2015-07-24
Good Morning Dear Ones,
We are taking our time, wading through the issues that help us to understand God’s need for adding to the law, a Covenant of Grace, that functions differently. The law has told us what is right in God’s sight and what isn’t. However, by no means can the law grant us salvation [JN 3: 16; RO 3: 24-25], justification [RO 4: 3] and/or eternal forgiveness [1 JN 1: 9]. By His most excellent grace, God has kept His promise to Abraham [first given in GN 12:1-3] to increase His people and to bring them into the Promised Land. He has also kept His promise to make them a blessing to others. All one must do is to see how many great scientists, doctors, professors, (Jewish people) who excel in the arts and literature, etc. in comparison to other groups to see how this promise is manifested. This wonderful accomplishments are also found in the believing Gentiles who are the “wild olive branches” replacing cultured ones that have been culled [RO 11: 17]. Christ alone is able to grant salvation, justification, and eternal forgiveness, and thus, He alone is the “Seed” referred to in GA 3: 16-19. The law functioned to help people find Christ, that they can be justified by their faith, no longer under the supervision of the law [GA 3: 24].
GN 5: 16-17 helps us to understand the relationship between Spirit and the flesh. “So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature. For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to human nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want.” This is beautifully described by Paul in RO 7: 14-25, struggling with sin. Faith in Jesus Christ is the only way one can choose not to sin, not to be on a one-way path to spiritual death. Our faith in Christ as a part of the Covenant of Grace is what allows us to choose not to sin and to demonstrate the fruits of the Spirit. GA 5: 22-23, “But he fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control. Against such things there is no law.” When I took that 1-year course called “MasterLife,” one of the areas we looked at was how the human heart can be gradually opened to the Holy Spirit and closed off to the influence of the evil one. This is a graphic way to look at the process of sanctification, which is on-going in the lives of believers in Jesus Christ. It’s a struggle against what comes natural to us vs. what inner changes the Holy Spirit dwelling in us is making. As the believer matures and is more and more purified/perfected, the Holy Spirit is more and more powerful over the believer’s heart. EZK 36: 36-37 is a divine promise that is being kept. “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you: I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put My Spirit in you and move you to follow My decrees, and be careful to keep My laws.” In view of the fact that Ezekiel wrote as far back as around 593 BC, we can see God’s plan is nothing accidental. GA 6: 8 reveals the fate of rejecters and believers of Christ. “ The one who sows to please his sinful nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to pleas the Spirit from the Spirit will reap eternal life.”
This concept seems deceptively simple, but putting into practice can be challenging. It means one must know God and His will for his life first. Then, he must live according to God’s teaching. That involves making tough decisions, being self-disciplined in not always taking the easy road “along the wide path” that leads to spiritual death. Instead, he passes through the “narrow gate and travels along the hard path” to eternal life [MT 7: 13-14]. No effort has ever been more worth it! RO 3: 23 tells us, “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” However, if we understand JN 14: 6, which are Christ’s own words, “I am the Way, the truth, and the life. No one goes to the Father, except by Me,” we know which choice to make at a crossroads. The original sin [GN 3: 1-6] distorted God’s image in which humans were created [GN 1: 27]. All the progeny of Adam and Eve inherited sin from them and then added their own sins to it. This made it necessary for God to give mankind a way out, and that turned out to be faith in Jesus Christ accompanied with genuine repentance. Nothing else, no one else would do. The promise of that way out being provided was suggested by God’s dressing Adam and Eve in clothes made by sacrificing animals just before their expulsion from the Garden of Eden [GN 3: 21].
GN 3: 15 and 21 have already been discussed. Suffice it to say that (15), the Protevangelium, has told us that eventually the evil one will lose the day in the battle for mankind over history, and that we are told in DN 9: 27 and REV 12: 12, that God will overcome. GN 3:21 tells us that God promises one day to bring the believing progeny of Adam and Eve back to His side in heaven; it’s His promise albeit rather indirect. It is His message that the life is in the blood and blood must be shed for forgiveness to be possible [LV 17: 11 and HE 9: 22]. RO 5: 12-15 describes the “two Adams,” the first one being Adam, the man from whom we inherit sinfulness and certain spiritual death, and the second being Christ, from Whom we inherit salvation, justification and eternal forgiveness and life. RO 5: 19-20, “For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, to also through the obedience of the One Man the many will be made righteous.”
PRAYER: O Lord, we are so very grateful for the gifts of the Holy Spirit, which You give us, for Your willingness to keep the most sacred promises You have made to us, and for the love You show us every day. Therefore, we offer You our utmost thanks and praise, for Who You are and what You do for us. You deserve nothing less than our honor, loyalty, service, awe, reverence, and forever thanks and praise. Long ago, You told us that “cursed is the man hung on a tree” [DT 21: 23]. Our Lord Jesus was crucified that way, and thus became a curse for us, taking our sins with Him, being our Covenant Partner, Who physically died that way. He became the perfect Propitiation for our sins, thus being Enough on His own to prevent the need for any further sacrifices. Due to His Atonement and our faith in Him, we are saved! You urge us to read Your word, the Scriptures, so that You can teach us Your way and what leads to our eternal life with You. Your laws help us to know what pleases You. We are urged to understand Your will for us and not be hung up on the format of our worship. You want us to know You better through studying Your word [2 TIM 3: 16-17] and prayer [PS 86: 5, 7]. You encourage our unity, teach us truth, and love us with abandon. You deliver us from the grave by Your Son’s Atonement. You are compassionate and gracious, loving and faithful. We bow before You with reverence, awe, praise, and eternal thanks. In Christ’s holy/mighty name, we pray. Amen.
NEXT WEEK: I am led to continue writing more that the Holy Spirit gives me about redemption and how it came to be available to us. While growing up, I craved attention from parents, who were too busy to give it. This led to me running with the wrong crowd while middle school- aged and expressing my frustration and anger by doing property damage. I finally got my father’s attention that wrong way, but it led to his wise decision to remove me from my so-called “friends.” I was put in a school where I was sufficiently mentally challenged. During this period of time, even though I had been sent every week to religious training, I didn’t believe God existed or cared about me. But that was a lie. I was in God’s sight the whole time, and gradually He made His presence known to me. One of the first ways came in the all-academic high school to which my father had me transferred. I was provided with the chance to take courses, not offered in comprehensive high schools, that captured my interests. With my mind finally on my studies, I began to stop spending time in detention for bad behavior and was removed from the faulty influences that had led to my bad behavior. An incident in which I expressed myself regarding the deity of Christ during my traditionally Jewish religious training, began building the faith I have in Him now. I was familiar with the Old Testament, but began to take an interest in reading the New Testament. The Holy Spirit was at work in me, and it was about to change my entire life. That kind of patient love is what God has to give to anyone open to it. Therein lies the comforting message my story has for anyone reading this devotion. Be encouraged that each of us is indeed in God’s sight, for He has created us in His image, so that we can know the joy of salvation and spending our lives serving Him. He loves us as no human can, completely, as our Covenant Partner, Who can always be counted on to keep His promises. Praise and thanks be to God!
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn
JS 24: 15
© Lynn Johnson 2015. All Rights Reserved.
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