Please find below Brett Harris' notes from the Mid-service comments this past Sunday on the assurance of our salvation found in Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior.

Sometimes I struggle with assurance of my salvation. I see the sin in my heart, let alone the sin in my actions, and I wonder if I'm really saved at all.

I fall into the trap of believing that I'm saved by grace but kept in salvation through my works - as if I could lose my salvation if I didn't do the right things or enough works. The trap of thinking that my works have to be pleasing enough to God in order to keep his favor.

While our works have a proper place in assurance, they cannot be the primary basis for our assurance. My security in salvation cannot be primarily found in my works; my security in salvation must be found in the same grace that saved me.

It is God who first loved me.

It is God who gave me life when I was dead in my sins.

It is God who adopted me and made me his son.

I brought nothing to salvation. I was running away from God, I didn't have any righteousness of my own to offer him. I could not - and cannot - fully pay the penalty for my sin.

But God provided the way to salvation for me. It was God who sent his son to earth, to become a man, to live the righteous life that I could not live, to die on a cross to satisfy his wrath toward my sin. Isaiah speaks of this. When he wrote this, Isaiah didn't yet know who the Messiah was, but he knew what the Messiah would accomplish. Isaiah 53:5-6

Jesus was that Messiah. Jesus was wounded for our sin, Jesus was crushed, Jesus was chastised, Jesus was the object of wrath instead of us.

Any assurance that we have in salvation has to be rooted in what God has done to Jesus. If God has laid all of my sin on Jesus, then that is where I have to turn for my assurance. My salvation didn't come because I did anything to earn it - it came because Jesus did everything.

Prayer
God, you alone are timeless. You set the earth's foundations in place. You determined the end of things from before they began. You, alone, will never change.

The word that you gave to Isaiah, you fulfilled in Christ. You put forward your own son for our salvation. You know that we can do nothing, but because of your amazing love, you provided the sacrifice for our sin. Remind us that any hope, any assurance, that we have in salvation is found in the finished work of Jesus Christ.

It is because of your grace that we are able to continue to live faithful lives. It is because of your grace that we can kill sin. And it is because of your grace that we can remain faithful to the end of our lives.

To him who keeps us by his grace and who sustains us by his grace, be honor and glory and all worship.
Amen