SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 2/27/2017
10:49 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
PT-2 Intro to John 17:6-10
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: John 17:6-10
Message of the
verses: “6 "I have manifested
Your name to the men whom
You gave Me out of the world; they were Yours and You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word. 7 "Now they have come to know that
everything You have given Me is
from You; 8 for the words which
You gave Me I have given to them; and they received them and truly understood
that I came forth from You, and they believed that You sent Me. 9 "I ask on their behalf; I do not ask on behalf of
the world, but of
those whom You have given Me; for they are Yours; 10 and all things that are Mine are Yours, and
Yours are Mine; and I have been glorified in them.”
In our last SD we looked at different passages which
showed that the Lord chose those who will become believers before the
foundation of the world, but there are also verses in the Word of God which
contain numerous entreaties to all unsaved people to believe in the Lord. I say this because one, it is in this
introduction in MacArthur’s commentary and two because it needs to be said so we
can understand that God loves the unsaved people of this world and desires for
them to come to know Him and so there are included in the Word of God verses
which the Holy Spirit can use to draw people to Himself in a saving
relationship. And as we look at both
truths in the Word of God I keep going back to the sermon “Two Truths” as
MacArthur explained it so very well in that sermon.
I think that one of the things that I personally have
trouble with and that God is dealing with me is that I need to be praising the
Lord for this wonderful gift that He has given to me, I truly do not want to
act like the Pharisees did in Jesus’ day when they thought that they were so
good because they thought that God had chosen them because of their good
works. Ok I don’t want to get away from
the verses that I am trying to introduce here.
Let us look at a quote from a 17th century
English Puritan named Richard Baxter whom John MacArthur quotes in his
introductory comments for these verses.
The quote has to do with believers praising God for all eternity because
He graciously chose them and also redeemed them through the work of His Son,
and that is a big part of what Jesus is praying for in this “Lord’s Prayer.”
“[Salvation] was dear to Christ, but free to us…Here is
all free; if the Father freely give the Son, and the Son freely pay the debt;
and if God freely accept that way of payment, when He might have required it of
the principal; and if both Father and Son freely offer us the purchased life on
our cordial acceptance; and if they freely send the Spirit to enable us to
accept; what is here, then, that is not free?
O the everlasting admiration that must surprise the saints to think of
this freeness! ...What an astonishing though it will be [in heaven] to think of
the immeasurable difference between our deserving and receivings! Between the state we should have been in, and
the state we are in! To look down upon
hell, and see the vast difference from that to which we are adopted! What pangs of love will it cause within us to
think, ‘Yonder was the place that sin would have brought me to; but this is it
that Christ hath brought me to! Yonder
death was the wages of my sin, but this eternal life is the gift of God,
through Jesus Christ my Lord…But no thanks to us, nor to any of our duties and
labors, much less to our neglects and laziness; we know to whom the praise is
due and must be given for ever…So then let DESERVED be written on the door of
hell; but on the door of heaven and life, THE FREE GIFT. (In The practical Works of Richard Baxter).”
Spiritual meaning
for my life today: To praise the
Lord for His inexpressible gift of salvation.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible
question: “Jesus” (Luke 20:8).
Today’s Bible
question: “In what city did David first
become King?”
Answer in our next SD.
2/27/2017 11:29 AM
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