Why should we know God's Word?

In our day and age where anti-intellectualism runs rampant in the visible church, it is not surprising to see poll after poll verify what students of scripture have known for many years. The visible church does not know much about the scriptures they profess to believe in. This is sad considering many saints during the Reformation period lost their lives for the sake of being able to read and study God's word. Not to mention the many passages in scripture that speak as such:

Isaiah 66:2 This is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.
John 8:31-32 Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, "If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."
Psalm 19:7-8 The law of the LORD is perfect, reviving the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple; the precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes.
Psalm 119:9 How can a young man keep his way pure? By guarding it according to your word.
Psalm 119:11 I have hidden Your Word in my heart, that I might not sin against You.
Psalm 119:103 How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth!
Psalm 119:105 Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.
Psalm 119:130 The unfolding of your words gives light; it imparts understanding to the simple.
Psalm 119:162 I rejoice at your word like one who finds great spoil.

The posts on this blog will address essential Biblical doctrines of the Christian faith. You can find much of the background for the posts here. My prayer for these posts is that the people who read them will be encouraged to open their Bibles and not just read a verse or two, but learn them and indeed, be transformed by them. As Jesus prayed, "Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth." (John 17:17). This is my prayer as well.

Tuesday, March 02, 2010

From the paper - Trust God in His Righteousness

For a very brief introduction read the first paragraph here.

Trust God in His Righteousness
How many of us have had jobs where we earned money or some other type of wage? Probably all of us have earned wages at one time and we all believe we should be compensated for our work. It’s just common sense, right? Well, maybe in the business world it is, but when we speak of our salvation, particularly justification, we should think again. In the context of salvation, we read of wages in this manner, “the wages of sin is death.” (Romans 6:23). The only wages all of us earn in this life is sin and it leads to death. We are told that all our righteous deeds are as filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6) and that there is no one righteous or good (Romans 3:10-12). We might wonder why this is the case, even if we are truly sincere in our works. The reason being is that our work is a self-centered endeavor before God and rejects His work to bring us near to Him. This is why our good works are worthless regardless of how good they look. There is no charitable deed, ritual to perform, or anything you can physically do to make you right with God and bring you to Him.

Then we should ask, if our good works cannot bring us near to God, if they are of no use to justify us, then how does God declare us righteous? “To the one who does not work but trusts him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness.” (Romans 4:5) For those who trust in Christ, God takes His heavenly ledger that details all their sin and wipes it away. In its place, He writes in His righteousness and justifies them on that basis alone. This is imputation. In other words, God credits or imputes Jesus’ righteousness to the Christian. “He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” (2 Corinthians 5:21). This goes against the grain of our human nature. We just want to be a good person and try to do our best and hope God accepts us. God says, “Your righteousness is as filthy rags! (Isaiah 64:6) Trust in what I have done through my Son, Jesus Christ, and I will accept you as perfectly righteous.” This is what makes the good news so wonderful – we can be with God based on what He has done for us! Our problem is we want to do everything ourselves when our work is a slap in the face of God who accomplished everything in Christ. We must lay down all our religious works, efforts, and good deeds and humbly come to God trusting only in His work of righteousness. Whose righteousness do you stand in?

2 comments:

Unknown said...

God bless you for speaking the truth in love. The Father has blessed you to preach the Gospel,all praise and glory to the Lord. From one brother to another brother I appreciate the work you do on your blog page and Faith Bible Church website it brings Glory to the Father continue on and faint not. Love in Christ Jesus. Doug

p.s. I also enjoy listening to the sermon's you post on your website,so please keep posting them. God Bless

Exblogitory said...

Hi Doug,

Good to hear from you and thanks for the encouragement. I pray you and your wife are doing well in the Lord.

I am working on getting last Sunday's sermon up this week. The 2/21 sermon was not recorded due to technical difficulties.

We'd love to meet you sometime. Feel free to call or email me anytime. I believe you have my personal contact info, but if not let me know.

Blessings in Christ,
Chris