The Joy in Redemption
Join us for Christmas service! Celebrate hope and joy with Jesus and with others. It won’t be the same without you and yours, so make time to attend together.
Transcript
INTRO
(Speaker: Kong)
In the last 3 weeks of our Christmas Joy series, we’ve talked a lot about joy. We’ve talked about the joy of anticipation and how Christmas is a time when we look back at Jesus’ birth, which helps us to look forward to Jesus’ return. We talked about the joy of humility and how we can take on a posture of being humble to serve one another just as Jesus did. The attribute of humility means we rely on God to care for us just as Christ relied on God to care for him. Last week, we talked about the collective joy of Christmas. The birth of Christ wasn’t meant for us to privately enjoy. The birth of Christ was meant for everyone. This morning, we conclude our Christmas series with the joy of redemption. Pang and I will talk about 3 major ways we experience joy in redemption. I’ll give an overview of the joy in redemption and we’ll take a look at 3 ways that we experience joy in 3 parts of our redemption. I’ll lead us into exploring what the joy of being born again looks like and Pang will take us through the joy of being made right with God and the joy of becoming more like Jesus, but before we go any further, let’s get a broad idea of what the joy in redemption is.
The entire Christmas season is focused on this, redemption. Redemption is the purpose of Christmas. Redemption is the purpose of why we’re here. Redemption isn’t just something that we focus on during Christmas, but it’s the focal point of our faith tradition. Ephesians 1:4 tells us that before creation, God already chose us to be redeemed. The Old Testament narratives and prophecies all point to the promise of redemption. The New Testament reveals to us what redemption looks like. In the Christian tradition, we believe that Jesus was born as a human so that he could one day die for our sins and be resurrected so that we could experience redemption. What is the joy in redemption? The joy in redemption is that we have Jesus who rescues and redeems us allowing us to experience peace. This isn’t any ordinary peace, but it is the complete fullness and harmony that we have with God, ourselves, and others. The joy in redemption is also this: We have a God who loves us unconditionally. He loves us so much that he sent his one and only son, Jesus, to die for us so that we could experience eternal life with God. But it isn’t just us who experienced joy. In Luke 15:4-7, we’re given a parable to illustrate someone else who experiences joy in redemption. Let me read this for us,
“4 Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? 5 And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders 6 and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep. 7 I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.”
God is the shepherd over 100 sheep and we are the 1 sheep who is lost. God leaves the rest of the sheep to find us. When he does find us he joyfully brings us back to him to celebrate. And it isn’t just God who celebrates when he finds you and rescues you, but all of heaven celebrates and rejoices too! There is so much joy in redemption. Let’s take a deep dive into the first part of the joy that we experience in redemption. The joy of being born again.
THE JOY OF BEING BORN AGAIN
(Speaker: Kong)
When God redeems us, the first phase of redemption is to be born again. Theologians refer to this as regeneration. We need to be born again because, in our unredeemed state, we are spiritually dead. This causes us to be alienated from God because we rebel against God. It’s the image of us being the 1 sheep who gets separated from the 99 and gets lost. Ephesians 2:1-3 describes our unredeemed state like this,
“1 As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, 2 in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. 3 All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath.
Life without God causes us to rebel against him. Instead of obeying God and following his desires and thoughts, we obey ourselves and seek our desires. This results in wrath, which is another word for death. It would be a sad ending if that was the only option, but this is what the rest of Ephesians 2 has to say,
“4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.
God’s love intervenes our rebellion and as we head towards wrath, His love turns us around and makes us spiritually alive when we believe in him. When we are reborn and made spiritually alive, 1 John 3:9, tells us this,
“No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God’s seed remains in them; they cannot go on sinning, because they have been of God.”
Being born again to God means we inherit the characteristics of God kinda like how we inherit our parents’ characteristics. Instead of rebelling against God, we obey God. Instead of hating God, we love God. We inherit the spiritual genetics of our loving Father, God, and become his children. John 1:12-13 says this,
“12 Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God”
The joy of being born again is that we belong to God. When we are born again, we become his children. I’m going to pass it over to Pang and have her share with us the joy of being made right with God.
THE JOY OF BEING MADE RIGHT WITH GOD
(Speaker: Pang)
God calls us sons and daughters. He wants to be close and connected to us. But sin, our wrongful ways of hurting God and hurting others, keeps God far far away because He is holy! But there is HOPE and joy! Ephesians 2 says,
“It is by grace you have been saved, through faith –and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God– not by works so that no one can boast.”
Justification is being made right with God. We are made right with God because He declares it. Justification is God’s declaration that He no longer sees you as sinful. Instead, God sees us as righteous. And it’s only because of God’s kindness. We don’t don’t have to stay wrong with God. God is with us. God is near! God is close and connected to us. The JOY of righteousness is how good it feels to be right with God. To be a part of God’s people
THE JOY OF BECOMING MORE LIKE JESUS
(Speaker: Pang)
But, God’s generosity doesn’t stop there! There’s more because we have a loving and abundant God! He has the supernatural power to transform us. Let’s read more about what this transformation can look like. 1 Thessalonians 5:23 says:
“May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul, and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do it.”
Sanctify or sanctification means to be made holy. And the joy of being made holy is that we don’t have to stay stuck. Sometimes stuck means: being crabby or mean, it can also mean stuck being sick in your body, heart, or sick in your mind. But the joy of sanctification, being made holy, is that there’s a way to grow. Earlier, Kong mentioned that when God chooses us, we are born again! And because we are born again, God WILL teach us how to grow. When God calls us to Him, we will grow not like how we want, but we will become more like Jesus!
I want you to take a minute to think of a person in your life who loves God SO much! How are they like Jesus? What do they do with their days? What do they say with their words? How do you feel when you’re with them? Do you have a person in mind? I have to persons, my mom and my dad. They love God so much! They are kind to people, their families, and even strangers! They say words like… “I’m sorry,” “I’m proud of you,” and “I love you.” They make me feel safe and joyful. When God sanctifies us through and through, Our actions, words, and thoughts start to change. We should be different because God shows and teaches us to become more like Jesus! And when he does, we will grow!
So, how do we know we’re growing? The Holy Spirit will be displayed in your life! Galatians 5:22 says:
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.”
God will sanctify you!
REFLECTION
(Speaker: Kong)
Let’s take a few minutes to reflect on this question, are you redeemed and being redeemed? Are you redeemed? Have you accepted Jesus as your Lord, your Savior, your rescuer? And, are you being redeemed? Are you becoming more and more like Jesus every day? Take some time and reflect on that.
If you can answer yes to those, I encourage you to continue to be joyful in your redemption. If you are unsure, I want to invite you to understand this. Redemption begins with the understanding that something good has been ruined. When God created humanity, He created everything to be good, but humanity had a desire to be like and even better than God, so pride and independence destroyed that good relationship. Since then, there has been no peace or harmony. So how do we fix that?
God loves humanity so He sends his one and only son, Jesus to redeem the broken relationship. Jesus takes on all the guilt and shame that we feel about our broken relationship with God and exchanges it for his perfect relationship with God. All we have to do is believe and trust that Jesus did that for us and the relationship is redeemed. It is only by trusting in Jesus that we can experience redemption.
This morning, if you are unsure if you’ve been redeemed, you have a chance to experience that. In Romans 10 the writer tells us that believing in Jesus comes through hearing and responding to this message about redemption. When you hear this message and respond by declaring with your mouth that “Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved”. So this morning, if you seek redemption, declare with mouth, and believe in your heart that Jesus is Lord and God raised him from the dead, you are redeemed.
But it doesn’t stop there. Redemption is a process that continues throughout our entire lifetime where we are becoming more and more like Jesus every day. Being redeemed is called sanctification and it is an ongoing process of separating ourselves from being independent of God so that we can become more and more dependent on God. Every day, we struggle with depending on God so in our journey of being redeemed, we must find ways to depend on God. We must trust that God is transforming us even though we might not feel it in the moment. We must choose to do what is God-honoring instead of self-honoring. Colossians 3 reminds us that we have to set our hearts and minds on things above where Christ is, not on earthly things. The joy in being redeemed is this: we are growing to become more like Christ. Imagine being with others who are becoming more like Christ. Imagine the love, support, care, patience, kindness, gentleness, peace, etc. that you would experience as you and others strive to be more like Jesus.
This is just a taste of the joy we have in being redeemed because it encourages us to look forward to becoming completely redeemed. The final stage of redemption is holiness, and we get to experience that when we reunite with Jesus. There, our redemption is completed and we get to experience the fullness and perfection of what it’s like to be Christ. You get to experience love, support, care, patience, kindness, gentleness, peace, every attribute of Jesus in its perfect form. So, wherever you are at in your redemption journey, know that it’s not too late to be redeemed nor is it too late to experience being redeemed, because in the end, we will get to experience the complete joy of being completely redeemed. Let’s pray.