Christian Growth to Full Assurance

When the Christian is born again life is new, things are changing and he is saved, but because of lack of experience in the Christian life, the babe doesn’t know how to deal Biblically with their sin, guilt and punishment they feel they deserve.  Preaching the Gospel to yourself daily will sanctify your heart.

“You were dead in your trespasses and sins.” and

The Wrath of God was abiding on you in your disobedience.    “He who believes in the Son has eternal life; but he who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.”

The lake of fire was exactly where you were headed.  You were in slavery.  A slave of Satan, held captive by unbelief.  He blinded your spiritual eyes.  You have neglected to do His will from a pure heart,

an did not know the joyful purpose of your life.

Then He rescued us out of the dominion of darkness

and into the Kingdom of the Son of His Love.

You now have a new heart Ez. 36:26.  You are a new creation.  The old has passed and the new has come.   It is a fact.  You are a new creation.  Different from the old one.  This new creation that you are was created by God for good works.  Jesus saves you by His work on the cross, your own good works don’t earn you heaven.  God sent Jesus to do that for us and we believed and

as a babe desires milk, we hungered for God’s Word.

As you read the Bible, it delighted your soul and obeying God felt better than not obeying God.  You found pleasure in obeying God for obeying his word is your delight.

Sometimes after sinning, you would feel guilty, this guilt will lead to self-condemnation, fear of punishment from God, and an attitude that think “we must do good in order to make up for the bad”  or we think “I must obey God or He will punish me”

You got a good start by believing God sent His Son to die for you sins and that you are covered in Christ’s righteousness, and that you are saved by God’s gifts of grace and faith and you didn’t do good works in order to get grace or faith.

The babe is tossed “to and fro” by doctrines.

Saved by faith or saved by works.  Tossed to and fro between believing they are saved by Christ feeling God’s full wrath and Him living a perfect life so that His perfect life could become theirs.

The devil tells you after you have sinned that you deserve hell, God’s angry with you and you must do good in order for God to not punish you in hell.

The devil also comes to you when your doing good or rather Christ is doing His good pleasure in you, and you think “Im doing good” and get prideful about the good changes you have been making in your life.  This is spiritual pride.  Having a wrong view of your good deeds.  Taking credit for the good when God deserves the glory.  This happens in the context of when you are doing well in Christ.  This temptation won’t come when your in sin or guilt.  Other temptations come at that time.   But self righteousness comes in when comparing yourself to others verse staying humble by comparing yourself to Jesus.

The babe in Christ has enough true doctrine dwelling richly in them in order to keep their thought pure.  They are learning and learning fast, for they drink up truth like milk.  And they need pure milk.  Meaning truth without error.  Simple truths for a babe to get, not “meat” Hebrews 5:12

The babe in Christ is saved, but often times after sinning will not feel saved.  As David asked God to “restore the joy of his salvation”  Not that David lost his salvation, but since he didn’t confess his sin for at least 9 months that guilt had set in and he didn’t have the joy in knowing that he was saved. Ps. 51:12.  When feeling guilty needs to have a balanced view of their sin, quilt, dark am I yet lovely in Christ, remaining sin and their position being loved in Christ, experiencing forgiveness of sins, being cleansed daily by His blood, thinking on the gospel every time we feel guilty so that you know the Love of Christ and don’t fear the Wrath of God for “fear has to do with punishment”. 1 John 4:18.  And many other things must be learned for the are babes, not children with abiding assurance that comes with continued obedience.  Once they are tossed to and fro less often then comes the assurance that your sins have been forgiven for His Names sake and not yours.  1 John 2:12-14.

So the babe in Christ needs to put the “belt of truth” on, meaning drink up the Scriptures as often as possible, learn the Christian life, memorize and learn to meditate on God, truth, the Gospel, Jesus and His will, listening to your conscience through out the day.   Think often about the cross especially, when you sin and feel guilty.  and that you are saved by having Christ’s righteousness credited to your account thus putting on the “breastplate of righteousness” and the peace and rest your soul so desires will be found in meditations on the Gospel, especially when feeling guilty of sin.   Go soon, go to God quickly.  As soon as you feel guilt go to the cross.  You know you have sinned and feel bad then look to Jesus.  The babe needs to learn this over and over again until it is natural.  And soon their great joy knowing that your sins have been forgiven for His Names sake.  Which is what a Child knows by experience.

 

We are all children of God but a child here is more mature than a babe but has not overcome the evil one.  Satan will soon come with his fiery lies in order to steal your joy and weaken you.   “For the joy of the Lord is your strength.” Ne. 9:10

Make your calling and election sure.  No doubts.  You know you are saved if you continue in these virtues and not forgetting your current and past sins that have been forgiven.

2 Pt. 1:5-11

“make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; ⁶ and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; ⁷ and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love. ⁸ For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. ⁹ But whoever does not have them is nearsighted and blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their past sins.

¹⁰ Therefore, my brothers and sisters,^[ make every effort to confirm your callingand election. For if you do these things, you will never stumble, ¹¹ and you will receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”