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“Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.”  This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.  (Eph 5:31-2) Lord Jesus … I do. When a rich man marries a poor woman, the two become one.   They share one home, one life, one bed, one estate, and one purpose. As far as the law is concerned, everything the husband has belongs to the wife. His riches are hers. She may have come out of the slums, but now she…

Christ died for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring us to God (I Pet 3:18). For our sake, he made him to be sin who knew no sin so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (II Cor 5:21). These Scriptures give a picture of the great transaction that lies at the heart of the gospel. Remove the substitutionary atonement of Christ, and there is no gospel. God died for us. The death of Christ paid the penalty for our sins. Now we are free in the eyes of the law. But not everyone likes…

. . . and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus (Rm 3:24) In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our sins, according to the riches of his grace. (Eph 1:7) . . . it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. (Gal 2:20) Father, I thank you for the Cross, for through it I have riches that this world cannot touch.   Sometimes the Bible uses fancy words to describe what God has done. Justification, redemption, reconciliation, and regeneration are some of…

“… and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.” (Rm 3:24-5) Praise, You, O Lord! My guilt is gone through the blood of the Cross! This week’s blog continues the last one. If you haven’t read the last one, scroll down. In the last blog, I mentioned that real Guilt involves relational brokenness and justice. When we sin, we justly deserve punishment and we harm our relationship with God. Therefore, any attempt to deal with Guilt…

… holding faith and a good conscience (I Tim 1:19) … the insincerity of liars whose consciences are seared … (I Tim 4:2) May I, by your grace, O Lord, have a clean conscience in Christ, for you have taken my guilt and thrown it into the depths of the sea. I bet you have someone in your family like Aunt Georgina. She feels guilty when she dries her hands on the wrong towel in the bathroom at Uncle Bob’s house. She apologizes when she gives Christmas gifts because she wasn’t sure what you wanted. Her conscience troubles her when…