Tag Archives: righteous

The Just Shall Live By Faith

Bible Study, ,

THE JUST SHALL LIVE BY FAITH

. . . The righteous person will live by his faithfulness (Hab. 2: 4b).

I cannot leave this verse without giving it fuller treatment because of its importance in Scripture.

“This great principle – “the just shall live by faith” – so inflamed the soul of Martin Luther that it became the watchword of the Reformation. It occurs first here in the small prophecy of Habakkuk but is then quoted three times in the New Testament. The term “just”, of course, means “justified” or “righteous”. God says a person is enabled to live righteously by his faith.” http://www.icr.org/article/just-shall-live-by-faith/

Paul’s first reference to Hab. 2:4, found in Rom. 1: 17, highlights God’s way of achieving righteousness. It comes through the gospel of God’s salvation. God’s righteousness is revealed through the gospel, a righteousness that is received as a free girt through faith. The great theme of Romans is God’s righteousness. How can a holy God forgive and receive sinners into His presence?

Through the atoning sacrifice of His Son, Jesus, He has revealed His justice in punishing sin, and at the same time justifying the sinner, absolving us from all guilt because the debt has been paid by one who had no sin of His own. His justice has been fully satisfied. He is free to impute righteousness to those who are unrighteous and receive us back into His family as His beloved sons and daughters.

Paul’s second reference to Hab. 2:4 is found in Gal 3:13, a companion letter to his letter to the Romans. Galatians was written to deal with a serious error that was being broadcast by a group of Jewish believers called Judaisers. They were insisting that Gentile believers be circumcised first before they could become Christians and identify with the church. Paul was adamant that anything added to faith in Christ for salvation nullified God’s grace and put them back under the law.

Just as they could only be counted as righteous through faith in Christ, so they could only be declared innocent through faith in Him. The two truths are closely linked. Without justification which we receive by faith in Christ’s finished work and the righteousness which He freely gives us through the same faith, we cannot approach and have fellowship with a holy God. We can do nothing to absolve ourselves from guilt and the punishment we deserve for our imperfection in God’s sight. He did it all to bring us back to Himself, and we receive it by faith and act on what He has done for us.

The third reference, Heb. 10: 38, emphasizes the importance of the life that flows from faith in what God has done for us. It leads into chapter 11, the great “faith” chapter in which the writer gives a resume’ of the heroes of the faith who obeyed God because they believed in Him. Faith that does not issue in obedience is sterile and useless.

Paul emphasised faith as the basis for salvation. James emphasised “works” as the evidence of faith. The two themes go hand in hand. Jesus applauded Zaccheus because he bore witness to the change in his heart by his willingness to make restitution for his greed and dishonesty.

The point of this revelation to Habakkuk was that every individual must take responsibility for what he does and the way he lives. Those who, like the Babylonians, were cruel and ruthless were accountable to God for what they did not only to God’s people but to all people. The problem was the attitude of their hearts. They treated others with contempt as lesser beings than themselves and thus they wiped them out or enslaved them with impunity. They would not “live” in the sense that their wickedness would take them to an eternal “death”.

Those who, by faith in God, live in dependence on Him, will be reckoned as righteous and will continue to experience true life when they pass from this life. Righteousness is imputed to those who believe God’s promises.

Abraham believed the Lord and it was credited to him as righteousness (Gen. 15: 6).

It does matter what we believe because our destiny depends on believing what God has done for us and living our lives on the basis of His promise.

“Those who by faith are righteous, shall live.”

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 new book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (copyright 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

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

Check out my blogsite at www.learningtobeason.wordpress.com

A Surprising Revelation

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A SURPRISING REVELATION

Then the Lord replied, ‘Write down the revelation and make it plain on tablets so that a herald may run with it. For the revelation awaits an appointed time; it speaks of the end and will not prove false. Though it linger, wait for it; it will certainly come and not delay. “See, the enemy is puffed up; his desires are not upright – but the righteous person will live by his faithfulness -” ‘ (Hab. 2: 2-4).

God’s reply to Habakkuk’s dilemma was not only for him and for his time but also for us and for all time. Perhaps the prophet was expecting something more precise than the answer God gave him. But what could be more specific than the eternal principle He uttered?

When God speaks, He need not give long explanations. A few words are sufficient to awaken the heart to a world of meaning. But God does not often communicate with words. He speaks by impressions that are difficult to express in words but convey to the heart everything one needs to know. How many times God has spoken to me a wordless message with a world of meaning!

Before His revelation came an instruction: Wait for it and when it comes, write it down. This message is not only for you; it is also for the whole world, and especially for those who fall into the same category as the godless Babylonians. This message is not for now; it will happen at the end of time; when the books are opened and the time for judgment comes.

This is God’s answer for the “why do you do nothing?” question when the wicked seem to prosper and the godly suffer. There is an answer but it is not for now. This is the difficult part for us because we demand justice, and we want it now. We are forced to view each situation from God’s perspective. No, He is not indifferent. No, He has not forgotten us. He has a different timetable for a different reason from our “I want you to do something now” mentality.

In this prophecy, God divides the whole world into two categories: Those who are “puffed up” and those who are “righteous”. What does it mean to be puffed up? It means to be full of “wind”. The Hebrew word ruach can be translated “wind” or “spirit”. Jesus compared the Holy Spirit – pneuma, the Greek equivalent – to the wind in John 3. When ruach is used of God, it means “spirit”. When it is used of man, it refers to his pride. A proud person is full of “hot air” or wind.

The Babylonians were a proud people. They relied on themselves for their accomplishments. They had no time or place for God. Their greatest king, Nebuchadnezzar, epitomised the attitude of the nation. He forgot his dream and the warning that came with it (Dan. 4: 4; 24-27; 28-37) and went insane. For seven years he lived like an animal until he came to his senses and acknowledged that, after all, he was not God!

But the prophecy was even more personal than that. In a nutshell, every single person will have to face God and give an account of his life. This is not about nations. This is about individuals. God is inescapable and in the white light of His holiness, every heart will be exposed. This is about every person’s eternal destiny. This is about who will live and who will die.

The righteous person, by comparison, will not only navigate this life by his trust in God but will also enter the next and continue to live forever through the everlasting life God gives to those who trust in Him. God reckons those righteous who rely on Him for forgiveness which takes care of their sin, and grace which provides help for their weakness. They are filled with God’s Spirit, not the hot air of their own self-sufficiency.

Each Babylonian soldier who took part in the campaigns to capture and destroy nations would have to account for his actions and his motives. Each person who ever lives and who has ever lived with stand before God and give an account of his life. On the Day of Judgment the books will be opened.

Then I saw a great white throne and Him who was seated on it. The earth and the heavens fled from His presence, and there was no place for them. And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and the books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books.  . . . Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire (Rev. 20: 11-12; 15).

God’s response goes way beyond the Babylonian issue. God’s answer to Habakkuk embraces His rule over the whole world. He will come, and He will judge the earth in righteousness. All those who have not entrusted themselves to His mercy will perish. No contest!

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 new book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (copyright 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

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

Check out my blogsite at www.learningtobeason.wordpress.com

 

 

 

Either Or, Not Both And…

Bible Study, , , ,

EITHER OR, NOT BOTH AND…

“For all who rely on the works of the law are under a curse, as it is written: ‘Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law.’ Clearly no one who relies on the law is justified before God, because ‘the righteous will live by faith.’ The law is not based on faith; on the contrary it says, ‘The person who does these things will live by them.’

“Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who is hung on a pole. He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.” Galatians 3:10-14.

The Judaizers were trying to convince Gentile believers that salvation was a “both and…” situation. In order to have Christ, they had to obey the law as well. “No way!” said Paul. It is not “both and” but “either or” because they are mutually exclusive. You cannot have law and grace because they are opposing principles. The one automatically cancels out the other.

Let’s see why. Those who rely on their own attempts to obey God’s law perfectly (and anything that is less than perfection is automatically disqualified), and fail, are under a curse and have to pay the penalty for disobeying God’s law. Since death is the penalty for sin, and everyone is born into the world with a dead spirit – unable to connect with God’s Spirit because of his sin nature, everyone comes into the world already under a curse.

No amount of trying to satisfy God’s righteous standards will make them alive because they all begin with a spoiled record before they ever choose to sin. Sinning is automatic. Take the two-year-old who throws a tantrum because he can’t get his own way. What is that? It is the self-demanding to be in charge. He doesn’t even need to choose. He just does it because it is in his nature to rebel. No amount of trying will cancel the sin already present from birth.

There is only one way to get rid of the penalty of sin – if someone else pays the debt who has no debt of his own. That’s where Jesus comes in. He is the only alternative because He was placed under a curse by being executed on a pole (a euphemism for being put to death as a criminal), as a substitute for every sinner who deserves to die because he is already spiritually dead.

Now the alternative is – not trying to keep God’s commandments because it doesn’t work, but trusting in Jesus because God is satisfied with what our Substitute did. What is the outcome of Jesus’ sacrifice? God restored the Holy Spirit to everyone who believes in Jesus. Why do we have to have the Holy Spirit resident in us? Because, without Him we have not link with the Father.

God breathed His breath into Adam in the beginning and gave him life, that is, a connection with Himself that made him fully human and therefore fully alive, able to have fellowship with God because he was one with Him. When Adam rebelled, the Spirit of God withdrew and Adam died to any connection with God. He was on his own, just as he had chosen to be, and he had to make up his own rules. We know the result.

Only when rebellion was dealt with and we are reconciled to God through the death of His Son, can God give the Holy Spirit back to us. We are reinstated as His sons and daughters with a new nature of loving submission to the Father.

Who wants to keep on trying to please God by fruitless keeping of rules when He offers a free pardon for our sin, a new nature and all the benefits of being His children simply by accepting His gift? How foolish to think that we can do both!

It’s no wonder Paul became angry with the Judaizers for their poisonous teaching. It was like telling the Gentiles to go back to jail after being given a free pardon just to make sure that justice has been served.

Acknowledgement

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.

 

Why Are You A Believer?

Christian life, , , ,

WHY ARE YOU A BELIEVER?

INTRODUCTION

Start with 20 questions!

Which is the most misunderstood book in the Bible?

Have your read the book of Job?

What is “Job” about?

  1. 1.     BACKGROUND TO JOB

Job belongs to the genre – Wisdom Literature

Job not the author but the subject of the book. Written by an Israelite – he, not Job or his friends – uses the covenant name of God in the prologue and the epilogue.

When was the book written?

Two dates: When Job lived; some time during the time of the patriarchs –

  1. No mention of Israelite history
  2. Live for more than 100 years
  3. Wealth measured in livestock
  4. Acted as a priest in his family
  5. Sabean and Chaldean tribes fit into this period in history.

When the book was written about Job; probably at some time between the reigns of Solomon and Israel’s exile in Babylon.

What was the purpose of the author?

The author addressed the problem of suffering. Not intended to be a theological answer but a message to the godly who suffer and don’t know why.

The problem of suffering is an ongoing one typified by Job. He was a man who feared God and shunned evil (1:1) and yet he suffered terribly. If anyone had a reason to ask the question, “Why me?’ Job did.

The author’s purpose was not so much to contribute to the ongoing discussion but to speak to the godly sufferers who struggle with the crisis of faith their ongoing suffering produces. He is more of a pastor than a theologian.

  1. 2.     WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?

Throughout history people have asked the same questions: Why do good people suffer? If God is almighty and God is good, how can He allow this to happen?

The world offer three possibilities:

  1. God is not almighty, after all,
  2. God is not just
  3. Humans may be innocent,

These three assumptions contradicted Job’s belief and that of his friends.

God is almighty; God is perfectly just and no human being is pure in His sight.

The only logical conclusion was that the person who suffered was guilty of sin and that the measure of his suffering was the measure of his guilt.

In their pain, the “wisdom” of the theologians does not answer their dilemma. Their so-called “wisdom” only seems to rub salt in their wounds and creates a stumbling block to faith.

How current is this situation? Preachers and well-meaning Christians glibly give the same arguments as the ancient theologians – God punishes those who sin; you are suffering therefore you must have sinned.

In Psalm 73 Asaph raised the same question: Why do the wicked prosper and godly suffer? Instead of theology providing an answer, it only increases the mystery. The sufferer is doubly wounded, by his circumstances and by the well-meaning responses of people who only drive the knife in deeper and increase the suffering, And for the godly sufferer God remains the biggest puzzle of all. How can God love me when He allows this to happen to me?

Instead of merely contributing to the theology of the day and adding his logical arguments, the author tells a story.

 

 

  1. 3.     ENTER A THIRD PARTY

 

Without the prologue (chapters 1 and 2), the dialogue between Job and his three friends would be a rehash of the age-old argument between theologians and the godly sufferer who were attempting to solve the “God problem” (is God just?) in the face of the “human problem” (they must be getting what they deserve),

The author adds a third party to the mix. The relationship between God and humans is not a closed one. Among His creatures is the great adversary. Since he cannot contend with God directly, he turns his attention to God’s creation who carries His image.

He began his assault on human beings in the Garden of Eden. Through his subtle deception he lured the first woman into believing that God had short-changed them. Instead of focussing on everything God had given them, he drew Eve’s attention to one thing God held back from them, their right to make their own rules, symbolised by eating fruit God said not to eat. He lured them by what he offered without telling them the consequences. Satan’s modus operandi becomes quite clear.

  1. Lure them into disobedience to God’s way,
  2. Then load them with guilt through his accusation and condemnation because they did wrong!

Eve was convinced by the devil’s deception. Adam stepped into rank disobedience.

The outcome was that they lost their oneness with God, their God-awareness and became selfishly, self-centredly self-aware, introducing a fundamental flaw into the nature of all mankind.

Satan’s all-consuming purpose was to drive a wedge between God and His beloved humans to bring about an irreconcilable rift between them.

In his story, the author describes the accuser’s bold attack on God and godly people in the special and intimate relationship that is dearest to them both. When God draws Satan’s attention to the righteousness of His beloved creature in whom He delights, he attempts to attack Job’s righteousness and show God up for a fool for trusting him.

He charges Job’s godliness as evil, calling him mercenary and self-serving. The very righteousness in which God delights is Job’s way of getting what he wants from God. Job’s so-called righteousness is nothing but the worst kind of heinous sin!

  1. 4.     SATAN’S ACCUSATION

If God will allow Satan to test Job by cutting the link between righteousness and blessing, he will expose Job and all righteous people as the frauds they are.

This is Satan’s ultimate challenge. He believes he has found the wedge he is looking for to cement the rift between God and man. The fact that humans are dependent on God for their lives and well-being, is the occasion for humankind’s greatest temptation – to love the gifts rather than the Giver, to please God for the benefits and to be righteous because it pays.

If Satan is right, then the very “righteousness” in which God delights is evil and creates a chasm between God and man that cannot be bridged. Even God’s plan of redemption is flawed because the righteous person is guilty of the worst sin and God can only sweep everything away in judgment. All of creation becomes irredeemable.

  1. 5.     GOD’S RESPONSE

Satan’s challenge cannot be ignored or silenced, nor even by destroying the accuser because it exposes the heart of creation and man’s place in it. God has to let Satan have his way with Job within limits so that both He and righteous Job can be vindicated and the accuser silenced.

Out of this contest comes Job’s anguish. He is robbed of every sign of God’s favour and He is silent so that He becomes the great enigma. In addition to that, Job’s so-called friends attack his righteousness according to their orthodox logic until Job feels abandoned and alone.

  1. 6.     JOB’S VINDICATION

In spite of his suffering and the agony of his apparent alienation from God, Job refuses to curse God and die. He may curse the day of his birth, complain bitterly of his lot and chide God for his unjust suffering but he refuses to renounce God, no matter what.

Job does not mourn the loss of his possessions – he focuses on God. ‘I thought I knew you,” he says in effect, “but I realise now that I know nothing. I repent in dust and ashes.”

In spite of his heinous accusation, the devil is silenced and Job is vindicated.

Not only is Job’s righteousness put to the test but also the highest of human wisdom. The best that his friends could come up with fell short of the truth. Neither their wisdom nor Job’s can fathom the truth of his situation, not even the brash “wisdom”’ of the young Elihu who thought he knew better than all of them!

God steps in when every other argument is stilled and every voice is silenced and there is nothing more to be said. He shows His displeasure with puny human wisdom by the way He approaches Job, not in a gentle whisper but by His dramatic entrance out of a ferocious storm!

God has given man the ability to understand creaturely things but he cannot learn the ways of God through the world of nature. Job 11:7 “Can you fathom the mysteries of God? Can you probe the limits of the Almighty?”

“But where can wisdom be found? Where does understanding dwell?” Job 28:12. Job answers his own question from the mouth of God: “And He said to man, ‘The fear of the Lord – that is wisdom, and to shun evil is understanding.’” Job 28;28.

  1. 7.     THE OUTCOME OF JOB’S TEST

Job passed the severest test any human being can undergo. God’s confidence in him was vindicated and Job could be trusted with material things because he had proved that he was trustworthy and did not worship God for things!

CONCLUSION

What can we learn from the story of Job? How relevant is his story for us today?

Job’s story is the answer to some of the pernicious deception in the church today. There are too many “believers” who are in it for what they can get out of it. When God does not give them what they are “believing for”, they walk away disillusioned because He did not make good on the promises preachers made on His behalf.

Abraham faced the same test and passed. God required of him what he treasured most in life – Isaac, his son. When he showed that he was willing to offer him as a sacrifice on the altar, God gave him back with the promise of multiplied blessing.

Why are we believers? Is it because some preacher offered us eternal life if we “accept Jesus as our personal Saviour” and all the benefits that go with that? Is it because we will go to heaven when we die?

If so, then Satan’s accusation is accurate and we fall into the category of those whose righteousness is phoney because it is empty of the “fear of the Lord”.

Jesus gave us the gift of righteousness He won by perfect and absolute commitment to the “fear of the Lord.” It is a gift that is of no use to us if we allow our old selfish nature to rule. It is not our decision to follow Jesus that counts but the evidence of a transformed life lived out in obedience to Christ and under the authority and control of the Holy Spirit.

“For if you live according to the sinful nature you will die; but if, by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live, because those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.” Romans 8:13,14.

Beware of preaching that is watered down to what God can do for you! What He does, He does for His glory and we happen to be the ones to whom and through whom His glory is revealed!

God has no qualms about putting us to the test to see whether our faith in Him is about us or about Him!