Consciousness of being sealed

(I arrived yesterday in Chicago and didn't have internet connection last night staying with a married couple near the lakefront. I am attending my church's annual Bible conference and will have new article tomorrow evening)

What you need to do is acknowledge that the most important person in your life is God Himself and what the Father thinks of you is you’re "accepted in the beloved." And all the rest--the circumstances, your enemies, whatever, faulty or accurate opinion . . .

I think of the thing in John 13 when the Lord is in the Upper Room with His disciples, He starts out in verse 3: [3] Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he was come from God, and went to God;

I read that and I say there’s Philippians 2: "Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus." What was it that allowed God the Son to become the servant with the towel, washing the feet of His disciples? It was verse 3. He was secure in the knowledge that He was the beloved Son of the Father, in whom the Father is well-pleased.

He had a consciousness of His acceptance in His relationship with the Father that allowed Him to humble Himself. You see, true humility . . . humble yourself to be a servant, obedient even unto death. To say, "It’s not I, it’s Christ."

That doesn’t come with pride; pride doesn’t do that. That doesn’t come from self-confidence. It comes from confidence in who God has made you in His Son. You learn to, "Let this mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus."

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James 1:21 says to "receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls."

That’s a great expression—"the engrafted word." You have God’s work grafted into your soul. A graft is a living kind of thing. In horticulture, you can make a graft, cut a slit into a trunk, graft in a cutting from another tree, bind it up and cause it to grow. It’s a thing about putting life into something.

Hebrews 4 begins, 1] Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it.
[2] For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it.

If the Word’s going to profit you, you don’t just hear it and know it--it has to be mixed with faith. In other words, you have to BELIEVE it. And when you believe it, it gets engrafted by faith into your soul. There’s a spiritual transaction where that Word literally gets implanted into your inner man.

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If ever there was a passage of Scripture that succinctly reveals how eternal salvation is brought into a person's life, Ephesians 1:13-14 is it:

[13] In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise,
[14] Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory.

The Holy Spirit comes in to seal you (He "seals the deal," we would say) when you believed, and you believed when you heard the Word of truth.

The moment you trust the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior, relying exclusively on Him to be the Savior He died and rose again for you to be, God goes into action and seals you.

Now, when He seals you WITH His Spirit, the personal residency of the Spirit of God in your life is the seal; it’s the guarantee.

He says "that seal which is the earnest of our inheritance." It’s the down payment; it’s the first installment of the eternal glory that you’ll have forever.

A seal in the Bible is a sign of a done deal--the thing's accomplished. It’s a sign of ownership.

II Timothy 2:19 says, [19] Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his. And, Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity.

You see, the seal tells you that He knows you. You’re His so you have "the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession." It also says you should depart from iniquity. Now that’s our part. We should live in the identity God gives us.

Ephesians 4:30 says, [30] And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.

Your security isn’t in what you do; it’s in who Jesus Christ is. Your security is the fact you’re sealed WITH the resident agency of the Holy Spirit. That’s a secure seal.

The seal is an issue of security, but that security doesn’t produce carelessness; it produces appreciation. Because of who we are, we should live in line with and in cooperation with what the Spirit of God’s doing in our life. That’s the sum total of what the Christian life is all about.

H.A. Ironside writes in a commentary, "The seal speaks of something that is settled. One draws up a legal document and seals it and that settles it. And so Christ and His loved ones have entered into an eternal relationship, and He has given us the seal, the Holy Spirit. That seal is the pledge of His love."