Conditions for Conquest
Notes
Transcript
Gratitude
Pastoral Prayer: Mike and Susan Mills
Illumination
20 “Behold, I am going to send an angel before you to guard you along the way and to bring you into the place which I have prepared. 21 “Be on your guard before him and obey his voice; do not be rebellious toward him, for he will not pardon your transgression, since My name is in him. 22 “But if you truly obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. 23 “For My angel will go before you and bring you in to the land of the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites; and I will completely destroy them. 24 “You shall not worship their gods, nor serve them, nor do according to their deeds; but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their sacred pillars in pieces. 25 “But you shall serve the Lord your God, and He will bless your bread and your water; and I will remove sickness from your midst. 26 “There shall be no one miscarrying or barren in your land; I will fulfill the number of your days. 27 “I will send My terror ahead of you, and throw into confusion all the people among whom you come, and I will make all your enemies turn their backs to you. 28 “I will send hornets ahead of you so that they will drive out the Hivites, the Canaanites, and the Hittites before you. 29 “I will not drive them out before you in a single year, that the land may not become desolate and the beasts of the field become too numerous for you. 30 “I will drive them out before you little by little, until you become fruitful and take possession of the land. 31 “I will fix your boundary from the Red Sea to the sea of the Philistines, and from the wilderness to the River Euphrates; for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and you will drive them out before you. 32 “You shall make no covenant with them or with their gods. 33 “They shall not live in your land, because they will make you sin against Me; for if you serve their gods, it will surely be a snare to you.”
Introduction
Generally speaking before we commit to something we want to look at the terms of the agreement. Before we go to take a class, we look at the syllabus to see what is going to be required of us. How many hours of sleep am i going to lose to get an A in this class? Before we agree to that car payment, or a house payment, or a lease we generally look at the terms and conditions. What is this going to cost me? Are there fees associated... so on and so forth. It doesn’t even have to be as formal as that. Back in college I had a friend ask me if I wanted to run a half marathon with him. On the front end of something like that, I thought I understood what the conditions of this commitment were. It was pretty simple: 13.1 miles. Simple as that. I know what I’m getting myself into… I didn’t know what I was getting myself into. I failed to train like I should have and about 7 miles in I started to realize the nature of the commitment I made. Around mile 11 things started getting pretty rough. I finished, but using the stairs was painful for a few days. Terms and conditions generally look approachable on the front end, its as easy as a checked box or a signature on the dotted line, but it’s often not until we’re in the middle of the class, or the middle of the race that we realize what we’ve gotten ourselves into.
For the past three chapters or so God has been laying out the terms of the covenant that the people of Israel are to keep and we’re approaching a dotted line, We’ll see next week the people gather together and sign that dotted line with the words, “All that the LORD has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient!” But before we get there we get a summary of God’s plan for His people and the terms associated with that plan. God reminds them of the certainty of His promise. According the unshaking promise given to Abraham, his descendants will be brought into the land! God will be faithful to His commitments according to the covenant given to Abraham, but what follows asks, “Will Israel be faithful to the covenant they have with God?” Will they be faithful to obey - to cultivate and keep the land which they have been given in accord with God’s instructions. These terms are not unfamiliar to us if we look back to Genesis. Adam too was placed in a land to be kept. Terms were given to him as well: obedience to the LORD’s commands, cultivation, protection. And that same question arises from the very first pages of scripture, “Will Adam be faithful to the terms he has with God?” Will he go on to enjoy the blessings of the land which he has been given? Again, we can ask the same question of Israel: Will they go on to enjoy the blessings of the land which they have been given? In our text this morning there are extraordinary blessings laid out for the people of Israel should they keep this covenant. The land will be protected from the warring nations around them; There will be food, water, health, multiplication of children. The epitome of cultivation and protection assured them if they keep their covenant with God, much like Adam. You can understand the eagerness with which they might pick up that pen and sign, yet in years to come we’ll see Israel at mile 2. Forget mile 11. Two miles in, the terms of that covenant really come to bear. It’s not long into the Old Testament narrative that the first time reader must begin to wonder, “How will Israel ever be blessed?” How will God bring about this promise of blessing given to Abraham?
As the church today we have the benefit of looking back to Christ and seeing the fulfillment of that promise given to Abraham, but we still need to wrestle with a couple challenges we encounter as the church. We might be inclined to ask, “Where is my blessing?” With a world hostile to our beliefs right at our door and a longing for fruitfulness of one kind or another, we should be asking, “Where do we, the church, find our hope of blessing in a dark and broken world?” By the end of our time I’d like us to see that the New Covenant we’ve been given may not appear prosperous on the outside or promise earthly blessings like we see here, but it’s truly a more glorious covenant with extraordinary blessings in Christ yet to come.
From our entry into the kingdom to the ongoing and eternal blessing we receive as citizens of heaven, it’s all secured for us through our faith in the faithfulness of Christ.
From our entry into the kingdom to the ongoing and eternal blessing we receive as citizens of heaven, it’s all secured for us through our faith in the faithfulness of Christ.
A Certain Entry
Covenant Conditions
Blessings of Conquest
If you look closely at the text there’s an interesting structure to it. It’s in an ABCABC format. Our first point being A, our second point being B and our final point being C. So for each point this morning I’ll be pointing out two sections that won’t be next to each other given the structure of the text. I’ll point those out as we go.
A Certain Entry (vs. 20, 23)
A Certain Entry (vs. 20, 23)
20 “Behold, I am going to send an angel before you to guard you along the way and to bring you into the place which I have prepared.
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23 “For My angel will go before you and bring you in to the land of the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites; and I will completely destroy them.
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You can tell we’re coming to a turning point in the text simply by the pronoun in verse 20: “I” … For the past three chapters the emphasis from God has been “you.” You shall, You shall, You shall… We’ll get there even here, but when we start talking about the people entering in the land, God points to Himself first. “I am going to send an angel, to guard you and bring you into that place that’s been prepared for you.” “My angel will go before you and bring you into the land...” There’s is nothing that Israel can do to keep God from fulfilling His promise!
This work of bringing the people into the land goes all the way back to Abraham in Genesis 12
1 Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go forth from your country, And from your relatives And from your father’s house, To the land which I will show you; 2 And I will make you a great nation, And I will bless you, And make your name great; And so you shall be a blessing; 3 And I will bless those who bless you, And the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.”
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6 Abram passed through the land as far as the site of Shechem, to the oak of Moreh. Now the Canaanite was then in the land. 7 The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your descendants I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the Lord who had appeared to him.
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There’s no question as to whether God will bring this about! He reiterates the same commitment in chapter 15 to Abraham again and then later to his son Isaac, and then to his grandson Jacob. God will give the sons of Abraham, the land of Canaan! They will be made into a great nation! His descendants will be blessed to the degree that all the nations will be blessed through the offspring of Abraham.
If we were to stand in Abrahams shoes for a moment we can look forward with a certain hope of a promised land sure to be delivered to our descendants because God is going to do it! God’s word is sure! It is reliable, it is always true. If God said it, that settles it. Not even the weakness and sin of Israel that is just around the corner will keep God from bringing them into the land. Not even their doubt as they finally looked upon the land could keep God from fulfilling His promises. They would be delayed because of their sin and unbelief, but God’s promises are sure and they will be brought to completion in spite of the sinful heart of men, the brokenness of the world, and all the workings of the devil. We serve an almighty God who is true to His Word. That is what we cling to in times of uncertainty! What did God say? What did the creator of heaven and earth say he would do? What did my Savior and Lord say He would do? We must cling to His promise and His perfect character and trust Him with the rest. The Lord may not provide for us how we think he should. He may not provide for us when we want Him to, but He will provide according to His Word.
As we look at our passage this morning we can see a bit of the “how” in how God will keep his promises: He’s taking things into His own hands in order to bring about His promises. This task is not fundamentally left to the people. It’s not fundamentally left to Moses or even Joshua as much as they will be entrusted to lead them, God promises that an angel will come. He is the one who will guard them and bring them into the land.
We should pause here a moment. Who is this angel? Firstly, the Hebrew word ‘angel’ as it appears in the text may immediately bring pictures into our heads. White robes, wings, perhaps somewhat like the depictions we have around Christmas time. In a strictly biblical understanding though, angel just means messenger.
It’s not an unfaithful reading to put the text this way: “I am going to send a messenger before you.” or “My messenger will go before you and bring you in...”
Why is this important? I believe if we step back and look at this angel of the Lord and how he continues to appear in the text, we’ll see he is more than just an angel. There’s speculation on this matter, but I believe this “messenger” is actually Christ Himself. God Himself appearing before Israel fulfilling His promises.
If you’ll follow me for just a moment, I believe this becomes clear.
We’ve already seen in the Exodus narrative an angel of the Lord appearing in a cloud of smoke and a pillar of fire, but this “messenger” is referred to as God Himself and also a “messenger” of God or angel of God.
21 The Lord was going before them in a pillar of cloud by day to lead them on the way, and in a pillar of fire by night to give them light, that they might travel by day and by night.
Later on in the same narrative.
19 The angel of God, who had been going before the camp of Israel, moved and went behind them; and the pillar of cloud moved from before them and stood behind them.
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The LORD, Yahweh, God Himself is the one going before and behind His people, protecting them and bringing them out. Just like God has said He would do in the promised land. He’s already done it, He will do it again. Perhaps even more striking is Joshua’s encounter with this “messenger”.
13 Now it came about when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, a man was standing opposite him with his sword drawn in his hand, and Joshua went to him and said to him, “Are you for us or for our adversaries?” 14 He said, “No; rather I indeed come now as captain of the host of the Lord.” And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and bowed down, and said to him, “What has my lord to say to his servant?” 15 The captain of the Lord’s host said to Joshua, “Remove your sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy.” And Joshua did so.
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This is no ordinary angel! No angelic being over the course of all of Scripture allows any man to bow before them. No ordinary angel makes the ground around them holy like Moses before the burning bush. Only God Himself, is deserving of the allegiance of men. Only God is worthy of the worship of men. Only God Himself sanctifies even the ground around Him demanding men to remove their sandals. It is Christ Himself who commands the armies of heaven in Revelation as Lord of hosts.
I hope this would be more than a neat observation, because I believe it speaks to God’s character and plan of salvation evidenced from the very beginning in the book of Exodus.
I appreciate how Calvin put it, “...as often as He [Christ] appeared to the ancient people He gave an indication of His future mission.”
Before we even address the mission, let’s recognize first, we worship and serve a trinitarian God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. That is not a New Testament idea. We do not need to wait until Matthew to see Christ, He is anticipated as Messiah in the Old Testament, but I believe He is active and present in His plan of redemption as seen here. The Father, the Son, and Holy Spirit are active throughout the whole of Scripture fulfilling God’s covenant promises to His people. Even here and especially in Christ’s coming.
For now though, not even the earthly conquering of the land is left to the people. No, it is God Himself who ushers His people into the kingdom according to His promises.
We see this fulfillment towards the end of Joshua.
43 So the Lord gave Israel all the land which He had sworn to give to their fathers, and they possessed it and lived in it. 44 And the Lord gave them rest on every side, according to all that He had sworn to their fathers, and no one of all their enemies stood before them; the Lord gave all their enemies into their hand. 45 Not one of the good promises which the Lord had made to the house of Israel failed; all came to pass.
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The LORD gave… The LORD gave… The LORD gave… and none of His promises failed.. all came to pass.
The wonderful news is that nothing has changed. We too have great and precious promises regarding our entrance into the kingdom.
13 For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
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When we find ourselves much like Israel, sojourners and strangers in a foreign land awaiting our entrance into the glories of that eternal kingdom, who do we look to bring us into the kingdom? We must first look back and see the angel of God going behind and before us ushering us out of slavery to sin. Christ Himself, has transferred us out of the kingdom of darkness by His work of salvation. We can acknowledge the roles of great men like Moses, Aaron, and Joshua, but at the end of the day it is God who saves. It is Christ who has come to accomplish salvation and usher in a kingdom that is His church, and it is Christ who will come again to gather his elect.
God speaks of a place prepared for His people to which he will bring His people by means of His angel. Jesus gives us that exact hope when he speaks to His disciples.
2 “In My Father’s house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. 3 “If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am, there you may be also.
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He’s brought us out, we are now citizens of that glorious kingdom as sojourners and strangers not yet home, yet the work of Christ continues. He will come again to receive us to Himself by the word of His promise. It is a sure hope, but it is a hope we wait for.
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As certain as this deliverance into the kingdom of Israel is, there are conditions which God establishes with the people of Israel. After they have entered the promised land, it is entrusted to Israel to cultivate and keep the land through obedience to God much like Adam.
Covenant Conditions (vs. 21-22, 24-25)
Covenant Conditions (vs. 21-22, 24-25)
21 “Be on your guard before him and obey his voice; do not be rebellious toward him, for he will not pardon your transgression, since My name is in him. 22 “But if you truly obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries.
...
24 “You shall not worship their gods, nor serve them, nor do according to their deeds; but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their sacred pillars in pieces. 25 “But you shall serve the Lord your God, and He will bless your bread and your water; and I will remove sickness from your midst.
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The divine nature of this messenger is only emphasized here in these following verses. His voice is to be obeyed like God’s voice. He has the authority to judge according to their transgressions, and the name of God is in Him. Again, I believe we must see Christ here bearing the name and authority of God before the people of Israel and holding them to account in a way that only God Himself can.
What exactly is expected of the people?
Obedience and fidelity to this messenger. They will obey him!
An abandonment of all idolatry found in the land. All the evil practices and idols shall be utterly overthrown and physically destroyed.
Faithfulness to God and a rejection of false gods. Cultivate a proper worship of God, “fill with good”. Keep the land from false gods. “remove the dirt/ remove the evil”.
It sounds pretty straightforward doesn’t it, and yet it carries serious consequences if they do not obey.
“he will not pardon your transgression”
The expectation of obedience and fidelity given to Adam were straightforward too,
Genesis 2:17
17 but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat,
and yet there too, the consequences were dire.
for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.”
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If you were to survey the Mosaic covenant and the conditions that are set before the people it could be summarized in this way.
“Do this and you will live, Don’t do this and you will die.”
put another way:
“Obey and you will be blessed. Disobey and you will be cursed.”
When Moses seeks to summarize the whole of the covenant at the end of Deuteronomy before they enter they land they are promised he states this explicitly.
15 “See, I have set before you today life and prosperity, and death and adversity; 16 in that I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in His ways and to keep His commandments and His statutes and His judgments, that you may live and multiply, and that the Lord your God may bless you in the land where you are entering to possess it. 17 “But if your heart turns away and you will not obey, but are drawn away and worship other gods and serve them, 18 I declare to you today that you shall surely perish. You will not prolong your days in the land where you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess it.
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The ongoing blessings of the garden, the ongoing blessings of the promised land are conditioned upon the faithfulness of the people of God. Let’s realize this is more than a common grace for the people of Israel.
We can recognize today that if we live according to God’s created order, things will go better for us. Whether someone is a Christian or not, if they refrain from drunkenness, commit themselves to one spouse for all of life in marriage, and aren’t behaving like a criminal, life is going to go better for them. That’s not what’s going on here. God is establishing a unique relationship with the people of Israel as a holy people such that if they disobey God’s law, if they live like the world, God is going to actively punish them with his own hand. “They’re not going to be left to their own devices to hopefully learn their lesson. God is going to bring curses upon His people in their disobedience. He’s also going to bring blessings by his own hand in a particular way when they obey.
We’ll look at those blessings more in a moment, but in these few verses we get a sample of God’s active work to bless His people in their obedience. He will be an enemy to their enemies. He’s going to give them food, water, and remove sickness from among them.
Unfortunately, we don’t need to go very far into the book of Judges to see how Israel is going to cultivate and keep the land. God has kept his promises, the angel of the Lord openly declares his faithfulness to the people to bring them into the land, yet are the people found faithful?
They did what was right in their own eyes. They forsook the covenant they made and would come to experience many of the curses which Moses warned them of.
The narrative continues and David comes. The people are finally led into faithfulness and they experience the blessing of that faithfulness all the way through Solomon’s reign… Until the kingdom is split, and Jeroboam’s idolatry leads the people astray. God ultimately raises up the foes of Israel and Judah to bring them into exile for their disobedience.
There’s a looming question over the whole of the Old Testament, “How can a sinful people find their blessing in the conditions of the covenant?”
How are these conditions of faithfulness going to be met? How are God’s people ever going to prosper in the land?
We must go back to a promise which God Himself will fulfill.
When God gave His promise to Abraham that his descendants will enter the land, he also gave a promise of blessing and tells us how.
“In your seed, all the nations of the earth will be blessed...”
Galatians helps us to see this seed which God promises is Christ Himself. It’s through one obedient, faithful descendant that blessing will be secured, the gift of life for those who believe. Jesus is the faithful one. Jesus is the obedient one. Jesus is the one through whom the promise of life and blessing comes. Jesus is the mediator of the New Covenant through which we are given the promise of an eternal inheritance (Hebrews 9:15) We cannot overlook Christ and His covenant which we celebrate in the Lord’s Supper this morning. That is the assurance of our blessing! That is our assurance of life!
There is no shortage of false religions and false gospels in the world who try to say otherwise.
The prosperity gospel is one prominent example in modern America.
It works to ignore Christ and present the promise of earthly blessings if only we have enough faith. If only we’re faithful enough. It turns faith into a work and accuses the individual of sin when bad things happen. If life is hard there must be sin somewhere. If life is hard you clearly need more faith. If life is difficult, be more faithful. If you want the blessings and comforts of life, be faithful in these areas.
Let’s recognize the issues here that are brought to light with Scripture.
Christ has not reimposed the Mosaic covenant onto the church. He’s fulfilled it. Our assurance of blessing and entrance into glory is not rooted in our faithfulness. The gospel is not: do this and you will live. The gospel is Christ has done it so you may live through faith.
That doesn’t mean we are not called to faithfulness. The prosperity gospel puts faithfulness before blessings. The Christian gospel puts faithfulness after our greatest blessings. Now we can recognize that if we are unfaithful we can deprive ourselves of certain blessings, but at the end of the day our faithfulness does not secure our position before God. The foundation and source of our life abundant is in Christ. Christian faithfulness is an act of devotion to God who has saved us and promises to return for us. It is a faith filled faithfulness!
The prosperity gospel also redefines what our blessings are as Christians.
Our last point.
Blessings of Conquest (vs. 23, 26-33)
Blessings of Conquest (vs. 23, 26-33)
23 “For My angel will go before you and bring you in to the land of the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites; and I will completely destroy them.
26 “There shall be no one miscarrying or barren in your land; I will fulfill the number of your days. 27 “I will send My terror ahead of you, and throw into confusion all the people among whom you come, and I will make all your enemies turn their backs to you. 28 “I will send hornets ahead of you so that they will drive out the Hivites, the Canaanites, and the Hittites before you. 29 “I will not drive them out before you in a single year, that the land may not become desolate and the beasts of the field become too numerous for you. 30 “I will drive them out before you little by little, until you become fruitful and take possession of the land. 31 “I will fix your boundary from the Red Sea to the sea of the Philistines, and from the wilderness to the River Euphrates; for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and you will drive them out before you. 32 “You shall make no covenant with them or with their gods. 33 “They shall not live in your land, because they will make you sin against Me; for if you serve their gods, it will surely be a snare to you.”
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You can see the nature of the blessings God provides is largely oriented toward the enemies that are before them. There’s an assurance of ongoing victory if they remain faithful to God and reject any agreement or covenant with this idolatrous people. Their enemies will be completely destroyed. God’s going to even use things like hornets to drive out Israel’s enemies. They won’t even have to go into battle at times.
In addition to their victory, they’re going to have a secure land. The assurance of offspring “There shall be no one miscarrying or barren in your land”. And even their daily meals will be assured them, and they will be free from sickness. All this if they are faithful.
When we look at the book Exodus we need to recognize that God is dealing with His people in a unique way for a particular time, and in Christ’s coming the nature of the kingdom looks different!
If we fail to recognize that distinction we start asking some questions.
Why am I being persecuted? Was I not faithful? Isn’t God supposed to take care of my adversaries?
Why don’t I have a house or land to call my own? Have I not been faithful? Isn’t God supposed to give me a land?
Why did we have to endure a miscarriage or infertility? Have I not been faithful? Isn’t God supposed to bless us with children?
Why is it difficult to pay the bills? Why have I have been given this debilitating sickness? Why do I have this disability? Why do I suffer?
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Scripture makes it very clear, in the new covenant, the church experiences blessings differently. God’s favor toward us is not expressed in material blessings all the time.
35 Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 36 Just as it is written, “For Your sake we are being put to death all day long; We were considered as sheep to be slaughtered.” 37 But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
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This is a uniquely Christian way of reasoning! In tribulation we are loved! In distress we are loved! In persecution we are loved! In famine we are loved! In nakedness, peril and sword we are loved! All these things may very well come about and not because we did anything wrong! In fact they will likely come about because we have been faithful.
It’s in this faithfulness to persevere with Christ in suffering that Paul says “in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us.
“Paul that doesn’t feel like conquering!”
Nakedness, hunger, and persecution… conquering. How? I’ll admit, I like the sounds of my adversaries fleeing before me more than this, and yet Paul tells us this is what it looks like to conquer.
For us blessing looks different than Israel. It’s more difficult on the outside. It looks more like failure and humiliation from the outside yet it is conquering because we are united with Christ the one who loved us and redeemed us. For a time we are sojourners and strangers in a foreign land rejected by the world, but it’s precisely because we are citizens of an eternal kingdom, heirs with Christ of the glory to be received in eternity that the world hates us.
Christ Himself makes this clear from the very onset of His ministry!
The very first thing he does is go out into the wilderness and accomplishes what neither Adam nor Israel could do. He resists temptation by faithfully preserving the worship of God, and resisting the idolatry of the devil. Exactly what Israel was supposed to do, Christ did! Then he goes up onto the mountain to preach like Moses did and starts by defining what blessing looks like in the Kingdom of Heaven.
3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
10 “Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 “Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me. 12 “Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great; for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
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You better believe the Jews in that audience were thinking, “That sounds a little different than what Moses said!”
“I thought blessing was supposed to look like land, wealth, conquering enemies, and no more sickness.”
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The New Covenant and the nature of the church is distinct from the Old and the nature of Israel, but the New is a better covenant as Hebrews says. To have Christ and Christ alone is a treasure
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At the end of the day if blessing in this life becomes the good news then we risk distancing ourselves from the fellowship of Christ. To walk with Him, to be reviled because of Him, to be persecuted for the sake of righteousness, that’s blessedness in the words of Christ!
Some may say? Do we then seek out persecution? No.
Are we calling suffering good? No.
Jesus gave clear instructions to avoid persecution at times. If we have opportunity for freedom and well-being let’s take it, but let’s make sure it’s not the gospel! What Jesus is saying is that fellowship with Him is our reward! When we walk with Him in this life we will be rewarded in heaven for that! And the nature of walking with Christ in a broken world often looks like being reviled, being rejected, being persecuted. We have a unique experience as Americans! We are the minority in the grand scheme of church history. Today there are Christians in Nigeria whose lives are in danger because of their faith. There are Christians who have lost loved ones because of their faith. Christ in the words of Scripture speaks to these in light of the gospel and says, “You are blessed because you are unwaveringly walking with Christ in faith even through suffering and trial.”
7 But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. 8 More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, 9 and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, 10 that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death;
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For Paul the greatest of blessings is to know Christ! Every blessing he may have been entitled to he counted it rubbish for the sake of Christ. He was a faithful Jew in many respects. According to the law he should have been among the most blessed of his piers. Some of us may experience those wonderful blessings in this life! May we praise God for them. Some of us may live long lives of health and prosperity. Might we thank God for that, but might we all be found clinging to that greatest blessing that is Christ Himself even if it means death and the loss of all earthly blessings knowing there is a treasure awaiting us in heaven.
Two closing thoughts for us.
Just because we experience loss or trial or pain doesn’t mean we’ve done something wrong. We can put that to rest. In this life we will have trouble, but that doesn’t mean the love of Christ has been exhausted or removed from us. He said He will never leave us nor forsake us. He is the faithful one, and if God said it, that settles it.
What are we clinging to? Where is blessing really found? Is it found in a certain amount of effort in this life? Our greatest blessing is Christ Himself and we await the fullness of that blessing. Let’s be found faithful as we wait, and in that waiting might we cling to Christ and a reward we won’t fully see in this life?
Devotion:
Local Ministry: One Family Church
Fred Clement: His wife and 4 boys. Bi-vocational ministry. Continued provision for their family and ministry at One Family Church.
International: The Church in Israel
In the midst of conflict and war there’s a longing for peace. We pray you would provide peace for the nation of Israel and the church there, but even more so would you use the church to extend the blessing of Christ. For those who are faithful to study and read your law I pray that they too would see the plan of salvation you always had for your people. Open their eyes to the salvation of Christ through the witness of the church.
If you are a member of this church, or a baptized member of another evangelical church in good standing, where you hear the same gospel preached that you hear in this church, then you are welcome to join us at the Lord’s Table.
