God our Savior
The
God of the Bible has revealed Himself as a Triune God. That is, one
God in a trinity of three sacred Persons, the Father, the Son and the
Holy Spirit. There are many mysteries to us concerning this union but
there is one thing we know for sure: as such, all three divine
Persons in the Godhead have engaged themselves actively in the
salvation of God’s elect. When you read the Bible, each divine
Person seems to attribute the glory for this work to the others and
the apostles as they write surely acknowledge each the same. Neither
is said to be greater than the other and neither Person’s work to
be less important than the other. Think how many times the apostles
speak as Paul does in EPHESIANS
1:3, “Blessed be
the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath blessed us with
every spiritual blessing.” Listen to them all as they ascribe
salvation to the Son and His work on the cross. Listen to the Son as
He speaks of the necessity of the Spirit’s work, saying, “Ye
must be born again.”
Yet,
today very little is said of the Father’s part in salvation or of
the Spirit’s work. I think I can see in part why. Men have
neglected to speak of the Father’s essential work because to do so,
since it is said to take place before the world began, takes this
salvation totally out of the hands of man and makes it to come solely
out of the sovereign grace, mercy, will and power of God the Father.
This the Son rejoiced in! This assures that all the glory in this
salvation goes to God alone! Likewise the same is true of the
Spirit’s work. Men avoid speaking of the necessity of it because to
do so would be to admit the true condition and inability of fallen
man. It would be to acknowledge his spiritual death, the bondage of
his will and his inability to come to Christ. In short, to preach the
truth concerning the Father’s work and the Spirit’s work would be
to deal a death blow to modern so-called evangelism. In it the Son is
reduced to being a savior who has made salvation available and whose
success ultimately depends on the sinner’s decision for or against
Him. This is not our God!
Christ
suffered the death of the cross for a people given Him by the Father,
who because of His death before divine justice, shall be quickened by
the Spirit and brought to life and faith in Him. To diminish the work
of the Father and the Spirit is to leave the work of the Son for men
to make of it what they will! Listen to the apostle ascribe salvation
to the triune God:
“But
after that the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man
appeared, Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but
according to His
mercy He
saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy
Ghost; Which He
shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour; That being
justified by His
grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal
life.” -TITUS
3:4-7
[KJV]
-Gospel
report by preacher Gary Shepard
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