I enjoy this camp because I find this more a very cozy atmosphere. I find that some of our other camps are getting so big that one doesn't know who is who in the camp. Already in our last camp in Hong Kong, the camp was so big that I seem to know only a fraction of the people. I feel a bit, if the other people feel lost in the camp, then I also felt lost in there. There are so many people going and coming, I don't even know who. And as I said, a large proportion of the people I didn't even recognize because I hadn't been in Hong Kong that long on this particular occasion. And there are some who are regular in the church that I still haven't had a chance to talk to, not to mention so many friends and visitors who come to the camp. So I find a camp of this size is very cozy, very comfortable. You have a chance to talk to one another, a chance to know one another. So I really enjoy this, you can say, family camp. We would like all camps to be family-sized, but when they reach rather big, when they become very big, the sense of family begins to be a little bit scattered.
Now, we also have in this camp a very important subject, the new creation. And this subject is so big, such a vast subject, that I was sitting there trying to ponder, how am I going to even do justice to this subject? And I got, as I looked through here, I have seven points, and I'm looking at my watch and I'm thinking, how do we get through seven points? Now, normally, as you know, I don't like to preach in point form, because it makes the whole thing sound like a lecture, and I really don't want to be giving a lecture. I really want to speak the word of God from my heart. But in view of the vastness of the subject, I'm a bit forced this time to go into point form, and try to help you all, and all of us, to remember more clearly what is here.
And the reason why it's important to remember is because this subject deals with the very foundation of the Christian life. And we are already familiar enough with the problem, that there are so many Christians today in the church who don't understand the basics of salvation. And when we are talking about the new creation, we are talking about the basics of salvation. And I'm hoping, by the grace of God, that nobody will leave this camp and say, I still don't know what it means to be a Christian. In which case, I feel that I would have failed the task that has been given to me. So let us proceed on this vital subject. And I hope, and I ask of you, for the sake of your own eternal well-being, to truly concentrate and grasp what the word of God is saying to you and to me.
First point. New creation. The first point is, I want to talk about this word creation. Because there's no use going on without even knowing what creation means. What's the use of talking about new creation, when we don't even know what the word means. And sometimes we assume that we know what a word means, when in fact we didn't really understand what it means. What does creation mean? Before we can talk about a new one, let's just talk about creation. What is your concept of creation?
We use many words today very vaguely. We speak of an artist, for example, as being creative. What is meant by that? We mean that this artist produces pictures or works of art, which are not a copy of somebody else's production, but is original. Creative means something new that hasn't been seen before. We say, oh, this is a new work of art. It presents an artistic concept that nobody has thought of. And therefore we use this word creation. An artist who composes a piece of music is creative. This piece of music has never been written before. Nobody has heard it before. It is a new work. It is a creative work. In this sense, one can fairly say that the word creation is used rather loosely, but there is some truth in it.
Now the question is, what does creation mean in the Bible, in the word of God? Because it is vital, as I say, for our understanding of what salvation means. Now creation in the Bible means to bring into existence something that never existed before. Not just a new idea, as an artist may have. Not just a new painting. Not just a new song. Which is also creative, and it's true. But something, the music existed before. So there are some elements. The words and the music, all these things existed before. But it is rearranged in a new form. And we call this creation. But that is not the biblical meaning of creation.
Creation in the Bible means to bring into existence something which never existed before in any of its parts. Now if there was no such thing as music, the artist could not compose new music. There had first to be certain elements present, which the artist merely rearranged or manipulated into a new form. That is not creation in the biblical sense. Creation in the biblical sense is bringing something into existence which never existed before. And there is a technical term in theology for this. Theologians like to use Latin a lot for some unknown reason. But it becomes a technical term, as in many other things. You have technical terms. And the technical term in theology is creatio ex nihilo. If you know English, nothing difficult to understand. The English word creation comes from this Latin word creatio, which means to create. Ex we also know. We use the word exit, to go out. Ex means out of. But nihilo is also found in English, in the word nil. Nil means nothing. Zero. So creatio ex nihilo means creation out of nothing.
Now this is vital for you to understand. Why do I say it's vital? Quite simply because becoming a Christian, as Paul has put it here, is to become a new creation. That means to say, when you become a Christian, you are not just being sort of refashioned. A kind of reproduction of something that has existed. Like in England, what we do sometimes is those of us who cannot afford new fancy cars, what we do is we buy an old piece of junk. And we calculate a bit and we take it to the body shop. We call it body shop. This is not where you build muscles. Body shop is where they fix up broken down car bodies. And then they put it in there and they spray the thing all over again and put some shiny bits of metal on it. And this piece of old junk comes out. Ooh, looking beautiful. Yeah. They've covered all the rust spots. They put fiberglass and covered the dents. And they re-spray the thing and it comes out beautiful. The old junk has now put on a new appearance.
And then you turn on the engine and the thing is puttering along. The body looks good. The engine doesn't work too well. So you think, ah, this one is still not good enough. So now you go to an engine shop. And what they do is they give you a reconditioned engine. That is, they take the engine out and they regrind the valves. They may do some work to the piston, the piston rings, maybe replace the piston rings, rebore the thing and so on. And so, you've got a reconditioned engine. Reconditioned means it's an old engine that has been redone, refurbished. Is that what becoming a Christian is about? You come to the Lord and the church is a kind of a body shop. And you come in here and you're all in a bad shape with a knock in here and a dent over there and some rust over there. And the paint falling off here. And we say, no problem. Come in here. Come in here. We'll fix you right up. And so you have the co-workers give them polish, spray them down. And it looks good. Okay, you can go now. Nice body job, it's called.
What is becoming a Christian? Does it mean, you see, here I said it's fundamental to a correct understanding of biblical teaching. Becoming a Christian then, is it like I go down to the street and I see an old tramp there. He's all dirty and the beard is sticking out of him. His hair is a mess and so on. And so I grab him in here. And what do I do? I put him in the bathtub. Give him a good wash. Lysol soap. Rub him down. Clear all the bugs away. Now he's nice and clean. No teeth. No teeth, no good. So I get him a denture. Ah, stick a denture in. Oh, beautiful. When he smiles, oh, beautiful. Before when he smiled, there was a toothless smile. Now you have a real, polished, beautiful, shiny teeth coming out. Hair is getting thin on top. No problem. You go to the wig shop. Ah, new wig on top. Whew, you look at this man. A new man. New man? Yes, in a sense, a new man. But that is not what salvation is about.
I'd like you to understand this thing very clearly. Now I'm illustrating this because this is the kind of notion that many people have. Good to go to church. They wash you up. Put some makeup on your face. All the wrinkles disappear. Do your hair over again. Nice, nice looking person. Before he went into church, he looked rather ugly. But now he comes out. Hmm, good job. Yeah, nice. So if we move this to the moral plane, then you have a sinner who's doing bad things all the time. Ah, he's all the time doing, he's gambling, he's drinking, he's into drugs, he's into all kinds of other unpleasant things. And what then is the church? The church is a rehabilitation center for drug addicts. No, sin addicts. Okay, so here comes the sinner. And we are the specialists. We put on our white coats. And we examine the sinner carefully. Diagnose his case. Yes. You're in a bad shape, my friend. We got to fix you up in this place. Hmm. We're going to give you a good spiritual wash. We're going to give you a nice spiritual wig. And some spiritual dentures. And we are going to look like a new man. Indeed he will. He will look like a new man.
The trouble with reconditioned cars. The trouble with rehabilitated down and outs. The trouble with morally revamped sinners. Deep down inside, they are the same person. I'm wondering if you can get what I'm driving at. But the point is, at this point, most people don't understand the picture anymore. They still think that becoming a Christian is getting rid of sin, sin being understood as bad moral habits. And therefore, becoming a Christian is learning to get rid of bad moral habits so that you become a decent guy.
And our church in Liverpool is very interesting. We had a Sunday school. Most of our other churches today don't have Sunday schools. But our church had quite a thriving Sunday school. We had to go around with a church minibus to pick up all the children from the various homes to the Sunday school. And after Sunday school, we send them back home. Invite the parents to come to church. No, no, no. Not for us. No, no, no. But the children? Yeah, yeah. It's good. They go to church. It's good. We are trying to think, you don't want to go to church. Why do you want your children to go to church? Oh, it's very good for them. They learn good habits in church. They become nice people. The concept of the church that they have is a kind of moral re-education center. They don't want moral re-education. They think they are quite all right already. But these kids, yeah, this new generation. They're always into drugs and bad habits. Now, you teach them good habits. When they grow up, they won't go on to drugs. The church is very good. And so our minibus is going around picking up lots of kids and bringing them to church.
This is the concept that even some Christians have of what it means to be a Christian. And then what happens? You find that your spiritual life, so-called spiritual life, maybe you should have called it moral life. Maybe most people don't know the difference between spiritual and moral. There is a connection between the two. But they are not one and the same thing. Are you simply a morally revamped, refurnished, reconditioned kind of Christian? Or are you a new creation? That is the question we got to get clear in this camp. Otherwise, I say we have failed of the purpose. I am not in the business of rehabilitating people with bad moral habits. God called me to preach the gospel, which has to do with a new creation.
What does creation mean? Let's get it one more time into our minds very clearly. It is not a re-education, becoming a Christian. It is not that before you were not religious, now you become religious. I am not in the business of turning people into religious fanatics. Paul tells us, the whole New Testament tells us, becoming a Christian is to become a new creature. Now remember the definition, creatio ex nihilo. You have learned a bit of Latin this morning. That means that when you become a true Christian, not just a morally reconditioned person, it means that you are a person with a totally new life. Which means, the life that you now have in you, as a true Christian, is a life you never had before. It is something totally new. It never existed before. It was brought into being by God's power, and by his power alone.
Now please, I beg of you, to distinguish this thing very carefully. Because, if being a Christian is simply a matter of re-education, moral re-education, I think that some good non-Christians can do that job. It doesn't need us Christians to do it. We should simply call the church, frankly and honestly, without any nonsense and beating around the bush, we should call the church a moral re-education center. And I suppose that some churches are not even that. They are simply a social center, where all the aunties come together to drink tea, and the young people come together to play badminton. It is a social center. And you attract the people in, in fact, shamelessly on those grounds. Come to our church, because we have wonderful badminton facilities. What is this when we are preaching? Why don't they just call themselves Christian Social Center? Maybe you can drop the word Christian as well.
Somebody said we have today the YMCA. Forgot what it means, YMCA. It stands for Young Men's Christian Association. And I pointed out before, the interesting thing about it, that the only part that is true about this name is the A at the end. Association. Association. It is neither for young men, because anybody of any age can join in there. And of course, it is very flattering to my ego to consider that I am still qualified for the YMCA. It is not even for men. And you just go down to Singapore, where I was staying in the YMCA, and you just see all the women walking in and out of there. So you are thinking, YMCA? What happened to the M? As far as C, the C has disappeared so far, you don't know what is left that is Christian. In fact, if you want to go into YMCA, you can learn judo in there, and you can learn Shaolinquan, Chinese boxing in there, and you can learn creative pottery and so on. But everything else you can learn. I don't know where the Christian part comes into this. So maybe they should just drop all the YM and C and just call it A. Capital A. That's it. We are an association.
But the problem is, brothers and sisters, that that is true not only for the YMCA, it is true to a great extent of the churches as a whole. They have seemed to have gone into social activity. They have gone into doing good deeds, which is fine. I have nothing against good deeds. We have done our share of good deeds too as a church. But this is not the primary purpose of the church. When the Vietnamese and Cambodian refugees were desperately in need, the boat people had nowhere to go. Our church in Montreal was one of the first to sponsor 10 people to Canada, covering all their expenses and their costs. I am not running down our commitment to the poor and the needy. In fact, we established a remarkable reputation with the Canadian government and had received a letter from the Minister of Interior at the time, expressing appreciation and thanks to the church for sponsoring so many refugees. No, no, I am not against any of these things. But this is not the primary reason why the church is there.
Now, ask yourself this. Are you a new creation? Without watering down the word creation, when you became a Christian, did God give to you a new life which you never had before? Not a refashioning of your old life, a resuscitation of the old life, a polishing up of the old life. Did you receive a totally new life? That is the first point on creation.
Let's get quickly to the second point, which follows straight from the first point. Creation from nothing. Creatio ex nihilo. By definition, in this sense, it is not something that man can do. Man can simply manipulate existing materials, existing things, like so-called musical creation. The notes of music have been all there. The composer is simply rearranging the notes around, readjusting them into new shapes and new forms, but the notes are always there. Our so-called creation, or inventions, or discoveries, are simply remanipulations, rearrangements, of existing things. Man can do that.
And I am not preaching a gospel which can be accomplished by man. When we speak about creation out of nothing, it is possible only by the power of God. I glory in the gospel, as Paul says, because it is the power of God unto salvation. If this is a purely human activity, even though it is a good activity, a nice social activity, it is good that people play badminton, that they can learn some judo, some boxing, some Shaolinquan. I have been into some of this myself. I have nothing against these things. But these are purely human things. It is also good to give people Bible studies, in the sense of telling people how to be decent people, be kind to other people, be nice to other people. Why not be nice? Be kind. Sure, I have nothing against being kind and being nice. But that is not the gospel.
The gospel is the power of God. To bring into your life something that was never there before. That nobody could bring it in. Neither I nor anyone else could have brought this new life to you. It is the power of God that makes a new person out of you. Now sometimes, and here is where the problem is, it is hard to distinguish between the two. You go to church for a while and you become a nice guy. And you go home and your mummy says to you, oh, sunny boy, ever since you've gone to church, you've become a nice boy. I like what I see. Hmm? Oh, church is a good place to go.
My friends, brothers and sisters, if that is the case, I think every religion will tell you to do good. And everybody knows that. Any religion will tell you to do good. The Buddhists will tell you to be a nice guy too. And so will the Muslims, I hope. Though they are busy killing one another off in the Middle East, in Iran and Iraq. I don't know what happened to the nice guy bit, but anyway, most religions tell you to become decent people. Decent people. And Christians are quite good at killing one another too, as they are doing in Ireland. As we all know to our shame. What happened to the nice guy bit?
I am not a nice guy. At least in the eyes of many people, this guy is not a nice guy. I don't even pretend to be a nice guy. Because the truth is not always nice. When somebody tells you, what about the sins you committed the other day? Why? It is my private business. You are not a nice guy. You should not say that. Talking about people being sinners. I have never heard that anyone is regarded as a nice guy for talking about sin. Talk about other pleasant subjects. Employ some psychology. As some of our pastors in North America are doing. According to them, sin is negative. One should not talk about negative things. Think positively. And if you think positively, you don't think about sin. You just forget about it. Sin is a problem you just put out of your mind. You just think positive.
So when people come into church, what do you do? Oh, what you do is say, you are wonderful people. Each one of you are such lovely people. Oh, you are beautiful people. And I keep saying more adjectives and you are feeling better all the time. It was so good to come to church. So nice. I'm feeling better now. You must have more self-esteem. Did your boss trample down on you in that workplace? Shame on him. Because you are a wonderful person and nobody has the right to trample on you. I am not kidding, brothers and sisters. I really am not kidding. I have heard this kind of messages with my own ears. And I am thinking, you know, my friend, pastor, whatever his name was, he is a well-known pastor in North America. You know how much money he can get into the church to build his churches by this kind of preaching? Everybody loves it.
Do you like to be told that you are a sinner? Of course not. That's negative thinking. But you love to be told what a nice person you are, what potentials you have. You are such a wonderful person. And I keep preaching like this and all the crowds come. I mean, it's so refreshing. But after my preaching, people are so tired. Oh, I was feeling good when I went to church and after I listened to him preach, I was so exhausted. He hammered me through a whole one hour. I barely managed to crawl out of the church door.
I remember a professor from Taiwan, he came to our church once, the first time in Montreal. He said to me, I can't take this. I'm never going to go back to the church again. He came out all black and blue spiritually. He said, I can't take this. I'm exhausted after this one message. And he told me, he said, I determined after listening to your first message, I'm never going to come back to your church again. He said, I don't know what happened. The next week, somehow the power of the Lord got hold of me and dragged me back for another beating. He said, I got another beating at the next message. I said, this time, really I'm not going back. I had enough of this. And the next week he was back again for the third round. A 15 round boxing match, this one was. He got black eyes, blue everywhere, swollen.
That's why I say, the gospel that Paul preached, the gospel that I preach, the gospel that above all my Lord and Master preached. The gospel is not acceptable to the natural man. When has it ever been acceptable to the natural man to take up his cross, the instrument of his own execution, and follow after Jesus? Such a message has never been acceptable. That's why I said last night, anyone who can accept such a message, it is the power of God that accomplishes it. Men cannot talk anyone else into this. And I have no intention of talking anyone else into it. For if anyone became a Christian because of my persuasion, because of anything of so-called eloquence or human wisdom on my part, I have done the gospel a disservice. But the power of God grabbed hold of that professor and he came back week after week until the power of the gospel, the power of God made him a new person. And by the way, he had been a Christian for many years already. He had been a Christian leader in Taiwan and I think many of you from Montreal will know who I'm talking about. He became a new person. I was very moved because he's a Christian leader in Taiwan, well known in the university in which he teaches. And many months later, he was coming faithfully to church and many months later I asked him, would you like to share at a prayer meeting? You know what answer he gave me? He said, no, I cannot. Not that I'm not willing. He said, but I have now only a baby. I'm only a baby. I cannot share anything. Once I thought I knew what it was to be a Christian. But now I'm not fit to share the gospel. He had been born anew. He had now become a new creature and he was in the process of growing. And he told me, I cannot share. Not now. Wait till I'm a little more mature. I was very touched, very moved in my heart by his humility. The power of God can accomplish this and only the power of God.
I must stop to sidetrack for a very brief moment. You remember the first message that Brother Andrew preached. He started off by saying the new creation he thought in terms of a baby. In other words, he was bringing in regeneration. And some people sitting there may have thought the subject of this camp is a new creation, not regeneration. You got on the wrong track, my friend. In fact, he was not on the wrong track. He was quite correct. Because in the Bible, regeneration and new creation are simply two different metaphors for the same thing. When a person is born, this life did not exist before. This person never existed before. The Bible does not know of any doctrine of reincarnation, by the way. Now let's get this clear because there are some Christians who are not very clear about this. You did not exist in some shape or form before as another human being 300 years ago and now you have crept back into the world in a new shape and a new form. Or maybe you were a cow before but thanks to karma or whatever it is you are now a human being and hopefully next time you will still be a human being and not going back to becoming a cow. Or you might end up as a mosquito if you have bad karma.
So, the Bible knows of no doctrine of reincarnation. You are, when you were born, you as a person were entirely unique. You never existed before. You came now into existence for the first time. That's wonderful. This life that you received was simply transmitted from God through your parents to you but it is God's work in your life. I said yesterday I greatly believe in ancestor worship. I didn't say ancestors, plural. I said ancestor, one. And if some of you thought you knew scripture very well and you said, ah, you made a mistake because God is creator and therefore not father in the sense of being an ancestor. That's wrong. Because in scripture these two metaphors, creation and birth are interchangeable.
Let me give you one example from Psalm 90. We don't have time to go into details but to show you how creation can be spoken of as birth. Psalm 90. This, we just read verses 1 and 2 because it's a wonderful psalm. I'd like to read it to you just for the sake of the beauty and power of this psalm in worshipping the Lord. Psalm 90 verses 1 and 2. Lord, thou hast been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the mountains were born. Notice, he doesn't use the word created here. Before the mountains were born or thou didst give birth to the earth and the world. All creation is spoken of as being born not created here because the two metaphors are interchangeable. Even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God. Only you could do it. Only God's power could accomplish such a thing.
And that is why the new birth and the new creation are simply interchangeable terms. And that is why though Adam is created by God, in the Bible he is also called a son of God. You see, creation, he wasn't born physically or literally but by God. He was created by God. But because these two metaphors are interchangeable, Luke can speak of Adam under the inspiration of the Spirit as Adam, son of God. That is why I say I believe in ancestor worship. Worship our ancestor who gave us birth in the first place through Adam, son of God, from whom we all came. And so if somebody says, let's worship ancestors, you say, good, let's all get on our knees and worship our ancestor. We should worship our ancestor every day. What do you mean once a year, twice a year? Shameful. Every day we worship our ancestor. So anytime they want to say, oh, let's do it. Let's do it. Worship. Let's get on our knees and worship our ancestor. Yeah, even use this sound. Wonderful. From everlasting to everlasting. Our God. You are the one worthy of worship and adoration. Think on it. You will see the wonder of this matter. The problem with the world today is that people have not been worshipping their ancestor. That's why we are in such trouble. They worship all the wrong objects.
I'm a very rude person sometimes. I told you, being Christian doesn't always mean nice. Because I was going out with my daughter Grace and in Hong Kong in that apartment that level where we stay four out of six households are burning joss sticks at the front door. Burning joss sticks to some god that they hope will make them rich. And Grace was looking at this joss stick which is placed over an empty biscuit tin and so I jokingly said what a pity one has to burn incense to the god of the biscuit tin. Very rude person. I hope you forgive me. I couldn't resist the ridiculousness of this whole thing. Hoping to get rich by a god who could only afford to live above a biscuit tin. I also saw that these gods have a very poor appetite or at least they must be half starved to death because the Hong Kong people only remember from time to time to give some leftover noodles to the spirit out there and occasionally he even manages to get one or two oranges. I mean his vitamin C level is quite low. What are we worshipping? Spirits? Ancestors? What are we talking about? God. Only one is one ancestor worthy of our worship. God and Father from whom every family, as we read yesterday in Ephesians chapter 3 verse 14, every family on earth is named. Verse 15, to be named means to come into a new existence. Every family in this world, your parents and my parents, your ancestors and my ancestors, all came from the one ancestor. And I'm not talking about Adam but about his father, God of all gods, Father of all fathers. Don't you think it right that we should worship him? And have I exaggerated when I said that the problems we have today is because man does not worship their one ancestor?
Let us rush on quickly. We said we got seven points, covered only two points and my time is almost gone. Maybe I'll send the tape of the remaining part of this message to you sometime. Thirdly, this creation, this new creation. The second point which I have to cut short and put briefly is God's power. We are not saved by any effort of our own. We are not saved by our achievements by trying to be good people. New creation means that it is God's power and his power alone that saves us. Anyone who thought that I preached the salvation by works has obviously never listened to my preaching or if they have they have not understood what has been said. Through all the years I have put my trust in a gospel that is the power of God unto salvation. I have put my faith only in a God who has given me new life. The God of the new creation.
Thirdly, very quickly, and I'm going to make this point very brief that we must rush on. This new creation, why do we say new creation? Because the word creation already means something new so what's the point of talking about a new creation? Seems repetitive. A new new thing as it were. A redundant phrase. No. Paul speaks about a new creation because he is comparing this creation to the old one. To the one that material creation that now exists round about us. It is in this comparison of new and old. The old material creation is also creation brought into being out of nothing as Paul says in Romans chapter 4 and elsewhere. But this new creation is in comparison to and in contrast to the old. And this new creation, brothers and sisters, think on this, it's wonderful. It is a mystery.
Now here I have to explain another word which is little understood by most people. The word mystery in the New Testament occurs many times. This new creation is a mystery. What does that mean? I'm not going to read all the verses now but we'll turn just to one. First Corinthians chapter 2 verse 7. First Corinthians chapter 2 verse 7, which I'll read to you. And it reads like this. Perhaps I'll start from verse 6. Yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature, a wisdom however not of this age nor of the rulers of this age who are passing away. Verse 7, but we speak God's wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined or pre-planned before the ages to our glory. How much God loves us that he wants to glorify us. He pre-planned this. Predestined simply means a plan determined before the creation of the world. Something determined before. It doesn't mean that you are predestined. It means the plan is predestined. I have already expounded this elsewhere. I will not go into it. But I'm stressing this word mystery.
Now a mystery the Bible means that it is something hidden. As it says here, hidden. Now if something is hidden it means it is not obvious to your eye. You cannot see it. The physical creation is visible. You can see it all around you. It's not hidden. But the spiritual new creation is hidden. You have to have spiritual perception to see it. That's why it's called a mystery. A mystery here does not have to do with detective novels. It has to do in its definition in the Bible with something that is hidden and therefore can only be known by God's revelation. And it is now revealed in the gospel. And even when it is revealed you may not see it because your eyes are blinded by sin. You can't see it.
# The New Creation (Part 2)
People sitting here may not even know what I'm talking about. So there is an old creation that is everywhere visible. There is a new creation that is hidden. And you must search for this new creation if you want to have it. I can develop on this point a great deal. Because this is a very important point in scripture. The Lord Jesus spoke about the parable of the hidden treasure. A treasure that is hidden in the world. Found by God and hidden by God in the world. There is also the parable of the hidden pearl. Which only the merchant with a trained eye discerned. Or was granted to discern.
The gospel, Paul says, has been hidden through all the ages. It is now revealed. But you need to have eyes to see it. Do you see it? Can you discern it? If you can, and many people, it is so wonderful to me, how they can discern it. It is like this professor I mentioned. He was beaten up black and blue by the word of God. But why did he come back for another beating? You say, is he some kind of a fool who enjoys being beaten up? And so next week he comes back for another beating? No, no. Because God's power to save involves his power to reveal the truth to you. And this professor said to me, I realized that all along in my heart, I was not loving the truth. And this is why when I listened to the message of the power of God in salvation, I was so offended. It hurt me. It hurt my pride. I didn't want to come back. But God helped me to see that this is the truth. And if I don't come back next week, I'm running away from the truth. I must come back. And so he got another beating from the word of God.
The Bible says the word of God is like a sharp two-edged sword that penetrates into the heart. It wounds in order to heal. It kills in order to give life. But you see, it is hidden. And many people can't see it. New creation, where? But he was granted to see. Can you see? Can you see that what the gospel is saying is true or not? I cannot talk you into believing that it is true. And even if I could, I wouldn't want to do it. God forbid that anyone would be persuaded to become a Christian because of my argumentation, my skillful reasoning. I don't even want to do it. That's what Paul meant in 1 Corinthians 2. When I came to you, I came not with the eloquence of men. Not with the wisdom of men. To persuade you to become a Christian. No. I came to you and what did I preach? I preached the power of God to save. I preached Jesus and him crucified.
It takes me to the next point very quickly. The fourth point. Where can we find this hidden new creation? Where can we find it? There is only one place that you will ever find the new creation. The new creation can be found only in him. The theologians speak of the Bible, the New Testament in particular as Christocentric. The theology is basically Christocentric. The theology is basically Christology. The new creation is to be found in him. The heart of the gospel is a person. The person is Jesus. To be saved, the new creation is to be found in him. To be in Christ is to be a new creation. If any man be in Christ. This is the title theme right here in your cover sheet here. 2 Corinthians 5:17. If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation. You cannot be a new creation outside of Christ. This new life. This power of God to save is found only in Jesus. Are you in Jesus? Have you seen the hidden marvelous wisdom of God? Why it's hidden will become clear perhaps in a little while.
I begin to conclude this message. And that is why to become a Christian is to put on Christ. That is to enter into Christ. Does that sound mysterious to you in some way? Mystical language? Not mystical at all. How do I get into Christ? The Bible tells us there are two things. First we believe. Through faith we enter into Christ. This comes out in the Greek. It doesn't come out in the English unfortunately. It says in English generally the translation is believe in Jesus. But the Greek says believe into Jesus. Which means that it is by faith that you enter into Christ. And that is why we are saved by faith. Not by works. Not by our own achievement. We are saved by faith. Because it is by faith that we enter into Christ. And I shall explain this a little bit more in a moment.
Secondly. We enter into Christ through baptism. We are baptized by one Spirit into one body. That is how we enter into Christ. For those of you who are going to be, I do not know how many, one or two, for those of you who will be baptized today, you will this day, thanks be to God, you will this day be given the privilege through baptism to enter into Christ.
Now two things must come together. Faith and baptism. Not baptism alone. Not faith alone. I have to say that on the authority of scripture. But faith expressed in baptism. The commitment of baptism. All this I have expounded on the meaning of baptism elsewhere. I don't go to repeat that either. But this is what the Bible tells us. Twice we have the Greek preposition here. Greek preposition eis. Which means into. So two things. We believe into Christ. And we are baptized into Christ. These are not two separate things. That first we believe into Jesus and then somehow we got baptized again into Jesus. We sort of got out and got baptized again. What's going on? Faith and baptism must come together. If baptism is to be meaningful and if faith is to be meaningful.
In faith, in baptism we make a public commitment. That's why to say, if I believe in Jesus am I saved? The answer is no. Not if that means you have not confessed him publicly. And the way to confess him publicly in the Bible is at baptism. If any man will confess me before men, the Lord Jesus says, I will confess him before my Father. And those who will be baptized today will this day be confessed. Think of it. In heaven today. The Lord Jesus will be confessing you to his Father. Saying this is one of mine. He belongs to me. Or she belongs to me. Oh it's so beautiful. It's so wonderful. Your faith is expressed in the public confession. Baptism. It takes courage to publicly confess the Lord in an open public place. I mean you're not going to be baptized in your bathtub secretly. Sneak behind. Don't let anybody see. And get baptized. Turn on the shower. Otherwise if you don't have a bathtub, the shower will do. Just have one of the co-workers secretly come in and baptize you. No, it's out in a public place. Where did John the Baptist baptize? At the river Jordan. All those crowds standing by. Maybe some are snickering. What's he doing over there? It's too hot. You get dipped in the water. Never mind. What was that beautiful hymn? Let them smile. Let them laugh. Because they have not seen the mystery of the gospel.
So that is. Only in Christ will this new creation be found. Let me rush on. Now comes another vital question. How is this new creation brought into being? How in other words does God create this new creation? Now that is where the comparison with the old creation becomes important. How did God create the old creation? We know the answer to that. We also know the answer to the question about how did God create or how does he now create the new creation? If you look at Genesis, and I'm rushing along so I'm not going to give you a lot of references. I'm afraid that you'll have to do some homework on your own here. But just read Genesis chapter 1 and you'll see it all there for yourself.
The old creation was brought into being through two means. You know what those two means, huh? All of you great Bible scholars who have been going from one Bible study to the next. Down through basic training and intermediate training, all kinds of training. Wow, I must be overflowing with knowledge. But I wonder if you know what are these two things. He created, he brought this creation ex nihilo out of nothing by means of his word. His almighty word. Oh, that's amazing. Just look at Genesis chapter 1. He said, let there be light. And there was light.
The new creation is just the same. Paul uses that picture in Genesis chapter 1 verse 3 and 2 Corinthians chapter 4 and says this. He who said, let light come out of darkness has shone into your hearts. The first word of creation was, let there be light. That's the first word. He brought by his power new creation through his word. What is the word? You've got it in your hand. Did you ever know when you go to a Bible study what you're holding in your hand? How easily we say, this is the word of God. You know what it means? That also is a mystery. So many people use these words. They don't know what it means. A new creation is brought about by the word. Not by an intellectual analysis of the word. But by letting that creative word speak into your heart.
We have some food scientists in our midst. Many members of our full-time teams have studied food science. Oh, you need to know something about food. You know, you ask Boo and Boone and all these experts to tell you all about food. Yeah. Chemical analysis. Look through the microscope. Ah, I've got something in here. Structure of this and that. And some people, when they come to the Bible, they are doing this too. They turn their intellectual microscope on. They're studying the Bible. Let's examine this preposition. Ah, this grammatical construction. Very good. Very good. By all means, study food science. Yes. I mean, I'm talking about spiritual. But that's not going to save you. I mean, if those who study food science never eat, then they can know all the food science they like. They're going to die of starvation all the same. Right? So you can study the Bible through five years of seminary. Six years if you like. Not enough. Do ten more years on it. Analyze every word.
When I studied with my Hebrew professor in England, well, I thought to myself, this man knows the Old Testament Hebrew so well, he can read it backwards. I can only read it forwards and not so well at Hebrew either. But he can read it backwards in Hebrew. You think that because he knows the Bible so well in Hebrew, in the Old Testament, that he'll be saved? I was concerned about this professor of mine. I doubted that he knows what salvation is. You don't become healthy through studying food science either if you don't make use of your knowledge in a practical way.
How does food benefit you? By eating it. The word of God is described as food. Matthew chapter 4 verse 4. The Lord Jesus says in answer to Satan's temptation. Man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that comes out of the mouth of God. Now comes my question. Are you a new creation? Not unless you can truthfully say to me, more importantly, that you can truthfully say to God. I live by every word that comes out of God's mouth. Here written in this New Testament. I live by every word of it. Do you? If you cannot, my beloved, you are deceiving yourself. I don't care how active you are in the church. I don't care how many years of seminary you have studied. And I think few people can match how many years I have studied in this business. And I don't put one bit of confidence in the six years of Bible and theology that I've studied. I know that that will not save me one bit. It will not even help me one bit in terms of being a new creation.
I had in my classmates people today who are pastors in the Anglican Church. They are called vicars. Some of them may be bishops now in the Anglican Church. Sitting in the House of Lords in England. The Lord Bishop of this and that. Many of these will be my classmates. But they are as dead as the wood of this pulpit is dead. I'm sorry to say. Not by way of judgment. Did they study theology? Yes. Just like those who study food science. They know about food. But it won't benefit them until they live by it. They eat it. They eat the food that they study and live by it. You will become a new creation first only if you let the word of God speak into your heart. Day by day. Not putting it in your head. In your heart. That's where it belongs. And first what it will do is that this life-giving word will make of you a new person.
I said there were two things in the old creation. One was God's almighty word. The other is what? The Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit was hovering over the creation. Exerting his power. God's word and God's Holy Spirit always work together. Coming back to theology. There is a term in theology that is called, in and with the word. The Lutherans love to use this expression. It simply means that if you try to separate the Spirit from the word and study it intellectually, that word will kill you. But if the Holy Spirit is working in and with the word, it will bring you life. There will be more theologians in hell, proportionately speaking, compared to all the other Christians. Great will be their condemnation. I fear and tremble before the Lord. And can only say Lord have mercy upon me. I'm not condemning them. I have to be numbered as one of them. But the point is, I want to let his word speak to my heart. I want to live by every word he says.
Now when you eat food, what happens? Normally after the meal, the work of eating your meal was so exhausting that your arm is sore at the end of the meal. Your jaws are tired. You are exhausted. Are you? No. Then why do you find the Bible study so difficult? Or is it that by the end of the meal you are snoring away over your dish. Snoring soundly asleep. Somebody says, I study my Bible, oh I fall asleep. Did you ever fall asleep at your meal? You must be in a very bad physical condition if you fell asleep at your meal. This means there is something wrong about the way we study the word of God. We use the word study. It bothers me a bit. It makes it sound very intellectual. I have spent too much time studying the word. I must live by the word.
Now when I eat a meal, even if I am very tired, I never find eating my food exhausting. Study is very exhausting for most of us. But eating food is very refreshing. No matter how tired it is. To say, hey, let's go out and have a meal. Oh, what a refreshing idea. And while you eat, your energy is coming back. You are very tired. But soon you are well pumped up again. New energy. New dynamic. New power. Coming through this food. The blood sugar level is coming up. Then why when you study the Bible is it so tasteless? Why when you study the Bible you are falling asleep? There must be something wrong. And you say you are a new creation?
It's true. When I was a young Christian, I had trouble with the Authorized Version. I was given my Bible by a friend. And the only Bible that was given to me was Authorized. It's very old English. English of 360 or 70 years ago. I had trouble understanding the Bible. I said what does this mean? What kind of sentence is this? I don't understand this thing. I'm having a hard time with this. Sometimes there are reasons. We want to eat this food. But the shell is a bit too tough on us. I mean it's a bit hard on our teeth. We don't know how to eat this food. We don't know how to open it. It seems that the food is presented to us in a package we don't know how to open. But that's not the way it should be.
When I got the new translation that was given to me later on, I said, oh, this one is so easy to understand. Ah, praise the Lord. Now I can understand this thing. But even in those days, when I found it hard to understand, I still determined to study the word of God. I want to let it speak to my heart. And sometimes when I could not understand, partly because of my spiritual dullness and partly because of my trouble with the old English, I knelt down on the concrete floor and I said, Lord, I am not going away until you feed me out of your word. I'm going to kneel here. I'm your child, remember. And I'm hungry. I'm hungry. And is there a father or a mother who says, my child is hungry, I'm not going to give you any food? Here, take a walnut. A child is trying to chew on the walnut. He can't manage. Too bad. You're so silly. Go find yourself somewhere. Learn to crack the walnut next time you have food to eat. No parent deals with us like this. But I knelt there and I said, Lord, please, I am hungry. Feed me from your word. And he's been feeding me ever since. Ah, wonderful.
What does the psalmist say in Psalm 1 verse 2? In thy word, O Lord, do I meditate day and night. Why do you want to meditate day and night? It's because he loves the word of God. He delights in it. He says later in the Psalms, he says, your word is sweeter than honey to my taste. So delicious to my taste. Is that your experience? Oh, no, no. I have a hard time understanding the word. The problem is that you have been doing it the wrong way. Look at this word and let it speak to your heart. And everything, once it's speaking to your heart, will do wonderful things. If you don't understand, ask the Holy Spirit to teach you. Let the Holy Spirit open it up to you. That doesn't mean you don't need human teachers. But even if you have a good teacher, you will still not understand without the Holy Spirit. You may have the best teacher in the world. But without the Holy Spirit, you will still not understand.
Well, how am I going to finish all this? Let me then try to close as quickly as I can and cut out some of these things. So let us close with one more point and conclude on this point. I have said that we enter into Christ through faith. And so I have one more task left. And that is to say, what does faith mean? If I'm going to become a new creation, and this new creation is found only in Jesus, and therefore if I want to become a new creation, I must enter into Jesus by faith.
First of all, faith means that you have a choice. If there is faith, there is also unbelief. If there is belief, there is also unbelief. Now this is to do with the mystery that I spoke about. God has hidden the gospel. You see just how much you really want it. Somebody who really wants something is going to seek for it. And the Lord Jesus says, seek and you shall find. Now if it's not hidden, you don't have to seek. The very word seek implies that it's hidden. And therefore, there is this difference between the old and the new creation. We were given our physical lives through no choice of our own. The gift was freely given to us. We didn't have to say yes or no. Some people wished that they had been consulted before they were born. They might not want to be born. But that is foolishness. Your being born is a gift. Your physical life is a gift. A precious gift. But if you make a mess of it, don't blame God for it. Much less, don't blame your parents for it. It's a wonderful gift to have physical life. But how much more wonderful is the gift that God gives you a spiritual life. But this time, he is not going to give it to you without your choice. This time, you have to make the choice. And this choice is the choice to believe or not to believe. God leaves that to you.
Now, when we understand this, what faith is, to translate it into the simplest language, no high technical definition of faith that nobody understands, I will tell you that faith can simply mean yes. It just means yes. Unbelief is a no to God. Faith is yes to God. As simple as that. Let me not make it so complicated. There are volumes written on faith that the average reader would not even understand the terminology that's being used in there. In my past days, I was going to write a doctoral thesis on the meaning of faith. And thanks be to God that God saved me from this foolishness. So I heard a friend today who is teaching at a theological seminary who wrote the thesis that I didn't write. He wrote as his doctoral thesis the meaning of faith. And I can tell you that there are many people who collect their doctorates on the study of the word faith. And I think to myself, has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?
Putting it very simply, and we must preach the gospel in such a way that any simple person who has not gone through a lot of education, and God bless their souls, that they can easily understand. Faith simply means what? It means yes to God. The moment you say, yes Lord, you have faith. Nobody can say yes Lord without faith. Believe me. You cannot say that from your heart. If you are already saying, yes Lord, very quietly, very shyly, but still, yes Lord, you have faith. But if you are saying, no Lord, no Lord, as you are listening to the preaching of God's word, you say, no, no. That means you have rejected the gospel. You have no faith. But as you are listening to God's word, and you are saying, yes Lord, yes. That yes is faith. Faith is simply yes.
I'm not going to go into a lot of details of scriptural references here. Let me just give you one, to show you that I am not preaching out of my own ideas. 2 Corinthians chapter 1. Let me read this to you. 2 Corinthians chapter 1, verses 19 and 20. For the Son of God, Christ Jesus, who was preached among you by us, that is by me and Silvanus and Timothy, was not yes and no, but is yes in him. For as many as may be the promises of God, in him they are yes. Wherefore also by him is our amen to the glory of God through us. Do you understand what he is talking about? Very simple. The gospel I was preaching to you is faith in Christ. It is yes in Christ. Nothing sophisticated. And yet many scholars are baffled by these kind of phrases. It's simple language. I think God wants to speak to fools like us. Like me, I should say. I'm sorry. I would like to be a fool that God may speak to me. Because if I'm too clever and too sophisticated, I can't understand what he's saying. Because God only wants to speak to the fools. And Paul says, we are fools for Christ's sake. I want to be a fool for Christ's sake. The gospel I preached to you, Paul says, is yes in Christ. Faith in Christ. Verse 20. For as many as may be the promises of God, in him they are yes. Wherefore also by him is our yes to the glory of God through us. Amen simply means yes. Did you know that? Whenever you say amen to a prayer, you're simply saying yes. That's all. Nothing fancy about this word. So when I say amen to somebody's prayer, I'm saying yes, Lord. May it be so. I'm giving my faith to it.
That's why I shared once that I love to share this story. Some of you may have heard it two or three times for which I beg your pardon. But it illustrates it. I'm sharing this because Pastor Joe in Toronto, at the time he was in Montreal, we were driving my old car, which really needed to go to the body shop and recondition the engine and so forth. But anyway, he was driving this car and on the way back from Toronto to Montreal, Joe relieved me at the wheel so I could rest a bit in the car. And I said to Joe, I said, Joe, go easy on the car because this car is suffering from old age. I'm not sure we might or may not get back to Montreal because the transmission is falling apart.
So we were going along and sure enough, as we were still within 100 miles of Montreal, the gearbox packed up. Smoke was coming out of the gearbox. Everywhere was smoke. We had to jump out of the car thinking the car was going to catch fire. And we had to stand and finally went off the roadside. The whole gearbox burnt out. In thick smoke, everything went up. So after a time when the smoke cleared, we got back in the car and thought, what are we going to do? We were stuck in the middle of the highway. It was pitch black. It was dark. It was night. Canada is a very big country. Not like here. There's always somebody passing. You get stuck on the highway, it might be a long time before somebody comes by. And anyway, if they came by, what could they do for us? The transmission was burnt out.
So we were sitting in the car, got off on the shoulder of the highway. And so I said to Joe, why not you pray? And we commit this whole matter to the Lord. And so, Brother Joe began to pray. Lord, we commit the situation into your hands. We are only 1.6 kilometers, I think it was, from the next gas station. Will you please grant that this car will drive the remaining 1.6 kilometers to the gas station? I gulped and I thought, oh dear me. What is he saying? What is my dear brother saying? The problem with Joe is he's a mathematician by training. He never studied engineering. He should have studied engineering. And he should know that a gearbox that is burnt out is burnt out. And it's not going to get us another 2 feet down the road, never mind 1.6 kilometers or whatever else.
So after he said, he came to the end of the prayer, he said, Amen. Amen. I was saying, how am I going to say yes to this prayer? How am I going to say yes to this prayer? How do I do? You see, some people just say Amen as a ceremony. Amen. You best not say Amen too fast. Because you might just get what you asked for. I've heard people praying, Lord, break me, smash me, crush me. You know. I thought, you just say Amen to that prayer and you'll see what happens. You will know that God is the living God. You want to be broken, smashed, trampled on? Well then, the next day when you go to the office and somebody is doing it to you, then just keep on saying Amen. Praise the Lord. Praise God. You answer my prayer.
You know, one sister did that. She said she wanted to become a better Christian. So she prayed, Lord, smash me, break me. And the Lord just gave her six months of smashing and breaking. Until she begged the Lord, said, Lord, Lord, I have enough, I have enough, I can't stand it anymore. I know you're the living God. Next time somebody is praying or you are praying, you best be careful before you say yes because God will take you at your word.
Faith is simply saying yes to God's word so that the Holy Spirit can now implement that word into your life. Are you a new creation? You can be this day. What do you have to do? You say to the Lord Jesus, Lord, I say yes to you. You be my Lord. But don't play games with God. The Lord Jesus said, let your yes be yes. If you said yes, let it be yes. Because he will hold you to account. If you say yes and then it's a no. That is why so many Christians say yes and then they're in trouble. All kinds of trouble with God. You know why? Because they said yes but they only meant half a yes. That's why in this church we talk about total commitment. Because that's what Jesus said. Let your yes be wholly yes. Not yes but a little bit no. Total commitment means total yes.
I hope I've made the gospel very clear and very simple for you to understand. So that you too may experience that God is the living God. But you said you didn't finish the story about Joe. I nearly forgot because I thought well after a moment of struggle I'm thinking to myself yes dear brother Joe knows nothing about engineering and about gearboxes. That's why he can pray this kind of prayer. But then I thought to myself you see my so-called knowledge became my stumbling block. Is it too much for God to move this car without a gearbox? With a burnt out gearbox? Is it too much for God to move it another kilometer down the road?
You see we had tried already before he prayed that prayer. I tried. I put the car into gear, stepped on the gas, nothing happened. It wouldn't budge. It's then he said pray. Lord move it to the beginning. So after he prayed that prayer I looked to the Lord and I said is God not the God of the impossible? It is impossible. This is going to be a creation out of nothing. He's going to have to move this car by his power. It's not going to be able to move under its own power. And so I said Amen. Wow that was one of the toughest Amens I can remember saying in my life. I said yes Lord.
Amazing. That car without a gearbox, that is without a functional gearbox, burnt out, you know what it did? It went all the way to the gas station more than one kilometer down the road. And you know what happened? When it got to that gas station and stopped there it would not budge another millimeter. Not one millimeter we could get it to go. But God answered the prayer. He said gas station right? So we were at the gas station right in front of the garage door. We were there. In the same way God will give you a new life. Your engine may be burnt out spiritually. It is non-functional. Death in the Bible, to be dead in sin, by the way death does not mean non-existence in the Bible, it means non-functional. Our car died. Our gearbox was dead. It was non-functional. But the God who creates all things, is anything too difficult for him?
To my mind to this day it is still a mystery. This happened only two or three years ago and every time I think about it I marvel. How can a car without a gearbox move? Talk to any mechanic and ask him to explain this thing. It is incredible. But with God nothing is impossible. If you say yes to him from your heart today you will be a new creation. God will do something in your life as wonderful as bringing creation ex nihilo, out of nothing, from the past. He will bring new life into you and you will know that he is the living God. Let us pray.