The Necessity of Good Works
Ephesians 2:10
- Eph 2:1-10
- And in the true nature of Reformed Heritage
Paul emphasizes several things in this passage.
- He emphasizes Sola Fida – By Faith alone
- He emphasizes Sola Gratia – By Grace alone
- He emphasizes Solo Christo – By Christ alone
- He emphasizes Sola Deo Gloria – For God’s
glory alone
- So let us now focus on verse 10 and let us
look for 4 distinct truths.
- In case any of you are having trouble
following my ramblings let me tell you where we are going with this
today.
- The logic of good works, the motivation
for good works, the pattern of good works, goal of good
works.
- The logic of good works
- “For we are his workmanship…”
- The logic of Paul here is simple: If we are
God’s workmanship then we will do God’s work.
- The logic throughout the New Testament is God
saying “I will therefore you must”
- If you read through your New Testament and
haven’t noticed this before then you need to write that down and start
looking for it.
- The New Testament is replete with examples of
God doing for us therefore we must.
- If you have read Paul you are used to seeing
that little connector therefore.
- As C. H. Spurgeon the great English preacher
of the nineteenth century said “When you see that little ‘therefore’ you
need to ask yourself what is it there for?”
- Invariable it will tie two thoughts together
for Paul and frequently it will be this pattern of, God will therefore
you must.
- Think about the book or Romans Paul gives us
11 wonderful chapters expounding to us the riches of God’s grace and then
he starts chapter 12 by saying “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by
the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice….”
- Another literary tool Paul relies on heavily
is a concept of “Know who you are in Christ Jesus then you will live like
you are supposed to.”
- This is precisely what Paul says in greater
detail in vs. 19 of Eph 2: “You are no longer strangers and
foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the
household of God”
- If follows just like night follows day that
if we know who we are then we will also understand what we need to do.
- Ill.
Those of you who are parents of small children or have been the parents
of small children know that you spend a good portion of the time telling them
when they are small to act their age.
- You ask them questions like “How old are
you?” “Do 4 year olds, 6 year olds, 9 year olds, etc. act this way?” “Do
you want to be treated like your age or a baby?”
- What are we saying in effect to our kids? If
you know who you are it will follow that you will act out the role.
- When I decided to get married and take on the
responsibility of a family I knew some things would have to change in my
life.
- I knew I couldn’t keep spending 50% of my
paychecks on recreation for just me.
- I had to realize who I was preparing to
become, a husband and a father, and because of who I was that should and
would effect how I would behave.
- Well this is exactly what Paul is trying to
do for us as believers know who you were and who you are know because it
will effect everything we do.
- Isn’t this exactly what Paul is saying in
Roman 6:2-4. Paul says
-
- “How shall we who died to sin live any longer
in it? 3Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized
into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? 4Therefore we
were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was
raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should
walk in newness of life.”
- We just read it Ephesians 2:1 “And you He
made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins”
- Instinct: Know who you are; first and foremost you are the workmanship of
God.
- God, the heavenly potter, in his providence
reached down and took the broken clay pots of humanity and made them into
something glorious.
- Since we are his workmanship we should do the
works of him that made us.
- The pattern seen throughout the gospel is
that God’s sovereign Grace not only has the power to heal our heart from
sin but to “raise us to newness of life”
- In other words to change who are and how we
behave. Why is at the moment of conversion we become strangers and
pilgrims in this world?
- Because we have been adopted into a new
family! But because with that adoption as sons we have also been changed
to do new works, good works.
- When you try and evacuate the gospel of the
fruit of grace you evacuate the gospel of the power of God’s grace not
only to change a life but also to save a life!
- Indecently this is true of even the person
that has been held up throughout all of Christian history as the prime
example of being saved by grace, namely the dying thief on the cross.
- I mean this is a guy who didn’t have time for
good works.
- But if this is what you believe then you need
to read the story again. For he exhibited that he was God’s workmanship
by doing at least two good works that are recorded for us.
- He encouraged the Savior “Lord remember me
when you come into your kingdom” If there was ever Lordship salvation it
was here “Lord, remember me”
- And the second is hard to even imagine, he
had the grace to rebuke the other thief.
- You see he was “God’s workmanship created
in Christ Jesus for good works...”
- Now we have looked at the logic of
good works lets us turn our attention to…
- The motivation for good works
- “…which God prepared before hand…”
- This should create a spirit of anticipation
- You should be able to wake every morning,
look at your alarm clock, stretch and say “I wonder what God good works
God has prepared for me today.”
- We see he has prepared them, it doesn’t say
for those of you who have graduated from Bible School or Seminary I have
some good works for you to do.
- This letter of Paul’s to the Ephesians was
meant to be a circular letter distributed to all the churches in the part
of the world and even today it is still being distributed to you and I
right now.
- We see it here again God has prepared
these good works that we should walk in them.
- And in addition to the fact that God has
created them for us and in light of what we just looked at as far as the
logic of why we should that should be enough.
- But Eph. 2:4 tells us “God has loved us with
a great love”
- Ill. Those of you who are parents, and I see this being even more
true of Fathers and their daughters, know what it is for a child to
disobey.
- And you must punish that child for disobedience
and when you punish them they go off somewhere in the house with tear
stains on their cheeks and then they emerge some time later wanting to
show you something they made.
- Perhaps it is a drawing, invariably of you
and her, albeit unrecognizably of you and her.
- And she will describe the picture to you and
then turn to you looking for your affection.
- What do you do as a father? Do you tear the
drawing up and say don’t you ever bring anything so pitiful and awful to
me again?
- No you say it is beautiful and she says I’m
sorry daddy, I love you. Then you hold her for a moment before she runs
off to draw you yet another picture.
- This is how it should be in the Christian
life that we reciprocate the love of the father back to his son.
- By doing a good work and then bringing it
before the father.
- You see a motivation is our access to the
father, “by one spirit we have access to the father” Isn’t that
what verse 19 tells us.
- You see we bring our good works who just like
small children are impoverished.
- Even the best works of the best believers are
tainted by devious motivation and just or flesh.
- But because of Christ God accepts our good
works and transforms them into a thing of beauty.
- You see Christ didn’t just fulfill the law to
accomplish righteousness for us.
- When you read in 2 Cor. 5:21 “21For
He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the
righteousness of God in Him.”
- Do you understand what this verse means? God
treated Christ just like he had committed all the sins of the elect throughout
all of redemptive history so that God could treat all the elect like they
had lived Christ’s perfect life.
- Yes he forgave us but He, God, treats us like
the good works of Christ our imputed to our account.
- This is how God transforms our impoverished good
works into things of beauty. When we do good works through the filling of
the Holy Spirit God views those as the righteousness of Christ.
- You see when you grasp this it is the
difference between living legally and living graciously.
- What are you here for today? Well Eph.
4:11-12 lets us know that “He Himself gave some to be apostles, some
prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, 12for
the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of
the body of Christ”
- Essentially you are here to be trained for
ministry or good works. Think of 2 Timothy 3:16 “16All
Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine,
for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, 17that
the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.”
- That is why you are here not to become burden
with a new responsibility but to receive knowledge of our privilege our
birthright.
- This isn’t a get excited for God and start
working your fingers to the bone being busy for God. This isn’t about
being busy for God this is about what God has prepared.
- Ill. If you had a wealthy uncle who lived in Oregon and had left his
entire estate to you would it be burden to drive up near Salem to be
there for the reading of the will and then go back up there to sort
through your new found treasure?
- What if it took you multiple trips with your
U-Haul truck to carry all the treasure back would it be a burden then?
- And each time you make the trip you make it
with anticipation because every time you rummage through his attic full
of stuff you find better treasure than you found on the last trip.
- And just when you think you have gone through
the whole thing and found all there is to find one of servants says have
you looked in the barn on the far side of the property?
- The barn??? That is all the way across the
property and there aren’t any good roads to get there so now you have to
walk to your treasure and carry it back by hand is it a burden then?
- It is just like that in the Christian life
the good works God has given to other Christians is not what he has given
you.
- Don’t look at those around you and say I
can’t do that good work that is too hard.
- Of course it is God didn’t plan that good
work for you.
- When you come to the place of anticipation
and you see the rewards and treasure you are laying up in heaven by doing
good works in the power of the Spirit it isn’t a burden but a joy and a
privilege.
- Ok we have seen the logic of good
works and the motivation for good works let us look at…
- The pattern of good works
- “…created in Christ Jesus…”
- If you are familiar with Paul’s writing you
will recognize this phrase “in Christ” This is Paul’s most common
expression to describe Christians.
- And when you read Paul’s writing you see that
this tiny preposition ‘in’ and you began to realize that it can expand in
meaning almost to infinity it seems sometimes.
- In the context of this passage I think it
also carries with it a nuance of a mold or a pattern
- Ill. Just like what we did in the children’s portion of the service
with the play dough. We made a replica and we saw that the play dough
came out exactly like the mold.
- And even those small children saw it
illustrated and they know that they are to look to Jesus as the pattern
for their life.
- With Christ as our pattern when God puts His
workmanship on display what will come forth by the transforming power of
God’s grace is a little replica of Christ.
- Romans 8:29 “For whom He foreknew, He also
predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son…”
- Philippians 3:21 tell us that He “will
transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body…”
- How about John 11 and Jesus at the grave a
Lazarus? “Come forth…take off the grave clothes” Why did Christ want the
grave clothes to come off?
- They were no longer appropriate to this new
creation.
- When CalTran starts another street repair or
enhancement it is always painful isn’t it?
- The traffic is bad where they are working, it
gets noisy, it churns up lots of dust doesn’t it?
- But what do they mean by it, only to cause
pain? No they want to transform that road into something useful something
of glory.
- So yes sometimes even many times it is
painful to be conformed as we have to trim away parts we don’t want but
the outcome far outweighs the negative.
- Moving on we have seen the logic the motivation
and the pattern of good works let us now look in closing at
the…
- The goal of good works
- “…that we should walk in them…”
- The goal of good works in put another way
would be the consummation of the gospel. The complete fulfillment of
God’s purpose.
- What is God’s purpose? I think we see it very
clearly in Matthew 5:14 & 16.
- 14 tells us we are the light of the world and
then in 16 we read “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see
your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.”
- That is the goal to bring glory to the father
right?
- Looking up in the text to verse 7. We read “that
in the ages to come He might show (display) the exceeding riches of His
grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus”
- Titus 2:14 “Who gave himself for us, that
he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar
people, zealous of good works.”
- Even the nature of the term good works
removes the focus from us and indicates we are doing for someone else.
- Think about it, you don’t say I am doing good
works for myself.
- Also what do we find in Revelation 19 what
are these white robes? Verse 8 they are the righteous deeds of the
saints.
- Wow, did you catch that, your righteous deeds
or good works that you do here on earth weave the garment that you will
wear for all eternity.
- When you look at your brothers and sisters
that are sitting around you now when you see them in eternity you will
look at their white linen garments and see where they spent hours on
their knees in prayer for you sick family members. When you were without
a job and they gave money to meet your needs, When you were too sick to
get out of bed and they brought a hot meal to your home.
- Your good works will at that point bring such
glory to the father at that point that you will be even more overcome by
gratitude and you will again cast yourself down at the feet of Christ and
say “I had no idea that this is what you were doing in Mr. Smith’s life
or Mrs. Jones life, it is so beautiful, I never would have guessed that
that is what you had planned but now I see and I can see your
incomparable riches on display in their life.
- Conclusion
- That is it folks, that is God’s plan for your
life.
- He is the potter we are the clay
- He desires to put on display the incomparable
glory of His riches in our lives.
- It isn’t a burden he says My yoke is easy and
my burden light.
- However if you don’t have a personal
relationship with Jesus Christ then it is a heavy burden, too heavy.
- The law is not a ladder to be climbed, we
can’t do enough good things to get into heaven. The law is a mirror to
show us how far short we fall of God’s standard at which point we must
turn to Christ and say it is Jesus Christ plus nothing else that equals
God’s forgiveness and acceptance of me.
- If you don’t have that testimony of having
said Jesus you are my all, my Savior, my Lord, then today is the
appointed hour for you to come