A Near Salvation
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Introduction
Introduction
A few of us men went to the National Churchill Museum in Fulton, MO yesterday. And we were reminded of the events leading up to World War 2. Neville Chamberlain, Prime Minister of Great Britain, had met with Hitler and came back reporting, “There will be peace for our day.” Churchill, who understood war and understood Germany better than anyone, knew that was not possible. He sought to warn the people that there would be no peace, but everyone believed he was just a war-mongerer. Of course, he was right and within a year, the world was plunged back into one of the bloodiest wars the world had ever known.
What must it feel like to warn a people that it is high time to awaken out of their stupor and ready themselves for war while they all believed it better to make peace through accommodation? Perhaps, it was something like Paul felt as he wrote the passage we study today. I cannot be sure about the people in Paul’s day, but I can say that most Christians today, would see Paul as being a fear-mongerer. In reality, Paul sees what most cannot. There is a war already underway, and you and me, have been affected by it already, and if we haven’t been dragged into it already, we will be soon. And if we ever hope to have the victory, then we must be prepared to fight. So Paul gives us four ways to prepare for victory.
Rouse
Ready
Resist
Robe
Besides this you know the time, that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed.
The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light.
Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy.
But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.
Rouse from Sleep
Rouse from Sleep
The first way to prepare us to get victory is simply that we need rouse from our sleep.
Besides this you know the time, that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed.
One thing that Jesus talked quite a bit about was staying awake and staying alert. Let me give you some of those times.
Then two men will be in the field; one will be taken and one left.
Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one left.
Therefore, stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming.
And while they were going to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast, and the door was shut.
Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, ‘Lord, lord, open to us.’
But he answered, ‘Truly, I say to you, I do not know you.’
Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.
“But concerning that day or that hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.
Be on guard, keep awake. For you do not know when the time will come.
It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his servants in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to stay awake.
Therefore stay awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or in the morning—
lest he come suddenly and find you asleep.
And what I say to you I say to all: Stay awake.”
And there are many other places. Sleep is linked to a dereliction of duty. It is linked to unpreparedness. The story of the ten virgins shows five being prepared while five others were not. They were not ready for the bridegroom to come. The master leaves instructing his servants to stay awake. To not, is to go against the master’s orders, a dereliction of duty.
Paul was warning the Romans, and the warning has come to us, that we must rouse from our sleep. We must be prepared. We must not be sleeping, taking our responsibility as followers and soldiers of Christ lightly. Why? Because our salvation is closer than when we first believed. Did Paul believe that Jesus was going to come again in his day? Perhaps so. But he certainly believed that there was nothing holding him back from coming. The death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus was the second to last event in salvation’s history. Nothing is left but for Christ to return. Which means that our final salvation is closer than it has ever been. Every single person who comes to faith takes us that much closer. So while we may have received Christ 5, 10, 50 years ago, we do not want to be caught sleeping spiritually when he comes. We want to be awake and ready, mentally and spiritually alert. The enemy is at hand to fight us until the very end, and we must not act otherwise.
There might be some here who are awake politically speaking. You know the fight well between Democrats and Republicans. There are probably some awake judicially speaking. You know the fights that come before the Supreme Court. There are probably even some here who are awake entertainmently speaking. You know which teams are battling over which star player. What movies are coming out is battling to be number 1 at the Box Office. And all the infighting between Harry and Meghan and the British crown. But spiritually you are sleeping, not realizing there is a spiritual battle that being waged over your soul. That’s how Peter put it in
Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul.
Beloved, be roused from your sleep and and make yourself ready for battle.
Ready for Battle
Ready for Battle
Which leads us to the second way we can be prepared for victory. The first was to rouse from our sleep. The second is to ready ourselves for the battle ahead. That’s exactly what Paul wrote.
The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light.
Brothers and sisters, it is not just enough to be awake when Jesus comes, but to be fighting the spiritual war that is going on. Notice the contrast here of night and day throughout the verses we’ve been reading. Sleeping versus awakening, night versus day, darkness versus light. So if Paul says the night is far gone, then the day is at hand. The sun has crested. That’s how close our final salvation is! Do we believe that? Do we believe that as strongly as Paul? I would imagine most of us look at the world today and see a dark, dark place. We don’t see light at all. Like Israel enslaved in Egypt, we are crying out to the LORD in our affliction. There’s no daylight to be seen. But the sun has crested!
Paul uses the perfect active indicative here, which indicates that the day has come and it has lingering effects. When Jesus came preaching, he let the people know that the kingdom of God is at hand—perfect, active, indicative. It has drawn near. Why? Because Jesus, the Son of God, is here. He is ushering it in. And it has lingering effects that will reach through the world. Paul is making the same point. The night is gone. The day has cresting, and it has lingering effects. What effects? In part, the two that Paul immediately brings up.
We are to cast off the works of darkness. The very acts or deeds that go on in darkness are to be thrown off of us. Beloved, we cannot fight darkness if we are still clothed in it. We are to cast them off, throw them away. Acts of darkness are like comfy pajamas. Anyone ever wear their comfy pajamas long after waking up and getting out of bed? They’re warm. They’re comfortable. And it has become the trend today to pretend like they’re for public wear. You see people wearing pajamas to school, to the grocery store, to the movies, and even to church. But pajamas are night wear, not day wear. To wear them in the day is to say that you have not readied yourself for day.
Paul is calling us to take off the works of darkness. Take off those PJs and ready yourself for battle. Put on the armor of light. The word could also be translated as weapon. We do not live in a world that is passive in Jesus’s return. We live in a world that is fighting his return tooth and nail. They scratch, bite, punch, stab, kick, and shoot darts. They in effect, are Satan’s weapons of war. They are Satan’s instruments of unrighteousness. And we must protect ourselves from those attacks, but also be ready to return it, but we do it in a specific way. This is not physical armor. This is the armor of light.
For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh.
For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds.
We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ,
I love the line in O Church Arise by the Gettys.
Our call to war, to love the captive soul,
But to wage against the captor;
And with the sword that makes the wounded whole,
We will fight with faith and valor.
Too many Christians are not fighting this way. Too many Christians are trying to fight a spiritual war with fleshly weapons. Our weapon, our armor is of light, the gospel light. We wake up with and in the gospel. We remind ourselves what the gospel is and to whom it is given. It is not only given to the lost but we who are saved as well. We remind ourselves why it was given and how it was given. And we pray. Brothers and sisters we pray. Each morning, we put on the gospel armor, each piece put on with prayer. We cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. Or as Paul wrote in chapter six:
Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness.
Resist Temptation
Resist Temptation
Which leads us to our third way to prepare for victory. We resist.
Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy.
You may look at that verse and not see the idea of resistance, but I do. Let me tell you why I am using the word resist while Paul used the word walk. Because it is not simply that it starts with an “R.” First, Paul is using war language here, thus there is a fighting element to this idea of walking properly. Second, there is no denying that these deeds that he list are deeds of darkness which he has just told us to cast off. Third, humanity—whether Christian or not—has a way of wanting to return to what they’ve known even if it enslaves or kills them.
We see Israel as an example. How often they longed for Egypt, the land of their enslavement! Fighting is hard. It’s wearisome. It’s exhausting. The war never lets up. And so, we want to just go back to bed. Things were better when we were in our pajamas and under the nice comfy blankets. But no! We must resist! We must not just rouse from our sleep and ready ourselves for battle. We must resist the inclinations of to return to our former way of living.
When I was a teenager, I would not get enough sleep at night, and would fall asleep when I got home from school. Some times my mom would catch me sleeping and would wake me up. She knew the temptation of getting up just until she returned to cooking dinner, so she told me not only to wake up, but walk around. Stay awake! Walk! Resist the urge to go back.
We are to walk properly in the daytime because its daytime! Everyone can see us! And believe me, they are looking. In wartime (and in peace), you have soldiers walking the perimeter. They are to walk at the ready. They aren’t to be joking around. They aren’t to be sloughing off. Walking isn’t a “busywork” task. It’s a task that keeps the troops ready for attack and a task that shows readiness to the enemy.
We remember the story of how the Greeks infiltrated Troy with a wooden horse, and while the city partied the night away, those soldiers in the horse, crept out and took it. Or we remember how Belshazzer partied the night away and saw the hand of God write that that night he would be found wanting. And the Medes and Persians infiltrated the city of Babylon. So we resist the orgies and drunkenness. I think the word carousing is a better fit than orgies. We have a set idea of what orgies is, and while that could be part of it, the idea is more about carousing where there is wild partying going on. We resist sexual immorality and sensuality, including pornography and indecent behavior. We resist the quarreling and jealousy. These are not becoming of children of the light wearing the armor of light.
Robe in Christ
Robe in Christ
And this leads us to our last way to prepare for victory. That is to robe ourselves in Christ.
But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.
Christ everywhere! Flesh no where! We are to wear Christ over every part of our being so that there is no place for the flesh, the sinful nature to reside. That’s what Paul is meaning here. There is no place to hide our sin nature because we have so much of Christ in our being. This does not mean that we are to be so busy in church matters that we have no time to get into trouble. This does not mean that we are so busy reading our Bibles and praying that we have no time to sin. I like how Kistemaker put it,
Romans F. What Should Be the Attitude of the Justified Believer toward the Lord Jesus Christ (13:11–14)
“Become more and more spiritually united with Christ, so that he will be the Light of your light, the Life of your life, the Joy of your joy, and the Strength of your strength.”
Ought we read our Bibles and pray? Absolutely, but to what end? If it is simply to play defense and not offense, we will fight a losing battle. We cannot fight not to lose. Must must fight to win. So, we don’t simply look for verses that help us with whatever we struggle with. Nor do we simply read our Bibles to say we’ve read them. We read and study and meditate to win! To become more and more spiritually united with Christ, so that he will be the Light of our lights, the life of our lives, the joy of our joys, and the strength of our strength.
Foreman explains the idea of making no provision for the flesh in this way:
The Epistle to the Romans F. Living in the Light, 13:11–14
“Put into very simple English, Paul is saying: Do not plan for sin; give it no welcome; offer it no opportunity. Kick the sin off your doorstep and you won’t have it in the house.”
How often do we know our own weaknesses and accommodate them? A little look here. A little taste there. A longer glance the next time. And suddenly, we find ourselves in the flesh.
But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire.
Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.
Conclusion
Conclusion
As we finish this study of Romans 13:11-14, I hope that we’ve seen how necessary it is to be prepared for victory—for the time when Jesus returns. Hopefully, we see the progression that Paul made from rousing from sleep to readying for battle to resisting temptation to robing ourselves with Christ.
St. Augustine was a miserable man. He had tried every major philosophical and religious way of life and they all left him empty. Monica, his mother, had been praying for his salvation since he was a boy believing one day he would turn to Jesus. Having fathered a child by a concubine, and having become so distressed by life and its emptiness, Augustine fled from his residence into the garden and cried to God, “How long, O Lord?” Suddenly he heard a child sing out, “Tolle Lege. Tolle Lege,” which means “Take up and read. Take up and read.” A Bible was next to him and he picked up and read the text we looked at today. It was at that moment that hope and salvation filled the life of Augustine.
Beloved, this passage is supposed to have that same effect upon you: hope and salvation. You are not alone in your struggles. By that I do not just mean other Christians struggle in the same ways you and I do. But that the Spirit has not abandoned us in our struggles. He is in us to rouse us from our sleep. He is in us to ready us for battle. He is in us to help us resist our temptations. He is in us as we are robed in Christ. It was the Holy Spirit who regenerated us and it is the Holy Spirit who continues to generate in us the power to faith-filled obedience.