Tag / Easter devotional

by In Light Of The Cross

Glimpses of the Cross Day 21; Victory in Jesus

I am writing tonight from the beautiful Tampa Bay area.

I am writing tonight from the beautiful Tampa Bay area.

The story goes of a pastor who was changing trains at a train station. While waiting on his train, a man approached him with some religious literature, trying to witness to him about God. The pastor could not help but smell the alcohol on his breath. He asked the man if he was drinking. The man confessed yes. The pastor asked him how he could be sharing Jesus while he was drinking. The man told the pastor, that Jesus overcame so that he did not have to overcome, and that Jesus also died for him so he does not have to die. The pastor responded, “So Jesus overcame do you don’t have to?” “That’s right” the man said. “He did it all for me so I don’t have to.” The pastor asked another question. “So Jesus died so you don’t have to die to self?” The man nodded yes. The pastor then replied, ” Well if Jesus overcame so you don’t have to overcome, and died so you don’t have to die, then He also rose again and went back to heaven so you don’t have to do that either!”

The Good news is Jesus overcame so we can experience victory in our lives too!

 Now thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and through us diffuses the fragrance of His knowledge in every place.  2 Corinthians 2:14 NKJV

Jesus died so that our sinful ways can be crucified with Him.

I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. Galatians 2:20 NKJV

Jesus rose again and is in heaven so we can rise from the dead and be in heaven too!

But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us,  even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved),  and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, Ephesians 2:5-6 NKJV

Jesus’ victory over sin is to be a reality in our lives. Jesus’ death to self is to be a reality in our lives, and Jesus’ victory over the death and the grave is to be a reality in our lives as well!

Because I live, you will live also. John 14:19 NKLJV

To the believer, death is but a small matter. Christ speaks of it as if it were of little moment. “If a man keep My saying, he shall never see death,” “he shall never taste of death.” To the Christian, death is but a sleep, a moment of silence and darkness. The life is hid with Christ in God, and “when Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with Him in glory.” John 8:51, 52; Colossians 3:4. –Desire of Ages, Page 787 

by In Light Of The Cross

Glimpses of the Cross Day 8: Accursed of God

 

I am writing today from the beautiful Tampa Bay area.

I am writing today from the beautiful Tampa Bay area.

And Joshua said unto them, Fear not, nor be dismayed, be strong and of good courage: for thus shall the LORD do to all your enemies against whom ye fight.  And afterward Joshua smote them, and slew them, and hanged them on five trees: and they were hanging upon the trees until the evening.   Joshua 10:25-26   

 By hanging these five kings on five trees, Joshua was saying that they had their opportunity to accept Israel’s God, but they rejected Him, so it was good-bye to life forever. This is the death Jesus tasted for us. He did not taste the death of the righteous as He did not save us from the death of the righteous. He saved us from the death of the wicked, therefore He tasted the death of the wicked. Jesus faced the death of the wicked which meant facing total oblivion Obadiah 1:16.      

Hebrews 2:9 tells us Jesus tasted death for every man.

But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man.

If Jesus was only tasting the first death, with the hope of salvation, then why does everyone still taste that death themselves? Jesus did not save us from that death. We still experience that death ourselves. Jesus and Paul always refer to the first death, with the hope of salvation as sleep. See 1 Thessalonians 4. 1 Corinthians 15 John 11.  Paul does not say in Hebrews 2:9 that Jesus tasted sleep. This time Paul says “death” – meaning He felt accursed by God, like the five kings in Joshua 10. 

 “Satan with his fierce temptations wrung the heart of Jesus. The Saviour could not see through the portals of the tomb. Hope did not present to Him His coming forth from the grave a conqueror, or tell Him of the Father’s acceptance of the sacrifice. He feared that sin was so offensive to God that Their separation was to be eternal. Christ felt the anguish which the sinner will feel when mercy shall no longer plead for the guilty race. It was the sense of sin, bringing the Father’s wrath upon Him as man’s substitute, that made the cup He drank so bitter, and broke the heart of the Son of God.” -Desire of Ages, Page 753.

by In Light Of The Cross

Glimpse of the Cross Day 6; The God-Abandoned God

I am writing today from the beautiful Tampa Bay area.

I am writing today from the beautiful Tampa Bay area.

“My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? why art thou so far from helping me, and from the words of my roaring” Psalms 22:1 

Jesus had always called God His Father. “In my Father’s house are many mansions.” “I always do those things that please my Father.” “I and my Father are one.” Yet when Jesus was on the cross, being treated as we deserve, He could not call God His Father, and so He cried out “My God,  Why has Thou forsaken me?”

Could this be what made Jesus’ death the ultimate sacrifice? Many  think of the physical torture Jesus endured while on the cross, but many have suffered physically just as much. As a matter of fact, if you asked a cancer victim if they would like another year of chemo or six hours on a cross, they will choose the cross over chemo! What made Jesus’ death the ultimate sacrifice goes a lot deeper than the physical pain. He died a death no one has ever died yet.  John Huss sang hymns of praise while he was burning at the stake. If Huss could sing as he died for his faith, why wasn’t Jesus singing songs as He died? Why was He instead crying out, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” Because Jesus died a totally different death than Huss or anyone else has ever died. Huss died knowing he was accepted of the Father, but Jesus suffered God-abandonment for us so we could be saved.

The Saviour could not see through the portals of the tomb. Hope did not present to Him His coming forth from the grave a conqueror, or tell Him of the Father’s acceptance of the sacrifice. He feared that sin was so offensive to God that Their separation was to be eternal. Christ felt the anguish which the sinner will feel when mercy shall no longer plead for the guilty race. It was the sense of sin, bringing the Father’s wrath upon Him as man’s substitute, that made the cup He drank so bitter, and broke the heart of the Son of God. -Desire of Ages, Page 753

Christ was treated as we deserve, that we might be treated as He deserves. He was condemned for our sins, in which He had no share, that we might be justified by His righteousness, in which we had no share. He suffered the death which was ours, that we might receive the life which was His. ‘With His stripes we are healed.  -Desire of Ages, Page 25.