous. The gift truly is a transforming gift. I have in my hand what is commonly called tinsel or icicles. I'm curious to know how many of you put these on your tree still today? Just raise your hand. One. That's it? Nobody else, huh? It's hard to find tinsel today because most people don't put it on their tree anymore. When I was growing up as a child, my father was meticulous about decorating our tree. My father was a very creative person and he would hold in his hand the tinsel and he would show us exactly how we are to hold the tinsel.

And he would take it and he would take it one or two strands at a time and he would place it on the tree. And he would teach us how we are to do that. He said, you cannot throw it on the tree. When we were kids, we used to take it and just kind of like throw it on a tree and hopefully it would land in the proper branch. But my father wouldn't let us do that. In fact, when we did, we were scolded. We had to put it on properly on the right branch and evenly over all the tree. And so my sister and I would ask him, why this way?

Why can't we just toss it on there? Why even use it at all? And he would tell us that it was important for us to realize that the Christmas tree would represent something very unique. That when people would walk into a room, they need to be able to see the tree in all of its uniqueness. By taking that which was a normal green tree and transforming that tree into something absolutely gorgeous and beautiful. So when people would walk into the room, they would ooh and aah over the beauty of that tree.

Because he says, that tree would be transformed into something that it wasn't before. Just an original evergreen green tree will be transformed into something that was absolutely gorgeous and beautiful. And he would tell us that that tree would symbolize what God wants to do in your life and mine. That he would take a normal life, a sinful life, and he would take it and he would transform that life uniquely for his glory. He would transform it differently than the tree. Because a tree would be transformed externally, but the believer would be transformed internally.

And because of the internal transformation that would take place, everything externally then would be changed. So that when people encountered you, and when people walked into a room, they would ooh and aah over the beauty of what God has done in your life. My father would use Christmas to teach us about the uniqueness of the gift of God and how it truly transforms an individual. The great thing about the gift of God is that once received, you are never the same again. Everything changes. People sometimes forget that.

But the uniqueness of the gift, the gift of God that is eternal life given to us by the eternal king is a gift that truly transforms a person from the inside out. This was the promise that God had given to Israel. A promise way back in the book of Jeremiah when he said these words in Jeremiah chapter 31 concerning the new covenant. He says, Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. Not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them from or by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them, declares the Lord.

But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord. I will put my law within them and on their heart, I will write it, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, Know the Lord, for they will all know me from the least of them to the greatest of them, declares the Lord, for I will forgive their iniquity and their sin, I will remember no more. So God begins to tell Israel about the new promise, the new covenant that He will give them that will take away their sin and that He will write their law upon their hearts.

He goes on to say in Jeremiah 32 verse number 38, They shall be my people, I will be their God, and I will give them one heart and one way that they may fear me always for their own good and for the good of their children after them. I will make an everlasting covenant with them, and I will not turn away from them to do them good, and I will put the fear of in their hearts so that they will not turn from me. When God writes His law on your heart, He causes you to fear His name, and that causes you never to turn from Him.

You see, Psalm 130 verse number 4 says, There is forgiveness with thee that thou mayest be feared. Why does God forgive us all of our iniquities? So that we in turn will fear Him. Because Romans 3 verse number 18 tells us that there is no fear of God before the eye of the unbeliever. But the believers, they live in fear of God because the law of God has been written on their hearts. God through the prophet Ezekiel would say it this way. He says, For I will take you from the nations, gather you from all the lands, and bring you into your own land.

This is Ezekiel 36 verses 24 and following. Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean. I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you, and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes, and you will be careful to observe my ordinances. God says, I'm going to give you a new heart.

I'm going to give you a new spirit. God says, I'm going to change you from the inside out. I am going to actually transform you as a person. I'm going to take the heart of stone, and I'm going to break it and cause it to be a heart that seeks me, that truly fears me, that truly wants to honor me. I'm going to give you a new spirit. I'm going to give you my spirit. I'm going to put my spirit within you because God knows that once he is in you, everything changes about you. And so when it comes to the gospel of John and the Lord Jesus encounters a ruler in Israel by the name of Nicodemus, a rabbi, a teacher of the law, in John chapter 3, he talks to him about the new covenant.

He talks to him about the cleansing power of God. The gospel of John begins with how it is the Lord cleanses, how God came to cleanse us from our sins. Remember in John chapter 2, there's a miracle of turning the water into wine. It's a miracle of transformation, how God takes the murky, filthy, dirty water and transforms it into the cleanest and the purest and the best of all wine because the very first miracle that Jesus performs sets the tone for his ministry.

This is what he's going to do. He's going to take a dirty life, transform it into the most beautiful of all lives. So once tasted, it sparkles and tastes unlike anything else. And then he moves from there to, remember in John chapter 2 as he goes on, to cleanse the temple. Remember that? He goes into the temple on the very first time of Passover during his earthly ministry and he cleanses the temple.

Why? Because that's what God came to do. He came to cleanse people's lives. And so you have the turning of water into wine, you have the cleansing of the temple in Jerusalem, and then you had the discussion with Nicodemus, a ruler in Egypt, or excuse me, in Israel. And in that conversation, this is what Jesus says.

There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. And this man came to Jesus by night and said to him, Rabbi, we know that you have come from God as a teacher for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him. Jesus answered and said to him, truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus said to him, how can a man be born when he is old? He cannot enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born, can he?

And Jesus answered him, truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. Very important statement. Why? Because what he does is refer Nicodemus to the book of Ezekiel. You must be born of water, must be born of spirit, the washing of water of the word, according to Paul in Ephesians 4.26. It's not by works of righteousness, which we have done, Titus 3.5. It's by the washing of regeneration. It's by the renewing of the spirit of God by which a man is born again.

And what Christ does to Nicodemus is take him back to Ezekiel, where God says, I'm going to sprinkle clean water on you.

I'm going to wash you. I'm going to make you clean. And I'm going to put my spirit within you. And so he says that which is born of the flesh is flesh and that which is born of the spirit of spirit. Then I'd be amazed that I said to you, you must be born again. The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going. So is everyone who is born of the spirit. Then Nicodemus said to him these words, how can these things be? Then Jesus says, are you the teacher of Israel and do not understand these things?

How can you be a teacher in Israel and miss the most important lesson of the old Testament? How can you be a ruler of the Jews and not know about the new covenant? How can you be a leader of a people and not guide them in the truth of God? How can you Nicodemus represent me, the God of the universe to people? If you don't know what I have already said, think about it. Jesus was always telling the rulers of Israel. Have you not read? Have you not heard? Do you not know? How do you not know what is so plainly given to you in scripture?

That's why it's so important for you to know the word of God, because in the word of God is everything you need to know that pertains to life and Godliness. And so the Lord would take Nicodemus through the process of helping him understand the cleansing power of the word of God and the spirit of God, because God came to transform people's lives. And the only way he could do that is to cleanse you from the inside out, through the washing of the water of the word, through the regeneration of the spirit of God in the life of an individual.

It's the transforming work of Christ. What you used to believe, the values you used to hold dear, the desires you used to have, have all changed. Now they become God's desires. Now your plans become his plans. Now your aspirations are his aspirations. Now your life is different because you've been crucified with Christ. You've been born from above. You've been born again. You've been cleansed on the inside and it affects everything on the outside. That's a transforming work of the spirit of God in the life of a believer who has received the gift of God.

It truly does transform someone's life into something that is absolutely beautiful. Listen, what Paul says in the book of Ephesians, the second chapter, he says, and you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience.

Among them, we too all formerly lived in the lust of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, being rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ by grace you had been saved and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come he might show the surpassing riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

God takes a life that was once one way, but is now a completely different way. That's why Paul would say these words in 1 Corinthians chapter 6, when he talked about the sanctifying work of the gospel of God. He says, do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived, neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

Such were some of you, but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the spirit of our God. See, you have been cleansed by God. You were once this way. You were once a swindler. You were once an adulterer. You were once a fornicator. You were once a homosexual. You were once this way, but now you're this way. Why? Because you've been washed. You've been cleansed. You've been sanctified, set apart unto God for his purposes. You have been justified, declared righteous before the living God.

Everything has changed because of the transforming work of the gift of God. See that? That's why the apostle Paul would say these words in 1 Timothy chapter 1. He says, I thank Christ Jesus, our Lord, who has strengthened me because he considered me faithful, putting me into service. Even though I was formerly a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent aggressor, yet I was shown mercy because I acted ignorantly in unbelief. And the grace of our Lord was more than abundant with the faith and love which are found in Christ Jesus.

It is a trustworthy statement deserving full acceptance that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all yet. For this reason, I found mercy so that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate his perfect patience as an example for those who would believe in him for eternal life. Paul says, this is the way I was. I was a blasphemer. I was a persecutor of Christians, of the church of Christ. I was a killer of man. But I found mercy, and God transformed my life.

I was once this way, but now I am no longer that way. I was once a sinner, but now I am a saint. It doesn't mean that Paul never sinned again. Oh, he would sin. But isn't it unique that the Bible never characterizes the believer as a sinner, only as a saint? Is he ever called a sinner again? Because a sinner is a person who's characterized by a sinful lifestyle. But a saint has been set apart unto God for his purposes. We have been made holy before him that we might represent him to a lost world.

The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 2, verse 16, we now have the mind of Christ. Isn't that great? The mind of Christ. That is so important because the Bible says that once, in Ephesians 4, our mind was dark.

The Bible tells us in 1 Timothy 6 that our mind was defiled. It tells us in Titus 1 that our mind was depraved. In Romans 6, it tells us that our mind was dead. A dark, defiled, depraved, dead mind needs to be delivered. And the only way it can be delivered is through the power of the living God, where he takes us and transforms our life from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of God's dear son. That is the miracle of transformation. You see, salvation is a miracle work of God. For those who were once enslaved to Satan now have been rescued.

We have been transferred from the kingdom of darkness into God's kingdom. That is the miracle of the saving work of God. That's why Paul could say, you were this way. In 1 Corinthians 6, I read to you earlier, that's just a list that's representative, not all-inclusive, of people who will not inherit the kingdom of God. He's just giving an example of the way people are by nature. But when the Spirit of God invades a life, when God invades a life, everything changes. That's why the Bible says, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks, right?

So the very first evidence of a transformed life is your conversation, how you speak, the words you use, the things you say.

Because out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. Well, if you have a transformed heart, you're going to speak the things of God, right? You're going to want to talk about God. Your language is going to no longer be a filthy language. It's going to be a holy language, a spiritual language, because you want to say things that honor God, not dishonor God. Before, you would speak lies, but now you speak the truth. Why? Because at one time, you were of your father, Satan, who is the father of lies.

But now you're of the God of truth. So now you speak the truth. Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. So the very first characteristic that evidences a transformed life is our conversation.

And the second evidence is the conduct of our lives, how we live our lives. Peter would say it this way in 1 Peter 2, when he talks about what God has done. He says in 1 Peter 2 verse number 9, but you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession. That's what God does when he saves you. You become a holy people, a holy nation. You become God's possession. You become possessed by God. So you may proclaim the excellencies of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

For you were once not a people, but now you are the people of God. You had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. In other words, mercy is for the miserable. So you were once in misery, but now you receive mercy. And then he says this, Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts, which wage war against your soul. Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, they may, because of your good deeds as he observed them, glorify God in the day of visitation.

Peter encourages the believers to realize, look, this is the kind of people you are. You have been positionally set apart into God. Now, practically, you need to live as aliens and strangers in a foreign land. Keep your behavior excellent. Why? Because the people who do not know God are observing your behavior. They're listening to your language, the words you speak. And as you give them, the prayer is that they will glorify God in the day of visitation, because through your life and through your language, they have come to know the true and living God, the transformed life.

Have you received the gift of God, the gift that is glorious, gracious, and good, the gift that is indescribable, the gift that is incorruptible, the gift that is incarnational, the gift that is forgiving, fulfilling, and forever? That gift is transforming. It revolutionizes the life. If you claim to have received the gift, but your life is no different than an unbeliever's life, you are sadly mistaken about receiving the gift. You don't know what the gift is. You don't know the God of the gift. If you've received the gift, you want to live for God.

You want to honor God. You want to serve Him. Your life has been transformed. It doesn't mean that everything about your life automatically becomes completely different. We know that there's a progression in the sanctification process, but there is a progression towards Christ-likeness. There is a movement toward the things of Christ, a desire to honor Christ, and it begins at the point of conversion. It begins when a man's soul has been redeemed. It's been ransomed. It begins when a man receives the gift of God.

Because his sins are forgiven, because he has been cleansed, he wants to live a clean life. It doesn't mean you're going to be perfect, not at all, but it does mean you're going to progress toward Christ-likeness and live for His glory. If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation. 2 Corinthians 5, 17. All things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new. Not some things, all things. Because everything changes. Everything about his attitude, everything about his activities, everything about his desires and ambitions, everything about his beliefs have all been transformed because God has invaded the life.

Can you actually believe that once God invades a life that God doesn't do anything in the life? Oh, no. In fact, it says, For by grace you have been saved through faith, that not yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. Then it says, And we are his workmanship. We are the masterpiece of God. We have been created for good works. In fact, Titus says that once redeemed, you are zealous for good works. You are zealous to do what is right. You are anxious to do what is right.

You can't wait to serve God. See, that's transformed life. So my dad would take in his hand every year, and he would hold him in his hand always this way, always this way. We were reminded that my father was in the process of transforming that green tree taken from the Christmas tree a lot because we didn't have an artificial tree in those days. We just had to go out and get one, that he would take that green tree and transform it into a beautiful, gorgeous tree because that was, in my father's mind, his masterpiece.

And my God and my Lord would take our lives in his hands. He would not just change what is on the outside. He would change what's on the inside, the heart of a man, so that it could be manifested on the outside, all the things that God himself had done. That's the gift of God. It is transforming. Number 11, it is true. Number two in our outline today, but number 11 in a total of 12 words, it is true.

There's nothing fake about the gift of God. It's not a forgery. There is no deceit in the gift of God. There's nothing in error about the gift of God. God's gift is the one true gift. For he himself said, I am the way, I am the truth, I am the life. When he came, he was full of grace and full of truth. In fact, the Bible tells us in Psalm 31 verse number five, that the Lord is the God of truth. In Jeremiah 10, the Lord is the true God. When he returns, his title is faithful and true. Because everything he said about what was going to happen, happened exactly as he said it would.

Because he is the God who is faithful and true. The gift that we offer to you, the gift that God gave to you, is a true, genuine, real gift. Because it comes from the God of truth. At the end of the ministry of Christ, in John chapter 18, there's a conversation between Christ and Pilate, right before he was crucified on that Friday. Christ says to Pilate, my kingdom is not of this world.

If my kingdom were of this world, then my servants would be fighting so that I would not be handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not of this realm. And Pilate said to him, so you are a king. And Jesus answered, you say correctly that I am a king. For this, I was born. And for this, I have come into the world to testify to the truth. This is why I've come. I've come to testify to the truth. And everyone who is of the truth hears my voice. So Pilate, I've come to testify to the truth.

The truth about what? The truth about God, who he is, what he's about. The truth about man, that man is separated from God. Man is in need of a Savior. I've come to testify about that truth. The truth about sin, the truth about judgment, that judgment's coming upon those who do not give their life to the God of the universe. The truth about love, holiness, life, death. I've come to testify to everything that is true because I am the God of truth. This is why I've come forth for this purpose, so that man will know what is true.

And everyone who hears my voice, or is of the truth, hears my voice. What was Pilate's response? Simply this, what is truth? Same question people have always asked, because when you reject the God of truth, you always are searching for truth. But God is that truth. In rejecting God, you reject the truth. In rejecting Christ as King, Pilate rejected the truth about who he is, that he is the King. Not just the King of the Jews, but he is King of all kings. He is Lord of all lords. I wonder if you've received the gift, not just the gift that is transforming, but the gift that is true.

How do you know you've received the gift that is true? Number one, you live in the presence of truth.

You live in the presence of truth. First John 3, verse number nine, John says this, no one who is born of God continues to practice sin, because his seed, that is God's seed, abides in him, and he cannot continue to sin, because he is born of God.

Those who have received the gift that is true live in the presence of truth. Knowing that, they long for the person of truth. They long for the person. Because you live in the presence of truth, God's seed lives in you. God lives in you. You can't wait to actually be in the presence of the living God for eternity. So you long for the person of truth. You anxiously await the appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ our Lord. There's a Jewish creed. In that Jewish creed, there are 12 articles.

The 12th article of the perfect faith in the coming of the Messiah. And though he tarry, I will wait daily for his coming. Isn't that great? The problem is, he's already been here. He's coming again. See, they forget that. And I have shared with my Jewish friends in Israel that he's already been here. And they have a hard time accepting that. They have a hard time believing that. So I take them to the book of Zechariah. I take them to the Old Testament Scriptures. Because when talking to a Jew, you always want to take them to the Old Testament, because the Old Testament tells you the story of the Messiah.

So I say, you know that in Zechariah chapter 12, verse number 10, that God is speaking through the prophet Zechariah to the nation of Israel. And this is what God himself says. He says, I will pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the spirit of grace and of supplication. That's the new covenant. And they would say amen to that. So that they will look on me. And they would say amen to that. Whom they have pierced. And so I would ask them, when was your God pierced? If God is a spirit, He cannot be pierced.

If God is light, you can't pierce the light. Light pierces the darkness, but you can't pierce the light. So when was your God pierced? He is speaking. The great Jehovah God of Israel is speaking. And they will look on me whom they have pierced. And they will mourn, listen to this, for him. Well, who's the him? Well, the him is the he. How can the him be the he? Unless the him has been here before. And they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only son. And they will weep bitterly over him like the bitter weeping over a firstborn.

And my Jewish friends would, would hymn and haul about over the fact that how God could somehow be pierced. And yet you would take them further along in the book of Zechariah to the 13th chapter and say, well, God says this, awake, O sword against my shepherd.

This is God's shepherd. And they would recognize that the Messiah would be a shepherd because Israel had false shepherds. And yet there would be the one true shepherd that would come. That would be the Messiah of Israel. And against the man, not just an ordinary man, but Geber, a strong and mighty man, my associate or my equal, one who is equal in nature to me. In other words, the shepherd of Israel is going to be equal in nature to me, the God of Israel. Declares the Lord of hosts, strike the shepherd that she may be scattered.

Well, when was the shepherd stricken? The same time he was pierced because he's been here before. And so when I quote to them their Jewish creed and refer them back to the book of Zechariah, I would say to them, your Jewish creed is absolutely accurate, except for one word. The Messiah is coming again because he's already been here. And the reason he came is so he could fulfill the new covenant. So he could transform your inner person so that you would be what God wanted you to be. How do you know you've received the God who is true?

The gift that is true. You live in the presence of truth. You long for the person of truth. You look to the promises of truth because all the promises of God are yes in Christ. Second Corinthians 1 20.

You lean on the power of truth because power belongs to God. And when the spirit comes upon you, you should receive power. You love the precepts of truth. Psalm 119. Oh, how I love that law. It is my meditation all the day. You linger with the people of truth because you don't want to forsake the assuming of yourselves together because you love to be with the people of truth. And you lounge on the pathway of truth because it says thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path. And you love to lounge on the pathway of truth.

Have you received the gift that is true? Not only is it transforming, not only is it true, the 12th and final word, that gift is absolutely tremendous. Absolutely tremendous. And I could spend weeks talking to you about the tremendous aspect of God's gift. But let me just give you this element.

It is that one gift that absolutely sets you free. He says in John 8 chapter 31, ye are my disciples if you continue in my word. And if you continue in my word, you shall know the truth. And that truth will set you free. Free from what? Free from the bondage of Satan and sin. First John 3 8.

For this reason, the Son of Man appeared that he might destroy the works of the devil. And we are set free. The Bible says in Galatians chapter 5 verse number 1, these words, it was for freedom that Christ set us free.

And it says in 1 John 5 verse number 18, he who was born of God is kept from the evil one by God. In other words, we're protected because the shackles have been broken. And we are no longer sons of disobedience. Listen, you're either a child of Satan or you're a child of God. There is no in between. You're either son of disobedience or you're a son of the light. That's it. And when God grants you the gift of eternal life, you're set free. You're set free from the judgment of God because you were judged, all your sins were judged at Calvary's cross.

You're set free from the condemnation of God for there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Romans chapter 8 verse number 1. You are set free from spiritual ignorance. You are set free from spiritual death. You are set free from all that Satan has on you. You are free to live for the glory of God. You are set free to be all that God wants you to be. The Bible says, I hath not seen nor ear heard nor has entered the heart of man the things that God has prepared for those who love him.

You can even begin to fathom the tremendous aspects of the gift of God. Have you received God's gift of eternal life? Let me pray with you.

Father, we thank you for this great and glorious day, a day that we can reflect once again back on the gift of God. For truly Lord, the gift that you have given, the gift of eternal life goes way beyond the words we have used to describe it on this day and the previous Sundays because it truly is the infinite, glorious, gracious gift of the eternal God. We thank you Lord for those of us who have received the gift that Lord we can revel in its beauty. We pray for those who have yet to receive it that today would be the day in which they give their life to Christ and embrace the glorious gift of eternal life that comes through Jesus Christ our Lord.

We pray in Jesus name. Amen.