The primary ground of assurance is rooted in the promises of God, but those promises must become increasingly real to the believer through the subjective evidences of grace and the internal witness of the Holy Spirit.
Feed My Sheep, ed. Don Kistler, Soli Deo Gloria Ministries, 2002, p. 123.
Prayer helps us cling to the altar of God’s promises by which we lay hold of God Himself.
Feed My Sheep, ed. Don Kistler, Soli Deo Gloria Ministries, 2002, p. 117.
The objective is the food for the subjective; thus the subjective is always rooted in the objective… Without the Spirit’s application, the promises of God lead to self-deceit and carnal presumption. On the other hand, without the promises of God and the illumination of the Spirit, self-examination tends to introspection, bondage, and legalism. Objective and subjective Christianity must not be separated from each other.
Focusing on Christ, Reformation 21, April 21, 2020. Used by Permission.
The Bible is full of God’s promises to provide for us spiritually and materially, to never forsake us, to give us peace in times of difficult circumstances, to cause all circumstances to work together for our good, and finally to bring us safely home to glory. Not one of those promises is dependent upon our performance. They are all dependent on the grace of God given to us through Jesus Christ.
Transforming Grace, NavPress, 1991, p. 71. Used by permission of NavPress – www.navpress.com. All rights reserved. Get this book!
Satan promises the best, but pays with the worst; he promises honor, and pays with disgrace; he promises pleasure, and pays with pain; he promises profit, and pays with loss; he promises life, and pays with death. But God pays as He promises; all His payments are made in pure gold.
All God’s promises depend upon Christ alone. This is a notable assertion and one of the main articles of our faith. It depends in turn upon another principle – that it is only in Christ that God the Father is graciously inclined towards us. His promises are the testimonies of His fatherly goodwill towards us. Thus it follows that they are fulfilled only in Christ… Secondly, we are incapable of possessing God’s promises till we have received the remission of our sins and that comes to us through Christ.
Commentary.
Satan has been a liar from the beginning. His constant goal is to get believers to turn their backs on the promises of God and pursue apparently rosier dreams.
Living in the Gap Between Promise and Reality, P&R Publishing, 1999, p. 36. Used by Permission.
When you look at the Cross, what do you see? You see God’s awesome faithfulness. Nothing – not even the instinct to spare His own Son – will turn Him back from keeping His word.
A Heart for God, 1987, p. 46, by permission Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA.
In Christ is the yes, the grand consummating affirmative, to all God’s promises. He is the horn of salvation raised up for us by God, “as He spake by the mouth of His holy prophets which have been since the world began” (Luke 24:44). The covenant promises addressed to Abraham and his seed are realized in His single person (Gal. 3:16). To the believer, therefore, Christ is all, not merely as fulfilling a word of the past, but as Himself being the very living Word of God, faithful and eternal. In Him all fullness dwells (Col. 1:19): wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, redemption are to be found in Him alone (1 Cor. 1:30). There is nothing which is not in Him, who is the First and the Last, the Beginning and End (Rev. 22:13).
2 Corinthians, Eerdmans, www.eerdmans.com,1962, p. 36-37.
When God makes a promise, you can take it to the bank. God cannot lie, so His promises never deceive. God is all-powerful, so His promises never fail.
The Story of Promise by Michael Lawrence taken from Biblical Theology by Michael Lawrence, copyright 2010, Crossway Books, a division of Good News Publishers, Wheaton Illinois 60187, www.crosswaybooks.org. Page 173.
What’s striking when you consider that God is a God of promise is that it means that our lives are, by design, lives of waiting.
The Story of Promise by Michael Lawrence taken from Biblical Theology by Michael Lawrence, copyright 2010, Crossway Books, a division of Good News Publishers, Wheaton Illinois 60187, www.crosswaybooks.org. Page 169.
From the opening pages of Scripture to their close, the story of God’s redemptive activity is structured by promises made and promises kept.
The Story of Promise by Michael Lawrence taken from Biblical Theology by Michael Lawrence, copyright 2010, Crossway Books, a division of Good News Publishers, Wheaton Illinois 60187, www.crosswaybooks.org. Page 169.
God’s…promises are not simply random good intentions. Rather, God’s promises together point to and delineate a divine plan for history – a plan to rescue a people for the praise of His glory, and to effect that rescue, that salvation, through a judgment that God Himself would bear on our behalf. In other words, history is not cyclical, a “mere repetition” of archetypal patterns. Rather, history is heading somewhere. It’s linear. It’s developing and progressing toward an end that God has already prepared.
Biblical Theology Tools 2 by Michael Lawrence taken from Biblical Theology by Michael Lawrence, copyright 2010, Crossway Books, a division of Good News Publishers, Wheaton Illinois 60187, www.crosswaybooks.org. Page 71.
What greater rebellion against God, what greater wickedness, what greater contempt of God is there than not believing His promise? For what is this but to make God a liar or to doubt that He is truthful.
Freedom of a Christian, p. 59.
There are basically two ways to read the Bible — as a book of law, or as a book of promise. Our natural religious psychology wants to read the Bible as law: “God is explaining here how I can win his favor.” A law-hermeneutic is the pre-understanding we naturally bring to our Bible reading, every page. But in Galatians 3 Paul explains that he reads the Bible as a book of promise, and he wants us to as well. He sees every page of the Bible as gracious promise from God to undeserving sinners. Is there law in the Bible? Yes. But it was “added” (v. 19). Law was inserted after the promises to Abraham were established. It is promise that comes first (Genesis 12), then law comes later (Exodus 20). It is promise, therefore, that defines the all-encompassing framework within which we are to read everything else in the Bible… Every page [in the Bible], most deeply understood, shines forth as a promise of grace to sinners in Christ.
Blog Post: How to Read the Bible, January 14, 2008, Used by Permission.
God Most High is attentive to us all every moment of every day. He always will be. Not one promise of His will fail. Not in the slightest detail. Instead, His promises will prove to be better than we expect, better by far.
Blog Post: God Fulfills His Purpose, May 2, 2008, Used by Permission.
The being of God may as well fail as the promise of God (Timothy Cruso).
A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 226.
I am the Almighty God, able to fulfill your highest hopes and accomplish for you the brightest ideal that ever My words set before you. There is no need of paring down the promise until it squares with human probabilities, no need of relinquishing one hope it has begotten, no need of adopting some interpretation of it which may make it seem easier to fulfill, and no need of striving to fulfill it in any second-rate way. All possibility lies in this: I am the Almighty God (Marcus Dods).
The Book of Genesis, 1902), p. 161.
For the most part we live upon successes, not promises: unless we see and feel the print of victories, we will not believe.
A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 227.
The Lord’s commands are rarely accompanied with reasons but they are always accompanied with promises, either expressed or understood.
Gleanings in Genesis, Moody Press, 1950, p. 142.
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One of two things causes a man to change his mind and reverse his plans: one is foresight to anticipate everything, or lack of foresight to execute them. But as God is both omniscient and omnipotent there is never any need for Him to reverse His decrees.
We must never expect God to do the things He has never promised to do. For instance, God has never promised to always heal your infirmities, provide a spouse and/or children, exempt you from suffering or make you wealthy. God gives us His promises according to His will. We are in no position to force our will upon Him and expect Him to comply and then express our disappointment that He let us down when He, according to our own estimation, fails to come through. It’s not “name it and claim it.” It is “read it and believe it.”
Sermon, The God Beyond Imagination, Ephesians 3:20-21, December 18, 2016.
Our eyes need to be on God’s Word. Specifically we need to know and trust by faith the promises He has revealed to us in Scripture. We need to train ourselves to see the unseen. We need to view His doing as the ultimate reality. We need to keep His character and His truths forefront in our minds. We need to walk not by what we see, but by faith in what might be invisible, yet what we know to be true. Then and only then will we be able to cut through the smokescreen of this world and have the confidence to conduct ourselves with hope and courage, knowing God is in charge and He will keep His promises.
Sermon, Courage Encouraged, 2 Corinthians 5:6-10, June 22, 2014.
Consider God’s faithfulness to His promises: We learn that all things do work together for good (Rom. 8:28). We learn that God will never leave us nor forsake us (Heb. 13:5). We learn that nothing will separate us from the love of Christ (Rom. 8:35). We learn to walk by faith and not by sight (2 Cor. 5:7). We learn to trust in God’s character and not our circumstances. We learn no detail of our life is outside His loving purpose and sovereign control. We learn His solution far surpasses our most creative imagination. We learn God is often closest when we least feel His presence. We learn Hebrews 10:23 which calls us to “hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.”
Sermon, Can I Trust God? Lamentations 3:19-23, August 16, 2020.
When you’re in the intersection between the promises of God and the details of your situation, what you do with your mind is very important. In this intersection, God will never ask you to deny reality. Abraham did not deny reality. Romans 4 says that he “considered the deadness of Sarah’s womb.” Faith doesn’t deny reality. No, it is a God-focused way of considering reality.
Dirty Secrets by Paul David Tripp taken from Dangerous Calling by Paul David Tripp copyright 2012, Crossway Books, a division of Good News Publishers, Wheaton Illinois 60187, www.crosswaybooks.org, p. 133.
God has not promised skies always blue, flower-strewn pathways all our life through; God has not promised sun without rain, joy without sorrow, peace without pain. But God has promised strength for the day, rest for the labor, light for the way; grace for the trials, help from above, unfailing sympathy, undying love.
