Sunday, August 26, 2012

A Ransom for all

1Ti 2:5  For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;
1Ti 2:6  Who gave himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.
1Ti 2:7  Whereunto I am ordained a preacher, and an apostle, (I speak the truth in Christ, and lie not;) a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and verity.

Christ Jesus gave himself a ransom for all.

Ransom definition-

Redemption, the price paid, means of deliverance, rescued from punishment, redeemed from captivity, to release-to restore upon receipt of payment.

PAYMENT- Christ Jesus' life was the price paid for US, for us, for ALL, for
bEVERYONE.

To take on His role as our MEDIATOR our Savior had to pay a price for us. 

1Co 6:20  For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's.

1Co 7:22  For he that is called in the Lord, being a servant, is the Lord's freeman: likewise also he that is called, being free, is Christ's servant.
1Co 7:23  Ye are bought with a price…

Bought with a price.

We tend to think that it was so easy for God to sacrifice His Son, that it was so easy for the Son to agree to be sacrificed. Christianity, being a follower of Christ is not something that should be taken for granted at all.  What our God did for us is so far beyond our true comprehension that the little glimpse we are allowed into the understanding boggles our minds. 

God CHOSE to create us. He did NOT have to create us. And yet we live as if we are greater than He is! We live thinking we are here by mere chance. We philosophize away the truth so that WE become our OWN creators. We take it ALL out of anyone else's hands and believe that we just happen to be what we are and to think anything else is foolishness. We believe our science can duplicate everything. We clone now and we believe that makes us creators, yet the material we are cloning from was not created by us. Rather than believe in a CREATOR we choose to believe we exist and there is little more to it.

God chose to create us, I believe this with ALL my heart! I have a GOD, I have a REDEEMER. My God before creating me agreed with my other God, who is God the Father and they agreed together that we should be created. They agreed on all the particulars of our Creation. They agreed on our being given the power to choose whether or not we would give honor, glory, and praise to them as our Creators. They agreed that they would reveal their love in all they created to us and they also agreed that to be given a choice we had to have something to choose between. 

Satan rebelled, a created angel being, made the choice to not return the pure love given to him by God even though there was NO physical, NO tangible choice for him to choose between. There was NO forbidden tree place before the angels. The angels were spirit beings just as God was and is a spirit being. Satan's own thoughts betrayed Him. He wanted to be like God, He wasn’t satisfied with His position. He had so much, He had everything except the power that makes God, God, and able to create as only He can.

We as created human being also made the choice when we were confronted with that forbidden tree and egged on by an outside force to disobey God.

I believe it's because we were enticed and did NOT solely act of our own accord that God deemed us worthy for the plan of redemption that had been drawn up before our creation.

People say, 'The devil made me do it.' And you know what? The devil tries to make us do it- but we CHOOSE whether or not to ultimately do it.  The devil does not force us to sin but he'll do everything he possibly can to make us desire to do so ourselves.

That plan of redemption wasn't just a silly little thing, it wasn't a minor plan, it was a plan of tremendous forethought and SACRIFICE. The enormity of the plan of redemption cannot truly hit home, at least I don't think it can not until we understand what was sacrificed. It wasn't one human sacrificing themselves for another, though we call that honorable and good.  It was so much more than the sacrifice of our temporary life.

Agreeing to take on human flesh, that is not even like us agreeing to become an insect, it is so incredibly much more.

Would you agree to become an insect- permanently? Would you agree to that? Of course not, an insect is more often than not considered a pest and pests are meant to be killed quite often.

Our Savior agreed to put aside His GODHOOD. One who had no way to die, to be killed, to be destroyed. One who was from everlasting to everlasting- CHOSE to put on flesh and solely rely on God the Father as we must do and NOT any power He might possess- this amazing God did it so that He could SAVE us vile creatures.

He PAID the price! We are BOUGHT with a price! The ransom for us was INCREDIBLY, mindblowingly HIGH!

The ransom has been paid.

However usually when a ransom is paid the person held against their will is set free, and we are still here, still living with sin only growing more and more powerful all around us.

Again we have to look to the SANCTUARY that we were given an example of. Remember the earthly sanctuary was patterned after the heavenly. We MUST look there because our REDEEMER became the ULTIMATE LAMB of GOD that was SACRIFICED.

When we look at the Sanctuary we know that on the Day of Atonement after the animals were sacrificed their blood was still in play. They didn't simply die and that was it, their blood had a purpose.

Our Savior's blood has a purpose and He went to the FATHER to prepare a place for us, He went to the Father to plead on our behalf revealing that He had indeed met the necessary conditions in order to redeem us. He is our HIGH PRIEST in the HEAVENLY SANCTUARY.  The work is ongoing, the application of the shed blood in play.

Our Savior isn't slack concerning His promise to us, but is LONGSUFFERING.

2Pe 3:9  The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

Our Savior doesn't want to lose a single person that chooses to be saved by Him, not one.

By the grace of God may we comprehend as much as we possibly can of the love of God towards us in the sacrifice made to redeem us, in the RANSOM paid, the PRICE we are bought with.

All through the LOVE of our God forever!


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