Talk of JESUS .com

Tag: forgiveness

  • A Personal God – Jesus

    A Personal God – Jesus

    Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord God is an everlasting rock. – Isaiah 26:4 ESV

    … and he would have given you living water.” – John 4:10b

    “I and the Father are one.” – John 10:30

    Setting aside for a moment your personal preferences for worshiping God; whether ritualistic routine, overflowing emotion, singing, shouting, standing, sitting, hands held up, heads bowed low, knees on the floor or feet off the ground; on the scriptural presumption that Jesus and God are one, let us examine two things:

    The Person of Jesus and His personal mission for each of us.

    Before Christ became God in Person on this earth as the Son of Man, some worshiped God and some worshiped worship. Some worshiped the Law, some worshiped family and forefathers above the Living God. Though Moses stood in the Presence of the Living God, the people worshiped God only in the fear and emotion of the moment.

    Exodus 20:

    18 Now when all the people saw the thunder and the flashes of lightning and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking, the people were afraid and trembled, and they stood far off 19 and said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, lest we die.” 20 Moses said to the people, “Do not fear, for God has come to test you, that the fear of him may be before you, that you may not sin.” 21 The people stood far off, while Moses drew near to the thick darkness where God was.

    22 And the Lord said to Moses, “Thus you shall say to the people of Israel: ‘You have seen for yourselves that I have talked with you from heaven.

    Followers feared Moses only when he reflected the glory of God, yet would not obey the commands given to Moses by the God they feared.

    The Prophets spoke God’s word and demonstrated the truth of God’s refining exhortations. Generation after generation, God’s worshipers assumed a posture of disobedience and self-righteousness; for by their witness they forgot the fear of God. By their witness they failed to please the LORD with the same love and compassion the LORD had shown them from generation to generation.

    The worshipers of God would not listen to Moses. The worshipers of God would not listen to the Prophets.

    Therefore, God intervened in time in the Person of Christ Jesus to redeem a sinful world from the futility of death and the inevitability of judgment.

    Jesus Christ lived in Perfect righteousness on the earth. NO man of any religion on the earth has lived in the righteousness of Christ. Men of every era have lived agendas of purpose for the earthly agendas of man; not the will of God for a Heavenly Kingdom.

    Jesus did not come into the world for worship of holy mothers or ancient fathers. Jesus did not come into the world to win a war by peaceful protest or by sword. Jesus did not come into the world to work miracles to impress or heal men who will die.

    The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners…

    1 Timothy 1:15a

    Jesus became the sacrifice to God for the redemption of sin – sins you and I have committed in God’s Holy presence.

    The gospels testify to the glory of Christ Jesus, the Word of His instruction and the Life of His own witness.

    Our God is a Personal God and He IS present in the Person of Jesus Christ.

    By the perfect and sinless example of Jesus Christ we have assurance of forgiveness for our many sins and eternal life for our soul, which does long for the embrace of God through the love of His perfection.

    Fear the God Who IS. Give thanks to the One who has formed your flesh and summons your soul.

    Jesus Christ was witnessed by the Apostles, including Paul who was blinded by His presence. Jesus Christ was witnessed by disciples who believed (as well as those who refused to follow Him).

    The Apostles stood and sat and ate in the presence of the Person of Jesus from day to day and after the resurrection of His crucified body. They are witness to the Person of God in Him.

    And they were filled with great fear and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?” – Mark 4:41

    Acts 9 (excerpt) … and suddenly a light from heaven shone around him. 4 And falling to the ground he heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” 5 And he said, “Who are you, Lord?” And he said, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. 6 But rise and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do.” 7 The men who were traveling with him stood speechless, hearing the voice but seeing no one. 8 Saul rose from the ground, and although his eyes were opened, he saw nothing.

    God and Jesus pursue sinners personally – sinners like you and me.

    Jesus taught us how to live as a perfect son (which I am not) and how to approach God as a perfect father (which I am not). We are neither perfect son nor father, perfect daughter nor mother; yet because Christ Jesus has taken our sin from us, He presents us to God the Father as blameless to do the will of our Father and Lord, as He would have done ‘on earth, as it is in Heaven.’

    Our Personal God and Father has sent Himself in His only Son, Christ Jesus, to us; as example for a personal obedience to His will on earth in this day and until the day He has appointed for our finished work, the witness of His love, to complete His purpose for our mortal life.

    In Christ Jesus, our Lord, my soul stands before God and man as witness to hope eternal and witness to eternal life daily.

    In you, our Lord has placed an eternal voice and temporal call to a personal relationship of love to fulfill His purpose for your mortal life on this earth.

    God has something He has sent your soul here to do in the flesh. The Person of God has a mission just for you.

    Will you do it?

    Will you listen to God our Father and Christ Jesus our Lord?

    To be continued, God willing

  • After the Resurrection

    After the Resurrection

    John 21:14 This was now the third time that Jesus was revealed to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.

    My purpose here is not to convince you of proof of the resurrection, but to convict you with the command of our our risen Lord.

    Mark 16:15 And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation.

    16 Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned…”

    We would do well to study all of the Gospel and what Christ Jesus, our Lord, has commanded His servants, those saved by the Blood of the Cross and sent into all the world as witness of God’s compassionate love for sinners like us.

    Now none of the disciples dared ask him, “Who are you?” They knew it was the Lord.

    13 Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and so with the fish. 14 This was now the third time that Jesus was revealed to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.

    Dr. Luke, historian recording his gospel and the Acts of the Apostles from the first hand testimonies of Peter and the Apostles probably records this with the most details:

    Luke 24: 

    Jesus Appears to His Disciples

    36 As they were talking about these things, Jesus himself stood among them, and said to them, “Peace to you!”

    37 But they were startled and frightened and thought they saw a spirit.

    38 And he said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? 39 See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.”

    40 And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. 41 And while they still disbelieved for joy and were marveling, he said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?” 42 They gave him a piece of broiled fish, 43 and he took it and ate before them.

    44 Then he said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.”

    Here is a lesson in Scripture from our risen Lord I would have liked to have heard.

    Trust that Luke and the other scribes of the Gospel have accurately recorded much of this as part of what we have read from the life of Jesus Christ prior to the Crucifixion and Resurrection.

    45 Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, 46 and said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, 47 and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.

    48 You are witnesses of these things.

    One witness betrayed, then hung himself. Condemned to Hell, Judas was not present for these commands.

    One witness to the dark night of Jesus’ trial did not flee, but remained near enough to have denied Jesus as His lord three times. John is witness of Jesus forgiving Peter, before sending Peter to follow in His way to the Cross.

    thomasOne witness had to place his hand in the wounds of the resurrected body of Jesus.

    But we would not have been any less skeptical than Thomas, who was also later martyred for His witness of these things.

     

    Matthew 28:19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.

    And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

  • GOD! Why have you forsaken me?

    My God, my God, why have you forsaken me!?

    The familiar words from Psalm 22 must have still been ringing in the ears of the mourners at the Cross.

    Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning?
    2 O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer,
    and by night, but I find no rest.

    The lament must have weighed as heavy on their hearts as Romans rolled the stone to seal a new tomb where Jesus’ body lay wrapped in blood-stained linens of embalmment.

    6 But I am a worm and not a man,
    scorned by mankind and despised by the people.
    7 All who see me mock me;
    they make mouths at me; they wag their heads;
    8 “He trusts in the Lord; let him deliver him;
    let him rescue him, for he delights in him!”

    How they must have wept bitterly for our Lord from beyond the Tomb on this Holy Sabbath of the Passover.

    Jesus is dead! Crucified on a Cross. His broken body cursed by God.

    The Passover Seder

      “why is this night different from all other nights?” 

    Jews long ago escaped from the darkness of their slavery to Egypt, only to have Jerusalem enslaved to Rome.

    All are enslaved by sin, Jew and Roman alike… until this night.

    For the Passover Lamb of Sacrifice has been killed for our sins.

    The Body of Jesus Christ lay in a grave beyond an immovable stone and Roman Guards.

    The Body of Christ Jesus… wrapped in the linens of death, stained with the blood of our sins…

    My GOD! My GOD! Why have YOU forsaken me?

    For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. – 2 Corinthians 5:21 ESV

    To be continued…

    Tomorrow is Resurrection Sunday

    EASTER!

    Worship Christ Jesus, who died for your sins.