The Special of the Day… From the Orange Moon Cafe
"Grace and Peace"
"Grace to you and peace, from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ" (Romans 1:7).
Only God's freely given favor in the Lord Jesus - grace - received by faith in His death, burial, and resurrection, results in true peace. Indeed, one can be in optimum health, have a good family and many friends, seek to live a moral life, enjoy a successful career, beautiful home, and all the world seems to offer. Apart from redeeming relationship with God through, however, "there is no peace, saith my God to the wicked" (Isaiah 57:21).
Deep within every unbelieving heart, the Holy Spirit bears witness to the unsettling truth of being "alienated from the life of God" (Ephesians 4:18). Many allow the aforementioned blessings to distract from their dire need. Others find different diversions as a means of ignoring the "no peace" condition of a heart empty of the Presence for which it was made. "The wicked, through the pride of his countenance, will not seek after God: God is not in all his thoughts" (Psalm 10:4).
The world can be viewed as the converted, those who have received God's freely given favor through the Lord Jesus, and the condemned, those who will not trust in Christ and Christ alone as the hope for peace with God. "He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God" (I John 3:18). Salvation involves the great humbling of the human heart steeped in pride and self sufficiency. Satan's "ye shall be as gods" lie runs deep in all until the Gospel is believed and the Lord Jesus is received (Genesis 3:5). No real peace is possible apart from the reception of grace whereby the sinner's heart sings, "Nothing in my hands I bring, only to Thy cross I cling" ("The Old Rugged Cross" - George Bennard). Pride dissolves in the moment of the new birth, replaced by the humility that kneels to affirm the Prince of peace as our only hope for peace. "He that is entered into His rest, he hath ceased from His own works, as God did from His" (Hebrews 4:10).
Either "accepted in the Beloved" or "alienated from the life of God" (Ephesians 1:6; 4:18). One either receives God's grace and its blessed bestowal of peace, or he remains in the deep inner turmoil of "no peace… to the wicked. Moreover, the believer grows in the experience of Christ as He grows in grace. Little wonder then that all of the Apostle Paul's epistles begin with the salutation of grace in the Lord Jesus and its blessed assurance of peace.
"Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God."
(Ephesians 5:1-2)
Weekly Memory Verse
He that is entered into His rest, he hath ceased from His own works, as God did from His.
(Hebrews 4:10)
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