OK, so if you made it past that title, you may be one of the few, the chosen, who will dive deeper to understand more. Remember as Piper says, "you rake, you get leaves, you dig you get treasure"
Speaking of the church during the final 7 years, especially the church that travails for the breakthrough at the mid-point 3 1/2 years.
We need to see that the events of the last 3 1/2 years are preceded by the events of the first 3 1/2 years. These events are likewise described with great detail and specificity (Dan 11:23-30) so that will be recognized by at least a sizeable remnant of the true church of God (Dan 11:33).
These events and the urgency that they signify will have a ‘straightening’ affect on the church. The sure and certain approach of the final tribulation will crowd the church to a place of deepest intercessory travail. Through a process of crisis urgency and transforming revelation, the church will be increasingly freed of the hindering power of self-reliance (2Cor 1:9), since this is what gives Satan power to accuse the saints. Where there is no confidence in the flesh, his power to accuse is canceled. As Israel is transformed only after they have been brought to an end of their power (compare Deut 32:36 with Dan 12:7), so must the church pass through a time of profound self-emptying before it can be raised (or birthed) to the fullness of kingdom love and power.
The Accuser will be cast down at that time by the same means that his power is broken now, namely, by the revelation of the gospel. But we must understand that there are degrees of apprehension of revealed truth, and we know that the greater the death to our own sufficiency will be the greater resurrection in the revelation of grace and glory, as the light shines brighter to the ‘perfect day’. This is why that even while the Antichrist is ‘wearing out’ the saints of the most high (Dan 7:25; Rev 13:7), they shall mount up with wings and overcome more and more as they are purged, purified, tested, and made white “even to the time of the end: because it is yet for a time appointed” (Dan 11:35; 12:10)., since this is what gives Satan power to accuse the saints. Where there is no confidence in the flesh, his power to accuse is canceled. As Israel is transformed only after they have been brought to an end of their power (compare Deut 32:36 with Dan 12:7), so must the church pass through a time of profound self-emptying before it can be raised (or birthed) to the fullness of kingdom love and power.
The veil that holds back the in-breaking of apocalyptic revelation is proportionate to the strength of the flesh. This is a profoundly important principle. This is why it is not until Israel’s power has been broken that “all these things shall be accomplished.” So is it any different with the church? What is the church but a people that have learned that grace only appears when one has come to an end of their own power? So the church that can overcome in the final test is a church that has learned that kingdom strength comes only at the end of our own strength. This is the basis by which we may confidently know that the church will be perfected in love in time for its final witness.
a portion of an article by Reggie Kelly, the whole thing is here...
http://the.mysteryofisrael.org/articles/daniel-as-a-type-of-the-godly-remnant/
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Romans Study # 27 Romans 8:11-27
Had to take it down do some editing and now re-post.
Romans Bible Study #27
Romans 8:11-27
Sonship, Suffering, Glory
Word: HOPE
11But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you. 12So then, brethren, we are under obligation, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh-- 13for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live. 14For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. 15For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, "Abba! Father!" 16The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are children of God,
17and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him.
18For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us.
19For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. 20For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope 21that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. 23And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body. 24For in hope we have been saved, but hope that is seen is not hope; for who hopes for what he already sees? 25But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance we wait eagerly for it.
Our Victory in Christ
26In the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words; 27and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. NASB
9-11But if God himself has taken up residence in your life, you can hardly be thinking more of yourself than of him. Anyone, of course, who has not welcomed this invisible but clearly present God, the Spirit of Christ, won't know what we're talking about. But for you who welcome him, in whom he dwells—even though you still experience all the limitations of sin—you yourself experience life on God's terms. It stands to reason, doesn't it, that if the alive-and-present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life, he'll do the same thing in you that he did in Jesus, bringing you alive to himself? When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as he did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life. With his Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ's!
12-14So don't you see that we don't owe this old do-it-yourself life one red cent. There's nothing in it for us, nothing at all. The best thing to do is give it a decent burial and get on with your new life. God's Spirit beckons. There are things to do and places to go!
15-17This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life. It's adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike "What's next, Papa?" God's Spirit touches our spirits and confirms who we really are. We know who he is, and we know who we are: Father and children. And we know we are going to get what's coming to us—an unbelievable inheritance! We go through exactly what Christ goes through. If we go through the hard times with him, then we're certainly going to go through the good times with him!
18-21That's why I don't think there's any comparison between the present hard times and the coming good times. The created world itself can hardly wait for what's coming next. Everything in creation is being more or less held back. God reins it in until both creation and all the creatures are ready and can be released at the same moment into the glorious times ahead. Meanwhile, the joyful anticipation deepens.
22-25All around us we observe a pregnant creation. The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs. But it's not only around us; it's within us. The Spirit of God is arousing us within. We're also feeling the birth pangs. These sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance. That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting. We, of course, don't see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy.
26-28Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God's Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don't know how or what to pray, it doesn't matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That's why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.
The MESSAGE
verses 9-12 God is the source of that body of yours, it should be used to bring Him glory.
Verse 13 lesson 26 was all about this. We are in the middle of a violent rebellion against the flesh that pushes us to ignore and disobey God. The devil and the fight against him is not mentioned in Romans except where he is seen as a defeated foe. So, we are our main problem. Self violence to self, not other people’s sins , but to your harshness and critical spirit. Relying on God’s word and faith to take us onlward in the Christian life.
Verses 14-17 WOW! The amazing truth that we are sons, heirs, of God. It is too big to wrap our minds around. What He owns we own. We inherit the earth. We truly are His son, that implies approval and love. If I know God approves of me, I can pass that approval on to my wife and kids. That Approval can be something that is freely given not earned, freely given. Then it is not a burden buy a tremendous 'setting free.” Spend time with the God who chose you, who sees the end from the beginning and loves you. As my heart cries, “Abba, Father" something transformational happens.
Verse 17 “suffering” We suffer with Him, by imitating what He did, giving up self to do what the Father wants. Being that grain of wheat that unobtrusively falls into the ground. Those sufferings are never the focus, the focus is on the next life, with the incredible rewards that come to a son, heir, such as us. Verse 18 Suffering will come but our hope is built on the truth that “glory will be revealed to us.” Not now, not here, will be revealed.
Verse 18-20, corruption and death in this world, came as a result of the fall, they are not the perfect will of God, and somehow, creation knows this and waits eagerly, with their necks craning to see, are they coming yet?, is that them?, is this the time?, is our freedom coming finally?
Thank God for hope, a firm belief in a firm outcome. The whole of creation is subject to futility, (can I get an Amen?) in HOPE.
Futility -- an act having no useful purpose, An action to achieve a goal that is unachievable.
I picture treading water, digging a hole and then filling it in. Feeding a teen-ager... ha ha.
Verse 21 slavery to corruption, “it’s all gonna burn”, “we’re all gonna die”, “death and taxes”
As soon as you are born, you start dying. Decaying...not a lot of good news about this life.
Verse 22 All pain is labor pain, even the pain of suffering and death.
If you are in the hospital and hear a woman
groaning and crying out, your response to that groaning will be totally different if you are on the maternity ward or on oncology unit! The perspective that we are to have is; this is childbirth not oncology. Death where is thy sting, Grave where is thy victory? The groaning, the pain of this life is going somewhere- toward new life, not death.
Verse 23 Believers are not protected from the corruption and futility of this world. Bad things happen to us. Over and over Paul makes it clear in this verse, “yes, you too, will suffer the futility of this creation, the futility, the decay, but in hope.” There is no “king’s kids don’t have to ... verse in the Bible. Just the opposite, we are called to have faith and trust in what we cannot see, called to see this life as a “stopover” on the way to reality.
Verse 24 The now and the not yet of salvation, all we have is hope, there is nothing that we can
see, nothing tangible. So it is hope, a sure belief in a sure thing, that will get us through this life of futility and decay.
Verse 25 The surety of our hope, enables and strengthens our hearts to persevere. God is the guarantor so it will happen!!
Verse 26 The “third person” of the Trinity is introduced and shown to be working on our behalf. He is a person. He does love us. He does have the ‘mind of God’ on every issue, on every thing that concerns us. He always prays in unison with the Father. He always prays for our ultimate “good.” We will not always know the will of God, and sometimes the reason we will not know the will of God will have nothing to do with some sin in our lives. We just will not know it. At those times the Holy Spirit is there to take the burden off of us and to pray for us, and to always be praying the will of God for us, the exalting of Jesus through us, always praying for the ‘working together for the good’ for us.
Prayer, fasting, and tithing are manifestations of the fact that we are weak. Praying says I am weak spiritually and need God. Fasting is becoming voluntarily weak physically. Tithing is becoming voluntarily weak financially. All to show that God is the unseen source of our lives. Prayer is a manifestation that we are desperate. Help, help, help, is our constant prayer.
The Spirit does not need to groan, the Spirit is expressing our groaning, and connecting it to the sovereign, all-knowing will of God. We don’t dictate to God, we humbly groan, not knowing what is our ultimate best. This verse is totally connected to the verses before it. Here we are in this very real world where bad things happen to everyone, no one is spared. Futility is real. Death is real. But death is not final, futility is not the final word. Yes, we are IN this world and suffering is real, but when we are beyond the point of knowing how to pray, we can be comforted that the burden is not ours, the Spirit will pray for us, intercede for us, according to the will of the Father, our Ultimate Good!! Our hope is not in this life, there is a river who streams make glad. If our hope was only in this life we would be pathetic.The amazing, incomprehensible inter-play of the Trinity is glimpsed here and this little glimpse overwhelms our senses.
This is such a good lead in to our next lesson.
Need to just take time before we pray to thank the Holy Spirit for interceding for us, when we don’t know how to pray.
Various quotes and thoughts:
“Sanctification has its seat in the heart; but it regulates the whole man, and appears in his conduct in every-day life. If a man experiences the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit, then . . . sin grieves him, Satan tries him, the world troubles him, and Heaven attracts him. (hope)
Spirit of Jesus, sanctify us deeply, thoroughly--that we may be just like Jesus! Sanctify us . . . by every trial, by every affliction, by every privilege, by every comfort!"
James Smith
John Newton’s “It’s going to be worth it,” story/ illustration updated to modern times....
The power of a proper view of eternal reward.
Driving to a bank. When you get to the bank massive $ will be deposited into your account, from an inheritance. Next to the bank is your favorite new car parking lot. The $ would enable you to buy every car on the lot. 25 feet from the bank your 1997 Ford Escort breaks down. Imagine how silly it would be to walk that last 25 feet, crying and wailing, “my car is broke, my car is broke.” So as our bodies start to show decay- keep in mind the hope of eternity.
This study brought to me a new appreciation for the word hope. It passes away in the next life. No more need for it, but it is sooooo needed here and the gift of it from God is sooooo important to our “making it” in this dark, bleak, world. I looked at a picture of a person, who is far, far, from fulfilling the purpose of God for their life and the word ‘hope’ came to me, and now my ‘looking’ at that picture and at that person, must change, because God is in control and God has subjected all things to futility in HOPE. I need to join my thoughts with His and to have hope, for the lives of those around me and for my own life.
I have never met the man I could despair of after discerning what lies in me apart from the grace of God. Oswald Chambers
God used circumstances in Hannah’s life, that He was the author of, to drive her faith and trust to Him. Hannah knew what hope means.
5 But he gave a double portion to Hannah, for he loved her even though the Lord had kept her from conceiving. 6 Her rival would taunt her severely just to provoke her, because the Lord had kept Hannah from conceiving. 7 Whenever she went up to the Lord’s house, her rival taunted her in this way every year. Hannah wept and would not eat. 8 “Hannah, why are you crying?” her husband Elkanah asked. “Why won’t you eat? Why are you troubled? Am I not better to you than 10 sons?”
1 Samuel 1:9 Hannah got up after they ate and drank at Shiloh. Eli the priest was sitting on a chair by the doorpost of the Lord’s tabernacle. 10 Deeply hurt, Hannah prayed to the Lord and wept with many tears. 11 Making a vow, she pleaded, “Lord of Hosts, if You will take notice of Your servant’s affliction, remember and not forget me, and give Your servant a son, I will give him to the Lord all the days of his life, and his hair will never be cut.”
12 While she continued praying in the Lord’s presence, Eli watched her lips. 13 Hannah was praying silently, and though her lips were moving, her voice could not be heard. Eli thought she was drunk 14 and scolded her, “How long are you going to be drunk? Get rid of your wine! ” 15 “No, my lord,” Hannah replied. “I am a woman with a broken heart. I haven’t had any wine or beer; I’ve been pouring out my heart before the Lord. 16 Don’t think of me as a wicked woman; I’ve been praying from the depth of my anguish and resentment.” 17 Eli responded, “Go in peace, and may the God of Israel grant the petition you’ve requested from Him.” 18 “May your servant find favor with you,” she replied. Then Hannah went on her way; she ate and no longer looked despondent.
Romans Bible Study #27
Romans 8:11-27
Sonship, Suffering, Glory
Word: HOPE
11But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you. 12So then, brethren, we are under obligation, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh-- 13for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live. 14For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. 15For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, "Abba! Father!" 16The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are children of God,
17and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him.
18For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us.
19For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. 20For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope 21that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. 23And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body. 24For in hope we have been saved, but hope that is seen is not hope; for who hopes for what he already sees? 25But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance we wait eagerly for it.
Our Victory in Christ
26In the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words; 27and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. NASB
9-11But if God himself has taken up residence in your life, you can hardly be thinking more of yourself than of him. Anyone, of course, who has not welcomed this invisible but clearly present God, the Spirit of Christ, won't know what we're talking about. But for you who welcome him, in whom he dwells—even though you still experience all the limitations of sin—you yourself experience life on God's terms. It stands to reason, doesn't it, that if the alive-and-present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life, he'll do the same thing in you that he did in Jesus, bringing you alive to himself? When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as he did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life. With his Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ's!
12-14So don't you see that we don't owe this old do-it-yourself life one red cent. There's nothing in it for us, nothing at all. The best thing to do is give it a decent burial and get on with your new life. God's Spirit beckons. There are things to do and places to go!
15-17This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life. It's adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike "What's next, Papa?" God's Spirit touches our spirits and confirms who we really are. We know who he is, and we know who we are: Father and children. And we know we are going to get what's coming to us—an unbelievable inheritance! We go through exactly what Christ goes through. If we go through the hard times with him, then we're certainly going to go through the good times with him!
18-21That's why I don't think there's any comparison between the present hard times and the coming good times. The created world itself can hardly wait for what's coming next. Everything in creation is being more or less held back. God reins it in until both creation and all the creatures are ready and can be released at the same moment into the glorious times ahead. Meanwhile, the joyful anticipation deepens.
22-25All around us we observe a pregnant creation. The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs. But it's not only around us; it's within us. The Spirit of God is arousing us within. We're also feeling the birth pangs. These sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance. That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting. We, of course, don't see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy.
26-28Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God's Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don't know how or what to pray, it doesn't matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That's why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.
The MESSAGE
verses 9-12 God is the source of that body of yours, it should be used to bring Him glory.
Verse 13 lesson 26 was all about this. We are in the middle of a violent rebellion against the flesh that pushes us to ignore and disobey God. The devil and the fight against him is not mentioned in Romans except where he is seen as a defeated foe. So, we are our main problem. Self violence to self, not other people’s sins , but to your harshness and critical spirit. Relying on God’s word and faith to take us onlward in the Christian life.
Verses 14-17 WOW! The amazing truth that we are sons, heirs, of God. It is too big to wrap our minds around. What He owns we own. We inherit the earth. We truly are His son, that implies approval and love. If I know God approves of me, I can pass that approval on to my wife and kids. That Approval can be something that is freely given not earned, freely given. Then it is not a burden buy a tremendous 'setting free.” Spend time with the God who chose you, who sees the end from the beginning and loves you. As my heart cries, “Abba, Father" something transformational happens.
Verse 17 “suffering” We suffer with Him, by imitating what He did, giving up self to do what the Father wants. Being that grain of wheat that unobtrusively falls into the ground. Those sufferings are never the focus, the focus is on the next life, with the incredible rewards that come to a son, heir, such as us. Verse 18 Suffering will come but our hope is built on the truth that “glory will be revealed to us.” Not now, not here, will be revealed.
Verse 18-20, corruption and death in this world, came as a result of the fall, they are not the perfect will of God, and somehow, creation knows this and waits eagerly, with their necks craning to see, are they coming yet?, is that them?, is this the time?, is our freedom coming finally?
Thank God for hope, a firm belief in a firm outcome. The whole of creation is subject to futility, (can I get an Amen?) in HOPE.
Futility -- an act having no useful purpose, An action to achieve a goal that is unachievable.
I picture treading water, digging a hole and then filling it in. Feeding a teen-ager... ha ha.
Verse 21 slavery to corruption, “it’s all gonna burn”, “we’re all gonna die”, “death and taxes”
As soon as you are born, you start dying. Decaying...not a lot of good news about this life.
Verse 22 All pain is labor pain, even the pain of suffering and death.
If you are in the hospital and hear a woman
groaning and crying out, your response to that groaning will be totally different if you are on the maternity ward or on oncology unit! The perspective that we are to have is; this is childbirth not oncology. Death where is thy sting, Grave where is thy victory? The groaning, the pain of this life is going somewhere- toward new life, not death.
Verse 23 Believers are not protected from the corruption and futility of this world. Bad things happen to us. Over and over Paul makes it clear in this verse, “yes, you too, will suffer the futility of this creation, the futility, the decay, but in hope.” There is no “king’s kids don’t have to ... verse in the Bible. Just the opposite, we are called to have faith and trust in what we cannot see, called to see this life as a “stopover” on the way to reality.
Verse 24 The now and the not yet of salvation, all we have is hope, there is nothing that we can
see, nothing tangible. So it is hope, a sure belief in a sure thing, that will get us through this life of futility and decay.
Verse 25 The surety of our hope, enables and strengthens our hearts to persevere. God is the guarantor so it will happen!!
Verse 26 The “third person” of the Trinity is introduced and shown to be working on our behalf. He is a person. He does love us. He does have the ‘mind of God’ on every issue, on every thing that concerns us. He always prays in unison with the Father. He always prays for our ultimate “good.” We will not always know the will of God, and sometimes the reason we will not know the will of God will have nothing to do with some sin in our lives. We just will not know it. At those times the Holy Spirit is there to take the burden off of us and to pray for us, and to always be praying the will of God for us, the exalting of Jesus through us, always praying for the ‘working together for the good’ for us.
Prayer, fasting, and tithing are manifestations of the fact that we are weak. Praying says I am weak spiritually and need God. Fasting is becoming voluntarily weak physically. Tithing is becoming voluntarily weak financially. All to show that God is the unseen source of our lives. Prayer is a manifestation that we are desperate. Help, help, help, is our constant prayer.
The Spirit does not need to groan, the Spirit is expressing our groaning, and connecting it to the sovereign, all-knowing will of God. We don’t dictate to God, we humbly groan, not knowing what is our ultimate best. This verse is totally connected to the verses before it. Here we are in this very real world where bad things happen to everyone, no one is spared. Futility is real. Death is real. But death is not final, futility is not the final word. Yes, we are IN this world and suffering is real, but when we are beyond the point of knowing how to pray, we can be comforted that the burden is not ours, the Spirit will pray for us, intercede for us, according to the will of the Father, our Ultimate Good!! Our hope is not in this life, there is a river who streams make glad. If our hope was only in this life we would be pathetic.The amazing, incomprehensible inter-play of the Trinity is glimpsed here and this little glimpse overwhelms our senses.
This is such a good lead in to our next lesson.
Need to just take time before we pray to thank the Holy Spirit for interceding for us, when we don’t know how to pray.
Various quotes and thoughts:
“Sanctification has its seat in the heart; but it regulates the whole man, and appears in his conduct in every-day life. If a man experiences the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit, then . . . sin grieves him, Satan tries him, the world troubles him, and Heaven attracts him. (hope)
Spirit of Jesus, sanctify us deeply, thoroughly--that we may be just like Jesus! Sanctify us . . . by every trial, by every affliction, by every privilege, by every comfort!"
James Smith
John Newton’s “It’s going to be worth it,” story/ illustration updated to modern times....
The power of a proper view of eternal reward.
Driving to a bank. When you get to the bank massive $ will be deposited into your account, from an inheritance. Next to the bank is your favorite new car parking lot. The $ would enable you to buy every car on the lot. 25 feet from the bank your 1997 Ford Escort breaks down. Imagine how silly it would be to walk that last 25 feet, crying and wailing, “my car is broke, my car is broke.” So as our bodies start to show decay- keep in mind the hope of eternity.
This study brought to me a new appreciation for the word hope. It passes away in the next life. No more need for it, but it is sooooo needed here and the gift of it from God is sooooo important to our “making it” in this dark, bleak, world. I looked at a picture of a person, who is far, far, from fulfilling the purpose of God for their life and the word ‘hope’ came to me, and now my ‘looking’ at that picture and at that person, must change, because God is in control and God has subjected all things to futility in HOPE. I need to join my thoughts with His and to have hope, for the lives of those around me and for my own life.
I have never met the man I could despair of after discerning what lies in me apart from the grace of God. Oswald Chambers
God used circumstances in Hannah’s life, that He was the author of, to drive her faith and trust to Him. Hannah knew what hope means.
5 But he gave a double portion to Hannah, for he loved her even though the Lord had kept her from conceiving. 6 Her rival would taunt her severely just to provoke her, because the Lord had kept Hannah from conceiving. 7 Whenever she went up to the Lord’s house, her rival taunted her in this way every year. Hannah wept and would not eat. 8 “Hannah, why are you crying?” her husband Elkanah asked. “Why won’t you eat? Why are you troubled? Am I not better to you than 10 sons?”
1 Samuel 1:9 Hannah got up after they ate and drank at Shiloh. Eli the priest was sitting on a chair by the doorpost of the Lord’s tabernacle. 10 Deeply hurt, Hannah prayed to the Lord and wept with many tears. 11 Making a vow, she pleaded, “Lord of Hosts, if You will take notice of Your servant’s affliction, remember and not forget me, and give Your servant a son, I will give him to the Lord all the days of his life, and his hair will never be cut.”
12 While she continued praying in the Lord’s presence, Eli watched her lips. 13 Hannah was praying silently, and though her lips were moving, her voice could not be heard. Eli thought she was drunk 14 and scolded her, “How long are you going to be drunk? Get rid of your wine! ” 15 “No, my lord,” Hannah replied. “I am a woman with a broken heart. I haven’t had any wine or beer; I’ve been pouring out my heart before the Lord. 16 Don’t think of me as a wicked woman; I’ve been praying from the depth of my anguish and resentment.” 17 Eli responded, “Go in peace, and may the God of Israel grant the petition you’ve requested from Him.” 18 “May your servant find favor with you,” she replied. Then Hannah went on her way; she ate and no longer looked despondent.
Thursday, June 16, 2011
Hope
I have a new appreciation for the word hope. It passes away in the next life. No more need for it, but it is sooooo needed here and the gift of it from God is sooooo important to our “making it” in this dark, bleak, world. I looked at a picture of a person, who is far, far, from fulfilling the purpose of God for their life and the word ‘hope’ came to me, and now my ‘looking’ at that picture and at that person, must change, because God is in control and God has subjected all things to futility in HOPE.(Romans 8:20) I need to join my thoughts with His and to have hope, for the lives of those around me and for my own life.
Sunday, June 12, 2011
"I need a miracle"
Praying for some friends lately, battling cancer; "Lord, _______ needs a miracle."
Prayed four names in there and then was stopped in my tracks. "Lord, I need a miracle."
The same type of miracle you performed when I was born again, now it is not a salvation miracle, but a sanctification miracle that I need. Make me more like Jesus, "by the Spirit, putting to death the deeds of the flesh." Romans 8:13
I need a miracle, to be a loving husband, father, friend, servant of the Most High.
And maybe, if I come to truly understand, that I need a miracle, I will be far more gentle with other people, who need their own miracle.
Prayed four names in there and then was stopped in my tracks. "Lord, I need a miracle."
The same type of miracle you performed when I was born again, now it is not a salvation miracle, but a sanctification miracle that I need. Make me more like Jesus, "by the Spirit, putting to death the deeds of the flesh." Romans 8:13
I need a miracle, to be a loving husband, father, friend, servant of the Most High.
And maybe, if I come to truly understand, that I need a miracle, I will be far more gentle with other people, who need their own miracle.
Monday, June 6, 2011
Romans Study #26 Romans 8:13
Nest time I'll resume the Romans Study in it's usual form,
picking up in verse 11 and going to verse 27, but this verse
deserved a study all its own!
Romans Bible Study #26
Romans 8:13
The Practical Application Verse
Romans 8:13 for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live. NASB
12-14So don't you see that we don't owe this old do-it-yourself life one red cent. There's nothing in it for us, nothing at all. The best thing to do is give it a decent burial and get on with your new life. God's Spirit beckons. There are things to do and places to go! The Message
13For if you live according to [the dictates of] the flesh, you will surely die. But if through the power of the [Holy] Spirit you are [habitually] putting to death (making extinct, deadening) the [evil] deeds prompted by the body, you shall [really and genuinely] live forever. Amplified
It is no exaggeration to say that Romans has been building to this point. It is no exaggeration to say that my life has been lived up till now to teach this lesson. This is the practical, “how do we make this thing called the Christian life work” verse. “by the Spirit putting to death the deeds of the flesh.” This isn’t for the Christian who is OK with his walk with God. This isn’t for the one who is content with where he is at and is pretty sure he is better than most. This is the lesson for the one who is crying out, “God I’m failure, I’m letting You down, I’m letting my family down, HELP!!”
The Message translation misses it here, there is no picture of the violence that a believer is to take toward the ‘killing’ of his own flesh. This verse is giving us a key difference between life and death. It is no ‘formula,’ but a principle, and all the glory goes to God. It is a process as we have learned, but not one in which we are a helpless bystander, but a co-worker with God. By His Spirit we are given a scripture to fill our mind with. We violently wrap our mind around the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, and cling to it. With every choice to fix our mind on the truth, we are defeating the enemy. We are shown a truth and we believe in it. In the same way “you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him.” We saw the truth and we believed in Him. Now a scripture is revealed to us by the Spirit that applies to our situation and we believe it and act upon it. His power is released in the first instance to save, and in this instance to continue the violent process of sanctification.
So as we try to make this verse practical we look back a couple verses in Romans and see that we are to set our minds on the things of the Spirit.
Romans 8:5,6 For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace,
What are the things of the Spirit? That phrase “the things of the Spirit” is used one other time by Paul.
1 Corin. 2:13,14 which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words. But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised.
This would answer the question what are the things of the Spirit, by saying they are the words of God, in the Bible, and on the tongue of our brothers and sisters in Christ when they are speaking God’s truth to us.
Two scriptures to back up where I am going with this.
Matthew 11:12
“From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and violent men take it by force.”
“But if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body” The best selling “guy” movies have this premise, a heroic tale of a man who uses violence to overcome an enemy that is out to destroy, him and his family. This is easily translated to the Christian life. It can be viewed, as a battle between your body/flesh/self, and the new life that God has placed in you by the Spirit. It is NOT just about what I don’t do anymore. It is a positive life change, what I do now is “by the Spirit.” We don’t just stop lusting after other women, we learn how to love our wives and daughters and how to demonstrate to our sons, the correct attitude toward women.
We don’t just stop having angry outbursts, we model the contentment and peace of a man who knows that God is in control. 1 John 5:16
“If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he shall ask and God will for him give life to those who commit sin not leading to death. There is a sin leading to death; I do not say that he should make request for this.”
“The wages of sin is death” so how can there be a sin ‘not leading to death.?’ This is the sin that the Holy Spirit has not convicted that person of yet and if we try to confront it in any way other than prayer to God, we are moving ahead of the Holy Spirit and we will bring death to the situation. In the phrase, ‘putting to death the deeds of the body by the Spirit,’ by the Spirit, becomes very important. The sins we are working on, violently opposing, in our lives are the ones that the Spirit has put before us and convicted us of. They are specific and few in number.
Mine currently is stopping putting Laura down, not necessarily with words but with looks, or gestures. Also holding the boys accountable when they are being disrespectful. The first is the sin of pride and the second is laziness or sloth, the desire to not have confrontation and to just “get along.” The scriptures that I believe the Spirit has equipped me with to fight the first sin are, “love is kind, love believes all things, hopes all things.” and (I picked on The Message translation earlier, now I will praise it, this translation of the husbands lover your wives section is terrific) Ephesians 5:25-28 “Husbands, go all out in your love for your wives, exactly as Christ did for the church—a love marked by giving, not getting. Christ's love makes the church whole. His words evoke her beauty. Everything he does and says is designed to bring the best out of her, dressing her in dazzling white silk, radiant with holiness. And that is how husbands ought to love their wives. They're really doing themselves a favor—since they're already "one" in marriage.”The las scripture is “But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever says to his brother, ‘You good-for-nothing,’ shall be guilty before the supreme court; and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.” Matt. 5:22 Effectively when I put down Laura I am saying “you fool” and God has very harsh words for a person who says that. As men we are to lead, guide and protect the weaker vessel, not get puffed up that we are the stronger vessel. To love as Christ loved the Church. What a high calling. Ephesians 4:30,31 Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. 32 Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.
The scriptures for the boys are,
Ephesians 6:4
“And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord."
Proverbs 4:5
“Acquire wisdom! Acquire understanding!
Do not forget nor turn away from the words of my mouth."
I tend to be quiet, but this says, I must speak words that will give my sons wisdom and understanding. They should benefit from what I know, even if at first it appears they are doing the opposite. That does not give me the right to ‘abandon my post’ which I have done in the past.
It is clear that Romans 8:13 is telling us to put to death. The only offensive weapon in the armor of the Spirit is the sword. So the Spirit and the Word work together to bring about the change in me the same as they did when I was born again.
Col. 2:6 “Therefore as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him,"
Gal 3:5 “So then, does He who provides you with the Spirit and works miracles among you, do it by the works of the Law, or by hearing with faith?"
Romans 10:17
“So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ."
The Gal. and Rom. scriptures emphasize hearing and the word for ‘word’ in the second one is Rhema which is the now word, the revealed word, made real to you in that moment. So other believers can definitely be used by God to speak a scripture into our lives that we can then use to fight against the sin. As we confess our faults to one another, God may open a scripture to us that can then be our “fighter verse” against the deeds of the body. Two of the scriptures emphasize that we are ‘hearing’ the word, so we need to be faithful to share our struggles with others and be willing to ‘hear.'
This next scripture demonstrates the extreme nature of the battle that we are in.
2 Samuel 23:9 and after him was Eleazar the son of Dodo the Ahohite, one of the three mighty men with David when they defied the Philistines who were gathered there to battle and the men of Israel had withdrawn. 10 He arose and struck the Philistines until his hand was weary and clung to the sword, and the LORD brought about a great victory that day;
May we be like Eleazar, clinging to the sword of the Spirit, by the power of the Spirt until the LORD brings about a great victory.
James speaks of the ‘method of sin.' James 1:14 But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. 15 Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death. 16 Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren.
We can by the power of the Spirit stop this ‘method’ in its infancy using these truths.
Sin is never completely defeated in our lives, but we are not without our defenses. We are not helpless against it, “that’s just the way I am,” does not cut it.
Romans 8:13 for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live. NASB
This is not a method or formula, but a living and active, conversation with the living God. He convicts us of a sin, we cry out for help, He gives a specific scripture, either through our own reading of the word or through a brother.
We desperately cling to that word and look for the Spirit of God to make it real in our lives.
Genesis 4:7
“If you do well, will not your countenance be lifted up? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door; and its desire is for you, but you must master it.”
This is the first occurrence of the word sin in the Bible, and the instruction from God to Cain was “you must master it.”
Romans 6:14
“For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law but under grace.”
This verse in Romans gives us hope that grace is the path to mastering sin. And Romans 8:13 is the paradoxical answer to the question how? The Spirit and your cooperation with the Spirit and the word. We are effectively killing that which is already dead. This time on earth has a number of purposes but one of them is to demonstrate that the truth of God, can change a man.
This lines up perfectly with the John Bevere teaching and Jerry’s teaching on the ‘face of grace.’ We can live victoriously by grace.
Ephesians 4:20-24 “But you did not learn Christ in this way, 21 if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught in Him, just as truth is in Jesus, 22 that, in reference to your former manner of life, you lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit, 23 and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind, 24 and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.”
Gal 6:8 For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.
picking up in verse 11 and going to verse 27, but this verse
deserved a study all its own!
Romans Bible Study #26
Romans 8:13
The Practical Application Verse
Romans 8:13 for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live. NASB
12-14So don't you see that we don't owe this old do-it-yourself life one red cent. There's nothing in it for us, nothing at all. The best thing to do is give it a decent burial and get on with your new life. God's Spirit beckons. There are things to do and places to go! The Message
13For if you live according to [the dictates of] the flesh, you will surely die. But if through the power of the [Holy] Spirit you are [habitually] putting to death (making extinct, deadening) the [evil] deeds prompted by the body, you shall [really and genuinely] live forever. Amplified
It is no exaggeration to say that Romans has been building to this point. It is no exaggeration to say that my life has been lived up till now to teach this lesson. This is the practical, “how do we make this thing called the Christian life work” verse. “by the Spirit putting to death the deeds of the flesh.” This isn’t for the Christian who is OK with his walk with God. This isn’t for the one who is content with where he is at and is pretty sure he is better than most. This is the lesson for the one who is crying out, “God I’m failure, I’m letting You down, I’m letting my family down, HELP!!”
The Message translation misses it here, there is no picture of the violence that a believer is to take toward the ‘killing’ of his own flesh. This verse is giving us a key difference between life and death. It is no ‘formula,’ but a principle, and all the glory goes to God. It is a process as we have learned, but not one in which we are a helpless bystander, but a co-worker with God. By His Spirit we are given a scripture to fill our mind with. We violently wrap our mind around the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, and cling to it. With every choice to fix our mind on the truth, we are defeating the enemy. We are shown a truth and we believe in it. In the same way “you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him.” We saw the truth and we believed in Him. Now a scripture is revealed to us by the Spirit that applies to our situation and we believe it and act upon it. His power is released in the first instance to save, and in this instance to continue the violent process of sanctification.
So as we try to make this verse practical we look back a couple verses in Romans and see that we are to set our minds on the things of the Spirit.
Romans 8:5,6 For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace,
What are the things of the Spirit? That phrase “the things of the Spirit” is used one other time by Paul.
1 Corin. 2:13,14 which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words. But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised.
This would answer the question what are the things of the Spirit, by saying they are the words of God, in the Bible, and on the tongue of our brothers and sisters in Christ when they are speaking God’s truth to us.
Two scriptures to back up where I am going with this.
Matthew 11:12
“From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and violent men take it by force.”
“But if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body” The best selling “guy” movies have this premise, a heroic tale of a man who uses violence to overcome an enemy that is out to destroy, him and his family. This is easily translated to the Christian life. It can be viewed, as a battle between your body/flesh/self, and the new life that God has placed in you by the Spirit. It is NOT just about what I don’t do anymore. It is a positive life change, what I do now is “by the Spirit.” We don’t just stop lusting after other women, we learn how to love our wives and daughters and how to demonstrate to our sons, the correct attitude toward women.
We don’t just stop having angry outbursts, we model the contentment and peace of a man who knows that God is in control. 1 John 5:16
“If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he shall ask and God will for him give life to those who commit sin not leading to death. There is a sin leading to death; I do not say that he should make request for this.”
“The wages of sin is death” so how can there be a sin ‘not leading to death.?’ This is the sin that the Holy Spirit has not convicted that person of yet and if we try to confront it in any way other than prayer to God, we are moving ahead of the Holy Spirit and we will bring death to the situation. In the phrase, ‘putting to death the deeds of the body by the Spirit,’ by the Spirit, becomes very important. The sins we are working on, violently opposing, in our lives are the ones that the Spirit has put before us and convicted us of. They are specific and few in number.
Mine currently is stopping putting Laura down, not necessarily with words but with looks, or gestures. Also holding the boys accountable when they are being disrespectful. The first is the sin of pride and the second is laziness or sloth, the desire to not have confrontation and to just “get along.” The scriptures that I believe the Spirit has equipped me with to fight the first sin are, “love is kind, love believes all things, hopes all things.” and (I picked on The Message translation earlier, now I will praise it, this translation of the husbands lover your wives section is terrific) Ephesians 5:25-28 “Husbands, go all out in your love for your wives, exactly as Christ did for the church—a love marked by giving, not getting. Christ's love makes the church whole. His words evoke her beauty. Everything he does and says is designed to bring the best out of her, dressing her in dazzling white silk, radiant with holiness. And that is how husbands ought to love their wives. They're really doing themselves a favor—since they're already "one" in marriage.”The las scripture is “But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever says to his brother, ‘You good-for-nothing,’ shall be guilty before the supreme court; and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.” Matt. 5:22 Effectively when I put down Laura I am saying “you fool” and God has very harsh words for a person who says that. As men we are to lead, guide and protect the weaker vessel, not get puffed up that we are the stronger vessel. To love as Christ loved the Church. What a high calling. Ephesians 4:30,31 Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. 32 Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.
The scriptures for the boys are,
Ephesians 6:4
“And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord."
Proverbs 4:5
“Acquire wisdom! Acquire understanding!
Do not forget nor turn away from the words of my mouth."
I tend to be quiet, but this says, I must speak words that will give my sons wisdom and understanding. They should benefit from what I know, even if at first it appears they are doing the opposite. That does not give me the right to ‘abandon my post’ which I have done in the past.
It is clear that Romans 8:13 is telling us to put to death. The only offensive weapon in the armor of the Spirit is the sword. So the Spirit and the Word work together to bring about the change in me the same as they did when I was born again.
Col. 2:6 “Therefore as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him,"
Gal 3:5 “So then, does He who provides you with the Spirit and works miracles among you, do it by the works of the Law, or by hearing with faith?"
Romans 10:17
“So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ."
The Gal. and Rom. scriptures emphasize hearing and the word for ‘word’ in the second one is Rhema which is the now word, the revealed word, made real to you in that moment. So other believers can definitely be used by God to speak a scripture into our lives that we can then use to fight against the sin. As we confess our faults to one another, God may open a scripture to us that can then be our “fighter verse” against the deeds of the body. Two of the scriptures emphasize that we are ‘hearing’ the word, so we need to be faithful to share our struggles with others and be willing to ‘hear.'
This next scripture demonstrates the extreme nature of the battle that we are in.
2 Samuel 23:9 and after him was Eleazar the son of Dodo the Ahohite, one of the three mighty men with David when they defied the Philistines who were gathered there to battle and the men of Israel had withdrawn. 10 He arose and struck the Philistines until his hand was weary and clung to the sword, and the LORD brought about a great victory that day;
May we be like Eleazar, clinging to the sword of the Spirit, by the power of the Spirt until the LORD brings about a great victory.
James speaks of the ‘method of sin.' James 1:14 But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. 15 Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death. 16 Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren.
We can by the power of the Spirit stop this ‘method’ in its infancy using these truths.
Sin is never completely defeated in our lives, but we are not without our defenses. We are not helpless against it, “that’s just the way I am,” does not cut it.
Romans 8:13 for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live. NASB
This is not a method or formula, but a living and active, conversation with the living God. He convicts us of a sin, we cry out for help, He gives a specific scripture, either through our own reading of the word or through a brother.
We desperately cling to that word and look for the Spirit of God to make it real in our lives.
Genesis 4:7
“If you do well, will not your countenance be lifted up? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door; and its desire is for you, but you must master it.”
This is the first occurrence of the word sin in the Bible, and the instruction from God to Cain was “you must master it.”
Romans 6:14
“For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law but under grace.”
This verse in Romans gives us hope that grace is the path to mastering sin. And Romans 8:13 is the paradoxical answer to the question how? The Spirit and your cooperation with the Spirit and the word. We are effectively killing that which is already dead. This time on earth has a number of purposes but one of them is to demonstrate that the truth of God, can change a man.
This lines up perfectly with the John Bevere teaching and Jerry’s teaching on the ‘face of grace.’ We can live victoriously by grace.
Ephesians 4:20-24 “But you did not learn Christ in this way, 21 if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught in Him, just as truth is in Jesus, 22 that, in reference to your former manner of life, you lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit, 23 and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind, 24 and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.”
Gal 6:8 For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.
Monday, May 30, 2011
simple test
We act like pagans in a crisis, only one out of a crowd is daring enough to bank his faith in the character of God. Oswald Chambers
Friday, May 6, 2011
Romans Bible Study #25 Romans 8:1-10
Romans Bible Study #25
Romans 8:1-10
The Spirit - The Decision
Word -scandalon
Deliverance from Bondage
1Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
2For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.
3For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh,
4so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
5For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.
6For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace,
7because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so,
8and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
9However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him.
10If Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness. NASB
The Solution Is Life on God's Terms
1-2With the arrival of Jesus, the Messiah, that fateful dilemma is resolved. Those who enter into Christ's being-here-for-us no longer have to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud. A new power is in operation. The Spirit of life in Christ, like a strong wind, has magnificently cleared the air, freeing you from a fated lifetime of brutal tyranny at the hands of sin and death.
3-4God went for the jugular when he sent his own Son. He didn't deal with the problem as something remote and unimportant. In his Son, Jesus, he personally took on the human condition, entered the disordered mess of struggling humanity in order to set it right once and for all. The law code, weakened as it always was by fractured human nature, could never have done that.
The law always ended up being used as a Band-Aid on sin instead of a deep healing of it. And now what the law code asked for but we couldn't deliver is accomplished as we, instead of redoubling our own efforts, simply embrace what the Spirit is doing in us.
5-8Those who think they can do it on their own end up obsessed with measuring their own moral muscle but never get around to exercising it in real life. Those who trust God's action in them find that God's Spirit is in them—living and breathing God! Obsession with self in these matters is a dead end; attention to God leads us out into the open, into a spacious, free life. Focusing on the self is the opposite of focusing on God. Anyone completely absorbed in self ignores God, ends up thinking more about self than God. That person ignores who God is and what he is doing. And God isn't pleased at being ignored.
9-11But if God himself has taken up residence in your life, you can hardly be thinking more of yourself than of him. Anyone, of course, who has not welcomed this invisible but clearly present God, the Spirit of Christ, won't know what we're talking about. But for you who welcome him, in whom he dwells—even though you still experience all the limitations of sin—you yourself experience life on God's terms. It stands to reason, doesn't it, that if the alive-and-present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life, he'll do the same thing in you that he did in Jesus, bringing you alive to himself? When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as he did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life. With his Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ's!
The Message
Condemnation is pushed out of our lives as Jesus Christ lives in us.
We are. in Christ Jesus, that knowledge comes to us from the grace and mercy of God. We go all the way back to the garden and eat from the tree of life, we have put aside the knowledge of good and evil. Sin is condemned, the wrath of God is poured out, but all on Jesus. The law is fulfilled in us, not in the sense of perfection, but in the sense of ‘direction.’ Grace is working outward from an inward place. The Holy Spirit indwelling us is directing us toward truth and life. Our life course is headed toward God. No longer under the demands of the law as an outward rule book, we are in the open spaces of God’s freedom and grace.
An Example of this:
Jesus words on the Sabbath, Mark 3:23-28
23And it happened that He was passing through the grainfields on the Sabbath, and His disciples began to make their way along while picking the heads of grain.
24The Pharisees were saying to Him, "Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?"
25And He said to them, "Have you never read what David did when he was in need and he and his companions became hungry;
26how he entered the house of God in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the consecrated bread, which is not lawful for anyone to eat except the priests, and he also gave it to those who were with him?" 27Jesus said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.
28"So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath."
That is, this religious observance was intended for man's benefit, not his enslavement.
The sabbath was not an end in itself, an absolute that admitted no exceptions. It was intended for man's benefit, his well-being. To elevate it to a place of tyranny over man is to make more of it than was intended; indeed, it would overthrow it altogether.
Moreover, it is Jesus who possesses the authority to decide these things (v.28). His Lordship over "even" (ascensive kai) the sabbath demonstrates again the significance of his person and the "new" order of things marked by his arrival. The statement as it is neither confirms nor disallows the continuation of sabbath observance, in explicit terms. But it emphatically affirms Jesus' inherent right to do with the law as he sees fit, and so the foundation for an epochal shift in the meaning of the sabbath is clearly implied.
Significant also is the fact that he designates himself here "Son of Man." Mark's so-called "messianic secret" is not so secret here! And for good cause: Jesus is facing an opposition which is demanding justification for his activity. David had the right to lay claim to exception to ritual law; no less a right belongs to the Son of Man. And lordship over the sabbath is something which no mere man could claim, but for Daniel's Son of Man the situation is much different.
More significant still is the portrait of Christ painted here. His coming has ushered in a new age in which the promised salvation of God is realized. The gospel of Christ offers a rest which is more than physical and temporal but, in him, spiritual and eternal. End of example, back to the lesson.
6For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace,
7because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so,
8and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
These verses form one thought, if I begin thinking about and being ruled by MY attempts to overcome sin, sin will overcome me everytime, and even my temporary victories are failures, because they serve only to exalt me and my system/formula/self. Then comes the next set of verses.
9However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him.
10If Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness.
More and more, by growing awareness, we come to see that the Spirit is now at the helm of our lives. This process of sanctification brings us to a place where we ‘give up’ on a method or formula for success and we begin to rely on the Spirit. What does this look like?
“God, this sin has me beat, thank You, for showing me once again that in me dwells no good thing. Thank You for showing me once again that my efforts at reform will end in failure. Thank you for providing the only way out. Your Son, His Spirit, Your very life in me, working through me. Take control, be glorified, do such a deep and wonderful work, that all who see it will say, “that couldn’t be him, that must be his God!”
The progression of this book is so divinely organized, it is a thing of true beauty.
1) You are bad, with no hope of ever being good.
2) God “set this up” and also “set up” a way of escape.
3) The law was to show us our need of faith. Faith is the only way to be set free.
4) Faith puts us in touch with all the goodness of God, His peace, His righteousness.
5) This new life makes us free from sin.
6) This flesh keeps us dependent on God, it is opposed to God, but its opposition, drives us right back into the arms of Jesus, where we belong.
7) The law is no longer your master, the Spirit is, and it is like you have come out of a very narrow trail with thorns and briers and now you have come to a wide open field with space and beauty, in abundance. “Ahhhhhhhhh” your inner man says, this is what I was created for!
1 Cor 13:12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known. We are not there yet, and we make a mistake when we, think, act and talk like we are. Barth will not let us think that our ingenuity is capable of defining God. “We stumble when we suppose that we can treat of Him, speak and hear of Him–WITHOUT BEING SCANDALIZED.” “In Him the flesh has been deprived of its independence and restored to God who created it. In Him the disorder and corruption under which it groans has been laid bare, and thereby the hope of redemption which it awaits has also been exposed. In Him its independent might and importance and glory have been condemned, and thereby its glory and significance as the creation of God have been restored.
It is imperative that we from the human point of view should be scandalized; imperative that we should recognize that not flesh and blood but only the Fatihr which is in heaven can reveal that there is more to be found here than flesh and blood.
The purpose of the mission of the Son of God, a purpose veritablyy attained, is–that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
Thus the condemnation of sin inChrist is the revelation of the righteousness of God, which religion seeks after but never finds.
Verses 5-9
This being “in the Spirit” swallows up the “in the flesh” of our previous life. Like an eclipse, gradually, through the process of sanctification, the one totally blocks out the other. The totality is not until our flesh is in the grave, but the assurance is that that is the place we are headed towards.
Without “in the Spirit,” the world seeks to reform men, by passing laws and inflicting punishments. Evil only increases because the soure of the evil remains. What is needed is a severing fo the root of evil and that is what happens when we are ‘in the Spirit.’ The ax is laid to the root of being “in the flesh.”
Verse 10 This being in Christ is God acting upon us from outside of us. We were ‘in the flesh; apart from any toher choice od our own, and we are ;in Christ’ apart from any choice of our own. Sometimes we are in danger of exalting our “choice” over and above the God who gave us the grace to make the choice. (Calvinism and Arminianism do not need to be mutually exclusive.)
This scripture demonstrates the balance between the sovereign choice of God and the belief that we exercise.
"But we are bound to give thanks always to God for you, brethren beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth"
2 Thessalonians 2:13
“There are three things here which deserve special attention. First, the fact that we are expressly told that God's elect are "chosen to salvation": Language could not be more explicit. How summarily do these words dispose of the sophistries and equivocations of all who would make election refer to nothing but external privileges or rank in service! It is to "salvation" itself that God has chosen us. Second, we are warned here that election unto salvation does not disregard the use of appropriate means: salvation is reached through "sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth" It is not true that because God has chosen a certain one to salvation that he will be saved willy-nilly, whether he believes or not: nowhere do the Scriptures so represent it. The same God who "chose unto salvation", decreed that His purpose should be realized through the work of the spirit and belief of the truth. Third, that God has chosen us unto salvation is a profound cause for fervent praise. Note how strongly the apostle express this - "we are bound to give thanks always to God for you. brethren beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation", etc. Instead of shrinking back in horror from the doctrine of predestination, the believer, when he sees this blessed truth as it is unfolded in the Word, discovers a ground for gratitude and thanksgiving such as nothing else affords, save the unspeakable gift of the Redeemer Himself.” AW Pink
1 Corin. 1:28 “and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are,”
These truths are not “apparent” just from looking at life, in fact they are hidden and must be revealed.
So God chose us and gives us the grace to be “in Christ.”
Stumbling block - Scandalon
This from a guy named Steve Dewitt.
For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles… (Verses 21-23, emphasis added)
Salvation by faith in a crucified Savior is counterintuitive to us
The gospel is a stumbling block when you are blind. The Greek word for “stumbling block” is scandalon defined as that which gives offense or causes revulsion, that which arouses opposition, an object of anger or disapproval. (BAG)
We get the word scandalous from it. The cross is offensive to human way of thinking and it rubs the natural man the wrong way because it requires us to do the exact opposite of what man and his pride thinks he needs to do.
Let me illustrate this with a Chinese finger trap. You put one finger in each end and when you try to pull them out again, you’re stuck. You can’t get out. Do you know how to get out of a Chinese finger trap? You push your finger in so that you can pull your finger out. The way out is the way in. That’s counterintuitive. Here are some reasons that believing in Jesus is counterintuitive…
Contrary to human religion (Verse 22)
Every religion man comes up with has something to do with man making his way to God. Paul points out in verse 22 that the Jews demanded a sign. They wanted to see something that out of their wisdom they could judge as true. You may recall the Jews asking Jesus repeatedly for a sign or a miracle. They wanted to make their own judgment and all the religions of the world do the same. They magnify in some way man’s ability to do or think or earn his way to God or Allah or Nirvana or Jehovah or whatever. Man’s kind of religion always ends up worshipping man in some way. Christ crucified rubs man the wrong way.
Contrary to human thinking (Verse 22)
Paul says in verse 22 that the Greeks seek wisdom. They want to rationalize their way to God. In the end, who gets the glory if man’s wisdom leads him to God? Man does. Who gets the glory if human eloquence and human words lead man to God? Man does. To the Greeks in the Roman Empire, if someone was crucified he was the worst of criminals. A crucified Savior? How could God save mankind by something so ugly and weak and despised as a Roman cross? That doesn’t jive with our way of thinking. The Jews want power and in the cross they get weakness. The Greeks want wisdom, but in the cross they get apparent folly. 5
Contrary to human pride and self-sufficiency
This is the big one. The human heart does not want to do what the gospel requires – humble itself. All the major objections to Christianity in some way stem from this
fundamental flaw within us. List key doctrines and the objections will come; the atonement is too bloody and predestination seems unfair and God saving some and not everyone is too exclusive and eternal punishment in hell isn’t right and a loving God wouldn’t do it this way. The gospel rubs the modern man or woman the wrong way and since we are the judge of the way it ought to be, we simply call it ridiculous. There is a movie out right now that says exactly that. Religulous! Religion is ridiculous to Bill Maher for all the same reasons Paul explains here. It strikes our sensibilities the wrong way because it elevates God and humbles us and we don’t like that. The gospel is a scandal. It always has been. It always will be. We have to admit that….
God is wiser than us (Verse 25)
For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. The key to understanding this passage is adding the word “apparent.” God’s apparent foolishness in the cross is actually the eternal wisdom of God. Man’s apparent wisdom is actually foolishness. So things are not as they appear. Take all the talking points of all the philosophers and talk show hosts and writers and columnists and politicians and statesmen and professors and teachers. Take all the things they’ve ever said and pile them up. The smallest thought that God has ever had eclipses all the wisdom man has ever accumulated. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. (Isaiah 55:8-9)
God’s Word is like the traveler to the Country of the Blind and the secret to the Chinese finger trap. It is telling us what is wise and what is folly. It is also calling us to wonder and worship. Do you realize that were it not for God’s gracious calling in our lives, we would still be blind and solidly in the category of “those who are perishing” in verse 18? The right response of a recipient of grace is not pride but wonder and worship. There is nothing here for anyone to take pride in. The Corinthian Christians were finding their identity in eloquent speakers and teachers in the church. What? Who died for us? Who called us? God did. Let’s
praise Him!
Lastly this from Paul Washer. When you are teaching your children to take their first steps they must come to a place where they let go of the chair or table or whatever they are holding onto and they walk without holding onto anything. You don’t get them there by saying “Let go of the table.” You get them to walk by saying, “Come to Daddy.” and so it is with God and us. The focus is not on what we need to let go of, but on the great and beautiful God we are being called toward.
Romans 8:1-10
The Spirit - The Decision
Word -scandalon
Deliverance from Bondage
1Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
2For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.
3For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh,
4so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
5For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.
6For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace,
7because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so,
8and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
9However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him.
10If Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness. NASB
The Solution Is Life on God's Terms
1-2With the arrival of Jesus, the Messiah, that fateful dilemma is resolved. Those who enter into Christ's being-here-for-us no longer have to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud. A new power is in operation. The Spirit of life in Christ, like a strong wind, has magnificently cleared the air, freeing you from a fated lifetime of brutal tyranny at the hands of sin and death.
3-4God went for the jugular when he sent his own Son. He didn't deal with the problem as something remote and unimportant. In his Son, Jesus, he personally took on the human condition, entered the disordered mess of struggling humanity in order to set it right once and for all. The law code, weakened as it always was by fractured human nature, could never have done that.
The law always ended up being used as a Band-Aid on sin instead of a deep healing of it. And now what the law code asked for but we couldn't deliver is accomplished as we, instead of redoubling our own efforts, simply embrace what the Spirit is doing in us.
5-8Those who think they can do it on their own end up obsessed with measuring their own moral muscle but never get around to exercising it in real life. Those who trust God's action in them find that God's Spirit is in them—living and breathing God! Obsession with self in these matters is a dead end; attention to God leads us out into the open, into a spacious, free life. Focusing on the self is the opposite of focusing on God. Anyone completely absorbed in self ignores God, ends up thinking more about self than God. That person ignores who God is and what he is doing. And God isn't pleased at being ignored.
9-11But if God himself has taken up residence in your life, you can hardly be thinking more of yourself than of him. Anyone, of course, who has not welcomed this invisible but clearly present God, the Spirit of Christ, won't know what we're talking about. But for you who welcome him, in whom he dwells—even though you still experience all the limitations of sin—you yourself experience life on God's terms. It stands to reason, doesn't it, that if the alive-and-present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life, he'll do the same thing in you that he did in Jesus, bringing you alive to himself? When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as he did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life. With his Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ's!
The Message
Condemnation is pushed out of our lives as Jesus Christ lives in us.
We are. in Christ Jesus, that knowledge comes to us from the grace and mercy of God. We go all the way back to the garden and eat from the tree of life, we have put aside the knowledge of good and evil. Sin is condemned, the wrath of God is poured out, but all on Jesus. The law is fulfilled in us, not in the sense of perfection, but in the sense of ‘direction.’ Grace is working outward from an inward place. The Holy Spirit indwelling us is directing us toward truth and life. Our life course is headed toward God. No longer under the demands of the law as an outward rule book, we are in the open spaces of God’s freedom and grace.
An Example of this:
Jesus words on the Sabbath, Mark 3:23-28
23And it happened that He was passing through the grainfields on the Sabbath, and His disciples began to make their way along while picking the heads of grain.
24The Pharisees were saying to Him, "Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?"
25And He said to them, "Have you never read what David did when he was in need and he and his companions became hungry;
26how he entered the house of God in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the consecrated bread, which is not lawful for anyone to eat except the priests, and he also gave it to those who were with him?" 27Jesus said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.
28"So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath."
That is, this religious observance was intended for man's benefit, not his enslavement.
The sabbath was not an end in itself, an absolute that admitted no exceptions. It was intended for man's benefit, his well-being. To elevate it to a place of tyranny over man is to make more of it than was intended; indeed, it would overthrow it altogether.
Moreover, it is Jesus who possesses the authority to decide these things (v.28). His Lordship over "even" (ascensive kai) the sabbath demonstrates again the significance of his person and the "new" order of things marked by his arrival. The statement as it is neither confirms nor disallows the continuation of sabbath observance, in explicit terms. But it emphatically affirms Jesus' inherent right to do with the law as he sees fit, and so the foundation for an epochal shift in the meaning of the sabbath is clearly implied.
Significant also is the fact that he designates himself here "Son of Man." Mark's so-called "messianic secret" is not so secret here! And for good cause: Jesus is facing an opposition which is demanding justification for his activity. David had the right to lay claim to exception to ritual law; no less a right belongs to the Son of Man. And lordship over the sabbath is something which no mere man could claim, but for Daniel's Son of Man the situation is much different.
More significant still is the portrait of Christ painted here. His coming has ushered in a new age in which the promised salvation of God is realized. The gospel of Christ offers a rest which is more than physical and temporal but, in him, spiritual and eternal. End of example, back to the lesson.
6For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace,
7because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so,
8and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
These verses form one thought, if I begin thinking about and being ruled by MY attempts to overcome sin, sin will overcome me everytime, and even my temporary victories are failures, because they serve only to exalt me and my system/formula/self. Then comes the next set of verses.
9However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him.
10If Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness.
More and more, by growing awareness, we come to see that the Spirit is now at the helm of our lives. This process of sanctification brings us to a place where we ‘give up’ on a method or formula for success and we begin to rely on the Spirit. What does this look like?
“God, this sin has me beat, thank You, for showing me once again that in me dwells no good thing. Thank You for showing me once again that my efforts at reform will end in failure. Thank you for providing the only way out. Your Son, His Spirit, Your very life in me, working through me. Take control, be glorified, do such a deep and wonderful work, that all who see it will say, “that couldn’t be him, that must be his God!”
The progression of this book is so divinely organized, it is a thing of true beauty.
1) You are bad, with no hope of ever being good.
2) God “set this up” and also “set up” a way of escape.
3) The law was to show us our need of faith. Faith is the only way to be set free.
4) Faith puts us in touch with all the goodness of God, His peace, His righteousness.
5) This new life makes us free from sin.
6) This flesh keeps us dependent on God, it is opposed to God, but its opposition, drives us right back into the arms of Jesus, where we belong.
7) The law is no longer your master, the Spirit is, and it is like you have come out of a very narrow trail with thorns and briers and now you have come to a wide open field with space and beauty, in abundance. “Ahhhhhhhhh” your inner man says, this is what I was created for!
1 Cor 13:12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known. We are not there yet, and we make a mistake when we, think, act and talk like we are. Barth will not let us think that our ingenuity is capable of defining God. “We stumble when we suppose that we can treat of Him, speak and hear of Him–WITHOUT BEING SCANDALIZED.” “In Him the flesh has been deprived of its independence and restored to God who created it. In Him the disorder and corruption under which it groans has been laid bare, and thereby the hope of redemption which it awaits has also been exposed. In Him its independent might and importance and glory have been condemned, and thereby its glory and significance as the creation of God have been restored.
It is imperative that we from the human point of view should be scandalized; imperative that we should recognize that not flesh and blood but only the Fatihr which is in heaven can reveal that there is more to be found here than flesh and blood.
The purpose of the mission of the Son of God, a purpose veritablyy attained, is–that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
Thus the condemnation of sin inChrist is the revelation of the righteousness of God, which religion seeks after but never finds.
Verses 5-9
This being “in the Spirit” swallows up the “in the flesh” of our previous life. Like an eclipse, gradually, through the process of sanctification, the one totally blocks out the other. The totality is not until our flesh is in the grave, but the assurance is that that is the place we are headed towards.
Without “in the Spirit,” the world seeks to reform men, by passing laws and inflicting punishments. Evil only increases because the soure of the evil remains. What is needed is a severing fo the root of evil and that is what happens when we are ‘in the Spirit.’ The ax is laid to the root of being “in the flesh.”
Verse 10 This being in Christ is God acting upon us from outside of us. We were ‘in the flesh; apart from any toher choice od our own, and we are ;in Christ’ apart from any choice of our own. Sometimes we are in danger of exalting our “choice” over and above the God who gave us the grace to make the choice. (Calvinism and Arminianism do not need to be mutually exclusive.)
This scripture demonstrates the balance between the sovereign choice of God and the belief that we exercise.
"But we are bound to give thanks always to God for you, brethren beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth"
2 Thessalonians 2:13
“There are three things here which deserve special attention. First, the fact that we are expressly told that God's elect are "chosen to salvation": Language could not be more explicit. How summarily do these words dispose of the sophistries and equivocations of all who would make election refer to nothing but external privileges or rank in service! It is to "salvation" itself that God has chosen us. Second, we are warned here that election unto salvation does not disregard the use of appropriate means: salvation is reached through "sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth" It is not true that because God has chosen a certain one to salvation that he will be saved willy-nilly, whether he believes or not: nowhere do the Scriptures so represent it. The same God who "chose unto salvation", decreed that His purpose should be realized through the work of the spirit and belief of the truth. Third, that God has chosen us unto salvation is a profound cause for fervent praise. Note how strongly the apostle express this - "we are bound to give thanks always to God for you. brethren beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation", etc. Instead of shrinking back in horror from the doctrine of predestination, the believer, when he sees this blessed truth as it is unfolded in the Word, discovers a ground for gratitude and thanksgiving such as nothing else affords, save the unspeakable gift of the Redeemer Himself.” AW Pink
1 Corin. 1:28 “and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are,”
These truths are not “apparent” just from looking at life, in fact they are hidden and must be revealed.
So God chose us and gives us the grace to be “in Christ.”
Stumbling block - Scandalon
This from a guy named Steve Dewitt.
For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles… (Verses 21-23, emphasis added)
Salvation by faith in a crucified Savior is counterintuitive to us
The gospel is a stumbling block when you are blind. The Greek word for “stumbling block” is scandalon defined as that which gives offense or causes revulsion, that which arouses opposition, an object of anger or disapproval. (BAG)
We get the word scandalous from it. The cross is offensive to human way of thinking and it rubs the natural man the wrong way because it requires us to do the exact opposite of what man and his pride thinks he needs to do.
Let me illustrate this with a Chinese finger trap. You put one finger in each end and when you try to pull them out again, you’re stuck. You can’t get out. Do you know how to get out of a Chinese finger trap? You push your finger in so that you can pull your finger out. The way out is the way in. That’s counterintuitive. Here are some reasons that believing in Jesus is counterintuitive…
Contrary to human religion (Verse 22)
Every religion man comes up with has something to do with man making his way to God. Paul points out in verse 22 that the Jews demanded a sign. They wanted to see something that out of their wisdom they could judge as true. You may recall the Jews asking Jesus repeatedly for a sign or a miracle. They wanted to make their own judgment and all the religions of the world do the same. They magnify in some way man’s ability to do or think or earn his way to God or Allah or Nirvana or Jehovah or whatever. Man’s kind of religion always ends up worshipping man in some way. Christ crucified rubs man the wrong way.
Contrary to human thinking (Verse 22)
Paul says in verse 22 that the Greeks seek wisdom. They want to rationalize their way to God. In the end, who gets the glory if man’s wisdom leads him to God? Man does. Who gets the glory if human eloquence and human words lead man to God? Man does. To the Greeks in the Roman Empire, if someone was crucified he was the worst of criminals. A crucified Savior? How could God save mankind by something so ugly and weak and despised as a Roman cross? That doesn’t jive with our way of thinking. The Jews want power and in the cross they get weakness. The Greeks want wisdom, but in the cross they get apparent folly. 5
Contrary to human pride and self-sufficiency
This is the big one. The human heart does not want to do what the gospel requires – humble itself. All the major objections to Christianity in some way stem from this
fundamental flaw within us. List key doctrines and the objections will come; the atonement is too bloody and predestination seems unfair and God saving some and not everyone is too exclusive and eternal punishment in hell isn’t right and a loving God wouldn’t do it this way. The gospel rubs the modern man or woman the wrong way and since we are the judge of the way it ought to be, we simply call it ridiculous. There is a movie out right now that says exactly that. Religulous! Religion is ridiculous to Bill Maher for all the same reasons Paul explains here. It strikes our sensibilities the wrong way because it elevates God and humbles us and we don’t like that. The gospel is a scandal. It always has been. It always will be. We have to admit that….
God is wiser than us (Verse 25)
For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. The key to understanding this passage is adding the word “apparent.” God’s apparent foolishness in the cross is actually the eternal wisdom of God. Man’s apparent wisdom is actually foolishness. So things are not as they appear. Take all the talking points of all the philosophers and talk show hosts and writers and columnists and politicians and statesmen and professors and teachers. Take all the things they’ve ever said and pile them up. The smallest thought that God has ever had eclipses all the wisdom man has ever accumulated. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. (Isaiah 55:8-9)
God’s Word is like the traveler to the Country of the Blind and the secret to the Chinese finger trap. It is telling us what is wise and what is folly. It is also calling us to wonder and worship. Do you realize that were it not for God’s gracious calling in our lives, we would still be blind and solidly in the category of “those who are perishing” in verse 18? The right response of a recipient of grace is not pride but wonder and worship. There is nothing here for anyone to take pride in. The Corinthian Christians were finding their identity in eloquent speakers and teachers in the church. What? Who died for us? Who called us? God did. Let’s
praise Him!
Lastly this from Paul Washer. When you are teaching your children to take their first steps they must come to a place where they let go of the chair or table or whatever they are holding onto and they walk without holding onto anything. You don’t get them there by saying “Let go of the table.” You get them to walk by saying, “Come to Daddy.” and so it is with God and us. The focus is not on what we need to let go of, but on the great and beautiful God we are being called toward.
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