Beloved Believer

Chapter 6

Live

Oh! For a beautiful soul

I will give all things
For a beautiful soul

I will do all things

For a beautiful soul

I would kill this flesh

For a beautiful soul

I will cling to you

My beautiful one
That you may make me
A beautiful soul

I will weep to you

Walk with you
Live for you
Die for you
If I may but have
A beautiful soul

Beautiful Jesus:

How extravagantly bright is the beauty of Jesus Christ! His holiness and His
perfection are dazzling beyond compare and can barely reach our tiny imaginations.
The thought of one day being perfect in holiness as is Jesus is our motivation and
our endurance and our extreme hope. The church and Christ’s bride will be
spotless. We will be made beautiful together forever. My! What awesome gifts and
promises God gives to men. The beauty of cleanness and perfection and total,
undefiled allegiance to the one and only creator, God our Father through Jesus
Christ is a glorious gift that no gratitude could even touch.
There are no words in any language to adequately describe the beauty of our
Lord Jesus. He is the exact representation of the Father. He is perfect in obedience,
love and humility. When He walked on the earth he showed abundant compassion to
those who sought His favor. We know from personal experience His loving care and
faithfulness. Only Jesus was able to be our “lamb” because He is the Holy God
incarnate. To sacrifice Holy Jesus in a man’s lowly body to satisfy the justice of a
Holy God for an unholy bunch of people, is the epitome of beauty. The bearing of
The Holy God with his unholy people by way of the Holy Jesus, is a most beautiful
love. The working in the unholy people to make them holy for Our Holy God to be
one with Our Holy Jesus forever; what perfect and beautiful intelligence and power! I
grasp for a description of holiness like grasping air. It can be felt, known, seen,
tasted and talked about but it is all the same indescribable. Holiness is the beauty
of God. Holiness is God and God is Holiness. Holiness is much, much more that the
absence of sin. Perfection seems a cold word to describe holiness although it
certainly applies. Holiness is the perfection of all that is good. Since our
understanding of perfect good is limited because of our humanness, holiness is hard
to fully grasp intellectually.
What would keep us from this precious beauty of Jesus Christ? What could
we possibly want above the holiness that He promises and is working in us and that
He shows us in Himself?

Ex 15:11
“Who is like you, O Lord, among the gods? Who is like you, majestic in
holiness, awesome in glorious deeds, doing wonders?”

Psalm 27:4
One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell
in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of
the Lord and to inquire in his temple.

Psalm 50:2
Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God shines forth.

Psalm 96:6
Splendor and majesty are before him; strength and beauty are in his
sanctuary.

In Jesus is all that is good. Without Him there is no knowledge of good. In

Jesus is all true beauty. How could we know any beauty in this life or the next
without Him? The beauty of His creation, created perfect. Even tainted by sin
God’s creation takes our breath away in its’ beauty. Jesus is perfectly perfect, holy,
worthy and able for all good and no evil. God alone is holy. He offers Himself to us
in Jesus and accepts us in entirety. He gives us all of Himself in Jesus. We must
yield to Him all of ourselves to see his beautiful holiness to the utmost and to see it
in us.

Necessity for Holiness:

1 Chron 16:29 and Psalm 96:8-9

Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; bring an offering, and come
into his courts! Worship the Lord in the splendor of holiness; tremble
before him, all the earth!

Psalm 29:2
Ascribe to the lord the glory due his name; worship the Lord in the
splendor of holiness.

Both men and angels are directed to worship the Lord in the splendor of
holiness. The “splendor of holiness” in all three verses may also be stated “holy
attire”. Without holiness there is no worship. The need for holiness is repeated in
the same way in these verses, giving strength to the directive. There are many
other places in the Bible where we are directed to cleanness and rightness before
the Lord. Jesus is our cleanness and our rightness but holiness not an unseen thing.
Holiness is to be evidenced in our lives; proving God’s glory to mankind. Our
holiness ascribes to the Lord the glory due His name. We need it. We ought to
desire it more and we ought to reject the idea that it is passé since we are so
evolved and tolerant. God demands holiness for right fellowship with Him and
eternal salvation. God provides what He has demanded. Let us receive and pursue
what has been given, namely Jesus.

Mighty God, you are holy. You call us to be holy. Give us a fresh mind with respect
to our hope in your Son and in all He has done for us. Give your people a zeal for
your name.

1 Peter 1:14
As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former
ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your
conduct, since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”

In general conversation among Christians there is not much talk of holiness.

We should talk more about holiness. We should expound more to each other the
holiness of Jesus with a little less emphasis on how He loves us as we are. He does
love each one of His children to the utmost this moment. Let the realization of His
great love draw us to Him to be holy as He is holy. God’s love is absolutely
necessary and wonderful and beautiful. But it is the holiness of Jesus that gives us
our only hope. Without holiness no one will see the Lord. (Heb 14). Our holiness to
see God is Jesus. Without Jesus’ holiness, we have no reason to think about seeking
God because we would not see Him. We would have no place before His throne to
ask anything. Without Jesus’ holiness we would have no right to ask God to accept
us. We could ask if we knew to ask (which we wouldn’t) but it would not be granted.
Without holiness no one can have audience with God. Not me, not you, not a single
person ever born or to be born or who was not born. Jesus sits at the right hand of
God and has full access to God the Father at all times. In Jesus, because of His
holiness, we too have this access to the Father.
Jesus’ holiness seen in his children is displayed by the obedience of the whole
person. It requires cleanliness of the mind, heart, and soul. Holiness is not merely
an outward act but outward acts will be its’ evidence. As faith is to works, so
holiness is to obedience. Obedience is the bending and stretching to God’s ways,
not man’s ways. Holiness is the cleanness that allows obedience to be present.
Holiness is freedom to desire and to act in obedience. There seems to be a general
disregard for holiness in the lives of many Christians. This disregard signals unbelief
and lack of hope. We have a great hope in Jesus. May God grant us grace to hold it
close and to build on its’ foundation.

Raising the Standard:

Are we “dumbing down” Christianity? Most of us have heard of the term

“dumbing down” with reference to schools and to our society. Our schools have
largely lowered the standards of students. They send a message that the students
will not attain to a higher standard so it is unfair to expect them to. In our society in
general; little is demanded from the public and little is given from the public in the
way of true concern and involvement. We rely more and more on the government
to care for us. By doing this we change the very nature and purpose of our
government. We forget that one is a slave to the one who keeps him.
Our churches in America too clearly reflect this attitude of our society. Those
in the congregation seem to think that the leadership is required to provide
something for them in the way of services and a production line of activities and
“ministries” for the members to pick and choose from according to their mood and
current life situation. There is little interest in the average person to be involved in
building the body with regard to holiness or love or the many other great things God
has for His temple. We are so accustomed to being consumers that we treat our
church leadership as employees. Why do we think that because we write a check
that nothing more is required of us? Our tithe is not to be a payment for services
rendered. Possibly this is why many people cannot bear to hear a message that
actually convicts their heart of sin. They obviously did not intend to purchase that
kind of message.
Leaders of churches also fall into this trap of thinking they are providing a
service to be purchased by the church member. Many will go to great lengths to
give people want they want as would any good business man. The music must
appeal to those they want to attract and they must provide all the right activities for
the family. They are at the beck and call of those who financially support the church
but may have lost sight of actually loving them and serving them in God’s power.
When leaders fall to trusting themselves to men, they will not preach or teach that
men must be holy to see God. Hope dwindles and lives fade. How many are lost
forever?
We must raise the standard of our Christian lives. The members and the
leader must look to the Bible to assess their lives and ministries. We should have
no lack of understanding and tenderness when a person falls to sin or fails in their
faith and hope. We should be faithful to build in peoples’ minds the compassion and
forgiveness of God. But this should not be done and really cannot be done without
the expectation of the person to desire and live in holiness in Christ if they are truly
a child of God. Forgiveness and compassion without the hope and expectation of
holiness is a lie.
We must put “work” into our lives to make our calling and election sure. We
must work to believe, we must fight to drive lies from our thinking. We work and
fight in the power of God in the Holy Spirit and we must put our hands to this work
for holiness and the great hope we have in Jesus. In our churches today, it seems
that “work” is a dirty word when applied to holiness. We who labor intensely for
temporary things barely put forth effort to eternal things. The idea of training one’s
mind is unpopular and it is unacceptable to speak as if one expects others to do so.

John 6:27
“Do not labor for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to
eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. For on him God the
Father has set his seal.”

Romans 12:1-2
I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your
bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your
spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed
by the renewal of your mind, that be testing you may discern what is the
will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

Our minds need to be cleansed. The mind feeds the heart. What comes into
the mind will fill the heart. Worship of God is not mindless activity or mindless
waiting on emotional inspiration. Does not all training begin and stay with the
mind? We must train the mind and submit the body to God. Our work is to believe.
The work of the Christian is to train the mind to reject what is false and hold to what
is true. It is the work of faith to holiness. God’s living word tells us what is true and
reveals to us the one we trust personally so we know what and who to believe. In
prayer we are given perfect place to be cleansed by and spend time with Jesus, so
that we may know the one we believe.
Holiness is not an option. As we were called to believe we were called to be
holy. Jesus made it all possible for us in His work. The Holy Spirit makes us able,
reminding us of all that has been done, and of Gods’ promises and of what we can
look forward to when Jesus is revealed. We do not attain to be God – holy in our
own right. We do attain to be like God in our behavior in the sense of representing
who Jesus is to the world. Jesus makes us clean before God and the Holy Spirit
helps us to live that out here on earth.

Jesus Alone:

The desire to be holy is a good desire. As with any good desire from the Lord,
we can get sidetracked in pride and miss the point. The point is always in Jesus. We
need to want Jesus for the sake of Jesus. We need to seek Him for the end of finding
Him and being with Him and resting in Him. We can see every sin and desire every
good attribute God has to offer and fail to make progress in holiness if we are not
after the person of Jesus Christ.
We are given a multitude of instruction on how to live a holy, God honoring
life.
Rest / Work
Be Still / Run
Fight / The battle belongs to the Lord
Be childlike / Grow up in the faith
Seek / Wait
Pursue / Ask
Go / Abide
 Be strong / Glory in weakness

Only in Jesus can these perplexing commands and exhortations make perfect sense
and make us holy and like Jesus. We strive hard against the pride of our flesh to
rest in the One who saves us. We are still before God and He shows us and moves
us and teaches us and grows us and uses us. We look eagerly for Jesus and for
signs of Him in us and others as we wait for the day of His coming. We pursue all
God has promised us by laying down every doubt that comes against them and then
they are for our asking. We cannot “go” anywhere in terms of doing God’s will, if we
do not go in Christ. In seeing all we are not; we take joy in all He is. We cannot
have patience for the sake of being patient. We cannot have strength simply for the
sake of being strong. We cannot have wisdom or love or hope or endurance for our
sake. We can have no good thing apart from Jesus Christ. If we have Jesus, we
have everything for the sake of His name. All our goodness and holiness and
beauty are in Jesus. We will not be made holy apart from Him.
Disciplines and habits are good if they are godly disciplines. Our disciplines
and habits will only benefit us toward holiness to the degree that they draw us
toward Christ. Tricks to tame the flesh will only be effective if the goal is to die to
the flesh and see Jesus as the only true power for holiness. Jesus is holiness and He
lives through us. We have a responsibility to bring our bodies and minds and
emotions in to subjection to Jesus. It is the reality that He lives in us that makes this
possible. We don’t just “act right” and then offer ourselves to Him. We offer
ourselves first and then He motivates and empowers us to act right. All of our
obedience is through Jesus Christ. To be in obedience is to be found in him. We
have to go to him to be found in him. We go to Jesus at the cross. He comes to us
at the cross; to live through us. There is death on both sides. He has died to bring
us in. We must die to bring him in.

Seeing is Believing:

1 John 3:2
Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet
appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him,
because we shall see him as he is.

1 Cor 13:12
For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in
part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.

When we see Jesus as He is we desire to be like Him. The more we behold

His beauty in our hearts. The more we long to be made holy as He is holy. The more
we hold on to the promises purchased for us by Jesus, the more we believe them.
The closer we look into Jesus’ eyes, the more we are able to realize His ability and
willingness to do all that God has promised. Below are some references made to
God’s people. These serve to remind us of how God sees us in His Son. They tell us
what God has planned and of His love and care for us.

Rivers of living waters will flow from us God will rescue us

We will be like Trees planted by streams We will have honor
We are called a Holy priesthood We will bear much fruit
Promised abundant life We will have what we ask
for
We can be full of joy God will be with us in
trouble
We will eat of the tree of life God will answer when we
call
We are called conquerors No evil shall befall us

Promised to sit with Jesus on his throne We will not have

fear
We will be pillars in God’s temple God will deliver us
Clothed in white garments In the book of life
Confessed before the Father Given the morning star
Promised authority over the nations We will live forever
Given the crown of life Given a new name
God will command His angels concerning us Given hidden manna

Each of these is a short reminder of what God has promised to those who
belong to Him in Jesus Christ. What is it that keeps us from believing these
promises? One can pick them apart all one wants but God has promised these
things and much more to those who are his children. Why do we struggle to believe
even a few? It may be we don’t believe because we are not seeing Jesus. We are
not seeing him in scripture; we are not seeing Him in prayer. We are not seeing him
in our hearts and everyday lives. Why do we not see Him? We are not seeing Jesus
because we are not looking to Him. We look at everyone and everything but Jesus.
Jesus is not hiding Himself from his sheep; we have only to read the Bible to see His
heavenly and earthly life. Many are not looking in the Bible and so will not see him.
God’s word is living and active. The Holy Spirit has been given to guide us to all
truth. We need to set our eyes on Jesus, continuously. God has not denied us our
need. Jesus is ours for the seeking. The more we see of Him, the more we will
believe the promises he gave and bought with His blood for us. The more we
believe in his ability and desire to fulfill his promises, the more we will desire to be
conformed to his image. The more we desire, the more we will ask and the more we
will receive.

God is with us! Jesus is among His people and daily cares for us. We need to
look to Him and admire and enjoy Him. We have been given fellowship with the one
and only Living God. We have the privilege of knowing, personally, the One who
created the universe. We must look to Jesus and know Him! Failure to do this
results in profaning God’s name because we simply give lip service to believing Him
and others cannot see the testimony of His greatness in our lives. Believing God is
not only to meet our needs but it is how we magnify His greatness. Believing God
brings about the fruit of faith which is obedience, works and holiness so others can
see that God is who He says He is. When we refuse to strive to believe we not only
rob ourselves but make a mockery of God’s greatness in the eyes of others. Don’t
think God is unconcerned about what others think. He certainly isn’t worried in an
insecure way but He is very concerned about what others will say about His name
as a result of our lives. Much of God’s dealing with Israel in the Old Testament was
to show the surrounding nations what He is like. God desires to do us good. We
limit the great goodness that others could be witnessing when we are in unbelief of
any kind. God is sovereign and is not changed by our behavior but He is not in the
habit of changing the conditions of His promises. All set conditions are met in Jesus
Christ. We need to look to Jesus.

Fleshly Goodness:

In seeking to live a holy life, many fall to a life of legalism. Many others fall to
permissiveness. Others don’t address the issue at all but just try to do their best to
not get into too much trouble. All of these serve the flesh, not God. All of these are
lives of unbelief. Front and center of unbelief is pride. Pride will not lie down and let
God carry him. Pride has to walk on his own and get it right first and then pride
might say God helped. Our perception of holiness must change in order to break
the habit of trying to manage it ourselves. We must stop seeing holiness as just the
ceasing of socially unacceptable behavior among Christians. We must see it as a
vitally important role in our relationship to God.
Satan was cast out of heaven because he sought to be God. Our flesh is his
child and obeys its’ father. Our flesh desires to look “holy” so that it can be our
God. Our flesh knows no other way than to follow its’ father and obey its’ master.
We can be deceived into thinking that our determination to manage our bad
behavior is always of God. Typically we will fail so many times we will begin to
narrow down what we have the energy to manage; usually the behaviors others
see. We wear ourselves out trying to tame our flesh and in many areas just live
with it and console each other with the idea that this is our destiny on earth. Only
Jesus is holy. We cannot have our own. When we seek to make ourselves holy
rather than abiding in Jesus for His holiness in us, we find ourselves in hopelessness
and usually give up and live a life of pretense.
The lack of movement in sharing the gospel may not necessarily be a result
of laziness but possibly more of fear. Some fear our God is not as powerful,
attentive or interested as His word says. After all, if we have been asking for a
certain virtue but cannot seem to attain it or keep it – how can we expect to see
God move in the lives of unbelievers? The problem is; we are expecting the wrong
thing. If we are expecting to gain God’s virtues, we are expecting the wrong thing;
mainly to have our flesh justified by being given the ability to be perfect. Jesus is
our virtue and we have already been given Him.
Do not think it too high for your flesh to desire to do “right” things. The Holy
Spirit gives us a desire to be like Jesus – our flesh can quickly pick up this desire and
try to own it. Satan always copies God and our flesh copies Satan. He knows that if
He can get us chasing after goodness we will turn from the only one who is good.
Only away from our flesh and with Jesus do we see any good in and through our
lives. The Holy Spirit is able and willing to give us discernment as to which is which
in all situations. God is merciful and kind and He knows we can be easily confused
and turned and He knows the power of the deceptions of the enemy.
If we will be willing to be honest about the desires and capabilities of our flesh, we
will more readily heed the warnings of the Holy Spirit and follow His way of Holiness
in Jesus.
It is the person of Jesus who steps into our longing for holiness. He does not
just hand us a tool so we can continue our work. He does the work – the flesh must
die. There is no point at being dismayed at the evil of our flesh. The flesh is
destined to perish. Don’t waste time or divert your attention in worrying over what
your flesh will never be. Grieve over sin when you obey your flesh – yes! But there
is no point in grieving over the fact that the flesh will always be evil.
We cannot go off chasing a “virtue” or “ability”. We cannot collect God’s
good ways and carry them around as if they were our own. No, all is shattered on
the Rock, Our Lord Jesus. We have nothing; we do not amass knowledge or pile up
virtues. Jesus has all knowledge and righteousness. We cannot own a single part
but we must continually cast ourselves on Him. We are called to fellowship with God
by His Spirit through Jesus. So when we seek to be “good” for the sake of just doing
things right we miss the point of fellowship and what it means to glorify God in our
bodies. In Jesus is sweet desire for His desires. Let our part in loving one another
consist in our clinging to Jesus. We cannot seek Jesus for His gifts or virtues or
knowledge but for Himself. There is no good apart from Jesus. We will find no good
in anything or anyone other than Him. This also means that good is not separated
from Jesus. If we want anything good it comes in Jesus. We take Jesus, for Himself
or we do not receive good. We don’t need to know “how” but “whom”. God is not
reaching in from the outside to change who we are. He has come to live within his
people to show the world who He is.

John 14:23
“If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him,
and we will come to him and make our home with him.”

1 John 2:23b
Whoever has the Son has the Father also.

It is in learning and believing who God is and trusting who He is in us that we

have faith for holy lives. We can believe all good things about God but if we don’t
understand that he is within us in His Spirit we will not have the hope to be holy. We
will continue to try to work in ourselves. Apart from Jesus we can do nothing. With
Jesus, we can do ALL things. God has given himself in Jesus. That is the Great News
of life we have!
We can be in sin in our effort to stay out of sin. If we are seeking a method or
ability to use when temptation comes, we may be trying to work our own
sanctification. We may grieve when God shows us the ugliness of our sinful flesh
and we should. But we should not then rely on that flesh to eradicate its' ugly self.
How much of our grief is our flesh crying over what it cannot attain for itself and
how much is from the Holy Spirit showing us our need of Jesus and how His name
has been profaned? It is good to mourn and weep over our sinfulness and depravity
before God. It is good to be grieved about not treating God’s name as holy.
However, it is easy to be grieved over ourselves only with no regard to God’s glory.
When we are only upset over a failed attempt to control our flesh with the power of
the flesh, we have a false repentance.
False repentance brings a despair over what we are not and do not have.
The flesh desires and cannot have. Satan tempts us to hopelessness in reminding
us of what we aren’t doing what we ought to do and what we can’t do. We seek
God’s help to alleviate this hopelessness but often we are seeking to satisfy the
flesh in asking God to give it the power to do godly works. We work hopelessness
into our hearts when we seek an earthly “holiness”. Trying to work a pretense of
rightness for the sake of soothing our conscience will always bring hopelessness
because we will fail and lose sight of Jesus in our pursuit for personal rightness
before others.
Godly repentance comes when God shows us the desires and works of our
flesh and gives us the GIFT of repentance. We recognize, by His Spirit, that what He
has shown us is against Him and His word. He brings hope and a joy in it because it
is brought by His Spirit. The repentance comes when we turn from the flesh and its’
desires, whether those desires are evil or “good”, and we turn to Jesus. We ignore
the flesh and turn to the person of Jesus. We have freedom in that we are not
expected to bring the solution or cleansing or any power to sustain. Jesus doesn’t
give us holiness; He is holiness. He gives us Himself. We have helplessness not
hopelessness. We know Jesus will and can obey all His own commands so we can
rest in His ability to live them through us. We need only be quiet and turn from the
condemning thoughts of the flesh and devil.

Fight with Hope:

Psalm 78:32
In spite of all this, they still sinned; despite his wonders, they did not
believe.

In our fight of faith; we must have and hold to the assurance we have in Jesus
Christ. We need to have assurance in His ability and willingness to find us, claim
and cleanse us so that we can become children of God. We must believe and look
forward to being with him forever in perfection. Assurance in our past and future
gives us assurance for today. We have assurance that God is for us and that he
does not want nor intend for our lives to be torn to pieces by sin, marring his
treasure and making his bride ugly. Unbelief is the great barrier to holiness. The
outer life will reflect the inner life and in order for the inner man to be clean in heart
he has to have faith. We are all prone to thought patterns that breed unbelief. We
sometimes tend to rely too heavily on our experience or the experiences of others
and not heavily enough on scripture. We must fight against the barriers in our
thinking that keep us from the reality that God is with us and for us and will and is
making us holy for the sake of His great name. Our thinking can get twisted with
regard to truths. Some common barriers to belief for holiness are thoughts like
these:

“I won’t really know the Lord until I get to heaven”

“I can’t be perfect while on earth”
“I will always sin – the pull of the flesh is strong”
 While these statements are true, we tend to focus too much on them in the
negative sense. God’s word repeatedly makes emphasis on God’s power over evil
and on His ability and willingness to save. Most Christians do not really doubt they
will be saved on the Day of the Lord but there seems to be much doubt in the area
of sanctification. Partly this is cop out and partly this is a pattern of unbelief.
In the realization that God is too vast and too holy for us to fully know while in
our earthly bodies, there ought to be an awe that brings joy, not an attitude that
settles for less. We can be thrilled that in seeking to know Jesus, we will never be
bored, never have enough and never run out of new discoveries and joys in Him.
Satan can get us thinking it is just too hard to spend time seeking God and
meditating on His word so we just fall on the “not yet” side of our salvation and
hope it will all come together in the future. We have an invitation in Jesus from God
Himself to come and taste and see that He is good. He does not tell us simply to
wait but to pursue Him. In being content with what we know of Jesus, we make
God’s gift small. We can always have more of Jesus. There is never a time when we
will have all we can have. God is inexhaustible in treasures of joy and peace and
wonders. God is pleased when His children ask for more of Him in Jesus. Let us ask
and expect and receive and keep asking.
Only Jesus is perfect and only God is pure and holy. We are being made in
the image of Christ. We can enjoy godly attitudes and godly desires and the power
to live them out. God provides for us to love in fellowship that is not constantly
tainted and broken by sin. God desires for us to have this kind of fellowship. When
we act as if overcoming sin is not possible, we make the sacrifice of His only Son a
foolish act on His part. We do struggle with the flesh, the world and the devil but
Jesus offers us real hope and power to overcome in every instance. We too easily
put up with inner turmoil because we have taken “suffering” to mean that of the
inner man. God does not teach us with discouragement and despair. This is not His
school. God gives us hope and it is our hope in Jesus that will make us holy. We
hope in cleansing for our sins, past, present, and future. We can also hope for help
in temptation and hope for strength to do good today and tomorrow. Let us seek
God’s power to eradicate all sin form our minds, heart and lives to enjoy Jesus more.
The Holy Spirit is given to speak to our hearts regarding sin and if we will depend on
Him, he will help us to have the attitude God desires for us to have. The person
who recites to himself, “I can’t be perfect” may not see sin as seriously as God sees
it and may not see the danger of it. It is not a question of “being perfect” but a
matter of not hiding a favorite or particularly difficult area of disobedience.
Our flesh is well practiced at enticing us to sin against God. Our flesh is not
stronger than God. We are just more in tune with it. We need to get out of tune
with it. When our thinking gets stuck on the pattern of “I will always sin”, we almost
convince ourselves that the power of the flesh is stronger than the power of the
Spirit. If that were true, then God has not properly equipped us to live the life He
has called us to. We have been properly equipped. We have more than we need.
Wallowing in false humility masked by an eagerness to share our weaknesses will
not get the job done. Belief in God’s power over sin and the flesh and Satan will.
We would be foolish to underestimate the deception of our fleshly desires. But to be
prepared and already defeated are not the same. Be prepared with God’s promises
and the gospel that saves us. Do not be defeated before the battle by declaring to
yourself that there is not victory and that you are subject to every evil thought that
comes your way. Jesus Christ has defeated the corruption of the sinful flesh and we
are not slaves any more to it.
 Unbelief can take a general truth and twist it into ones’ heart so that it
becomes all one can see.
Unbelief is not to be defended or abided with. Unbelief must be destroyed within
us. Unbelief must be defeated if we are to have eternal life. God will not put up
with it. Many have been destroyed and many more will perish because of unbelief.
God is zealous for His name and He will secure it’s reality on this earth. We cannot
display who God is if we do not believe He is who he says. He is our savior. He
saves us – from sin.

1 Pet 4:2
So as to live for the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for human
passions but for the will of God.

To live for the will of God requires holiness, which we have and gain by faith.
We are called to live holy lives for the rest of the time here. We are given Jesus and
given to Jesus so we have holiness available to us to live by. We believe what has
been given, we look to what we will be given and we live out what we are.

1 Thess 4:3a
For this is the will of God, your sanctification: …

John the Baptist talked about repentance and the coming Messiah. He was
preparing the way. We must prepare the way for Jesus’ return also. We need
repentance and the hope of His coming. It is the hope in repentance and the future
with our Lord that will lead us to holiness. We were given hope when we were
initially saved. We realized, by the power of God, that we could have a relationship
with God. We hoped and were saved by faith. We know by God’s word that we can
be made holy. We hope and by faith are made holy. The enemy is eating away at
our assurance in the power of God and at our trust in God’s desire to make us holy.
Many people have given up the idea of holiness because it is seemingly out of
grasp. There is little trying or effort. There is a lack of effort in the sense of seeking
God with any expectation of change. Many don’t ask with expectation of really
living and being different. Some have lost faith in God for sanctification. They are
under the delusion that they will see God without holiness. Much of this lack is
blamed on God. Because God is absolutely sovereign some will become lazy in the
fight of faith. “God is in control and He will change me at His will”, they say. God is
sovereign but God does not force us to believe Him. He may bring us to the
banquet room, but He won’t force us to eat. We have a part in our sanctification.
We err in failing to take our privileged place in Gods’ work. We either think it is all
about our outward activities and make our lives a legalistic prison or we leave it all
to God and just feel sorry for our sinful selves.

Holy and majestic Father in heaven, forgive us for our disregard of your requirement
for holiness. Have mercy on us. We have made your name small and your holy
ways secondary to our emotions and experiences. You are the God who makes His
people righteous for acceptance into your kingdom. You are the God who makes
your people clean for good works. You are the God who made a people for yourself;
the inheritance of your perfect Son. You are merciful and compassionate. Make
your mercy and compassion known among your people in renewing the hope of
sanctification among your people everywhere. Let your name be known first and
foremost as holy, holy, holy.

God will not sanctify our works. It is not helpful to exhort each other to works
if we are not using faith as our means to work. If we are not taking hold, actively to
Jesus, given to and for us, we won’t strengthen our grip by works. Works come after
our faith is solid and secure. We cannot make it solid by our works. This solidity of
faith can come days after we give our lives to Christ. It is not a matter of time;
although time should strengthen it. Faith is belief. We are given it and it will
produce works – not the other way around. We can’t produce the works but we must
hold to the faith already given. If there is no evidence of faith by works, faith is
lacking. We must strive for our faith. Isn’t it a “work” to strive? Yes, it is the first
work of faith. If one has faith it will produce the work of striving for faith. People are
not lazy in their works but lazy in their faith. The striving and holding is to faith.
Strive to believe. Strive against the lies of the enemy and for the truth of God.

Heb 10:19, 22-23

Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by
the blood of Jesus,

Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our
hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with
pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering,
for he who promised is faithful.

Heb 4:11
Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the
same sort of disobedience.

Heb 4:14
Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the
heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession.

If we do not enter into the rest from our works into Jesus work, we will fall into
the sin of disobedience. To strive for faith is to hold on to what we’ve been given
and what we know. When we come against God’s word and He causes us to see we
don’t believe it we need to strive against our flesh with God until we do believe. We
strive for holiness in being cleansed of unbelief so that we can be prepared to do
good works. How can we do good works if we do not believe in Jesus’ power to
carry it out and through? How can we believe He will carry it through if we do not
believe in what He has already done for us?
1 John 2:24
Let what you heard from the beginning abide in you. If what you heard
from the beginning abides in you, then you too will abide in the Son and in
the Father.

John 15: 5
“Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for
apart from me you can do nothing.

Abiding in Jesus is required for fruitful lives and holiness. Holiness must be
the place of abiding. Our holy God will make Himself a suitable home in us. This
will be a holy place where He dwells in us. We are exhorted to hold to what we
have heard and what we have received. When we go to God for our salvation
initially, that is not the end of the conversation. It is only the beginning of God’s
transforming of us. This is more than a small concept of “I was saved”. It is the
huge reality of all that Jesus is in us and through us and who He has called us to be
and what He has called us to do. Jesus has purchased for us access to all of God!
God’s promises are as sure as the sun rising – even behind the clouds. To have
confidence in Jesus for our salvation is an awesome thing! We need to remember
and hold this confidence for every day of our lives.
We do not need to try to stimulate each other the works but to believe so that
we can work. Heb 10:24 tells us to “stir up one another to love and good works”. It
is, of course, necessary that we stir each other up. We are to stir up one another by
helping one another to believe what we have received, namely Jesus. It is in
helping one another to overcome unbelief that we stir up one another. This
exhortation to stir up one another comes AFTER many pleas to hold to our original
faith given by God. The problem is we read the book of Hebrews and skip right to
“stir up one another” without seeing the true directive in the letter to strengthen
one’s faith in Jesus by meditating and discovering what has been given through
Him.
Hebrews 11 gives us many examples of what belief looks like. We consider
those listed in this chapter as holy people. They were God’s people. They belonged
to God and were used for His purposes. We are God’s people to be used for His
purposes. Without holiness they would not have been able to stand in their faith.
They would have been eaten up by the enemy. Without holiness we cannot stand in
our faith and some of us are being eaten up by the enemy. We admire those listed
as faithful in Heb 11. We admire them as if they were athletes and accomplished
some man powered feat. It is the gift of faith and the giver of faith that is to be
admired. The examples are to show us what faith can do, not what men and women
of the past accomplished. They were given faith. We have been given faith.
Why is it usually assumed that those in the past – in the sense of biblical
accounts - received a larger portion of faith than those in Christ today? God
assigns the portion of faith to each of His children according to His wisdom. Is it
possible that the problem is not that we don’t’ have enough faith to gain holiness
but that we don’t use what we have? Faith must be practiced. If your child asks
you for more potato salad when they have a plate full, would you not tell them to
eat what they have? Let us examine and adore and hold and see clearly what we
have received in Jesus. What exactly have we been given in Jesus? That would take
another book in itself. The wonder of who Jesus is and all he does for us is for us
each to discover. We all have our own book of wonders on this subject. How does
yours read? Let us know and hold to what we have to press on to the future of living
for God.
We are called to fight the fight of faith. What are we fighting for? We don’t
fight to gain entrance into heaven. We have already been given access. We don’t
fight our old nature to bring it into obedience; the old nature has been sentenced to
death and we live in the new nature. We fight for faith with faith. We are fighting to
believe every word of God. We fight unbelief in God’ promises and in what he has
done and will do. We fight unbelief with belief. This is why it is crucial that we
renew our minds. When doubt and unbelief come; we fight the unbelieving
thoughts with the truth we have stored up in our hearts and trained our minds with.
We bring every thought captive to Christ. We fight the unbelieving thoughts with
truth about God before they turn into unbelieving actions. When we don’t fight well
and we sin, we continue to fight more unbelief with more truth. We fight with the
truth of forgiveness and with the knowledge of God’s strength to help us in our time
of need. We fight with the assurance of Jesus’ words and actions. We fight with the
assurance that He is with us and will never leave us but will continue to keep us in
Him.
Jesus is our rest. Strive to enter into His rest. True restfulness is not when
our minds are turned off but when they are turned onto something else. Sleep is a
physical necessity. Our bodies must be down for a little time to be able to function.
But restfulness of the soul and mind comes in a different way. To rest we seek things
that are calming and soothing. We do things like fish, hike, read or quilt. We
prepare to do activities that are restful. To rest in Christ in all of our lives, we need
to set our minds on Him; not turn them off. Since Jesus is our rest, we should
prepare and make plans to be with Him. We make elaborate plans for vacations so
that we can get in a position of rest from work. We also need to make a habit of
making and keeping plans for seeking Jesus so we can learn to rest in all things and
times. We need to put ourselves before Jesus in prayer, we need to be prepared to
wait on his presence and take time to read His word so we can hear Him. Being
with Jesus will work for our holiness and cause us to long for it more and more.
When we spend time with Him, we see ourselves and others through his eyes. And
the more readily we agree with him on the desires of our flesh that do not belong in
His temple.

Looking Forward:

1 Peter 1:3-4
According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living
hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an
inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled and unfading, kept in heaven
for you,

We are born again to a LIVING hope, not a sleeping or dying hope.

1 Peter tells us a little of the past, present and future. God has caused us to
be born again (1:3), to an inheritance kept in heaven (1:4). We are being guarded
for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time (1:5). We now have trial so that
our faith may be found to result in praise and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
(1:6-7). The prophets of yesterday searched for those in the future. (1:8).
 It is hard to imagine Peter writing about trials and how they will glorify God in
the future without thinking of his temptation and failure when he denied Jesus. He
must have known great pain in this. Did he ever wonder if God would continue to
keep him? Having denied Jesus once, did he fear he could do it again? His faith was
guarded, even though he stumbled. All that was past, serves us today, all that is
present serves others tomorrow. So when we see our present days as not shining
too bright or if they seem especially hard, we can know and set our hope on the fact
that all that is today will be for the result of praise, honor and glory at the time
when Jesus returns. The praise will be full as it ought to be. Today does not serve
today, today serves tomorrow. We can look at other’s yesterdays and our own and
be assured of God’s faithfulness and know He will keep us. If we have failed like
Peter and most of us have on some level, we can look to our yesterdays to take
strength for tomorrow. God has worked in and for us. God will continue to do so.

1 Pet 1:13-14
Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set
your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation
of Jesus Christ. As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions
of your former ignorance,

We look at the past and gain strength, we hope in the future. What is today
for? Today is for holiness. We are to look forward and live in obedience to Jesus.
Today we abide in Him and we endure. We look to the past and are served by it.
We look to the future and to the fullness of Our Blessed Jesus, the revelation of the
groom. We build and we are guarded. We stand – all for the joy of others in the
future so that Jesus will be met with the fullness of His people. We will be full in
number, full in Spirit. Jesus will reap the fullness and the completion of the faith He
bought and gave to us and perfected in us. Let us be kept by and use the faith
given us today, looking not to our own tomorrow but to the future present days of
others. For the faith of others shall be our true and full joy of our tomorrow.
So we have an “already” and a “not yet” but we also have a “now”. Now is for
holiness.

1 Pet 1:15
But as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct

1 Pet 1:22
Having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth for a sincere
brotherly love, love one another earnestly from a pure heart,

2 Tim 4:8
Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the
Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that Day, and not only to
me but also to all who have loved his appearing.

We are told to be holy in all our conduct. We see that we are purified by
obedience to the truth. All our holiness is in our hope of Jesus. We hope in what He
will do. We hope in his appearing and by this our souls are purified. Holiness is
attained by looking forward to seeing Jesus. We trust that we are cleansed inwardly
by Jesus’ blood which was for us. We bring our bodies into line with this knowledge
by hoping in his appearing. By looking toward to what we will have and what we
will be like when Jesus returns; we have power and motivation to wait and to live
lives that we know are pleasing to Him.
A faithful wife who loves her husband thinks of him while he is away on a
long trip, ponders and longs for his homecoming. As she continually thinks about
his return to her, she considers all the things about him she loves and treasures him
more and more. The more she thinks of what he is like the nearer her heart is to
him. Their communication spurs on the love in her heart. She keeps herself and
their home and their children in a way that pleases him with him in mind. Her
desire to see him face to face in the near future reinforces and assures her of his
love for her. He has not left her but is only away temporarily in body. In their daily
communication she is given much reason for her love and anticipation as he assures
her of his unending love for her and helps her understand the necessity of his
physical absence. It is the surety of his return to her that keeps her desire for him.
She wouldn’t even think of looking to another because her beloved is truly with her
in her heart and pervades her mind. She is first sure of his love, originally, and as
they communicate in this love she is also sure that his coming back is real and lives
for that day.

Allegiance:

To be holy to God is to be loyal to Him and His purposes and to be aligned

with His perfect will. The angels have allegiance to God and to no other. They are
able to carry out His every command because they are holy. God’s angels do His
bidding. Angels don’t balks at God’s commands or question them. The angles see
God regularly and are on speaking terms with Him. They are holy and so able to be
in His presence at all times.
Jesus Christ is the author and finisher of our faith. He will be faithful to bring
His bride home. But the angels also provide an inspiring look at the kind of love for
Gods’ glory we can all aspire to. In looking for a moment to the angels, let us be
inspired by their undivided loyalty to God and His purposes. There are similarities
between angels and men. Both are created. Both are appointed to proclaim the
salvation of God in Jesus Christ and to speak to men for God. Both are commanded
to worship Jesus Christ (Heb 1:6). Angels and men are fellow servants (Rev 19:10).
Both are called to minister to those being saved (Heb 1: 14). Both are elect (1 Tim
5:21). Both can be turned from God to Satan (Rev 12:7-9, Gen 13:13). Both must be
holy. Men and angels wage war with Satan and his angels in the power given them
by God (Dan 10:13, Rev 12:7-8). Both angels and men have among their number
those who have fallen to serve Satan.
The fallen angels will never be re-admitted into God’s kingdom. God has set
His affection on man. Man can be redeemed for God has made a way for man to be
reunited with Him in Jesus. Redeemed, holy man will share the throne of Jesus Christ
(Rev 3:21). We will be one with Him forever! The redeemed of the Lord will judge
angels (1 Cor 6:3). It must be fascinating to the angels, both evil and holy, that
lowly, fragile man has such favor with God. It ought to be even more fascinating for
us who believe! Angels have a high privilege in serving and worshiping God. What
wonder they must behold in seeing His face. But we who belong to Jesus are called
His children. To be a servant of God is amazing and wonderful – but to be His child;
unspeakable joy!
 Do angels have faith? They must believe God and trust Him to be able to do
His work. They must believe God to have allegiance to Him. The angels who were
cast to the earth with Satan did not believe God but believed Satan. Since it was
possible for some angels to turn from God to Satan, there must be a willing
allegiance to God from those who did not follow Satan. There is no allegiance
without faith and there is no holiness without allegiance. We know that the angels
are holy and can see in scripture that they are committed to God’s glory, and that
this is willful. They are not robots. So they must have faith. It would have been
given to them by God.
While Satan was deceiving the angels to follow him instead of God, was He
also attempting to deceive those angels who did not fall? It would not be out of
character for him to do so. If he is brazen and proud enough to try to deceive Jesus
in the dessert it is reasonable to think He would have tried to deceive all the angels.
Does this mean that the angels were tested in their faith as men are? This, of
course, is speculation but the point is that if even angels can be deceived and they
do not carry sinful flesh, how much more are we susceptible to be turned away from
God at every turn. We have the entire world, Satan and his demons and our own
flesh fighting to get us to disbelieve God.
Adam and Eve were deceived before they had sinful flesh. If those who have no
pull of the sin in flesh or a past of sin can be deceived away from the living God,
how much more in danger are we? What an awesome testimony to the grace given
to keep us!
God requires allegiance. We are called by God to forsake every affection and
allegiance of our hearts that conflict with our allegiance with Him. We need loyalty
to keep us from wondering off to serve false God’s, mainly our own selves. Trust
and belief in Jesus and in Jesus alone for all our needs will build a wall of allegiance
around our hearts. As we trust Him and call on Him for all things necessary for
salvation and life and see Him act, we will be increasingly more aligned with Him in
thought and deed. We will be increasingly holy as we are more aligned with His zeal
for His glory and all His purposes to promote the knowledge of His glory.
When we don’t believe God, we sin. In 2 Peter, chapter 1, Peter lists qualities
that ought to accompany our faith. In verse 9 he says, “For whoever lacks these
qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed
from his former sins. We must remember that we have been cleansed and believe
that Jesus’ blood will cleanse us still. The moment we fail to believe God, our loyalty
is turned from God to Satan. This is not holy living. We must always protect the
allegiance to God in Christ by continuing to fight for faith and against the lies of
Satan.
This fighting for faith seems like a big task but all has been provided for us in
Jesus. Because of Jesus and His work on our behalf, we have been given
supernatural ability to believe in all God is and says along with the understanding of
His word through His Spirit. God has equipped us with the wisdom of His Spirit
within us to lead us away from deception and into Gods’ truth. The Spirit of God in
us also gives us comfort and strength and inspiration. We are given help from God
by his angels. Jesus intercedes for us always. All of heaven is for us. The elect of
God cannot possibly fail to enter Gods’ kingdom forever!

What’s in a Name?
 It is the name of Jesus that is given to every child of God. His identity is what
gets us into heaven. It is in Jesus, that we go to the Father. Without permission to
use His name, we have no access to God’s throne.

John 3:5
“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he
cannot enter the kingdom of God.

Our identity changes when we are born again in Christ. Where we once
identified with our flesh and its’ desires and with the world, we now identify with
Jesus. We must identify with Jesus in our inner spirit, in our desires and
submissiveness to Him. And we must identify with Jesus publicly and outwardly, in
what we say and do. Both are necessary to enter the kingdom of God. The outward
life will reflect the inward life, or the lack thereof. One could say our name, before
we know Jesus is “one who belongs to Satan”. This is the identity of those who do
not belong to Jesus.
Before one knows Jesus, he belongs to Satan. He is a child of the Devils’
kingdom, awaiting destruction and eternal punishment. When one is under this
awful father, sin is his friend. He does not know any other way but the way of sin.
He uses the worlds system of taking care of the things of life and takes full
advantage of the “pleasures” of sin. His method of living makes perfect sense to
him because not only is it the way of everyone else, but it is the whole of his inner
man. Through sin, Satan owns the whole person.

When by God’s grace through faith, one is saved by Jesus. Sin becomes his
enemy. He is able to see how fully cooperative he is with sin and Satan and He is
able to hate it and to want to be free from it. He is given faith to believe in and hold
to Jesus for his salvation. He begins to war in the power of the Holy Spirit. He is
given the assurance of things not seen (Heb 11:1) concerning Jesus and himself and
all the promises purchased with Jesus’ blood. This assurance, his faith, gives him
the necessary belief in who he is as a new creation and more importantly, who Jesus
is as His savior and King and God. It is in believing God that he is able to see the
destroying nature of sin and want to be no part of it.
One who is saved by God is in the process of being sanctified by God. God is
working to make him holy. This is a sure work that is promised and is taken by faith
as all other promises. He has a part in his sanctification. His work is to believe and
to obey by believing. God desires that His children grow to more and more fullness
of assurance in all that He is in Jesus Christ.
When one has a full assurance in Jesus, sin becomes and evil imposter. As he
is more bold in his pursuit of righteousness and more thorough and unyielding in his
fight of faith against the lies of the enemy, sin is seen in a more realistic light. It is
viewed in the light of God. It is seen in the light given by Gods’ word and shone by
His Spirit. Sin is seen more as an unwanted intruder than an old friend or even a
familiar enemy. He who is growing in faith and moving in sanctification begins to
identify more with Jesus than his own flesh. Sin is not simply a few bad habits that
he needs to give up but is now seen as a defilement of the holy place of God, as it
truly is. Because he is able to see himself as holy, in process and in promise, his
view of sin is serious and rooted in faith. He is quick to take full advantage of every
moment of conviction, in cooperation with the Holy Spirit. He does not take man’s
side or even his own, but God’s. This is what our lives are to be like in the life of
faith; growing in sanctification, gaining holiness, gaining Jesus.

Heb 5:14
But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of
discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.

If we do not move forward in our sanctification; holding our original

confidence, sin is still our enemy but it is more like a bothersome fly than a
poisonous snake. Our discernment becomes dull and we do not have the assurance
to be done with sin so we put up with it far too easily, sowing seeds of corruption. If
there is not a full assurance in Jesus and all He promises, a person does not see
himself as holy or being made holy. He gives up. He can cry until Jesus returns over
the ugliness of his sin, but it is not enough. He must trust in the power of God to
make it different.
Conviction is an awesome and wonderful gift and is sweet to the heart of the
one who belongs to Jesus. But it is only a sign. It is an arrow pointing to the Savior.
Seeing our depravity before Our Holy God brings joy. We know we are alive in Him
when we can see with the clarity of His Spirit. But being overwhelmed by ones need
is not enough. There must to be a hunger for the cure to the disease. If all there is
to the conviction is to weep over the state of one’s heart than we are eventually
discouraged. There it is, very plain, the ugliness of sin. What is to be done about it?
What is the conclusion to the revelation? Is their only the realization that God is
holy and we aren’t? There has to be more. There is more than acknowledging our
need. We need to receive the provision. We are able to see our need for holiness.
We must cry out for it. Not simply acknowledge, “I am so sinful, sorry”. When a
person’s powers to distinguish good from evil are sharp, he will say “sin must go,
whatever the cost, it cannot stay.” What happens next? Is he to reform himself and
rearrange his circumstances or become a hermit? None of that would work. What
happens next is that he gives it all over to Jesus and comes to the point of
identification with Jesus that he realizes Jesus is totally responsible for all of him.
Whatever he is or is not he belongs to Jesus. God will make of him whatever he
wills. And Gods’ will is always good.
For one who gives over his whole self to Jesus, all the ugliness that causes
such glad grief is not his problem. Not his problem?! Doesn’t he have to do
something? Yes, he trusts, he rests, he obeys all he knows to obey and he is not
overwhelmed or alarmed to discouragement because Jesus is making him holy.
Because the faith initially given is still being put to work and growing, he is able to
look at himself in all his lack and it all points to who Jesus is. He has a new identity
in Jesus.
We can forget our name and take the name of Our Lord. All our ugliness
points to Jesus’ beauty and He is beautiful enough for us all. We share a common
name in Jesus. The name is “I am one who belongs to Jesus.”

i am ONE who belongs to Jesus

i am one of many
i am one who BELONGS to Jesus
He owns me
i am one who belongs to JESUS
 He who cares for me has all the power and love
there ever was.

The next time God is gracious enough to give you a look at the ugliness of
your flesh, look long and look hard and do not look away until you know total
desperation for the cure of your disease. Don’t leave the show early with the sour
comfort that you are in the company of many sinners. Don’t close your eyes with
the uneasy belief that God somehow loves you anyway. God does not just love you
anyway. The Father loves the Son, Jesus, and you belong to Jesus. God loves you
with that kind of love and it’s not just a pushing aside of your sinful state that allows
Him to love you. Revel in the view of your sin and struggle with the urgency of your
need until you are completely limp in the arms of Jesus. Does all that make the
ugliness go away? No and yes. No, it is still there but the one to whom you belong
will deal with it surly and in His time and in His way. It will be done. Look forward to
His coming and rest in His work today. And yes, because in your position before the
Father, you belong to Jesus. He is pure, beautiful and full perfection and His name
carries all you need and you have been given His name. He is pure light so all your
darkness is dispelled by Him. You are one with Jesus; you are found in Him. It is as
good as done because He has promised. Find rest in His holiness.