Why Do Good Works?
Belgic Confession • Sermon • Submitted
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This evening, we will, Lord willing, build upon what we learned about this morning. The theological term for what we learned this morning is sanctification. Sanctification is the process by which something is sanctified, made holy.
Sanctification
As has been taught before, there are two kinds of sanctification. There is positional sanctification, whereby an inanimate object can be sanctified for a task. Thus, we read that there were tools that the priests used in worship which were sanctified. They were set apart for a certain task, and they were used only for that task. Not only were they designed especially for that task, they were purified and made holy so that they could be used for that task.
An helpful illustration is the common household butter knife. Your wife has sanctified it for a specific task, it is an eating utensil, it is not, now, nor will it ever be, a screwdriver. It is set apart for a specific task, and it is not to be used for any other task, no matter how well it might work! Furthermore, it could be even more sanctified, if, for example the Queen of England were coming to dinner, and a representative asked, “What silverware will her majesty be using?” Whereupon you show him, and he says, “Yes, that’ll do.” It has now been sanctified for the honour of being used by her majesty the Queen.
That’s positional sanctification. What article 24 is talking about is positional sanctification and progressive sanctification. An inanimate object such as altar tools, or butter knives cannot be made more sanctified. They cannot grow in sanctification. They are unable to grow, they are able to be in a position, they can even be taken out of position, such as a butter knife turned screwdriver. But they cannot by their own action, become more or less sanctified.
Human beings, on the other hand, can. As animate objects, they can grow more or less sanctified, though it is very rare for them to become less sanctified.
Paul, in Ephesians 4:17 and following, says that Gentiles, that is, those who are not followers of Christ, are positionnally unsanctified. They are not set apart for God, they are not holy, even thought that is what everyone was created to be. We were created by God, to reflect him and his glory as his image bearers. But because Adam sinned and rejected that position, that holy calling, all have sinned and rejected it. But God, in his grace, has, through the preaching of God’s Word and the work of the Holy Spirit, regenerated, repositioned, re-sanctified people making them new creations, new people.
New Life
Not only are they made new, given this new position, they are also given a new life, a life that is growing in sanctification, that is, becoming more and more sanctified, set apart for God’s glory and honour. Paul puts it this way, “you were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.”
Let me pause here for a second. Perhaps, if you’re like me, you’re thinking. Okay, this sounds good, but I just don’t really see much growth in my life. Let me say this, your best efforts at serving God aren’t as great as you think they are and your worst offenses against God are far worse than you think.
Well, that’s a bit of peachy news, isn’t it? Well yes, but since we’re talking about our best efforts, we have to be honest, after all that’s what Paul tells me to do in the chapter 4:25. Turn again to the confession, “so then, it is impossible for this holy faith to be unfruitful in a human being, seeing that we do not speak of an empty faith but what scripture calls “faith working through love,’ which leads a man to do by himself the works that God has commanded in his Word” (BC Art. 24).
To answer the title of this message then, we do good works because of the holy faith, a faith working through love, which God has given us, and which leads a person to do God’s commandments.
The confession stops for just a moment and says, “these works, proceeding from the good root of faith, are good and acceptable to God, since they are all sanctified by his grace. Yet they do not count toward our justification—for by faith in Christ we are justified, even before we do good works.” In other words, the fruit of a tree cannot be good if the tree the fruit comes from is good in the first place. Good works are the fruit of a branch growing out of the good vine, Christ. It is our faith in Christ, the vine, which justifies us, and that faith too, that grafting into the vine of Christ is also a gift.
What God does then, says Ezekiel, for we are living in the time Ezekiel longed to see, “God places within us, a new heart, removing the heart of stone, replacing it with a heart of flesh.” This is what God does. He does it because of his grace and his mercy, in the people he has chosen, before the beginning of time, so that no one may boast.
Not only does God put a new heart in us, he puts within us a desire to do his will. In fact, when we follow through on this desire to do God’s will, that is obey his commandments, we find this also happening:
The desire to obey is from God, it is a result of the new heart we’ve received through our faith in Jesus Christ. The ability to obey is also from God. As such, we are indebted to God for the good works we do. It is he who works in us both to will and to do, according to his good pleasure.
This morning, we noticed that Jesus said, “I myself can do nothing, I can only do what I see my father doing.” The same is true for us. By ourselves, we will never do a thing out of love for God but only out of love for ourselves and fear of being condemned. We see this motivation in other religions.
But for the Christian, the motivation, the ability, the power to do what is right, that comes from God. God works in us to do.
God Works
What is His will?
Turning back to Ephesians, Paul has laid it out for us. We speak truthfully because we’re all members of one body. This is why we get together first as a local congregation, also in ecumenical events and projects, like worship services and the Thrift Shop. Do not sin when angry, when we are angry, the emotion of anger can cloud our ability to think, and we can say and do things which are wrong. Maintaining anger, even if justified, can give a devil a foothold. Surrender every thought, every emotion to Christ. Give it over. This is a very disciplined process. Think about giving it over, then give it over.
We do this in prayer. This morning, I mentioned that Jesus prayed saying thank you. He gave every situation over to the father. When Lazarus was called out of the tomb, Jesus prayed, saying, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me” (Jn. 11:41b-42).
Jesus had been in communication with his father already. The words he spoke aloud were for our benefit. But in private, Jesus had already thanked God for what he was about to do in Lazarus, raising him from the dead. Jesus trusted the work the father was doing, and so he did it too, and it reflected in his prayers.
Contrast that with the pleading, wheedling prayers that we so often say and hear. Sometimes people spend hours in prayer, giving their concerns to God, only to take them up again. Instead, we should transform our prayers to become more thankful. This will, I think, raise awareness of what God is actively doing in us in one another. At the very least, it will help us to turn our concerns over to God.
So then, why do good works?
Why Do Good Works?
We can’t help but do them, for it is actually First, the result of the new hearts God has given us. Second, it is God working in us. Third, it is the result of letting the light of Christ shine before men, which in turn will result in glory being given to God.
Good works, do not earn us righteousness, that comes from Christ alone. And this gives us hope! For any sin is enough to send us crashing into despair. But our good standing before God doesn’t depend our sinless streaks. It rests fully on Christ’s completed, once and for all work on the cross.
The process of sanctification takes a lifetime. It takes a long time to trust God to work. It is not easy to simply give thanks, though we’re commanded to do so, in every situation. It is difficult to say to God, “thank you for this cancer, thank you for this lay off, thank you for the starving people in Africa.” But it is necessary for us to see God at work, in his way, in our lives for his glory.
As the process of sanctification works in us, making us more and more obedient like Christ, we realise that all we’ve done is nothing more than that which the master expected out of his servants. We will do and continue to do good works, not because we have to, but because it is our duty! Therefore, we see what we do as a result of our faith in Christ, it is the end, it is not the means to the end.
I love the assurance we get from Lord’s Day one, our positional sanctification: what is your only comfort in life and in death? That I’m not my own, but belong, in body and in soul, in life and in death, to my faithful saviour Jesus Christ because of what he did. I also love the assurance that comes from the first question and answer of the Westminster Shorter Catechism: What is the chief end of man? To glorify God and enjoy him forever. We glorify God by doing his will. What is his will? Obeying the commandments, simply doing what he created us to do. Amen.