Monday, June 8, 2015,
7:30 a.m. – The Lord Jesus put in mind the song, “My Sheep.” Speak, Lord, your words to my heart. I read Ephesians 1:15-2:10 (ESV).
The Hope (Eph.
1:15-23)
For
this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love
toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you
in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may
give you the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having
the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to
which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the
saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who
believe, according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ
when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the
heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and
above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to
come. And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things
to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.
Paul wrote these words to those who were in Jesus Christ by
faith. He was thankful to God for them, and for their love, and he continually
remembered them before God in his prayers. He prayed, first of all, that God
would give them the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him.
Remember, back then, they didn’t all possess Bibles like many of us have
available to us today, though still many do not. They didn’t have printing
presses or computers and printers that could reproduce multiple copies of the
Old Testament writings, as well as the writings of the New Testament, all of
which had not been written at this time, I believe. And, they didn’t have these
writings in multiple languages like we have today, either, nor easy translators
like we have on our computers which can translate for us one language to
another. Most of them probably only had what they had been taught or whatever hand-written
copies of scripture they could get their hands on. But, what they did possess
was the Holy Spirit, whom Jesus gave us to teach us all things, and to remind
us of all the things Jesus taught when he walked the face of this earth.
…the Spirit of wisdom
and of revelation in the knowledge of him…
So, Paul prayed they would be given a Spirit of wisdom and
of revelation in the knowledge of God, in order that they might know God
better, not just intellectually, but experientially. We, as followers of
Christ, need to gain and possess spiritual wisdom, and then we need to exercise
that wisdom in our walks of faith. Wisdom goes beyond just head knowledge. It
includes understanding, spiritual insight, perception and good sense. I always
think of wisdom as applied knowledge. We can know a lot of things, even a lot
of things about God, but if we don’t apply what we know, then what good is it
to us? So, to me, this is the spiritual insight to understand what the word of
God is teaching us, by the power of the Spirit within us, and then it is the spiritual
discernment to know how God’s Word is to be applied to our daily lives. Then,
it is to be empowered of the Spirit to actually put what we know into practice
in our lives, i.e. to be doers of the Word and not hearers only.
…having the eyes of
your hearts enlightened…
What is my (your) heart? What does it do? Heart: “the
emotional or moral as distinguished from the intellectual nature” (M-W). The
heart is emotion, compassion, personality, my (your) nature, affection,
courage, inclinations, and where we feel sad or happy, etc. It is the center of
our being – who we are, what we are about, and our character, etc. It is also
the place where we sense conviction of sin, and where we are receptive to the
gospel and to being obedient to Christ (See: Ac. 2:37; 16:14; Eph. 6:6; Col.
3:12). And, it is the place where we favor (entertain) iniquity, and where we
are deceived (Ac. 5:3-4; 7:51; 8:21-22; 28:27; Ro. 1:21-24; 2:5; 16:18). In
addition, it is the place where we experience spiritual cleansing of the Spirit,
by God’s grace, via faith in Jesus Christ, and it is where the Holy Spirit
dwells (See: Ac. 15:9; Ro. 2:29; 5:5; 6:17; 10:9-10; 2 Co. 1:22; Eph. 3:17).
What about the eye? The eye has to do with judgment and
discernment. We need to be discerning in our hearts – the place where we are
vulnerable to sin, where we are convicted of the Spirit concerning sin, and
where we respond in faith and obedience to the Spirit of God when he speaks God’s
words into our hearts (the real us). We need to be enlightened, i.e. educated,
informed, instructed, edified, and counseled by the Spirit of God in the things
of God – concerning his divine nature, character and will, and with regard to
his purposes for our lives, so that we may know him better experientially and
may walk (conduct our lives) in the light of his truth. If we are blessed to
have Bibles in our possession, we need to be bathing our minds with the Word of
God, in the study of the Word and in obedience to what the Word teaches us, and
we need to be clearing our minds of all the junk that is in this sinful world
so that we can hear clearly when the Spirit speaks his words to our hearts.
…that you may know
what is the hope to which he has called you…
We can’t know the hope to which he has called us if we are
not abiding in His Word, if we are regarding sin in our hearts, and if we are
quenching or grieving the Spirit through disobedience. We can’t know this hope
if we are filling our minds daily with the garbage this sinful world is
offering, and if we are allowing ourselves to daily be entertained by the sins
of others via TV, movies, the Internet, magazines, books, music and the like. We
also can’t know this hope if we are investing our time and resources in
listening to false teachers spread their lies and deceptions, and if we are not
examining what they say against the Word of Truth so that we are able to
discern what is true and what is false, and if we are closing our ears to the
Spirit’s voice in favor of delighting ourselves in what tickles our itching
ears and in what is pleasing to our senses.
We need to have eyes to see and ears to hear and hearts to
receive what the Spirit of God is saying to the churches and to our individual
lives. We can’t build doctrines of faith around single verses, taken out of
context, while ignoring 95% of what the New Testament teaches us on the
subjects of salvation, eternal life and holy living. We need to repent of our
sins of idolatry and/or spiritual adultery, humble ourselves before God on
bended knee, and submit our lives to the control of the Holy Spirit within us,
forsaking our idols, and feeding our minds and hearts with the knowledge,
wisdom and spiritual insight and discernment of Almighty God – Father, Son and
Holy Spirit. Then, we will see clearly to see all that God has for our lives in
the way of holy and righteous living, obedience to his commands, walking in his
ways, following him wherever he leads us, and in doing what he says – all through
the power and working of the Spirit of God within us, as we daily yield our
hearts to his control.
Immeasurable Riches (Eph.
2:1-10)
And
you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following
the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the
spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once
lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and
the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But
God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us,
even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by
grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in
the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show
the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For
by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it
is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are
his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand,
that we should walk in them.
When we accept God's invitation to his great salvation, by God’s
grace, through faith in Jesus Christ, then by the power and working of the Spirit
within us we die with Christ to sin and self, and we are resurrected to new
lives in Christ, "created to be like God in true righteousness and
holiness” (See: Eph. 4:17-24; Ro. 6-8; 2 Co. 5:15; 1 Pet. 2:24-25). We put off
our old lives of living for sin and self, and we put on, by the Spirit, our new
lives in Christ, which are to be lived in the power of the Spirit within us for
the glory of God. This is what it means to be born of the Spirit – lives transformed
(like in metamorphosis) by the Spirit of God away from living to sin and for
self, to walks of faith in Jesus Christ, our Lord.
As followers of Christ, we should no longer follow the ways
of this sinful world, and the ways of Satan, who is the spirit who is at work
in those who are disobedient, as we once did when we were dead in our sins. As
children of God, we should no longer live to gratify the cravings of our sinful
nature, following after its evil thoughts and desires. God’s grace to us did
not give us free license to continue in sin, as some would have us believe. No!
God’s grace, which brings salvation, teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and
worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, godly and upright lives while we
wait for Christ’s return (See: Tit. 2:11-14). We were bought with a price. We
died to sin. How can we live in sin any longer? (See: Ro. 6). Don’t you know
that if we continue to walk (conduct our lives) after the flesh, we will die?
But if, by the Spirit, we put to death (present tense, progressive) the deeds
of our flesh, and we walk according to the Spirit, we will live? (See: Ro.
8:3-14).
Some people like to write off these scriptures as “works-based
salvation,” but it cannot be that if God’s word commands that is the way we
must live, and that by living this way, not in our own power, but by the power
and working of the Spirit within us, we prove ourselves to be his disciples
(See: Jn. 10:27-30; 13:35; 15:8; 1 Jn. 2:3-6). It can’t be salvation by works
if the scriptures teach that we must continue in the faith, and that our belief
in Jesus must be present tense, i.e. continuous, for us to have the hope of
eternal life. We are not being saved by works when we walk in obedience to
Christ’s commands or when we walk in the Spirit and not according to the flesh,
because the word teaches us that the righteous requirements of the law will be
fully met in us who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the
Spirit, and that if walk according to the flesh, we will die. We can’t write
off these scriptures just because we don’t like what they say, in other words.
Yes! It is true that we are saved by God’s grace, through
faith, and not of works, lest any of us should boast that we deserved or that
we earned our own salvation. We can’t! It is impossible! Our salvation is a
gift from God to us, which he provided for us through Jesus Christ’s death and
resurrection, while we were still dead in sin. So, we can take no credit at
all! Yet, we must receive this gift by faith, and scripture teaches us clearly
that faith in Jesus Christ means we die to sin and we live to righteousness
(See: 1 Pet. 2:24), yet all in the power of the Holy Spirit, and not of our own
flesh. Yet, our walks of faith are not absent of works, though not works of our
own flesh, according to human will. Rather, by the will of God, and according
to his plan and his purposes for our lives, we are his workmanship, “created in Christ Jesus for good works,
which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”
My Sheep / An
Original Work / June 24, 2012
Based off John 10:1-18
NIV84
My sheep hear me. They know me.
They listen to my voice and obey.
I call them and lead them.
They know my voice, so they follow me.
They will never follow strangers.
They will run away from them.
The voice of a stranger they know not;
They do not follow him.
So, I tell you the truth that
I am the gate, so you enter in.
Whoever does enter
Will find forgiveness and will be saved.
Nonetheless whoever enters
Not by the gate; other way,
He is the thief and a robber.
Listen not, the sheep to him.
Oh, I am the Good Shepherd,
Who laid his own life down for the sheep.
I know them. They know me.
They will live with me eternally.
The thief only comes to steal and
Kill and to destroy the church.
I have come to give you life that
You may have it to the full…
They know my voice, so they follow me.
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