Assurance and Evidence (3)

For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls.Hebrews 12.3

No easy road
The Christian life is not intended to be a life of ease. It is, rather, a life of struggle and work.

We have been redeemed by Jesus Christ unto good works (Eph. 2.10); we must daily work out our salvation in fear and trembling (Phil. 2.12); and we must not allow ourselves to grow weary or fainthearted in this high and holy calling (Gal. 6.9, 10). If we are fully assured that Christ has died for our sins and risen again that we might have life, then we will certainly apply ourselves diligently to the task of knowing more of His salvation day by day (Ps. 116.12-14).

We do not work in order to gain salvation; that comes to us by grace through faith alone (Eph. 2.8, 9). Rather, we work because we are saved, because being saved, we cannot help but express the new life we have in works of love toward God and our neighbors (Eph. 2.10).

It is only through work and struggle that we are able to bring forth the evidence of what we are assured of in the words and deeds of a transformed life. The Christian life is like running a marathon race or fighting in a battle raging against us on all fronts. Any other way of living the Christian life is not the life of full faith.

There are two aspects to the Christian life which make this struggle particularly difficult. First is the reality of sin. Even though Christians have been redeemed and forgiven of their sins, still, we continue to sin. If we say that we do not sin, we are kidding ourselves and lying to God (1 Jn. 1.8). A law of sin, which dominated our lives before Christ, continues to operate within us, reminding us of old and sinful pleasures and seeking to distract us from the pursuit of holiness in the fear of God (Rom. 7.21-23; 2 Cor. 7.1).

Moreover, the sinful world in which we live strews our paths each day with temptations, inviting us to walk in the ways of the flesh rather than the ways of the Lord (Gal. 5.16-23).

Second, spiritual forces of wickedness in high places assail us continuously and from every angle, seeking to distract us from our concentration on the things of Christ and to divert us from the path He calls us to walk (Eph. 6.10-20; 1 Jn. 2.1-6).

If we’re going to know full faith in Jesus Christ, we need to be prepared to struggle, both against the sin in our souls and the world, and those spiritual forces that would deceive and derail us from our course and calling.

Be done with sin!
We are called to be done with sin, to lay it aside, even to hate it (Eph. 4.17-24; Ps. 97.10), and succeeding in this daily and ongoing challenge requires that we grow in the Lord and keep a close watch on all aspects of our daily lives (2 Pet. 3.18; Eph. 5.15-17).

If we truly believe in the Lord and are seeking to orient our lives according to the righteousness and peace and joy in the Spirit of His unseen realm, we will daily discover areas of our lives – thoughts, affections, priorities, and practices – that are out of accord with the ways of our glorious King Jesus. We must check these at once, confessing, as the Spirit searches us (Ps. 139.23, 24), all that is contrary to the Lord and His will, and taking up instead whatever things are holy and good and true in their place (Rom. 12.21; Phil. 4.8; Ps. 1119.59, 60).

If we seek to excuse sinful thoughts or practices by insisting that the Lord knows us and loves us just as we are, while we may feel assured that all is well with us and Him, the evidence coming forth in our lives will suggest otherwise.

An ongoing struggle
“Fightings and fears, within, without”: This struggle against sinful ways will never be finished in this life, so we need to be ready to engage it every single day.

At the same time, we must learn to recognize and respond to the discipline of the Lord as He intervenes in our lives when, for whatever reason, our vigilance against sin has not been sufficient. The writer of Hebrews tells us to expect discipline from the Lord, and he warns us that such discipline is never pleasant (Heb. 12.3-11). But God is determined to keep us on the path of righteousness, since this is the evidence He seeks and the place where we can know fullness of joy and pleasures forevermore. Our Father will use a wide range of disciplines – including loss, setback, ill health, persecution, shame, defeat, and more – to get us to see in our lives whatever He sees and is seeking to correct.

So let us prepare for struggle in this walk of faith. As we fix the eye of our heart on Jesus, let us be vigilant to confess and repent of all sin and to recognize and respond to the discipline of the Lord, so that we may bear up under it with thanks, praise, and circumspection, until He brings us to the progress He desires for us in knowing the life of full faith.

For reflection or discussion
1.      In what ways do you experience this “struggle” of faith?

2.      How can believers prepare themselves to deal with the temptations they are sure to face every day (1 Corinthians 10.13)? Meditate on Psalm 73 as you think about your answer to this question.

3.      How can looking on the unseen things during the day help us to prevail in the struggle for full faith?

Next steps: What’s the difference between working for salvation and working out salvation? Ask a few of your Christian friends to comment.

T. M. Moore

This week’s study, Assurance and Evidence, is Part 1 of a 10-part series, Full Faith. You can download Assurance and Evidence by clicking here. Your gifts to The Fellowship of Ailbe make this ministry possible. It’s easy to give to The Fellowship of Ailbe, and all gifts are, of course, tax-deductible. You can click here to donate online through credit card or PayPal, or send your gift to The Fellowship of Ailbe, 19 Tyler Dr., Essex Junction, VT 05452.

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Except as indicated, Scripture taken from the New King James Version. © Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.