gospel

Happy Easter!

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“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”  2 Corinthians 5:21

“When you become aware of your sin and frightened by it, you must not allow the sin to remain in your conscience.  This would  only lead to despair. Rather, just as your awareness of sin flowed to you from Christ, so you must pour your sin back on him to free your conscience.

“So be careful you don’t become like the misguided people who allow their sin to bite at them and eat at their hearts.  They strive to rid themselves of this sin by running around doing good works.  But you have a way to get rid of your sins.  You throw yours sins on Christ when you firmly believe that Christ’s wounds and suffering carried and paid for your sins.

“As Isaiah said, ‘The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.’  (Isaiah 53:6) Peter said Christ himself ‘bore our sins in his body on the tree’ (I Peter 2:24). And Paul said,  ‘God made him who had no sin to be sin for us.’

(2 Corinthians 5:21)

“You must rely on these and similar verses with your whole heart.  The more your conscience torments you, the more you must rely on them.   For if you you don’t do this and try to quiet your conscience through your own sorrow and penance, you will never find peace of mind and will finally despair in the end.  If you try to deal with sin in your conscience, let it remain there, and continue to look at it in your heart, your sins will become too strong for you.  They will seem to live forever.  But, when you think of your sins being on Christ and boldly believe that he conquered them through his resurrection, then they are quite dead and gone.  Sin can’t remain on Christ.  His resurrection swallowed up sin.” –  Martin Luther

Happy Easter!

How To Stop Digging Your Own Grave

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I read C. H. Spurgeon’s devotional entry this morning in Morning and Evening. (If you don’t have a copy, buy one. It will make your soul smile.)

It was so stunning I am paraphrasing it here:

For he has made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. – 2 Corinthians 5:21

Why are you depressed?

Are you flogging yourself over your sins and failures?

Look to Jesus and remember you are complete in him. You are in God’s sight as perfect as if you had never sinned; actually more than that, the Lord your Righteousness has wrapped you in his perfection, which is none other that the perfection of God himself.

You have learned to hate sin, but you have also learned than your sin is not yours anymore – it was placed upon Christ at the cross.

Your acceptance is not in yourself but in Christ. God completely accepts you today as he will when you stand before his throne in the last day. There you will be free of all corruption, as you are now. Grab a hold of this truth – you are perfect in Christ.

(http://www.amazon.com/Morning-Evening-Charles-Haddon-Spurgeon/dp/0883684101/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1333576818&sr=8-1)

 

Better Than Botox

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You’re fixed.

You probably didn’t even know it.

That’s because you spend your life checking your spiritual pulse to see how you’re doing.

I do it. We all do it.

It goes like this:

Morning devotions? Check.

Prayed for family, friends and colleagues? Check.

Finished your bible study for the week? Check.

Attended church and helped usher? Check.

And when you fail, what happens? You feel guilty. Check.

You get the point.

You even do it with your personal stuff.

Did you go to the gym today? Check…er…no.

Did you eat your fruits and veggies for the day? Check. Well, maybe not. I hate spinach.

Did you drink eight glasses of water today? No, but I did have two caramel frapuccinos.

The truth is God loves you with or without a gym schedule.

Your biggest problem is not your weight, your hair color, or that bagel and cream cheese you just gobbled down behind closed doors.

It’s your sin, which separates you from God.

That’s your biggest problem and he fixed it for you.

And you didn’t even ask.

God sent his Son, Jesus Christ, into the world, to live a perfect life of obedience  in accordance to the Law, not for his own sake because he was already perfect, but in your place. And then, he died on the cross in your place to pay the price for your sins to satisfy the justice and the righteousness of God.

God forgives you because of Jesus.

You are a new person in Christ.

Isn’t that the best make-over you’ve ever heard of?

Leave Your Status at the Door

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In continuing with the theme of God’s kingdom, it is here that we can live status-free.

The world jostles for position all the time. It starts in the family. There’s a favorite aunt, or a special cousin. There are the relatives nobody likes, and there are others that everybody adores.

Then there’s school. The cool, the popular, and the geeks.

College is no better. Ivy league vs. state universities. Private vs. community colleges. Yale sounds better than Berkeley, Stanford more elitist than Cal State.

Once you get into the work force, you quickly slam into the status levels there. It’s called management and labor. The two great divides.

The only place on earth where this isn’t true is in God’s kingdom. There we have one head – Jesus. The rest of us are all brothers and sisters. We came into the kingdom on the same playing field – through the cross. We stay in the kingdom through no merit of our own, but solely on the merits of Christ and what he has done for us.

There is no room for posturing, snobbery, or reputation.

But there is plenty of room for compassion, love and service to one another.

Next time you’re tempted to elevate or belittle yourself – both are sin – remember that your life is defined by the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

He’s the ruler of the universe. You can rub shoulders with him!

A Strange Story

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In the biblical drama, all our expectations, assumptions, and cherished ideas are thrown into question. God the judge bears the sentence that his own justice demands. The offended party becomes the redeemer; even as he is subjected to further acts of the most heinous violence from those he redeems. The outcasts become royal heirs, the outsiders become insiders and the insiders outsiders, those who thought they were righteous are in fact condemned and those who were beyond any hope of moral recovery are declared righteous. A strange story, indeed. – Michael Horton

For more by Michael Horton, please visit:

http://www.whitehorseinn.org/

Whose Virtue Are You Trusting In?

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There are three levels of authentic faith:

1) you start with the historical facts and the creeds concerning Jesus

2) you believe these facts to be true

3) you cast yourself dead on the floor, trusting solely in Christ; his death on the cross will save you.

The moral plan is bankrupt!

The difference between law & gospel:

law = your obedience in order to win God’s acceptance – self-righteousness

gospel = Jesus obeyed for you and died for you; believe that and you have God’s approval

Your daily “spiritual” experience is captive to your diet, sleep habits, health, & emotional state. None of these is to be trusted for your salvation, or your nearness to God, or his love for you.

The apostles had first-hand experiences of Jesus. If there was ever a group of people who could tell their stories, relate their personal experiences with Jesus, it was them. With the exception of Paul, who was compelled to defend his ministry to the Corinthians, none of the apostles spoke of themselves. They spoke only of Christ and his saving work. (See the sermons in the book of Acts.)

When the apostles did speak of their experience with Jesus, they spoke of their doubts. They highlighted their weaknesses. (See Paul in 2 Corinthians 12.)

You have no virtue of your own, so don’t count on it to gain God’s approval.

The only virtue worth having is Christ’s virtue. And he gives it to you as a gift.

Have you received it?

Bug Off!

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God wants us to find our primary joy in our objectively declared justification, not in our subjectively perceived sanctification. — Jerry Bridges

I spent an afternoon visiting a Christian friend who was making herself sick remembering the failures, sins, and mistakes of her past. She was living in guilt, because as she said, “I see the consequences of my actions in the lives of my children every day.”

How many times a day do you do this?

How many times a day does the devil drag you there? This is one of his favorite  darts in his quiver.

Next time this happens pray like this:
“Devil, you’re going to have to do better than that. The blood of Jesus, my Savior, has paid the price of all of my sins, failures and mistakes. I stand firm in Him and I am as perfect as He is because I am robed in his righteousness. So go bother somebody else.” Then pray for your children. Remember the lives of the patriarchs, the life of David, the lives of countless others in the Scriptures that show their weaknesses, failures and sins, and yet God used them for his glory in spite of those things because they had faith in Christ. Take a look at the genealogy of our Lord’s in the gospel of Matthew if you need to be encouraged.

Oh, one more thing: there are no perfect people, only a perfect Savior.

Freedom!

~ godisnotlikeyou ~ 1 Comment

Holiness = Progress in obedience happens only when our hearts realize that God’s love for us does not depend on our progress in obedience.

Approval = You are already qualified. You don’t have to make the grade on your own or seek more approval from anyone. In Christ, you’re in! You’re accepted, affirmed, & validated. This also includes an inheritance that can never diminish, or disappear or be stripped away. You will be inheriting the new heavens and the new earth!

Power-Recognition-Fame = You are one of the saints in light. You’ve been united to Christ. You will always have his name, his presence, his character, and his reputation overshadowing and filling all that you are in your inmost being. Because Jesus was Someone (God of the Universe, God of Creation, God of Salvation and you are in him!), you’re free to be no one.

Security = You have been liberated out of darkness’s grip and transported into the kingdom of Jesus. You now are, and forever will be, safe and sound in Jesus-all because of what he long ago accomplished for you by his perfect obedience to God’s law for you and by his death on the cross for you.

– Jesus + Nothing = Everything by Tullian Tchividjian

Look To Jesus and Nobody Else

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by Octavius Winslow, 1856 (edited for
today’s reader by Larry E. Wilson, 2010)

Bible Verse

“Sanctify them in the truth; your Word is truth” (John 17:17).

Devotional

“How may I know that sin is being mortified in me?” is the anxious inquiry of many. We reply: by a weakening of its power.

When Christ subdues your iniquities, he does not eradicate them, but rather he weakens the strength of their root. The principle of sin remains, but it is impaired.

See it in the case of Peter. Before he fell, his easily besetting sin was self-confidence: “Even though they all fall away, I will not” (Mark 4:29). Behold him after his recovery, taking the low place at the feet of Jesus—and at the feet of the disciples too—meekly saying, “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you” (John 21:17). No more self-praise, no more self-confidence—his sin was mortified by the Spirit and he became as a different man.

In this way, often the very outbreak of your sins may become the occasion of their deeper discovery and their more thorough subjection.

As well, do not overlook the power of the truth, by the instrumentality of which the Spirit mortifies sin in us: “Sanctify them in the truth.” The truth as it is in Jesus, revealed more clearly to the mind, and impressed more deeply on the heart, transforms the soul into its own divine and holy nature. Therefore, your spiritual and experiential acquaintance with the truth—especially with him who is essential Truth—will be the measure of the Spirit’s mortification of sin in your heart.

Is the Lord Jesus becoming increasingly precious to your soul? Are you growing in poverty of spirit? Are you growing in a deeper sense of your vileness, weakness, and unworthiness? Is your pride more abased? Is your self more crucified? Is God’s glory more simply sought? Does your heart more quickly shrink from sin? Is your conscience more sensitive to the touch of guilt? And do confession and cleansing become a more frequent habit? Are you growing in more love to all the saints—even to those who, though they do not adopt your entire creed, yet love and serve your Lord and Master? If so, then you may be assured that the Spirit is mortifying sin in you.

But oh, look away from everything to Jesus. Do not look within for sanctification; look up for it from Christ. He is as much your “sanctification” as he is your “righteousness” (1 Cor. 1:30). Your evidences, your comfort, your hope, do not spring from your fruitfulness, your mortification, or anything within you; they come solely and entirely from the Lord Jesus Christ.

Looking unto Jesus by faith is like removing the covering and opening the windows of a conservatory, to admit more freely the sun, beneath whose light and warmth the flowers and fruits expand and mature. Draw back the veil that conceals the Sun of Righteousness and let him shine in upon your soul. Then the mortification of all sin will follow, and the fruits of all holiness will abound.

A Re-Write of Your Story

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Are you resting in God’s approval or are you still seeking your own? If you’re still seeking your own, chances are you don’t handle criticism very well. (I don’t either.) In the end, criticism is losing the approval of others. But if you are in Christ you can rest in God’s approval and then you can handle criticism. (I’m improving, sort of.)

The entire story of the Old Testament is a story of broken lives. Adam was the original broken life that resulted in a world enslaved to sin. But when Jesus entered into the human family, he re-wrote the script. He came for a radical rescue, to undo the curse of sin, untwist the distortions, and re-write the whole human story.

Is your name in his script?