But, because of His great love for us,
God Who is rich in mercy, made us
alive in Christ even when we were
dead in transgressions- it is by grace
you have been saved.
(Ephesians 2.5).
HALLELUJAH! THANK YOU LORD JESUS FOREVERMORE!
Command them to do good, to be rich
in good deeds, and to be generous and
willing to share. In this way they will lay
up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation
for the coming age, so that they may take hold
of the life that is truly life.
(I. Timothy 6.18 & 19).
HALLELUJAH! THANK YOU LORD JESUS FOREVERMORE!
Command those who are rich in this
present world not to be arrogant nor
put their hope in wealth, which is so
uncertain, but to put their hope in God,
Who richly provides us with everything
for our enjoyment.
(I. Timothy 6.17).
HALLELUJAH! THANK YOU LORD JESUS FOREVERMORE!
Therefore, my brothers, be all the more eager to make your calling
and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never fall, and
you will receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom of our Lord
and Savior Jesus Christ.
(II. Peter 1.10 &11).
HALLELUJAH! THANK YOU LORD JESUS FOREVERMORE!
But because of His great love for us, God,
Who is rich in mercy, made us alive
with Christ even when we were dead in
transgressions- it is by grace you have
been saved.
(Ephesians 2.4 & 5).
HALLELUJAH! THANK YOU LORD JESUS FOREVERMORE!
Who has believed our message? And to whom has the arm of the Lord
been disclosed?
For the Servant of God grew up before Him like a tender plant, and like
a root out of dry ground: He has no form or comeliness, that we should
look at Him, and no beauty that we should desire Him.
He was despised and rejected and forsaken by men, a Man of sorrows
and pains, and acquainted with grief and sickness; and like One from
Whom men hide their faces He was despised, and we did not appreciate
His worth or have any esteem for Him.
Surely He has borne our griefs (sicknesses,weaknesses, and distresses)
and carried our sorrows and pains, yet we considered Him stricken and
afflicted by God.
But He was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our guilt
and iniquities; the chastisement needful to obtain peace and well-being for
us was upon Him, and with the stripes that wounded Him we are healed and
made whole.
All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned every one to his own way;
and the Lord has made to light upon Him the guilt and iniquity of us all.
He was oppressed, yet when He was afflicted, He was submissive and opened
not His mouth; like a lamb, that is led to the slaughter, and as a sheep before
her shearers is dumb, so He opened not His mouth.
By oppression and judgement He was taken away; and as for His generation,
who among them considered that He was cut off out of the land of the living
for the transgression of my people, to whom the stroke was due?
And they assigned Him a grave with the wicked, and with a rich man in His
death, although He had done no violence, neither was any deceit in His mouth.
(Isaiah 53.1-9).
When it was evening, there came a rich man from Arimathea, named
Joseph, who was also a disciple of Jesus.
He went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus, and Pilate ordered
that it be given to him.
And Joseph took the body and rolled it up in a clean linen cloth used for
swathing dead bodies.
And laid it in his own fresh tomb, which he had hewn in the rock; and he
rolled a big boulder over the door of the tomb and went away.
(Matthew 27.57-60).
He was guilty of no sin, neither was deceit ever found on His lips.
When He was reviled and insulted, He did not revile or insult in
return; when He was abused and suffered, He made no threats;
but He trusted Himself and everything to Him Who judges rightly.
He personally bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we might
die to sin and live to righteousness. By His wounds you have been healed.
For you were going astray like sheep, but now you have come back to the
Shepherd and Guardian of your souls.
(I.Peter 2.22-25).
HALLELUJAH! THANK YOU LORD JESUS FOREVERMORE!
Jesus Christ fulfilled the Law and its righteous requirements.
He is also the fulfillment of all the types presented in the Law
which pointed to Him. The Temple, the High Priest, the high
holy days, the sacrifices and offerings all pointed to Him and
culminated in Him. In Him the purpose of the Law, the end
which it was designed to accomplish is fulfilled.
The purpose of the Law is fulfilled in Christ Jesus our Lord and
Savior.
The law was designed as the means of right relationship to God for
everyone who trusts in and adheres to and relies on Him.
“For Moses writes that the man who can practice the righteousness
which is based on the Law shall live by it. (Leviticus 18.5).
But the righteousness based on faith says, Do not say in your heart,
Who will ascend to heaven? that is to bring Christ down;
Or who will descend into the abyss? that is, to bring Christ up from the
dead. (Deuteronomy 30.12,13).
But what does it say? The Word is near you, on your lips and in your heart.
That is, the Word of faith which we preach. (Deuteronomy 30.14).
Because if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your
heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.
For with the heart a person believes unto righteousness and with the mouth
confession is made unto salvation. For as the Scripture says, Whosoever
believes on Him shall not be put to shame. (Psalm 34.22, Isaiah 28.16,49.23;
Jeremiah 17.7).
For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek. The same Lord is Lord
over all and he generously bestows His riches upon all who call Him.
For everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved.(Joel 2.32).”
(Romans 10.4-13).
The word of God is accessible as God is accessible. Because the Law was
given to point to Jesus and Jesus has fulfilled the righteousness of the
Law and every thing that the Law was designed to accomplish. We must
acknowledge that Jesus Christ is the complete fulfillment of the Law.
Knowing that He is righteous and that our righteousness comes from Him,
we fully trust Him. God Who is faithful, imputes to us the right standing
of Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior.
THANK YOU LORD JESUS FOREVERMORE! HALLELUJAH!
” The word of the faithfulness of God” points to the “righteousness that
comes from faith. The way “Abraham believed and it was counted to him as
righteousness. By trusting Christ Jesus we all become heirs of God with
Abraham. Every man, woman and child everywhere in every age included.
Jew or Greek, Asian or African, European or American, rich or poor we are saved
by faith in Christ Jesus Who is resurrected . We submit to the righteousness
and faithfulness of God and are rescued from sin and death.
We are transported from the kingdom of darkness to the Kingdom of God.
RICH GIFT
There is one body and one Spirit, just as there is also
one hope that belongs to the calling you received.
There is one Lord, one faith one baptism, One God
the Father of us all, Who is above all, Sovereign over
all, pervading all and living in us all.
Yet grace (God’s unmerited favor) was given to each
of us individually (not indiscriminately, but in different
ways) in proportion to the measure of Christ’s rich and
bounteous gift. Therefore it is said, When He ascended on
high, He led captivity captive (He led a train of vanquished
foes) and he bestowed gifts on men.(Ephesians 4.4-8).
POINTS FOR PRAISE AND MEDITATION
1) There is one Lord, one Spirit, one body, one faith, one
baptism, one God and Father of us all who is above all,
pervading all and living in us all. HALLELUJAH!
2) Each believer has specifically been blessed with grace,
which is God’s unmerited favor according to the measure
of Christ’s rich gift. The measure is unlimited as we saw in
Ephesians 1.19.
3) The rich gift of Christ is described and predicted by the psalmist
who alludes to God’s Kingdom rule in prophetic and spiritual
ways which cover the past, present and future. This has to do
with each individual Christian and the Church, because this is
the holy place where the Lord dwells.
Here is Psalm 68.13-20):
“Though you (the slackers) may lie among the sheepfolds (in slothful ease,
yet for Israel) the wings of a dove are covered with silver, its pinions
excessively green with gold (trophies recovered from the enemy).
When the Almighty scattered kings in the land, it was as when it snows
on Zalmon (a wooded hill near Shechem).
Is Mount Bashan the high mountain of summits, Mount Bashan the
mount of God? Why do you look with grudging and with envy, you
many-peaked mountains, at the mountain which God has desired for
His dwelling place? Yes, the Lord will dwell in it forever.
The chariots of God are twenty thousand, even thousands upon
thousands. The Lord is among them as He was in Sinai, in the
Holy Place.
YOU HAVE ASCENDED ON HIGH. YOU HAVE LED AWAY CAPTIVE
A TRAIN OF VANQUISHED FOES. YOU HAVE RECEIVED GIFTS OF
MEN, YES of the rebellious also, that the Lord God might dwell there
with them.
Blessed be the Lord, who bears our burdens and carries us day by day,
the God Who is our salvation! Selah (pause and calmly think of that)!
God is to us a God of deliverances and salvation and to God the Lord
belongs escape from death (setting us free).
4) Here in this psalm the Lord Who bears our burdens, whose
burden is easy and burden is light Jesus the Christ is the One
Who delivers and sets us free from sin and death, our God Who is
our salvation. The very name Jesus literally means (God Who IS
Salvation).
5) St. Paul in a turn of the phrase states that Jesus Christ led
captivity captive and bestowed gifts to humanity. This is different from
the context of the psalm where a train of captives were being led and the
Lord received gifts of men.
When the Lord led captivity captive He destroyed the power the
devil which kept mankind captive to the fear of death. This is
explained here by the author of Hebrews:
” Since, therefore His children share in flesh and blood, He himself
in asimilar manner partook of the same nature, that by going through
death He might bring to nought and make of no effect him who had the
power of death, that is the devil-
And also that He might deliver and completely set free all those who
through the haunting fear of death were held in bondage throughout
the course of their lives. “(Hebrews 2. 14& 15).
In the psalm He receives gifts. In Ephesians St. Paul is saying that
the Lord gives each believer individual spiritual gifts.
HALLELUJAH! THANK YOU LORD JESUS FOREVERMORE!
HOLY EMPOWERMENT
May He grant you out of the rich treasury
of His glory to be strengthened and
reinforced with mighty power in the
inner man by the Holy Spirit (Himself
indwelling your innermost being and
personality).
May Christ through your faith actually
reside in your hearts! May you be rooted
deep in love and founded securely on love.
(Ephesians 3.16 and 17).
POINTS FOR MEDITATION
AND PRAISE
1) The HOLY EMPOWERMENT alluded to
here is possible only through the indwelling
of the Holy Spirit in our innermost being.
2) This is how Jesus Christ actually resides
in our hearts permanently. This is when we
become secure in His love and solidly rooted.
HALLELUJAH! THANK YOU LORD JESUS FOREVERMORE!
MADE RIGHT
Who shall bring any charge against
God’s elect, when it is God Who puts
us in right relation to Himself ?
Who shall come forward and accuse
or impeach those whom God has chosen?
Will God, Who acquits us?
( Romans 8.33).
MEDITATION AND PRAYER POINTS
Meditate and pray about the following:
1) The immense peace that comes from
knowing that you are loved and accepted
by God Himself.
2) The fact that God, Who is rich in mercy,
because of His great love with which He
loved us,
Even when we were dead in trespasses,
made us alive together with Christ ( by
grace you have been saved),
And raised us up together, and made us
sit together in the heavenly places in
Christ Jesus. ( Ephesians 2.4-6).