Please turn to the passage that we have been considering these last several Lord's Day mornings in Romans chapter 8. Just read verses 28 through 30. And we know that to them that love God, all things work together for good, even to them that are called according to his purpose. For whom he foreknew, he also foreordained. to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. And whom he foreordained, them he also called. And whom he called, them he also justified. And whom he justified, them he also glorified. Let me just take a moment to review before we come to the subject for this morning. In this section, the Apostle Paul begins in verse 28 with this great promise. a promise that has been very much abused and misunderstood, but nonetheless is an exceedingly great promise, that to those who love God, to those who are called according to God's purpose. God promises that he will take everything in their lives and work them together for good. He does not say that everything is good. Many things are bad. Many things that come into our lives are painful and are not good. And God does not consider them good, nor are we called upon to force ourselves to think of everything as if it were good. But even the bad things and even the things that are the consequence of our or someone else's sins, The scriptures promise that God will take them all and orchestrate them together in such a way that they eventuate in the good of those who love God. The good in this passage, as we've considered before, it does not say, it does not mean that God will make everything work together for our happiness. It does not say that God will work everything together for our good health. It does not say that God will work everything together so that we'll be financially prosperous or socially ascending, but it does say that for our good in terms of conforming us to Christ's image, that's the purpose that God has called us for. It's to make us like the Lord Jesus Christ in conduct and character and in emotions and in thought. And the passage is saying that God will take everything that comes into our life and work it to the good as so defined. And then Paul, having made that wonderful statement, it seems determined to assure us that it really is so. And so he takes the next two verses to just state in a very brief fashion, but to state how it is that God has worked salvation from the beginning to the end, that he does work all things according to his purpose, and therefore we can be confident that he will make all things actually turn together for our good. And so he begins in verse 29 with this explanation. He says, for whom he foreknew, he also foreordained to be conformed to the image of his son. Now, the first thing that he says is that God has foreknown some, meaning that God has fought upon some beforehand. He has preferred some. Out of all the inhabitants of the world, God has especially and particularly set his mind upon some and known them, even loved them in a special way that he has not known and loved others. Then it goes on to say that these very ones who have been the special object of his attention, it says they he has taken them and predestined them, predetermined them, decreed that they should actually, in fact, be made like Christ. Now, those two things are in God's eternal mind. They have taken place before the foundations of the world. Then Paul goes on to say, and now we come to the sermon for this morning. Then Paul goes on to say that those people who have been the object of his special thought, those people whom he has decreed will be made like Christ, those same people he called. Now, it's that one word that I would like us to talk about this morning, calling, as set forth in the scriptures. And you may think, what are we going to do with one word? Well, there's much more than we can do in one sermon with this one word. But this one word deals with how someone becomes a Christian. And so it's not just of academic or theological interest. It has the greatest practical implications. If you are not a Christian, It's very important you understand what this word means. If you are a Christian, it's very important you understand what this word means so that you can know what's happened to you. And if you're concerned about bringing other people to be Christians, it's very important you understand this word so that you'll know how to bring them to Christ. So I'd like us to consider this morning this one word, called or calling, as it is set forth in the Bible. Now, in the Bible, in the New Testament in particular, calling, the term calling, is used in three different ways. Number one, it is used in reference to a vocation. In Romans chapter one and verse two, Paul says that he is called to be an apostle. Some of you are called to be plumbers and schoolteachers and doctors and lawyers and so forth. God calls people. He brings them into certain vocations. That's one usage of the term. A second usage is in reference to God's sincere invitation to everyone who hears the gospel to come to Christ. Wherever the gospel is preached, God is calling people in a general sense to come and to have their sins forgiven, to come and be changed and to be made new and to be washed clean of all their past and everything that's shameful about them. God is calling in the sense of inviting, sincerely offering Christ, sincerely offering forgiveness, sincerely offering a new life to everyone who would have it. That's the second way the term is used, calling. in reference to God's sincere invitation to everyone who hears the gospel to come and receive Christ. And then it is used in a third way. The term calling is used in reference to God's sovereign effectual work in the life of a person. It refers to that work where God takes someone who does not love Christ God takes someone who does not love Christ and brings him, summons him, takes him, calls him, in that sense, to a place where he does love Christ and where he's made so new that where once he would not be obedient to Christ, now he's determined to be obedient to Christ. It is in this third way that the word is primarily used in the New Testament, and it is in that way that the word is used here. I would like to read to you a definition of calling as it is given to us in the Westminster Confession of Faith. I don't quote the Westminster Confession of Faith because it's any authority to us. It's just the writings of men. The Bible alone is what we can trust in. But these were wise men and wiser than your pastor. And they, I think, gave a better statement than I could devise myself. So I would like to read this statement to you and again, appreciate I'm not reading the Bible to you. So take it as the writings of men. But I believe it very much captures the biblical teaching on this subject. Effectual calling is the subject. What is effectual calling? Question number 31 in the shorter catechism answer. Effectual calling is the work of God's spirit. whereby, convincing us of our sin and misery, enlightening our minds in the knowledge of Christ, and renewing our will, he doth persuade and enable us to embrace Jesus Christ freely offered to us in the gospel. Now, that's a very complicated and compounded sentence, but let me just go over again. Effectual calling is the work of God's spirit. God's spirit does this. What does he do? He convinces us of our sin and misery, enlightening our minds unto the knowledge of Christ. renewing our will, in doing those things, he does both persuade and enable us. Now, appreciate that. He does both persuade. That wouldn't be very much help. If he only persuaded us that we needed Christ, we would be left with frustration. He does persuade and enable us. to freely embrace Christ as he is offered to us in the gospel. Now, what I would like to do, having set before you this general idea of the way the word is used, these three different ways of the way it is used in this passage, this general definition from the catechism, I would like now to take up just a few aspects of calling as is set forth in the Bible. Now, you have heard sermons on calling before, and it's because you've heard sermons on calling before that I'm not taking any more time to lay this general groundwork. I would, though, like to take up some specific areas, some of them briefly, others a little bit more in length. Number one, not to beat a dead horse, but to state the obvious that we not miss it. Number one, calling is the work of God alone. This is not a human work. We believe, we repent, we persevere, but God calls. We do not call ourselves unto him. Notice again the language of Romans chapter eight. God is the one who foreknows. God is the one who predestines, and God is the one who actually calls us. Now, a lot of people are quite willing to say that God is the one who makes the choices. God is the one who back in eternity past foreknows, and God is the one who back in eternity past predestines. But when it comes to time and space, when it comes to things that actually happen in history, not just back there in eternity past, that at that point, God and human beings work together. Well, there may be a slight element of truth in that, in the sense that human beings do respond to God's work. But the point is that calling is what God does. God is the one who takes the initiative to call people to himself. Philippians chapter 1 and verse 6 is one of the many passages that bears reference to this, bears attest to this. It's that passage that says, he who began a good work in you will continue it until the day of Christ Jesus. It is the Lord from the beginning to the end who takes the initiative in our salvation. Wherever you find a Christian, You find someone who has been wrought upon by God before that person did anything. Wherever you find a Christian, you do not find someone who just burst forth with his own faith. You do not find someone who just woke up one day and said, I hate sin. I'm going to become a Christian. No, you find someone who has first been wrought upon by God. They have experienced this divine work of God's spirit where they were by the spirit drawn and enabled to believe. All right. Number two. The first is that calling is the work of God alone. Second. Calling is according to God's eternal plan. Calling is not something that is done in a haphazard manner. And again, I'm reminding you now of the context of this passage. Whom he foreknew, them he also predestinated, and them he also called. And in verse 28, it says they are the ones who are called according to his purpose. In Ephesians chapter 1 and verse 11, we looked at that a couple of weeks ago. Paul says there that God is the one having been foreordained according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will. God's calling is something that is done according to a very carefully laid out, predetermined plan. Now, that has many implications. Let me just list two of them. Number one, God has planned whom he will call unto himself. It is not left up to fate. It is not left up to chance. It is not left up to circumstances. It certainly is not left up to human beings. Who will be the object of God's calling? God has chosen whom he will call according to a predetermined plan. Far before the foundations of the world, God determined. God set his mind upon this person. He foreknew this person. He predestined this person to be conformed to Christ's image. And in the midst of making those declarations in his mind, he determined this person would, in fact, be called effectually and powerfully to be wrenched out of his old life and brought into a new life. Now, the second implication of the fact that this calling is according to God's eternal plan is that God has, in fact, planned the details of when and how someone will be brought to Christ. God has not only planned who will be called, but God, according to His eternal purpose, eternal blueprint, eternal plan, whatever you want to call it, has also determined when and how someone will be called. You could use anyone's conversion. Literally, anyone's conversion could be used as an example of this point. We'll use John Newton's. We sang one of his hymns this morning. We'll use John Newton's conversion as an example of this point. God planned his calling. The events of John Newton's life and everything that led up to his actually coming to Christ in faith and repentance were planned, were purposed according to God's eternal plan. You remember, some of you know the story. When John Newton was born, he was born to a mother who was a Christian. She taught him the scriptures. He learned Christian hymns. He memorized verses of the Bible. At a very young age, she died, and he was sent off into a life of making the rounds in different homes. And his father was a sailor, and he was brought up by different people. He became a very wicked young man. He himself became a sailor. Sailors were embarrassed at how wicked he was. His young sailing friends tried to restrain the extent of his viciousness and of his blasphemies. He became a slave trader of the worst sort. He was a murderer. He was an adulterer. He was a very vicious, ugly, vile-mouthed person. God ordained that he would have that mother. God planned in the way that he planned out John Newton's calling. God planned that he would have that mother and that certain scripture texts would be memorized. And God planned that when he was a vile, vicious slave trader, that certain events came into his life that humbled him and broke him. And those of you who know his life story, God planned that terrible storm at sea, which made him see that he was nothing but a very small part of the universe, and he cried out to God for help. God planned that sea disaster. God planned the people who came and spoke to him after he finally got back on land. God planned all the details that led up to the moment when he believed. God planned that. His calling was not left to chance. It was according to the eternal purpose of God. Now, we used John Newton, could have used any one of you in this room who is a Christian. God planned your background. God planned the exposures that you had to the scriptures. God planned the things that made you have a sense of your sin and have a sense of your need and have a sense of wanting He planned all of that. He planned what to you might have seemed like a chance encounter with a Christian. He planned the neighbor that would move in beside you and bring the gospel. He planned the mother that would teach you scriptures as a young child. He planned that you might just decide one day, I need something, I'll attend a church service. He planned that. It didn't happen by chance. And those of you who are Christians, you can look back on your conversion, whether it was a radical conversion or whether you were born in a Christian home and you really can't see the time when you became Christians, you just always seemed like you believed. You can look back and you can say, indeed, God planned that point by point by point by point. And some of you who aren't Christians, And you're beginning to wonder what in the world is happening in your life. Why have I had this difficult circumstance? Why do I have this religious interest? Why has God given me this Christian friend? It might very well be that God is working out his eternal plan to call you and bring you to love the Lord Jesus Christ. Nothing in calling is left to chance. God has planned the details of the lives of his people from the moment of their conception, long before they are his people in terms of loving Christ themselves. He has planned all that would lead up to their eventual coming to Christ. The third thing that I would like to draw to your attention concerning calling, number one, calling is the work of God alone. Number two, calling is according to God's eternal plan. And number three, calling is never according to human merit, but always according to God's grace. Calling is never according to human merit, but always according to God's grace. Please turn to 2 Timothy chapter 1 and verse 9. 2 Timothy chapter 1 and verse 9. The Apostle Paul is writing to Timothy and he says to him in verse 9, who saved us and called us with a holy calling. not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before times eternal. Who was this man, the Apostle Paul, who makes the statement? Well, many of you would know who he was. The Apostle Paul's own testimony is that he was a blasphemer and injurious. He was a man, using that old English language, he was a man who was devoted to religious Phariseeism. He was not devout in the sense of Old Testament Judaism, but he was devout in terms of Phariseeism. He was a proud, self-righteous man. He was also a persecutor of Christian people. He would go to their homes and drag them out and take them to prison. He hated Christ. He saw Christ and Christians as a violent affront to every religious tenet that he held to be dear. He was a violent man, even though he was a religious man. This man writes this statement. He called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given us in Christ Jesus. Paul, of all people, knew that if he was a Christian, if he was grasped and drawn to Christ, it was not because of deserving it. He was a very wicked man, and he came to realize that. And he had to say, if I am called at all, it has to be not on the basis of some good thing that I've done, but it is only on the basis of God's grace, of the extension of God's kindness. Please turn to another passage, to 1 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse 26. 1 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse 26. Now here again the Apostle Paul is writing this church in Corinth. The church in Corinth was a cauldron of problems and he writes to them and he says in verse 26, For behold your calling, brethren, that not many wise after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called, But God chose the foolish things of the world, that he might put to shame them that are wise. And God chose the weak things of the world, that he might put to shame the things that are strong. And the base things of the world and the things that are despised did God choose. Yea, and the things that are not, that he might bring to nothing the things that are, in order that no flesh should glory before God. Now, I read this in the old English, and it may not sound very meaningful to your ears, but the point that he's saying is, consider your calling, brethren. We're talking about calling. So God didn't call the wise men of the world. God didn't call the wealthy men of the world. God didn't call those in socially prominent positions primarily. God called the base people of the world. Now, the apostle Paul was an intellectual giant. He didn't have any trouble, though, seeing himself as God saw him and considering himself one of the base fellows of the world, because he knew something of his moral character. Who were these people that Paul is writing to? Who were the Corinthians? Well, you remember this statement the Apostle Paul makes in 1 Corinthians chapter 6. He gives this list of horrendous sinners and he says, of such were some of you. He says, some of you were adulterers. Some of you, he says, were idolaters. Some of you, he says, were homosexuals. Some of you, he says, were thieves. Some of you were revilers and drunkards. And so he writes this. He says, you know, look at who God has called. Who's he called? He did not call his people on the basis of something good in them. He called His people on the basis of His foreknowing them, on the basis of His predestinating them. He called His people because He loved them. He called His people on the basis of grace, never on the basis of works. And those of you in this room who have been subject to the work of God of effectual calling, it's important that it is always in your mind, you are not somebody, and therefore God chose you. You're among the base of the world, and therefore God chose you. Because God is determined that he will choose people and draw them to himself, who are not something in themselves, so that he will get all praise. So there'll be no big shot standing before God and say, look what a prize God got when he got me. And so God goes. to the base of the world and calls people, not who deserve to be called, but he calls people according to grace and according to mercy. For those who are Christians, that ought to be a proper directive to our humility. To those who aren't Christians, it ought to give great hope. Because you may be thinking that I've really got to reform myself, I've got to make something decent out of myself, I've got to be more respectable, I've got to be more honorable if God would ever pay any attention to me. No, God looks upon the unrespectable and God looks upon the homosexuals and the drunkards and the idolaters, according to this passage, and he calls people who don't deserve mercy, he calls them unto himself. The fourth thing that I would like to draw to your mind about calling is that calling is a work of God's Spirit upon our minds, upon our desires, and upon our wills. We've already said it is the work of God alone. Now I'm saying it is the work of God's Spirit upon our minds, upon our desires, and upon our wills. When God calls a person, the Holy Spirit so works upon these facilities in the language of the confession that he both enables and persuades us to embrace Jesus freely and fully. Let me try to illustrate what I mean. Think if you can for a moment about a person is not a Christian, a person who has never been called in the way that we're talking about now. Think of such a person and think of that person's relationship to the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, that person who's never been called may have various degrees of knowledge about Christ. There are all kinds of people that are not Christians, and they have all kinds of different awarenesses of Jesus. Their knowledge of Christ may range from ignorance to to error, or even to formally correct understanding. There are some people that have been raised and gone to Christian churches all their life, and they do have a formally correct understanding. They know that Jesus is the eternal Son of God. They know that Jesus was born of a virgin. They know that He was sinless. They know that He worked miracles. They know that He died on the cross. They know that He was raised from the dead. They know that He presently lives in heaven. They know that He's going to return in the future. They know all those things. In a formal sense, they have correct knowledge. There are other people who are just really ignorant, really quite ignorant of anything about what the Bible says about Jesus. And then there are others like Jehovah's Witnesses and cult members and so forth who are totally in error. They're not ignorant merely. They're just in error. They believe wrong things. So here you've got this person who's never been called. We're considering his relationship to Jesus. His knowledge about Christ may be in any of these areas that we've just talked about. He may be quite indifferent to Christ, or he may hate Christ, or he may have some kind of a religious, emotional, sympathetic interest in Christ, but Christ, nonetheless, remains a mystery to him. He doesn't love Jesus. He doesn't know and sympathize with Jesus. He doesn't obey Jesus. Whatever place in the spectrum that we've just talked about he fits into, this is true. He doesn't love Christ. He doesn't know Christ. He doesn't commune with Christ. Christ is not precious to him. Now, consider what happens to this person when God calls him. Something happens, something that may be observable and explainable, something that may be so mysterious that you analyze yourself and you don't understand how in the world it did happen. But something happens by the work of God's spirit. where the person does develop a deep concern about God. And he does develop a deep concern about his life and about his soul. And that concern God may prompt by a variety of things. He may give that man or that woman a deep sense of sin. We've talked about this before, how God creates a sense of need and he may do that by causing the person to feel deep awareness of sin and how wrong his life is and that there is a right God and a right standard and that he doesn't match up and he feels ashamed of that. Or it may be that God just makes him to feel empty, that his life is insignificant and meaningless and has no purpose, and God stirs up in him a desire for him to know something that is beyond his mundane experience. But God does something to make him, in the language of the Confession, aware of his sin and misery, to make him aware of his want, of his need. That wasn't true of him before, but God does make him to have this sense of want or need. And he may use so many things. He may use a ruined or unhappy marriage to bring someone to that point. He may use a tragedy to bring something to that point. He may not use a tragedy at all. He may just use the humdrum line of your life to expose how empty it is, but he uses something to create this sense of concern about God and about the soul. And then God will give to that person, through some means, a true knowledge of Christ and the gospel that is coupled with And in my notes, I underlined the words coupled with, because that's the important part. He will give that person who has this awakened sense of need and concern about God, he will give that person a knowledge of Christ that is coupled with a deep personal appreciation for the Lord Jesus. There are a lot of people that know things about Christ, have no appreciation for Him. They know that He died on the cross, but that is not awing to them. Well, when God calls someone, They have this sense that when Jesus died on the cross, he bore my sins, that I am forgiven because of what Jesus did and how desperately I need to be forgiven, how desperately I need my sins to be taken off of me and placed upon Christ and the wrath of God come upon Christ instead of upon me. And that knowledge of Jesus dying in the place of sinners is now coupled with a deep sense of personal appreciation that I benefit from Jesus' death in the place of sinners. The knowledge that Jesus is presently living, presently living in heaven before God the Father, making prayers on behalf of his people. Some of you children know that, and you know that like you know the address of your house. But when God calls someone, they don't know it as a mere intellectual fact. They sense that everything is lost for me if I do not have Christ pleading with God for me moment by moment, day by day throughout my life and the knowledge that he's doing so. becomes a source of the greatest amazement and thanksgiving. Well, I'm saying that when God calls someone, he does prompt within them that sense of concern for their soul, and he does give them a knowledge of the gospel and a knowledge of Christ coupled with this deep personal sense of appreciation that this is for me and that I trust in this. I trust in Christ. I trust in his death. I trust in his prayers. I trust in his righteous life. When God does this, when God brings about this quickening, there are always some things that happen to us. You read of this in Ephesians chapter 2 and other places that where you have a man or a woman or a child who is dead in their trespasses and sins, not called, God does something. He comes to them and He makes them alive, the passage says. He quickens them. He gives them spiritual life. And when He does that, when God gives spiritual life, when He calls them and quickens them and makes them alive, these three things always happen. These things always happen. Number one, they know and love God. When God calls them and quickens them, number one, they know and love God. Jesus defined eternal life, spiritual life as knowing God and knowing Christ. A second thing that happens is that they have faith in Christ. And a third thing that happens is that they repent of their sins. Wherever God calls, wherever this quickening takes place, wherever God gives life, those three things are always there. You may remember a few years ago when we were talking about the matter of calling and regeneration, the Sunday school class used the illustration that when a child has life, When an infant is born into the world with life, that life always expresses itself. It expresses itself in brain waves. It expresses itself in a heart that beats. There are always certain expressions of life. Well, of spiritual life, too, there are certain necessary expressions. And where these things don't exist, there is no spiritual life. One of them is the knowledge of and love for God. The second is faith in Christ. And the third is the repentance from sin. And thus, with this awakening and enablement, with this knowledge of Christ, of God, this love of God, this faith that is given, this repentance that is given, this desire to obey that is given, when that is all given, what happens? This person embraces the Lord Jesus Christ. And so you make your comparison. Here's this person who's not called. He may have lots of knowledge about Jesus, but he doesn't love Him. He may have lots of awareness of gospel things, but they're not precious to him. But when he's called, when he's quickened, when he's made alive, all that changes. He now believes and appreciates and accepts and trusts in Christ and the gospel and everything that is said about him. So the point that we're trying to make is that in calling, the Spirit of God so works upon the mind and upon the will and upon the emotions that we are made to understand and appreciate and accept the Lord Jesus and the gospel. Now, the fifth thing that I would like to bring to your attention, and this is the last thing, is that calling always produces certain results. Now, you may think this will be a repeat of what I just said, but I mean this to be a second category. Calling always produces certain results. When God calls someone, the scripture says there are certain things that always happen. Peter says that we are to make our calling and election sure. In other words, he says we're to examine ourselves and do certain things to prove to ourselves that, in fact, we have been called by God. Well, how can you do that? You can do that because the Bible says certain things always happen when someone is called. And you can look and see if they've happened. So let us look at these things that are always true when someone is called by God. Turn to 2 Thessalonians 2 and verse 13. 2 Thessalonians 2 and verse 13 says this, But we are bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord, that God chose you from the beginning, unto salvation, in sanctification of the Spirit, and belief of the truth, whereunto he called you through our gospel to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now, what is it that he says, whereunto he called you? What is it that he called them unto? Well, three things are said of this passage. It says that he called them unto belief in the truth, The old English sort of has the phraseology mixed up, so look again at verse 13. God chose you from the beginning unto salvation, in sanctification of the spirit, and belief of the truth, whereunto he called you. That's what he called you unto. Number one, he called you unto belief of the truth. Now, that should go without saying. That should be implied by what has all been said before. When God does call someone, he calls them to faith. The effect of this work of God in the soul is that someone believes. They are called to believe. They are brought from a place where they didn't believe the gospel, where they didn't trust in Christ. They are brought from that state to a place where they now do believe. The second thing that is said in this verse is that they were called unto sanctification of the Spirit. I only want to state that at this point because we'll take it up again in a moment. But they were called to that. They were taken from a place where the Spirit didn't touch them. They were taken from a place where their life was lived in selfishness and fleshliness. And they were taken from that place and they were brought into a place where the Spirit of God would sanctify them, where they were brought under the sanctifying influences of the Holy Spirit. And the third thing it says there, they were called to the obtaining of the glory of Christ. And that, too, I'm only going to mention because that will come up in a couple of weeks when we study another passage in Romans chapter 8. But they were called to this, that they would be made like Christ. They were taken from a place where they were totally unlike Christ, and they were called into this position where they would be made like unto the glory of Christ. Alright, so what are you called unto? According to this passage, these three things always happen to someone who's called. Number one, they are brought to a place of believing the truth. Number two, they are brought to a place where they are sanctified by the Spirit. And number three, they are brought to a place where they will be made like unto the glory of Christ. Now, look at 1 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse 9. All of this is under these certain results of calling. 1 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse 9. 1 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse 9 says, God is faithful through whom you were called into or unto the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. What are we called unto? Well, we're not only called to faith, we're not only brought under the sanctifying influence of the Spirit, but according to this passage, those who are called are brought into fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ. We are not called into the context of simply holding to certain biblical ideas. We are not called into a place where we just have certain intellectual conceptions. We are brought, the passage says, through calling, we are brought into living communion with the Lord Jesus Christ, where we speak to him. And he communes with us by his spirit through the word, through the Bible. There is communion with him. We address him. We beseech him. We express affection to him and love to him. He succors us. He communicates comfort to us. He communicates his own soul to us in a very real sense. It's a very experimental idea that is set forth in this passage. But we are called unto this. Everyone who is a Christian is called into this relationship. There may be times when it is very wonderful and where it is sensed keenly. There may be other times when the emotions are flat and where there doesn't seem to be any awareness of communications with Christ. Granted, there are all kinds of fluctuations in Christian experience. But this is what we are called to, in fact, with all of its fluctuations. We are called into an experience of actual communion with the Lord Jesus Christ. Look at Romans chapter 1 and verse 6. Again, we're just talking about the certain results of calling. We are called to faith. We are brought under the sanctifying influences of the Spirit. We are called into fellowship with Jesus. Now in Romans chapter one and verse six, it says, among whom are you also called to be Jesus Christ? Someone who's called is called to become the possession of the Lord Jesus Christ. You buy something at the store, you take it home, and you say, now this is Bob Fisher's, or you call it, you say, now this is Joe Brown's, or whatever, this is your possession. Well, this passage is saying that those who are called by God become the possession of Jesus Christ. They are called to be Jesus Christ. And it's interesting to me, and I think somewhat edifying, to scan in your mind through the New Testament and to consider the various pictures that the New Testament gives us of how we are said to be the possession of Jesus Christ. We are said to be his possession in the same way that sheep belong to a shepherd, according to John chapter 10. In John chapter 10, Jesus sets him forth as the great shepherd, the good shepherd. He makes a contrast between himself and the other shepherds. He says, a hireling is somebody who doesn't own his own sheep. He's just paid, he's taking care of somebody else's sheep. So those sheep, they get into trouble. The hireling leaves because those sheep aren't theirs. They're not going to fight the bear or fight off the attacking lion. They're not their sheep. They don't care about those sheep. They'll leave them. Jesus says, I am the good shepherd. You are my possession. You are my sheep. I know you by name and so forth. You are my possession. Now, the point of the analogy is that where a shepherd really owns the sheep, He pays special care to them. They're His. He's affectionately related to them. He heals them. He guides them. He brings them into pasture and so forth. We are Jesus Christ's possession through calling in the same way that sheep are possessed by their shepherds. And thus we are brought into a relationship with Christ where He is tender to us, where He cares for us, where He provides for us, where He heals our wounds, where He nurtures us. He ministers to our souls. We are His. In the same way that sheep are the possession of a shepherd. But there is another picture of how we are the possession of Christ. We are also said to be Christ in the same way that slaves are the possession of a master. One of the passages that relates to that is right in this context, in Romans chapter 1 and verse 1, where Paul calls himself a slave, a bondservant of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's a very different picture than the relationship of a sheep who is owned by a shepherd. A slave is somebody who is not his own, just like Paul says that you are not your own, you are bought with a price. We do not have rights over ourselves. We are not our own possession. We do not ourselves possess our life. We do not ourselves possess our gifts. We do not ourselves possess our careers, our time, our money. We are the possession of the Lord Jesus Christ in the same way that slaves are the possession of a master. And therefore, we have no rights. We have many duties. We have wonderful privileges. But we own nothing and we do not own ourselves. We are not our own master. We are the possession of Jesus Christ in the way that slaves are the possession of a master. And somehow it's easier to think of foreign missionaries in that capacity than it is to think of plumbers and lawyers and mechanics. But the man who's called to be a foreign missionary and the man who's called to be a mechanic are each the slaves of the Lord Jesus Christ. They have nothing that is at their private discretion. He is the master. He is to be obeyed in every way because we have been called to be his, not to be ours, but to be his. And the third picture that you have in the New Testament of being the possession of Christ is that we are said to be the possession of Christ in the same way the bride is the possession of a bridegroom. In Ephesians chapter 5, you have that picture that Jesus is the great husband. He is the great bridegroom. And that we, the church, are his bride. We are his. We are his possession. And that connotes a very different picture than the possession that a master has over a slave. That connotes intimacy. The fact that we are his in the same way that a bride belongs to a bridegroom denotes intimacy, denotes affection. All of that, I think, is to be piled into this little phrase that we have been called to be Jesus Christ. We are His possession. Like sheep are the possession of a shepherd. Like slaves are the possession of a master. And like wives are the possession of their husbands. We're still talking about what are the certain results of being called. We're called to believe. We're brought into the sanctifying influences of the Spirit. We're brought into fellowship with His Son. We're made to be Christ's possession. And notice in the last place, notice, I'm sorry, yes, in the last place, notice that we are called to be saints. Look in this same passage in Romans chapter one, verse seven. to all that in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints." What are we called to be? Well, we're called to be Jesus Christ's possession. What are we called? Well, we're called to be in fellowship with his Son. We're also called to be saints. That's why Paul calls calling, in that passage we read in 2 Timothy 1.9, a holy calling. That's why he says in Ephesians chapter 4 and verse 1 that we're to walk worthily of the calling wherewith you were called in Christ Jesus. And then he goes on to a list how we're to walk, and it all has to do with holiness. We are called to be saints, not saints in the Roman Catholic sense. It's not at all the point. All the people of God, from the New Testament's perspective, are saints. You read the introduction to Paul's letters, the church is always to the saints here and the saints there and the saints in the next place. All the people of God are called to be holy. That's the point of this passage. Someone who is called. is not only called to the privilege of communion with Jesus, not only called to the privilege of being in the possession of Jesus, but is also called to be a saint. And that is that everyone then who is a Christian is made, in fact and experience, to be holy. Not perfectly holy, but really holy. Everybody that's called to be a Christian becomes a transformed person, not a perfect person. We heard of the life of David this morning. David was a wonderful man with glaring faults and sins. We'd go down the list, if we were to be so unkind, and take you one by one, myself included, and you would say, many things are true about this sister and this brother. They're holy in this way and this way and this way. And then you would say, but there are these 15,000 imperfections. But the predominant feature would be holiness. The predominant feature would not be the faults. The predominant feature would be holiness and the faults would be covered with repentance and shame and resolution to do what pleases God. Why? Because the supernatural work of God has called us to be saints. And wherever this supernatural work of God takes place, the object of that work becomes a saint, a holy one. a holy person marked with many flaws. While there are other things that could be said, and perhaps for the sake of time I'll just leave them, the last one I'll just refer you to is that people who are called are called unto a special purpose. According to 2 Peter chapter 2 in verse 9, we are called to show forth the excellencies of Him who called us, that the great issue, the great goal, the great terminus, the great purpose for a Christian, is that he, in all the affairs and aspects of his life, would demonstrate the excellencies of God. That whether his vocation is in a shop, or in an office, or on the road, whether she is a housewife, or called into something, whatever it is, whatever relationships, whether you're single, whether you're married, whether you have children, whether you don't, whether you're old, whether you're young, wherever you are in life, whatever your station position, you have been called to this in those places where God has put you to demonstrate the excellencies of God, to demonstrate the excellencies of Him who called you. That's the great purpose of our calling. All right, this last point that I'm trying to develop is that there are certain There are certain inescapable consequences. Where someone is called, these things happen. They are made to believe. They are brought under the sanctifying influences of the Spirit. They are brought into communion with the Lord Jesus Christ. They are made the possession of the Lord Jesus Christ. They are made holy, and they are brought to that place where they are to live to demonstrate the excellencies of the God who called them. I'd like to end with with those statements of exposition, I'd like to take a few moments to raise some of the implications of these things to you before we close. The first implication is this. It is that none would ever be saved apart from the effectual call of God. None, no one, no boy, no girl, no man or woman would ever be saved if it were not for this effectual calling of God. There are some who would like to argue against this doctrine. There are some people who step back from the kind of teaching that you've received this morning and say, that cannot be right. It cannot be fair. God could not operate that. By definition, they will say, God could not operate that like that. Because they say that means that that limits the number of people that could come. God could never do that. No, God would never do that. Everyone would be free to come. God would never make it such that only certain ones would be the object of calling and that they would come. Well, the fact is that none would be saved. if God did not so effectually call them. No one would ever come to Christ if God did not take the initiative in this work. None of you who are Christians, no matter what you think, no matter how confused your mind might be on the subject, none of you who are Christians would ever have become Christians if God had not taken the initiative to persuade you and to enable you to believe and to repent. And none of you who are not Christians will ever become Christians unless God takes the initiative to grasp you and to persuade you and to enable you to believe and to repent. I would like you to turn to one passage where Jesus makes such a clear statement of this. It is in the Gospel of John, the sixth chapter. Please turn there to John chapter six. Jesus has incited a great following. He has been performing many miracles. People are delirious almost with excitement to see him perform miracles. He has gone away from the crowd. The crowd is massed and thronged to finally get to him. He speaks to them and he begins to expose to them that they are only following him for miracles, that they are not following him because they really have spiritual interests and spiritual concerns. And these people begin to get the point. They begin to understand that he's not accepting their interest, that he's not pleased with their interest to only have miracles and spectacular things. And so this leads into something of a confrontation. And let's begin to read in John chapter 6, verse 41. The Jews therefore murmured concerning him. because he said, I am the bread which came down out of heaven. And they said, is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How doth he now say, I am come down out of heaven? They didn't like this stuff. They liked the miracles and they liked what they could understand, but they didn't like Jesus talking about his divine origins. And so they're murmuring about this and they're saying, isn't this that fellow that was born of the father was Joseph and so forth. Notice what Jesus says in verse 43, Jesus answered and said unto them, murmur not among yourselves, no man can come to me except the father that sent me draw him. He doesn't say no man may come to me as if it were a matter of permission. He says, no one is able to come to me. No man can come to me. No one is able to come to me unless the father draws him, unless the father apprehends him, unless the father takes him and brings him out of that position of unbelief and disobedience to God. No one can come. At the end of this section, he virtually repeats the statement, we won't take the time to read it, in verses 60 through 65. Same issue arises, more murmuring. Jesus again explains why these people will not believe the gospel. It's because they cannot, unless God the Father takes the initiative to bring them to himself. Romans chapter 3 and verse 11 says, there is none that understands, there is none that seeks after God. If God just sat back and said, all right, I won't effectually call anybody. Everybody that wants to may come. We'll see how many comes. If he did that, the scripture says no one would come because no one understands, no one seeks after God. The natural mind, is it in me against God? It cannot be subject to God or to his law. We ought not to fall back and say, oh, this is a hard, terrible doctrine that God chooses only to call some. We ought not to fall back as if that's a terrible thing. If we would only understand the Bible and if we'd only understand human nature as it really is, we would bless God that of all the hard, disobedient, disinterested people in the world that God has chosen to take the initiative to bring some out of that indifferent or rebellious state. It is an amazing thing that anyone is ever saved. It is an amazing thing that anyone is ever saved. If you look at your own lives, some of you may give yourself too much congratulation, but if you're able to look at your lives honestly and in a biblical sense, it is an amazing thing that you believe the gospel at all. It is an amazing thing. Why do you believe the gospel? It's because God has taken the initiative to call you when you could not and would not have ever come to him yourself. The second implication is that the doctrine of effectual calling is a very great encouragement to evangelism. And again, I know that some people take this and they turn it upside down and they say, well, if God's going to do the work anyway, why should we bother? That is really a perverted logic. It flies in the face of everything the Bible says. But what this should say to us is that there is not a single human being whose heart is so hard whose will is so obstinate, whose soul is so twisted, whose understanding is so perverse, there is no one that is beyond the power of the effectual call of God to save. The people that we pray for, the people that we love, the people in our families, parents, our children, our unconverted wife, our unconverted husband, the people that we care for, and some of whom have sold their soul, it seems, to perversity. None of them could be saved. There would be no hope. Our prayers would be vain if it were not for this doctrine. God can go to the most perverse, hard, and indifferent person and do what is necessary to persuade and enable that person to embrace Christ. And that has to be our hope in evangelism. They can be hardened for 50 years. They can be so perverse that their drinking buddies will no longer have anything to do with them. God can break that hardness and soften their heart and persuade them to embrace Christ because of this doctrine. A third implication is that this doctrine of effectual calling should be the source of our greatest personal humility and praise to God. Perhaps that goes without saying, but is it not true? This doctrine should be one of our greatest causes of humility on the one hand and praise to God on the other. Humility because of that old question, who has made you to differ? Why do you have that you have not received? Why do you believe and your brother doesn't believe? Why do you believe and your mom or your dad don't believe? Why are you the only one in a very long line of profligates who believe the gospel? It's just because God has taken the initiative to call you He's looked upon you from eternity past in a special and wonderful way. He's known you and he's not known them. He's thought upon you to the point of determining that you and not they would be conformed to Christ's likeness. And in time, he passed over them and called you to believe the gospel. That ought to be a source of great humility and ought to be a source of great thanksgiving to God. There's a fourth implication that I would like to make. The last implication was to those who do believe. I would like to say something finally of the implications of this doctrine to those of you who are not Christians, to those of you who are not believers. I wish that I could somehow tune into your soul and know what your thoughts are and what your response is to knowing that everything about your eternal destiny hangs upon God's choice. Some of you children and some of you that are older, I do, I wish that I could know what you're thinking about this. Some of you may be totally indifferent, but some of you, some of you may be thinking, this is impossible. If everything hangs upon God and I want to be a Christian, what hope is there for me? Because maybe God won't do this work. Maybe God won't work in my life. You remember a couple of Sunday mornings ago, the initiative. If everything depends upon God coming and persuading me and enabling me to love Jesus. If everything depends upon that, what can I do? It must be hopeless for me. If God doesn't do anything, what can I do? That would be an example, to use Peter's language, that would be an example of taking the scriptures and twisting them to your own condemnation. Because that is not a proper or biblical deduction from this biblical doctrine. It's true that you do not know the eternal decrees of God. That's true. You don't know what God's thought about you in eternity past. Of course, you don't know that. Nobody knows that but God. But the Bible calls you to think upon the things that are certain, the things that are true, not the things that cannot be known. And the things that are certain and true are these. Number one, the gospel to you as an individual is sincerely offered. That's true. God sincerely offers it to you. A second thing that's true is God commands you to believe it. God commands you to repent of your sins and to believe the gospel. That's true. Whatever you don't know about his decrees, those two things are true. He sincerely invites you and he sincerely commands you to believe the gospel. And so the third thing that is true is that you as an individual have every right to go to God and say, dear God, You have invited me. I come. You have every right to go to God and say, you have commanded me to believe. I have come. I want to believe. You have commanded me to repent. I come to leave my sins and to repent. You have every right to do that. You do not have to go to God and say, God, I don't know. I don't know whether you've chosen me or not. If you haven't, scratch off the prayer. If you have, please save me. That's not the way we're to go to God. You cannot look into the decrees of God, but you can look to the Bible and the Bible does invite you to come. It says, if you'll come, you will not be cast out. That's what you can know. And that's what you need to operate upon. And don't let these wonderful truths that are meant to sustain the people of God and are meant to explain the gracious sovereignty of God, don't let these things be used by the devil to twist up your mind. Don't let the things that are unclear to you obliterate the things that are clear. God invites you to come sincerely. God commands you to come sincerely. You can take the invitation, you can take the commands and use them literally as arguments in God's ear. And God will never turn away, never turn away the plea of a sincere person who's begging him for faith and repentance and forgiveness. I wouldn't know how many times I've quoted to you the old Puritan saying, I hope we never tire of it because it's always so appropriate. None will ever go to hell clinging to Christ. None will ever go there. They may not know about the decrees of God, but they can know this. If they're crying out to the Lord Jesus for pardon, none will ever be lost. And so don't sit back and try to inform yourselves about what is unknown, unknowable to you concerning the eternal decrees of God. But do rest your heart and rest your mind upon the certainties and come to Christ this day. May the Lord give you who are unbelievers grace to believe. And may we meet one day and say with humble thanksgiving, God has called you. to embrace the Lord Jesus Christ. Let us pray together. Our Heavenly Father, it is very sobering and humbling for us to consider that You have done such a great thing for us, something for which we have been completely unworthy, and something that even since our conversion we have not proven ourselves worthy of. that we did not love you or want you, and you came to us and caused us to believe the gospel. And since becoming yours, we have known so many inconsistencies, and yet your calling has remained fixed and eternal, that you have made us to be yours forever. You have made us, you have called us to be saints, you have called us into communion with the Lord Jesus. You have brought us under the sanctifying influences of the Holy Spirit. How we thank you. How we thank you. We pray that the knowledge of your initiative in these things, the expression of your love, would greatly affect our souls, and that we would love you and praise you as you deserve. And we cry out to you You are the only one who is able to save those who are here who do not yet love you. Oh, our God, we appeal to you that you would give them faith and give them repentance and give them hope and fill their hearts with your love that they would come to Christ. We ask you in Jesus' name, amen.