THERE is a radio talk show host who has a tradition with his callers, a greeting said back and forth: “Morning Glory,” “Evening Grace.” I like that, always smile when I hear it. I see it as an encouragement as to how we ought to start and end each day. It is my hope that these postings are an encouragement to you in your walk in Christ. There are many hindrances and obstacles in our quest for Christ, but there are many helps and aids for the hungry heart. The things I’ve been sharing here have been helpful to me along the path that is sometimes very difficult to traverse.
WE have looked at two aspects so far in our study in the Principles of Spiritual Growth: Faith and the principle of Time. In the last posting we started looking at the soul’s comfort in Acceptance. The key verse in this is Eph. 1:5&6:
Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.
WE left off where our author Miles Stanford wrote: “Our faith becomes a fixed attitude once it begins to rest in this wonderful fact.” We will now pick-up on his thoughts from there.
In the wondrous blessings of Christ,
Joe
Neh. 8:10, Isa. 30:15 & Job 2:10
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Chapter 3—Acceptance – Part 2
Our faith becomes a fixed attitude once it begins to rest in this wonderful fact. Then it can be, if necessary, “disallowed [rejected] indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious” (I Pet. 2:4). This is the steadying influence most believers are in need of today. A century ago J.B. Stoney wrote: “The blessed God never alters nor diverges from the acceptance in which He has received us because of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Alas! we diverge from the state in which God can ever be toward us as recorded in Romans 5:1–11. Many suppose that because they are conscious of sins, hence they must renew their acceptance with God.
“The truth is that God has not altered. His eye rests on the work accomplished by Christ for the believer. When you are not walking in the Spirit you are in the flesh: you have turned to the old man which was crucified on the cross (Rom. 6:6). You have to be restored to fellowship, and when you are, you find your acceptance with God unchanged and unchangeable. When sins are introduced there is a fear that God has changed. He has not changed, but you have. You are not walking in the Spirit but in the flesh. You have to judge yourself in order to be restored. ‘For this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins’ (Matt. 26:28). But if your sins are not met there, where can they be met? ‘Now where remission of [sin] is, there is no more offering for sin’ (Heb. 10:18). God has effected the reconciliation; He always remains true to it. Alas! We diverge from it; and the tendency is to suppose that the blessed God has altered toward us. He certainly will judge the flesh if we do not, but He never departs from the love which He has expressed to the prodigal, and we find that when the cloud, which walking in the flesh produced, has passed away, His love, blessed be His Name, had never changed.”
God’s basis must be our basis for acceptance. There is no other. We are “accepted IN the beloved” (Eph. 1:6) ….to be continued
