Jesus, My Redeemer

 

JUNE 18 Jesus Your Redeemer

Your Redeemer. Isaiah 54:5

Jesus, the Redeemer, is altogether ours and ours forever. All the offices of Christ are held on our behalf. He is King for us, priest for us, and prophet for us. Whenever we read a new title of the Redeemer, let us appropriate Him as ours under that name as much as under any other. The shepherd’s staff, the father’s rod, the captain’s sword, the priest’s miter, the prince’s scepter, the prophet’s mantle—all are ours. Jesus has no dignity that He will not employ for our exaltation, and no prerogative that He will not exercise for our defense. His fullness of Godhead is our unfailing, inexhaustible treasure-house. His manhood also, which he took upon Him for us, is ours in all its perfection. To us our gracious Lord communicates the spotless virtue of a stainless character; to us He gives the meritorious efficacy of a devoted life; on us He bestows the reward procured by obedient submission and unceasing service. He makes the perfect garment of His life our covering beauty, the glittering virtues of His character our ornaments and jewels, and the superhuman meekness of His death our boast and glory. He bequeaths us His manger, from which we learn how God came down to man, and His cross to teach us how man may go up to God. All His thoughts, emotions, actions, utterances, miracles, and intercessions were for us. He walked the path of sorrow on our behalf and has left to us as His heavenly legacy the full results of all the labors of His life. He is now as much ours as He will be; and He does not shrink to acknowledge Himself “our Lord Jesus Christ,” though He is the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings and Lord of lords. Christ everywhere and in every way is our Christ, forever and ever most richly to enjoy. O my soul, by the power of the Holy Spirit, call Him this morning “your Redeemer.”

 

Knowing God as Father

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June 16, 2023

All who are in Christ are God’s children. Yet many people find it difficult to think of God as their Father. This can be especially true for those whose earthly fathers have left them with unhappy recollections of sinful behavior and its consequences.

But God’s fatherhood has not been touched by sin. When we struggle to understand God as Father, it is likely because we are projecting onto God a notion of fatherhood that is not true of God. As Derek Prime writes, “All we know of genuine human fatherhood at its best is but a pale reflection of what the Father is, first, to his Son, and then to all who become his spiritual children.”1

The name of “Father” is not one we have chosen for God. It is what He has chosen to call Himself. Our great need, then, is to understand what God’s fatherhood actually is—and we may begin to do so by looking at His relationship with the incarnate Son, Jesus Christ. As we consider the richness of Jesus’ relationship with the Father, we can understand what it means for us to be adopted into God’s family.

Intimacy

To begin with, Christ’s relationship with His Father was marked by an unmistakable intimacy. For Jesus, God was not distant. He could converse with His Father openly and freely. We see this intimacy most clearly in the garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus, recoiling from the prospect of death, cried out to God with a term of the nearest familial endearment: “Abba, Father” (Mark 14:36).

Extraordinarily, the same interaction of the eternal Son with the Father is the intimacy that we now in some measure enjoy. Paul writes, “Because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, ‘Abba! Father!’” (Gal. 4:6). Like Jesus, we can cry out to our Father in times of desperation and need, certain that He will hear us.

When we struggle to understand God as Father, it is likely because we are projecting onto God a notion of fatherhood that is not true of God.

Jesus said, “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” (John 14:23). As children can make themselves comfortable in the home of a warm and affectionate dad, putting up their feet and sharing their lives without fear, so in Christ we may know what it’s like to be at home with God. Indeed, this kind of intimacy is only a glimpse of what we may enjoy with God by sharing in the life of His Son.

Generosity

Jesus also knew His Father to be generous. He described the Father’s liberality to the crowd: “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!” (Matt. 7:11). Jesus displayed God’s generosity in His ministry by healing the sick, driving out evil spirits, and even multiplying fish and loaves so that the hungry crowds could eat.

If we have a picture in our minds of God as a Father who reluctantly rations out His blessings—a little here and a little there—then we haven't understood the Bible’s image of Him fully. Our heavenly Father is magnanimous. He is generous in the extreme, and He loves to lavish His grace and affection on us. And even while we must deny a health-and-wealth “gospel” that supposes God’s gifts always come in the form of worldly prosperity, we need to take Jesus at His word when He teaches us that God is far more willing to bless His children than we are willing to ask.

Security

When Jesus was in the desert and hungry from fasting for forty days and nights, He did not yield to Satan’s temptation to turn stones into bread. He understood that His security was ultimately with God the Father and the Spirit. God the Son knew that the Father offers provision that sustains far greater than physical bread ever could. (See Matt. 4:1–4.)

On another occasion, recorded in Matthew 16:5–12, we read that Jesus warned His disciples about false teaching, speaking of “the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.” The disciples supposed He was teaching them about their physical circumstances, saying, “We brought no bread.” But Jesus was incredulous at this response: “Do you not yet perceive? Do you not remember the five loaves for the five thousand, and how many baskets you gathered?” Unlike the disciples, Jesus trusted resolutely that God would meet His greatest needs.

Jesus had already taught His disciples that they could rely on the Father, saying, “Do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For … your heavenly Father knows that you need them all” (Matt. 6:31–32). God is not some aloof animating force of the universe. He is our generous Father who knows, cares, and provides. It is in these truths that our security lies.

God not only forgives our sins but also adopts us as His own children. He invites us into His home to become members of His family.

Indeed, even amid the realities of suffering and death, we know this security. No hardship can separate us from God’s love (Rom. 8:35–39). The Christian knows that she is secure in the Father’s providential care and that God will raise her up at the last day. We are guaranteed “an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you” (1 Peter 1:4).

Identity

At the very beginning of Jesus’ ministry, when John the Baptist baptized Him, God confirmed Jesus’ identity as His Son by speaking from heaven: “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased” (Matt. 3:17). God said the same to the disciples on the Mount of Transfiguration: “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him” (Matt. 17:5). Jesus’ self-perception was founded on His being the Son of the Father—a sense of identity that He expressed on many occasions (e.g., John 5:30, 6:38, 8:28).

Jesus is unique in His status as the incarnate Son, the second person of the Trinity. Yet through His work of atonement, He has invited us to share in the privileges of identifying as God’s children. We may be tempted to prove our ourselves worthy to be God’s children by our works, but actually, in the grace of God, those who know Jesus simply are heirs of the Father and “fellow heirs with Christ” (Rom. 8:17). We are children of the King and part of His family. We are one with Him. And it is the reality of this identity, through grace, that prevents us from slipping back to our old identity by nature. We can say to ourselves, “I am a child of the King, and I will live as a child of the King should.”

How to Know God as Father

The benefit of knowing God as Father are indeed rich—but not everyone experiences them. God is, in one sense, the Father of everyone as the creator of all things. But there is a difference between being God’s “offspring” (Acts 17:28–29) because He is the Creator and being a son or daughter in a healthy relationship with his or her Father. And apart from the redeeming work of Christ, Paul writes that we are “by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind” (Eph. 2:3), “having no hope and without God in the world” (v. 12). In other words, by nature, we belong to a different family all together.

There’s good news, though, for those who want to join God’s family: we can become children of God through the Lord Jesus Christ as God gathers people by a supernatural rebirth. As the apostle John writes, “To all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:12–13). The grace of God enables us to turn away from sin, to turn to faith in Jesus, and so to gain spiritual life. God not only forgives our sins but also adopts us as His own children. He invites us into His home to become members of His family. Through Jesus, we may know God as our Father even as Jesus does.

Is God your Father? Have you turned to Christ with a conscious repentance of sin, confessing your need for His redemptive work in your life? If so, then God has welcomed you into His family. The Father’s love for us is imponderable (Eph. 1:4–6). Yet as we begin to contemplate this great love, expressed to God’s beloved Son and to us, it will guide us to a greater awareness of all that it means to know Him as Father.

This article is adapted from the sermon “The Fatherhood of God” by Alistair Begg. Subscribe to get weekly blog updates.

The Danger of Unbelief

 

JUNE 16 The Danger of Unbelief

I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. John 10:28

The Christian should never think or speak lightly of unbelief. For when a child of God mistrusts His love, His truth, His faithfulness, it is greatly displeasing to Him. How can we ever grieve Him by doubting His upholding grace? Christian, it is contrary to every promise of God’s precious Word that you would ever be forgotten or left to perish. If it could be so, how could He be true who has said, “Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you.”1 What would be the value of the promise—“‘The mountains may depart and the hills be removed, but my steadfast love shall not depart from you, and my covenant of peace shall not be removed,’ says the LORD, who has compassion on you”?2 What truth would there be in Christ’s words—“I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand”?3 What value would there be in the doctrines of grace? They would be all disproved if one child of God should perish. What value could be placed in the veracity of God, His honor, His power, His grace, His covenant, His oath, if any of those for whom Christ died, and who have put their trust in Him, should nevertheless be cast away? Banish then those unbelieving fears, which so dishonor God. Arise, shake yourself from the dust, and put on your beautiful clothes. Remember, it is sinful to doubt His Word in which He has promised you that you will never perish. Let the eternal life within you express itself in confident rejoicing. The gospel bears my spirit up: A faithful and unchanging God Lays the foundation for my hope, In oaths, and promises, and blood.

Isaiah 49:15 Isaiah 54:10 John 10:28-29

Look at the Positives

 

JUNE 9 Look at the Positives

The Lord has done great things for us; we are glad. Psalm 126:3

Some Christians are sadly prone to look on the dark side of everything, and to dwell more upon what they have gone through than upon what God has done for them. Ask for their impression of the Christian life, and they will describe their continual conflicts, their deep afflictions, their sad adversities, and the sinfulness of their hearts, but with scarcely any reference to the mercy and help that God has provided them. But a Christian whose soul is in a healthy state will come forward joyously and say, “I will not speak about myself, but to the honor of my God. He has brought me up out of a horrible pit and out of the miry clay and set my feet upon a rock and established my goings; and He has put a new song in my mouth, even praise to our God. The Lord has done great things for me—I am glad.” This summary of experience is the very best that any child of God can present. It is true that we endure trials, but it is just as true that we are delivered out of them. It is true that we have our corruptions, and sadly we acknowledge this, but it is just as true that we have an all-sufficient Savior who overcomes these corruptions and delivers us from their dominion. In looking back, it would be wrong to deny that we have been in the Slough of Despond and have crept along the Valley of Humiliation, but it would be equally wicked to forget that we have been through them safely and profitably; we have not remained in them, thanks to our Almighty Helper and Leader, who has “brought us out to a place of abundance.”1 The deeper our troubles, the louder our thanks to God, who has led us through them all and preserved us until today. Our griefs cannot spoil the melody of our praise; we consider them to be the “bass line” of our life’s song, “The LORD has done great things for us; we are glad.”

Psalm 66:12

Why Are We Here?

 

JUNE 10 Why Are We Here?

We live to the Lord. Romans 14:8

If God had willed it, each of us might have entered heaven at the moment of conversion. It was not absolutely necessary for our preparation for immortality that we should linger here. It is possible for a man to be taken to heaven and to be found fit to partake in the inheritance of the saints in light, even though he has only just believed in Jesus. It is true that our sanctification is a long and continued process, and we shall not be perfected until we lay aside our bodies and enter within the veil; but nevertheless, if the Lord had wanted to, He could have changed us from imperfection to perfection and have taken us to heaven at once. Why then are we here? Would God keep His children out of paradise a single moment longer than was necessary? Why is the army of the living God still on the battlefield when one charge might give them the victory? Why are His children still wandering here and there through a maze when a single word from His lips would bring them into the center of their hopes in heaven? The answer is—they are here that they may “live to the Lord” and may bring others to know His love. We remain on earth as sowers to scatter good seed, as plowmen to break up the fallow ground, as heralds publishing salvation. We are here as “the salt of the earth,”1 to be a blessing to the world. We are here to glorify Christ in our daily life. We are here as workers for Him, and as workers together with Him. Let us see that our life fulfills this purpose. Let us live zealous, useful, holy lives, to “the praise of his glorious grace.”2 Meanwhile we long to be with Him and daily sing— My heart is with Him on His throne, And ill can brook delay; Each moment listening for the voice, “Rise up, and come away.”

Matthew 5:13 Ephesians 1:6

The Origin

 

JUNE 11 The Origin

We love because he first loved us. 1 John 4:19

There is no light in the planet but that which proceeds from the sun; and there is no true love for Jesus in the heart but that which comes from the Lord Jesus Himself. From this overflowing fountain of the infinite love of God, all our love to God must spring. This truth is foundational, that we love Him for no other reason than because He first loved us. Our love for Him is the result of His love for us. When studying the works of God, anyone may respond with cold admiration, but the warmth of love can only be kindled in the heart by God’s Spirit. What a wonder that any of us, knowing what we’re like, should ever have been brought to love Jesus at all! How marvelous that when we had rebelled against Him, He should, by a display of such amazing love, seek to draw us back. We would never have had a grain of love toward God unless it had been sown in us by the sweet seed of His love for us. Love, then, has for its parent the love of God shed abroad in the heart: But after it is divinely born, it must be divinely nourished. It is not like a plant, which will flourish naturally in human soil—it must be watered from above. Love for Jesus is a flower of a delicate nature, and if it received no nourishment but that which could be drawn from the rock of our hearts, it would soon wither. As love comes from heaven, so it must feed on heavenly bread. It cannot exist in the wilderness unless it be fed by manna from on high. Love must feed on love. The very soul and life of our love for God is His love for us. I love Thee, Lord, but with no love of mine, For I have none to give; I love Thee, Lord; but all the love is Thine, For by Thy love I live. I am as nothing, and rejoice to be Emptied, and lost, and swallowed up in Thee.

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Getting on the Scales

 

JUNE 12 Getting on the Scales

You have been weighed in the balances and found wanting. Daniel 5:27

It is good to regularly weigh ourselves on the scale of God’s Word. You will find it a holy exercise to read some Psalm of David and, as you meditate upon each verse, to ask yourself, “Can I say this? Have I felt as David felt? Has my heart ever been broken on account of sin, as his was when he penned his penitential psalms? Has my soul been full of true confidence in the hour of difficulty as his was when he sang of God’s mercies in the cave of Adullam or in the holds of Engedi? Do I take the cup of salvation and call upon the name of the Lord?” Then turn to the life of Christ, and as you read, ask yourself how far you are conformed to His likeness. Endeavor to discover whether you have the meekness, the humility, the lovely spirit that He constantly urged and displayed. Then take the epistles, and see whether you can go with the apostle in what he said of his experience. Have you ever cried out as he did, “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death”? Have you ever felt his self-abasement? Have you seemed to yourself the chief of sinners, and less than the least of all the saints? Have you known anything of his devotion? Could you join with him and say, “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain”? If in this way we read God’s Word as a test of our spiritual condition, we will often have good reason to pause and say, “Lord, I feel I have never yet been here. O bring me here! Give me the true penitence about which I am reading. Give me real faith; give me warmer zeal; inflame me with more fervent love; grant me the grace of meekness; make me more like Jesus. Do not allow me to be ‘found wanting’ when weighed in the balances of the Bible, in case I be found wanting in the scales of judgment.” “Judge not, that you be not judged.”