By His Grace...We have become Heirs with the Hope of Eternal life!

 

Be ye holy, for I am holy. Who is holy? God is holy, Jesus is holy… We are called to this holiness. 1 Peter 1:15 ~ As obedient children, do not conform to the passions of your former ignorance. But just as He who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do, for it is written: “Be holy, because I am holy”… Man was made in God’s image and in this fallen world only in Christ Jesus are we  made holy. Made what? Holy, for He is Holy… think about that.

To live a holy life, we recognize who we are in Christ (created in God’s image). We have a crucified flesh because with Christ we too were crucified and as Christ lives, we live as a new creation having become one in Christ, we have a renewed mind, which is a new spirit. That is why once the mind   is renewed, we walk  NOT according to the flesh but according to the spirit.

In this way, in Him, Jesus Christ, our hope is well placed. We are captives to this hope… because in Him the Father is well pleased. That is why Jesus Christ is our hope, because we have become heirs with the hope of eternal life.

For in this hope we were saved; but hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he can already see? But if we hope for what we do not yet see, we wait for it patiently.…Romans 8: 24-25.

For the creation was subjected to futility, not by its own will, but because of the One who subjected it, in hope ~ Romans 8:20.

So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal ~ 2 Corinthians 4:18.

Now faith is the assurance of what we hope for and the certainty of what we do not see ~ Hebrews 11:1.

So that, having been justified by His grace, we would become heirs with the hope of eternal life ~ Titus 3:7

Heirs with the hope of eternal life… Jesus is that hope! Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed… Romans 4:18. I have the same hope in God as these men themselves have, that there will be a resurrection ~ Acts 24:15.

Jesus is our only hope because He is hope. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the command of God our Savior and of Christ Jesus our hope ~ 1 Timothy 1:1.

This is our truth because Jesus is truth and He is life. He is the way, the truth and the life ~ John 14:6.

That is why the Father was well pleased with Jesus before His ministry even began. When the dove descended on Jesus The Father said, you are my Son with whom I am well pleased.

And a voice from heaven said, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased!"Matthew 3:17

This account of dedication by the Father was given before Jesus did any miracles, or healing, or teachings…There is no work that we must do either so that the Father will be pleased with us. We have only to put our faith and hope in His Son Jesus Christ.

Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love, for his wondrous works/ what He has done for us! ~ Psalm 107:15

Knowing that God is well pleased with His Son, we know that He is well pleased with us. Jesus did miracles, He healed and He taught the Kingdom of God which is unity. That is what we are called to do… some are to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, and some to build up the body of Christ, until we reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God.…Ephesians 4: 11-13.

What should we reach for? …Unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God. Who was the Son of God – Jesus Christ; so, in Christ we have hope in God's Unchangeable Promise; Thus by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope set before us may be strongly encouraged for We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and  ~ Hebrews 6: 18-19.

In this truth, this hope, we can love one another… showing mercy and compassion as God did for us… sending His Son!

 

Put God First in your Life....

Putting God first means that we keep the greatest commandment: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind” (Matthew 22:37). In other words, we are totally invested in our relationship with God. Everything we have and everything we are is devoted to Him. We hold nothing back.

Putting God first means we keep our lives free from idolatry in all its forms: “Dear children, keep yourselves from idols” (1 John 5:21). An idol is anything that replaces the one, true God in our hearts. As Gideon demolished the altar of Baal and chopped down the Asherah pole (Judges 6:25–27), we must tear from our hearts anything that lessens our devotion to or reverence of God. As Gideon built an altar to the Lord to replace the idolatrous images, we must dedicate ourselves as “living sacrifices” to God and in that way put Him first (Romans 12:1).

Putting God first means that we strive to follow in Jesus’ steps (1 Peter 2:21). Jesus’ life was characterized by total submission to the Father’s will, service to others, and prayer. In the garden, faced with unthinkable agony, Jesus prayed, “Not my will, but yours be done” (Luke 22:42). That’s putting God first. Jesus’ words, actions, and doctrine all came from the Father (John 5:19; 7:16; 12:49). Jesus glorified the Father in every detail of His life and accomplished all that He has been sent to do (John 17:4).

Jesus taught us to “seek the Kingdom of God above all else” (Matthew 6:33, NLT). That is, we are to seek the things of God over the things of the world. We are to seek the salvation that is inherent in the kingdom of God, considering that of greater value than all the world’s riches combined (see Matthew 13:44–46). The promise associated with the command is that, if we are putting God first, “he will give you everything you need.”

During a time of famine, the prophet Elijah visited a town where he met a widow who was preparing a final meal for herself and her son. Elijah asked her from some bread and water, and the widow explained that she had the resources for one meal only, and after that was gone, she would face starvation. Elijah persisted: “Don’t be afraid. . . . But first make a small loaf of bread for me from what you have and bring it to me, and then make something for yourself and your son” (1 Kings 17:13). 

In essence, Elijah told her to put God first. By faith, the widow obeyed. She put God first and fed the prophet. And then came the miracle: “There was food every day for Elijah and for the woman and her family. For the jar of flour was not used up and the jug of oil did not run dry” (verses 15–16).

Those who put God first will stand out from the rest of the world. They will obey God’s commands (John 14:15), they will take up their cross and follow Jesus (Luke 9:23), and they will not forsake their first love (Revelation 2:4). They give God the firstfruits, not the leftovers. The Christian life is characterized by moment-to-moment selfless service to God that flows from love for Him and His people. 

In all things, the believer trusts, obeys, and loves God above all else. Putting God first becomes easier when we take to heart the words of Romans 11:36: “Everything comes from the Lord. All things were made because of him and will return to him. Praise the Lord forever! Amen” (CEV).

Knowing who God is, we can understand God's Love...

How do we understand God is love? All we have to do is recognize that God is a Trinity. In the understanding of His Triune nature, God the Father/Son and Holy Spirit, we understand what God’s love is.  From there, we recognize also that in his fullness and perfection, the Bible makes plain that, from all eternity, God has had a perfect image of himself, the radiance of his glory. 

The Bible calls it “the exact imprint of his nature” (Hebrews 1:3). And this image is so complete with all that God is that the Bible speaks of this image as the second person in God and uses the language of Son of God, not because there’s any biological way that he’s a son — like he had sex with Mary and had a baby; that’s not what the Bible teaches. He’s a son, the second person that has always existed in and as the perfect image of God.

This Son is a son to indicate that they have the same nature. They’re both personal, and love reigns between them. The Bible speaks of God the Father loving God the Son, and God the Son loving God the Father, and the Bible points to the reality that this Spirit between them — this love between the Father and Son — carries, as it were, such a fullness of all that they both are that a third person exists, stands forth, has always stood forth in God.

So, the biblical picture is that there’s one God — not three gods — and that this one God mysteriously exists as God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. This is one reason that it makes sense to say, as 1 John 4:8 says, “God is love.” Love has been surging from all eternity in the fellowship of the three persons of the one God.

One question we can ask now is how do we in a fallen world, though having been born again in the spirit, understand this love? The answer is in the question… having been born again in the spirit. We were created in His image, spirit and in love. His love is not the ‘love’ of this world for the love of this world is love of the flesh. Being born again, we are made a new creation, and being a new creation, we walk according to the spirit. And, in this way, we know God’s love and that such love comes from God.

1 John 4: 15-17 ~ Love Comes from God
If anyone confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. And we have come to know and believe the love that God has for us. God is love; whoever abides in love abides in God, and God in him. In this way, love has been perfected among us, so that we may have confidence on the day of judgment…

John 15:10-11 ~ No Greater Love
If you keep My commandments, you will remain in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and remain in His love. I have told you these things so that My joy may be in you and your joy may be complete.

Dr. John Piper Answers the Question: Who is God?

 Who is God?

God revealed himself as absolute, self-existent, independent of all other reality. I think one of the most important verses in the Bible is Exodus 3:14: “God said to Moses, ‘I Am Who I Am.’ And he said, ‘Say this to the people of Israel: “I Am has sent me to you.”’” The phrase “I Am Who I Am” is a declaration of absolute freedom from being created or formed or guided or swayed or determined by anything outside himself. Whatever God is or whatever God does, he himself is the ultimate source and cause of that…

“I Am Who I Am.”

1. It means he never had a beginning. Nobody made God. God simply is, always was, with no beginning.

2. God will never end. He is absolute being. If you are being from forever, there’s no place to go outside being. You can’t not be.

3. There is no reality before him. There’s no reality outside him unless he wills it to be and makes it.

4. God is utterly independent. He depends on nothing to bring him into being or support him or counsel him or make him what he is.

5. Everything that is not God depends totally on God. All that is not God is secondary and dependent. The entire universe — vast, vast, vast billions of galaxies — is utterly secondary to God.

6. He is constant. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He cannot be improved. He is not becoming anything. There is no development in God, no progress. Absolute perfection cannot be improved.

7. He is the absolute standard of truth and goodness and beauty. There is no lawbook to which he looks to know what is right. There’s no almanac to establish facts for God, no guild to determine what is excellent or beautiful. He himself is the standard of what is right and true and beautiful.

8. All that God does is always right, always just, always beautiful, and always in accord with truth — that is, himself. It fits. In that sense, it is right and good and beautiful, all things considered.

9. Therefore, God is the most important and most valuable reality in the universe. He is more worthy of interest and attention and admiration and enjoyment than all other realities, including the entire universe.

Now, all of that, all nine of those implications of “I Am Who I Am” — all of that — is implied in God’s word to Moses, “Tell them, ‘I Am has sent me to you.’” You can see the same implications in many other places in the Bible — for example, in the letter to the Romans. This is one of my favorite passages: Romans 11:33–36.

Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!

“For who has known the mind of the Lord,
     or who has been his counselor?”
“Or who has given a gift to him
     that he might be repaid?”

For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.

“The Son of God has always been God, and now he is also man — the God-man, Jesus.”

In other words, God can’t be counseled because his knowledge and wisdom are infinite. God can’t be negotiated with or bartered with or bribed because he owns everything. He can never be put in anybody’s debt. Everything originates with him. He sustains all that is. And the display of his glory, his beauty, his greatness, his value, is the goal of everything: “From him and through him and to him are all things.” Therefore, “to him be glory forever.”

So, who is God? He’s the Creator, Sustainer, Governor, and Judge of the universe. And in his justice and mercy, he devised a way, from all eternity, for sinners like us to be forgiven and to be adopted into his eternal family as the children of God and as a kind of bride for his Son, Jesus Christ, so that by sharing the joy God has in himself, our joy in him would show the fullness of his own glory.