My Kingdom of Works

Where are the words, 

As I'm picking up swords,

Fighting a battle, that's already been won?

I work and I try,

Striving to more than "get by",

Thinking it's what I do, instead of what He's done. 

I'm so sick inside,

Of this wretched pride. 

It hurts to think He could love me like this. 

To stand and be used,

When I should be abused,

Is something that seems quite amiss. 

I'm scared and I'm tired. 

I'm no one. I'm mired. 

But who I am is really irrelevant. 

You are love, you are good. 

You are worthy, I misunderstood. 

I do nothing without your intent. 

Break my pride, help me see;

You, alone, carry me.

You are my everything. 

All I have is yours to give,

Give me strength to look and live,

And know it's nothing I'm doing. 

Lord, do your work, I'm here for just for you. 

There's nothing good in me, so make it only of you. 

Our Return Requires His Grace

“So you, by the help of your God, return, hold fast to love and justice, and wait continually for your God.”
- Hosea 12:6

I love this verse. What a picture of God's grace. When we walk away, knowingly or unknowingly wandering from the truth, even our return to him requires his help. There is absolutely nothing we can do on our own. It is never "I CAN DO THIS." It is always "if I submit, he WILL do this." I can't change me. I can't return to him. He WILL bring me back.  HE will change me. 

Hosea, Day 13 #SheReadsTruth 
http://shereadstruth.com/2014/09/07/weekly-truth-25/

I'm the Enemy

"But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust." (Matthew 5:44-45 ESV)

"But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful." (Luke 6:35-36 ESV)

Not easy...but our example hung on a cross enduring insults for us, saying father forgive them, loving us as we yell "crucify him" with our daily acts of idolatry and unbelief. Who does that?! Only Jesus. And although we cannot meet the criteria of perfect child of God, we can be grateful for his substitutionary death and imputed righteousness that reminds us how truly little we have to suffer for his name.

For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:6-8 ESV)

For if while we were ENEMIES we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. (Romans 5:10 ESV)

When we realize our inability to love our enemies, we have a few choices. 1. We can despair, hopeless as we look at the reality of our sin. 2. We can attempt to "try again" at righteousness with determination, pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps and working at it. OR 3. We can look at our perfect example, realizing his perfect love for us, who have made ourselves his enemy. He cried for his Father to forgive us as he was on the verge of being separated from the one with whom he had constant intimacy since forever, never having been apart. And because of this love for us, his enemy, we now never have to be separated from the Father. We never have to experience a break in intimacy. We have unlimited access. The veil was torn. 

See, we CANNOT love our enemies like that. But we can look at Christ and be changed. We can see the depth of his love for his enemy (us) and be moved by gratitude and humility, recognizing how undeserving we are of this grace. And in that response, a love will grow, a love for God, and a love for others, even those who hurt us. If we can see ourselves as an enemy, we can have mercy on those who are an enemy to us. After all, we have had very little to endure from our enemies, in comparison to what we've put Jesus through. And what we've put Jesus through is what we actually deserve. 

And what we get instead is what we should be denied: access to the Father, eternal glory, reigning with Christ, a position of honor. 

"For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison" (2 Corinthians 4:8-9, 17 ESV)

So do not despair. Do not lose hope. Look at Christ and live! 

The Gospel Applied

This exercise was born out of my church’s Bible study while reading the book “Because He Loves Me,” by Elyse Fitzpatrick. Specifically, this came from Chapter 10: “Take Courage; Your Sins Are Forgiven.” I highly recommend this book as it was the jumping off point for my understanding the Doctrines of Grace. I hope you will take some time to complete this exercise, even if you haven’t read the book.

____________

We are going to have a time of quiet reflection. A time for you to seek the Lord and ask him to reveal how the incarnation, His sinless life, the crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension apply to your daily struggles and sins. As I prepared to do this I looked through the examples in the chapter. These were “big” sins/struggles by human standards: eating disorders, workaholism, suicidal thoughts, lust. I had a hard time seeing my own sin when comparing to these examples. I prayed and I actually asked my family what they thought my biggest sins were. That was an eye-opening place to start! But it got me writing and thinking, and God took it from there. As I sought to apply these 5 aspects of the Gospel, I re-read Elyse’s application to the examples in the chapter. I highlighted what jumped out at me in each one and used those as a starting point. I’m still taking it all in but just to give you another, maybe more tangible example, I’m going to share with you what God revealed to me.

I started by listing my sins: yelling, impatience, discontentment at the monotony of serving my family, slothfulness. Then I got more specific: discontentment at serving my family manifested in yelling, impatience, expecting perfection from my children/expecting worship from my family. Slothfulness, pride – I want to be worshipped. I want to sit on a throne doing nothing. I struggle with wrong motives - doing good out of legalism and then pride in “look at what I’ve done.” I suffer from idolatry and unbelief – just like Elyse said. I idolize myself and I don’t believe Jesus is enough.

Then I started to think about the incarnation. Jesus laid aside his right to be worshipped and obeyed. He subjected himself to sinful authorities. He humbled himself, not asserting his deity but serving everyone around him, completely content because he trusted his Father.

His sinless life: Not only has Jesus been perfect in my place, he was perfect in place of my children. Jesus served and submitted himself for the glory of the Father alone. When I expect acclaim and praise for all I “do” I need to remember the only one who deserves glory is Christ who lived perfect in my place.

The crucifixion: Like George on page 164 I don’t often see the cross for what it is – “an indictment and conviction of my abject failure.” The cross reminds me that all I do is filthy rags because even my goodness deserves the death that Jesus died in my place. When I think, “I don’t deserve to be spoken to like that, I don’t deserve to be treated like that,” I need to remember what I truly deserve is a gruesome death on a cross and an eternity in torment and darkness. When I desire to be worshipped I need to remember Jesus’ death to self in order that I can worship GOD forever. And HE is the only one who truly deserves worship.

The resurrection: I know that God has the power to change my idolatrous heart because he finished the work of justifying me when he raised Jesus from the dead. I have to force myself to stop and think about the dead coming back to life. That is a BIG deal. I serve a powerful God. He’s revealing to me that my idolatry of self is a desire to be loved. And because of the finished work, I am more loved & welcomed than I’ve ever desired. This is the biggest struggle for me – to accept that I really am loved not because of anything I’ve done.

The ascension: Not only am I loved and welcomed but until that day when I enter His presence, Jesus my bridegroom, the lover of my wretched soul, intercedes for me. He sees my struggles and he prays for me. He reminds his Father that he’s borne the wrath that was meant for me. I can know because of this that he is sanctifying me, making me a little more into his image day by day.

As I went through these facets of the Gospel, I really saw my idolatry and unbelief. I need to repent of my self-worship, my running from God and doing all my good in my own strength. Like Mike in our chapter, I need to draw near to the throne of grace.

For me, practically that means just spending more time with my Savior. I need to meditate on how the Gospel speaks to my everyday sins and struggles. I want to make this an ongoing conversation between myself the Lord, so that as James reminds us, I do not look in the mirror of the Gospel and then walk away and forget.

I’m praying that as we move into this time of personal introspection, we would truly pursue God and our cry would be that of Psalm 139:23-24:

“Search me, O God, and know my heart!

Try me and know my thoughts!

And see if there be any grievous way in me,

and lead me in the way everlasting!”

Some of us are like the woman with the alabaster jar – our sin is glaringly obvious to us. Some of us are like Simon and me. This process of applying the Gospel to our sin may take many quiet times with the Lord and it most likely will be a life long process but we want to encourage you to start that process today. I’m praying that the eyes of your hearts would be enlightened, that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the immeasurable greatness of his power toward you, power that raised Christ from the dead (Eph 1:17-20 paraphrase), that he may grant you strength to understand His love (Eph 3:16-19 paraphrase), and that He would give you spiritual wisdom and understanding and strengthen you for endurance and patience and fill you with joy (Col 1:9-11 paraphrase) as you dive deeper into the knowledge of your wretchedness and His glorious love.

This is the Gospel, Day 8 #shereadstruth

For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin. Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. (Romans 6:5-11 ESV)

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, (Ephesians 2:4-6 ESV)

As we complete these devos on the Gospel, we can consider what has occurred and what's to come. Take some time to meditate on the grace given to us through Christ's sacrifice and consider the full Gospel: the incarnation, sinless life, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension of our Lord. Contemplate how these facets of the Gospel apply to your daily life, your struggles and successes, your trials and triumphs.

For some examples, check out chapter 10 in "Because He Loves Me" by Elyse Fotzpatrick or my next post: The Gospel Applied. I encourage you to take some time to really consider your wretchedness, your flesh, and apply the Gospel to it.

Our devo writer states: "The gospel changes everything.You have been made alive through Christ. You have been brought from death to life. Sister, you have been set free. So now? We act like it. Not because it saves us; no, Jesus has already done that. Not because we have to; no, we cannot earn more or less of His love. We act like it because it’s who we are. We are new creations; putting off our old selves and putting on the likeness of God (Ephesians 4:22-24), we are daughters of the Most High; we are the lovely, spotless bride of Christ."

Remember who you are IN Christ. Seek Him more, know Him more, love Him more. In this is our hope. Not works, not lists, not morality. Just Jesus.


This is the Gospel, Day 8 #shereadstruth
http://shereadstruth.com/2014/02/03/now/

This Is The Gospel, Day 7 #SheReadsTruth

and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him. (Romans 8:17 ESV)

We are heirs WITH Christ. Do you know that Revelation tells us that we will REIGN with Christ? That's kinda mind blowing. Not only have we been saved from eternal death but we are placed beside the one who ACTUALLY deserves eternal glory. This devo has 2 chapters of Revelation included in the scripture reading. I hope you will take the extra few minutes to read the beautiful picture of what awaits for the children of God. 

My favorite line from this devo:

"In other words, friends, we can’t mess this up. When we are His, we are His. Always. Period."

This Is The Gospel, Day 7 #SheReadsTruth
http://shereadstruth.com/2014/02/02/living-hope/

This is the Gospel, Day 6 #SheReadsTruth

For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight; so you are right in your verdict and justified when you judge. (‭Psalm‬ ‭51‬:‭3-4‬ NIV)

When we are truly honest with ourselves, we see who we really are and what we really deserve. It is then that we understand God's justice AND His mercy. 

As it is written: “There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands; there is no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.” (‭Romans‬ ‭3‬:‭10-12‬ NIV)

AND

Indeed, there is no one on earth who is righteous, no one who does what is right and never sins. (‭Ecclesiastes‬ ‭7‬:‭20‬ NIV)

AND

The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, they do abominable deeds, there is none who does good. The Lord looks down from heaven on the children of man, to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God. They have all turned aside; together they have become corrupt; there is none who does good, not even one. (‭Psalm‬ ‭53:‭1-3‬ ESV)

AND

for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, (‭Romans‬ ‭3‬:‭23‬ ESV)

BUT

...[we] are justified by his grace as a GIFT, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, (‭Romans‬ ‭3‬:‭24‬ ESV)

AND 

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the GIFT of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. (‭Ephesians‬ ‭2‬:‭8-9‬ ESV)

The author of this devo writes: "I must have prayed 'The Sinner’s Prayer' twenty times growing up. I was always so afraid I’d missed something, paranoid I’d somehow nullified my salvation since the last time I said the magic words. And do you know what I finally understand now, a full thirty years after the first time I prayed? There is nothing magic about about it....It was never about the where or how or with what words I came to Christ. It was never about what I was doing. It was always about what He did."

Can you relate to this? I most definitely can. I'm daily fighting the urge to make my salvation about something I'M doing. Making the list, living the Christian life, making the focus ME instead of Jesus. 

You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings. My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, God, will not despise...Then you will delight in the sacrifices of the righteous, in burnt offerings offered whole; then bulls will be offered on your altar. (‭Psalm‬ ‭51‬:‭16-17, 19‬ NIV)

See, first we need to be broken. We need to recognize our wretchedness. And by responding in love, gratitude and devotion to how he's loved us, then our "works" (the response) become a delight to Him.

But even when we get this, when we remind ourselves of this EVERY DAY, we still fall short. We still struggle. We are still flesh. The writer continues: "But, oh! even the believing requires His grace! Like the father in Mark 9:24 we cry out, 'I believe! Help my unbelief!' We believe for a moment and then we doubt. We are tossed by the waves one day and stand tall on the rock the next. We are frail and we are strong; we are sure and we despair; we do what we hate and hate what we do, just like that same apostle Paul (Romans 7:15)."

Last Sunday at ABF (Adult Bible Fellowship), our leader read the lyrics to the hymn, "How Deep the Father's Love for Us" and the last stanza just blew me away. Why me? Why am I given this grace? I have no answer. This is just one of the mysteries of the Gospel. It is HARD to believe. It's crazy, foolishness (For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing - 1 Corinthians‬ ‭1‬:‭18‬ NIV). BUT we can choose to respond like the father in Mark, to realize our inability even to believe. We can recognize our need for Jesus, even in our unbelief. 

"Why should I gain from His reward?

I cannot give an answer.

But this I know with all my heart,
His wounds have paid my ransom."

Here is a link to the whole song with lyrics. Just beautiful. http://youtu.be/e9FG12eTSbI

The full devo is in the link below. 

This Is The Gospel, Day 6 #SheReadsTruth
http://shereadstruth.com/2014/02/01/receiving-grace/

This is the Gospel, Day 5 #SheReadsTruth

God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— (‭Romans‬ ‭3‬:‭25‬ NIV)

"If the life and death and resurrection of God for man is new to you (and even if it isn’t), it may feel like a lot to wrap your mind around. (Remember when we said the gospel is clear and yet complex, simple and yet mysterious? This is that.) A good way to explain it might be with the word 'propitiation', which means 'to substitute or appease.' Christ’s resurrection is the only thing that makes us righteous before the Father.  He is the 'propitiation' for our sins (I John 4:10)."

I've been studying this and it's pretty amazing how Jesus' death and resurrection meet the requirements for atonement as laid out in Leviticus and as prophesied by Isaiah. I'm so looking forward to digging deeper and understanding these mysteries of the Gospel. I hope you are all enjoying these little snippets from my study and that its encouraging you to dig deeper in your time with God. Praying for you all!

This Is The Gospel, Day 5 #SheReadsTruth
http://shereadstruth.com/2014/01/31/christ-crucified/

This is the Gospel, Day 4 #SheReadsTruth

This is one of my favorite devos. Pray you have a few mins today to let this wash over your soul! Here's a snippet. Click on the link at the bottom for the whole thing.

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. (‭Ephesians‬ ‭2‬:‭8-9‬ NIV)

"Ephesians says Christ gives us this life by grace through faith (2:8).  This 'by grace through faith' business is a difficult idea for me to understand. I like to see a reward earned for a hard day’s work. I like to do a great job and get my what is rightfully mine. I like to use my own power to get what I want, what I feel like I deserve.

But I forget that what I deserve is death. "

This is me. Every day I want to be recognized for what I've done. I want to look at my works and my good and my striving and I want to hear "well done". I forget my wretchedness. I forget that what I've done is filthy rags to him. And when trials come, I say "I don't deserve this, I'm trying to do good, to do right." Thank God he is transforming my mind. I'm beginning instead to say, "I deserve worse, I deserve hell." 


This Is The Gospel, Day 4 #SheReadsTruth
http://shereadstruth.com/2014/01/30/god/

This is the Gospel, Day 3 #SheReadsTruth

But the serpent said to the woman, "You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate. So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate. (Genesis 3:4-6 ESV)

"This is what sin does - it lies. It promises to be shiny and colorful and inflated with excitement forever. It promises to be worth it. Sin tells us that God wants to keep the good stuff from us - that what we want matters more than what He has for us."

22 And the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.”

Did you know that this was actually an act of grace? Removing Adam and Eve from the garden and distancing them from the tree of life was not necessarily a punishment. It was out of God's grace that he chose to protect the human race from living forever in a broken state, a state of eternal separation from God. He removed them so that He could enact his plan to provide an everlasting covering, more than just animal skins - the covering of his son. Allowing us to be found innocent of our disobedience and justly enter his presence to eat from the tree of life, abiding forever in the light. What a gracious God we serve.

Check out the devo below reminding us that we all fall short.


This Is The Gospel, Day 3 #SheReadsTruth
http://shereadstruth.com/2014/01/29/sin-enters/

This Is The Gospel, Day 2 #SheReadsTruth

Our devo author today says, "God said, 'Let us make man in our image, in our likeness' (Genesis 1:26), and His creation was complete and good. In a sense, these same words are spoken of us who are in Christ every day of our lives. We are being 'renewed in knowledge after the image of our creator' day by day (Col. 3:9-10). This is what salvation is. God is making us ever new, ever more complete...He is restoring His likeness in us."

This is called sanctification. As we grow in our love for God because of our understanding of how much he's loved us, our hearts begin to change. God does a work in our heart, soul, mind, and strength. He conforms us more to His image so that we better reflect Him. 

The process of sanctification will never be complete on this earth. We are flesh until our days here are complete. But when they are, sanctification will also be complete. We will be restored to our original glory, dwelling with God for eternity in a beautiful garden city with no curse, no pain, no tears, and no sin (take a look at Revelation 21 & 22). Praise be to God. No wonder John said "...Come, Lord Jesus!" in Revelation 22:20. And so we wait with baited breath for the day of our complete restoration. 

This Is The Gospel, Day 2 #SheReadsTruth

http://shereadstruth.com/2014/01/28/original-glory/