Category: Discipleship Foundations

10: The Hope of the Resurrection

And even we Christians, although we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, also groan to be released from pain and suffering. We, too, wait anxiously for that day when God will give us our full rights as his children, including the new bodies he has promised us. 24 Now that we are saved, we eagerly look forward to this freedom. For if you already have something, you don't need to hope for it. 25 But if we look forward to something we don't have yet, we must wait patiently and confidently. Romans 8:23-25 (NLT)

Sometimes when we are attempting to share the gospel with someone, we might ask them if they are saved. A typical response might be, “I hope so!” At that point we have a perfect lead in to tell them about the meaning of biblical hope.

Instead of hope being something we wish for, but is unlikely to happen, biblical hope is a confident expectation that God’s promises will be fulfilled.

Biblical hope enables us to patiently wait for the promise, no matter how long it may take for it to come to pass. Some have described hope as “stretched out” faith. Faith is the basis or ground of hope. Like faith, hope originates in God, who is our source. Paul wrote:

I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit. Romans 15:13 (NLT)

 We expectantly wait (hope) for what we believe (know) to be true.

Faith immediately receives the answer to prayer, knowing that God has already “done” what He promised, even though we do not yet see it. Hope hangs on to that promise for as long as it may take until we see and experience the actual fulfillment.

The resurrection is our hope. We know it’s coming, but we don’t know how long it will be before it arrives.

The future salvation of the body is called glorification, and this is what will happen when believers rise from the dead. We will be instantly transformed into Christ’s image, and our resurrection bodies will radiate His glory.

But we are citizens of heaven, where the Lord Jesus Christ lives. And we are eagerly waiting for him to return as our Savior. 21 He will take these weak mortal bodies of ours and change them into glorious bodies like his own, using the same mighty power that he will use to conquer everything, everywhere. Philippians 3:20-21 (NLT)

The resurrection is the final installment of God’s great salvation.

The first installment is the new birth, whereby we are given a right standing with God, liberation from all that would enslave us, forgiveness of sins, life eternal, the indwelling Holy Spirit, reconciliation to the Father, and the privileges and rights of sonship. The second installment is called sanctification or transformation, which is the day-by-day walking out in our souls of what was given to us through the new birth. This requires our participation in daily grace, faith, and obedience. This is the process of working out our salvation and becoming more and more like Jesus in our thoughts, motives, and behavior. This process will continue until the day of our death. At that point, we will be ready to receive the last installment, the resurrection of the body. The first installment is a past grace. It was accomplished at Calvary. The second installment is a present or daily grace. The last installment, the resurrection, is in the future. Though it will certainly come, we cannot have it now and must patiently wait for it. When the resurrection becomes our experienced reality, salvation will be complete.

But let me tell you a wonderful secret God has revealed to us. Not all of us will die, but we will all be transformed. 52 It will happen in a moment, in the blinking of an eye, when the last trumpet is blown. For when the trumpet sounds, the Christians who have died will be raised with transformed bodies. And then we who are living will be transformed so that we will never die. 53 For our perishable earthly bodies must be transformed into heavenly bodies that will never die. 54 When this happens—when our perishable earthly bodies have been transformed into heavenly bodies that will never die—then at last the Scriptures will come true: "Death is swallowed up in victory. 55 O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?" 1 Corinthians 15:51-55 (NLT)

The transformation of our souls will be instantly completed when our bodies are transformed, too. Jesus wants us to live today in the tension between looking back to what He has already completed through His death and resurrection and what will be ours in the resurrection. In other words, we must learn to live in past grace, present grace, and future grace.

We must learn to reckon as true what is already done and confidently wait for what yet remains to be done.

This will give us the faith and strength to walk with God today, day after day after day.

What do we hope for? Jesus wants us to live our lives in the hope of receiving a reward at the resurrection. This means we should invest in God’s kingdom by making sacrifices now so that we can have a more glorious resurrection later.

It was by faith that Moses, when he grew up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter. 25  He chose to share the oppression of God’s people instead of enjoying the fleeting pleasures of sin. 26  He thought it was better to suffer for the sake of Christ than to own the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking ahead to his great reward. Hebrews 11:24-26 (NLT)

Having a future hope in the resurrection gives us a reason to live today.

Dear friends, we are already God’s children, but he has not yet shown us what we will be like when Christ appears. But we do know that we will be like him, for we will see him as he really is. 3  And all who have this eager expectation will keep themselves pure, just as he is pure. 1 John 3:2-3 (NLT)

Hope in the resurrection is one of our most powerful motivations toward godly living. We should ask God to give us transforming hope.

I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit. Romans 15:13 (NLT)
 
Questions for Further Study and Discussion
  • In your own words, give a working definition of hope.
  • Explain why it is important for our life in the present to both look back to what Christ has already accomplished for us through His death and resurrection and to look forward to what will be given to us in the resurrection.
  • What practical difference will it make for me today, if I live in the hope of the resurrection?

Click here to see the other articles in this series.

Share this post...

9: More about Repentance

The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance. 2 Peter 3:9 (NASB)

Repentance is integral to the entire process of our salvation. Without it, there is no salvation. Prior to repentance our condition is one of denying our need or willingness to submit to God’s rule. After repentance we recognize the greatness and glory of our Creator–Redeemer–Sustainer and our utter dependence upon him, and we willingly serve him out of love and appreciation for who he is and what he has done.

The “deeper” our repentance from independence and rebellion against God, the greater will be our enjoyment of his benevolent rule and the more effective we will be as his servants.

The basic meaning of repentance is “to change the mind”. How does this happen and what does it look like? Everyone is born with a mind that is clouded or deformed by sin. By default, we are prone to distrust the truth and believe lies. Thanks to the presence of evil in the world, deception is ubiquitous and relentless. Over the course of a lifetime, without continual repentance, all sorts of wrong thinking can begin to accumulate. Sometimes seemingly impregnable fortresses of deception are erected in our lives as a result of painful experiences and wrong interpretations or reactions to those experiences. The net result is a mind that resists God and rejects truth. Paul describes it in Romans as a deliberate suppression of truth.

But God shows his anger from heaven against all sinful, wicked people who push the truth away from themselves. Romans 1:18 (NLT)

This is every person’s condition before God gives us the desire and ability to repent.

Those who oppose him he must gently instruct, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, 2 Timothy 2:25 (NIV)

It is important to realize that, before the Holy Spirit begins to work inside us, we are quite incapable of understanding how far from God and His truth we are.

Self-deception is deadly because the person who is gripped by it has no idea of his or her condition or peril.

Using God’s Word as the catalyst, the Holy Spirit does an inner work of revelation and conviction. He brings us to the point where we begin to see that we are guilty of wrong thinking and sin, and that we need a Savior.

And when he comes, he will convince the world of its sin, and of God's righteousness, and of the coming judgment. John 16:8 (NLT)

When this happens, God asks us to humble ourselves before Him and sometimes other people, admit we are wrong, ask for his help, and surrender to his lordship.

Repentance, then, is the process whereby we transition from sinful defiance of God and His ways to humble reliance and obedience. It opens the way for us to receive God’s blessings and forgiveness.

The process includes aligning with how God thinks. Confession of sin means we agree with what God says about our sin and rebellion. 

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 1 John 1:9 (NASB)

To confess in Greek means “to speak the same things as” God.

True repentance always agrees that God is right instead of justifying our own actions.

King David did this in Psalm 51.

Against you, and you alone, have I sinned; I have done what is evil in your sight. You will be proved right in what you say, and your judgment against me is just. Psalms 51:4 (NLT)

Ultimately repentance will result in a change of behavior, which is the fruit of repentance.

Therefore bear fruits in keeping with repentance, and do not begin to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham for our father,' for I say to you that from these stones God is able to raise up children to Abraham. Luke 3:8 (NASB)

You can tell when we are truly repentant because we will no longer argue in an attempt to defend our innocence or justify our actions. Instead, we will humbly admit to our wrongdoing, along with having a heartfelt sorrow for our sin and a desire to make things right. Here is how Paul describes it in his second letter to the church at Corinth.

For God can use sorrow in our lives to help us turn away from sin and seek salvation. We will never regret that kind of sorrow. But sorrow without repentance is the kind that results in death. 11 Just see what this godly sorrow produced in you! Such earnestness, such concern to clear yourselves, such indignation, such alarm, such longing to see me, such zeal, and such a readiness to punish the wrongdoer. You showed that you have done everything you could to make things right. 2 Corinthians 7:10-11 (NLT)

In summary, repentance is an inner work of the Holy Spirit that begins with a change of thinking and will ultimately result in a change of behavior. Repentance opens the door to faith and the blessings of God. It is something we must do for all our lives. No one ever outgrows our need for it.

Questions for Further Study and Discussion

  • Why does our thinking have to change before our behavior does?
  • Why it is important for us to agree with God regarding our sin.
  • What would you say to someone who says that he has repented of a specific sin but who still struggles in that area?
  • Why are godly emotions usually a part of true repentance?
  • Would you characterize repentance as more of a gift from God or a choice that we make?

Click here to see the other articles in this series.

Share this post...

8: The Renewing of the Mind

Don't copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will know what God wants you to do, and you will know how good and pleasing and perfect his will really is. Romans 12:2 (NLT)

The first component of Jesus’ message concerning the Kingdom of God was repentance. He echoed John the Baptist when he proclaimed, “Repent!” The basic meaning of the Greek word for repentance, metanoeo, is “to change the mind”. We are born into this world with a predisposition to believe lies. It’s called the “old man” or sin nature. Have you ever wondered why gossip is so universally appealing? We love the “dirt” about folks, and it doesn’t usually matter whether it’s true or not. Why do people so easily believe negative news but find it difficult to believe the truth? It’s because we’re sinners whose minds need renewing.

Satan is a liar, and his kingdom operates on fear, intimidation, and lies. He lied to Adam and Eve about God, and his most destructive work today is to convince people that God is not to be trusted. He plants deception and misinformation wherever he can, because knowing the Truth (Jesus) will set us free. Knowing and believing the truth of God’s Word will keep us free.

All of us are in bondage to one degree or another, which is always connected to our believing lies. The way out of slavery is to displace lies with God’s truth and begin to act upon it.

Jesus put it like this.

...If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; 32 and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free." John 8:31-32 (NASB)

The salvation of the soul is the process over time whereby God displaces wrong thinking and actions with correct thinking and living. This is a lifetime process that requires fresh help from God (grace) each day. Ideas have consequences. What we believe will affect every part of our lives.

Right thinking, the result of repentance, is the key to right living.

The Word of God affects every area of our lives, if we are open and willing to obey. If we see that God’s Word conflicts with something we believe or are doing, we should ask God to help us change.

Repentance is a gift (2 Timothy 2:25 and Acts 5:31), not something we can do on our own.

The Holy Spirit comes alongside us to work repentance or right thinking into our lives. We participate in repentance by responding to the conviction and leading of the Spirit in the pursuit of embracing God’s truth and turning away from evil. The turning away from evil is the fruit or evidence of our change in thinking.

Embracing truth is always the first step in transformation.

Sometimes we will discover areas in our lives that seem impregnable to God’s Word. The Bible calls these “strongholds”.

Biblical strongholds are fortresses of falsehood reinforced by fears and hurts that resist God’s truth. They are usually built on logical arguments that we have constructed, perhaps without realizing it, which interfere with our ability to believe and receive the truth.

For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. 4 The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. 5 We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. 2 Corinthians 10:3-5 (NIV)

We can often tell where we have a stronghold against the truth by observing when we use the word “but” as our defense against believing and receiving God’s truth. Here is an example: “I know the Bible says God is a loving Father, but that has not been my experience.” Or “I know we are supposed to forgive, but… (fill in the blank).” In cases like these, everything that comes after the “but” is a lie that must be cast down.

Perhaps our own father was such a bad example of what a father should be that we have transferred our experience with him to God, and we cannot believe in our hearts that God really loves us. This is a common stronghold that must be destroyed with God’s help, if we are going to experience true victory and freedom in our daily lives.

Remember: it’s not necessarily what we believe theologically that will set us free, but what we believe in our hearts. How we act under pressure reveals what is truly in our hearts.

Whenever we act contrary to what we thought we believed or with a reaction that is disproportionate to the stimulus, we should suspect the presence of a stronghold.

Some strongholds run so deep that we must get help from others to recognize and overcome them, but it is always worth the effort. Most of the time God breaks these things down as we seriously study God’s Word, listen to good teaching, pray, and interact with other believers who will speak the truth in love to us.

Unless we take seriously the requirement to study and become familiar with God’s Word as revealed in the Bible, we have little hope of renewing our minds and living in freedom.

Many Christians are lazy in this regard and therefore fail to qualify as real disciples.

Christians are born (again), but disciples are made by the Holy Spirit over a lifetime of disciplined study and committed obedience.

Which are we going to be? Regardless of what our past has been like, we can make the choice to act as a disciple from now on. May God help us all make the right choices.

Questions for Further Study and Discussion

  • Is the basic meaning of repentance different from what you thought?
  • How is the mind renewed?
  • What is a stronghold and how are they demolished?

Click here to see the other articles in this series.

Share this post...

7: Once for All

For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit; 1 Peter 3:18 (NASB)

How important is the phrase “once for all”? I believe it would be safe to say that everything pertaining to our salvation hinges upon it.

Does that surprise you? If it does, you have not properly understood the nature of the work which Christ accomplished through His death and resurrection.

In a very real sense, the sin in the garden was a “once for all” sin. Adam’s and Eve’s failure to obey God was a one-time event that negatively impacted all of us. What some call the “original sin” resulted in the transmission of a fallen “sin nature” to every human being who would ever be born the natural way. (Jesus is excluded from this list by reason of the virgin birth.) It set in motion a horrendous sequence of events that is still whirling seemingly out of control today. (However, God is still sovereign over his creation.) The evil we see around us, that sometimes seems to strike the most “innocent” at random, is nothing more or less than the result of that original sin reinforced by the additional sins that each of us have added to the mix and which has been augmented by the malevolent interference of the Devil. Since salvation is God’s means of overcoming the power and effects of sin, it stands to reason that what God would eventually do to rescue mankind would also be a “once for all” event.

God is “Other”. By that I mean that He is very different from you and me, even though we are created in His image. Time is part of his creation,  but he is not bound by it as we now are in many ways. He sees the end from the beginning and “calls those things which be not as though they were”. (Romans 4:17) He exists outside of time but interjects himself into our historical timeline. God merges the eternal with the temporal in a way that confounds our minds. The following verse is an example of this.

And all the people who belong to this world worshiped the beast. They are the ones whose names were not written in the Book of Life, which belongs to the Lamb who was killed before the world was made. Revelation 13:8 (NLT)

If you are a believer, not only did God choose you before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 1:4), but His Son was put to death before history ever began as well.

There is an eternal reality to things before they ever show up in what we call “history”. History is the playing out of God’s wonderful plan.

That which is eternal is what is truly important. It might be said that what we do here in the present (the working out of history) is the outworking of the eternal. What happens on our timeline is also part of determining our eternity. God is sovereign and we are responsible agents. Please do not make the mistake of insisting that both of these things cannot be simultaneously true. In God they are. That which from God’s perspective was accomplished before the foundation of the earth had to take place at a given point in history as well. In the “fullness of time” (God’s appointed time), Jesus was born, lived, was crucified, and rose again.

When Jesus hung upon the cross, some eternal things were taking place that we must acknowledge and believe if we are to fully appreciate and benefit from what God did. Romans says that when Jesus died, we died. When He rose, we rose. We were placed “in Christ” so that what He experienced and accomplished is now ours. We were and are identified with Christ.

Identification is one of the most important salvation concepts in the Bible.

We were not given salvation as much as we were given a Savior. We did not receive grace so much as the Gracious One now lives inside us. We have not so much been given life as we are filled with the One who identified himself as the Way, the Truth, and the Life (John 14:6).

All the blessings of God are in a Person, and His name is Jesus. We experience all this via the indwelling Holy Spirit, God’s most amazing gift.

When Jesus died on that cross, for the believer He took care of every sin that had ever been committed or would ever be committed. Does this sound too good to be true? Think about it: when the crucifixion took place, the sins of every person who would ever live and come to believe the gospel were still in the future. How could those sins be included in what Jesus did on the cross? God, in His eternal wisdom, placed every future sin of His people on His Son. Jesus carried that heavy burden to His death. He substituted for us by taking our punishment for us. Substitution is another big concept.

Jesus was our Substitute by paying the price for our sin, but we are identified with Him in that we too died. God accomplished two things on the cross. Jesus died for us, and we died with Him.

His death for us released us from guilt and condemnation. (Romans 8:1) Our death with him released us from the power of sin and the Law. (Romans 7:4) When He rose again, we rose with Him, which empowered us to live a new life in the Spirit.

Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. 2  Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. 3  For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. 4  When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. Colossians 3:1-4 (NIV)

But let’s get back to our main topic for today, the once for all nature of what Jesus did. The Greek language has more verb forms than English. The past tense can be expressed as the imperfect, which is used for repeated past actions, and the aorist, which is used to communicate a one-time occurrence. An example of this would be: “Johnny practiced (imperfect) his driving skills every day with his instructor. Eventually he got (aorist) his license.” What Jesus accomplished on the cross is always expressed in the aorist tense. It was done only once, never to be reenacted. (This is one reason why the Catholic doctrine of the reenactment of Christ’s death in the Mass is so unbiblical.) Here is how the author of Hebrews put it.

Nor did he enter heaven to offer himself again and again, like the earthly high priest who enters the Most Holy Place year after year to offer the blood of an animal. 26 If that had been necessary, he would have had to die again and again, ever since the world began. But no! He came once for all time, at the end of the age, to remove the power of sin forever by his sacrificial death for us. Hebrews 9:25-26 (NLT)

In other words, what Jesus did was permanent and eternal. When we confess our sins and ask forgiveness from God, we tap into that once for all past work of grace on the cross. I hope you can see the significance of this important truth.

Since His death was “once for all” and it took care of the power of sin “forever”, then our salvation is also “once for all”.

Once for all time he took blood into that Most Holy Place, but not the blood of goats and calves. He took his own blood, and with it he secured our salvation forever. Hebrews 9:12 (NLT)

God permanently transferred us out of the kingdom of darkness into his kingdom of light and life. (Colossians 1:13-14) He caused us to pass from death to life with the result being we will never come under condemnation again.

“I tell you the truth, those who listen to my message and believe in God who sent me have eternal life. They will never be condemned for their sins, but they have already passed from death into life. John 5:24 (NLT)

Christ removed us from the treadmill of needing to “earn” our salvation or maintain a right standing with God through our performance and placed us “in Christ,” where the work is finished.

The New Covenant was inaugurated with the death of the substitute “covenant breaker,” our Lord Jesus, who upfront paid the penalty for our failures. He actually “became” our sins, and, when he rose again, we became the righteousness of God in him.

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

When he rose again, all forgiven former covenant breakers entered a right relationship with God, passed from death to life and from darkness to light. We participated in his death through identification and in his resurrection, too. It is impossible for us to go back into death and unbecome a born-again child of God.

Christ’s death and resurrection were “once for all” and so is the resultant new birth and justification.

We are now “one spirit” with God. (1 Corinthians 6:17) He lives his life in and through us. (Galatians 2:20) Now God is working in us both to “will and to do” his good pleasure as we cooperate with his grace. (Philippians 2:12-13) This ought to make us shout for joy!

Questions for Further Study and Discussion

  • Why is it important that we understand that Christ’s sacrifice for sins was “once for all”?
  • Why does the Bible tell us to confess our sins, if the provision for them was in the past?
  • In your own words, explain the difference between identification and substitution.

Click here to see the other articles in this series.

Share this post...

6: Born of the Spirit

Jesus answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. 6 "That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. John 3:5-6 (NASB)

The spirit of man is the part of us that died when Adam and Eve first sinned. God warned Adam that “from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.” Genesis 2:17 (NASB) God does not lie. They died on the inside that day; even though death did not claim their bodies and souls for many years. God’s great salvation through Christ reverses the death process. When a person places his or her faith and allegiance in Christ and His finished work on the cross and the resurrection, a new birth takes place in the spirit. God makes us new creatures inside, but the full manifestation of that miracle will not be seen until the resurrection.

Just as the death process began in the spirit and later manifested in the soul and body, our new life in Christ begins in the spirit and eventually transforms us in the soul and body.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! 2 Corinthians 5:17 (NIV)

When Adam and Eve died on the inside following their sin, it showed up in their souls (mind, will, and emotions) almost immediately. They experienced guilt and condemnation for the first time. When we are born again in the spirit, something begins to change in our souls, too.

The first thing God takes care of for us is the guilt and condemnation problem.

The Bible says that anyone who is justified by faith has peace with God. Peace is the polar opposite of guilt and condemnation.

Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, Romans 5:1 (NASB)

This peace comes from being in a right relationship with God, which is accomplished by the removal of all guilt and condemnation. Our sins are forgiven, and condemnation is removed. In other words, we are declared “not guilty!” This happens in the spirit, even if we are not fully aware of it or believe it.

Our growth as disciples happens in a large part because we become educated in what the Scriptures reveal about the person and work of Christ in our lives and begin to believe it.

Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect. Romans 12:2 (NLT)

If a murderer, while waiting on death row, were to receive a visit from the family of the one he murdered and received forgiveness from them, he would still be under the sentence of death at the hands of God’s earthly minister of justice, the government. His sin would have been forgiven, but his guilt would remain. Jesus did an amazing thing for us. God’s justice and wrath were both satisfied when He bore our sin on the cross. God’s wrath was appeased, resulting in forgiveness. This is called “propitiation”. God’s justice was also satisfied, resulting in our justification.

To be justified means to be declared “Not Guilty”! Our names were cleared of all crimes under which we stood convicted and sentenced to die.

That is why Jesus boldly proclaimed:

I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life. John 5:24 (NIV)

Paul’s words in Romans completely agree.

Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, Romans 8:1 (NIV)  [* See note at end of chapter.]

The purpose of the Law is to condemn us for our sins and drive us into the arms of our Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ.

Before this faith came, we were held prisoners by the law, locked up until faith should be revealed. 24  So the law was put in charge to lead us to Christ that we might be justified by faith. 25  Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law. Galatians 3:23-25 (NIV)

When we come to Christ and receive justification, the condemnation produced by the Law is removed.

Because we have received Christ’s own righteousness, there is nothing left for the Law to condemn.

This is the reason why we can “walk” or live in the Spirit of grace rather than under a set of laws. Sin gains its power in our lives when we succumb to the accusations of the devil and condemnation for our failures pointed out by the Law. In 1Cor.15:56, Paul wrote that “the law gives sin its power,” meaning that God’s prohibitions stimulate the “flesh” to rebel, and, after we sin, it seeks to keep us focused on our failures and under a cloud of defeat. Instead, we are to focus on our Lord and the freedom we have in Christ, allowing the Spirit to work inside us to change our inmost desires into conformity with God’s will. And when we do sin, we are to admit it and repent, but not get mired down in condemnation. Sadly, many believers either do not understand this great truth or simply do not believe it.

It is important that we grasp that justification and the removal of condemnation were accomplished in the realm of the spirit. Our souls (hearts and minds) often feel quite condemned when we fail to live up to God’s righteous standards. Unless our souls are trained to believe what God’s Word says about justification, we will quite likely fall back into a works mentality and measure our worthiness and right standing before God in relation to our perceived success in living uprightly. This kind of Christianity is filled with frustration and condemnation and is not what God meant for us.

God wants to lift us out of legalism into a new realm of walking by the “law of the Spirit of life”.  (Romans 8:2) For this to happen, our minds must be renewed to think correctly. The end result with be that we live free of condemnation and the struggle of legalism while actually becoming more godly through the working of the Holy Spirit.

Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, 2 because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful man, 4 in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit. Romans 8:1-4 (NIV)

It is impossible to “walk” in the Spirit while under condemnation.

Condemnation makes us withdraw from God and others, just as happened with Adam and Eve in the garden. They hid from God after sinning and becoming aware of the guilt and failure. Many Christians today are hiding from God because they do not understand justification. Even when we fail miserably, we are encouraged to “draw near” to God to receive his forgiveness, affirmation, and help. It is when we are most obviously a “failure” that we need God the most. He will never reject us because Christ has totally satisfied the requirements of the Law on our behalf. Our relationship with God is sealed and secure. The more we draw near to God, the greater is the liberating and transformative work of the Spirit.

This Lord is the Spirit. Wherever the Lord's Spirit is, there is freedom. 18  As all of us reflect the Lord's glory with faces that are not covered with veils, we are being changed into his image with ever-increasing glory. This comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. 2 Corinthians 3:17-18 (GW)

The new birth is a hidden work of God in our inmost being, the spirit, but ultimately this salvation in seed form will grow and manifest itself in every area. It is like leaven that works its way into the whole batch of dough.

We must have confidence that what God begins in us, though seemingly small and hidden, will eventually conquer and result in our transformation into the image of Christ.

And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns. Philippians 1:6 (NLT)

This is what God has planned all along.

And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. 29 For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. 30 And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified. Romans 8:28-30 (NIV)

From this passage we see how the salvation that begins in the spirit will eventually result in a day-to-day transformation of our thinking and behavior (the salvation of the soul) and finally be manifested in the glorification of our bodies in the resurrection (the salvation of the body). The salvation of the Spirit can be termed a “past” salvation because it was accomplished once for all through Christ some 2000 years ago. The salvation of the soul is “present” because new grace is needed each day as we believe and apply what Christ has done for us. Paul calls this “working out our salvation” in Philippians 2:12. The salvation or glorification of our bodies is in the future. In the next meditation, we will look in more detail at the “once for all” nature of the salvation of the spirit.

* Note pertaining to Romans 8:1 - Later Greek manuscripts added the phrase "who live according to the Spirit", but this addition is not in the earliest manuscripts. We must remember that the Word of God AS ORIGINALLY WRITTEN is the infallible message from God. I suspect later editors who did not fully comprehend the grace of God could not abide such a wonderfully freeing message and felt compelled to add in the legalistic terms that once again seek to place the reader on a performance basis with God rather than allow him or her to fully enjoy the grace of God. John 5:24 has no such addition and further confirms that the earlier manuscripts were correct.

 

Questions for Further Study and Discussion

  • Why would a lesson entitled “Born of the Spirit” end up focusing on freedom from condemnation?
  • How would you explain the difference between forgiveness and justification?
  • Do you think that a person who feels condemned by God can live in the freedom God intends? Why?
  • If you were trying to help someone who feels condemned, what would you tell them?

Click here to see the other articles in this series.

Share this post...

5: Spirit, Soul, and Body

Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. 1 Thessalonians 5:23 (NASB)

A proper understanding of the relationship between spirit, soul, and body is a master key to help us unlock the mysteries of salvation.

According to Genesis, God created mankind in His own image.

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. Genesis 1:27 (ESV)

God is a Trinity – one God consisting of three distinct Persons – the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This is clearly revealed in the Bible, even though the word “trinity” is never used. We too are one person having three distinct parts – spirit, soul, and body. This too is revealed in scripture. Just as it is sometimes difficult to distinguish one Person in the Godhead from another, since they are all one God; likewise, the lines sometimes get blurred when we try to differentiate between our three parts. With God, one of the easiest ways to keep the Members of the Godhead separate in our understanding is to focus on what each Person does. Similarly, if we highlight how God’s great salvation affects each of our parts differently, it will become clearer to us that they are indeed distinct.

Using the language of building, God the Father is the architect of salvation. He planned it long ago before the creation of the world. Jesus is the contractor, so to speak: He came and put the plan into action, doing the difficult “hands on” work. The Holy Spirit is the marketing agent and administrator. He is “selling” the completed work to prospective customers. This is a very inadequate and somewhat inaccurate description of salvation, but it gives us an idea in plain language of the distinct roles of each person in the Godhead.

Father God planned salvation. Jesus accomplished it. The Holy Spirit applies it. The Father chose us. Jesus died for us. The Holy Spirit draws us.

Reconciliation to the Father is the goal of salvation. The cross and resurrection are the means of salvation. The Holy Spirit is the agent of salvation, applying to our lives everything the Father planned, and the Son accomplished.

Then the LORD God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being. Genesis 2:7 (NASB)

When God created Adam, he took dust and formed it into a body. Then He breathed His Spirit into that lifeless substance, and Genesis says that Adam became a living soul. As I understand it, a soul is the result of the combination of spirit and body. Spirit is breath or wind. We all know what a body is. The soul is harder to define, but many have settled on three main components – mind, will and emotions.

God’s salvation impacts each part of our being and is marvelously complete.

We will look at what God has done for each separate part in more detail in coming chapters, but, for now, an overview is helpful.

And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, 17  but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” Genesis 2:16-17 (ESV)

On the day Adam sinned, just as God promised, he died. His body did not die, nor did his soul. That leaves only one other part. His spirit, which had been alive to God in a special way, was cut off from its source of life, God, when Adam sinned. This was evidenced by his and Eve’s hiding from God in the garden and their sudden awareness of their own nakedness. Many think the first humans’ nakedness may have been previously covered by God’s glory, which was removed because of sin. Regardless, their consciousness had been defiled. They became all too aware of their own shame and sinfulness; whereas, before they had been gloriously innocent before God and able to fellowship with Him without fear, guilt, or shame.

The spirit was the first part of man to die and needed to be the first part restored.

The spirit is the most God-like part of a person. We know from Scripture that God is Spirit. (John 4:24) The spirit is the innermost core of a human being, the part of us that is intuitive and able to connect with God naturally. I started to write “supernaturally”, but God’s intention for the spirit of man is that it would always be able to connect with Him; therefore, it is its “natural” function.

When we are “saved” the first thing that happens is a rebirth of the spirit.

"That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. John 3:6 (NASB)

The spirit is restored to the perfect condition it had before sin. (Hebrews 12:23) The spirit within is given access to God’s presence once again. (Ephesians 2:18) Believers are hidden with Christ in God (Colossians 3:3), and this in the spirit, or should I say, Spirit. When we are born again, our spirit is joined to God’s Spirit (1Cor.6:17), and it is hard to distinguish them anymore.

The body is the last part of us that will be restored completely. This will happen at the resurrection.

Until then we live in a world that still suffers from the aftershocks of that first sin. God’s judgment upon our race still stands. Even born-again Christians still die physically. People get sick. Evil is all around us, and our bodies often suffer the most. As we wait for the glorious day when these mortal bodies will be transformed into glorious spiritual ones, we can experience God’s provision of healing and strength. Nevertheless, the glorification of our bodies is a future event for which we confidently wait. In the meantime, we live in imperfect bodies that are still subject to the fallout from sin.

As mentioned before, the soul is the combination of spirit and body. If you are tracking with me thus far, I imagine you see where I am going next. We have a problem here.

A saved person has a huge inner conflict. We have a perfect spirit combined with a body that is still subject to the fallout of sin.

(Paul calls it a “body of sin” – Romans 6:6 & 8:10.) What do you think will be the result when we combine the two? Paul describes our inner conflict in Galatians Chapter Five.

But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. 17  For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. 18  But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Galatians 5:16-18 (ESV)

The soul or mind is where the battle rages.

Our spirits always desire to do what is right, but our “flesh” or sin nature, which derives from the unredeemed body that is not yet glorified, never wants to do what is right. (* See note at end of chapter.)

So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. 22  For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23  but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24  Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25  Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin. Romans 7:21-25 (ESV)

The ”inner being” is the spirit, with which Paul’s mind agreed. However, the pull of the flesh, which comes from the unredeemed body, works against the desires of the spirit. This makes born again people somewhat spiritually “bipolar.”

We are pulled in opposite directions, and we must learn to lean on the Holy Spirit to overcome the pull of the flesh.

Jesus recognized our weak condition when he said:

"Keep watching and praying that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak." Matthew 26:41 (NASB)

What God did for our spirits was done once and for all on the cross. We can say it is a “past” salvation. What God will do for our bodies at the resurrection is in the future, but what God wishes to do in our souls is in the present.

Every day we need to access fresh grace for that day. Our victory in the daily battle for our souls hinges on our confidence in what God did in the past and what He will do in the future. You can also see what a glorious day it will be for every believer when we shall be given glorified bodies that will not be in conflict any longer with our perfected spirits. There will no longer be any inner turmoil or struggle between “flesh” and spirit. We will have been completely saved!

For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ; 21  who will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory, by the exertion of the power that He has even to subject all things to Himself. Philippians 3:20-21 (NASB)

 

* Note: I am not suggesting that the body is evil, but only that it has been corrupted by sin. The body was part of God's original creation which was good. Jesus came in the flesh, which showed again the inherent goodness of the body. Jesus' body was not compromised like ours by sin since He was born of the Holy Spirit and the woman. Apparently, the sin nature is transmitted through the man, the governmental representative of the human race. Jesus did not have the inner conflict caused by having a perfect spirit and a sin corrupted body. The fact that God will one day glorify our bodies further establishes that God regards these bodies as "good" and worth saving. Let me also emphasize that my theory of the soul is not something you must believe in order to benefit from this teaching. To me it makes sense and helps me understand. If you have a better model, please share it with me.

 

Questions for Further Study and Discussion

  • What questions do you have regarding spirit, soul, and body?
  • Do you think that Genesis 2:7 and 1 Thessalonians 5:23 adequately support this doctrine?
  • Do you understand the significance of the past, present, and future aspects of salvation?
  • How is our daily transformation impacted by believing in what God did in the past (justification) and what he will do in the future (resurrection & glorification)?
  • How would you attempt to explain the battle we all have between flesh and spirit?

Click here to see the other articles in this series.

Share this post...

4: The Nature of Revelation

"For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life, and I Myself will raise him up on the last day." John 6:40 (NASB)

The spiritual condition of an unsaved person is spiritual blindness and deafness to the things of God. Jesus addressed this issue with the Pharisees who believed they could see but were blind. This is a common deception for religious people who are not born again. Religion, as I am using it, is our attempt to know and be accepted by God through using our own efforts, rather than by receiving by faith the gift of forgiveness and eternal life offered in Christ.

Then Jesus told him, "I have come to judge the world. I have come to give sight to the blind and to show those who think they see that they are blind." 40 The Pharisees who were standing there heard him and asked, "Are you saying we are blind?" 41 "If you were blind, you wouldn't be guilty," Jesus replied. "But you remain guilty because you claim you can see. John 9:39-41 (NLT)

A blind person cannot see where to go and does not know what to do to be saved. When a religious person, who has never received a revelation of Christ, tries to lead another to salvation, the result is disastrous.

Jesus replied, "Every plant not planted by my heavenly Father will be rooted up, 14 so ignore them. They are blind guides leading the blind, and if one blind person guides another, they will both fall into a ditch." Matthew 15:13-14 (NLT)

We cannot know God unless he opens our eyes, unstops our ears, and softens our hard hearts. When God does this for us, we can see, hear, and understand spiritual things, which results in our seeing or knowing Christ in a totally new way.

But people who aren’t spiritual can’t receive these truths from God’s Spirit. It all sounds foolish to them and they can’t understand it, for only those who are spiritual can understand what the Spirit means. 1 Corinthians 2:14 (NLT)

When we see Christ for who he truly is, it fundamentally changes us on the inside. The new birth and revelation go hand in hand.

Jesus answered and said to him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God." John 3:3 (NASB)

We can easily tell which plants were planted by the Father from those which were not: the first has a revelation of Christ, and the latter has only religion.

Those who are religious end up opposing those who have revelation and faith. (Galatians 4:28-29)

Then he asked them, "Who do you say I am?" 16 Simon Peter answered, "You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God." 17 Jesus replied, "You are blessed, Simon son of John, because my Father in heaven has revealed this to you. You did not learn this from any human being. Matthew 16:15-17 (NLT)

So how does a spiritually blind unsaved person gain sight through revelation? Only the Holy Spirit really knows, but those of us who have had our eyes opened can testify that it happened.

The wind blows wherever it wants. Just as you can hear the wind but can’t tell where it comes from or where it is going, so you can’t explain how people are born of the Spirit.” John 3:8 (NLT)

The man healed by Jesus of physical blindness in John Chapter 9 did not know how Jesus did it, but he knew he had been healed.

The mechanics of revelation are not necessarily for us to know, only the results.

I remember when I first “saw” in my heart that Jesus is Who the Bible claims. I don’t know how God did it, but suddenly I “knew” that Jesus is alive, risen from the dead, and the glorious Lord. Before that life-changing moment, I heard my girlfriend, who is now my beloved wife, share the gospel with me. I deeply considered whether I wanted to pursue knowing this Christ. I honestly asked Christ into my heart and life, if He were indeed real, and I asked Him to reveal Himself to me. From all this, you can see that receiving revelation is not a passive thing; at least it wasn’t for me.

Only the Holy Spirit can open our eyes, but, as far as I can tell, we must be active in our pursuit of Christ in some form or another.

It is God’s good pleasure to limit salvation to those whose eyes he opens.

At that time Jesus prayed this prayer: “O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, thank you for hiding these things from those who think themselves wise and clever, and for revealing them to the childlike. 26  Yes, Father, it pleased you to do it this way! 27  “My Father has entrusted everything to me. No one truly knows the Son except the Father, and no one truly knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.” Matthew 11:25-27 (NLT)

No one deserves to receive revelation from God. No one is good enough or smart enough.

It is always a supreme act of mercy when God opens blinded eyes.

It is also very humbling to us as the recipients of his mercy. No one can boast that they were able to know these things on their own.

Paul the Apostle was a man who received a revelation of Christ in a dramatic fashion. He was actively pursuing Christians to torture, imprison, and kill them for their faith. Was he pursuing God, too? The answer has to be, “Yes”. Although he was misguided, he really did wish to please God. The point is that God knows the human heart and will reveal Himself to those who seek him.

'For I know the plans that I have for you,' declares the LORD, 'plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope. 12 'Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. 13 'You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart. Jeremiah 29:11-13 (NASB)

The Pharisees believed that they already knew God because they had their Law and religion.

Many who attend Christian churches today are modern day Pharisees. They grew up in the church, know the language and the Bible, and are members of the church. They hear sermon after sermon and mentally agree with what is said, but they have never received a revelation of Christ from the Father.

This is the most dangerous place to be in the world. It is a form of self-deception that inoculates a person from ever really hearing the gospel. It’s as if their hearts are closed to any possibility that they might be still lost. Only the Holy Spirit can bridge the chasm between their deception and the light of the glory of the revealed Christ. It begins when we realize we need to be saved.

Is there any record that this has ever happened before? Yes, Paul is the supreme example. God gave him to all religious people as an example of what God can do for the most obstinate of people. Humanly it is impossible, but with God all things are possible. You may know people who are in this condition. If so, you should pray for them to have their spiritual eyes opened to receive a revelation of Christ. More importantly, we should ask ourselves, “Have I ever had my eyes opened?” If not, we should earnestly seek God until we know that we have.

Questions for Further Study and Discussion 

  • Share your testimony of how Christ was revealed to you.
  • Explain why you think God uses revelation to separate those who are really His children from those who are not.
  • What is our role in the process of having our eyes opened?

Click here to see the other articles in this series.

Share this post...

3: The Nature of Salvation

Therefore they said to Him, "What shall we do, so that we may work the works of God?" 29 Jesus answered and said to them, "This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He has sent." John 6:28-29 (NASB)

Faith in Christ is a spiritual “work.” How is this so? Many conceive of faith as a blind leap into the unknown in hope that we might be right. Others think that belief in Christ is acknowledging key truths about him, such his suffering, death, and resurrection. But is that the version of belief to which Christ referred?

Perhaps the most important aspect of faith is our understanding through revelation who Jesus is, and this must result in something more, if our faith is genuine – our allegiance to him.

When we see him for who he is, it fundamentally changes us and inspires us want to serve him.

This is what my Father wants: that anyone who sees the Son and trusts who he is and what he does and then aligns with him will enter real life, eternal life. My part is to put them on their feet alive and whole at the completion of time." John 6:40 (MSG)

The more we know about Jesus and what he did, does, and will do for us, the more we love him and desire to be loyal to him.

True faith produces a life of adoration, surrender, and obedience, which results in spiritual transformation.

This will continue until we die or he returns. The final piece of the puzzle will be our glorification at the resurrection. We will discuss this more later.

Many people fundamentally misunderstand of the nature of salvation, which can easily lead to legalism, which is a man-made attempt to reach God or stay right with God. Some imagine Christ’s death and resurrection provided us with a clean slate from which to begin again. Their understanding is that God erased the list of things we did wrong (sins), but since then has been writing our new sins on the blackboard. We had a clean slate, but it is starting to fill up again. This kind of thinking led Constantine to delay his water baptism until his deathbed, hoping that the slate would be clean at death, giving him a sure entrance into heaven. This feeds into the Roman Catholic doctrine of Purgatory, which is the belief that after death we enter a place of suffering until our sins are purged and we attain the moral purity required for entrance into heaven.

What is wrong with this concept? Several things, but let’s concentrate on two right now. First, we need to understand that our problem is not so much “sins” as it is “sin”.

Yes, we will be held accountable for the individual sins we commit, but the far deeper problem is our inherited sin factory which propels us into sinful thinking and behavior.

We can erase our slates clean every day, but, by nightfall, it will have begun to fill it up again. This propensity is called the “flesh” by Paul.

I have discovered this principle of life—that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong. 22  I love God’s law with all my heart. 23  But there is another power within me that is at war with my mind. This power makes me a slave to the sin that is still within me. Romans 7:21-23 (NLT)

Thankfully, Jesus took my sins upon Himself on the cross, but my “sin” had to die, too.

My sin “nature” had to be crucified because there is no reforming it.

Like a leopard, it cannot remove its spots. This is why in the previous lesson I pointed out that we cannot actually know just how sinful we really are. Even if we are spiritually cleansed somehow, the “flesh” lurks under the surface, ever ready to rear its ugly head and do something despicable. Even our best attempts at righteous living need to be made righteous by God. (Isaiah 64:6)

Salvation then is not a mere erasing of the slate, but an execution. The old man, flesh, or sin nature had to die.

For when I tried to keep the law, I realized I could never earn God's approval. So I died to the law so that I might live for God. I have been crucified with Christ. 20 I myself no longer live, but Christ lives in me. So I live my life in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. 21 I am not one of those who treats the grace of God as meaningless. For if we could be saved by keeping the law, then there was no need for Christ to die. Galatians 2:19-21 (NLT)

There had to be a complete exchange of life for life. Jesus died in our place (substitution), putting to death our old man (identification), and placed in us His Holy Spirit.

The Bible calls this receiving a “new heart” or being “born again” in the spirit. Christians are indeed “little Christs” who carry about in themselves the life of Christ.

Salvation is an exchange of our sin for His life. It is not erasing a blackboard. It is smashing the blackboard because it is irrelevant now.

God does not mark iniquities any longer.

LORD, if you kept a record of our sins, who, O Lord, could ever survive? 4  But you offer forgiveness, that we might learn to fear you. Psalm 130:3-4 (NLT)

We have been released from the system of works that keeps track of every right and wrong for an impending day of reckoning. Jesus took the condemnation and punishment for all our failures and sins upon Himself, and instead we have been given the Christ life within. The “sin nature” still lurks, waiting for an opportunity, but it no longer has the right to control us.

We must engage in a continual battle of the spirit (Christ’s life within us) against flesh (the residual inclination toward sin that is somehow linked to our Adamic bodies) until the day of our resurrection, but our true identity now is the new life of Christ that indwells us.

Another aspect of our salvation pertains to family. For those of us who are born again, born of the Spirit, and born of the Father, what really matters is who is our Father now.

Our salvation depends on being born into the family of God.

For you have been born again. Your new life did not come from your earthly parents because the life they gave you will end in death. But this new life will last forever because it comes from the eternal, living word of God. 1 Peter 1:23 (NLT)

Rather than being weighed in the balances in a system of works in which we can never measure up, we are born into a family where our acceptance is based on our all having the same Father. Blood is thicker than water, they say, and when it comes to the Kingdom of God, I would rather be a beloved “son” than a frustrated “keeper of the rules.”

Our access to the throne and heart of our heavenly Father, our Abba, is based on our being identified with His beloved Son, the Righteous One, Jesus. Our relationship with Abba is the same as Jesus’ because it is His Spirit within us who cries out, “Abba, Father”.

God sent him [Jesus] to buy freedom for us who were slaves to the law, so that he could adopt us as his very own children. 6 And because you Gentiles have become his children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, and now you can call God your dear Father. 7 Now you are no longer a slave but God's own child. And since you are his child, everything he has belongs to you. Galatians 4:5-7 (NLT)

To conclude, we must see salvation not as a second chance to “get it right” but as a life exchange and an adoption because we had no possibility of ever “getting it right”.

God knew we were hopelessly flawed; so, He provided a salvation that is not dependent on us but on Christ. If we are going to be good disciples, we must cast aside our vain attempts to measure up by keeping the Law and accept the marvelous provision of Christ’s life within as our only source of righteousness and acceptance and our key to obedience and victory. This is truly Good News!

The key for us, then, is faith. The way we do the works of God is by believing on Christ and His promises, declaring allegiance to him, and trusting in His Spirit to live the Christ life through us.

Questions for Further Study and Discussion

  • How would describe faith or belief in Christ?
  • Why does our salvation demand an execution?
  • Why do some people call Christianity an “exchanged life”?
  • Why does our salvation depend on being born again into God’s family?
  • What would you tell someone who struggles with trying to be “good enough”?
  • What do you see are the most fundamental differences between the Old and New Covenants?

Click here to see the other articles in this series.

Share this post...

2: The Condition of Man

As the Scriptures say, "No one is good— not even one. 11 No one has real understanding; no one is seeking God. 12 All have turned away from God; all have gone wrong. No one does good, not even one." Romans 3:10-12 (NLT)

The first thing we need to know is that human beings are in desperate need of a Savior. We are not just a little off track: we are totally lost. If we think we have a pretty good idea of how bad we are (without Christ), we have not yet seen ourselves as God sees us. We are rotten to the core and so skewed by sin so that we cannot save ourselves. Knowing this up front makes it easier later to appreciate God’s grace and to avoid the pitfalls of legalism. If you find this assessment of our condition offensive, you do not yet understand the nature of sin.

Sin is the attempt to live independently from God.

It started in the Garden of Eden, and today it takes many forms, from defiant atheism to moral attempts to live a “godly” or religious life without surrendering everything to God first. Murderers and self-righteous hypocrites all share the same basic problem – a determination to live without a humble reliance upon God. In fact, the most religious people in Israel, the Sanhedrin, Pharisees, priests, lawyers, and scribes, banded together to murder the Messiah. It was not the “criminal element” that put the Lord of Life to death.

Sometimes those of us who have been brought up from childhood in the church don’t know our own sinfulness as well as those of us who had a B.C. (before Christ) existence.

A danger for any long time Christian is losing touch with our need for mercy and grace.

We sometimes imagine that we are “beyond” all that because the Lord has helped us overcome some sins that formerly defeated us. There is nothing worse than a self-righteous Christian who looks down on others who are struggling with sin. Jesus had little tolerance for those with such an attitude.

When Jesus heard this, he said, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor—sick people do.” 13  Then he added, “Now go and learn the meaning of this Scripture: ‘I want you to show mercy, not offer sacrifices.’ For I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners.” Matthew 9:12-13 (NLT)

The good news is that God understands our hopeless condition and sent His Son to die for our sins. In addition, He sent His Holy Spirit to live a new kind of life through us.

One of the biggest secrets of the New Covenant is that God never expected us to live in a way that brings God glory all by ourselves. He sent his Spirit to live through us.

The gospel confirms our need for salvation, forgiveness and reconciliation to God accompanied by a complete overhaul from the inside out. It comes through repentance and faith in Christ. When we come to realize how much we need a Savior and the Holy Spirit’s help, we learn to be humble, which is a mark of a true disciple, as is a love and an appreciation for mercy.

How about us? Have we yet come to terms with our own sinfulness? Are we disillusioned with ourselves when we fail once again, imagining we are better than that? Are we prone to judge others whom we see as inferior to us, or do we extend to them the same mercy God has shown to us? Real Christians are not perfect, just forgiven.

Questions for Further Study and Discussion

  • Did you have a B.C. stage of your life in which you were very much aware of your own sinfulness?
  • Did you come to Christ to be forgiven or for some other reason?
  • When did you first begin to realize that you are not a “good person”?
  • Do you still get discouraged when you see another example of your sinfulness? What does that say about you?

Click here to see the other articles in this series.

Share this post...

1: The Call to Discipleship

Jesus called out to them, “Come, follow me, and I will show you how to fish for people!” Matthew 4:19 (NLT)

The Great Commission prioritizes making disciples. Discipleship is the process whereby the Lord trains and shapes his followers to be like Him in the way we think, speak, and act.

For God knew his people in advance, and he chose them to become like his Son, so that his Son would be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. Romans 8:29 (NLT)

God is conforming his people into the image of His beloved Son. He uses the various pressures and challenges of life to teach us about Himself and about love. He is shaping us into bold witnesses He can use to spread the good news of salvation throughout the world. He is preparing us to rule and reign with Him for all eternity, and He is making us into a people who will bring glory to His name.

Those who are victorious will sit with me on my throne, just as I was victorious and sat with my Father on his throne. Revelation 3:21 (NLT)

God is working everywhere to draw men, women, and children to Himself. Some have said that there are many believers but few who are true disciples. If this is true, it is a product of “easy believism” and a watered-down gospel that does not call for our surrender to Jesus’ lordship. Every Christian is supposed to be on a pathway to total commitment to Jesus and the Kingdom of God. Unfortunately, many of us are still trying to decide if we would rather be comfortable or committed.

We cannot straddle the fence with one foot in the world and one in God’s Kingdom. Such a position makes us unfit for both. (Luke 9:62)

God is looking for people whom He can shape into a world conquering force.

You are the salt of the earth. But what good is salt if it has lost its flavor? Can you make it useful again? It will be thrown out and trampled underfoot as worthless. Matthew 5:13 (NLT)

If we will count the cost and make the commitment, Jesus will show us the secrets of His Kingdom and reveal Himself to us as our Everything.

If we give ourselves to Christ as an investment, he will provide a return that far outweighs the sacrifice.

But don't begin until you count the cost. For who would begin construction of a building without first getting estimates and then checking to see if there is enough money to pay the bills? Luke 14:28 (NLT)

As we go through this study, it is important that we apply the principles to our lives. God is after doers, not eternal considerers.

But don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves. James 1:22 (NLT)

If we are among those who long to grow in our knowledge and obedience to our Lord, we should make it our practice to read, meditate, and obey what the Bible says, relying on God’s Spirit and grace to help. This is not a “works” or performance thing, however.

Whenever we seek to obey God’s Word by depending on His grace and Holy Spirit, He will always do His part. But only real disciples will do theirs.

Questions for Further Study and Discussion

• Why is being conformed to Christ’s image usually not comfortable?
• Have you ever thought much about how our lives here on earth are preparing us for our destiny to rule and reign alongside our Lord?
• Can you think of areas of your life that that need to be more fully under the Lord’s rule?
• Why does the Lord tell us to count the cost? Is he encouraging some to give up the pursuit of discipleship?

Click here to see the other articles in this series.

Share this post...
Share this post...