Good Friday |
| Posted by Bill Orf (billorf) on Apr 15 2007 at 8:28 PM |
Good Friday to Ya’ all
Today we celebrate the reality that the creator of all things took upon himself all the filth and shame of humanity and allowed that same humanity to mutilate and destroy his earthly body. Be careful to just view it as a sacrificial death of an earthly body. That was the least of it. He bore our shame and guilt and allowed himself to be separated from the Father for a time. Pray and ask to receive a revelation on the weight of this truth. When you receive it then you to will willingly lay down your life so you may gain it. Only out of a willingness to die to your earthly desires can you experience the abundant life. The risen with Christ kind of life. Consider this. It is the only kind of death that can bring life. Remember God does things in seasons. For you and I this is a great time to allow our Father to refresh our understanding of the depth of his love for us. The more we understand that, the more power we have to put to death areas of weakness in our own lives. Sin looses its grip on us when we understand the love and promises of God. You are royalty. Are you living like it?
As most of you know, I am a great fan of Oswald Chambers. He is a man who died in 1917 but his insight still packs an amazing amount of relevance and application. The following are a couple daily devotions for us to consider during this amazing time of the year.
The collision of God and sin
Who His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree. 1 Peter 2:24.
The Cross of Jesus is the revelation of God’s judgment on sin. Never tolerate the idea of martyrdom about the Cross of Jesus Christ. The Cross was a superb triumph in which the foundations of hell were shaken. There is nothing more certain in Time or Eternity than what Jesus Christ did on the Cross: He switched the whole of the human race back into a right relationship with God. He made Redemption the basis of human life, that is, He made a way for every son of man to get into communion with God.
The Cross did not happen to Jesus: He came on purpose for it. He is “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” The whole meaning of the Incarnation is the Cross. Beware of separating God manifest in the flesh from the Son becoming sin. The Incarnation was for the purpose of Redemption. God became incarnate for the purpose of putting away sin; not for the purpose of Self-realization. The Cross is the centre of Time and of Eternity, the answer to the enigmas of both.
The Cross is not the cross of a man but the Cross of God, and the Cross of God can never be realized in human experience. The Cross is the exhibition of the nature of God, the gateway whereby any individual of the human race can enter into union with God. When we get to the Cross, we do not go through it; we abide in the life to which the Cross is the gateway.
The centre of salvation is the Cross of Jesus, and the reason it is so easy to obtain salvation is because it cost God so much. The Cross is the point where God and sinful man merge with a crash and the way to life is opened—but the crash is on the heart of God.
[1] Why are we not told plainly?
He charged them that they should tell no man what things they had seen, till the Son of man were risen from the dead. Mark 9:9.
Say nothing until the Son of man is risen in you—until the life of the risen Christ so dominates you that you understand what the historic Christ taught. When you get to the right state on the inside, the word which Jesus has spoken is so plain that you are amazed you did not see it before. You could not understand it before, you were not in the place in disposition where it could be borne.
Our Lord does not hide these things; they are unbearable until we get into a fit condition of spiritual life. “I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now.” There must be communion with His risen life before a particular word can be borne by us. Do we know anything about the impartation of the risen life of Jesus? The evidence that we do is that His word is becoming interpretable to us. God cannot reveal anything to us if we have not His Spirit. An obstinate outlook will effectually hinder God from revealing anything to us. If we have made up our minds about a doctrine, the light of God will come no more to us on that line, we cannot get it. This obtuse stage will end immediately His resurrection life has its way with us.
“Tell no man . .”—so many do tell what they saw on the mount of transfiguration. They have had the vision and they testify to it, but the life does not tally with it, the Son of man is not yet risen in them. I wonder when He is going to be formed in you and in me?
