The Special of the Day… From the Orange Moon Cafe…
"The Surgeon"
The law of Moses, "holy and just and good" as it was, never made anyone righteous with God (Romans 7:12).
"By the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in His sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin." (Romans 3:20).
The law was given to expose sin, not to expunge it. "The law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith… by the law is knowledge of sin" (Galatian 3:24; Romans 3:20). God gave a moral code to Israel proceeding from His nature and character that profoundly conflicted with their own. Never was there hope they would actually keep the law, even as they broke the first command before Moses could even fully descend from the mount where he received the tablets of stone on which God etched His tenets (Exodus 31-32). Indeed, their hearts of stone ensured that no outward code could serve to meet their truest need. The Jews, like all, rather required an internal work of radical change possible to be fulfilled only by the heart and hand of God.
"What the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit" (Romans 8:3-4).
The law of Moses served as the diagnostician of Israel's need. "You have a heart problem" it revealed. "O that there were such an heart in them, that they would fear Me, and keep all My commandments always, that it might be well with them, and with their children forever!" (Deuteronomy 5:29). "The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus provides the Savior as the surgeon who transplants a new heart of "righteousness and true holiness" to replace the old. "A new heart also will I give you, and a new Spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh" (Ephesians 4:24; Ezekiel 36:26). Yes, the law of Moses declares and defines the problem. The grace and truth of the Lord Jesus provides the solution by an internal work only He can accomplish. "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature. Old things are passed away, behold, all things are become new" (II Corinthians 5:17).
The internal presence of the Holy Spirit in believers promises an ongoing change of our hearts and lives. Our role involves trusting and submitting to the process, and expecting that what God promises to perform, He will accomplish. "Being confident of this very thing, that He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ…We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works" (Ephesians 2:10). His "good work in you" results in our "good works" as the fruit of the Holy Spirit rather than the strivings of our flesh. How we needed the diagnostician of the law to expose our need! And how we rejoice in the Surgeon who performed the life-saving operation when we entrusted ourselves to His heart and hands! How He also continues His work to empower our hearts and hands to function in spiritual vitality and health as we trust His ongoing work of internally administered grace. That work will be finished one day, and for the glory of God, we shall be perfectly…
"Conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren."
(Romans 8:29)
Weekly Memory Verse
The Lord of hosts is with us, the God of Jacob is our refuge.
(Psalm 46:7)
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