"Being... Behavior"

"Being… Behavior"

   

     The Christian life involves our being in Christ leading to our behavior through Christ.

     "Ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord.  Walk as children of light" (Ephesians 5:8).

     The new birth of spiritual salvation through the Lord Jesus not only provides forgiveness of sin and assurance of eternal life.  It also fundamentally changes who and what we are at the deepest level of our being.  "Therefore 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 entrance of the indwelling Holy Spirit reconstitutes who and what we are.  From darkness to light, death to life, sin to righteousness, and alienation to acceptance, believers become temples of the living God.  Grace freely provides such "newness of life," and then institutes a lifelong process of being resulting in behavior.  We are to act in accordance with fact.  "If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit" (Romans 6:4; Galatians 5:25).

    Our challenge lies in the members and faculties of our earthly humanity inherited from Adam.  Therein we still await the change that has already occurred in our spiritual depths.  "For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now.  And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body" (Romans 8:22-23).  We can still walk as if we are the same person we were before we trusted in Christ.  Being does not always lead to behavior in our present existence.  The Corinthians serve as a prime New Testament example of this potential that will remain with us until our Heavenly glorification:

    "Ye are the temple of the living God, and the Spirit of God dwelleth in you… Ye are yet carnal and walk as men" (I Corinthians 3:16; 3).

    The Apostle Paul plainly affirms the Corinthians as genuine believers inhabited by the Holy Spirit.  Our brothers of old nevertheless walked in a fleshly manner that belied their spiritual being.  They did not act according to fact.  Again, this will remain a possibility throughout our lives in a fallen world.  It therefore behooves us to grow in the knowledge and awareness of the new birth miracle that occurred in us when we believed.  Indeed, the Lord Jesus became who He was not in order to make us who we are.  "He hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him" (II Corinthians 5:21).  Herein the matter becomes devotional, that is, too much was sacrificed for the factual to not become more and more actual.  May our Lord lead us accordingly, and may we follow the "light in the Lord" that shines upon us - and within us as the Life of our lives.

"As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in Him."

(Colossians 2:6)

"Reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord."

(Romans 6:11)

Weekly Memory Verse

    If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit"(Galatians 5:25).

    

   

    

     

"No Greater Gift"

"No Greater Gift"

   

        Born again believers in the Lord Jesus Christ are called to distribute to others the grace we freely receive in our Savior.

       "Wherefore receive ye one another, as Christ also received us to the glory of God" (Romans 15:7).

      "Walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us" (Ephesians 5:2).

      Upon first consideration, this seems impossible.  To receive and to love as did the Lord Jesus?  Our native human tendencies seem to flow in such a different direction, particularly when we consider those who hurt or offend us, or who seem distasteful to us.  However, we must remember and affirm that the reception of God's love for us when we believed was accompanied by the wondrous gift of God's love imparted unto and within us.

     "The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given unto us" (Romans 5:5).

    Christians love as a matter of grace, again, of grace received and then distributed.  We love not by our own determination or devices, but rather by the Holy Spirit's motivation, guidance, and enabling.  Our calling involves trust, submission, and expectation.  We choose to believe that Christ lives in us no less than He died for us.  Thereby we submit ourselves to His involved presence in our hearts, acknowledging and yielding to our calling to love God and people.  We then expect the Lord to faithfully reveal His love in us by empowering our attitudes, words, actions, and willingness for self sacrifice.  "Freely ye have received, freely give" commanded the Lord Jesus of His disciples (Matthew 10:8).  The mandate proceeds to us, accompanied by the promise of grace, "the grace of our Lord was exceeding abundant with the grace and love which is in Christ Jesus" (I Timothy 1:14).

    It would be a cruel hoax for our Heavenly Father to command His children to love as He loves apart from His imparting the capacity to do so.  He does not call us to make bricks without straw.  Thus, believers rejoice that God most loves us by dwelling within us through the Holy Spirit.  By Him, we love God and others as we trust, submit, and expect our Lord to faithfully reveal His character in us.  We will not be perfect in this lifetime, but we can grow in the grace and knowledge of the Christ whose salvation of love comes to us with the indwelling presence of God's love.  He could give no greater gift than the wonder of blessedness whereby we discover that loving is far greater than being loved…

"It is more blessed to give than to receive."

(Acts 20:35)

"I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me."

(Philippians 4:13)

Weekly Memory Verse

    If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye; for the Spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you: on their part He is evil spoken of, but on your part He is glorified.

 (I Peter 4:14)

“The Perfect and the Perfected”

"The Perfect and the Perfected"

   

        Relationship between God and human beings presently involves the Perfect and the imperfect.

        "His work is perfect… If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us" (Deuteronomy 32:4; I John 1:8).

       Consideration of this obvious truth leads us to the wonder of grace, mercy, and salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ.  The pristinely holy God redeems unholy human beings by His Son, constituting us as "accepted in the Beloved" by imputing the righteousness of Christ to all who believe (Ephesians 1:6; I Corinthians 1:30).  In this regard, we become perfect as a matter of relationship, standing, and place with God.  "By one offering He hath perfected them forever who are sanctified" (Hebrews 10:14).  However, believers remain far from perfect in our response to our Heavenly Father and the subsequent life of faith and faithfulness to which He calls us.  We walk with God in a process of growth that requires ongoing change and maturation.  "But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ" (II Peter 3:18).  Moreover, the presence and power of the Perfect effects this spiritual and moral undertaking that will ultimately result in our complete conformity to the image of the Lord Jesus.  "We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works… We shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is" (Ephesians 2:10; I John 3:2).  Only grace would devise such a process, and only grace will fulfill "the perfecting of the saints" (Ephesians 4:12).

    Our role in the matter involves the confidence that looks to the perfection of "the Author and Finisher of our faith" (Hebrews 12:2).  We focus on His working, choosing to affirm in the pleasant, the painful, and the mundane that "He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ" (Philippians 1:6).  Such a view of the perfect God's relentless process rightly exalts Him, humbles us, and maintains the frame of heart and mind that results in more consistent response of trust, submission, and obedience, as enabled by the Holy Spirit's working in us "both to will and to do of His good pleasure" (Philippians 2:13).  Only thereby can the imperfect grow in the grace that began and continues the process of perfection made possible by the Person of perfection.  Humbling indeed, but also vibrantly encouraging and energizing as we consider that the present bond of the Perfect and the imperfect will one day give way to the eternal union of the Perfect and the perfected.

"Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is."

(I John 3:2)

"The LORD will perfect that which concerneth me: Thy mercy, O LORD, endureth forever: forsake not the works of Thine own hands."

(Psalm 138:8)

"As for God, His way is perfect."

(II Samuel 22:31)

Weekly Memory Verse

    If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye; for the Spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you: on their part He is evil spoken of, but on your part He is glorified.

 (I Peter 4:14)