Let's read together this evening Philippians chapter one. Philippians chapter one, we'll consider tonight, verse six. of this chapter. Let's read the entire chapter for our Bible reading this evening. Philippians chapter one. Paul and Timotheus, the servants of Jesus Christ to all the saints in Christ Jesus which are at Philippi. with the bishops and deacons. Grace be unto you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God upon every remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine for you all, making request with joy for your fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now. being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. Even as it is meet for me to think this of you all, because I have you in my heart, inasmuch as both in my bonds and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel, ye all are partakers of my grace. For God is my record, how greatly I long after you in all the bowels of Jesus Christ. In this I pray that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment. that ye may approve things that are excellent, that ye may be sincere and without offense till the day of Christ, being filled with the fruits of righteousness which are by Jesus Christ unto the glory and praise of God. But I would ye should understand, brethren, that the things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the gospel, so that my bonds in Christ are manifest in all the palace and in all other places. And many of the brethren in the Lord, waxing confident by my bonds, are much more bold to speak the word without fear. Some indeed preach Christ even of envy and strife, and some also of goodwill. The one preached Christ of contention, not sincerely supposing to add affliction to my bonds, but the other of love, knowing that I am set for the defense of the gospel. What then, notwithstanding every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is preached, and I therein do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice? For I know that this shall turn to my salvation through your prayer and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, according to my earnest expectation and my hope, that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but that with all boldness as always, so now also Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life or by death. For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. But if I live in the flesh, this is the fruit of my labor, yet what I shall choose I want not. For I am in a straight betwixt two, having a desire to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better. Nevertheless, to abide in the flesh is more needful for you. In having this confidence, I know that I shall abide and continue with you all for your furtherance and joy of faith, that your rejoicing may be more abundant in Jesus Christ for me by my coming to you again. Only let your conversation be as it becometh the gospel of Christ, that whether I come and see you or else be absent, I may hear of your affairs, that ye stand fast in one spirit, with one mind striving together for the faith of the gospel. and in nothing terrified by your adversaries, which is to them an evident token of perdition, but to you of salvation and that of God. For unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake, having the same conflict which he saw in me. and now here to be in Me." So far we read God's Word. Let's reread v. 6 of this chapter. The text for the sermon. Philippians 1-6 Being confident of this very thing, that He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. Beloved in the Lord Jesus Christ, we heard tonight the confession of faith of Carter Dykstra. And having confessed that faith, we are reminded, for many of us, of the confession that we made many years ago, or maybe only a little while ago. And we are reminded of what we are hoping and striving that our children and young people will grow up to do as they mature in their faith. Part of that confession of faith is a confession of what we believe to be the truth. And when we confess our faith, what we are confessing is that we believe that what is taught here in this Christian church is the truth of God's Word. And that means that it is a confession that we believe what our creeds confess is the truth. We are a creedal church, and one of those creeds is the Canons of Dort. And as we're familiar with, the Canons of Dort are divided into five heads, beginning with unconditional election, moving on to limited atonement, and then to total depravity and to irresistible grace and ending with what is a precious truth of the Reformed faith that we hold to and that Carter confessed tonight, the preservation of the saints. Carter confessed to believe in the preservation of the saints. We confess to believe in the preservation of the saints. And that is such an important confession that we make from God's Word. It's important that we confess that so that theologically we confess what the truth of God's word teaches, but that's an important confession to make because it means everything for us in our lives. This is what he must know and this is what we must all know as we gather for worship tonight, that God will preserve us. And the text that we consider tonight is one of the outstanding passages in the word of God that teaches this truth. He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. I call your attention to this text under the theme, Confidence in the Preserving Work of God. Let's consider what this means, why Paul had this confidence, and why we can have this confidence too. And then to what end? What does that work in us when we think about this truth? Confidence in the preserving work of God. What, why, and to what end? The text that we're considering tonight comes from the introduction to the epistle to the Philippians. Paul starts with the greeting in verses 1 and 2, and then verses 3 through 11 make up the introduction to the epistle. And the apostle does two things in this introduction. The second thing that he does is offer a specific prayer. That's verses nine through 11. It's a beautiful prayer. It's the prayer that their love may abound yet more and more. That just as well could have been used for a confession of faith tonight. The prayer that our love may abound more and more in knowledge and in all judgment. But the first thing that he does in the introduction, running from verses 3 through 8, is he expresses thanks to God for the church in Philippi. Notice that in verse 3, I thank my God upon every remembrance of you. And then you come to verse 5, and he says specifically what it is that he is thankful to God for. as he thinks about the church in Philippi. He's thankful, verse 5, for your fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now. He's thankful that he shares with them fellowship in the gospel, that he's one with them in the gospel. that together they are the recipients of the grace of God in Jesus Christ through His shed blood. Together they make the confession of that Gospel. Together they have the common desire to walk in thanks to God for that salvation. He's thankful that he shares with them in the Gospel. And he says that this was true from the first day The first day being the first time on his second missionary journey that he went to Philippi, and at that time God by his work established the church in Philippi. From that first day until now, and the now is while Paul is in prison in Rome. From the first day until now, he's shared with them in the fellowship of the Gospel. And thinking back and thinking present, leads him to think future. And that's the content of our text in verse 6. Well, what about the future? This has been true from the first day. It's true now. And Paul says, and this is what I'm confident of. I'm confident that God, which has begun a good work in you, will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. Just to be clear, when he says at the beginning of the text, being confident of this very thing, the this very thing is what he's going to go on to say. I think that's how we naturally read the text. That he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. This text teaches then the preservation of God's people. So let's look at the main ideas of this text. We start with the good work that He begins in us. Notice that. That He which hath begun a good work in you. God has begun a good work in His people. God has begun that good work in Carter. God begins that good work the moment He works the life of Jesus Christ in us. That's the work of regeneration. John 3 speaks of that as being born again. Ephesians 2 speaks of that as a spiritual resurrection from the dead. Ezekiel speaks of that as a new heart that's been given to us by God. God has begun a good work in us. That's the first time that he implants in the life of one of his children the life of Jesus Christ. And having implanted that life in his people, That life then matures and grows so that that faith that God works in us becomes active. And Carter expresses that activity of faith tonight by his confession, which he made before us all. The text describes this as a good work. Notice that. He which hath begun a good work. That idea of the word good in the text is that of loveliness and excellence. Beautiful. That's the idea of that word good. This is a most beautiful work that God has begun in us. And there's all sorts of reasons why we can say that it is a beautiful work. It's a beautiful work because of the one who has performed it. God has begun this work in us. And God is beautiful. God is most excellent. And all of the works of God are most beautiful and most excellent. And so what he does as God is always, by virtue of the one who does it, a good work." It's a good work because of what the work itself is. It's a beautiful thing that God has done to us. Think about that. We who are sinners, we who are guilty sinners, we who are filthy sinners, God has worked in us. God has worked in us to change us, to transform us, to make us new creatures in Jesus Christ. We aren't the way that we used to be. All together in our sin, now we're alive with the life of Jesus Christ being conformed more and more in the image of Jesus Christ. When you look at what God has done, we say in response to that, that's a good, beautiful, excellent, lovely work. And then you think about what it results in, which makes it a good work and a beautiful work. It's this right here. A body of believers coming together in a church of Jesus Christ. An individual believer tonight, and we together with Him tonight, confessing our faith, confessing glory to God, singing praises to His name, living a life God willing in this week to come that serves the living God. All of this, and there are other reasons, make the work that God has begun in us the good work that it is. But that's not the main point of the text. The main point of the text is not that God has begun a good work in us. We have to say something about that. We did. But the main point of the text is to say that the God which has begun this good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. That's the main idea. The good work begun will be performed until the day of Jesus Christ. And here we zero in on that word perform. That word perform has in it the word goal. The idea of the word perform is that he will bring to the end, he will bring to the accomplishing of the goal, the good work that he has begun in us. God is always a God who has a goal in mind. Nothing God does is done outside of the scope of a goal. This is the doctrine of providence. That God upholds all things and that God governs all things according to His decree. All working towards a certain goal at the very end when Jesus returns. Well, there is a goal that God has with the good work that He has begun in you and in me. And that goal is fulfilled, according to the text, when the day of Jesus Christ comes. The day of Jesus Christ referred to there in the text is the day of Jesus Christ's return. When he comes a second time, he came a first time. He came in humility the first time. in order to go down the path of suffering, a suffering that would end with His death on the cross and His resurrection from the dead and His ascension into heaven. And now He will come again. And when He comes again, He won't come in humility as He came in the first time. He's going to come in exaltation. On that day of the Lord's return, then the good work begun will be brought to It's final completion. The goal will be accomplished and fully realized. What this makes clear then, beloved, is that we don't have it all yet. God has begun a good work in us. This doesn't take away anything from the work begun in us and how good it is. It's amazing. There's more to come. There's something that we don't have. There's a goal yet to be accomplished with that good work that is begun in us. And to get at that, we just have to think about what Jesus Christ will do when He returns that second time. When Jesus Christ returns that second time, what He is going to do is He's going to raise the bodies of all men. He's going to raise the bodies of believers. In that body from the grave, He is going to raise into a new resurrected body. A body fit for eternity. And then He's going to perform that final judgment before Christ. All men will stand. And the final judgment will be performed such that all the enemies of Christ are cast into everlasting damnation forever. And such that Those who belong to Christ are gathered with Christ. And God is vindicated for everything He has done throughout time and history. And then what Christ is going to do after that is He's going to make all things new. He's not going to start over, but He's going to take this present world and He's going to renew it and make it a new creation, bringing the heavens and the earth all together, one in Jesus Christ. And we in our resurrected bodies, having been brought through that final judgment in which God was glorified on the basis of Christ's work, will be brought into that new creation where we will live with Jesus Christ forever. That's what's to come for us until the day of Jesus Christ. And what this text is saying is that that will be performed. Because we don't have it all yet. And the things that I just mentioned a moment ago indicate why, though God has begun a good work in us, we still need that goal to be accomplished in the future. Because here we are, still sinners. Still have an old man of sin. Still living in a body that is broken down and breaking down and on a path to death. And still in a world filled with devils and demons and unbelievers who seek to destroy us and who hate us because they hate the Lord Jesus Christ. And here we are, just as a little tiny group of believers, when you think about the scope of God's people, gathered from the beginning to the end of the world. Yes, God has performed a good work. But beloved, and here's the point, there's so much more for us to come. In Philippians 1 verse 6 says to us tonight, God will perform that goal when Jesus Christ returns. And Paul is confident of that. And he expresses his confidence of that and the strength of his confidence in that. Notice that at the beginning of verse six, being confident of this very thing, he calls attention to this. He doesn't just state the truth, but he calls attention to it and says, I'm confident. I'm confident of this very thing, that God will perform this work until the day of Jesus Christ. Christian faith is a faith of confidence. In other words, he does not doubt. He does not question. But he says, I'm confident. I know this. I'm assured of this. It's certain that God who has begun a good work will perform it until the day of Christ. The nature of faith is that it's confident. It doesn't mean that we don't have to fight against doubting and questioning. We do. But where that comes from is not the new man in our faith itself. Where that comes from is the old man and the devil who seeks to lead us down paths of despair. But the faith itself, as God has worked it in us, is confident. We can know, we must know, Carter must know, who confessed his faith tonight, that this is true. That he will be brought to that end when Jesus Christ returns, and that we will be brought to that end, too, when the Lord Jesus Christ returns. And this leads us to the second point of the sermon, of why. Why could the Apostle Paul, and by implication of course, we, have this confidence? This is quite the statement. This is quite the truth. That he can say something about a day that he doesn't even know when it's going to come. No man knows the day of the Lord's return. He knows He's going to come. He doesn't even know exactly when it's going to be, but he can say, I know that at that day in the future, whenever that day is, this is going to be true. That the good work begun will be brought to its final end. How and why can Paul be so confident? The answer to that question is he's confident because he knows God. Being confident of this very thing that he which hath begun this good work will perform it. The confidence of the Apostle Paul does not reside in the members of the church of Philippi to whom he is writing. and see the stark difference between those two ideas. Confidence in God, or confidence in men. He does not go down this path and take a good survey of the church in Philippi and the members of that church, think about their character, think about their attitudes, think about their gifts, and analyzing all of that say, okay, looking at you, I'm confident. I'm confident because of you, that this will be brought to its end when Jesus Christ returns. I don't say that to you this evening as a congregation. I certainly don't say that to you, Carter, who confessed your faith tonight. And I don't say that with respect to myself. Our confidence does not reside in ourselves. If it were to us, this would never take place. But Paul doesn't look at them. His confidence is in God. He understands God. And understanding God, he can say in a resounding way, this will one day take place. That's the main truth of why Paul is confident. He knows God. who He is, what He has said, and what He promises to do. Now let's break that down a little bit more carefully into three points to explain as he looks to God why he is confident concerning this truth. The first is that Paul is confident because he understands that God is a God of an all-encompassing decree, and then in particular, he is the God of the decree of election. Paul knows the God concerning whom he is writing is a decree, a decretal God. Meaning that He is a God who before the creation of the heavens and the earth has a decree that is all-encompassing for time and history. And specifically a decree concerning the salvation of His people. God in eternity said, these are my children. These are my children whom I elect in Jesus Christ, and whom I give to Jesus Christ, and who will be saved by Jesus Christ, and who will be brought then to that final end when Jesus Christ returns. It's all in its source, which is the decree of election. Understand, people of God, the nature of God's decrees. God's decrees are unchanging. And God's decrees are powerful. They're unchanging. Which means in eternity, if God said, I set my love upon these particular persons, And I give them to Christ. And Christ is going to die for them. And Christ is going to return for them. None of that can ever change because God in eternity said, this is what will come to pass. And just as they are unchanging, they are effectual. They are powerful. God doesn't give a decree and say, I think this is the way that it's going to work out in time and history. It's not, okay, we'll go down this path, and then depending on this or that, we'll go down that path or that path. No, in eternity God said, this is the decree. These are whom I'm going to save. And nothing changes it, and it's powerful in order to be accomplished. Beloved, this is the comfort of the decree of election. Unchanging in His love and powerful to carry out in time and history. And that source of election means that this will take place. I'd like to read in this connection from the Canons of Dort. In the introduction to the sermon, I referenced the Canons of Dort. And now I'd like to read, at this point and then at a later point, a couple of articles. We'll start with the first head of the canons and read Article 7. This is on page 58 in the back of this altar, at least this altar that I have. Article 7 of the first head. And remember that the canons begins with election, and this is why, this is why, because of what it is. and what it means for everything that comes after it. Election is the unchangeable purpose of God, whereby before the foundation of the world he hath out of mere grace, according to the sovereign good pleasure of his own will, chosen from the whole human race, which had fallen through their own fault, from their primitive state of rectitude into sin and destruction, a certain number of persons to redemption in Christ, whom he from eternity appointed the mediator and head of the elect and the foundation of salvation. That's the definition of election. You want a definition of election? There it is. And now this. This elect number, though by nature neither better nor more deserving than others, But with them involved in one common misery, God hath decreed to give to Christ, to be saved by him, and effectually to call and draw them to his communion by his word and spirit, to bestow upon them true faith, justification and sanctification. And then this, and having powerfully preserved them in the fellowship of His Son, finally to glorify them for the demonstration of His mercy and for the praise of His glorious grace. As it is written in Ephesians 1 and Romans 8. The point there is the election is the source of everything that comes after it and what comes after it Powerfully preserved in the fellowship of His Son. One of the passages cited there is Ephesians 1. You read Ephesians 1, it starts with the election and then it gets to the end. Where all things are gathered together, one in Jesus Christ. That's the goal that has its source in election. Why is Paul confident? Paul is confident because he knows God is a God of election. Why can you be confident? Why can I? Why can Carter tonight? It's because we can know this. I'm an elect child of God. God has worked in me the life of Jesus Christ. I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. And knowing that to be true, this will come to pass. The second reason the Apostle Paul can be confident as he is in this text is that he understands the nature of the cross of Jesus Christ. This adds to the point that we just made. He understood the cross. Because of what the cross of Jesus is, that means that this truth must come to pass. You see, the nature of the cross is that it actually did something. It was powerful. It was effective to accomplish the salvation of those for whom Jesus Christ laid down His life. The cross of Jesus as He hung on that cross did not just make salvation possible for some or for others. But when Jesus Christ hung on that cross, He did so in the place of individual persons taking their actual sins and nailing them to the cross and paying the price for them as He suffered the wrath of God. And the nature of the cross, therefore, is that it actually accomplished the redemption of those for whom Jesus Christ laid down His life. And what that means is this. This has to come to pass. Because of the way in which Christ saved us on the cross. The full salvation was accomplished by Jesus through His lifelong obedience and His atoning death on that cross. The full salvation which has as its end life with God in the new creation. because it was a full salvation actually earned by Jesus on that cross. There can be nothing but this end for those whom Jesus laid down His life for. The end of perfect life in the age to come. And so as we think about Christ tonight, looking back, We can say, Jesus came for me. He came for me in humility. He came for me in such a way that He died for me. He actually satisfied the justice of God for my sins and was victorious over death for me. As I look back and know that Christ came for me once, I can look forward and say, because He did that, And this is why we always look to the cross. Look to Christ. Because He did that, I can look forward and know He's going to come for me again. In glory and exaltation. And if at that time I am dead in a grave, He's going to raise my body because that's the salvation earned on the cross. And He's going to bring me into the new heaven and new earth. You ever doubt? the preserving work of God, if you will ever doubt that, Carter, going forward, as the devil assaults us. How could this be true? Is this really true? Is this for you? What do you do? Where do you go? What do you do and where do you go? It's this. You go to God's Word. And you go to the cross. And you see your Savior. In the full and free redemption that He has earned, knowing that if He did that, There's nothing that could ever separate us from His love. And that the end of that salvation must come to pass. The first reason he was confident is he knew God is a God of election. The second reason is he knows that the nature of the cross is powerful. And the third is he knows who God is as the sovereign God. who is sovereign over all of our enemies, who seek to hurt us. Notice that we're talking about God here. It's not the name used in our text. It's the pronoun He. But that goes back to verse 3, I thank my God. Just take note of the name God. The Almighty One. And because He's the Almighty One, we can know that all of the enemies that seek our hurt and destruction will never prevail, and can never prevail. That's a good thing to think about on a night that a young man makes confession of faith, because the devil is relentless. And the world is relentless. The pressures that our children and youth are experiencing and our young adults are experiencing from this world are increasingly bearing down upon them. The pressures of all of the sin and worldliness and materialism and self-centeredness and post-modernism and all of the rest, not to mention all of the sins that are so alluring and can so easily entrap. All of that makes us think, are the enemies too strong? Is the devil too crafty? Are the pressures too extreme? And will they finally get to the point where some are plucked out of Father's hand? And the answer to that is the most resounding, powerful, No, no, no. Why? Because it's God. It's God who reigns. It's God who rules. It's God who is in control and it's God who will not let that pressure and the devil and all of his enemies ever, ever destroy one of his children. And so confident we are that God, who has begun a good work, will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. And what was the main point that I started that second point with? It was this, just to reiterate. Don't look to yourself for confidence. Because when you look to yourself, you see someone weak and sinful and unworthy. Paul looked to God. He knew God. He knew the truth. He knew Christ. And in Him, there is this certainty. And that gives us a certain end. There is a certain end worked in us as a result of these amazing truths. And this comes from the context. Two things that if we know this, if we have this confidence, number one, we will be thankful. Verse 3 of Philippians 1, I thank my God upon every remembrance of you. And then what he thanked God for was the fellowship in the gospel. And part of that was he knew that the work God began in them would be performed until the day of Christ. Paul was thankful. And tonight we are thankful. We are thankful for this amazing truth. We're thankful that of all men, God has chosen us. Undeserving sinners and saved us in Christ. Saved us with a complete salvation. Saved us with an end that is beyond imagined. So amazing for us to come. Thankfulness. Certainly, Carter is thankful tonight. Carter's family is thankful. Carter's friends are thankful. We as a congregation are thankful for him and God's work in him, but also as we think about our life together as believers. Thankful that God has done this. And then the second thing is joy. Always in every prayer of mine for you all, making requests with joy. Beloved, if this doesn't thrill our hearts, there's nothing that will. To know We who are unworthy sinners have been saved by Jesus. Nothing can pluck us out of our Father's hand. And there's an end for us to come, which is a new heaven and a new earth where we will live forever with Jesus. I say again, if that doesn't make us joyful, there's nothing that will, because that is our joy as Christians. And so may God give us that joy. the joy of the certain hope that we have when the Lord Jesus Christ returns. And be confident of this. It's a very interesting thing about the text, and I conclude with it. Paul is in prison in Rome. In prison in Rome, he writes to the church in Philippi. He's not even with them, but he knows them. And Paul writing in Rome to those saints says, I have this confidence for you. Understand that that's what he's doing in the text. He's expressing the confidence that he has for them. It's not even his own personal confidence that this is true, but a confidence for the church. And the point with this, if Paul had this confidence for them, they certainly could have this confidence for themselves. We can and do have this confidence for each other as we see God's work in each other. I can have this for Carter. We can have this for each other. We can also have it, of course, for ourselves then. And that's the hope and prayer that God would fill this congregation in light of the preaching of His Word tonight with this confidence, and therefore with this thanks, and therefore with this joy. so that this would have an effect upon us in this week to come. Peace in the midst of the struggles of this life. Joy, no matter the circumstances, because of the future to come. And lifelong thanks for God's gift of grace in Jesus Christ. Amen. Our Father in heaven, thankful we are as we bring this service to a conclusion tonight for Jesus Christ and for the salvation that is in him alone. Thankful thou hast worked that in Carter, we pray for him again, and we pray for all of us here present that thy word may penetrate our hearts deeply, that we may believe it and take it with us in this week to come, and that thou comfort our hearts too through it, because what an amazingly comforting text and truth this is. Hear our prayer, Father, and forgive our sins for Jesus' sake, amen. Let's sing now number 203.