The Righteous Who Keep Faith

Isaiah 26:1-4 ESV

 

“In that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah:

 

“We have a strong city;

    he sets up salvation

    as walls and bulwarks.

Open the gates,

    that the righteous nation that keeps faith may enter in.

You keep him in perfect peace

    whose mind is stayed on you,

    because he trusts in you.

Trust in the Lord forever,

    for the Lord God is an everlasting rock.”

 

A Strong City

 

The strong city is the church, but not what is commonly referred to as “church” these days here in America. The church is the body of Christ comprised only of those of genuine faith in Jesus Christ. We are those who have been crucified with Christ in death to sin and who have been raised with Christ to walk in newness of life in him, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.

 

We are those who have died with Christ to sin and who are living to God and to his righteousness in the power of God’s Spirit living within us. We are those who have forsaken our lives of sin to follow our Lord in obedience to his commands (New Covenant) who are walking no longer according to the flesh but according to the Spirit and who by the Spirit are putting to death the deeds of the body (of the flesh).

 

We are those who are no longer deliberately and habitually sinning against our Lord while refusing to walk in obedience to his commands, and while refusing to honor him as Lord of our lives. For we are those who are walking in the fear of the Lord who are honoring him with our bodies and who are loving his word and whose desire is for him to do what pleases him. For we love Jesus. We love God. And we want to serve the Lord with our lives.

 

Now I am not saying that we are absolutely perfect or that we never sin against our Lord, but sin no longer has mastery over our lives. We are no longer slaves to sin but to God and to his righteousness. And it isn’t as though we never fail the Lord in anything that we do or say but that we are not on a sinful course. And this is where the Scriptures make the division between saved and unsaved for the saved are no longer under the power of sin but the unsaved are still living in deliberate and habitual sin against God.

 

Now we who are following Jesus with our lives are the church, the body of Christ, and this church is a spiritual building made up of human beings as living stones with Christ as our chief cornerstone. The church is not a physical building or a church denomination or an institution of men or a corporation under the state, although many have turned the church into that. But we don’t have physical walls. Our salvation is our walls.

 

Open the Gates

 

So, when we open the gates to this city that the righteous nation that keeps faith may enter in, we are not talking about opening physical doors to physical buildings. We are not inviting people into physical buildings. We are inviting people into genuine relationship with Jesus Christ. We are inviting them to salvation from sin and to eternal life with God, to dying with Christ to sin and to living to God and to his righteousness.

 

For the only ones who can enter into this city are the righteous who keep faith. For our salvation is not a one-time experience which takes place in our lives which secures heaven for us when we die. Our salvation begins at the point when we first believe, but then it continues as we walk by faith and not by sight, and as we forsake our lives of sin and follow Jesus in obedience to his commands and as we walk in his holiness and righteousness.

 

For if we do not, if we do not follow the Lord in obedience, and if we do not forsake our sins but we continue in deliberate and habitual sin against the Lord doing whatever it is that our sinful hearts crave, then we don’t have salvation from sin and we will not inherit eternal life with God unless by God’s grace we put sin to death in our lives and we now walk according to the Spirit and no longer according to the flesh. We must keep the faith!

 

And our minds and our hearts must remain stayed on the Lord and not on our flesh and not on the things of this sinful world. We should be living pure lives which are separate (unlike, different) from the world because we are being made into the likeness of Jesus Christ. Our minds must be set on things above and not on the things of the earth, and on the Spirit, to live according to the Spirit, and not on the flesh, to live according to the flesh.

 

For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law (his gospel). Indeed, it cannot. For those who are still living in the flesh by the flesh cannot please God. And yet we are debtors, but not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if we live according to the flesh we will die, but if by the Spirit we are putting to death the deeds of the body, then we will live with Christ for eternity (Romans 8).

 

[Lu 9:23-26; Jn 6:35-58; Jn 15:1-11; Rom 6:1-23; Rom 8:1-17; Eph 4:17-24; 1 Pet 2:24; 1 Co 6:9-10,19-20; 2 Co 5:10,15,21; Tit 2:11-14; Jas 1:21-25; Rom 12:1-2; Php 2:12-13; Col 1:21-23; Col 3:5-10; Gal 5:16-21; Eph 5:3-11; Gal 6:7-8; Rom 2:6-8; Heb 10:26-27; 1 Jn 1:5-9; 1 Jn 2:3-6; 1 Jn 3:4-10; Matt 7:21-23; Ac 26:18; Rev 21:8,27; Rev 22:14-15; Eph 2:8-10]

 

Send the Light

 

By Charles H. Gabriel, pub. 1888

 

There’s a call comes ringing o’er the restless wave,

“Send the light! Send the light!”

There are souls to rescue, there are souls to save,

Send the light! Send the light!

 

We have heard the Macedonian call today,

“Send the light! Send the light!”

And a golden off’ring at the cross we lay,

Send the light! Send the light!

 

Let us pray that grace may everywhere abound,

“Send the light! Send the light!”

And a Christlike spirit everywhere be found,

Send the light! Send the light!

 

Let us not grow weary in the work of love,

“Send the light! Send the light!”

Let us gather jewels for a crown above,

Send the light! Send the light!

 

Send the light, the blessed Gospel light;

Let it shine from shore to shore!

Send the light, and let its radiant beams

Light the world forevermore!

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Lmn-20yyJY

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