Today’s Scripture: Romans 6:11

“Consider yourselves dead to sin.”

The guilt of our sin in Adam resulted in our being given over to sin’s dominion as a penal consequence. When a judge sentences a convicted criminal to five years in prison, that sentence is the penal consequence of his crime—analogous to what God did to Adam and all his posterity. Part of the penal consequence of Adam’s sin was being delivered into sin’s bondage.

When the prisoner has served his five years, his penal consequences are over. The broken law no longer has a claim against him. In that sense he has ended his relationship to the law and its penal consequences. He must continue to obey the law in the future, but the particular offense that sent him to prison has been dealt with forever. To use Paul’s expression, he has died to the law and its penal consequences.

How does this apply to us? Let me paraphrase from the comments of John Brown, a nineteenth-century Scottish pastor, theologian, and author of several commentaries: “The wages of sin is death. Until the condemning sentence is executed, a person is subject to sin, both in its power to condemn and its power to deprave [or exert dominion]. But let the penal consequences be fully endured, let the law’s penalty be fully paid, and the person is at once delivered from sin’s condemning power and its depraving influence or dominion. It’s in this way that all that are in Christ Jesus, all that have been justified by his grace, have died, not in their own persons, but in the person of their surety. They are therefore delivered from the reign of sin—from its power to condemn, and therefore, also from its power to rule in the heart and life.”

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Today’s Scripture: 1 Corinthians 16:13

“Be watchful.”

With all the enemies from the world and from Satan arrayed against us, and a guerrilla army of flesh within our own hearts, how can we effectively watch against the temptations that constantly beset us? The old adage “The best defense is a good offense” is good advice for watching against temptation. The best offense is meditation on the Word of God and prayer. It’s surely no coincidence that they’re the only two spiritual exercises that we are encouraged to do continually. We’re to meditate on God’s Word “day and night” (Psalm 1:2), and Paul exhorted us to “pray continually” (1 Thessalonians 5:17, NIV).

There is power in the Word of God to keep us from sin: “I have stored up your Word in my heart, that I might not sin against you” (Psalm 119:11). For every temptation that you face, there are specific passages of Scripture that address that issue. If you’re not aware of some, ask your pastor or another mature Christian to help you find them. Then memorize those verses, meditate on them, and pray over them every day, asking the Holy Spirit to bring them to your mind in times of need. Ask, also, that he will strengthen your will to enable you to obey the Word that he brings to your mind. All of us are being influenced by sinful society, so we want to do all we can to continually bring the Word of God to bear upon our thinking.

Also remember that Jesus told us to watch and pray against temptation (Matthew 26:41). We aren’t capable of watching by ourselves. “Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain” (Psalm 127:1). Even with our best diligence, we need the extra dimension of the Lord watching for us. (Excerpt taken from The Discipline of Grace)

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Today’s Scripture: Romans 6:7

“For one who has died has been set free from sin.”

“What shall we say then?” the apostle Paul asked in Romans 6:1. “Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound?” If we’re justified freely by God’s grace through the work of Christ, doesn’t more sin increasingly magnify God’s grace?

“By no means!” responded Paul. “How can we who died to sin still live in it?” (Romans 6:2).

Paul’s response is not an impatient “how could you think such a thing?” Rather, as he demonstrated in the verses that follow, such a practice cannot occur because a fundamental change has occurred in our relationship to sin. The expression Paul uses for this decisive change is, “We died to sin.”

What does Paul mean by that? It’s fairly obvious he doesn’t mean we died to the daily committal of sin. If that were true, no honest person could claim to be justified, because we all sin daily. Nor does it mean we died in the sense of being no longer responsive to sin’s temptations, or else Peter’s admonition to abstain from sinful desires (1 Peter 2:11) would be pointless. So what does Paul mean?

Conservative evangelical commentators have generally taken one of two positions in answering this question. Several have held that Paul refers exclusively to the guilt of sin. That is, through our union with Christ in his death, we died to sin’s guilt. Other commentators say that Paul means we died to sin’s reign and dominion in our lives. Because sin no longer exercises absolute dominion over us, we no longer can continue in sin as a predominant way of life. We struggle with sin, and we do sin, but sin no longer is our master.

I believe both views should be brought together.

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Today’s Scripture: John 12:26

“Where I am, there will my servant be also.”

While Paul in 1 Corinthians 15 emphasized the reality of an immortal, spiritual body, John in revelation called our attention to the reality of our eternal presence with God: “and I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away’” (Revelation 21:3-4).

In the next chapter we read, “no longer will there be anything accursed, but the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and his servants will worship him. They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. And night will be no more. They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign forever and ever” (Revelation 22:3-5).

The day will come when our perfected spirits and immortal bodies are forever united. And in that glorious condition “we will be with the Lord forever” (1 Thessalonians 4:17, NIV). Hallelujah! At that time we will experience the full reality of the unsearchable riches of Christ.

Before we experience that glorious reality, we still live in this life. We’re not just to wait for our hope of heaven, but to be actively and vigorously engaged in becoming more like Christ (the process called sanctification) and of extending the rule of his kingdom (the first three petitions of the Lord’s Prayer in Matthew 6:9-13). (Excerpt taken from The Gospel for Real Life)

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Today’s Scripture: Psalm 119:32

“I will run in the way of your commandments when you enlarge my heart!”

We must keep going back to his grace. Only the grace of God revealed in the Gospel of Jesus Christ will give us the courage to get up again and keep on going even after we have failed for the umpteenth time. Only grace will allow us to be as honest about our sin as David was about his.

The desire to engage in the discipline of mortification comes only from the gratitude and joy of knowing that, however miserably I’ve failed, God’s grace is greater than my sin.

The godly Scottish pastor Horatius Bonar expressed it this way: “It is forgiveness that sets a man working for God. He does not work in order to be forgiven, but because he has been forgiven, and the consciousness of his sin being pardoned makes him long more for its entire removal than ever he did before. An unforgiven man cannot work. He has not the will, nor the power, nor the liberty. He is in chains. a forgiven man is the true worker, the true law-keeper. He can, he will, he must work for God. He has come into contact with that part of God’s character which warms his cold heart. Forgiving love constrains him. He cannot but work for him who has removed his sins from him as far as the east is from the west. Forgiveness has made him a free man, and given him a new and most loving Master. Forgiveness, received freely from the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, acts as a spring, an impulse, a stimulus of divine potency. It is more irresistible than law, or terror, or threat.”

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Today’s Scripture: Daniel 4:35

“He does according to his will . . . among the inhabitants of the earth.”

Most Christians tend to think of the sovereignty of God only in terms of its immediate effect upon us, or our families or friends. We’re not too interested in the sovereignty of God over the nations and over history unless we’re consciously and personally affected by that history.

But we must remember that God promised to Abraham and to his seed that all nations will be blessed through Christ (see Genesis 12:3; 22:18; Galatians 3:8). Someday that promise will be fulfilled for, as recorded in Revelation 7:9, John saw “a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the lamb” (NIV). God has a plan to redeem people from all nations and to bless all nations through Christ.

As we look around the world today, we see over half of the world’s population living in countries whose governments are hostile to the Gospel, where missionaries are not allowed, and where national Christians are hindered from proclaiming Christ. How do we trust God for the fulfillment of his promises when the current events and conditions of the day seem so directly contrary to their fulfillment?

We must also look at the sovereignty of God and at his promises. He has promised to redeem people from every nation, and he has commanded us to make disciples of all nations. We must trust God by praying. We must learn to trust God for the spread of the Gospel, even in those areas where it is severely restricted.

God is sovereign over the nations. He is sovereign even where every attempt is made to stamp out true Christianity. In all of these areas, we can and must trust God. (Excerpt taken from Trusting God)

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Today’s Scripture: Psalm 50:5

“Gather to me my faithful ones.”

Sometimes when I focus too much on my own shortcomings—how often I’ve sinned, how little I’ve availed myself of all the blessings of God and opportunities that have come my way—I think I would like to somehow just slip in heaven’s side door unnoticed. But that’s because I focus too much on myself and try to anticipate my welcome on the basis of my performance.

There will be no slipping in the side door of heaven with our head hanging down and our tail between our legs. No, no, a thousand times no! Everyone who has been the object of God’s calling and election will receive a rich welcome into Christ’s eternal kingdom (2 Peter 1:10-11)—not because we deserve it, but because we’ve been clothed with the spotless robe of Christ’s righteousness. Because we are united to him who is the object of the Father’s everlasting love and delight, we also will be received as objects of his love and delight.

We see something of God’s perspective on our entrance into his eternal kingdom in Psalm 116:15: “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.” Why is this true? We think of death as a parting. We think of “losing a loved one” through death. But from God’s perspective, the death of a believer is just the opposite. It’s a homecoming. It is precious in his sight.

Think of a World War II ship steaming into the harbor at war’s end with servicemen lining the rails. That sight was precious in the eyes of the relatives eagerly watching. And this is just a pale picture of how God anticipates the arrival “home” of his sons and daughters from our own spiritual war of this life.

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Today’s Scripture: 1 Corinthians 15:10

“By the grace of God I am what I am.”

Paul was conscious throughout his entire ministry of his utter unworthiness to be a servant of Christ. We see him expressing it again to the Corinthians: “For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me” (1 Corinthians 15:9-10).

Paul freely admitted he didn’t deserve his ministry; he was an apostle only by the grace of God—by God’s unmerited favor. However, in the expression “by the grace of God I am what I am,” the word grace can be taken in the context to mean either God’s unmerited favor or God’s enabling power. Considering his prior acknowledgment of unworthiness, his statement would appear to mean, “I am unworthy to be an apostle, but by God’s unmerited favor I am one.” But looking forward in this passage, to where Paul speaks about the effects of God’s grace on his ministry, it would appear to mean, “By God’s enabling power I am an effective apostle.”

I believe both these meanings of grace are incorporated in Paul’s statement. He wasn’t giving us a technical treatise on grace and distinguishing its finer shades of meaning. Rather, Paul was speaking from his heart, saying that God’s grace was sufficient for both his unworthiness and his inadequacy. He was saying, “I’m an apostle as a result of God’s unmerited favor shown to me and as a result of God’s enabling power at work in me.” (Excerpt taken from Transforming Grace)

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Today’s Scripture: Psalm 16:11

“In your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.”

The period between our death and the still-future resurrection of our bodies is usually called the intermediate state. The Bible actually tells us little about this period, but what it does say is very encouraging. In 2 Corinthians 5:8 Paul said that he “would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord” (NIV), and in Philippians 1:23 he said, “My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better.”

Taking Paul’s statements along with Hebrews 12:22-24, we can say that in the intermediate state we’ll be with Christ; we’ll be in the presence of thousands upon thousands of angels in joyful assembly (perhaps still hearing those seraphs of Isaiah 6:1-3 who call out antiphonally, “holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty”); we’ll be with all believers of all ages; we’ll be perfectly conformed to Christ in our spirits; and we’ll be in a state that is far better than anything we can imagine.

It’s difficult for us to visualize an existence in heaven without the benefit of our physical senses; or, for that matter, a physical brain. Yet we need to remember that God has existed eternally without a physical body. And even the angels apparently exist only in spirit (though some have assumed a physical body at times for specific purposes). Though we cannot understand how these things will be, we need to submit our minds to the teaching of Scripture and look forward to the time when we also will be with Christ, when our spirits will be made perfect, and when we’ll be in a state that’s far better than our best conditions on earth.

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Today’s Scripture: 1 Peter 4:10

“As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace.”

We’re so accustomed to thinking of spiritual gifts as ministry abilities that we lose sight of the ordinary meaning of the word. A gift is something given to us; something we don’t earn. But even that fails to adequately convey the biblical sense. We tend to give gifts to people who in some sense deserve them because of their relationship to us or because they’ve done us a favor of some kind. But God gives spiritual gifts to people who don’t deserve them. None of us deserves to be in God’s service, whether teaching a children’s Sunday school class or serving on some faraway mission field.

It’s an awesome thing to attempt to speak on behalf of God. Yet that’s exactly what we do when we teach or preach or write. It matters not whether our audience is one person or fifty thousand, whether they are kindergarten pupils or graduate theological students. Any time we say or write something that we hold out to be biblical truth, we’re putting ourselves in the position of being God’s spokesman.

Peter said, “If anyone speaks, he should do it as one speaking the very words of God” (1 Peter 4:11, NIV). When we teach the Scriptures, do we appreciate the awesomeness of our responsibility, to be speaking on God’s behalf? Do we consider the accountability that comes with being entrusted with the divine message?

Paul himself was keenly conscious of his immense responsibility: “For we are not, like so many, peddlers of God’s word, but as men of sincerity, as commissioned by God, in the sight of God we speak in Christ” (2 Corinthians 2:17). He knew God not only sent him, but observed him. (Excerpt taken from Transforming Grace)

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Today’s Scripture: Romans 4:7

“Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered.”

David’s experience is very helpful to us in the relationship of repentance and grace: “Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer. I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not cover my iniquity; I said, ‘I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,’ and you forgave the iniquity of my sin” (Psalm 32:1-5).

Here David first stated his conclusion, as he spoke of the blessedness of being forgiven. Then he explained that blessedness by acknowledging his own guilt and his miserable condition before he repented. But with genuine repentance came the deep assurance that he was forgiven. In sequence of time, the blessedness actually came after his repentance and assurance of forgiveness. But just as we often do, David gave the “bottom line” before explaining how he got there.

We must do as David did if we want to experience God’s grace in our failures at mortifying sin. It’s not that repentance earns God’s forgiveness. Only the blood of Christ does that. God, however, does deal with us as a loving but firm father deals with his children. He accepts us unconditionally because we are his sons and daughters in Christ, but he disciplines us for our good. And in the administering of his discipline he withholds the assurance of his forgiveness until we, through repentance, are ready to receive it.

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Today’s Scripture: Hebrews 12:22-23

“You have come . . . to the spirits of the righteous made perfect.”

Although the Spirit is at work in us to transform us, our sinful nature opposes him every step of the way. We find we still struggle with indwelling sin. “For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the spirit, and the spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want” (Galatians 5:17, NIV). A continuous conflict wages between two opposing forces in our hearts. When we want to do good, evil is right there with us (Romans 7:21). We struggle with pride, selfishness, impatience, a critical spirit, a sharp tongue, a lack of love, and countless expressions of our sinful natures.

We’ll have this struggle as long as we live in these bodies. It’s painful because we’re at war within ourselves, and continually we have to say no to sinful desires. It’s sometimes humiliating as sinful traits reveal themselves to our consciousness. Sometimes we soar into the heavenlies with Christ in our morning devotions, only to come crashing down with a thud before nine o’clock through some conflict with another person.

We long to be released from this warfare, and one day we will be. In Hebrews 12:22-24, a quick preview of heaven as it is now, we read of “the spirits of the righteous made perfect” (verse 23). This is a reference to believers of all ages whose spirits are now with Christ in heaven, and who are now “made perfect.” The sinful nature that now clings to our spirits like dirty, wet clothes will be done away with, and our spirits will be completely conformed to the likeness of Christ. This happens immediately at death when we go directly into the presence of the Lord. (Excerpt taken from The Gospel for Real Life)

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