2010-11-26
Good Morning Cherished of God,
Last week, I continued our discussion of the security we have in a covenant relationship with the Lord and ended with LK 1: 68-69, 72, a prophecy which reiterates the Davidic covenant. “Let us praise the Lord, the God of Israel! He has come to the help of His people and has set them free. He has provided for a mighty Savior, a Descendant of His servant David, He said He would show mercy to our ancestors and remember His sacred covenant. The original Davidic covenant is found especially in 2 SAM 7: 13, “He [Solomon] will be the one to build a temple for Me, and I will make that his dynasty continue forever.” While not precise here, this is a clear reference to our Lord Jesus Christ, the only Descendant of the royal line of David Who can and will rule forever. I am reminded of how this same thing is described in the mental picture conjured up in Daniel’s vision of the giant statue. DN 2: 34-35, “While you were looking at it, a great stone broke loose from a cliff without anyone touching it, struck the iron and clay feet of the statue and shattered them. At once the iron, clay, bronze, silver, and gold crumbled and became like a dust on a threshing place in summer. The winds carried it all always, leaving not a trace. But the stone grew to be a mountain that covered the whole earth.” The statue of many metals represented all human empires. The stone that grew to be a mountain represented the final and eternal rule of God’s Kingdom by Jesus Christ, which will eventually replace them.
The following passage sets Christ apart from any wholly human descendant of David or other person. Read Paul’s God-breathed words here. EPH 3: 17-19, “And I pray that Christ will make His home in your hearts through faith. I pray that you may have your roots and foundation in love, so that you, together with all God’s people may have the power to understand how broad and long, how high and deep is Christ’s love. You, may come to know His love-although it can never be fully known-and so be completely filled with the very nature of God.” Yes, only the Father, through the Lord Jesus Christ, has the power to transform human hearts from human desire-driven ones on a one-way trip to condemnation to ones led by the Holy Spirit, which enable us to gain eternal life through our faith in Him. RO 12: 2 describes the supernatural method through which this happens as “a complete transformation through the renewal of our mind.” That’s something no ordinary human can accomplish. An important and foundational reminder of this appears in EPH 2: 8-10, “For it is by God grace that you have been saved through faith. It is not the results of your own efforts, but God’s gift, so that no one can boast about it. God has made us what we are, and in our union with Christ Jesus He has created us for a life of good deeds, which He has already prepared for us to do.” It’s not the doing of good deeds that earns our way to heaven, as so many belief systems teach, but instead, God’s grace [unmerited favor given to us] and our faith in Jesus Christ which does it. It is not simply coming to faith in Jesus Christ, but our living out this faith, which allows us to mature spiritually. It is in the process of sanctification, that we are perfected and purified by the Lord in preparation for that time when the Father is ready to call us home to Him.
It’s a fact that certain nuances of meaning are lost in the translation of the NT into English from the original Greek or the OT from Hebrew. That is why I will give you the Greek words that found in EPH 3: 17-19 above that will help clarify exactly what is meant. “Philos” is the word for “friend,” which is very close to the word for “loving kindness.” In Hebrew, the word for “friend” is “checed,” [kheh’-sed], which implies “toward God,” “one with rare piety,” “merciful,” “one who does very good deeds.” It is helpful to do a word study like this one, so that when the word “friend” is applied to another believer, we can really understand its meaning in the covenant sense. Our understanding of the meaning is fuller and richer this way. PS 69: 16 gives us insight into loving kindness. “Hear me, O Lord, for Your loving kindness is good; turn to me according to the multitude of Your tender mercies.” ECCL 4: 9-10 gives us a practical view of the word “friend.” “Two are better than one. When one falls down, his friend can help him up.” That can be taken in any contextual sense of the word- physical, intellectual, emotional, and/or spiritual. If we think back to what goes on in our own friendships with other believers or potential believers, we might be able to see where these principles apply to our own lives. The Father would want us to do this, so that we don’t become “unequally yoked” [2 COR 6: 14], choosing the wrong people to be our friends or partners. He asks, “How can light and darkness live together?” If my experience is any teacher, such a relationship can’t be sustained indefinitely. [If you wish to do a word study such as this one, Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the OT and NT is a very useful reference when you don’t speak Greek or Hebrew]. As you can see, a covenant relationship with God gives us a wealth of useful information to help us make wise choices of with whom we associate.
PRAYER: O Lord, the security You give us when we are in a covenant relationship with You gives us a basis of comparison that allows us to make wise choices in our lives. We ask You to give us your godly and wise direction. My own experience has revealed that nothing is more important in our lives as believers in Jesus Christ than our covenant relationships with You and with others around us. It is clear to us that there are relationships between us and others that You forge for Your own reasons, which are always righteous. Sometimes these relationships are with people we don’t expect in our lives. You have told us, “Be holy, because I am holy” [LV 11: 44-45; LV 19: 2, and 1 PET 1: 16]. In more practical terms, You want us to do two important things: 1) Interact and associate with other believers for the purpose of mutually strengthening faith, and 2) reach out to others who are potential believers with the truth of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The latter is to be done with sensitivity and kindness borne out of some understanding of where that person is spiritually and culturally. 1 PET 3: 15-17, “But have reverence for Christ in your hearts, and honor Him as Lord. Be ready at all times to answer anyone who asks you to explain the hope you have in you, but do it with gentleness and respect. Keep your conscience clear, so that when you are insulted, those who speak evil of your good conduct as followers of Christ will become ashamed of what they say. For it is better to suffer for doing good, if this should be God’s will, than for doing evil.” It is because You give us security in our covenant relationship with You from knowledge of what good really is that we can have the courage to approach others for Christ and to make good judgments on who are friends should be. We humbly thank and praise You for that. You have made Your love of us clear, when You prompted Your son to say, in JN 15: 15-16, “I do not call you servants any longer, because a servant does not know what his master is doing. Instead, I call you friends, because I have told you everything I heard from my Father. You did not choose Me; I chose you and appointed you to go and bear much fruit, the kind of fruit that endures. And so the Father will give you whatever you ask for Him in My name.” It is with reverence that we thank and praise You; it is with deep, abiding faith that we say this prayer in the holy and mighty name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
NEXT WEEK: In the course of looking at the security we have in our covenant relationship with God, we have met the messenger [John the Baptist] who announced the coming of the Savior, we recognize the covenant is certain, we have seen that the fullness of time had come for Christ’s first Advent, and we have seen what a covenant relationship gives. Next week, we will see how covenant takes the veil off of truth. How can we not offer praise and thanks to a Lord Who makes such a rich and rewarding relationship available to each of us? Our Lord has told us, in EPH 3: 12, “ In union with Christ and through our faith in Him, we have the boldness to go into God’s presence with all confidence.” What an amazing statement that is! Imagine, we have a pipeline through prayer and study of His word, directly to the Father. He will, though the Holy Spirit, walk us through our challenges, answer knotty questions that come up, and empower us to help ourselves when Satan does his dirty work. We can then emerge stronger and more sure of our path to eternal life than before. This doesn’t mean being smug and self-satisfied, because downward judgments of other people lead to arrogance-a mindset God abhors. Instead, we are encouraged to be as Christ-like in our interactions with others and our thoughts as possible. And that, Dear Ones, demands humility. We must, instead, leave the judgments to God and follow His direction in our human to human and human to God relationships. If we will do this, our lives will honor God; our relationships will be peaceful and pleasing to Him. Praise and thanks be to our God for letting us know how to bring this about!
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn
JS 24: 15