Waiting

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. For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for? – Romans 8.23-24

‘ Tiocfaidh ár lá’- our day will come indeed. But in the meantime can be a pretty rough time. It is not always easy. I have often wanted to cry out with John ‘even so come Lord Jesus’ or agreed with Patrick who wrote ‘we are looking for the soon appearing of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.’ We still long for that day and mockers say ‘where is His coming?’ We’ve been looking for it for a long time, how do we endure.

We are awaiting our full adoption into God’s family. We struggle with sin and groan for our full redemption when we no longer have to battle with sin. It is hope that gets us through all of this. If we could see it it would not be hope. As we have seen this hope is not a vain hope that ‘maybe this or that will happen.’ It is an assured hope that carries us through the waiting and the groaning and the eager anticipation.

In the meanTime let us run with patience the race that is set before us, keeping our eyes on Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith.

Our day will come

For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. – Romans 8.18

Life is not easy sometimes. Sometimes life is tough. We have medical crisis. We have financial crisis. It’s a troublesome world and the people who are in it are troubled with troubles almosy every minute (thank you Dr Suess).

In this terribly broken world the sufferings we go through can almost seem unbearable. The reality is that no matter what we are going through if we look there is always someone going through more than we are. Everyone’s real sufferings are very real to them.

We have a great promise though. These sufferings are not forever. They are only temporary. They will passs.

And they are nothing when we compare them to the glories which we will one day see in heaven. One day it will be worth it all when we see Jesus. One day our trials will seem so small when we see Christ.

There is an Irish phrase that fits here. I hesitate to use it because the militant IRA and others have sort of tried to make it their own, but is really expresses the feeling here.

‘ Tiocfaidh ár lá’ is the phrase. My best attempt at an English phonetic pronounciation would be ‘CHUCK-ee are la.’ It means ‘our day will come.’
We can be assured that no matter how bad it is today our day will come and we will spend eternity with Him.

An heir

For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father.” The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together. – Romans 8.14-17

Heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ. What an astounding statement. The perfect, righteous, holy God has chosen to make me his heir. Not only that, I am not a partial heir or a secondary heir or not getting a partial inheritance. I share in the full inheritance with Christ.

Peter describes my inheritance. He says it is as incorruptible, as undefiled, that will not fade away, and that is reserved in heaven for us. I love this. It is pure, nothing can mar it. It is undefiled. No other co-heirs are going to get my cut. No lawyers are going to whittle away at my inheritance.  It is reserved in heaven, not by my power but by the power of God.

With that confidence I can rest assured that I have been adopted and am going to share in the full inheritance of Christ.

Think of it. Me, Roger, with all of my flaws and sins and weaknesses and ignorance and unworthiness have been adopted into God’s family and I am now His heir and share it with Christ.

If you don't have the Spirit

But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His. And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you. – Romans 8.9-11

I have heard a lot of talk about Christians praying to receive the Spirit, or to get more of the Spirit, or to get the power of the Spirit. I am not here to get into a fight over those words, but this passage seems to make it pretty clear that I already have the Spirit.

If you don’t have the Spirit of God you don’t belong to Him.

That seems pretty clear. The Spirit of Christ dwells in me.

Therefore I have all the power of the Spirit in me today. The problem is not one of me not having enough of the Spirit, but the problem does He have enough of me? Am I  well and truly fully His? Am I yielded to His control, or do I have to me in the driver’s seat?

I am can live Him and for Him when I submit to His leading and stop trying to live righteously in my own flesh.

Praise God I have the Spirit, all of the Spirit. May I learn to let Him have control and follow His direction.

Those who live in the flesh

For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God. – Romans 8.5-8

For all of recorded history and probably beyond man has always tried to please God. Humanity has had many ideas about who He is or what kind of god they worshiped, but religion generally has had a goal of trying to satisfy whatever concept they had.

That’s where religions started – and that’s where they fail. No one who is in the flesh not please God. Everyone born is born in the flesh. No matter how hard man tries he is going to fail because God’s standard is perfection.

Part of religion is pleasing the flesh; it makes us feel like we are doing something. Pleasing the flesh does just that – temporarily. It is pleasurable for a season. It is gratifying for the moment. To be carnally minded is death.

But it can’t serve for eternity. It can never please God.

Our desire is to please the Spirit for in Him we have life. One way, the way of the flesh leads to eventual destruction. The other way, the way of the Spirit leads to freedom in Christ today and an eternity of hope and joy.

What the law could not do

For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. – Romans 8.3-4

What the law could not do. It could not provide eternal life. It could not do anything about be and my flesh. It could do nothing because I was always going to fall short. Me, like everyone else, will fall short of the glory of God.

This is only possible because God sent His own Son in the flesh to do what none of us could do – to satisfy and fulfil the law. Because the law and its requirement of righteousness has been fulfilled we are now longer bound to walk in the flesh. Now we are free to walk in the Spirit.

‘God did,’ all by itself really says it all. God did, not we did. Through Jesus Christ all that needed to be done was done. ‘It is finished’ indeed.

No condemnation

There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. – Romans 8.1

No condemnation now I dread;
Jesus, and all in Him, is mine!
Alive in Him, my living Head,
And clothed in righteousness Divine,
Bold I approach the eternal throne,
And claim the crown, through Christ my own.
Bold I approach the eternal throne,
And claim the crown, through Christ my own.

Thus writes Charles Wesley in his hymn ‘And Can It Be.’ Wesley I think fully captures the essence of Romans 8.1. We need fear no overriding guilt or condemnation for eternity because of what Christ has already done. Satan may tempt me to despair – because my condemnation is not up to him. I have been declared right in Christ alone.

We need not carry on through life with faces downturned and downcast. We no longer need fear the devil’s condemnation or the world’s codemnation or even the condemnation from inside ourselves.

Now, because of Christ, I live my life in Him. It is no more Roger who lives, but Christ lives in me. I walk in His spirit and not in the flesh. I am not perfect, but I am growing to be more and more like the One Who lives in me.

No condemnation now I dread. None. I am free from condemnation in Christ.

O wretched man that I am

I find then a law, that evil is present with me, the one who wills to do good. For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 
I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.  – Romans 7.21-25

How do we respond honestly to the terrible truth that we do the things we don’t want to do and we don’t do the things we ought to do and want to do?

Paul nailed it – he said what needed to be said, ‘O wretched man that I am…’ It is a wretched thing to be caught in that trap when you just can’t see to get it right and move on. It is defeating and discouraging and disappointing and depressing to never seem to ‘get the victory.’

So yes, O wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death?

Thankfully there is an answer – I thank God, I can be delivered through Jesus Christ our Lord.

I am not bound to continue this cycle of doing what I don’t want and not doing what I do. The answer is Christ in me. Jesus, and Jesus alone can deliver me from this body of death and defeat sin within me.

Now, if I could just yield to Him and stop trying to fight it on my own.

A batttle

For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin. For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do. If, then, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good. But now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. – Romans 7.14-20

The law is spiritual. I am carnal. I am still living in a fleshly body that cries out for satisfaction. So I find myself in a dilemma. I don’t do the things I want to do. I do do the things I don't want to do. I still have to deal with the presence of sin. The old me was crucified but sin is still residing with me.

What a mess, huh?  I think we have all ‘been there, done that.’

There is a solution, but we need to be aware that this is a very real situation. We are all going to battle with the devil and the world, but we are also going to have to battle the real truth that the flesh is still an enemy.

The battle is real. It is ever present with us. As long as we live in this flesh we are going to struggle with sin. Perfection is not going to come until we meet Jesus face to face.

But what do we do about it this battle in the meantime? More tomorrow.

Oldness of the letter

Or do you not know, brethren (for I speak to those who know the law), that the law has dominion over a man as long as he lives? For the woman who has a husband is bound by the law to her husband as long as he lives. But if the husband dies, she is released from the law of her husband. So then if, while her husband lives, she marries another man, she will be called an adulteress; but if her husband dies, she is free from that law, so that she is no adulteress, though she has married another man. Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you may be married to another—to Him who was raised from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God. For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death. But now we have been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by, so that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter. – Romans 7.1-6

Using the picture of a divorced woman being bound to her husband until he dies and then is free to marry another Paul further illustrates that in Christ we have a new spouse.

The Jews were married to the law. We are married to Christ. We are not bound to the oldness of the letter. Now we are bound to the newness of the spirit.

Jesus talked about He came to fulfil the law. He said the law alone binds because in the spirit we have life.

How does that play out in my everyday life? It means that I am not bound by a ticklist or a bunch of dos and don’ts. It means that I am not bound by a bunch of laws.

That sounds great, but now I have what is in some ways a tougher challenge. Now I am bound to the spirit. When Jesus described what that means it seems even tougher. The law said we can’t commit adultery. Jesus says we aren’t to even think about it. The law says we cannot kill. The spirit says that if we are truly in the spirit we won’t even hate because hate is the same as murder.

It isn’t as easy as a ticklist. Anybody could do that. It is a matter of yielding to the Holy Spirit when deciding what to do in our lives. That means we need to pray and study the scriptures and seek godly discernment.

Now we should serve in the newness of a spirit controlled life. 

The gift of God

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. – Romans 6.23

Everything comes at a cost. We tend to think of our wages as good things, but there are cases where we sould say that the wages can be bad. The wages for a night of drinking is a hangover. The wages of drink driving is endangering lives. The wages of smoking are heart or lung disease. The wages of unhealthy eating are cardiovascular disease and so on.

Here we have the ultimate picture of bad wages. The wages for sin is death.

Death, physical, spiritual, and eternal is the cost we pay for sin. Because of sin man’s spirit is dead already. Because of sin my body will die. Because of sin man’s eternity is one of separation from God.

BUT

BUT

But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The gift of God – a gift! Because it is a gift it cannot be earned. A true gift is permanent because a true gift is given without condition. A true gift cannot be taken back. All a gift requires is acceptance.

Eternal life – eternal! Because it is eternal it is permanent. If it could be lost it would be temporary. But it is eternal!

Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Not me or my works or my goodness or my church or because I am special, but through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Thanks God for His most precious gift!

Present your members to holiness

And having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness. I speak in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members as slaves of uncleanness, and of lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves of righteousness for holiness. – Romans 6.18-19


Free from we are now called slaves of righteousness. Paul admits this is a tough way to put it because he is speaking in terms we can understand. Slaves of righteousness means that we are now bound to do what it right.

It is not just a matter of doing right. It also deals with how we do what is right. A lot of time our practical righteousness can almost be done begrudedly and with a ‘have to’ spirit. Paul writes here though that we are to use our members to serve righteousness with the same fervour with which we used to pursue uncleanness.

The result of doing so will mean the end will not be despair and emptiness from serving sin we will see holiness by serving righteousness.

My desire now is that as I start every day I do so with a determination in my heart and a deep reliance on ‘Christ in me’ that I will by His grace live today seeking righteousness and pursuing holiness. I need to chase it just like I used to chase my own selfish and fleshly pursuits.

What will you and I chase after today?

Don't let sin reign

Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in its lusts. And do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace. – Romans 6.12-14

We not only have a new master after salvation – we have a new king. Once sin reigned supreme. It was the king of our lives. The prince of the power of this world sat on the throne of our hearts so we all had an evil style contrary to God. King Sin had control of our lives..

But then Jesus came and broke the power of King Sin. He dethroned King Sin and took his place. Now it is our job to let Jesus reign.

How does this play out in our day to day lives?

It means that when the flesh calls out for attention to satisfy its sinful fleshly desires we chose to not let sin reign as we remember we are no longer bound. We chose to follow the Spirit with the knowledge that Christ is in us giving us the power to do what is right.

There is no sin where we have say ‘I just can’t handle it’ or ‘that’s just the ways I am.’ We have all the power of Jesus Christ Himself to defeat the power of our former regent.

Don’t let sin reign – instead let our new King have control.

Reckon yourselves

For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. Likewise you also, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord. – Romans 6.10-11

Paul spends a lot of time here in Romans 6-8 dealing with the whole issues of Christians and how we are to deal with sin. He says that same basic truth in a lot of ways. Each of these though have an important instruction that we should not miss.

Here we read that the key to having victory over sin is that we reckon oursleves dead to sin. This is an accounting term. We look over the facts and examine the books and we do the figuring and we recognise that we are dead to sin.

It is this reckoning that reminds us that when we see it is nobody’s fault but our own. We are dead to sin. When we are tempted we need not give in. No temptation has any power unless I empower it but relying on my own strength and ignoring the power of God in my life. The sooner we realise that we have all the power in Christ to defeat sin the sooner we can we can begin to see victory in our lives. My new life is in Christ and He defeated sin and death.

I am not facing that next battle with temptation alone – it has no powers because greater is He that is in me than he that is in the world.

No longer slaves

For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin. For he who has died has been freed from sin. – Romans 6.5-7

It was a terrible state before Christ. Everyone could be ‘good’ to varying degrees, but we were all still captive to sin. Sin was our master and we were its slaves. Sin would always win out. Some may have been seen as worse than others, but sin was in control.

That’s why the world is the way it is today. It has always been this way, or course, and in some ways even worse, but today we see every sordid detail of evil and violence and wickedness. Paul wrote of this in Ephesians where he speak of how we all walked in a way that proved that we were dead in trespasses and sin.

We are no longer slaves to sin because we have been redeemed and bought back by God. Our sin divided us from God. Sin became our owner and all we could do was sin. But when Jesus shed His blood for us he bought us out of slave market. Though He made us He still paid the price to set us free from the chains.

Our old man is dead as surely as Jesus died on the cross. The power of sin was done away with. We are no longer slave. We have a new Master – let us serve Him.

Newness of life

Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. – Romans 6.3-4

Our physical baptism is a picture of a much greater event. When we were baptised we were laid under the water and raised back up. The laying back in the water pictures our burial with Christ, but the being raised back up pictures the resurrection from the dead and the raising of a new life in Christ. We are being raised to a new life in Him and so we are called to walk in that new life in Him.

If any man is truly in Christ the old things gave passed way and all things have become new. That doesn’t mean that the day we get saved all of our troubles with sin are over. It means that we are longer in bondage to sin. We are not to walk according to the course of this world. We are not to walk in the old life, but in a newness of life.

How are our lives in comparison to the old pre-Jesus life? Is there any difference? Is our newness of life any different that our ‘oldness’ of life? Do people who meet us know that there is a difference? Do our lives speak to the fact that we are ‘not of this world?’

We are all going to have chances today to walk in that newness of life. Are we going to act and react as ‘new creatures’ or do we insist on living according to the world’s pattern?

How are we going to make a difference?

Continue in sin?

What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? God forbid! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? – Romans 6.1-2

All of this stuff about how we are saved by grace through faith and that we our works can’t save us can sound great to our flesh. So doesn’t it make sense that we chould go ahead and keep sinning so that God can show us more grace? Party time?

Paul’s answer was pretty strong. The King James translators here used a powerful phrase to translate the Greek ‘no way.’ They chose the phrase ‘God forbid!’ Either way the word is a very emphatic –‘there absolutely is no way that you can possibly in any situation in any sense or in any measure ever’ in response to the question that we can ‘continue in sin that grace may abound.

The rest of the chapter goes in to talk about how that it is an impossible attitude to take. Twice more he addresses almost exaclty the same attitude.

Deliverance from the Law can never be seen as a licence to sin. Our liberty is never to be used to serve our flesh but to love each other and if we love each other we will not insist on our liberty and do anything to offend others. It would be as silly as it sounds to think that we can just continue on in sin to give God a chance to forgive us more.

Now, how are we that are dead to sin live any longer in sin?

Grace abounded more

Moreover the law entered that the offense might abound. But where sin abounded, grace abounded much more, so that as sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. - Romans 5:20-21

The law came to show the world what sin was. Sadly it exposed a world where great sin abounded. It indeed shows how far short man falls of the glory of God. Where sin reigns death results. We live in a world where sin seems to reign supreme.

We read here thought the amazing words ‘where sin abounded grace abounded much more.’ Its not just ‘where sin abounded grace abounded more,’ but ‘where sin abounded grace abounded much more.’

There is no sin that is too great for grace to cover. The sins of the most brutal tyrant and the most vicious serial killer and the most perverse child molester and the most sadistic leader all put together are not greater than the grace of God.

Honestly, as I look around it is hard to even imagine that God’s grace could ever expand to some of the wicked men that I see now and in history. Could God’s grace extend even to Hitler? Pol Pot? Stalin?

Yet the Bible says ‘grace abounded more.’

Then though we look at who was writing these inspired words. Paul, who was persecuted the church with a fervour seeking to imprison and kill Christans who so feared by the church that they did not want to welcome when he first came to them. If you had an early believer ‘do you think Saul could ever be saved?’ It is hard a imagine a ‘sure’ as an answer.

Paul knew who he had been. He knew the great truth of ‘grace abounded more’ personally.

It was true for Paul, and it is still true today.

By one man...by one Man

For if by the one man's offense death reigned through the one, much more those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.)
Therefore, as through one man's offense judgment came to all men, resulting in condemnation, even so through one Man's righteous act the free gift came to all men, resulting in justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man's obedience many will be made righteous. – Romans 5.17-19

Three times in the little section we read ‘for by one man this and by one man that.’

For by one man’s offence sin reigned..grace is given by One’
By one man’s offence judgement…through one man’s righteousness the free gift…’
By one man’s disobedience…by one Man’s obedience’

The first man, of course, is Adam who, by his sin cast the whole world into and through whom we all became sinners. Through the first Adam sin and death and condemnation and disobedience entered the world and curse of sin was passed because ‘all have sinned.’

But ‘the second Adam from above’ resinstated us by His love. Through His righteous acts came the free gift and justification of life and and an abundance of grace and righteousness so that instead of sin reigning righteousness will reign.

This is why Jesus had to be Emmanuel, God with us. He had to take on flesh and blood and become a man and take on the role of a servant. A man messed everything up and only a man could sort it out. Jesus, the God/man man/God was the only one who could do out because any other man would only have messed it up again like first Adam did.

By one man death passed to all men
By one Man came life everlasting

Enemies - reconciled

Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation. – Romans 5.9-11

Enemy seems a very harsh word, doesn’t it? Man being called the enemy of God does not seem very nice or sound very caring.

But that’s where we were before Christ. Our sin had put us on the opposite side of the battlefield from Him. We were enemies of the Almighty. Our sin had separated us from Him and we had no mean of going to peace talks. We had nothing to offer but our sin and that has no power for reconciliation.

I am reading a book about an Irish doctor who served in the Royal Air Force in World War 2. He served in France before being evacuated from Dunkirk and then was sent to the Pacific campaign. He was captured and kept in unreal conditions in Japanese POW camps for 2 ½ years. He was being held captive in Nagasaki when the second atomic bomb was dropped. The author is a historian who also relates surrounding events. This is where his story ties into ours.

After the second bomb was dropped the Japenese leaders knew they had lost all negotiating power. They had nothing to offer at the peace table. They could continue to endure the wrath of the Allies or they could surrender.

Now I realise that every illustration breaks down at some point. The picture is not perfect – but there are lessons. The Japanese, because of their transgressions, were at the mercy of the west, espcially the Americans. They had nothing to do to reconcile. So they surrendered and almost immediately began receiving aid and support in rebuilding by the Americans. Instead of punishment the Japenese were aided in recovery and now are one of the US’ greatest allies.

We too were enemies of God. We could offer nothing at the table. All we could do was surrender. And when we did God rebuilt us and gave us new life and began to reconstruct us and conform us to His image.

By God’s grace and by nothing but our surrender God reconciled us to Him!

God showed His love

For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God commendeth His love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. – Romans 5.6-8

We were without strength
We were sinners

But, on the other hand

Christ died for the ungodly
God showed us His love
Christ died to us

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.

Despite our deepest, darkest, most deplorable and despicable sin God showed His love to a totally God rejecting world lost in the darkness of sin God showed His love through Christ.

This broken world is filled with broken people. Hatred and division and cruelty have always filled this world. I am reading a book about POWs in Japanese controlled prison camps and the evil seems beyond belief. The sad thing is those kind of actions are commonplace among men.

But even then God shows His love. He wants all men to come to repentance. He loved us, and He proved that love by sending His Son to pay the price for our sins.

Hope that will not let you down

Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us. – Romans 5.5

I hope it doesn’t rain on our picnic. I hope I get picked for the team. We use phrase like this all the time. There is certainly no sureness in that kind of hope.

Bible hope though is a whole different story. Bible hope is a calm assurance. Our hope is God and His word is the only hope that won’t disappoint us. It is the only thing we can hope in to give us true hope for life eternal.

Our hope in Him will never disappoint because His love has been poured out by the Holy Spirit. We need not fear. We need not despair. We need not give up because the love of God gives us an unshakeable hope.

People are going to let us down. Circumstances our going to disappoint us. The economy may fail. Our jobs may be gone. We could lose it all.

But our hope in God can never, never, ever, in any way disappoint. It will always come trhough.

Glory in tribulations

And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; and perseverance, character; and character, hope. – Romans 5.3-4

Trials and testings and tribulations and tough times are never fun. Nobody really enjoyed them. It seems strange then to ‘glory in tribulations’ and to ‘rejoice in trials,’ as James writes.

How are we supposed to glory and rejoice in trials?

We can only do it from God’s perspective. Later on in James we will read ‘my brethren count it as all joy when you fall into all kinds of trials. The trying of your faith will bring patience and when patience has done it work you will grow into maturity lacking nothing.'

Here Paul writes similar words about rejoicing in tribulations because they bring perseverance and it brings character which brings about pure hope.

Testings are never fun. I remember a long, long time ago when my little sister was born with one foot turned. The doctors devised a crude brace for her which was simple two baby shoes nailed to a slat facing in opposite directions. I remember her crying bin pain as my mom put her feet in those shoes. It was a long seemingly cruel process. But, when the process was done her feet had been turned properly and she walked normally.

The suffering was temporary – the end result was a normal gait for the rest of her life. Our trials and tribulations are temporary as well. It will be worth it all we can see the why for these time.

So we can rejoice and glory that God knows what He is doing and know that it will one day be worth it.

Peace with God

Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. – Romans 5.1-2

Peace is something we all crave. We want peace in our homes. We want peace in our society. We want peace amongst nations. We all want world peace. If we think about it though the most important peace that we must consider is peace with God.

It is, of course, the most important peace of all. It is the only peace that lasts for eternity. All other peaces fail.

Throughout history societies and cultures have established religions to make God happy with them. All kinds of terrible works have been done to try and placate their notion of God. No religion has ever provided that though.

That long sought after peace with God is only possible one way. We can do nothing to placate God on our own. We are sinners who deserve His wrath. We have no chance of being justified with Him on our own. Our justification with Him only comes by faith in Him and in the finished work of Christ on the cross.

Peace with God is our only sure hope for the future, and the peace of God can reign in our hearts as we learn to trust Him in the everyday situations of life.

For us

Now it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him, but also for us. It shall be imputed to us who believe in Him who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was delivered up because of our offenses, and was raised because of our justification. – Romans 4.23-25

I love the way that the Bible is not just historical or theoretical or theological. It is practical and personal and applicable as well. Paul spends a lot of time here talking about what God did for Abraham. Abraham was there beofre the Law. God called him to leave everything and move to a different land, sight unseen. Abraham simply believed God and did what God wanted him to do. It was not the doing that mattered. It was the faith to believe God that allowed the righteousness of God to be imputed to him and to justify him in the sight of God.

But is was not just for Abraham. ‘Not for His sake alone…but also for us who believe in Him.’

Jesus was delivered up for crucifixion because of our offences. He died and then rose from the dead in order to justify us.

For us – what an amazing phrase. It was ‘for us’ in Abraham’s day. It was ‘for us’ in Paul’s day. It is ‘for us’ in our day. It will be ‘for us’ till Jesus comes.

Thank God for ‘for us.’

Fully convinced

And not being weak in faith, he did not consider his own body, already dead (since he was about a hundred years old), and the deadness of Sarah's womb. He did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully convinced that what He had promised He was also able to perform. And therefore “it was accounted to him for righteousness.” – Romans 4.19-22

Abraham is a fascinating study. He believed God and was therefore imputed with God’s righteousness. He was declared righteous.

But he was not perfect. He exercised faith – but at times he still doubted. Yet here we read that he was ‘fully convinced’ and did not waver in his faith.

To me that sounds a little contradictory. How can he never waver and be fully convinced and yet have those little doubts?

I think the phrase ‘Lord, I believe, help my unbelief’ comes into play here. It looks like, though Abraham was fully convinced in his mind did not waver and his faith was solid he still did obviously have an occassional niggling doubt.

I know I can have the same issue at times. I am fully convinced that God is right and able and perfect and acts out of love and goodness, but every now and then either my flesh or the devil throws up a thought that can cause me to wonder. My real faith doesn’t waver – I am convinced that God will handle it – but I still have to deal with those fleeting thougths.

That doesn’t excuse me, it just lets me know that I need to rely on what God says and not waver in my belief that He as this covered.

It is kind of a comfort to know that even Abraham, fully convinced and never wavering, had those momentary lapses. It didn’t mean He had lost His faith in God.

Grace through faith

Therefore it is of faith that it might be according to grace, so that the promise might be sure to all the seed, not only to those who are of the law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all (as it is written, “I have made you a father of many nations”) in the presence of Him whom he believed—God, who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did; who, contrary to hope, in hope believed, so that he became the father of many nations, according to what was spoken, “So shall your descendants be.” – Romans 4.16-18

Two words that come up all the time when we talk about salvation are grace and faith. We are saved by God’s grace only through the faith He empowers us to exercise. It is all of Him and none of us.

‘For by grace you are saved though faith…’

I am reminded of the verse in Ephesians that says ‘for by grace you are saved through faith, and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God. It is not of works so that no one can boast.’

Paul wants to make dead sure that we lose any idea that works have anything to do with our justication.

We could not be justified apart from grace. That grace in inaccessible apart from faith. Neither grace nor faith are things we can work up on our own. Both are the gist of God.

He did all of this despite the fact that we were enemies of God in our sin.

Its no wonder we sing about ‘Amazing Grace.’

Imputation

But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness, just as David also describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputes righteousness apart from works:
“Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven,
And whose sins are covered;
Blessed is the man to whom the Lord shall not impute sin.” – Romans 4.5-8

Imputation is a wonderful theological word. The dictionary definition is ‘to represent something as being done.’ In theology it represents Christ’s righteousness represented in us.

All of us are guilty. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.There is no one righteous, no not one. All of our works are unprofitable. And there is nothing we can do about.We can not be made unguilty.

But we can be forgiven. Our sins can be covered. Christ’s righteousness can be represented in us so that sin is no longer imputed to us. No works can bring about imputed righteousness.

In a few days I will have been saved 45 years. That seems like a lifetime. As I look back over those last 45 years I have been amazed at Christ’s imputed righteousness. My own righteousness has fallen far, far short of God’s standard of perfection. If I could have lost my salvation I would have lost it over and over again. I cannot unimpute the righteousness of Christ in me. I didn't  put it there, so I can’t take it off. What I must do is to reckon the truth of this and the resultant truth that because of His imputed righteousness sin has no power. God sees Christ’s righteousness instead of my sin.

Imputation – was a marvelus gift!