Tag Archives: brought near

HE DESTROYED THE BARRIER

Bible Study, ,

HE DESTROYED THE BARRIER

But now in Christ, you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ. For He Himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing in His flesh the law with its commandments and regulations. His purpose was to create in Himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace (Eph. 2: 13-15a).

Racism is everywhere. It’s as old as humanity itself. People just can’t get along with others if they are a little different from themselves. If his skin colour or culture differs from your own, that is a reason to hate and to persecute him. Some governments have, in the past, built racism into their constitution and have made it legal to hate and to side-line those whom we want to hate. It seems that racism is deeply encoded into our fallen nature to despise those whom we consider less than ourselves.

It was no different in Jesus’ day. In fact, the Jews believed that God wanted it that way. He had instructed them, from the beginning of their history, to have nothing to do with the heathen. They were not to fraternise with their neighbours and they were under no circumstances to take part in their heathen worship.

Of course, God had a reason for giving them these prohibitions. He knew that any contact with the pagans around them was dangerous. They had already proved their fickleness when they were hardly out of the land of Egypt, where they had learned and adopted the ways of the Egyptians. They insisted on worshipping an object which they thought represented their God when He had forbidden them to worship a man-made image of Him.

They, unfortunately, believed that God hated the heathen. They thought that that was the reason for His antagonism towards them. He could not get them to understand that it was their evil religion that He hated, not the people themselves. The Israelites got into trouble with God and were severely punished for worshipping idols and adopting the wicked behaviour of the pagans. Because of that, they swung in the opposite direction, hating and despising the Gentiles to the extent that they tried to kill Paul for taking the gospel to the Gentiles in Europe and Asia Minor.

They had not realised their mission in the world was to obey God’s directions for living, recorded for them in the Torah, the five books of Moses, so that the heathen would see the true God through them and leave their idolatry to worship Him. They believed that God wanted them to have nothing to do with the Gentiles. It was perfectly acceptable for them to hate non-Jews because God hated them, so they thought.

However, the message of Jesus was completely different from their philosophy. Jesus came to reveal the Father’s true nature to His people – His love and compassion for the world which He demonstrated by sending His Son to live as a perfect son. and die a criminal’s death to pay the debt of sin of the whole human race. God’s plan was to reconcile all people to Himself, to do away with race, colour and cultural distinctions and to create a new race of people who love one another in His family.

There is no legislation that can get rid of racism. We have an inborn capacity to hate and be suspicious of those who are different from ourselves. Legislation won’t take it away and not even the decision to be tolerant will take it away. We cannot change our own hearts. Racial prejudice is part of our old nature. It needs the radical intervention of God to change our nature, give us a new heart, and release in us the love of God which views people from a different perspective.

The miracle of the gospel, the marvel of what Jesus did on the cross, is that God actually intervenes in our lives to activate His nature in us when we relinquish control to Him. He did what man cannot do. He took away our animosity and mistrust towards one another and replaced it with a new attitude of acceptance and love.

I experience this every day of my life. I belong to a church family made up of a spread of people from many different cultures and people groups. We experience unity and harmony in our fellowship that is deeply embedded in Christ. Racial tension has been obliterated and replaced with love and trust, patience and tolerance which is not forced on us. It is not unnatural or fake.

God, through Jesus, has taken away the reason for animosity. We no longer live in fear or mistrust of one another because we are not slaves but sons. God has given us the Spirit of adoption. We are now brothers and sisters in Christ, belonging to the family of God and having the same Father.

This is the remarkable miracle God does in the hearts of those who put their trust in Jesus and return to the family of God. By the power of God through what Jesus did on the cross, we come back to God’s original plan what we should be one with Him and with one another in the Father’s love and under His authority.

Scripture is taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Have you read my first book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

ISBN: Softcover – 978-1-4828-0512-3,                                                                              eBook 978-4828-0511-6

Available on www.amazon.com in paperback, e-book or Kindle version, on www.takealot.com  or order directly from the publisher at www.partridgepublishing.com.

My second book, Learning to be a Disciple – The Way of the Master (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing), a companion volume to Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart, has been released in paperback and digital format on www.amazon.com.

BROUGHT NEAR BY THE BLOOD

Christian Life, ,

But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ (Eph. 2:13).

“Far away…” What does that mean? How far is far away? When we stand outside and look at the Amatola Mountains, they seem far away.  This is not the kind of “far away” to which Paul is referring. He is talking about another kind of “far away”. Not far away in kilometres but far away in fellowship.

You know what it feels like to be in the same room with someone you love but at the same time to be far away because of some rift that has come between you. That person might as well be on the other side of the planet because you cannot communicate with one another. Your hearts are estranged.

We were all once far away from God because there was a great rift between us and Him. Sin had separated us from Him and made us enemies. We were afraid of God; we hated Him; we stayed as far away from Him as we could because we were not sure what He might to do us if we got too near.

Then Jesus stepped in. In fact, the Father sent Him. How amazing that God the Father, the very one that we hated and ran from, wanted us back so badly that He sent His own Son to heal the breach which breach was no easy matter! It was not just about apologising on our behalf for our rebellion. It was about paying the debt for what we owed God.

Death was the penalty God demanded for our stubborn disobedience. God created us for a very specific purpose – to have fellowship with Him and to manage the earth and its resources for Him, but we thumbed our noses at Him and ran amok. We lived as we chose, did as we liked, wasted His gifts and refused to have anything to do with Him. We deserved to die.

Then He sent Jesus to die, as though He had done what we did. Jesus loved and obeyed the Father in every way we did not. The people whom God chose to be His own people put Him to death as an evil-doer. He went willingly in obedience to the Father.

Gone was the sin between us and God. Gone was the enmity, the broken fellowship, the hatred and rebellion. The Father opened His arms to us and said, “Come.”  There was no reason for us to be estranged from Him any longer.

We have been brought near!

He Destroyed The Barrier

Bible Study, , ,

HE DESTROYED THE BARRIER

But now in Christ, you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ. For He Himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing in His flesh the law with its commandments and regulations. His purpose was to create in Himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace (Eph. 2: 13-15a).

Racism is everywhere. It’s as old as humanity itself. People just can’t get along with others if they are a little different from themselves. If your skin colour or culture differs from your own, that is a reason to hate and to persecute him. Some governments have, in the past, built racism into their constitution and have made it legal to hate and to sideline those whom we want to hate. It seems that racism is deeply encoded into our fallen nature to despise those whom we consider less than ourselves.

It was no different in Jesus’ day. In fact, the Jews believed that God wanted it that way. He had instructed them, from the beginning of their history, to have nothing to do with the heathen. They were not to fraternise with their neighbours and they were, under no circumstances, to take part in their heathen worship.

Of course, God had a reason for giving them these prohibitions. He knew that any contact with the pagans around them was dangerous. They had already proved their fickleness when they were hardly out of the land of Egypt, where they had learned and adopted the ways of the Egyptians. They insisted on worshipping an object which they thought represented their God when He had forbidden them to worship a man-made image of Him.

They, unfortunately, believed that God hated the heathen. They thought that that was the reason for His antagonism towards them. He could not get them to understand that it was their evil religion that He hated, not the people themselves. The Israelites got into trouble with God and were severely punished for worshipping idols and adopting the wicked behaviour of the pagan. Because of that, they swung in the opposite direction, hating and despising the Gentiles to the extent that they tried to kill Paul for taking the gospel to the Gentiles in Europe and Asia Minor.

They had not realised their mission in the world, to obey God’s directions for living, recorded for them in the Torah, the five books of Moses, so that the heathen would see the true God through them and leave their idolatry to worship Him. They believed that God wanted them to have nothing to do with the Gentiles. It was perfectly acceptable for them to hate non-Jews because God hated them, so they thought.

But the message of Jesus was completely different from their philosophy. Jesus came to reveal the Father’s true nature to His people – His love and compassion for the world which He demonstrated by sending His Son to live as a perfect son. He died a criminal’s death to pay the debt of sin of the whole human race. God’s plan was to reconcile all people to Himself, to do away with race, colour and cultural distinctions and to create a new race of people who love one another and belong to His family.

There is no legislation that can get rid of racism. We have an inborn capacity to hate and be suspicious of those who are different from ourselves. Legislation won’t take it away and not even the decision to be tolerant will take it away. We cannot change our own hearts. Racial prejudice is part of our old nature. It needs the radical intervention of God to change our nature, give us a new heart, and release in us the love of God which views people from a different perspective.

The miracle of the gospel, the marvel of what Jesus did on the cross, is that God actually intervenes in our lives to activate His nature in us when we relinquish control to Him. He did what man cannot do. He took away our animosity and mistrust towards one another and replaced it with a new attitude of acceptance and love.

I experience this every day of my life. I belong to a church family made up of a spread of people from many different cultures and people groups. We experience unity and harmony in our fellowship that is deeply embedded in Christ. Racial tension has been obliterated and replaced with love and trust, patience and tolerance which is not forced on us. It is not unnatural or fake.

God, through Jesus, has taken away the reason for animosity. We no longer live in fear or mistrust of one another because we are not slaves but sons. God has given us the Spirit of adoption. We are now brothers and sisters in Christ, belonging to the family of God and having the same Father.

This is the remarkable miracle God does in the hearts of those who put their trust on Jesus and return to the family of God. And, through the power of God through what Jesus did on the cross, we come back to God’s original plan what we should be one with Him and with one another in the Father’s love and under His authority.

Scripture is taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Have you read my first book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

ISBN: Softcover – 978-1-4828-0512-3,                                                                              eBook 978-4828-0511-6

Available on www.amazon.com in paperback, e-book or Kindle version, on www.takealot.com  or order directly from the publisher at www.partridgepublishing.com.

My second book, Learning to be a Disciple – The Way of the Master (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing), a companion volume to Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart, has been released in paperback and digital format on www.amazon.com.

For more details, check my website:

http://luellaannettecampbell.com/

Have you read my blogs on www.learningtobeason.wordpress.com ?

The Power Of The Cross – Brought Near By The Blood

Gospel, , , ,

THE POWER OF THE CROSS

BROUGHT NEAR BY THE BLOOD

. . . At one time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of promise, without hope and without God in the world.  But now, in Christ Jesus you who were once far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ. (Eph. 2: 12-13)

What is Paul saying? Does he mean that all Jews are “in” and all Gentiles are “out”? Not at all. In his letters to the Romans and Galatians, he stated quite clearly that not all Israelites are true Israelites. Only those who are the children of Abraham by faith in Jesus are the true Israel. They have completed the process which He began when He called Abraham to be the father of His people, by recognising and receiving Jesus as God’s promised Messiah and His gift of righteousness to which the old covenant pointed.

However, Gentiles were not even in line to be a part of the Old Covenant because God had called only the natural children of Abraham to be His special people. They received God’s Torah, His instructions for living and His promises, so that they could show the pagan nations around them the nature of the true God. It was through them that the Messiah would come, and they were to live in anticipation of His coming – prophesied over many centuries in uncanny detail so that they would recognise Him when He came.

According to the prophetic fingerprint in their sacred writings, He would come as both Suffering Servant and King, but their exile and repeated occupation by enemy forces because of their unfaithfulness to the covenant, aroused in them a longing to be free from their enemies and to rule their own country without interference from outside. The other side of Messiah’s purpose to recuse them from sin was either forgotten or ignored in favour of a king who would rule over them in justice and peace, as did their great ancestor, David.

When Jesus came, the Jews did not recognise Him because He did not fit their expectation of a political deliverer. What was even worse for them was that those who followed Jesus and preached that He was indeed their Messiah, had opened the door of faith to the Gentles. Their hatred for and prejudice against the Gentiles was so strong that the followers of Jesus were to be exterminated for daring to preach that their God was the God of the Gentiles as well.

In spite of the message of their prophets that God would call the whole world to obedience to Him, they resented the intrusion of Gentiles into their exclusive right to worship God. There were many “God-fearers” scattered across the Roman Empire in Paul’s day, Gentiles who worshiped the true God without actually embracing Judaism with its tedious rules and ritual. It was this group that were more ready to receive the good news about the Messiah than God’s own people.

In his letter to the Ephesian church, and the other churches in Asia Minor which also read his letter, Paul reminded them that, without the message of Jesus which they had heard and embraced, the Gentiles had not hope of reconciliation to God or participation in the promises of the old covenant made to Abraham and his descendants.

It was through Abraham that the whole world would be blessed. His descendants would receive and were to preserve the revelation of God given to them through His covenant with Abraham and expanded in the covenant He made with them at Mount Sinai when He espoused them to Himself as His bride. In the Abrahamic covenant was the promise that they would be a blessing to all nations.

The Lord had said to Abram, ‘Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you. I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you. I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.’ (Gen. 12: 1-3)

Through Jesus, God fulfilled His promise, opening the door to the Gentile world to embrace everything that He had promised His own people in His covenant. It was through Him that they were “brought near”, giving them access to the Father through the forgiveness He made possible, and allowing them to be a part of the promises that guaranteed their acceptance with Him and everything that the death of Jesus made possible.

Through faith in Jesus everyone, Jew and Gentile alike, becomes a part of God’s new race, no longer categorised as “Jew” and “Gentile” but by their new status as sons and daughters of the Father.

For through Him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit. Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of His household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus Himself as the chief cornerstone. In Him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in Him you are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by His Spirit. (Eph. 2: 18-22)

When we consider how strong and how damaging the issue of racism is in our world, and no amount of external pressure can cure, we can only marvel at the miracle of reconciliation which Jesus made possible by His death.

This is the power of the cross.

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Have you read my first book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

ISBN: Softcover – 978-1-4828-0512-3,                                                                              eBook 978-4828-0511-6

Available on www.amazon.com in paperback, e-book or kindle version, on www.takealot.com  or order directly from the publisher at www.partridgepublishing.com.

My second book, Learning to be a Disciple – The Way of the Master (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing), companion volume to Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart, has been released in paperback and digital format on www.amazon.com.

For more details, check my website:

http://luellaannettecampbell.com/