“Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.”[b] 4 Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace but as debt. 5 But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness,
Abraham was pronounced righteous. How? By keeping the law? No...the law had not yet been given...so not the law...I love that!! Neither was it for anything he did. He had not left Ur of the Chaldees, he had not offered up Isaac, his son...so not of works...more good news...but what does the Scripture say? It says he was accounted righteous because he believed God. That's it! Good news for me and for you and for all of us fallen human beings. It was not work that Abraham did or else as the Scripture rightly says it would have been debt not grace. Who gets justified...not the righteous...not the Pharisee...but the ungodly...the guy who knows he is nothing! While we were yet sinners...enemies of God...Christ died for us. He died for me before I could even figure out a way to make Him try to want to. And He bears with us and suffers long with us as we try to do this life on our own..as we try to live our lives..the very lives He gave us...on our own and for ourselves until maybe that day comes when we realize we can't and we look to Him by faith and believe His promises. Then He pours His grace out and our sin is now put on Christ, His Son's account and Christ's righteousness on our account. Wow!
Matthew 9:9-13 As Jesus passed on from there, He saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax office. And He said to him, “Follow Me.” So he arose and followed Him.
10 Now it happened, as Jesus sat at the table in the house, that behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and sat down with Him and His disciples. 11 And when the Pharisees saw it, they said to His disciples, “Why does your Teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
12 When Jesus heard that, He said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. 13 But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy and not sacrifice.’[b] For I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.”
There are very few people of whom I think I might die for..and none of them are my enemies. Girls, when you truly understand this...Christ died for us when we were still His enemies...when we did not love Him, when we esteemed Him lightly...your desire will be to show others the One who has been so good and gracious to you. You will find yourself responding with His kind of love to those He has placed in your path. Your desire will be to know Him better through His word, to pray, to worship...not because you think it is going to earn you something or because you think you have to, because if you understand God's grace you know that is not possible. It will be because you are amazed at His goodness and so filled with gratitude that the overwhelming desire of your heart will be to be more like Him...to be conformed/transformed into His image. You will not read the bible, pray, worship or do anything "for the Lord" because you have to...you will do it because you get to...because you are blessed to have the opportunity.
So what is the application for us..for me and for you. Despite knowing and truly having that overwhelming desire in my heart to be like Jesus, I do not always respond to those Christ puts in my path with His kind of love. You know the sacrificial kind...not the syrupy, sweet kind. Why? I think that at times it is because I am too busy keeping track of wrongs. 1 Corinthians 13 tells me that love keeps no record of wrongs. In fact, as I think on this, I not only at times will keep a record of wrongs but I will also keep a record of rights I have done. We all do this...with others and with God. We think they/He owes us because we have done this or that and we get offended when their/His response to us is not what we envisioned. With a husband you might say...I cleaned the house, cooked him dinner, greeted him at the door, blah, blah, blah and then he says no to taking a walk. How dare he. With God...I spent time in your word this morning...I prayed for 2 hours...blah, blah, blah...can't You fix this circumstance I find myself in. How dare You don't fix it. You see a lot of the times when we do things for others or "for God" (hahaha) we do them with a heart that expects something back. Agape love does not think of itself....only others. It expects nothing back. This is totally foreign to most of us. It is the polar opposite of selfishness. The closest kind of love of human love that resembles this is the love a mother has for her infant. You don't say to your two month old...hey I nursed you two hours ago...get up and get your own drink now. It is a sin that we must be ruthless with. God does not owe anyone...He is a debtor to no man. The love we show others should reflect His love. The Bible tells us in Romans 13 that we are to owe no one anything but love. It is the debt we always owe and the one that can never be repaid. The Lord has worked this much in my heart over the past 10 years.
Romans 13:8 Owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law. 9 For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not bear false witness,”“You shall not covet,” and if there is any other commandment, are all summed up in this saying, namely, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 10 Love does no harm to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.
This verse and others like it have changed my relationship with those dear to me. Without love I am truly a sounding brass or a clanging symbol in my house that all shudder to have around. The more I make love a practice, I realize that love really is the bond of perfection. It is the one thing we can do to fulfill the law completely. Also, the more I attempt to make a practice of love, the more I realize how very very much my love falls short of the love that God wants us to have for each other. I feel overwhelmed and condemned like Paul in Romans 7 and rejoice that there is no condemnation for me in Christ. It is only by the power of His Spirit working in me and through me that I can have this kind of love for others.
It would be great if love were our natural response toward others. Unfortunately, it is not. In fact, we don't even often have loving feelings toward those around us. Most of the time our thoughts are on how they can love us. Since their thoughts are probably on themselves also, we are at an impasse. Biblical love, however, is a command. Our response, therefore, is not a matter choice but of obedience.
Choose to purpose in your heart to practice love at where the Lord has placed you. Choosing this road will bring you nigh unto the Lord. It is a choice that will be filled not with your own way and getting what you want, but will be what God wants and as such will not only bless you but also glorify God.
As Paul says the way of love is the excellent way. It will right your relationships with God and with others. It will be a choice that will have an eternal effect on all you meet. A choice that will make you shine as a light in this dark world. A choice that will always put you in God's perfect will. Choose today to be that person that speaks gently to those around her and has the law of kindness on her tongue. Break the hold of selfishness and pride and surrender to His Spirit. Go the second mile, bless those who curse you...love your enemies, heap coals of fire on their heads. Loving this way takes a step of faith...God's grace will be there. Most of the time loving this way will go totally against what the world might tell you to do and definitely opposite to what your own feelings are telling you to do. Fight pride!!! Surrender to His Spirit and love as He loved.You will be a blessing and be blessed!
Now, if you are anything like me, you make excuses as to why you couldn't respond to someone in love..but remember the Bible says that God's grace is sufficient for you ...you are without excuse. Bitterness, selfishness and pride are sin, as is making excuses for them. So here is a previous entry to help you (me) with this:
Through offenses I have learned more about God’s love.The answer to them: Here it is in a nutshell: LOVE. The bible says that love is the greatest commandment, it is the debt that is always owed (Romans 13), that it suffers long and is kind....that it never fails.(Cor 13) I interpret the never fails part like this. Responding in love always has an effect. It always bears fruit. You CANNOT go wrong by responding in love. Another verse that helps keep me from getting offended is in Philippians. In 4:5 it says to let your gentleness be made known to all men. That word gentleness is filled with meaning in the Greek. I got this list from John MacArthur and it helped me through many an offense...
Gentleness: This means learning to accept less than you might think you are due...this is a tough one for me...Let your gentleness ....we can replace this word with the following: Get ready for a long list... I needed one so that there were no loopholes. Let your contentment, forbearing spirit, sweet reasonableness, bigheartedness, good will...bending beyond what is expected to grant them good, magnanimity, charity toward the faults of others, mercy toward failures of others, not being personally offended by the faults of others..be known to all men. It is the kind of gentleness that can submit to injustice, disgrace, mistreatment, without hatred, without malice, without retaliation, without vengeance. The best way to look at it...it is the graciousness of humility which basically says you may have mistreated me, you may have misjudged me, you may have misrepresented me, you may have not given me what I deserve or given me what I don’t deserve, you may have ruined my reputation with some, acted in hostility towards me, I may be the recipient of your inequity, injustice, and mistreatment but I humbly, graciously accept it...Christ still reaches out in love...
Wow...we really are without excuse. But the blessings and joy you receive by responding biblically to offenses in your life will be far reaching. Owe no one anything but love...love is the fulfillment of the law.
Love,
Mom
