The Order Of Salvation (Part 1)

Let's bow for a word of prayer together. Father, as we open your word, as we read it, Father, I pray that you would remind us that it's your word, and you've given it to us so that we can know who you are, so that we can learn something about your ways so that we can learn about what you've done to rescue us. Please teach our hearts, instruct our hearts as we hear your word this day.

Teach us to delight in you. Teach us to give thanks as we ought. I pray that you would use this time to strengthen your people and that you would be glorified. In Christ's name, amen. If you would, turn to the book of Titus. We're going to start in Titus.

Although, although, the next three weeks we're going to be looking at something more systematically than just directly from a text. Titus 3 is going to be our home base today. But be prepared to turn your Bibles a lot to other passages. And if you are not quick at that, just don't feel bad about not trying. Just listen as we go back and forth throughout God's Word.

I thought it would be good for us to look at what theologians call the order of salvation. You have a handout in your bulletin. It looks like this. What this is, it's a view of what God has done in salvation. That as we look at the Bible, the whole Bible, systematically putting these things together, we can understand there's a certain logical order to what God does to save His people.

Now some of these things time might occur at the same time Some of them start at the same time and one continues and one doesn But these are in order You can see the arrow to the left side These are in order from the first thing to the last thing. And you can see the bookends. The first thing on the list is election. And the last item is glorification.

So you can see there's an inherent logic. And the reason I think it's legitimate to look at something like this is because we see these things throughout the Scriptures. What we're going to do in these messages is not any kind of exhaustive study. It's going to just be really an outline. You'll probably have a lot of questions. Dive into God's Word.

Read it. Study it. What I'm saying to you in these messages I don't think will be exhaustive. It's not going to be everything. You'll still have questions, but my prayer and my effort and my labor is to say things that are true and beneficial. And I think it's good for us to take a step back and look at the grand scheme of what God's doing to save us, I see that in our lives as we get so overwhelmed with the day-to-day tasks, with moms who are home all day, with kids bouncing off the walls, who they love dearly, but then they also get a little bit fried through those days.

Or us at our work, when we work 40, 50, 60 hours a week, and it's like our soul is given to our work or the uncertainties in our life, the news that we watch or the sicknesses that we face. It's useful in my life to take a step back and look because as I'm ministering the gospel to people, sometimes I get really disheartened and confused. What's going on?

What is God doing in their life? What is God doing in His Word and through the gospel? I think it's good for us to take a step back and look at what is God doing? What has He told us in His Word is the way He brings about salvation for His people. So that we can have perspective. So that we can be unified as a body of believers in this church body.

And so that as we look at what God's doing to save us from our sin, I hope it becomes apparent to any of you who have never experienced his salvation who have never experienced the washing and renewal and rebirth by his spirit I hope that as we study this that becomes clear to you that also my prayer So let look at Titus chapter 3 starting in verse 1 Paul is writing to his protege, one of his students, one of the men he's passing the baton to, his name is Titus. He tells Titus, remind them, remind the believers on Crete, to be submissive to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work, to speak evil of no one, to stop quarreling, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle and to show perfect courtesy toward all people. For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another.

But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, He saved us. And right there, in that line, is the theme of everything I'm going to say today. But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, He saved us. Not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to His own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by His grace, we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

This saying is trustworthy, and I want you to insist on these things so that those who have believed in God may be careful to devote themselves to do good works. These things are excellent and profitable for people. So why study this? Well, Titus gives us some clues, actually some direct guidance for why we should study this. First, notice though, in verses 3 through 7, there's really an order.

What did we contribute to our salvation? you could answer two things you could answer nothing which is absolutely true or if you really focus on verse 3 you could say the only thing I contributed was my need I contributed my sin my part the role I played in my salvation was I'm the one who needed saved so God intervenes he saves us and how does he do it? by His own mercy, He appears and He washes us, He regenerates us, He renews us by His Holy Spirit. Verse 7 He justifies us by His grace Verse 7 we become heirs Verse 7 the last part of it heirs according to the hope of eternal life You can see a lot of the things in the order of salvation on that handout appear even in this text. We see God regenerating us.

We see Him justifying us. We see Him adopting us and making us heirs. We see Him sanctifying us, growing us in holiness so we can pursue good works. We see us persevering and then finally one day having the hope of eternal life, glorification. So we see, even in this text, sort of an order of salvation given, and he says these things are, notice in verse 8, he says these things are excellent and profitable for people.

He says these things are excellent, they're good, they're beautiful. They're things that are actually good to focus on. We focus on a lot of things that aren't so excellent. We focus on a lot of things in our day-to-day that are at best ephemeral. At best they just pass away. We fill our days with things that just flitter away.

And oftentimes, at worst, we fill our days with things that are outright wicked. We don't walk in integrity. Not only are these things excellent, but they're profitable. They do something good. They do something beneficial for people, for us. When we understand God's plan of salvation, what He's doing to save us, It's good for us, and it's good for the people we interact with.

So let's start in with this order of salvation, and the first thing on the list is election. Now, he doesn't, Paul does not actually mention election in this text. Now, election is defined for us as, in this way, before creation, because of his sovereign good pleasure, God chooses some people to be saved. Now, at this point, some of you I'm speaking to accept this already, and you rejoice in this.

This is something you understand, and you delight in it. Maybe you don't understand there's still a mystery involved, but you understand God's Word teaches this. But some of you, you might have some hesitation at this definition. Wait, because God chooses only some people to be saved? And instantly, when we start thinking about election, we have all these questions.

Well, why me and why not them? Why not these people that I love? Well, if God chooses, then why does He blame people? If it's His choice, why does He blame people? and people for not coming. The Scriptures address all of these questions in one way or another, but at first, let's look at our text here. And I want to kind of try to argue why I think election is in this text implicitly.

It's not there, but it's there. Because of this, was I looking for God, according to Titus 3.3? was I asking him to save me? Was there any fiber in my body that was searching for him? No. We read it in our confession of sin today, Romans 3. There are none who do good, none who are righteous.

All have gone astray. Together they're worthless. And in Titus 3 here, we ourselves were once foolish and disobedient, led astray. We were slaves to our passions and pleasures. I like the way, too, it's helpful the way we read in our New Testament reading, Ephesians 2 says, you were obeying the passions of your body and of your mind. Everything in my body, my flesh that wanted to sin, I was a slave to that.

And everything in my mind, I didn't want to think God's way, I wanted to think my own way about life. There was nothing in me that was searching for God. So the reason I think the doctrine of election is important is because if God didn't take the first move, we would all be lost. Turn to Ephesians chapter 1, or again, if you don't want to run around the scriptures quite so intensely today, you don't have to, you can just listen.

Ephesians chapter 1, verses 3 and 4. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world. You see how our definition is rooted in Scripture? Before creation, God chooses His people. That we should be holy and blameless before Him.

In love, He predestined us. We see different language, different words put on this reality of God predestining, choosing, foreknowing who His people are and choosing to rescue them. 2 Timothy 1 verses 8 and 9 Paul writes to Timothy and says Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord nor of me his prisoner but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God.

2 Timothy 1, verse 9, Who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works, but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began. it's a staggering thought that before God said, let there be light, He knew His own. And before He said, let there be light in your heart, He knew you. It's because of His sovereign good pleasure.

Turn to Matthew chapter 11. Or again, just listen along carefully. Matthew 11, this is our Savior speaking. This is a, I think it's a familiar statement, but think about what Jesus is saying here. Matthew 11, beginning of verse 25. At that time, Jesus declared, I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children.

Yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son, and anyone whom the Son chooses to reveal Him. It's not an isolated doctrine. It's not an isolated teaching. You'll find this throughout the Scriptures. Was Abraham looking for God when God called him out of his idolatry?

No. God selected him and blessed him. was Israel searching for God with their hearts pursuing God and that's why God saved them he tells them flat out it's not because you're more righteous than the other nations that's not why I'm redeeming you the doctrine of election is important because we have to understand how depraved we were how lost we were we were not looking for God so it's before creation it's because of his sovereign good pleasure and God chooses some people to be saved. Jesus said another thing in John chapter 6, verses 35 through 37 Jesus said I am the bread of life Whoever comes to me shall not hunger and whoever believes in me shall never thirst note this this teaching of election that God has chosen who his people are doesn't kill the free offer of the gospel the reality that God has chosen who his people are does not prevent the gospel from being offered freely Jesus says here, I am the bread of life.

Whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. But I said to you that you have seen me, and yet you do not believe. All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. Jesus knows who are his. He came to seek and save them. I believe the doctrine of election is not there so that we will start...

It's not there so that we'll fail to do other things. A lot of times when we latch on to this, God's sovereignty, He's in control of everything, He knows everything. Why pray, right? Sometimes that thought pops up. But God certainly isn't telling us this so that we'll lose an incentive to pray. He's not telling us this so that we'll stop praying.

He's not telling us this so that we'll stop evangelizing. So why is... He's not telling us this so that we'll be paralyzed. Well, did He choose me? I don't know, right? Or did He choose this person I love?

I don't know. My little daughter Ellen, seven and a half months old, we pray for her, we want to teach her, we share the gospel with her. Less than eight months old, we're sharing the gospel with her. This doctrine isn't here to paralyze me. Why is it there? Well, every place that I can think of where the doctrine of election is clearly spelled out for us in Scripture, it's always doing two things.

One, it's making me decrease. It's making me see that I was completely unable. And two, it's making God increase because He loved the unlovable. He loved His enemies when they were shaking their fists at Him. probably the greatest exposition of God's sovereignty and election is Romans 9 10 and 11 and Paul starts that we won turn there Paul starts that by saying I tell you the truth I have unceasing anguish in my heart because I see my brothers and sisters my fellow Israelites and they're dying in their sins.

He says, I tell you the truth, I would give up my own salvation if I could see them be saved. And more than that, wasn't Jesus sent to save Israel? So are God's purposes failing? And where Paul goes next is he goes into one of the fullest expositions of God's sovereignty and election in Romans chapter 9. And he carries that through until Romans chapter 11.

At the end of Romans chapter 11, there is one of the most beautiful doxologies, one of the most beautiful hymns of praise in the scriptures. Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has instructed him as his counselor? Who has given to the Lord that the Lord should repay him? For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever and ever.

Amen. The doctrine of election is first. It has to be because if God didn't move first, we would still be lost in our sin. You know, God didn't save angels. When angels rebelled against him, they were condemned. How amazing is it that God has chosen to save human beings and not just one, not just five, not a hundred, not a thousand, but multitudes will be surrounding the throne of the Lamb, worshiping him throughout eternity.

The doctrine of election magnifies God's grace, that he would do something preemptively to save his people from their sin. And I know our hearts want to go a thousand different directions and our minds want to go a thousand different directions. And there's a place for that. But we need to make sure we stick close to Scripture and we see this doctrine is here to show us God's greatness, his mercy, he's a God full of mercy, and our utter inability the second thing on the list is the calling and we can think about this two ways first there's the general calling we just talked about this that just because God has elected who are his doesn't mean that we stop offering the gospel that's a wrong way to think about the doctrine of election I'm going to turn back to Matthew chapter 10 we were just there where Jesus is giving thanks for God keeping the truth hidden from the wise but revealing it to the humble, to the little children.

And then he says at the end of that, after he says no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone whom the Son chooses to love. reveal him, right after that, Jesus gives the general call to the gospel, where he says, come to me all who labor and are heavy laden. Matthew chapter 11 verse 28, come to me all who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart and you will find rest for your souls, for my yoke is easy and My burden is light.

There's a general call to believe the gospel, to come to Christ. The call in Isaiah 55. Come, all who are hungry and thirsty, come and buy and eat without money, without cost. Why spend your money on what doesn't satisfy? There's a general call to come and believe the gospel. That's what Jesus sent his disciples out to do in the Great Commission.

Go, preach, proclaim, make disciples. But then there's another way of looking at this calling, and this is God's effective call, or you maybe have heard of it described as his effectual call. And it's the call of a child who says, Mom, on the playground, and only one mom turns around, right? Because that mom knows that child's voice. This is God's effectual call, his effective call in our lives.

It comes through the general call, but what happens is as the general call goes out as the gospel is proclaimed God does something in us so that we have ears to hear look at Romans 8 verse 30 this is another place where we see an order of salvation given it's another place where we kind of see the purpose of this kind of study where we look at the steps of salvation I'll start in verse verse 29 For those whom he foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness or the image of his son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. So what's first? Foreknowledge and predestination.

In order that you be conformed to the image of his son. And those, and look at verse 30, if you're there. If not, you can listen closely and I'm sure you can follow along. Verse 30 says, and those whom he predestined, he also called. And those He called He also justified And those He justified He also glorified There a straight connection nothing missed between His predestining His calling His justifying, and His glorifying these people.

This is God's effective call, His effectual call. When we can hear the call of the Gospel and say, that's for me, I need that, I'm thirsty for that, that's what my soul has been lacking. Jesus says something similar in John chapter 10. John chapter 10. Let's see, I'll be in verses 16 and 17. Take that back.

It's going to be 26 and 27. I'll start in verse 25. Jesus answered them to the Jews who were gathered around him, I told you and you do not believe. The works I do, I do in my Father's name, and these bear witness about me, but you do not believe me because you are not part of my flock. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.

My Father who has given them to me is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of my Father's hand. I and the Father are one. We see the same connection. Those the Father gave to Jesus, he calls out, the gospel goes out, and they hear his voice, and they follow him. This is God's effective call, his effectual call. Second step. it's really closely tied to the third step that's on the paper there if you look at it this step is called regeneration and here it's defined for us as God secretly and sovereignly imparts spiritual life to those who have been called this was my initial thought when I thought about what I should share in these messages is I'm just so excited about regeneration.

What God does. You heard it in Ezekiel 37. It was read for us today Timothy read it for us The valley of dry bones And God told Ezekiel Son of man preach to these bones Call out to these bones. Proclaim the message to these bones. And then when they were put together and assembled, they didn't have breath in them. He said, preach and send breath from the four winds.

And send breath into them. It's a stunning picture. It's a staggering picture. The same thing in Ephesians 2. You were dead in your transgressions and sins in which you used to walk. Verse 4, but God saved us because He's rich in mercy.

He did something. God did something. He didn't just elect. It wasn't just Him choosing and electing, which we needed because we never would have chosen Him. It wasn't just the call going out. He did something inside of us to make us alive to that call so that we could respond to it.

This is described in different ways in the scriptures. Jesus told Nicodemus, in order to see the kingdom of God, a person must be born again or born from above, right? look being a Christian is not just adding some some Jesus clothes onto who you were before right or some sprinkle in some religion on your life going to church or or maybe speaking a different way or hanging with different people or even reading your bible that's not what being a Christian is about being a Christian starts when God does a work inside of us to make us alive to his truth so that we can hear that gospel call and pursue him in faith. God does this secretly and sovereignly.

I'm going to read for you what happened in Acts chapter 16. Acts 16, they're preaching, Paul and his companions are preaching the gospel. I'll start in verse well I'll just start in verse 14 they went down to the riverside because they thought there might be a place of prayer there and they spoke to them and one of the women who heard us she was a woman named Lydia from the city of Thyatira this is Acts 16 verse 14 she was a seller of purple goods who was a worshipper of God and the Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul Jesus tells Peter something similar when Peter confesses Christ He confesses, Jesus says, who do people say I am?

And they're like, well, some people say you're John the Baptist, some people say you're one of the prophets, Elijah. Jesus says, and who do you say I am? And Peter says, you are the Christ. And Jesus' response to him is, blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, because this was revealed to you not by flesh and blood but by my Father who's in heaven. We're entirely dependent on God doing this work inside of us to make us alive.

I've heard of one exercise that a preaching professor, a homiletics professor in a seminary would do with his students. He would take them to a cemetery after they had prepared a sermon and he'd have them preach to the tombstones. Because that's what preaching is. That's what at least proclaiming the gospel is. Unless God brings life to those graves, brings those people out of their graves, spiritual graves, Ezekiel 37, Ephesians chapter 2, the word of the gospel, the message of the gospel falls on dead ears.

So God does this regenerating work. He imparts spiritual life. He makes us new. He makes us a new creation. He works something new in us from the inside. I like the way C.S.

Lewis describes it in his book, Surprised by Joy. He says, I know very well when, but hardly how, the final step was taken. I was driven to Whipsnade, evidently a town in England somewhere, one sunny morning. When we set out, I did not believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and when we reached the zoo, I did. For those of you who are saved maybe later in life, you can maybe remember this transition in your life.

You remember what it was like to have blind eyes toward the things of God, spiritual death in your heart. You can remember those ways that you walked. You just stumbled over. You were confused. You thought you were doing things the only way you could to find joy, but everything you did seemed to create just more agony. And then you might know, and if that happened later in life, you might remember when that switch happened, when you actually finally had ears to hear the message.

Some of us, me included, I don't remember when that happened. I don't know when I was regenerated. I know that I am. But I don't know when. It happened when I was young. It happened at some point in my life, and I'm thankful for it.

The important thing is that it happened. God does this mysteriously. 1 Peter 2. The reason this comes after calling, 1 Peter 2, I'm sorry, I said it wrong again. It's 1 Peter 1, verse 22. Verse 22.

Having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth for a sincere brotherly love, love one another earnestly from a pure heart, since you have been born again. How? Not of perishable seed, but of imperishable. Well, what is that imperishable seed? through the living and abiding word of God. For all flesh is like grass and all glory is like the flower of the grass.

The grass withers and the flower falls, but the word of the Lord remains forever. And this word is the good news that was preached to you. God brings regeneration through the proclamation of his gospel. The God who has ordained and elected who are his has also ordained and chosen to use the preaching of his word to work along with his spirit, regenerating people to bring spiritual life where there was only spiritual death.

Let's go back to Titus and touch home base before we close. But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, He saved us. A couple notes. One, God did something. He appeared. I would see maybe a calling in this part of it because He did something He appeared He sent Jesus who the fullness of the Godhead made flesh The gospel was grace and truth preached through Jesus God appeared.

And then he saved us. Now, in Greek, if you read verse 5, it actually goes, verse 4, when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, he saved us. It's awkward in English, so they switch it around. but the point is, he's really emphasizing here, it's nothing we do.

It's nothing we do, which is why the theme of the day is, these first three steps are, but God. But when he appeared, he saved us. That's the theme of the day. Paul is going to great lengths in Titus chapter 3 to show, it's not by anything we did, but instead it's according to his own mercy. He saved us. And he did this by the washing of regeneration and renewal in the Holy Spirit.

He sent his Spirit. And the picture here is, the washing isn't baptism per se. The washing is the ceremonial cleansing to make something holy. If you read the book of Exodus, you'll find them doing this, the priest's garments, to make them holy. This is what the Spirit of God does in us when he regenerates us. He makes us holy.

He washes us ceremonially so that we're holy and we can come before God. he does this through his Holy Spirit. He regenerates it. He makes us new. And he does this through the Holy Spirit, whom he has poured out richly through Jesus Christ our Savior. Closing thought here, when we were in our sins, John chapter 3 says, God wrath remains on us Ephesians 2 says we were by nature objects of God wrath You read the book of Revelation you see God wrath being poured out on fallen humanity What poured out on those of us who are regenerated?

God's Spirit. It's a different pouring out for us. Why do we need to hear this? Well, we need to be unified in how we see the work of God. We need to be students of his word. But more than that, we need to be excited about these things.

I fear a lot of times that we are a lot of seeds growing among thorns. Our lives are so busy. We have so many cares and concerns. but when I read scripture what is really glorious what's really something you get excited about what really transports or is supposed to transport the readers of this word is the idea that God has done something strictly out of his own mercy to save us and because of that I get his spirit, I get made new instead of his wrath we were dead but God did something about it he did something about it by choosing before the foundation of the world who were his, he did it by sending out the gospel call and working with that gospel call to regenerate us to make us alive so that we could respond to that gospel call in the coming weeks we're going to look at the future the steps after this and I like the picture of rebirth.

Did you have anything to do with your conception or gestation? No thankfully What about your birth Did you have anything to do with that They say I fought against it all I could I mean, I was like three or four weeks late and came out sideways or something with the cord around my neck. So if anything, I resisted my birth, right? Up until this point in our lives, we've done nothing, right?

Up until this point, it's been someone else's decision, someone else's doing to bring out this life. but once that baby's born does that child participate in its own well-being? Yeah. Absolutely. It's a great metaphor the scriptures give us. Right now we're looking at what's happening leading up to our rebirth our regeneration. We're going to start looking at our response to that and what that looks like in our lives as we go on through these next two weeks.

So please continue searching out the scriptures continue studying these things and, well, let's close in prayer. Father, please teach us to rejoice in these truths. Please teach us how lost we were. When we go out into the world, when we go home to our families, when we go to our places of work, when we are participating in our hobbies, when we're having casual conversation, when we're going through the drive-thru, let us live as people who haven't just understood these ideas at an arm's length, That it's not just a part of our thought life, but help us live as people who are absolutely thankful because you did what we could not.

And you did what we wouldn't even expect you to do. You loved your enemies. You sent your only son to die for our sins so that we could be your children. We give you glory now. We thank you. Please teach us to glorify you with everything we do.

In Christ's name, amen.