Tuesday, June 20, 2006

Christ's Suffering and Our Privelege

I was just studying John 8 for a Bible study I've been doing and I was really struck by verse 29. I'll just post my notes that I took on this portion:

God is always with Christ and never leaves Him. But this is because of something: For Christ always does what is pleasing to God. This tells us two things:
1. God will never leave us if we always do what is pleasing. This has two aspects:
a. We have been covered in Christ's righteousness (II Cor. 5:21) so we are always pleasing to God in a way and can never lose our salvation
b. We can lose fellowship for a time but we can draw near to Him by humbling ourselves (James 4:6-10), which is pleasing to God.
So we can never lose our salvation but we must still act in a manner pleasing to God in order to maintain our fellowship with Him.

2. This demonstrates the awfulness of Christ's death. Because He bore our sins God for sook Him, breaking that nearness. This would have been the worst part of His death. It meant that Christ was no longer pleasing to God in that moment because of our sin. That is the price Jesus bore to bring us to God and to behold and magnify His glory. Never forget this. How horrible this must have been. We cannot fathom it.

Never forget the sacrifice of Christ and the privelege that He bought for us.
"Surely our griefs He Himself bore, and our sorrows He carried; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; but the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him.... But the LORD was pleased to crush Him, putting Him to grief; if He would render Himself as a guilt offering, He will see His offspring, He wil prolong His days, and the good pleasure of the LORD will prosper in His hand. As a result of the anguish of His soul, He will see it and be satisfied; by His knowledge the Righteous One, my Servant, will justify the many, as He will bear their iniquities. Therefore, I will allot Him a portion with the great, and He will divide the booty with the strong; because He poured out Himself to death, and was numbered with the transgressors; yet He Himself bore the sin of many, and interceded for the transgressors." (Isaiah 53:4-6, 10-12)

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