August 26, 2018
Jude 3
3 Dearly loved friend, I was fully intending to write to you about our amazing salvation we all participate in, but felt the need instead to challenge you to vigorously defend and contend for[c] the beliefs that we cherish.[d] For God, through the apostles, has once for all entrusted these truths to his holy believers.
Over the last two weeks I touched on this idea of REST and what a life could be like when we REST in the finished work of Christ. Freedom, Victory, Forgiveness.
This morning, we segway into something that I believe will leave a divine imprint on your heart and life. I call it “Revisiting the Gospel”.
I finished my message last week with this passage and thought it would be good to start here.
Deut. 6.10 (NLT) “The Lord your God will soon bring you into the land he swore to give your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It is a land filled with large, prosperous cities that you did not build.
Deut. 6.11 (NLT) The houses will be richly stocked with goods you did not produce. You will draw water from cisterns you did not dig, and you will eat from vineyards and olive trees you did not plant. When you have eaten your fill in this land,
Deut. 6.12 (NLT) be careful not to forget the Lord, who rescued you from slavery in the land of Egypt.
Now it is important to see in the OT the figures and who they represent. Moses represents our deliverance but Joshua represented our promised land.
Oftentimes I notice many have been delivered (like the Egyptians) but have yet to walk in and enjoy the promises of God (promise land).
John 1.17 (NKJV) For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
Remember when Jesus went the mountain and was transfigured?
Moses, Elijah and Jesus. (Matt. 17)
Grace is ours! Just like the law was to be received and embraced, we are to receive and embrace the Grace of God.
Paul reminds us of something very important regarding this Life we are called to live by God –
Rom. 1.16 (NKJV)
For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek.
Rom. 1.17 (NKJV) For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, “The just shall live by faith.”
Romans 1:16 (PTP)
16 I refuse to be ashamed of sharing the wonderful message of God’s liberating power unleashed in us through Christ! For I am thrilled to preach that everyone who believes is saved—the Jew first,[a] and then people everywhere!
17 This gospel unveils a continual revelation of God’s righteousness—a perfect righteousness given to us when we believe.[b]And it moves us from receiving life through faith, to the power of living by faith.[c] This is what the Scripture means when it says: “We are right with God through life-giving faith!”[d]