"According as He hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love:" Ephesians 1:4
We have studied together that God’s Word boldly proclaims that we have been glorified! “And the glory which Thou gavest Me I have given them; that they may be one, even as We are One.” John 17:22 We have seen in the Word of God that we are perfect through our oneness with Christ. “I in them, and Thou in Me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that Thou hast sent Me, and hast loved them, as Thou hast loved Me.” John 17:23 We have also seen that all things are now new for us. “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” 2 Corinthians 5:17 And now we see that our Father has chosen us and that we are holy and without blame before Him. Our Father's Truths are awesome, plain and simply awesome! The Blood of Christ is that strong for us, no work can justify what the Blood of Christ, shed on the cross, has so freely bestowed upon us. We need the Holy Spirit to begin to allow us to believe this Truth and to strengthen us in the Truth that through Christ we are more than able to live a life without any blame! We tend to talk about this lifestyle of perfection and blamelessness in the future tense, when we are in Heaven, but the Truth that will set us free is that God is more than willing and able to cause us to live this way right now! We can never earn this own our own, through our own efforts, but we can have it, and its an easy yoke to be borne, by simply looking unto Jesus to Author and Finish our faith! The Truth is that we stand before our Father blameless, apart from any work, with free and complete redemption through the power of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior! Our Father has chosen us because He is able to do these glorious things through us!
Turn to John 8:4, “They say to Him, Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act.” You want to see a picture of how God really is; well here is a great one! “When Jesus had lifted up Himself and saw none but the woman, He said unto her, woman, where are those thine accusers? Hath no man condemned thee? She said, no man, Lord. And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.” John 8:10-11
Not only didn’t Jesus condemn this woman, who had every right to be condemned, He was able to run off all of those who could condemn her! This verse shows us plainly how our Father is; He is compassionate. He knows who we are and how we are, and God knows what to do about it. Our Father doesn’t want to condemn us; He doesn’t want to be separated from us. So to insure that He didn’t have to be, He sent His Son, to make an everlasting sacrifice for us, so that we could stand before Him without blame! Through Christ we stand holy, sanctified, perfected, and all by the power of the Blood of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior! Jesus did it all for us, so that as Romans 8:1 proclaims, “There is now therefore no condemnation for us who are in Christ Jesus!”
If there is now no condemnation for us who are in Christ Jesus, than there is now no fault for us who are in Christ Jesus! There is no fault for us because the Blood of Jesus has cleansed us from all unrighteousness. “Much more then, being now justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him.” Romans 5:9 “In whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace;” Ephesians 1:7 “But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the Blood of Christ.” Ephesians 2:13 “Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the Blood of Jesus,” Hebrews 10:19
People may call us arrogant for confessing that we are perfect, holy, spotless, sanctified, and glorified in Christ, as all of these scriptures have proclaimed that we are. But the Truth is that we actually have to be extremely humble to confess and believe them. Because all of the glory is totally directed towards Jesus, only He can do it, there is absolutely nothing that we can do to even begin to scratch the surface to possess such awesome attributes. Humility does not mean tearing ourselves down, true humility is saying yes to Jesus and accepting and confessing we possess all that He went to the cross to give us. We have been redeemed by the Blood of Christ! Redemption means that someone else did it for us, the ransom was paid for us by Jesus and true humility, not arrogance, accepts this Truth and directs all of the attention towards Him!
Jesus is called the stumbling stone. Romans 9:32-33, “Wherefore? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumblingstone; As it is written, Behold, I lay in Sion a stumblingstone and rock of offence: and whosoever believeth on Him shall not be ashamed.” When we talk about perfection, holiness, glory, and honor, people tend to immediately think of human works and efforts as the forces that bring these things to pass. This type of belief is the stumbling stone and the rock of offense that is Jesus, because these things are only given by faith and not by works!
We have studied together that God’s Word boldly proclaims that we have been glorified! “And the glory which Thou gavest Me I have given them; that they may be one, even as We are One.” John 17:22 We have seen in the Word of God that we are perfect through our oneness with Christ. “I in them, and Thou in Me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that Thou hast sent Me, and hast loved them, as Thou hast loved Me.” John 17:23 We have also seen that all things are now new for us. “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” 2 Corinthians 5:17 And now we see that our Father has chosen us and that we are holy and without blame before Him. Our Father's Truths are awesome, plain and simply awesome! The Blood of Christ is that strong for us, no work can justify what the Blood of Christ, shed on the cross, has so freely bestowed upon us. We need the Holy Spirit to begin to allow us to believe this Truth and to strengthen us in the Truth that through Christ we are more than able to live a life without any blame! We tend to talk about this lifestyle of perfection and blamelessness in the future tense, when we are in Heaven, but the Truth that will set us free is that God is more than willing and able to cause us to live this way right now! We can never earn this own our own, through our own efforts, but we can have it, and its an easy yoke to be borne, by simply looking unto Jesus to Author and Finish our faith! The Truth is that we stand before our Father blameless, apart from any work, with free and complete redemption through the power of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior! Our Father has chosen us because He is able to do these glorious things through us!
Turn to John 8:4, “They say to Him, Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act.” You want to see a picture of how God really is; well here is a great one! “When Jesus had lifted up Himself and saw none but the woman, He said unto her, woman, where are those thine accusers? Hath no man condemned thee? She said, no man, Lord. And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.” John 8:10-11
Not only didn’t Jesus condemn this woman, who had every right to be condemned, He was able to run off all of those who could condemn her! This verse shows us plainly how our Father is; He is compassionate. He knows who we are and how we are, and God knows what to do about it. Our Father doesn’t want to condemn us; He doesn’t want to be separated from us. So to insure that He didn’t have to be, He sent His Son, to make an everlasting sacrifice for us, so that we could stand before Him without blame! Through Christ we stand holy, sanctified, perfected, and all by the power of the Blood of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior! Jesus did it all for us, so that as Romans 8:1 proclaims, “There is now therefore no condemnation for us who are in Christ Jesus!”
If there is now no condemnation for us who are in Christ Jesus, than there is now no fault for us who are in Christ Jesus! There is no fault for us because the Blood of Jesus has cleansed us from all unrighteousness. “Much more then, being now justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him.” Romans 5:9 “In whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace;” Ephesians 1:7 “But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the Blood of Christ.” Ephesians 2:13 “Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the Blood of Jesus,” Hebrews 10:19
People may call us arrogant for confessing that we are perfect, holy, spotless, sanctified, and glorified in Christ, as all of these scriptures have proclaimed that we are. But the Truth is that we actually have to be extremely humble to confess and believe them. Because all of the glory is totally directed towards Jesus, only He can do it, there is absolutely nothing that we can do to even begin to scratch the surface to possess such awesome attributes. Humility does not mean tearing ourselves down, true humility is saying yes to Jesus and accepting and confessing we possess all that He went to the cross to give us. We have been redeemed by the Blood of Christ! Redemption means that someone else did it for us, the ransom was paid for us by Jesus and true humility, not arrogance, accepts this Truth and directs all of the attention towards Him!
Jesus is called the stumbling stone. Romans 9:32-33, “Wherefore? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumblingstone; As it is written, Behold, I lay in Sion a stumblingstone and rock of offence: and whosoever believeth on Him shall not be ashamed.” When we talk about perfection, holiness, glory, and honor, people tend to immediately think of human works and efforts as the forces that bring these things to pass. This type of belief is the stumbling stone and the rock of offense that is Jesus, because these things are only given by faith and not by works!
The great humbling Truth is this; even our faith is not a human work, because our faith is Authored and Finished by Jesus. We have boldness and access to true Holiness through the free gift of Jesus’ Blood. We are as He is, because He is Who He is, and He is now within us. He has chosen us to be one with Him, without fault and without blame. Jesus paid a high price to buy our redemption! Don’t stumble at who we are in Christ, because of who you think we are in the flesh. Our flesh is not the force that brings the blessings of God into our lives; Jesus’ flesh is, and His flesh has accomplished it all. There is no need for us to ever stumble, we have the Anointing of our Father within us, strengthening us with the Truth and the Truth sets us free! God has placed His Spirit within us, and He will lead us into the paths of righteousness, and He will cause us to walk in His ways. Through Christ we can do all things, and without Him we can do nothing! The Blood of Jesus has made us all of these things!
Faith comes from hearing and hearing from the Word of God! The Word of our Father is what allows us to walk in this revelation of the power of the Blood. The Spirit will lead us into the paths of righteousness that the Word of God holds for us, and through the power of Christ (the Anointing) God will be able to do all things through us! Our part is our Father using us, to look to Him to Author and Finish the faith in our lives, and be the branches that bear the fruit that the Vine produces. Jesus is our Head and we are His body. The Head directs, leads, unifies, and allows the body to walk in perfection. Remember faith is not the human ability to believe God and thus unlock the riches and power of His Kingdom; faith is from our Father and it is His key, that He Authors and Finishes through us, to unlock the power and victory of His Kingdom! Through Jesus we are now holy and blameless before God in love!
Our man made laws are not the tools that unlock the favor and blessings of our Father! What pleases God is for us to serve Him through the power of His Spirit that now dwells within us. And by being empowered by the Holy Spirit to allow His Son, our Savior, to Author and Finish our faith in believing that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who allow Jesus to lead them and guide them in the paths of righteousness! If we truly want to change the attitudes of the world, it is not accomplished by influencing governments to pass laws. It is accomplished by our Father using us as lamps on the side of the hills! The weapons of our warfare are spiritual and they are mighty to the bringing down of strongholds. We change the world by showing them Christ and by proclaiming God’s Word that does not fall void to the earth. In America we have passed laws that resemble the Ten Commandments and every year the crimes against those laws increase or at best stay the same. We need to stop trying to pass laws that attempt to force righteousness and allow God to show the world Jesus through us. So that the presence, pleasure, penalty, and power of sin will be destroyed and then people will be truly be set free. Laws didn’t allow the Israelites to become one with God and be free and laws wont allow us to either. Why Christians are so concerned with passing laws always stumps me. We weren’t set free and saved by a law, why do we think that laws will now bring the favor and blessings of God? “Are ye so foolish? having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh?” Galatians 3:3 There is no fear for us in Christ and we don’t need a law to protect us. Our Father is for us, so who or what can be against us! Our Father doesn’t pour His favor out on us because we have a laws that resemble the Ten Commandments. Our Father pours His blessing on us because we are one with Him because He has caused us to believe in Jesus and accept Him as Lord! Be blessed and where are energies and efforts are, that is where are hearts will be as well!
1 comment:
found your blog through doing a search on the phrase, 'Christ in all the Scriptures'.
Wondered if you might be interested in my blog - www.christinallthescriptures.blogspot.com I also have another blog - www.theologyofgcberkouwer.blogspot.com
Post a Comment