A New Creation

Colossians 1:1-2

COL-017

We are studying Colossians 1:1-2. This is "The Salutation," number 17.

Grace

What we are trying to stress in this particular portion of Scripture, is to get a deep appreciation for what the grace of God is. If you understand the grace of God, then how God functions, and what God will do for us, becomes awesome indeed, and becomes free of all those human viewpoint opinions that interject what man would do over against what God is able, and does do, for us in grace.

Grace is God's unmarried favor, sovereignly bestowed on those who deserve the very opposite. It's not just that we don't deserve the grace of God, this great kindness, but we deserve the very opposite from Him. The kindness of God toward lost humanity is, first of all, shown through the gospel of the grace of God. And people who do not grasp the glorious principle of the grace of God, and it's transforming power, cannot understand free grace salvation. They cannot understand salvation as an irrevocable gift from God. But grace is God's plan in dealing with sinners and with saints alike, so that His purposes are always preserved from being contaminated by the sin nature of man. God's grace is what sanctifies a believer (sets him apart) for eternal life in heaven, and there is a certainty that cannot be overridden. Grace is the Christian life basis for prayer; for meeting suffering; for expressing spiritual power; for stability; for spiritual maturity; for daily service; and, for the production of divine good works. What God does by His grace cannot be contaminated by man; cannot be reversed; and, man cannot ever be lost again. So, this is no small thing that we speak about when we talk about the grace of God.

The history of God's dealing in grace with mankind began in the Garden of Eden. Man, as you know, was created perfect by a perfect God, and he was given a volition because he was in the image of God. He used that volition to choose sin instead of righteousness. People are inclined to this very day, because of that, to take what is good, and to mess it up. And Satan's temptation in Eden was, of all things, based upon the veracity of God. It attacked the character of God: "Are you sure that God is not lying to you? Are you sure that God is not trying to keep some good thing from you?" And no matter how much we think about this, and how much we mull this over in our minds, and how much we try to walk through that garden in our imagination, so that we can try to get some feel of why two human beings would turn their backs upon a God who had given them everything, and whose situation lacked nothing, why they would cast suspicion in their minds upon this God, just because the devil suggested it. But that is what happened.

Now, in that circumstance, you and I are likely to react with a lot of indignation. We are ready to let people have what they deserve. And this is what God was perfectly free to do – to let them go into the lake of fire that He had prepared already for the devil and his angels, and to just forget the whole thing. This is what God could do, because to solve it now was going to cost Him dearly. And yet, this is what grace is. It is doing for people what they don't deserve. And Adam and Eve didn't deserve to live another moment. They deserved to be totally removed from this earth, and sent into that lake. But grace is what overrides all the characteristics of God. It is an expression of His essence.

So, when He was faced with what Adam and Eve had done, His sovereignty could have decided to simply take their lives, and to send them off into the lake fire. His absolute righteousness was revolted by what they had done, and He could have simply turned against them completely. His justice demanded the payment of death for their sins, and He could have put them to death instantly. The love of God, instead of being turned off, went out to Adam and Eve, to seek to comfort them in their misery. As eternal life, God knew what kind of forever agony would be upon them if they continued in their sinful condition. His omniscience knew what doom would come upon their descendants, and how destructive this would be. His omnipresence made Him witness to all the depraved acts that were to follow in the human race. His omnipotence had ample power to destroy man. His immutability prevents changes in God's character, so that He cannot tolerate sin. And therefore, something had to be done. And His veracity demanded that He be true to Himself. And what is God? God is grace, and God expresses that in love. So, to be true to Himself, he could not just blow them off.

Now, there's no doubt that the human race to this day is a sorry lot. Titus 2:11 says, "For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men," because all of us, deserving eternal death, need that salvation.

One of the things that comes from the grace of God is the spirit of relaxation. It is a great spirit of calm and relaxing that comes upon us when we realize just exactly how terrible our condition was, and yet how completely God has resolved it. So, thank God for who He is and what He is.

The result of the grace of God in solving this human dilemma was a tremendous new thing on the face of this earth. 2 Corinthians 5:17 describes that for us. Here is the great product of the grace of God: "Therefore, if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature. The old things passed away. Behold, new things that come."

Here, in 2 Corinthians 5:1-16, is a list of the fantastic provisions of the grace of God. Verse 1 tells us that, when we die, our body goes into an eternal place – a residence in heaven: "For we know that if the earthly tent, which is our house, is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." So, immediately upon death we go to a place of residence that God has prepared for us in a body that He has prepared. I don't think it will be your physical body at this point in time. That's in the grave. It will be an intermediate body that the grace of God has provided for us.

Verse 5 tells us that the Holy Spirit indwells every believer as a token of God's promise to take us to heaven upon the acceptance of His grace salvation: "Now, He who prepared us for this very purpose (this is God), Who gave us the Spirit as a pledge." God the Holy Spirit is the pledge that you are going to heaven.

In verse 6, the grace of God says that God Himself makes it certain that if we leave our bodies, we will go to be with the Lord: "Therefore, being always of good courage, and knowing that while we are at home in the body, we're absent from the Lord."

Then verse 9 says that there will be rewards for Christian service through the Holy Spirit, Who has produced divine good works through us. Verse 10: "For we must all appear before the Judgment Seat of Christ, that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad."

The provision, finally, of salvation by Jesus Christ for us all, is in verse 15: "And He died for all, that they who lived should no longer live for themselves, but for Him Who died and rose again on their behalf."

So, here is the first part of this chapter, detailing the things of God's grace that have been done for us. And then very properly, in verse 15, Paul says, "With that kind of treatment, by that kind of God, isn't it reasonable that we should not live for ourselves, but that we should concern ourselves to live for Him who suffered death for us, and then rose again, because our salvation had been secured by His grace; and, now He has given us this wonderful gift?" And this is a question which you must answer in your own mind. You must answer exactly whether this is the focus of your life. For some people (for some Christians), this is the focus of their lives – to live for God. For most Christians, that's a nice thing, but is quite secondary. And all of us, in our personal Christian ministries, whatever they are, must learn to remember that we are serving God, and people will be very disappointing to us. People that we would hope would recognize that what the grace of God has done for them, and the magnificence of this treatment, and that their lives would be centered around Him – that He would be the focus of their attention, and He would be the focus of their day's activity.

A New Creation

We are not a new creation because we don't do something, or because we do something. People read this verse, and they think that they are a new creature because their old sinful habits are no longer there, or they're doing the good things that they never used to do. New believers and immature, untaught Christians pick up this idea of "new creature," because it gives them something in the way of their living. Even when you're born again, you want to make it with God by gaining credits – by merit. But God's grace is never going to leave you. You don't have to worry about losing your salvation, so that you must act in a certain way to gain and keep it.

There are many meetings run for Christians which are designed to create a closer walk with the Lord – getting Christians to decide to give up something, or to give up someone. Very often, these meetings are directed in such a way that people are challenged that, because there are new creatures in Christ, they should do certain things; and, if they do, then they will gain God's favor, and they will gain God's special blessing. But even unsaved people give things up in order to get to heaven, but that makes no difference with God. We all, by our old sin nature, love to do things in order to gain benefits and merit with God.

So, why do you knock yourself out in Christian service? Because He has called you to do it. Why do you focus your life on Him? Because His grace has caused you to fall in love with Him. And when you're in love with a person, you want to take care of that person. You want to do things for that person. That is a person that you delight in serving.

What this verse has to do with is that the grace of God has done something great for us. It is not something that we are going to do for Him in order to do something for ourselves.

So, here are a few words: "If any man (anyone) is in Christ, he is a new creature." In the Greek Bible, there are two basic words for "new." One is this word "neos" (neh'-os) N E O S. And this means "new in reference to time," or "recent:" "I have newly begun to do this." This means that I've recently started to do something.

The other word is this word "kainos" (kahee-nos') K A I N O S. And "kainos" means "new in reference to kind," or "a new species." And that's the word which is used here. It is not that you're new in terms of that recently you've become a Christian. It's the fact that you're not even the same person anymore. And this is used in 2 Corinthians 5:17 of people who are Christians in the church age. They are a new species of humanity in God's creation. And this new species of being began on the day of Pentecost, with the baptism of the Holy Spirit, where a number of believers at that time were then joined to Jesus Christ to begin the body of Christ, the church. This baptism was delayed until Jesus Christ was ascended to heaven. And after He was gone, 10 days later, it came.

Old Testament saints were born again, but they were never a new species of human being. They were born again, but they were not transformed in some way such that they were actually related to the person of Jesus Christ. They were not part of what the Bible calls "the body of Christ." Ephesians 1:22-23 referred to this when it said, "And He put all things in subjection under His feet." God the Father put all things under God the Son: "And gave Him, as head over all things, to the church (Christians), which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all" – His body, which is being filled by Him with great blessings.

So, the Christian is a new creature because grace, at the point of salvation, joined him to Jesus Christ, through the baptism of the Holy Spirit automatically. It is not because of his behavior patterns.

Now, he is also described here by the word "creation." That is the Greek word: "ktisis." (ktis'-is), K T I S I S. And "ktisis" means "creation." You are a new creation. Specifically, you're a new order in that creation. You're a new species. The Christian is a new kind of human being on the face of the earth because he has achieved a level of union with God, and, therefore a potential union of victorious living that no human beings before the church age ever dreamed possible.

How well have you entered into that? How well do you and I walk through society, and are we aware of the fact that we are a new species of human beings, and do we sense that we're just not like the rest of the human race? Or are we just like anybody else, living as if we were just part of the herd? We're not part of the herd. We're an entirely new kind of human being, because God's grace did this for us. We could never have made ourselves this. But the grace of God enabled us to do this.

What kind of a species is this? This unique breed is capable of talking to God, and moving heaven in his behalf. You're able to talk to God and get things done. You are a new species who's able to understand that you have a calling from God, and you don't quite know how you're going to be able to do it. And it is the grace of God that enables you to go forward, because that's the mission, and you're going to be true to the mission. It is the grace of God that enables you to put yourself in focus so that you don't think you're some little god with great superiority, so that you never cut any slack to other Christians when they're not as perfect as they should be. You are a human being who has the capacity to rise to great mental dignity.

Some Christians are so cheap that they are never going to be anything but cheap in their thinking, because they do not grasp what the grace of God has done for them. Their hearts are not full of the joy bells of recognizing what a transformation has taken place, and what great potential lies within them for their eternity.

Satan, of course, attacks this. And we weep for those who never rise to the recognition that the grace of God has made of them this kind of a new species of humanity.

Fallen from Grace

The apostle Paul referred to this in Galatians 5:4, when he said, "You have been severed from Christ – you who are seeking to be justified by the Law. You have fallen from grace." You who are in Christ, by the great act of the grace of God, as a result of your salvation, have actually been severed, in effect from Christ. He is not doing anything with you. He is not functioning in you. You're not living in fellowship with Him. You're living by your old sin nature, and thinking that you're something great. You are seeking to be justified by doing; by the acts of the Law; and, by what you can do. And you think that God is going to be pleased with this.

Many years ago, we used to have a man in our church who was in the auto body repair work. And I got a dent in the fender of my car. And Sunday morning, as he was going out, I said, "I've got this dent in the car. Take a look at it, and tell me what it'll cost to have it fixed." And he said, "Oh no, I can't do that on Sunday." And right away, I knew that he thought that he was going to please God because he didn't think through what it would cost to fix a fender – like that was going to offend God, and like that was going to be held against him. As that man went through life periodically, I would notice him surfacing, and he was always groveling. He never rose to being anything but just one of the good old boys of our society. He went through it just like any other person of the world system. And here he is, a new species of human being, and what does he do with it? He blows it. Well, he's up in heaven now, and he is ever regretting that attitude that he reflected that he wanted to live by the Law, and he fell from grace. He could not rise to what he was in grace. If you haven't caught on, that's the point of all of this instruction today – for you to recognize the doors that grace has opened to you: the refinement; the quality; the character; and, the power that's available to you. Why would you be anything else than the magnificent thing that God has placed upon you through His grace?

Our place in Christ is positional sanctification, and it is the basis of our orientation to the grace of God. When it says that old things are passed away, it is not our ways and experiences of our unsaved days. It means our spiritual death status. That's what's passed away. That's the old thing we were – dead in Adam. And that's what has passed away, and our old sin nature is no longer capable of controlling us.

The Old and the New Things

"The old things" – these refer to the archaic things. These are the things that existed before spewing out of our old sin nature. Under the old condition of spiritual death, we had no relationship with God. Now that's all different. You have a relationship with God, and that status of death has passed away, and it has come to an abrupt end. It has been neutralized by the spiritual death of Christ. Now we are alive spiritually, and it's impossible for us to ever die again. And for that reason, it says that everything has become new. It means that it is new in the fact that we are a new breed of human being, permanently secured in eternal life, and permanently related to Christ who indwells us, and permanently related to the spirit of God who indwells us. It means that we can say "no" to the vilest sins.

That's a great tragedy, if somebody, early in life, does not learn this. We do our best to teach this to our children. And we try to teach them (try to convey to them) what kind of creatures they are in Christ – what God has done, and the magnificent transformation that he has brought about upon them. But if they don't learn that, then they will move through the world, and they will do exactly what the world's system is doing. They will do what their peers at school do. They will do what those in their age bracket do. And the worst thing they will do is plunge their lives toward a prematurity status, because they don't understand how special they are, and that they're in training.

Children of the royal families of Europe are carefully nurtured and cared for, as they are carried along. And when they are little kids, who haven't even graduated from high school, they are not permitted to pretend that they have become something that can make any kind of decision relative to what is good for them in their lives. The same is true of our Christian children: spiritually; in their associations; their objectives; and, their purposes. And if you do not train a child like that, that child will slip off into a lot of personal grief, sooner or later. They have to know that they're a prince and a princess, and that they're in training for their adult place in the court of God. Nobody else is going to be up in the court of God except we who are the believers of this age. That's what it means. All that old enslavement to the sin nature, with all the lust patterns that it spews up, we have been shaken free of. And now God's grace has made it possible for us to carry great dignity.

It is a terrible thing to see a young person who moves along in the sins of the world, and has no dignity. And if you do that, you don't have dignity. And all those with the discernment will hold you in contempt. Grace always finds a way to meet our needs. Grace finds a way to a noble us. Grace is who and what God is, and what He's free to do for us through Christ.

The Provision of the Grace of God

Now, here's the great provision of grace because of that – the provision of the grace of God. We've already reminded you that God is perfect. Therefore, His plans are perfect. And His plans of grace for us are magnificent. In Romans 8:28-30, we are reminded of this: "And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, and to those who are called according to His purpose." The good that God gives us begins, first of all, with a salvation that is irrevocable – uniquely related to Jesus Christ and the Spirit of God.

The second good that comes to us is that we are capable of living, experientially, a godly life. We are capable of going with dignity. One of the criticisms I've seen several times of certain potential presidential candidates is they do not have what the writers call "gravitas." This is a Latin word. And what that means is "dignity." They just do not have dignity. Isn't it terrible to be viewed as a Christian, and for you and I to call ourselves Christians, and to go through this world, and when people look at us, they have no respect for us because we have no gravitas? We don't have any dignity? One of the goods that God has given us is that we are able to live in a way that we carry great dignity. People look upon us, and they recognize that we are not just another clod.

The third that good that comes to us is that God enables us to so live in this life, because of His grace, that we can earn rewards to store in heaven for our eternal enjoyment. And to whom does that go? To those who have been called by God to receive this great blessing. The consequence and the assurance of this, in Romans 8:28-29 says, "For whom He foreknew, He also predestinated." Now, here are a series of things that God has done for us, and each one is connected to the previous one. "God foreknew" means that He wanted us to be intimately related to Him, so He chose us for salvation: "Whom He foreknew, He also predestinated" to become conformed to the image of His Son: "That He might be the firstborn among many brethren. And whom He predestinated, these He also called. And whom He called, these He also justified. And whom He justified, these He also glorified." So, the issue is that, when God starts working on you with His grace power, it goes down through a series of steps that takes you from foreknowledge (you're going to heaven) to glorification (being in heaven) – completely transformed.

Now, when you read that passage, you see how pathetic it is – these people who say, "No, no, no, don't give that free grace salvation stuff. It can't be that simple. It can't be that easy." But it is that easy. It's all of God, and none of us. And what does He do? He does things that we could not dream of doing. He connects us with these steps that give us a relationship to the living God that we could not accomplish.

Now, if you're not able to sit and think a few deep thoughts, this will not hit you. But if you're able to think a few deep thoughts with some depth of perception, you will see that this is a magnificent act of the grace of God. And, of all things, it has happened to you.

Constantly, Satan is challenging this. He wants to substitute some system of your doing good things, and some system of divine of human viewpoint to counter your divine viewpoint, and some system of undermining the grace of God. Believers who are ignorant, or negative to doctrine, will emphasize, in their experience, that they will be seeking emotional good feelings to deal with their sins. A young person might say, "Oh, I'm sick and tired of doctrine. I'm sick and tired of the Word. And I'm sick and tired of having to listen to all that heavy stuff. I want to go where the action is, where things are jumping and jiving, and my emotions get a little bit of a tickle." Well, he's on the way down. That gal is on the way out. And neither one of them are worthy for your consideration thereafter.

When you get hold of what the grace of God is, you're going to stop messing around with people who are spiritually beneath you, and who can never rise to the quality and the caliber that we're called to be. And the summary of that is: when God said, "Be holy, as I am holy." Do you realize what that says? And I'll tell you that it's in imperative mood. God says, "I'm commanding you folks to be just as holy as I am." Now, where do you get off saying, "Well, yeah, okay, but I want to be realistic." What is realistic is to be godly, and is to be holy. And the most realistic thing is to take your time in life, to find where you're going, and to find what God has for you, so that you're not making rash choices. It is God's grace that carries us along through all these magnificent steps.

However, Satan comes along, and he says, I'm going to challenge the grace of God. In Romans 8:31, he opposes it: "What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us?" God's plan for the believer functions by means of the doctrines that we have learned, and that we have stored in our human spirit, and which He cycles up to our mind. Satan does not fool around with believers who are minus doctrine. He lets them play church successfully. He lets them just carry on. And they do it with shamefulness. . . A little shame is a good thing.

One of our all-time great preachers, Bob Tilton, is back in the news. And Bobby is shameless. He was on television the other day, and they were showing him in his great power period, when he had all those stations on television, and he had all that millions of dollars of money flowing in. And boy, God must have been really blessing him. And here he was in his period when the charismatics came to a period where they call "yelling at the devil." They have since passed from that to what they call "holy laughter," where they get into a service, and everybody giggles like crazy.

Well, when they're back at the yelling at the devil, he's there showing how to do it. And he's screaming at the devil at the top of his voice, telling the devil to get out of there, and to leave this person alone, and to stop this, and to stop carrying on here. He just had a wonderful time. And the people in the background are shouting, shouting, "Hallelujah." They're clapping their hands, and their hands are over their heads. And it really makes me mad that, every time the news media wants to talk about fundamentalists, they'll put the camera to a scene of the holy-rollers up there swaying with their hands and their head. And those are fundamentalists. Those are not fundamentalists. Those are fools who haven't made the connection. These are people who are degrading the grace of God that is upon them.

Well, Bobby knows how to make a new beginning. So, he traded in his old wife, and got rid of her, and divorced her. And on TV the other night, we were treated to a picture of his new wife. She's very "grinny." And she held their new baby in her arms. And she said a few things, and then she would scream, "O, praise the Lord. We're having such a time." The loony tunes were all there. And Tilton is there, with a few stations, but carrying on. Whatever else you may say about him, he can't be discouraged.

Now he has some little problems. Some idiot woman, who used to be in this congregation, that gave him a lot of money, because he said that he could pray her husband out of his illness, and that he would be healed. And he kept sending the letter to her, such that: "If you'll continue your faithfulness in the support of this ministry, God is going to heal your husband." The problem was he was already buried. At this point, the woman should have said, "Oh thank God. I'm so glad to hear that. When will you go to the cemetery with me? I'd like to have him raised." Now, this is shamelessness. And here's what the devil is throwing out at you. And the religious world eats this up. What shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?

I guarantee you that the whole world of our society is against us as Christians. And a lot of Christians are against us as Christians. What are they against us for? Because we're saying that the grace of God has made us a new breed of human beings. And we are not perfect, but we are nobody's patsy. And we're not intimidated by any of you who think you're superior, because we know doctrine. And there's not much about the basic principles of doctrine that you can teach us, or the people of our congregation. They're in the know. And they know, most of all, that when they stumble and fall, how to get up; make the confession; forget it; and, move on. Why? How can they do such a thing? It might have been a terrible sin. It's because they know the grace of God, and they know what grace does. Grace wipes it all out. Grace wipes everything back out. And we're back on top, ready to go. It's only when we don't think that the grace of God is what it really is.

So, here's Satan, making fool to believers who don't know their heritage – what they are. No sin is too great for the plan of God. You cannot eliminate yourself ever from Christian service. But Satan eggs on the no-doctrine type into pseudo-spirituality; self-crucifixion; legalisms; the welfare state; and, everything that goes with it.

Romans 8:31: "If God be for us." The truth of the matter is that that "if" is a first-class condition. That means that it's true. God is for us. And you Christians, who don't appreciate the grace of God, are the ones who are singing the blues. You're singing the blues: "Nobody likes me." And most of the time, when I hear somebody say that, I can understand it: "Nobody likes me. Why do I have the troubles? Why do these things happen to me?" You do something wrong, but the grace of God is not going to let you down. Who can be against us? Nobody. Who can really oppose us in God's plans? Nobody: Grace, grace, greater than all our sin.

Our job is to be faithful to our calling. It's not going to be easy. And the carnal Christians who don't like us – they're going to make it tough for us. They will misrepresent us. They will abuse us. And they will take great satisfaction in seeing us have our hard times. But don't get your eye on yourself. We serve the living God. And Satan and his minions who attack us are attacking the Christ that they cannot reach – opposition from Satan.

However, here's the provision of God. Romans 8:32, "Who did not spare His Own Son, but delivered Him up for us all. How will he not also with Him freely give us all things?" God has provided you with salvation. He will now keep His word. He will not let you down. He will not fail you. It is impossible for Him to change. God provided the most first when He gave us salvation. Everything else in grace is easy for Him. He did not spare His son. He delivered Him up to remove the issue of His demands for death. And He's done it all for us. How great it is to be a child of God! And when the believer is out of fellowship, there's always a way back.

So, please try to appreciate who you are in Christ. Please try to appreciate the potential that you have. And you take it one step at-a-time. I would like to have all of the things that we need to do our ministry, and to do it well, and to not have to be burdened with the things that we must have if we're even going to survive. That would be nice. But I do know this – that I'm not some yo-yo out in the mass of humanity. I'm part of the new species. That puts me above all the rest of humanity. And all I have to do is act accordingly. I have to learn the Word of God. I have to store doctrine in my human spirit. And I have to stay in temporal fellowship by constantly confessing known sins. And then I have to be open to the gentle leadings of the Spirit of God. Time is short. The Lord is at hand. And the time has come for us to devote ourselves to our great calling, to our great potential in Christ.

The next time you look at yourself in the mirror, salute yourself, and say, "Hail, great one – great one in Christ, the new species of human being. What a wonderful thing God's grace can do for anybody. He does it to bring us into salvation. And then He carries us to the mountain peaks for the rest of our lives. Be appreciative of the fact that he has made it possible for you to have gravitas. Be the dignity. Be the dignified one that the grace of God has permitted you to be. The average human being that you deal with has no dignity. They're a clownish lot, and we must pity them. But you have dignity. Teach your children to walk with dignity, and to do so because of who they are in Christ.

Dear Father, we thank you for this day, and we pray that we have learned something very significant about Your grace and Your provisions.

Dr. John E. Danish, 1995

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