Are You Spiritually Thriving? God’s Purpose, Sin’s Ruin, and Christ’s Salvation

So on my mind tonight are a couple of phrases that have caught my attention physically, from a very physical health perspective. But then I began to think about them. What do they mean spiritually?

The first one of those phrases is one that you may have heard primarily in relation to a very young child, an infant. Maybe it is just because there have been quite a few babies born recently. This phrase I heard again this afternoon: failure to thrive.

Some of you are medical, so you would know way more about that than I do. But usually what it means is that, for some reason, that little child is born and there is just something that is not quite where it should be. That baby is not thriving. It is not growing. It is not as healthy as you expect that child to be.

This afternoon, we were talking a little bit about the fact that people create things out of Lego. The site expressed this afternoon—I do not know if I ever completed a Lego project in my life—but people create massive, beautiful, amazing things out of Lego.

A couple of years ago, someone gave Eleanor a Lego flower to build. She built that flower. I think it was roses, if I remember correctly, and they were beautiful. But you would never confuse that Lego flower, those roses, with the real thing. It does not matter how beautiful that Lego construction is; you would say, “It is not the real thing.”

Maybe someone would give you some dried roses, some dried flowers, and they would be absolutely amazing. They would be beautiful. But you would never confuse them with something that has life—actual flowers growing, vibrant.

This afternoon we were at a farm for a little while, and on one of the shelves in the farm there was a stuffed cow. It was a very nice stuffed cow. But then we went out to the barn and saw real cows, and you were not going to confuse a stuffed cow with a real cow.

So how come we begin to think the way people normally live in this world is normal? It is okay. Almost like we think this is how God expects individuals to live.

You would not confuse a dried flower with a real living flower. So how come in our world we think it is okay to not have a real living relationship with the God who created us?

We think this facsimile of life that people seem to live around us in a world filled with sin, a world heading for destruction—that that is okay. That is normal. But God says it is not.

To not have a living relationship with the God of heaven is not normal. It is not what God expects. It is not how God created human beings to exist.

So my message tonight may seem a little different than what I normally speak. But I want to read to you, first of all, three verses that you may never have heard read in a gospel meeting before. I have never spoken on them before.

The first one is Ephesians 2:10:

“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works.”

That is what God expects.

The next one is Jeremiah 29:11:

“I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord.”

So God thinks toward individuals, toward human beings:

“Thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.”

That is God’s perspective.

The third verse is Romans 12:2:

“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

Did you see yourself in those verses? That is what God expects of His creation.

Now walk the streets of Ottawa tonight. Meet people from every walk of life. Some of them will be saved. They will know their sins have been forgiven. They will know they are on the way to heaven. They have a personal relationship with God. That is normal.

That is how God perceives His creation. When God created Adam and Eve, that is what He expected for them and humanity for the rest of eternity. That is the way they would be.

But then sin came in, and everything changed.

Now, which group are you in tonight? Are you the dried flower? Are you the Lego creation? Are you the stuffed animal in comparison to real, living life, which is a relationship with God?

In that first verse, Ephesians 2:10, notice it says workmanship. When I think of workmanship, I think of care and tremendous detail.

When you look in the mirror, what do you see looking back at you? You may say, “I do not really see what I would like to see. I wish I could change some things about me.” But when you look in that mirror, what you are seeing is what God has created.

Tremendously intricate. Incredibly detailed. Every single part of it needing to work together for you to exist.

Ephesians 2:10 says we are God’s workmanship. It speaks of care. It speaks of time. It speaks of thought. It speaks of design. All of that poured into this creation, so that you and I would be able to stand up, walk, and function physically.

But how about spiritually?

It says, “We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works.”

Have you ever walked through a craft fair? You stop at certain booths and look at things people have made. Sometimes you say, “Not very good. They should have kept that one home.” Other times you look and say, “Wow. The intricate detail that went into what that person has created.”

Maybe they are asking $20 for it. I cannot help myself; I am an accountant. I start to do the math. I look at that thing and say, “Even if they had really good tools and are extremely experienced, they have about ten hours of labour in that, and they had to pack it up, go all the way over to this craft fair, and sell it there. They are making a buck an hour. It is pretty good.”

You and I understand the tremendous amount of effort that goes into making something.

Ephesians 2:10 says God created us with infinite, detailed design, that we would have a relationship with Him. Not that we would go out and just do sin after sin after sin. Not that we would live our lives as if nothing matters except for me. Not that our whole life would be filled with the things of this world.

God designed us to have a relationship with Him. If you and I do not have that relationship, we are just living a poor facsimile of life.

Those of you who are younger will go to school. You will sit in classes. You will listen as teachers teach you things that are very important. But the vast majority of what they are teaching you is only to get you through a very finite period of time.

You might work 35, 40, 45 years, and everything they have taught you will eventually come to an end.

But for eternity, what have you learned? What have you thought? What time have you spent so that you could have a relationship with the God of eternity?

That is what matters.

That second verse I read, Jeremiah 29:11—you know what the key words in that verse are? They are peace, not evil, future, and hope.

What does our world want tonight? People want a future. People want hope. It has been said over and over again that if people have no hope, they have no reason to go on.

What that is really saying is that if people have no thought or desire for what eternity has, life just becomes this tedious treadmill, like gerbils or hamsters on a wheel. Watch them go—over and over, round and round and round—and they think they are getting somewhere, but they are getting nowhere at all.

Individuals in this world are born. They live their life. They fill their life with things. They fill a backpack of life with details, with education, with jobs, with activity, with articles. But they do not fill it with what lasts for eternity.

That is not normal.

What does God say His desire is for you and me? That we would have a future and a hope. That is normal.

Maybe you think I am belabouring this point too much, but I begin to wonder recently: have we become so used to what the devil has taught us in this world that we think it is okay just living life casually in it? Thinking, “Okay, you get 75 years, or 80 years, or 85 years, and it comes to an end. Well, that is just normal.” Out into eternity.

That is not normal.

What matters tonight is that the God of heaven who created you created you to have a relationship with Him.

Parents have children. They do not just have them so they will have someone to look after them in their old age. They do not just have them to work on the farm. They do not just have them to help change the tires.

They have them for a relationship.

God created individuals that there would be a relationship.

It is not normal for you not to have that relationship with God. You will not be able to ignore it. You will not be able to step back and say, “I am able to fill my life with things, so it does not really matter that much right now. I can actually forget about it and just live my life.”

There is coming a point in time when you will face the God who created you, and He wants a relationship with you now. Without that relationship, you will never have a relationship with Him in eternity.

God has desires for a future and hope.

Romans 12:2—what is important in that verse? Let me read it again:

“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

What is it actually saying? I know these verses are for people who are saved. It is normal, right? That is the actual go-to setting. God’s perspective is that you would be saved.

So what does this verse say? It says that you and I would not be like an evil world. We would be transformed. We would be renewed.

What does that mean?

Go back to Adam and Eve in the garden. Do you remember what it was like for them? They would get up every morning expecting to spend time with God. When they woke up, I wonder if the first thing that went through their mind was not, “I have to prune that tree today,” or, “This particular vegetable has to be weeded and gardened,” or, “Things have to be done,” or, “I have to check on the animals.”

No. They woke up that day and thought to themselves, “Soon we are going to spend time with God. We are going to talk to Him. We are going to have a relationship with Him.”

That was normal.

But then they sinned, and everything God had planned for those people was affected, damaged, scarred, stopped by sin. Sin came into the world.

Romans 12:2 says, “Not like an evil world.” God is saying that individuals who have not trusted Christ are just like those around them, heading for a lost eternity.

The moment Adam and Eve sinned, everything changed. Every single person from that day forward, all the way down to you and me—everything changed.

Why? Because the relationship with God was broken.

The relationship that God intended stopped because of sin.

Is that where you find yourself tonight? Do you find that your relationship with God is definitely broken? You may try to say prayers. You may try to gain His favour. But that wall of sin that stands between you and Him has broken the relationship.

You cannot find a way over it. You cannot find a way through it. There is no way under it. That massive wall of sin that you have created—the things you have done, item after item, brick after brick—building a wall until you are separated from God, deeply, darkly in your sins.

No hope. No future. No relationship with God.

And so, at just the right time, God sent Jesus Christ into the world so that you and I could be saved.

Those of us who are saved wake up every morning looking forward to time we will spend with our Saviour, looking forward to time reading our Bibles and spending time with Him, because the relationship has been restored.

When I got saved, absolutely the most tremendous thing that happened that very night was that my sins were forgiven. But the relationship with God had also been restored. All of a sudden, I had a Father in heaven. I had a Saviour who is waiting to receive me. My eternal destiny was absolutely secure.

The relationship had been restored.

Do you have that relationship tonight? The most amazing relationship you could ever have is the relationship with God Himself. Almighty God wants time with you.

The very God of heaven, Deity, says to me, “Come unto me, and I will give you rest.”

As I read these three verses on the screen tonight, that is what God says is normal. That is how you and I should live.

There is a fourth verse I want to read with you tonight: Ephesians 4:18. It is like another side of the whole picture:

“Having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart.”

That is the other side of this picture.

On one side is a relationship that God wants. Do you find yourself on the other side? Every single one of us who is here, at some point in time in our life, this is where we found ourselves: alienated from God, minds that had been darkened, ignorant of who God was. All of that described us because we had been separated from Him.

Think about those words for a second tonight.

When I read the position, “being alienated,” over and over again there is separation brought about by sin. Families separated by sin. Siblings separated by sin. Countries divided, separated by sin. Wars fought because sin has sprung up, and individuals react to it.

Sin has so permeated our world. Over and over again, it darkens our minds as to who God is. It says their hearts are blinded. Spiritual and moral disconnection from God.

Now, when someone says a child is failing to thrive, it is not like the parents say, “Oh well, that is okay. There are all kinds of different children. They grow at different rates.” That is all true. But if the doctor says the child is failing to thrive, you do not just sit there and do nothing. Everybody jumps into action.

What is the issue? Is the child okay? Is there something that can be done? Are there more nutrients that can be given?

Do something.

You and I sit tonight with loved ones who are not saved, almost as if we are complacent.

You sit here tonight and you are not saved. You are lost. The Bible does not really use the words “not saved”; it uses the word lost.

Are you lost tonight without Christ? Are you just okay with it? Are you prepared to continue on like that—blinded, alienated from God?

That is the second phrase I want to speak on very quickly tonight. The first phrase was “failure to thrive.” The second phrase is one you have probably heard people use: getting someone to do a wellness check.

It just means there is somebody in some other place, some other city, some other part of town, and you are concerned whether they are okay. You have been trying to reach them. You cannot reach them. So you call the local police and say, “Can you go to their house, knock on the door, and do a wellness check? Make sure they are okay.”

Back in the early part of the COVID pandemic, all of us were working online. One of the biggest concerns employers had was, “Are our employees all right? Are they okay?”

I remember the first conversation we had around wellness checks. It was virtual, of course, because we were all home. One of the managers was concerned because they had not been able to reach one of their employees. Called—no answer. Texted—no response. Checked on Teams—nothing there.

The manager was saying, “What do we do in this case? We are all out of the office. Is the person okay? What should I do?”

We had a meeting. That is what you do in government. We had a meeting. We almost had a committee.

People were online and we were talking. There was somebody from HR there, the manager was there, their boss was there, I was there, and other people were there. The manager was saying, “I am just worried about them.”

The person in charge jumped in and said, “But what about their privacy?”

Right. We have to be concerned about their privacy.

The manager said, “Yes, but I have texted them, I have called them, I have tried them on Teams. What if they are not okay?”

At some point, those things stop mattering if the person is genuinely not well.

So we called the police. The police went over to their house and knocked on the door. In this case, thankfully, the person was okay.

You may be sitting here tonight saying, “Do not shake me up. Do not rattle my little cage. I am very comfortable with what I am doing and where I am at. Do not disturb me.”

Can we do a spiritual wellness check tonight?

You can tell me physically that you were born at a certain time. You came into this world. You can tell me about your life.

How are you spiritually tonight? Are you on the road to heaven, or are you lost and on the road to hell?

Once you go into eternity, it is irrelevant what conversation you think you might have. In the time you have been given, tonight is time to trust Christ.

Maybe you say to me, “Well, I am making progress.” That means you are lost.

Maybe you say, “Tonight I am reading my Bible, and I want to get saved.” That means you are lost.

You might say tonight, “Yes, but I have those who are praying for me. I expect to get it before I die.”

But if you say, “Tonight I trusted Christ as my Saviour,” then you are saved.

It is just that simple, really. That is the difference between the two things.

When Jesus Christ came into the world, He came because He loved us. He loved you and me. He so loved the world that He came so that you and I could be found. We could be saved. That relationship could be restored. We could know that our eternal destiny was absolutely secure.

Found within the precious blood of Jesus Christ is a redemption that is sufficient to pay the price. Every single sin that you and I have committed has been dealt with. The question of sin can never be brought back up to my charge because Jesus Christ dealt with it. He put it to rest.

Sin was finished, vanquished, because of the blood of Jesus Christ.

You and I come to Him and trust Him as our Saviour. We gain access to that payment.

Saved.

Are you saved tonight?

It is not normal to be not saved. That is not God’s purpose for you and me. He says that He would have all men, women, boys, and girls—all, everywhere—saved.

John 3:16 says that God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.

You are the “whoever” tonight. You cannot say salvation is not for you. Jesus Christ says, “Whoever.”

Would you not love to go home tonight knowing your sins are forgiven? You have a relationship with Almighty God of heaven. You are saved for time and eternity.

That is what is normal.