Gospel Reward

Good morning. I saw a book at my house the other day and was curious. The title of it was Joy Delivered. And with expectation of this would be a new children's book my wife found, I opened it up and I was surprised by what I found within it. This is a book that is, well, mailed out by Amazon so that you can choose your favorite Christmas gifts. It looks just like a children's book. It has the same kind of graphics. I assume many of you have seen this. At one level, I'm confused. This is Amazon. They're the ones putting the walled stores out of business, and now they're going back to the old Sears way of giving you a catalog. It was a moment of confusion. But then I thought, joy delivered. What a promise. What a promise that there is no way they can fulfill. Christmas is a fantastic time of sharing gifts and we should always be grateful, but to try to squeeze joy out of a wrapped gift will leave you unsatisfied. It doesn't deliver. Christmas is a wonderful season to share things and to pursue joy, but the real joy is in a promise fulfilled by God himself. Christ has come. He destroyed sin, he destroyed death, and he promises joy. It's a time where we've got to fight for that. Because let's face it, all the things of our cultural Christmas are really fun and exciting, especially with kids. But the real focus is on the joy that God provides. We should always be thankful. But we always realize if we're trying to squeeze joy out, we will be disappointed. This morning we're going to be looking at promises. We're going to be looking at promises of God and what we should expect. A healthy relationship has healthy expectations. And so we should know what we should expect from God and what He expects from us. And as we started with Psalm 98, it declares we should sing knowing that He's going to come and judge with justice and righteousness and equity. It's good news that God is going to judge. A world where evil goes unpunished is not a world we want to live in. A world where God does not reward the kind of good things that one might do is not a world we want to live in. This morning we're going to be wrestling with a difficult concept, and so we're going to slow down a few places, but God promises to render to believers at His coming according to our works. We heard it in 1 Corinthians 3. We heard it that there will be suffering, but they can still be saved. There will be an account given for the kinds of works we're trying to do that aren't a becoming of Christ, but they're still salvation. If you go to the book of Ecclesiastes, a great wisdom book, talks about everything is futile and futile and futile and futile. And then we get to Ecclesiastes 12, 13. It's great when a book tells us the end of the matter. The end of the matter. All has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment with every secret thing, whether good or evil. We can also look to 2 Corinthians 5.9, so whether we're at home or away, we make it our aim to please Him, for we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, good or evil. That's not the judgment of, are you saved by the blood of Christ? That's the judgment for if you've been purchased by the blood of Christ, how did you live those purchase moments? Christ bought us. How do we invest the life he bought? This is a weighty matter. Last week we looked at the very difficult tension between we're saved by grace, and then there's effort, and duty, and responsibility. And I want to make sure we hold these tensions properly. Avoid oversimplification. Well, today we're gonna be looking at how we're going to see that our works lead to rewards. Grace leads to works, not the other way around. Grace leads to works. Works lead to reward. We're in 2 Timothy. We have one more sermon for this, a very personal ending. This is the last charge. And the one sentence statement, the one declaration, Obey God's word with expectant hope. If you're looking for just one thing to take away this morning, obey God's word with expectant hope. There's three points. If you're looking for the simple outline, trust, obey, expect. Trust, obey, expect. I just now realized that's toe, T-O-E. If you're looking for a little more detailed outline than trust, obey, expect, trust God's Word, obey God's calling, expect God's reward. Trust God's Word, obey God's calling, expect God's reward. I'm going to go back in 3, 16, and 17, because as we think about the charge, I really want to make sure we understand this charge. And so our first point is going to be doubling back on last week's last point. There's so much to say about the verse, I felt like we left it with a little more to say. Well, a lot more to say. Trust God's Word. Look at chapter 3, verse 16. All Scripture is breathed out by God, and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work." We're going to think about this because the charge is to preach the Word. And here we see the truth of what that Word is. It's a Word that's breathed out by God. Verse 15 told us, it makes you wise for salvation. The only word that God gives that makes us wise for salvation is found in that word, and it can be declared in preaching, it can be declared in evangelism. But the sources are these words. Notice God breathed it out. He produced it. There's another place where we see God breathing something. How did God form man? He took the dust and formed him. Then he breathed life into him. That's the power of God's life source given to us as human beings. In the same way, he breathed these words into existence. And it's important, it's the words. As Scripture speaks, God speaks. Now, the word of God is a bigger category. God has spoken in different ways, right? The father, when Jesus is baptized, says, this is my son. That is the word of God from heaven, from the clouds. And we know that because God recorded it in words. We could say it would be great if God would just write his word in the clouds. Everybody would know that's what it is, but the wind would blow. Why do we want some other kind of words or some kind of revelation when what we have here is a once-for-all faith written? We look at the doctrine of inspiration. That's what the word breathe out really is getting at, and that is the doctrine of inspiration. These words, this book, these 66 books of the Bible are inspired. They're not inspired because we find them inspiring. They're empowered because God produced them. It's our job to sit underneath them because they're God's words. One theologian tried to be clever, as too many try to be. And well, he tried to argue something like, these words are deputized. What God did was he saw, well, this letter by Paul, that's pretty good. I'm going to deputize it. I'm going to empower it. No, that's robbing the very word that God gives about His Word. He doesn't deputize something He likes. He creates the exact words that we need to hear. This is where we get the phrase from last week, verbal. communication plenary every all inspiration inspiration is God giving us these words as the Holy Spirit carried men to provide for us in writing what we need you know there's a reason a marriage license is in writing there's a reason when you have a legal exchange of any kind or a purchase you want in writing It secures it. It solidifies it. Praise God. He's given us the most important thing in writing. Another doctrine that can also be confused is the doctrine of illumination. And this is where the Holy Spirit, who indwells believers, gives us eyes to see. Now, you don't need a decoder ring to read Scripture. It's written in our own language. It has subject, verb, and predicate. We can logically look at the words and the sentences and understand what it means, but illumination is how the Holy Spirit helps us to believe. Because oftentimes our hearts are combating against what our mind understands from Scripture. Inspiration is God giving us these words. Illumination is allowing us to believe and trust. And illumination allows us to see how it applies and convicts. The Holy Spirit doesn't add new revelation. The Holy Spirit lets us see and believe what has been revealed. There's two characteristics of Scripture that we uphold as a church. First, it's authoritative. Because it's from God. They are authoritative. God's Word is authoritative. We listen, because God speaks. The second is that it's sufficient. Sufficient. And there are many things we can say about Scripture, but they're authoritative, so we're always sitting under, and they're sufficient. We don't need to add. We certainly can't subtract. I mean, look! Verse 17. Scripture is profitable. Verse 16. so that the purpose, the man of God, may be complete, equipped for every good work. This is why our service is built around the Word of God. We began with a call to worship. We'll end with a benediction. We've been singing the words of Scripture. We've been reading the Word of Scripture. I pray that you're hearing it preached. Our goal as a church is to make sure we're all sitting under and regularly meditating upon the words together. We're singing those words together. That's a starting point. The whole Bible is authoritative. And as we think about promises, right, we want to make sure we're focused on God has spoken promises to give expectant hope. I'm going to give an unhelpfully too brief summary of some promises. The first promise after sin is to Satan. God says to Satan, for us to hear, someone will be born of Eve who will crush your head. God promises to put an end to our sin and our death. God promised Abraham, I will multiply you. I'll bless all nations through you. I'll give you a son that you can't have. He promised to Moses, I will use you, I will work through you to free my people, and you will be the leader who proclaims the truths of God, and there will be a prophet better than you to come afterwards. He promised to David, one of your sons will reign forever because you've messed up. One of your sons will be the king, and I will be like to him a father, and he will reign forever. He promised to Isaiah, the lamb will lie down with a lion. There will be peace in that lamb. There's a lamb who will take away the sins of the world by taking those sins upon himself. That's a very brief summary. We see the promised conqueror. We see the promised prophet. We see the promised king. We see the promised lamb. And then in Luke's Christmas narrative, Mary's song. You have remembered the words you spoke to Abraham. She's looking back and realizing that what's happening in her womb goes back 2,000 years to what Abraham was promised. The angels declare to the shepherds, good news of great joy for all people. Hebrews if you want to imagine on something for Christmas that four verses Hebrews 1 1 to 4 Long ago God spoke through prophets but now He's spoken through his own son God makes promises. There's 39 books in the Old Testament. They were making promises and They're making promises, and how did Israel function under those promises? Did they wait patiently? Did they wait obediently? No, the whole point of the Old Testament is to see how God is so faithful and how we just flounder around in misery because we don't trust Him. God was not slow. God was building up a glorious plan of salvation for us. God's Word is authoritative, it is sufficient, and let me just walk through the very few promises we've already seen in 2 Timothy. 2 Timothy, chapter 2, verse 7, Paul tells Timothy, think over these things, and the promise is this, Jesus will give you understanding. What a promise. What a promise. Chapter 2, verse 11 has some conditional promises. If we have died with Christ, we will also live with Christ. If we endure, we will reign. A warning promise. If we deny Him, He will also deny us. If we are faithless, He remains faithful. Chapter 2, verse 19, a great comfort. The Lord knows who are His. Chapter 3, verse 1. He promises that in the last days there will be difficulty. And then chapter 3, verse 9, he promises that those troublemakers will not get very far. And then chapter 3, verse 12, he promises that all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. And as we'll see this morning, chapter 4, verse 8, the Lord will return as the just judge and he will give proper awards. God makes promises. We can look at the Old Testament, we can see how faithful he's been with Christmas and Easter. He's been faithful to fulfill those promises. Are we faring any better than Israel in expecting him to keep the new promises we have in Christ? Now our text for the day. That was a really long extra bonus intro. You're welcome. Chapter 4 Notice we continue to go through charges. The latter is an apostle who's about to die, writing to one of his beloved children of faith, a pastor he's worked with personally, and he keeps giving him commands. Chapter 4, verse 1, I charge you. I charge you. Let's just walk back through and see how this command is really an end cap of the many commands he's given. Chapter 1, verse 6. Timothy is commanded, fan into flame the gift of God. Chapter 1, verse 8. Have no shame, share in the suffering of the gospel. Chapter 1 verse 13, follow sound words. Chapter 1 verse 14, guard the good deposit. Chapter 2 verse 1, be strengthened by the grace in Christ Jesus. Chapter 2 verse 2, entrust this teaching to faithful men. Chapter 2 verse 3, share in the suffering of Christ. Chapter 2 verse 15, do your best to To present yourself to God as one approved, a worker unashamed, rightly handling the Word of God. Chapter 2 verse 22. Flee sin, pursue righteousness. Chapter 3 verse 14. Continue in faith, trust God's Word. Chapter 4 verse 1. Charge in the presence of God. Preach the Word. Chapter 4 verse 5. Always be faithful, fulfill your ministry. I believe here's one of the end declarations. We've looked at it and seen, I'm more convinced even now, that fan into flame, that's the first. Everything else flows from that. Fan into flame. Be strengthened. Do your best to present yourself before God. Continue in faith. And now, the heightening of all these commands, not saying anything new, just saying it a different way, I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus." This last command is heightened because of the witness. In the presence of God. Paul seems to be very aware that he's speaking with the authority of an apostle in this declaration. Fan and a flame. The gift. What was the gift? To preach the Word. He's pointed back to the faith that he received from his mother and grandmother and from Paul. He's pointed back to his faithfulness. Now he's going to point forward. Notice, I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge, who will judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing in his kingdom. Here we have a final charge, and it's weighty. And it has a different tone to it, because it's in the presence of God that God is the testimony of this charge. And it's a future-looking. It's looking forward to what is going to happen. God's Son, Jesus Christ, is going to return, and there will be a just judgment. And look at the charge itself. It's in the presence of God. There's five specific commands that are really all built around preach the word. Preach the word, be ready, reprove, rebuke, exhort. Those are the five specific charges. So first, if you're taking notes, this is point to letter A. charge to preach the Word. It's fitting. He is to preach God's Word, and so the witness is in God's presence. Be a proclaimer of the words of God, and he's already said, handle rightly, cut straight the Word of God, fan and aflame the gifts so that the church hears the truth of the gospel. Remember Jesus Christ. Now this is for pastors, specifically. But church, don't check out. Don't check out. If you look at chapter 4, verse 22, if I could just translate that in my nice Southern dialect, that would be grace be with y'all. He's writing for the whole church. This is meant to be read before the whole church. This is good for all believers to hear, and it's especially if we think about the letter to the Galatians. When that church abandoned the gospel, Paul doesn't write to the elders and say, how did you abandon the gospel so quickly? Who's it addressed to? The church. We all are responsible for the preaching of the word, and that you're hearing it, and you need to make sure you're hearing it properly. There's a desire to teach and to discern the Word of God, and that is the preaching of God's Word. The pulpit, as I've said a few times in this letter, this is meant to be the pace setter. This is meant to be the pace setter for how we're going to talk to one another, how we're going to think with one another, how we're going to live with one another. The 52 sermons you're going to hear in a year from this pulpit, Lord willing, is like the slow dripping ivy. Shaping our thoughts. Shaping our desires. Shaping the words we use with one another. Shaping our behavior towards one another. The goal is to make the gospel clear so that it's just the way we think and talk. You want to realize that the words that we allow in, the words that we allow to penetrate and meditate, they're forming us. That's the power of words. That's what they do. That's how God designed it. His Word needs to have all authority, and we need to know how to sit together under it. It's always frustrating when churches want to not sound churchy. Let's get rid of the difficult words of Scripture. Let's not talk about righteousness or propitiation. Hard concepts, words we don't use regularly, but let's just think about it. Every community has its own language. Right? I love asking some of the students, what do you study? And they tell me something like, I got no further questions. I have no idea what they even talk about. I don't understand your lingo. Much less, therefore, I can't talk with you about what you're studying. God's given us language. God's given us words. These words should be shaping us in a way that we are able to reverberate, repeat. We don't have to come up with anything. We need not be afraid or embarrassed of words that are hard and challenging. We need to actually form a community around these words. Church, let's be very clear. The goal of us as a body is to speak to one another God's own words so that we're building up one another in Christ. Instead of a safe space not to hear hard things, The church is a safe space to be transformed by the truth of God where you can confess sin and be restored. Instead of judgment that leads to cancellation, we're supposed to be a people where judgment leads to a confession of sin and a freedom and forgiveness. Instead of a culture that seeks to be self-identifying and prioritizing the me, we prioritize God and we call each other to deny ourselves. We're not different for being different's sake. We're different because the Word of God gives us such clear instruction. Preach the Word. Let it shape. Let it transform. Hold high the standards. Hold out the clear grace of salvation. That's why we preach the Word. That's why this sermon is the centerpiece of every week's service. Number two. Be ready in season and out of season. Stand ready. When it's difficult, preach the word. When it's easy, preach the word. When it's convenient, preach the word. When it's inconvenient, preach the word. When you don't feel like it, preach the word. We too often excuse obedience because, well, the circumstances just aren't right today. There's always going to be a reason not to be obedient. There's always been some kind of distraction or something else to do that is not as worthy as coming together and hearing God's word and trusting it together. What kind of procrastination excuses we can come up with? Not today, tomorrow. It's why we have a ballast. We need to be people with a ballast that says, this is what's most important. I'm not going to let anything else get in the way. Be ready. In season, when it's easy. Out of season, when it's hard. The next three are really grouped together. Reprove, rebuke, exhort. Correct, warn, implore. These are three of many instruments that we have. And this really gets at the specifics of how you're going to teach. Notice you do this with patience and teaching. So while preaching, you have to be able to designate. You have to be able to think. What kind of word is needed? In your conversations with another, when you're counseling with another, when you're caring for another, when you're discipling with another, when you're in a hall group together, when you're sitting down reading the Bible, you have to think, what kind of word is needed here? Because sometimes we do need reproof, correction. Sometimes we need warning. Sometimes we need urging and admonishing. Paul says the same thing to the entire church in 1 Thessalonians 5.14. Admonish the idle. Encourage the fainthearted. Help the weak. You admonish the idle because they need to be pushed. They need to be moved. You don't admonish the fainthearted because you're gonna add the burden. Understand that? It's recognizing here's the problem, and the Word of God is full of solutions, and it's learning how to recognize the problem and apply the right solution. That's why you rightly handle the Word of God. with patience in teaching. You do not back off of the truths of God that are needed for every problem, but you also don't push and say, this is the time right now. This has to be done. There's a patience. It's the Word of God. It has power. The Holy Spirit has power. There's a way in which we're patient. Patience ends when someone says, I will not listen. That's Matthew 18. teaching and patience continue as long as we are able to talk. Why? Why does he say preach the word before the, in the presence of God? Why does he say be ready? Why does he say reprove, rebuke, exhort? Why? Verse 3 tells us why. For The time is coming, and he's talking about the day. In the future there's going to be trouble. We're living in that day. The church has been living in that day since Christ ascended. And we'll be living in that day until Egypt returns. A time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. There's going to be seasons. When there's going to be folks who say, I don't want to hear this anymore. I'm not going to endure sound teaching. The word sound is from the word hygiene, healthy. There's such an unhealthy passion that their ears itch to hear something that would accommodate what they desire more than accommodate what God desires. If we look back to think about who these people are, look at chapter 3, verse 1. I'm sorry, chapter 3, verse 2. They'll be lovers of self. Lovers of money. Chapter 3, verse 3, not loving good. And then very clearly, chapter 4, chapter 3, verse 4, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. When our hearts are so bent in on ourselves and we love our pleasures, that's going to cause our ears to not want to hear the truth that is against our desires. We're going to try to find someone who's going to scratch the itch of our sinful pleasures. They'll refuse to listen. They'll not listen to truth, verse four. They'll wander off into myths. You know why myths are so fantastic? They're unclear. Oh, sin loves to just play in so-called gray areas. Sin loves to hide with some kind of an excuse to, you'll always find somebody who's gonna agree with your passions. Are you finding people and surrounding yourself with people who are going to take the Word of God and help apply it and insist upon it and give you a high expectation? Or are we trying to find people who are just going to accommodate? Children, be thankful if your parents expect much of you. It means they love you. Paul here is expecting much of Timothy because he loves him. If you're a child and your parents expect much of you, it's because they love you. Disciple, if there's somebody who's expecting much of you, it's because they love you. Be thankful. We should expect much of one another because we love one another. This is a terrifying idea of sin, wanting to only hear what we like. And let's just be honest. This is our culture. This is why people can't have conversations. All we've done is surround ourselves in a little bubble of our ideology, and we won't listen to people who disagree with us. The church is supposed to be a place where we're all coming from all kinds of different backgrounds and ideas, and the Word of God is what unites us together if we submit to it together. There's a real tendency to want to isolate and live in my ideology. Here, we're all supposed to be listening to God's Word together. Notice verse 5. He does this often in the pastoral epistles. He'll talk about those out there, and then he'll say, but as for you, you need to make sure you're living this way. Why? Because we all have simple passions, and we might get itching ears. The real problem always begins here, not way out there. Verse 5, as for you, Timothy, always, Be sober-minded. Be serious. Be wise. Be focused. Endure suffering. Recognizing evil is going to come. Every chapter of this letter is about suffering. Share in the suffering. Share in the suffering. Endure the suffering. The promise that anyone who desires to live a godly life will suffer. Endure suffering. Do the work of an evangelist. Be sharing the good news. Fulfill your ministry. Do what God expects of you. Do what God expects of you. Our third point, expect God's reward. Trust God's Word. Obey His calling. Now expect God's reward. Paul, as he has done regularly, gives himself as an example or reminds him of something. Here he seems to be very aware he's going to die soon. He's been in prison numerous times, but whatever it is, he's aware that this is different. He believes this is it. For I'm already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure has come. I fought the good fight. I finished the race. I've kept the faith. Henceforth, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day, and not only to me, but also to all who have loved his appearing." Verse 6 is an allusion to a sacrifice. Isn't this how Paul lived his life? It's being filled up by Christ and being poured out for Christ. He's a steward of all the grace, and he's pouring out, pouring out, knowing that he's storing up treasures in heaven. Verse 7 gives us three analogies, or three illustrations, as he already used three illustrations before. They don't align perfectly. I fought the good fight. I finished the race. I've kept the faith. All those are in a verb that declares absolutely a completion. The perfect tense, it's a completion. He's not boasting. He's trusting God by grace. He has been faithful to the task as he's just charged Timothy to be faithful. He's making himself a model, and we need models. Now remember, what makes you useful in the kingdom? It was in chapter 2, verse 20 and 21. What makes you useful? Shout it out. Or we'll embrace awkward silence. You're useful if you cleanse yourself and be holy. It's not gifts and strengths and abilities. It's cleansing oneself and pursuing holiness is what makes you useful. Paul is saying I've cleansed myself. I've set my work. Verse 8. Henceforth. A logical conclusion. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness. Paul here declares, I have run the race. Henceforth, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness. I have fought the good fight. Henceforth, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness. I have kept the faith. Henceforth, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness. Crown is a declaration of victory. An ornament. We have an allusion to the Olympics here. There are numerous crowns mentioned in Scripture. Joy, life, here righteousness. Notice it's laid up. It's stored away where rust and thieves do not mess with it. It's in God's security. There's a, there's a crown that God has laid up and stored up that Paul is working towards to receive. And then this declaration. Will award to me on that day. The Lord, the righteous judge, the Lord who is perfectly righteous in every declaration he makes. He will award to me on that day, the day of his return. That word award is very important. Look over at chapter 4, verse 14. Alexander the coppersmith did me great harm. The Lord will repay him according to his deeds. That's how we usually think about award, render. Same Greek word, we really should say, let's use the word render. The Lord will render unto me. The Lord will render unto Alexander. There's a sense in which God is perfect in His justice. And when someone sins, when someone commits evil, God will render a just verdict and punishment. But notice how Paul's using it here, in chapter 4, verse 8. The Lord will render to me a crown because I was faithful. I believe that there's an implied promise there. There's an implied promise that there's a stance, there's a position where Christians will come before Christ and we'll give an account to him for what we did and there will be crowns. I saw in 1 Corinthians 3 there could be fire. That doesn't mean you lose your salvation. It means there's a burning up of the wasted things we did, and we're saved through suffering. Let me make it very clear. Let's back up. The gospel of Jesus Christ is this. This is how you need to be saved. This is what it means to be saved in Jesus Christ. If you see your sin, I've lied, I've lusted, I've gotten angry. I see my sin, and I can see there's nothing I can do about it, and then the Word of God tells me that God sent His Son to become like me in every way. Jesus Christ was God Himself in a perfect human nature, without sin. So that when Jesus dies on the cross, He takes God's punishment for my sin. It satisfies the wrath of God. So that when I believe in Jesus, I'm forgiven because God's wrath has been satisfied in His death. Then He rose again to give new life, and He sits at the right hand of the Father, and He will return. If you're not a Christian, the one thing you learn in here today is we have sin, and it's offensive to the holiness of God. God does love us while we're still sinners. But it is not an unconditional love. His love is bound up with His holiness. And as holiness demands, he must punish every sin. The condition for him to love us while we're still sinners is that Jesus died for our unholy lives of sin. Love is not unconditional for us. It is conditioned in the death of Jesus Christ. And now, it's forever. That's the first judgment for all people. We'll stand before God, and he will declare us forgiven in Christ or unforgiven, and then we will pay for our own sins forever. Christian, there's a second judgment for us. It's called the Bema Seat. We'll stand before the king who purchased us, with his own blood, and we will have to give an account for how he stewarded the life he bought. We'll have to give an account. He will repay with justice. This doesn't mean you lose your salvation. It means you stand before God and you hear, what did you do with your life? And then there'll be shame, but still salvation. Or we might hear, if faithful, Well done, good and faithful servant. There's four ways to live. You can have no faith and disobedience. You can reject Jesus and live in your own sin and just rejoice in it today and you will stand before God and you will be judged. There's another way to live. You can be very obedient to Jesus but never really believe in him. Jesus talks about this in Matthew chapter 7 verse 21. He'll say to some who come before him and say, I preached your word. I prophesied. I did all kinds of things for you. And he'll say, I never knew you. Works do not save us. Faith in Christ alone saves us. So there's no faith in disobedience. There's obedience without faith. And in the next two, there's faith without obedience. Faith without obedience is 1 Corinthians 3. When we stand before God and the hay and stubble, the wasted life, we'll stand before Christ and there will be an account. And you will be in the kingdom of heaven. But there will be an account for what we have or have not done in Christ. The fourth way is this passage. There's faith and obedience. You believe in Jesus Christ, you've trusted his promises, you've stored up your treasure in heaven, and he will say, well done, good and faithful servant. Let me be very clear about what I think heaven will look like for those last two categories. Everyone will be fully happy in heaven. Because they believe in Christ. But some will be happier. That's my best shot at saying something about that wonderful mystery. Jonathan Edwards talked about it. What we're doing here on this earth is growing the capacity of our hearts to be filled with the love of God, with our good works. We're storing up treasure so that our hearts be full More filled! Grown! Will we have a little heart, because we did little in the kingdom? Or will we have a large heart to be full, because we stored up treasure? The question this morning is, what reward are you striving for? Before the pastoral prayer, I read Jesus' own words about the storing up of treasure, and that is not a warning about your heart. It's a warning about where your treasure is. Because where your treasure is, that's where your heart will be also. Where's the treasure? Are we investing in things that will last? Are we investing in things that will get rusty, and be stolen, and be burned up at the end of the day? Are we really trusting the promises of God, that there's some kind of life beyond the grave, that Jesus has really risen, and that there is a promise? There's an eternal, forever reward. Believer in the resurrection, are you hedging your bets? Believe the whole Jesus. He is seated because he finished his first work. He will return. How do you receive the final reward? This is important. How do you receive the final reward? Well, it's there in verse 7. I fought the good fight. I finished the race. I've kept the faith. If you participate in the faithfulness of God, you receive this reward. Now, let me be very clear. I am no fan of the participation trophy in sports. Because it says there's no winners or losers. It actually says there's no losers, everybody's a winner. Well, now when you play a game, nobody loses and somebody wins. But notice what Paul doesn't say. He doesn't say, I won the fight. I was the victor in the race. He says, I fought. I finished. I kept. This is God's participation trophy. To get it, you just have to participate. To get it, you just have to labor and be faithful and participate. There needs to be a steady, regular, faithful running and fighting and keeping. When I was a young man, before I was a Christian, I went to one of these Christian youth race events. I don't think they have this anymore. And I was the only youth there of my age. And I think I wasn't a youth yet. I was pre-teen. And there were two other churches, and they had larger teams. I was by myself for my age group. I got to know these guys because we were competing on the individual races and things. And then came the relay race. Well, back in my pre-teens, I was a confident young man. And I decided I was going to race four guys by myself. And I never had paced myself. I still have never paced myself, to be honest. But I didn't know what it meant to pace yourself. And so I started out strong. And I was with the leader. And there was another guy behind me. There were only three of us. And then by the second one, I was still with the guy, and the other guy was a little bit far behind. And then the third one, well, I was starting to get behind in the first place, but still kind of right there next to the other team. And then by the fourth leg, I was done. And what I did was, as I saw them finish the cross line, cross the finish line, I just kind of mandered off and went inside the track in the grass. Well, I went to go get my third place ribbon, because that crown really mattered to me. And my mom was the one giving them out. And I went to go get it, and she said, you didn't finish the race. So furious. This is my mom. I ran hard. For three whole legs, I ran hard. didn't finish the race. That was just. That was right. Christian, are you setting at a pace of faithful, regular, disciplined discipleship, sitting under the Word, praying God's Word, so that you will finish the race? If you just think about this, Christ, He takes the crown of thorns with a joy that He will see you. And now He calls us to work and to labor and faithfulness by His grace so that you will receive a crown. It's investing. When I was a kid, I collected baseball cards because I thought I'd be rich by the time I was 20 if I just held on to these and sold them. Foolish investment. Silly paper of people's faces. Worthless, for the most part. What kind of investment are we making? Is it in what is real and heavenly and good and according to the promise of God? Let's look at our last phrase. Not only to me, but also to all who love his appearing. What a phrase. Memorize that. Love His appearing. Love His appearing. Love His return. We need to be a people that are set on loving His appearing, because we've invested so much in what is to come. We're longing for it. We're not trying to avoid it. Earlier we saw one of the heresies was saying, Jesus has already come back. And so people were concerned and confused. If there's a heresy today, it's Jesus isn't coming back. You're good. Don't live today like He might come back. No, every day, love and long for His appearing. Christian life requires gratitude. We will look back and we will be thankful for what God has done for us on the cross. And I think that gets us very far in the Christian life, but to be obedient, to finish the race, I believe He set forth hope by giving us promises to expect. I believe this is the way we live the full Christian life and believe in the whole Christ, what He has done, where He is, and what He will still do according to His promise. Are we believing what He's done? Are we looking up to where He is, the right hand of the Father? Are we longing for and loving His appearance? Will you pray with me? Father, we thank You for Your kindness that You have given us words to trust, words that will endure, words that have power to save, words that complete us for every good work, words that help us to see the true treasure and the true place to invest Thank you that you show us how meaningful our lives, our efforts, our words, and our deeds are. Help us to find the grace to persevere in Christ. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.