Sunday, June 8, 2014

Pitch Perfect. Psalms 124-125; Hebrews 10

May the mumbling commence!

Trust in God and be secure.  It’s that simple… and that hard.  Read Psalm One-hundred Twenty-five:

Those who trust in the Lord are as secure as Mount Zion;
they will not be defeated but will endure forever
Just as the mountains surround and protect Jerusalem,
so the Lord surrounds and protects his people,
both now and forever. 
The wicked will not rule the godly,
for then the godly might be forced to do wrong. 
O Lord, do good to those who are good,
whose hearts are in tune with you. 
But banish those who turn to crooked ways, O Lord.
Take them away with those who do evil.
And let Israel have quietness and peace.

If we want to be true, we must tune our hearts to the Lord’s Way.  God’s Way is the standard.  Make us pitch perfect, O God.  Only then will we have peace and quiet.

That peace and quiet has been won through the work of Christ Jesus.  Read from Hebrews chapter ten.

But just the opposite happened. Those yearly sacrifices reminded them of their sins year after year.  For it is not possible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sinsThat is why Christ, when he came into the world, said,
"You did not want animal sacrifices and grain offerings.
But you have given me a body so that I may obey you. 
No, you were not pleased with animals burned on the altar
or with other offerings for sin. 
Then I said, 'Look, I have come to do your will, O God
just as it is written about me in the Scriptures.' " 
Christ said, "You did not want animal sacrifices or grain offerings or animals burned on the altar or other offerings for sin, nor were you pleased with them" (though they are required by the law of Moses).  Then he added, "Look, I have come to do your will." He cancels the first covenant in order to establish the second.  And what God wants is for us to be made holy by the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all time. (Verses 3-10)

Through faith in Christ, let’s be made holy – pitch perfect.  And that’s about doing the will of the Lord… not by sacrificing after we err.  With Christ we have the boldness to approach God… together.  Let’s not fail to do so… together.  Read later from Hebrews chapter ten:

And since we have a great High Priest who rules over God's people, let us go right into the presence of God, with true hearts fully trusting him. For our evil consciences have been sprinkled with Christ's blood to make us clean, and our bodies have been washed with pure water. 
Without wavering, let us hold tightly to the hope we say we have, for God can be trusted to keep his promise.  Think of ways to encourage one another to outbursts of love and good deeds.  And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage and warn each other, especially now that the day of his coming back again is drawing near. (Verses 21-25)

How about that!  Let’s encourage outbursts of love and good deeds among one another.  Now that’s an outburst we can always use in this dreary and hopeless world.  You cannot get any more counter-cultural than that!


Enough mumbling for now…  Peace Out

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