Sermon Tone Analysis

Title: What the Lord has Done for You

Text: Colossians 1:12-14

Main Idea: When we understand the depths of our salvation, we cannot help but to be moved by God’s work to save us.

Introduction

I often talk to people who believe they are saved.

Yet they have little if any concept of the work of Christ for us.

One of the most concerning things about the state of the modern day church is the number of people who believe that they are saved, yet they have no concept of the sacrifice that Jesus paid to save them.

We tend to underestimate the significance of Christ’s work for us.

People have a tendency to want forgiveness without responsibility.

They want salvation without repentance.

They want heaven without confessing that what they truly deserve is hell.

Today, we will see from Colossians 1.12-14 that the work of Christ on our behalf is the only means to salvation.

What has Christ done for us?

Let me encourage to underline or circle five words in this text:

· Qualified

· Rescued

· Transferred/brought us (NIV)

· Redemption

· Forgiveness

You have been qualified for the inheritance (12)

The word used here (ἱκανόω) indicates that something has been made *worthy.*

We are not *worthy,* we *made worthy*.

It is not something that we have achieved.

It is something that God has done to us.

God gives us what we need to be a part of His kingdom.

We do not possess it.

We cannot go and purchase it.

It is something that the Lord does to us.

What is it that qualifies us?

It is righteousness.

It is holiness.

The Bible says “Be holy as I am holy.”

And yet, the very testimony of our lives is that we are not holy.

We are sinful.

We are broken.

We are separated from God.

And we are hopeless.

So how does God qualify us?

God qualifies us by declaring that we are righteous.

He speaks a word and we are justified.

We are made right—not by our works—but by His grace.

But notice what it is that He qualifies us for: that we would share in the inheritance.

In the OT, the inheritance was the land that flowed with milk and honey where the Lord was taking the Israelites.

But the NT promises a new land.

In Hebrews 4, that land is said to be a place where the believer rests from his works.

Our inheritance is the land that the Lord has promised to us—the land of heaven.

The land where there are no more tears and no more heart diseases and no more cancers and no more fears and worries and doubts.

A land where there is nothing but the presence of God.

And we do not “qualify” for that promised rest.

We are made to be qualified.

By God!

Not only has the Father qualified us.

But the Father has rescued us.

Look at verse 13:

You have been rescued from the rule of darkness (13a)

Not only has the Father “qualified us,” but He has rescued us from the domain of darkness.

What is the domain of darkness?

The domain of darkness is the kingdom that is ruled by chaos.

It is ruled by evil and judgement.

It is the kingdom of selfishness and desire.

It is the land that is dominated by the evil wiles of the devil.

And you and I belonged to that kingdom.

We sought to exalt ourselves.

We sought to justify our wrongdoing.

We wanted to the glory.

We lived our lives under the authority of darkness.

Our god was the prince of darkness.

Our guide was the way of selfishness.

Our goal was self-preservation.

But God rescued us from that!

This word for rescue (ῥύομαι) is the same word that is prayed in the Lord’s Prayer: deliver us from evil.

It is one-half of the concept of salvation.

God has set us free from our captivity that we had to darkness.

You see, it is one thing to say that God has rescued us from a dark kingdom.

But if you are rescued from the teeth of a lion only to be left in the wilderness with lions, what exactly has been accomplished.

God didn’t just set us free, give us a compass, a pocketknife, and a role of string.

He brought us into His Kingdom!

The Kingdom of His beloved Son!

You have been transferred into the Kingdom of Christ (13b)

Salvation is not merely that we have been rescued.

It is also that we have been transferred.

Too many of us are focused on what we have saved from and not enough of us are focused on what we have been saved for!

Interestingly, these two phrases put together—rescued from darkness and transferred into the kingdom—is the testimony of Paul.

When he stands before Agrippa in Acts 26, Paul says that the Lord spoke to him while he was on the road to Damascus and said

“Get up and stand on your feet; for this purpose I have appointed you, to appoint you a minister and a witness not only to the things which you have seen, but also to the things in which I will appear to you; rescuing you from the Jewish people and from the Gentiles, to whom I am sending you, to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the domain of Satan to God, that they may receive the forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who been sanctified by faith in me.”

When the Lord rescued you from the kingdom of darkness and put you into the Kingdom of His beloved Son, he not only saved you from the tyranny of the devil’s enslavement.

He saved you for the purpose of the Son’s glory!

Imagine that you had been captured—enslaved.

And then someone came and gave their lives to rescued you from the tyrannous army that had tortured you.

How would you respond?

Would you set silently by? Would you have no testimony to give?

No story to tell?

No hope to share?

Of course not!

If someone rescued you from a kingdom of darkness and deposited you into the brilliant Kingdom of eternal life, you should shout it from the mountaintop!

You should be a worshipper!

Also, we should notice that the Kingdom to which we belong is the “kingdom of His beloved Son.”

It is not our Kingdom.

It is His!

Have you ever met a person who seems to think that the world revolves around them?