What We Were Made For

Christ suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God. (1 Peter 3:18)

The greatest good of the good news — the gospel — is the enjoyment of fellowship with God himself. This is made explicit here in 1 Peter 3:18 in the phrase “that he might bring us to God.” That’s why Jesus died.

All the other gifts of the gospel exist to make this one possible.

We are forgiven so that our guilt does not keep us away from God.

We are justified so that our condemnation does not keep us away from God.

God is propitiated so that his wrath doesn’t stand between us and God as our Father.

We are given eternal life now, with new bodies in the resurrection, so that we have the capacities for being with God forever and enjoying God to the fullest.

Test your heart. Why do you want forgiveness? Why do you want to be justified? Why do you want the wrath of God to be propitiated? Why do you want eternal life? Is the decisive answer, “Because I want to enjoy God now and forever”?

The gospel-love that God gives is ultimately the gift of himself. This is what we were made for. This is what we lost because of our sin. This is what Christ came to restore.

“In your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore” (Psalm 16:11).

John Piper 

It's canceled - you're free!

BIBLE MEDITATION:

For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus made me free from the law of sin and death. Romans 8:2

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:

I’ve always found airplane flight amazing. Planes are so heavy, yet they fly! The pilot gets behind the controls, moves the throttle, and those great engines begin to roar. And the first thing I know, I’m flying. The law of gravity has no effect to cause me to fall 30,000 feet to earth because I’m in a plane overcoming that law, that downward pull on the airplane and on me.

Has the law of gravity been canceled? No, but another law, the law of aerodynamics, came into effect. A greater power than gravity was keeping me aloft. When you get right with God, the law of sin and death is still there. But for a Christian, there’s a new law—the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus. It sets us free from the law of sin and death.

That doesn’t mean the law of sin and death isn’t pulling on me, I’m not tempted or there’s not that downward pull. But hallelujah, there’s that upward pull, power of life in Christ Jesus.

Now, if I were to step outside the plane by my own choice, I’d go down. The law of gravity is always there. It’s also my choice as a Christian: if I cease to abide in Christ, the law of sin and death is always there. I have to stay in the plane; I have to abide in the Lord Jesus Christ, where there’s no more condemnation, no more control by sin.

ACTION POINT:

As long as you abide in Jesus Christ, you’re free from the law of sin and death. Then it’s your turn to set another captive free with the Good News. Go out and share it with someone today.

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers 

God Forgives and Is Still Just

Nathan the prophet comes to David after his adultery and murder and says, “The Lord also has put away your sin; you shall not die. Nevertheless, because by this deed you have utterly scorned the Lord, the child who is born to you shall die.” (2 Samuel 12:13–14)

This is outrageous. Uriah is dead. Bathsheba is raped. The baby will die. And Nathan says, “The Lord has put away your sin.”

Just like that? David committed adultery. He ordered murder. He lied. He “despised the word of the Lord” (2 Samuel 12:9). He scorned God. And the Lord simply “put away [his] sin”?!

What kind of a righteous Judge is God? You don’t just pass over rape and murder and lying. Righteous judges don’t do that.

This was one of Paul’s greatest theological problems — very different from the ones people struggle with today: How can God forgive sin and still be righteous? Here is what Paul said in Romans 3:25–26:

God put [Christ] forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

In other words, the outrage that we feel when God seems to simply pass over David’s sin would be good outrage if God were simply sweeping David’s sin under the rug. He is not.

God sees, from the time of David, down the centuries to the death of his Son, Jesus Christ, who would die in David’s place, so that David’s faith in God’s mercy and God’s future redeeming work unites David with Christ. And in God’s all-knowing mind, David’s sins are counted as Christ’s sins and Christ’s righteousness is counted as his righteousness, and God justly passes over David’s sin for Christ’s sake.

The death of the Son of God is outrageous enough, and the glory of God that it upholds is great enough, that God is vindicated in passing over David’s adultery and murder and lying. And ours.

And so God maintains his perfect righteousness and justice while at the same time showing mercy to those who have faith in Jesus, no matter how many or how monstrous their sins. This is unspeakably good news.

John Piper

Are you just gathering facts?

BIBLE MEDITATION:

For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you through His poverty might be rich. 2 Corinthians 8:9

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:

Years ago my wife gave me a little card to carry in my billfold. On it she had written her dress size, shoe size, glove size and more. That was nice to have so I could know all about her when I went to do some shopping. But it didn’t provide much companionship or encouragement when I was away from her.

It’s one thing to have the facts about Jesus, it’s another thing to have a relationship with Jesus.

ACTION POINT:

Do you know Jesus...really know Him? Or are you just gathering facts about Him?

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers 

Three Examples of How Faith Fulfills Good Resolves

To this end we always pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his calling and may fulfill every resolve for good and every work of faith by his power. (2 Thessalonians 1:11)

When Paul says that God fulfills our good resolves by his power through faith (he calls our acts “works of faith”), he means that we defeat sin and we do righteousness by faith, that is, by being satisfied with all that God promises to be for us in Christ in the next five minutes, five months, five decades, and into eternity.

Here are three examples of how this might look in your life:

If you set your heart to give sacrificially and generously, the power of God to fulfill this resolve will come to you as you trust his future grace in the promise, “My God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:19). And the promise, “Whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully” (2 Corinthians 9:6). And the promise, “God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work” (2 Corinthians 9:8).

If you set your heart to renounce pornography, the power of God to fulfill this resolve will come to you as you trust his future grace in the promise, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8). “It is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell” (Matthew 5:29). Much better. Wonderfully better. All-satisfyingly better.

And if you set your heart to speak out for Christ when the opportunity comes, the power of God to fulfill this resolve will come to you as you trust his future grace in the promise, “Do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say, for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour” (Matthew 10:19).

May God increase our daily faith in the precious promises of God — promises of his inexhaustible, blood-bought, Christ-exalting future grace.

John Piper 

Can you pick and choose what parts of Jesus you want?

BIBLE MEDITATION:

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. Romans 10:9

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:

Have you ever assumed salvation was like a cafeteria where you can pick and choose the aspects of Jesus you want? “I’ll have a little Savior hood, but no Lordship today, please.” If Jesus is not your Lord, Jesus is not your Savior. What’s the difference?

Well, suppose I perform a wedding ceremony and say to the young man, “Would you take Susan to be your lawfully wedded wife?” And he responds, “Well, I’ll take Susan as housekeeper.” Then I ask her, “Would you take John to be your lawfully wedded husband?” And she says, “Well, I’ll take him as provider.” No, you see, you don't take him as anything, you take him. You take her and all that comes with her.

I want to tell you dear friend, one of the things that comes with Jesus is His Lordship. You don't just take Him as “something.” Now, He happens to be Savior, He is indeed Savior, but the Bible says “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.” See Jesus for who He is, and you’ll discover that as Savior He is also Lord. What does it mean when I take Jesus Christ as Lord? It means entire submission to Him.

ACTION POINT:

We can’t pick and choose what we want from Jesus. We take Jesus as Lord over all! Is Jesus Christ the Lord of every area of your life? Examine your life—your finances, your relationships, your hopes and dreams. Have you turned everything over to Jesus Christ?

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers 

My Soul Thirsts for God

As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God? (Psalm 42:1–2)

What makes this so beautiful and so crucial for us is that he is not thirsting mainly for relief from his threatening circumstances. He is not thirsting mainly for escape from his enemies or for their destruction.

It’s not wrong to want relief, and to pray for it. It is sometimes right to pray for the defeat of enemies. But more important than any of that is God himself.

When we think and feel with God in the Psalms, this is the main result: We come to love God, and we want to see God and be with God and be satisfied in admiring and exulting in God.

A likely translation of the end of verse 2 is: “When will I come and see the face of God?” The final answer to that question was given in John 14:9 and 2 Corinthians 4:4. Jesus said, “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father.” And Paul said that when we are converted to Christ we see “the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.”

When we see the face of Christ, we see the face of God. And we see the glory of the face of Christ, Paul says in 2 Corinthians 4:4 and 6, when we hear the story of the gospel of his death and resurrection. He calls it “the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.” Or (verse 6): “the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”

May the Lord increase your hunger and your thirst to see the face of God. And may he grant your desire, even today, through the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

John Piper