1. Our bad things will turn out for good. (Romans 8:28)
2. Our good things can never be taken away from us. (Psalm 4:6-7)
3. The best things are yet to come. (1 Corinthians 2:9)
(Tim Keller paraphrasing the sermon outline of Jonathan Edward’s sermon “Christian Happiness”)
Author and Pastor Sam Storms makes the following points about the grace of God:
1. Grace ceases to be grace if God is compelled to bestow it in the presence of human merit.
2. Grace ceases to be grace if God is compelled to withdraw it in the presence of human demerit.
3. Grace is treating a person without the slightest reference to desert whatsoever, but solely according to the infinite goodness and sovereign purpose of God.
Is this how you view and understand grace????
Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance (Romans 5:1-3)
By faith alone- can we have peace with God!
By faith alone- can we have access to grace!
By faith alone- can we stand before God!
By faith alone- can we rejoice!
By faith alone- can we have hope!
By faith alone- can we be hopeful about Gods glory!
By faith alone can- we glory in tribulations!
“….When Jesus Christ picked up our sins, he became a curse for us, and when he became a curse for us, he was accursed by God. God was not forsaking his Son as much as he was forsaking the sin the Son was carrying.
If you want to know what God really thinks about sin and what he intends to do about it, look at Jesus rejected on the cross and listen to Jesus forsaken on the cross. That is what sin deserves: the wrath and curse of God. That is what sinners deserve: to be put to death and damned for their sins. That strikes fear into the hearts of those who are sinners. At least it ought to. If God was willing to forsake his own Son for the sins of others, should he not also forsake you for your sins?
The forsaking of the Son of God on the cross is a fearful thing, but it is good news for sinners who repent……because it means that God’s children will never have to be forsaken. Jesus was God-forsaken so that you might not be forsaken.”
Philip Graham Ryken
‘Jesus, Keep Me Near the Cross’ pages 87,88
I just checked my email and was delighted to see that Christianaudio.com is offering not just one but TWO great audio books for free this month. The Cost of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Fifty Reasons Why Jesus Came to Die by John Piper. Piper’s book is one of my favorite books, and is fantastic for pondering the Cross from many different perspectives. My written copy is marked and remarked from repeated readings. I highly recommend it!
You can find the books here.
“Nothing is more central to the bible than Jesus’ death and resurrection. The entire Bible pivots on one weekend in Jerusalem about two thousand years ago. Attempts to make sense of the Bible that do not give prolonged thought to integrating the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus are doomed to failure, at best exercises in irrelevance.”
-D.A. Carson
Preface to the book ‘Scandalous’
We as Christians should naturally believe this- but does this actually play out in the way that we read and study, evangelize and pray? Does it play out in the way that we live our daily lives? Are the Cross and Resurrection central in our lives? It might be good to take a minute and ponder this profound thought……
Hear the ironies of the cross:
1) The man who is mocked as king- is king.
2) The man who is utterly powerless- is powerful.
3) The man who can’t save himself- saves others.
4) The man who cries out in despair- trusts God.
-D.A. Carson
‘Scandalous’ page 36
(from Matthew 27:27-51)
O Lord Jesus Christ, most gracious Savior, with grateful joy we come to You. We know Your boundless love. We believe that You delight over us—to bless us and to do us good. We look to Your cross, and we see how You have loved us. You have given Yourself that we should never die. Surely with Yourself You will add all needful blessings. You have left us a precious legacy of promise; surely you will open heaven wide—to pour down fulfillment.
Henry Law, “Family Prayers”
If you’re wondering if we’re having church at Redeemed today- the answer is yes! I don’t know how many people will be there, but I know that I’ll be there. So if you want to hear the Word today- come on down!
Pastor Chris
“We are sinners, and we know ourselves to be sinners lost and helpless in ourselves, but we are saved sinners, and it is our salvation which gives tone to our life—-a tone of joy which swells in exact proportion to the sense we have of our ill-desert. For it is he to whom much is forgiven who loves much and, who loving much, rejoices much.”
B.B. Warfield
Al Mohler writes about the trend in our culture of men and women putting of marriage until they are older- and a couple that bucks the system. An interesting and thought-provoking article is here.
And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose. (Romans 8.28)
“All things work together for good.” This must be so for three reasons. First, because all things are under the absolute control of the Governor of the universe. Second, because God desires our good, and nothing but our good. Third, because even Satan himself cannot touch a hair of our heads without God’s permission, and then only for our further good. Not all things are good in themselves, nor in their tendencies; but God makes all things work for our good. Nothing enters our life by blind chance: nor are they any accidents. Everything is being moved by God, with this end in view, our good. Everything being subservient to God’s eternal purpose, works blessing to those marked out for conformity to the image of the Firstborn. All suffering, sorrow, loss, are used by our Father to minister to the benefit of the His elect.
A.W. Pink
‘Comfort for Christians’
Do you ever wonder why there is so much talk about the Cross? There is a good post about that over at the Gospel Coalition.
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And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose. (Romans 8.28)
“All things work together.” The first thought occurring to us is this: What a glorious Being our God be, who is able to make all things so work! What a frightful amount of evil there is in constant activity. What an almost infinite number of creatures there are in the world. What an incalculable quantity of opposing self-interests at work. What a vast army of rebels fighting against God. What hosts of super-human creatures over opposing the Lord. And yet, high above all, is GOD, in undisturbed calm, complete master of the situation. There, from the throne of His exalted majesty, He worketh all things after the counsel of His own will (Eph. 1:11). Stand in awe, then, before this One in whose sight “all nations are as nothing; and they are counted as less than nothing, and vanity ” (Isa. 40:17). Bow in adoration before this “high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity” (Isa. 57:15). Lift high your praise unto Him who from the direct evil can educe the greatest good.
AW Pink
‘Comfort for Christians’
A good reminder that Christianity is first and primarily about Jesus Christ…..
But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness, 6. just as David also describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputes righteousness apart from works: 7. “Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered;8. blessed is the man to whom the Lord shall not impute sin.” (Romans 4.5-8)
In Romans 3:21 and following, on into chapter 4 the Apostle Paul is contrasting faith and works. He is saying over and over that salvation comes by believing in what God has done, not by our doing. And then he makes this point in Romans 4:5-8 that is crucial to understand salvation.
In order for someone to be acceptable to God, they must be two things. They must be perfectly sinless and perfectly righteous. I hope we can see the problem immediately. God’s standards are impossible for any of us to meet. Who among us is perfectly sinless and perfectly righteous? Or who among us could, by working, ever make themself perfectly sinless or perfectly righteous? If you are sinful, (which we all are- see Romans 3) no amount of working or doing can make you ‘unsinful’. If you are unrighteous, no amount of working or doing can make you perfectly righteous.
But in Romans 4 Paul is saying that by believing in Jesus Christ’s work on our behalf, God will put Jesus’ perfect righteousness to our account, and God will put our sinfulness to Jesus’ account. So the perfect righteousness we need becomes ours through imputation, and the perfect sinlessness we need becomes ours through imputation as well!
So, as we consider these truths hopefully it becomes more evident to us that salvation is, and must be something that can only come about through believing. We must come to know that we are sinners who need a Savior, a Savior who made all provision for us to be accepted with the Father, accepted into His eternal presence. We must come to believe the Gospel!
17. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. 18. Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation, 19. that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation. 20. Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God. 21. For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. (2 Corinthians 5.17-21)
A couple of days ago I talked about the fact that God doesn’t owe us anything due to our obedience. Here is a quote relating to that issue.
“Divine blessing flows from God’s mercy rather than from our merit. Thus, we cannot guarantee that his care will flow according to our plans simply because we conform in some degree to biblical standards. Our works do not obligate God to care for us in the way that we think is best. We cannot put God on a leash through our goodness, nor obligate him to our wishes by our deeds. God blesses according to the wisdom of his eternal mercy rather than in proportion to our works of earned merit.”
-Bryan Chapell
‘Holiness by Grace’ page 25
All of us as Christians go through difficulties that tempt us to think God doesn’t love us, or is really mad at us. But we need to remember what the bible teaches us- that all of God’s chastening for the Christian is done in love in order to change us and make us holy. God’s anger and wrath toward our sin was taken out on Jesus Christ 2,00o years ago and can never be revisited. Here is a devotional portion that speaks to that truth:
“As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten.” —Revelation 3:19
Sorrowing Believer! what could you wish more than this? Your furnace is severe; but look at this assurance of Him who lit it. Love is the fuel that feeds its flames! Its every spark is love! Kindled by a Father’s hand, and designed as a special pledge of a Father’s love. How many of His dear children has He so rebuked and chastened; and all, all for one reason, “I love them!” The myriads in glory have passed through these furnace-fires—there they were chosen—there they were purified, sanctified, and made “vessels fit for the Master’s use;” the dross and the alloy purged, that the pure metal might remain.
And are you to claim exemption from the same discipline? Are you to think it strange concerning these same fiery trials that may be purifying you? Rather exult in them as your adoption-privilege. Envy not those who are strangers to the refining flames—who are “without chastisement.” You should surely rather have the severest discipline with a Father’s love, than the fullest earthly cup without that Father’s smile. Oh! for grace to say, when the furnace is hottest, and the rod sorest, “Even so, Father!” And what, after all, is the severest of your chastisements in comparison with what your sins have deserved? Do you murmur under a Father’s correcting love? What would it have been to have stood the wrath of an unpropitiated Judge, and that, too, forever? Surely, in the light of eternity, the heaviest pang of earth is indeed “a light affliction!”
-John Mc Duff
The Faithful Promiser (1849)
