Jesus is Our Peace
Ephesians 2:11-22
11Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called “the uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands— 12remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. 13But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 14For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility 15by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, 16and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. 17And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. 18For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. 19So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, 21 in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. 22In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.
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Jesus is our peace (v14, v16). He, through his death, killed the hostility that existed between us and God. This is true, yet I struggle every second of every day as I try to attain this peace through other avenues (being a good husband, a good dad, a good employee, always being efficient, obtaining a degree, success, etc). These nuanced lies constantly try to frustrate us and take our eyes off of Jesus.
Peace is not found by doing one more thing. Rather, it is found by believing in the finished work of Christ.
When Relationships Are Built Around the Truths of the Gospel
Per Justin Taylor’s blog, Between Two Worlds:
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Elyse Fitzpatrick and Dennis Johnson, in Counsel from the Cross: Connecting Broken People to the Love of Christ (pp. 86-87):
When relationships are built around the truths of the gospel—the truth that we are walking in light even though we are still sinners in need of cleansing by his blood—we can be free from feelings of inferiority and the demanding spirit that is born of pride. We can pursue relationships without fear of being discovered as the sinners we are. This kind of open relationship rests solely on the realities of the gospel. We are more sinful and flawed than we ever dared believe, and so is everyone we know. Because of this, we won’t be surprised by other’s sins. They won’t expect us to be sinless either, so we don’t have to give in to self-condemnation and fear when they see us as we really are. We don’t have to hide or pretend anymore.
The gospel also tells us that we are loved and welcomed without any merit on our part, so we can love and welcome others whose merits we can’t see. We can remember the circumstances under which we have been forgiven, and we can forgive in the same way. We don’t deserve relationship with the Trinity, but it has been given to us. We can seek our relationships with others because we know that we have been sought out by him and that he is carrying us all on his shoulders. (Yes, he is that strong!)
HT: Buzzard Blog
Hiding Food in High Chairs
Per CJ Mahaney’s Blog:
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As I mentioned in the last post, one way to appreciate the doctrine of God’s adopting love is to read stories of sacrifice and love displayed in human adoption. One of the most compelling adoption stories I have read was written by my friend Russell Moore in his new book, Adopted for Life: The Priority of Adoption for Christian Families & Churches (Crossway, 2009).
Listen to their moving story in Moore’s own words (pp. 25–26, 43–44):
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“So, are they brothers?” the woman asked. My wife Maria and I, jet-lagged from just returning from Russia, looked at each other wearily. This was the twelfth time since we returned that we’d been asked this question. When I looked back at the woman’s face, she had her eyebrows raised. “Are they?” she repeated. “Are they brothers?”
This lady was looking at some pictures, printed off a computer, of two one-year-old boys in a Russian orphanage, boys who had only days earlier been pronounced by a Russian court to be our children, after the legally mandated waiting period had elapsed for the paperwork to go through. Maria and I had returned to Kentucky to wait for the call to return to pick up our children and had only these pictures of young Maxim and Sergei, our equivalent of a prenatal sonogram, to show to our friends and relatives back home. But people kept asking, “Are they brothers?”
“They are now,” I replied. “Yes,” the woman said. “I know. But are they really brothers?” Clenching my jaw, and repeating Beatitudes to myself silently in my mind, I coolly responded, “Yes, now they are both our children, so they are now really brothers.” The woman sighed, rolled her eyes, and said, “Well, you know what I mean.”
Of course, we did know what she meant. What she wondered was whether these two boys, born three weeks apart, share a common biological ancestry, a common bloodline, some common DNA. It struck me that this question betrayed what most of us tend to view as really important when it comes to sonship: traceable genetic material.
This is the reason people would also ask us, “Now, do you have any children of your own?” And it is the reason newspaper obituaries will often refer to the deceased’s “adopted child,” as though this were the equivalent of a stepchild or a protégé rather than a real offspring.
During the weeks that Maria and I waited anxiously for the call to return to Russia to receive our children, I pondered this series of questions. As I read through the books of Ephesians and Galatians and Romans, it occurred to me that this is precisely the question that was faced by the apostle Paul and the first-century Christian churches. …
When Maria and I at long last received the call that the legal process was over, and we returned to Russia to pick up our new sons, we found that their transition from orphanage to family was more difficult than we had supposed. We dressed the boys in outfits our parents had bought for them. We nodded our thanks to the orphanage personnel and walked out into the sunlight, to the terror of the two boys.
They’d never seen the sun, and they’d never felt the wind. They had never heard the sound of a car door slamming or felt like they were being carried along a road at 100 miles an hour. I noticed that they were shaking and reaching back to the orphanage in the distance. Suddenly it wasn’t a stranger asking, “Are they brothers?” They seemed to be asking it, nonverbally but emphatically, about themselves.
I whispered to Sergei, now Timothy, “That place is a pit! If only you knew what’s waiting for you—a home with a mommy and a daddy who love you, grandparents and great-grandparents and cousins and playmates and McDonald’s Happy Meals!”
But all they knew was the orphanage. It was squalid, but they had no other reference point. It was home.
We knew the boys had acclimated to our home, that they trusted us, when they stopped hiding food in their high chairs. They knew there would be another meal coming, and they wouldn’t have to fight for the scraps. This was the new normal.
They are now thoroughly Americanized, perhaps too much so, able to recognize the sound of a microwave ding from forty yards away. I still remember, though, those little hands reaching for the orphanage. And I see myself there.
Dead People
The gospel is nothing less than God breathing life into dry bones. It is nothing less than God calling forth the dead from the grave. He is the mover, the giver, the gracious one and we are the ones who are dead in our trespasses and sin who desperately need a savior. Thanks be to Jesus who has made us sons of the living God. Eternity is not long enough to exhaust the praise and glory due His name for his unthinkable, unimaginable work of love towards us needy sinners. Amen and amen.
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Ezekiel 37
The Valley of Dry Bones
1 The hand of the LORD was upon me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the LORD and set me in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. 2 He led me back and forth among them, and I saw a great many bones on the floor of the valley, bones that were very dry. 3 He asked me, “Son of man, can these bones live?”
I said, “O Sovereign LORD, you alone know.”
4 Then he said to me, “Prophesy to these bones and say to them, ‘Dry bones, hear the word of the LORD! 5 This is what the Sovereign LORD says to these bones: I will make breath [a] enter you, and you will come to life. 6 I will attach tendons to you and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin; I will put breath in you, and you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the LORD.’ “
7 So I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I was prophesying, there was a noise, a rattling sound, and the bones came together, bone to bone. 8 I looked, and tendons and flesh appeared on them and skin covered them, but there was no breath in them.
9 Then he said to me, “Prophesy to the breath; prophesy, son of man, and say to it, ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD says: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe into these slain, that they may live.’ ” 10 So I prophesied as he commanded me, and breath entered them; they came to life and stood up on their feet—a vast army.
11 Then he said to me: “Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. They say, ‘Our bones are dried up and our hope is gone; we are cut off.’ 12 Therefore prophesy and say to them: ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD says: O my people, I am going to open your graves and bring you up from them; I will bring you back to the land of Israel. 13 Then you, my people, will know that I am the LORD, when I open your graves and bring you up from them. 14 I will put my Spirit in you and you will live, and I will settle you in your own land. Then you will know that I the LORD have spoken, and I have done it, declares the LORD.’ “
One Nation Under One King
15 The word of the LORD came to me: 16 “Son of man, take a stick of wood and write on it, ‘Belonging to Judah and the Israelites associated with him.’ Then take another stick of wood, and write on it, ‘Ephraim’s stick, belonging to Joseph and all the house of Israel associated with him.’ 17 Join them together into one stick so that they will become one in your hand.
18 “When your countrymen ask you, ‘Won’t you tell us what you mean by this?’ 19 say to them, ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD says: I am going to take the stick of Joseph—which is in Ephraim’s hand—and of the Israelite tribes associated with him, and join it to Judah’s stick, making them a single stick of wood, and they will become one in my hand.’ 20 Hold before their eyes the sticks you have written on 21 and say to them, ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD says: I will take the Israelites out of the nations where they have gone. I will gather them from all around and bring them back into their own land. 22 I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel. There will be one king over all of them and they will never again be two nations or be divided into two kingdoms. 23 They will no longer defile themselves with their idols and vile images or with any of their offenses, for I will save them from all their sinful backsliding, [b] and I will cleanse them. They will be my people, and I will be their God.
24 ” ‘My servant David will be king over them, and they will all have one shepherd. They will follow my laws and be careful to keep my decrees. 25 They will live in the land I gave to my servant Jacob, the land where your fathers lived. They and their children and their children’s children will live there forever, and David my servant will be their prince forever. 26 I will make a covenant of peace with them; it will be an everlasting covenant. I will establish them and increase their numbers, and I will put my sanctuary among them forever. 27 My dwelling place will be with them; I will be their God, and they will be my people. 28 Then the nations will know that I the LORD make Israel holy, when my sanctuary is among them forever.’ “
The Most Deceptive Idols
Per Tim Keller’s upcoming book, Counterfeit Gods – to be released on Oct. 20th: (This brief excerpt comes from the Willow Creek Leadership Summit where he was a featured speaker)…..
“We think that an idol is a bad thing, but that is almost never the case. The greater the good, the more likely we are to expect that it can satisfy our deepest needs and hopes. Anything can serve as a counterfeit god, especially the very best things in life.”
We must repent for the reasons we do our good deeds. If we only repent for our bad deeds, we fail to see the root of our problem.
Salvation is of the Lord
The following post comes from Tullian Tchividjian’s blog:
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My friend Scotty Smith has penned a prayer that I have made my own. I pray that you would make it your own as well.
In light of the trials I have been facing lately, I cannot think of a prayer that is more fitting, more comforting, more convicting. This prayer is a great reminder that in the end, those who believe that “salvation is of the Lord”–those who love and live the gospel–will be free. It is those who trust God even when they cannot trace him–-those who humbly leave all things up to him and who refuse to try and “save” themselves-–that will remain standing.
Gracious Father, today is a great day for me to be reminded that “salvation is of the Lord.”
You are the one who begins the “good work” of redemption in our lives; You are the one who is carrying it on, even when you’re not working according to my timetable and agenda; and You are the one who will bring redemption to completion on the Day Jesus returns to finish making all things new.
This is incredibly good news, as I ponder my own heart and the lives of other people I care about a whole lot. I cannot be my own savior, and neither can I be anyone else’s savior. What a relief, but also what a critical truth to remember. This grand affirmation leads me to offer these earnest supplications:
Father, give me the same confidence about your vigilance and faithfulness you gave Paul for the Philippians. Sometimes irritation, worry and fear loom larger in my life than patience, trust and hope. When this happens, I’m pretty worthless as a friend.
Father, teach me how to wrestle in confident prayer for others, like Epaphras wrestled in prayer for the believers in Colossae (Col. 4:12). My tendency is to wrangle emotionally rather than wrestle believingly. This leaves me worn out and it simply frustrates others.
Father, keep me tender enough to engage in my friends’ broken stories, but tough enough not to get entangled in “stuff” that has nothing to do with me.
Father, teach me how to wait on you without falling into self-protective passivity or self-validating activity.
Only the gospel is sufficient to help someone like me love others in such redemptive and healthy ways. So I abandon myself to you and your resources, Father, in light of the weight of grace and the Day of Christ.
In Jesus’ name,
Amen.
How Are You Righteous Before God?
Per Of First Importance:
How are you righteous before God? (Question 60)
“Only by true faith in Jesus Christ. Although my conscience accuses me that I have grievously sinned against all God’s commandments, have never kept any of them, and am still inclined to all evil, yet God, without any merit of my own, out of mere grace, imputes to me the perfect satisfaction, righteousness, and holiness of Christ. He grants these to me as if I had never had nor committed any sin, and as if I myself had accomplished all the obedience which Christ has rendered for me, if only I accept this gift with a believing heart.”
Are You Like Other Men?
Per Ray Ortlund’s Blog, Christ is Deeper Still:
The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus:
“God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.” Luke 18:11-12
What was wrong with the Pharisee? There was a lot right with him. He really didn’t do those bad things. He really did those good things. And he gave glory to God for it all: “God, I thank you . . . .” So, what was wrong with him? Just this. He sincerely believed he was “not like other men.”
Come Ye Sinners
Come Ye Sinners by Joseph Hart (Hymns Composed on Various Subjects, 1759)
Come, ye sinners, poor and needy,
Weak and wounded, sick and sore;
Jesus ready stands to save you,
Full of pity, love and power.
Refrain
I will arise and go to Jesus,
He will embrace me in His arms;
In the arms of my dear Savior,
O there are ten thousand charms.
Come, ye thirsty, come, and welcome,
God’s free bounty glorify;
True belief and true repentance,
Every grace that brings you nigh.
Refrain
Come, ye weary, heavy laden,
Lost and ruined by the fall;
If you tarry till you’re better,
You will never come at all.
Refrain
View Him prostrate in the garden;
On the ground your Maker lies.
On the bloody tree behold Him;
Sinner, will this not suffice?
Refrain
Lo! th’incarnate God ascended,
Pleads the merit of His blood:
Venture on Him, venture wholly,
Let no other trust intrude.
Refrain
Let not conscience make you linger,
Not of fitness fondly dream;
All the fitness He requireth
Is to feel your need of Him.
Refrain
Sinner Saints
Per The Centrality of the Gospel (I highly recommend reading this article) by Tim Keller:
“Without a knowledge of our extreme sin, the payment of the cross seems trivial and does not electrify or transform. But without a knowledge of Christ’s completely satisfying life and death, the knowledge of sin would crush us or move us to deny and repress it. Take away either the knowledge of sin or the knowledge of grace and people’s lives are not changed. They will be crushed by the moral law or run from it angrily. So the gospel is not that we go from being irreligious to being religious, but that we realize that our reasons for both our religiosity and our irreligiosity were essentially the same and essentially wrong. We were seeking to be our own saviors and thereby keep control of our own life. When we trust in Christ as our Redeemer, we turn from trusting either self-determination or self-denial for our salvation – from either moralism or hedonism.”
