Always by grace

In reading through Deuteronomy, you find that God never gave any indication to the Israelites that they could be righteous on their own. In fact He made it quite clear they were not.

The Israelites could look at any point in their history and see how rebellious, how stiff-necked, how idolatrous they were. They were not God's people because they were love-able. Rather, just like believers today, they were God's people because He sovereignly set His love upon them (Deuteronomy 7-11).

For the Israelites, keeping the Law of God as He laid it down was a stipulation of the relationship they had by His grace. Their obedience would not result in God's relationship with them; rather, their obedience was the result of the relationship! It is the same for us today. We in Christ are given commands - whether from the "one anothers" to the commands to walk in a certain way, to the putting off, to the putting on. We have commandments and instructions given to us even in the "New Testament" church. These commandments (and following them) are the result of the relationship and the love we have for our God and Saviour, Jesus Christ. 

Because the reality is, God has revealed Himself to us. He has given us a relationship with Himself. He has done everything necessary to ensure this relationship. Now, within this relational reality lie aspects of the relationship, and God has always required certain things of those to whom He gives Himself. The things that are required of us do not save us. Neither did they save the Israelites. Salvation has always been by grace through faith, as a gift of God. God bestows His mercy and love in spite of the rebellion of His people.

Know, therefore, that the LORD your God is not giving you this good land to possess because of your righteousness, for you are a stubborn people. (Deuteronomy 9:6)

You have been rebellious against the LORD from the day that I knew you. (Deuteronomy 9:24)

The Israelites were plainly given the truth. They were not a special people for any reason other than that the God Who is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love sovereignly set His favour upon them, for the sake of His promises to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob - men whom He also loved entirely because of His own sovereign favour! 

Yet the LORD set his heart in love on your fathers and chose their offspring after them, you above all peoples, as you are this day. (Deuteronomy 10:15)

God has always been as He is now: merciful, gracious, ready and willing to save. He has always given Himself in the place of others. He has always redeemed a people, a remnant unworthy to be redeemed. It has always been by the grace in Christ Jesus, the promised Messiah, the Seed of the woman Who would crush the serpent's head and lead us into repentance, restoration and redemption. 

This relationship, then, carries forward into what the Lord requires of us. This is seen in many other places in Scripture, notably Micah 6:8 (among many others), but we can actually stay in Deuteronomy. From chapter seven until now there has been something of an historical lecture, a telling and retelling of Israel's history, outlining the powerful works God accomplished for their sake. Now we come to the command: 

You shall therefore love the LORD your God and keep his charge, his statutes, his rules, and his commandments always.(Deuteronomy 11:1)

Remember that a "therefore" links back to what has been said, so this essentially means something like this: 

Because God has set his love on His people, not because of them, for they are rebellious and stubborn, but because of Himself, for He is gracious and merciful, therefore you should respond in love. God loves you, not for your own loveliness, but by His own grace. God has done everything for you. You are His child because He has adopted you. You are His treasure because He has treasured you. You are His workmanship because He has worked in you. It is not because of you. God has given you a clean heart, a right spirit, open eyes and ears, and most of all, Himself. In light of all this, your only response is loving Him, keeping His charge, statutes, rules, and commandments, for this is the way to deepening your relationship with the God Who loved you from eternity past because He chose to love you, not because you were worthy of His love.

All these principles, of course, culminate and come to full realization in Christ Jesus. Yet I think it is important to understand that Christ Jesus was God from eternity, so His promises and His redemptive acts existed from eternity. God has always worked by grace. 

The LORD passed before him and proclaimed, “The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness (Exodus 34:6)

Paul, the man who relied on Christ

It can be easy for me to forget about the weakness of Paul, because he was such a brilliant theologian, a masterful evangelist, a bold minister, a gospel-centered teacher, and a devoted leader of the church. 

Paul, though, was never hesitant about listing his own failures and weaknesses. He relied on Christ in all things. 

What brought this to mind was reading Philippians. In my personal Bible reading, I prefer to read whole books or letters of Scripture in one sitting in order to get the full message and context of what was written, as far as I am able. In Philippians, Paul wrote something that struck me as being the reality, not only of Paul, but of all believers. 

Look at the following two verses:

I am the more eager to send him, therefore, that you may rejoice at seeing him again, and that I may be less anxious. (Philippians 2:28)

do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. (Philippians 4:6)

Did you notice the word, "anxious"? Here is the striking reality: Paul did not teach, preach or write as though he were speaking from a lofty position toward lesser believers, though he could have. He did not write condescendingly as though he had a depth of insight unavailable to the Philippians - though he did. He did not instruct them from a position of closeness to Christ, giving them the sense that they were far off while he was near to the Saviour. No, he spoke as one on their level. He spoke as a believer needing the grace found in Christ, just as much as they did. 

In the first verse, Paul admits to being anxious. He was anxious for the Philippians, for they were worried. Epaphroditus, Paul's fellow minister for the gospel, had been sick, and he was distressed because the Philippians had heard it, and Paul was anxious for all parties. Epaphroditus had been ill near to death, so one can imagine that it was all-around a sorrowful, worrisome experience. 

Paul includes himself in those who are worried, yet in the second verse, he instructs them not to be anxious about anything! Do you see the mercy in this? Paul, who very likely did take his requests to God, who spent much of his life on his knees in prayer and supplication, who gave thanks to God on a regular basis, reached out to the Philippians with the comfort of knowing that he was just like them - weak, anxious, and in need of Christ. Paul doesn't say, "Do this, do not do that, and get things right, will you?" No, he says, "I fail in my weakness just as you. I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate (Romans 7:15). Let us therefore go together to the foot of the cross. Let us go together and sit at the feet of our Lord." Paul reminds them by way of his own weakness, by way of his own frailty, of the beauty of the Saviour - the Saviour that shows no partiality, the Saviour Who accepts the weak with the strong, the ignorant with the wise, the lowly with the lifted up, the poor with the rich, etc. 

Paul shows that for all his brilliance and faithfulness, just like the Philippians, he needs God. With that in mind, I'm sure Paul was also thinking of himself when he instructed them to take all their requests to God with prayer, supplication and thanksgiving. Paul reminds the Philippians, as well as us that no matter how wise, how learned, how faithful, or how bold for the gospel, the reality of our need of Jesus remains a constant. 

Walk in the Light

I travel in time with the beat of my heart

My heart that is healing, though right at the start

of my journey I felt I had no heart at all,

So cumbered and bonded it was by the wall

of my fear and destruction of self - yet I see

that from the first moment, You've been working on me. 

I walk in the Light.

The Light that envelops-

I'm waiting to see, further on, what develops

The more Light You give me,

the farther I see - 

O, bring it, O bring it, bring that Light to me!

Lord, You are the Light.
In Your presence I'm resting
though You bring me through paths of great trial and testing
You see everything, and You act in Your love
so, till I go to Your sweet rest up above
may I travel in time with the beat of Your heart,
Your heart that has loved me right from the start.
May I live in the light of Your life-giving grace
and find joy and contentment till I see Your face. 

love one another earnestly

I have a habit of looking at the Greek meanings of the translated words in the Bible. Usually I will look up a single word or phrase from Strong's Exhaustive Concordance on biblos.com. I am fascinated by words in general, and I love it when a word means something deeper and more profound than the English translation makes it out to be. 

For instance, in 1 Peter 1:22 it says "love one another earnestly". I've always taken "earnestly" to mean what it means in English: that is, seriously, honestly, in a serious manner, etc. If the translation is left there, it means enough for us to know that we ought to love one another without deceit. We ought to love one another in truth. 

Yet it was fascinating to me to read what the Greek word actually meant by "earnestly".

The word is ektenṓs, and it means fully-stretched. It describes kind of the idea of being extended out to the full potential. Sort of like pulling a rubber band to its maximum capacity - or chewing gum until all the flavour is gone. Leaving nothing. The idea then is loving one another without letting up, or without leaving any love unused. It means loving strenuously, to the full and necessary outcome. 

That's the way Christ loves us - to the necessary outcome, which was death on the cross. He loved us so much that He went to the cross in pain, suffering and separation, bearing our sins upon His shoulders. He loved us so much that He gave us His own righteousness, which was another necessary outcome of His love - giving us all that He has. 

Do I love others earnestly? Some days, I feel as though I hardly know what love is. Yet I am learning what God's love is for me. God's love is earnest. God's love is fully-stretched. 

but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8)