The Gospel & Salvation: The New Creation of Salvation

The New Creation of Salvation

A New Heart – A Heart of Flesh

2 Cor. 5:17 & Ezekiel 36:22-28

 Let’s begin today by turning to 2 Corinthians 5. The main theme of the first seven chapters of 2 Corinthians is the defense of Paul’s apostleship. He had spent about 18 months in the city of Corinth. He had planted the church and served as its pastor during that time. After his departure there were false prophets and false apostles who came in and attacked both the man and the message he had preached. In this passage, in 2 Cor. 5:11-21 Paul defends the message of his ministry. Read the passage.

There are a few statements in this passage we just read that are critical to the message of Paul’s ministry. The message of his ministry was the gospel message. Verse 14-15 says, “For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died; and He died for all, so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf.” The message of this verse should ring familiar to you because it is Paul’s summary description of the death of the innocent substitute of which we have said so much during this series. When Paul says, “one died for all” we know exactly who Paul is talking about.

Paul goes on to explain that the reason this One died for all is so that those who live through Him, might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf.” Paul is reminding the Corinthians that the message of his ministry, the gospel message, includes the reality of a transformation. To trust in the One who died and rose again on our behalf makes us to be a people who no longer live for ourselves, but for the One who died and rose again on our behalf.

Paul then continues in verse 16, “Therefore from now on we recognize no one according to the flesh…” What is Paul saying? Paul does not try to determine who lives for Christ and who lives for themselves based on what he can see on the outside. That which is done by the flesh is outwardly seen. In like manner, Christ was once known according to the flesh, but now Christ is not known according to the flesh. In other words, Christ is no longer seen in the flesh. Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Have any of us seen Christ? We have not seen Christ in the flesh.

This brings Paul to this incredible statement of verse 17. “Therefore…” This word ties what Paul is about to say to what he just said. What Paul has just said is that we don’t recognize anyone based on what we see them doing in the flesh, or outwardly, but “if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.” We can’t tell by looking at the outward appearance. We can tell because of the transformation of the individual who comes to Christ. This transformation is the result of old things passing away and new things become a reality in the life of the one who is truly in Christ.

Today I want to begin to look at these new things that come. This is a logical and a biblical transition in our series on the gospel and the work of salvation. We have studied the sin problem extensively. We have come to understand the solution to the sin problem. Those who repent and believe become partakers in the solution. It is through faith in Christ alone. We have learned that this incredible exchange of our sinfulness for His righteousness happens because of grace.

For the rest of the time we spend in this series I want to focus on what actually happens to us as a result of having been saved through faith in Christ. We learned last week, in the final message on grace, that we are God’s workmanship. We have been created in Christ Jesus to do the good works which God ordained beforehand. The next logical question seems to me to be, “Ok, what is included in this work of God?” What exactly has God done in those who are saved by grace? Maybe that isn’t the right way to ask the question. Maybe we should ask, “What has God done, and what is God continuing to do in those who are saved?”

We know from our experience in the Christian life that what God started when we were saved is a work He continues to do in us now. It would be nice if, at the moment of my salvation, my sanctification was also complete. It does not work that way. We have been justified. We have been redeemed. We have been delivered from sin’s penalty. We have been sanctified in one respect in that we have been set apart (that is what the word “sanctify” means – to set apart). We have become the beneficiaries of the great exchange we have talked about on several occasions - our sin for His righteousness. But, as we know, we are all still a work in progress. Some are further along than others, but none of us has arrived. So the old things that have passed away, and the new things which have come, need to be understood. 

So, I want us to spend some time looking at the Scriptures to understand what is involved in us being made a new creature. What are the old things that have passed away? What are the new things that have come? Paul has told us that we won’t necessarily recognize them by looking at what we see according to the flesh. What we do regarding the outward appearance doesn’t necessarily tell the truth about the work of salvation. Our experiences in life tell us that people are not necessarily what they appear to be on the outside. The Bible reveals that not everyone is necessarily what they appear to be on the outside. Judas Iscariot is the most obvious case in point.

The workmanship of God associated with salvation isn’t a work that begins on the outside. The workmanship of God, the making of us as new creatures, is a work that begins on the inside. In fact, it begins with God’s work in the heart. You can’t get anymore “inside” of a person than to get to the heart. We all know what I’m talking about when I refer to the heart. It isn’t the physical organ pumping blood. It is the center of our being. Our heart is the seat of our thinking, our emotions, and our will. We are who we truly are at the heart level.

Now let me take you back to January in our series on the gospel and salvation. Do you remember when we studied the sin problem? We looked at the temptation of the first couple in the Garden of Eden. Satan, speaking through the serpent, questioned the character of God, the love of God, the goodness of God, and the word of God and Satan tempted the first couple and they ate the forbidden fruit and they sinned. Do you remember what we identified as the root cause of their problem? They fell because they did not love the Lord their God with all their heart, mind, and soul. This, as you should remember, was the summary of God’s Law as given by Christ. The only way to perfectly fulfill the requirements of God’s Law is to love Him supremely, above everything else, and above everyone else, including ourselves. Only when we have done that can we fulfill the second part, which is to love our neighbor as we love ourselves.

So what we established very early in the series is that the sin problem, that which separates us from God and requires our reconciliation to God through salvation, is first and foremost a heart problem. Sin isn’t necessarily a behavior problem. Sin is a heart problem that manifests itself in our behavior. So, when God does His work to make us a new creature, and when God works to cause the old things to pass away, and to make new things come, guess where He begins? He begins with the heart. This is so important to understand. Too many people want a new life, but they want to start by changing everything external. They want to stop swearing, stop drinking, stop committing adultery, stop doing drugs, or whatever is causing their pain. Too many people believe that if they somehow modify the outward stuff that a new life will result. It won’t because it doesn’t work that way.

Turn with me to the book of Ezekiel and we will see what God does at the heart level. I want us to look at Ezekiel 36:22-28. Read the passage. Stand with me as we read these verses.

This is a prophecy concerning the nation of Israel. This is a description of something that God will do at some point in the future for the people of the nation of Israel. I must be faithful to the context of word of God and point that out. There may be some who would argue that this has nothing to do with the work of salvation in mankind now, but only for the nation of Israel. I don’t agree with that. I believe that what God is going to do to accomplish the redemption of the nation of Israel is paralleled by what He is doing now to redeem for Himself a people from every nation, tribe, and tongue.

When we are saved we are made to become a part of God’s kingdom. His kingdom, and the kingdom of our Lord and King Jesus Christ, is now a spiritual kingdom that is not of this world. In the future, when the King returns, the nation of Israel will turn as a nation to Christ. They will look upon Him whom they have pierced and they will mourn. They will turn as a nation to Christ and be saved by grace through faith in Christ. This is the only way anyone is saved.

So this passage is a description of what God is going to do for Israel at that time, but it is also a description of what God does in the life of the redeemed now. God’s work in the life of the believer begins with His work at the heart level. God’s work at the heart level is described in these verses.

Let’s begin with God’s motivation for doing what He does. Look at verse 22. “Therefore say to the house of Israel, ‘Thus says the Lord God, “It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for My holy name, which you have profaned among the nations where you went.’” Why does God do what He does in redemption? Is it because of Israel’s importance to God that God is going to do what He promises to do? Is it because God “needs” the nation of Israel?

There is a popular, but unbiblical notion among evangelicals that God saves us because He is lonely and wants us with Him in heaven for eternity. The idea is that God saves people because of some divine need or longing for relationships. Listen carefully. God doesn’t need anyone or anything. Western Christianity has exalted the worth of man far above a position that is biblical. The popular gospel presentation of the past generation has included a declaration of man’s inestimable worth to God. It convinces people that heaven will not be heaven if we are not there. This is a direct reflection of the influence of humanism on biblical Christianity. The truth of Scripture is that God has no lack, and therefore no need for anything or anyone outside of Himself. God has enjoyed perfect fellowship from eternity past as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. 

We learned from Ephesians 2:4 why God does what He does to redeem sinners. It was “because of the great love with which He loved us” that He made us alive together with Christ. Is there anything in the sinner that makes him or her worthy of God’s love? Our study has taught us that the answer to that question is clear. There is nothing in us that makes us worthy of God’s love. So what moved God to save us? What did Ephesians 2:4 tell us? Because of the great love with which He loved us, He made us alive together with Christ. Why does God love us? Because He is love. God is love, we are told in 1 John 4:8, and the love of God isn’t a decision or a feeling He has toward us. Love is an attribute of God. Love is at the essence of His nature and very being. God’s love is His motivation for saving us and His love is the result of who He is. It has nothing to do with the merit of the objects of His love.

We find here in Ezekiel 36:22 that it was not for the sake of Israel that God acted to redeem them. Israel did not deserve God’s blessings and favor. Nor will Israel deserve any future blessing. Israel has profaned His holy name among the nations where they have gone. God does what He does for the sake of His holy name. God saves for the sake of His own glory. God works among mankind to redeem for Himself a people for His own possession, so that we might proclaim His excellencies among the nations. God saves for His glory. When God is gracious and saves the undeserving sinner, He gains for Himself praise, glory, and honor. He is revered by all who experience it, and by all who see what He has done among His people.

Look at verse 23. God says, “‘I will vindicate the holiness of My great name which has been profaned among the nations, which you have profaned in their midst. Then the nations will know that I am the Lord,’ declares the Lord God, ‘when I prove Myself holy among you in their sight.’” Sinners, like the nation of Israel, profane the name of our holy God. God declares that He is going to do something among His people to vindicate His holy name. He is going to prove Himself holy.

What, then, is God going to do? Look at verse 24. “For I will take you from the nations, gather you from all the lands and bring you into your own land.” This passage provides one of the clearest Old Testament illustrations of God’s work to save sinners. Yes, it is directed to the prophetic future, but it is a description of His work now to redeem sinners to Himself to be part of His earthly kingdom that exists now.

Consider this parallel. Ephesians 2:2-3 describes our walk before our rescue from sin. We formerly walked according to the course of this world, a world under the dominion of the prince of the power of the air, that is Satan. We were among those in whom was working the same spirit working in the sons of disobedience. We lived in the lusts of our flesh. We indulged the desires of the flesh and of the mind. We were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.

Compare that to the way the nation of Israel wandered from God and into the lands of pagan influence. The people of Israel were in every way just like the godless pagans all around them. They were walking according to the course of this world, not according to the law of God as given them by Moses. All the nations, other than the nation of God’s people were under the dominion of the prince of the power of the air. The same spirit was working in the Israelites that was working in the disobedient people of these pagan nations. The people of Israel were just as much the children of wrath as the rest.

But God…said, (This parallels the “but God” statement of Ephesians 2:4) “I will take you from the nations, gather you from all the lands, and bring you into your own land.” What did we learn that God did in Ephesians 2. He, because of the great love with which He loved us, made us alive together with Christ and seated us with Him in the heavenly places. God took us from the nations, and gathered us from all the lands, and brought us into His domain. God rescued us from the world. He gathered us from the domain of Satan. He rescued us from the domain of Satan and transferred us into the kingdom of His beloved Son.

When God calls us from the world and brings us to dwell with Him we repent. By faith we receive the spiritual cleansing spoken of in verse 25. God sprinkles us with clean water. He cleanses us from all our filthiness and idols. This sprinkling is symbolized in the washing of the Mosaic rites of purification. Those washings were Old Testament pictures of the cleansing we would receive by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit (Titus 3:5). We were not redeemed, or saved, with anything but the precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ (1 Peter 1:19).

Now we come to verse 26 of Ezekiel 36 to the picturesque and instructive picture of God’s work at the heart level in those whom He saves. This is an Old Testament description of the work of God when He makes us alive together with Christ. God produces a transformation at the heart level. It is described as God’s giving us a new heart and a new spirit within. In order to do this God takes out our hearts of stone and gives us a heart of flesh. This is God’s work by which we are born again. This is what produces the regeneration of which we have learned so much. This is the supernatural work of God by which the spiritually dead sinner is made alive. This is what Paul describes as being made alive and raised to walk in newness of life in Romans 6:4.

The new heart and new spirit produce a change related to our very being, our nature, and our existence as a person. We are made to be new creatures. Old things pass away and new things come. A heart of stone which cannot respond to any stimuli is taken out and a heart of flesh is given that will respond to the conviction of sin, the truth of God’s word, and the leading of the Holy Spirit. This is the work of God. This is God’s work in the lives of those whom He saves. 

And I want you to notice throughout this passage that it is God who initiates the action. Verse 24 says, “I will take you from the nations…” Verse 25 says, “I will cleanse you from all your filthiness…” Verse 26 says, “I will give you a new heart…” Verse 26 again, “I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.” Verse 27 says, “I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes…” Verse 28 concludes with, “I will be your God.”

I would also ask you to notice the assurance regarding the outcomes of God’s actions. God promised to take the people from the nations and gather them from the lands and bring them to their own land. Look at verse 28. It says, “You will live in the land…” God said He will sprinkle the people and they will be clean (v. 25) God says He will put His Spirit in them and cause them to walk in His ordinances. Verse 27 describes the result. “you will be careful to observe My ordinances.”

Charles Spurgeon used an appropriate illustration to demonstrate the true nature of this transformation. Imagine taking a pig into a room where there were two dining options. On one side of the room was a beautiful buffet with the finest foods prepared by the best chefs in the world. On the other side of the room is a trough of slop. If we brought the pig into the middle of the room between the two options and turned it loose to choose what it would prefer to eat, where would it go? The farmer who owned the pig, and knew the nature of the pig, would not be the least bit surprised by the pig’s choice. He understands the nature of the pig so he knows beforehand what the pig will choose. The pig chooses the slop because he is a pig. You couldn’t get the pig to make any other choice unless you changed the pig from a pig into a human.

We should never be surprised when sinners act like sinners. Sinners are only acting in a way consistent with their nature. Until God does His work to take out a heart of stone, and replace it with a heart of flesh, nothing will change.

There are things that happen to attempt to produce change in the sinner. You can take the sinner, and without giving him a new heart, you can plug him into a religion, with rules, and rituals, and other external expectations, and you can alter the outward appearance, and the behavior of the person, but you cannot change the heart through a religion. That is why the religions of human achievement do not work. They cannot change the person at the heart level.

I recently read another illustration that depicts the futility of trying to change a sinner through religion. Imagine a wolf that has been raiding a flock of sheep. He kills and devours the sheep every time he gets hungry. The shepherds band together and manage to capture the wolf. They are compassionate shepherds. They believe they can help the wolf to change. They put him in a cage. The cage alters the wolf’s behavior. The wolf can no longer hurt the sheep. Does this change the nature of the wolf? The wolf is still the same creature that longs to kill and devour the sheep. If the cage door was to be left open, the wolf would immediately return to his old ways. The whole time the wolf is in the cage, it is filled with lust for the taste of sheep.

The only way the wolf ever stops desiring to kill and devour sheep is if it experiences a change of its nature. It would have to be changed from being a wolf. If the shepherds who put the wolf in the cage had the ability to take the nature out of the wolf and put within the wolf the nature of a sheep, the problem would be permanently and perfectly solved. This is far beyond the capacity of the shepherd. This is a transformation that can only be accomplished by the wolf’s Creator.

Think back to the illustration of the pig and its options for dinner. If the pig were to receive the nature of the human, not only would his choices of food options change, but his whole attitude about those options would change. If the pig could be made into a human, how would he now look at the slop? It would be repulsive to him. He would loathe the smell and the taste.

And if the wolf could be transformed from a wolf to a sheep, he too would no longer long to kill and devour sheep. His whole attitude toward both the shepherd and the sheep would be different. He would now love the shepherd and enjoy the company and fellowship with the other sheep.

When God gives the sinner a new heart, He gives the sinner a new attitude concerning sin and righteousness. The sinner who receives this new heart now hates the sin he once enjoyed. He loves the righteousness concerning which he was before indifferent. He is ashamed of the things he once enjoyed and he enjoys the things which he never enjoyed before. There is a transformation.

Verse 27 of our text says, “I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances.” The transformation of the nature of the sinner makes him or her to become one who delights in the Law of the Lord. We become those who want to do what is pleasing in His sight. We delight to do His will. We are made to become those who love Him supremely and do His will. We won’t be perfect, but our lives will be different, because our hearts are new.

If any man is in Christ he is a new creation, old things have passed away and new things have come. The heart of stone is removed and replaced with a heart of flesh. This is true because of the work of Christ on the Cross. We now turn our focus on the elements of the Lord’s Table.