Worthy....
Col. 1:9-14 For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding. [10] And we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, [11] being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and joyfully [12] giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light. [13] For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, [14] in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
We shouldn’t take for granted the forgiveness of our sins….
We should never forget where we came from. The Bible writers frequently describe our previous condition, how we were before we met with Jesus, of being one of darkness. It speaks of being blind, of not knowing the truth, of being unable to see where we are heading. It speaks of things being hidden so that they cannot be seen. It speaks of gloom and despair – and believe me, living in Scotland and experiencing the bleak early mornings it is easy to comprehend the despair that is possible….
But we are no longer there. We have moved out of darkness and into the Kingdom of the Son, the Kingdom of light. Where Jesus is there cannot be any darkness. First he is glorious beyond comparison and the Bible typically describes his glory as incandescent light. Light floods the darkness and overwhelms it. Being in light we can now see the truth, we are given hope rather than despair, and now nothing is hidden.
We need to live as people of the light, here Paul calls it living a life which is worthy of the Lord. Yet we know we cannot do this by ourselves. We may be on the way to becoming saints, but we are not yet perfect, and we never will be until Jesus calls us to himself when he makes all things new. But we should aim to be worthy. We have been given a second chance, a chance to live a life which pleases God, a chance to now live for him, as Lord and master of our lives, placing ourselves in his service. We can rely and depend on our fellow brothers and sisters, but we also have access to the power and glory of heaven, which through the spirit God pours out on us so that we can resist temptation and selfishness and live lives of love, often in tough places, so that we bring glory to his name.
And we need to live lives which are worthy – because our lives, the forgiveness of our sins was bought at a price. ‘Redemption’ is the word we use to signify the buying back, the purchasing of people out of slavery. We were slaves to darkness, and to release us from that slavery a cost had to be paid. It wasn’t money, but blood, the blood of that which God held most precious, his son Jesus Christ.
We shouldn’t take for granted the forgiveness of our sins – because it came at a cost. Someone was willing to suffer and die for us, to give us a second chance. He didi so willingly, out of love. Out of love for that, we should aim to make our lives worthy of that sacrifice. Not because we need to, but out of love, so as not to cheapen the love which did this for us.
We shouldn’t take for granted the forgiveness of our sins….
We should never forget where we came from. The Bible writers frequently describe our previous condition, how we were before we met with Jesus, of being one of darkness. It speaks of being blind, of not knowing the truth, of being unable to see where we are heading. It speaks of things being hidden so that they cannot be seen. It speaks of gloom and despair – and believe me, living in Scotland and experiencing the bleak early mornings it is easy to comprehend the despair that is possible….
But we are no longer there. We have moved out of darkness and into the Kingdom of the Son, the Kingdom of light. Where Jesus is there cannot be any darkness. First he is glorious beyond comparison and the Bible typically describes his glory as incandescent light. Light floods the darkness and overwhelms it. Being in light we can now see the truth, we are given hope rather than despair, and now nothing is hidden.
We need to live as people of the light, here Paul calls it living a life which is worthy of the Lord. Yet we know we cannot do this by ourselves. We may be on the way to becoming saints, but we are not yet perfect, and we never will be until Jesus calls us to himself when he makes all things new. But we should aim to be worthy. We have been given a second chance, a chance to live a life which pleases God, a chance to now live for him, as Lord and master of our lives, placing ourselves in his service. We can rely and depend on our fellow brothers and sisters, but we also have access to the power and glory of heaven, which through the spirit God pours out on us so that we can resist temptation and selfishness and live lives of love, often in tough places, so that we bring glory to his name.
And we need to live lives which are worthy – because our lives, the forgiveness of our sins was bought at a price. ‘Redemption’ is the word we use to signify the buying back, the purchasing of people out of slavery. We were slaves to darkness, and to release us from that slavery a cost had to be paid. It wasn’t money, but blood, the blood of that which God held most precious, his son Jesus Christ.
We shouldn’t take for granted the forgiveness of our sins – because it came at a cost. Someone was willing to suffer and die for us, to give us a second chance. He didi so willingly, out of love. Out of love for that, we should aim to make our lives worthy of that sacrifice. Not because we need to, but out of love, so as not to cheapen the love which did this for us.
posted by Gordon at
9:42 am
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