Sunday, May 31, 2020
"You Send Your Spirit" Sermon: Psalm 104:24-35 (manuscript)
“You
Send Your Spirit”
(Psalm
104:24-35)
May
31, 2020 YouTube
Today is Pentecost Sunday. Pentecost meaning “fiftieth day.” This holiday is fifty days after the Resurrection
of Jesus – ten days after the Ascension of Jesus – and it occurs during the
Hebrew celebration of the Feast of Weeks (Shavuot) – the celebration of the
wheat harvest and the remembrance of God’s giving of the Law on Mount Sinai.
We will remember that last week when we looked at the Ascension,
Jesus tells the disciples to remain in Jerusalem until the Holy Spirit comes on
them, saying, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon
you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria,
and to the end of the earth” (Acts 1:8, ESV).
Ten days later, we read:
“When
the day of Pentecost arrived, they were all together in one place. And suddenly
there came from heaven a sound like a mighty rushing wind, and it filled the
entire house where they were sitting. And divided tongues as of fire appeared
to them and rested on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy
Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance” (Acts
2:1-4, ESV).
As
Jesus had promised them, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I
will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you
forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it
neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will
be in you” (John 14:15-17, ESV).
Jesus
promises that – beginning at the day of Pentecost – the Father and He will send
God the Holy Spirit to indwell every believer – to be our Helper – as Jesus is
our Helper – forever – from salvation through death and into the Kingdom.
In
the Nicene Creed, we confess, “And we believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the
giver of life. He proceeds from the Father and the Son, and with the Father and
the Son is worshiped and glorified. He spoke through the prophets” (https://www.crcna.org/welcome/beliefs/creeds/nicene-creed).
It
is the idea of the Holy Spirit being the Giver of Life that we will focus in on
as we look at the second half of Psalm 104.
This psalm is written by an unnamed psalmist, and the purpose of this
psalm is to stir up praise to God.
He
begins by praising God as the Almighty Creator of everything that exists, and
then he praises God for creating and sustaining plants and animals, stars,
light and darkness, and humans. And that
brings us up to our text.
And
we see, first, God is to be praised for His Wisdom and
variety in Creation.
“O LORD, how manifold are your works! In wisdom have you
made them all; the earth is full of your creatures.”
The psalmist wants us to look at the variety of Creation
and praise God for it.
Look
around at what you have experienced: how
many varieties of trees have you experienced?
Google
says there are 60,065 varieties of trees.
If
you have ever worked on your lawn or gone to a garden center, you know there
are many types of grass. Google says there are over 10,000 varieties of grass.
What
about all the flowers you have seen? Google
says there are over 400,000 varieties of flower.
Why? Why such variety?
Doesn’t
looking at the plants – not to mention all the animals – convince us that there
is a Wise Creator behind their existence?
Do we really want to deny God and say that all of this beauty and
variety simply popped out of the slime by accident? The likelihood of that happening is a number
bigger than I can say.
No,
as we look at the amazing differences among the different varieties of living
things that exist – even the difference among varieties! Not every terrier is the same, is it, Carol?
Who
is this that has created all these different, beautiful, living creatures? He is our God, Wise, and worthy of praise!
Even
if our eyes are normally on our I-phone and I-pad – consider the One Who
created humans and gifted us with wisdom and skill to create things that are
useful in our lives – doesn’t the existence of humans cause us to raise our
eyes to God our Creator and praise Him?
It should.
The
psalmist gives his own example:
“Here
is the sea, great and wide, which teems with creatures innumerable, living
things both small and great. There go the ships, and Leviathan, which you
formed to play in it.”
God
created the sea – great and wide – and He filled it with more creatures than
can be numbered – Google says the number of the varieties of creatures in the
ocean is unknown – though scientists have catalogued 230,000 different types of
creatures, they believe that is only ten percent of all the varieties of
creatures – so their guess is 2,300,000 different varieties of creatures live in
the sea!
God
created human beings and gave us the wisdom to create ships so we can travel
across the sea and fish and go on cruises.
And
God created Leviathan. We remember
Leviathan – God describes His creation to Job:
“I
will not keep silence concerning his limbs, or his mighty strength, or his
goodly frame. Who can strip off his outer garment? Who would come near him with
a bridle? Who can open the doors of his face? Around his teeth is terror. His
back is made of rows of shields, shut up closely as with a seal. One is so near
to another that no air can come between them. They are joined one to another; they
clasp each other and cannot be separated. His sneezings flash forth light, and
his eyes are like the eyelids of the dawn. Out of his mouth go flaming torches;
sparks of fire leap forth. Out of his nostrils comes forth smoke, as from a
boiling pot and burning rushes. His breath kindles coals, and a flame comes
forth from his mouth. In his neck abides strength, and terror dances before
him. The folds of his flesh stick together, firmly cast on him and immovable. His
heart is hard as a stone, hard as the lower millstone. When he raises himself
up, the mighty are afraid; at the crashing they are beside themselves. Though
the sword reaches him, it does not avail, nor the spear, the dart, or the
javelin. He counts iron as straw, and bronze as rotten wood. The arrow cannot
make him flee; for him, sling stones are turned to stubble. Clubs are counted
as stubble; he laughs at the rattle of javelins. His underparts are like sharp potsherds;
he spreads himself like a threshing sledge on the mire. He makes the deep boil
like a pot; he makes the sea like a pot of ointment. Behind him he leaves a
shining wake; one would think the deep to be white-haired. On earth there is
not his like, a creature without fear. He sees everything that is high; he is
king over all the sons of pride” (Job 41:12-34, ESV).
God
created this creature to play in the sea!
Amazing!
God
is to be praised for His Wisdom and variety in Creation.
Second,
God is to be praised as He gives, sustains, and renews life.
“These all look to you, to give them their food in due
season. When you give it to them, they gather it up; when you open your hand,
they are filled with good things. When you hide your face, they are dismayed; when you take away their breath,
they die and return to their dust. When
you send forth your Spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the
ground.”
The psalmist tells us that the reason any creature – any
living thing – continues to live – is due to God providing food for it. God sustains all life – nothing would
continue to live and grow if God did not provide food for it.
Remember what Jesus says, “Therefore I tell you, do not
be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about
your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more
than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor
gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more
value than they?” (Matthew 6:25-26, ESV).
What is Jesus saying?
God provides the food for the birds and us. Everything we need for this day is given to
us as a gift. We continue to live as God
is pleased to will it.
Someone might say, “Wait a minute – I work for everything
I get. Nobody ever gave me
anything. I earned everything I
have. I have no reason to praise God
that I am alive.”
It’s true, God works through means – through people and
nature. But God gave you your body and
mind. God gifted you with the abilities
you use in your job and life. God gave
you your boss – even if you don’t like him.
God gave your boss the company you work for. God gave the country in which the company can
exist and hire people. God gave the
planet that would be habitable for humans and would sustain the type of
countries we have. On and on. Do we have no reason to praise God for what
we have?
James writes, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is
from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no
variation or shadow due to change” (James 1:17, ESV).
Everything good that we have, everything pleasant,
everything that functions, everything that is enjoyable – it is all given to us
– even through means – but it is given to us by God. And that is reason to praise Him no matter
how we may feel at any given moment.
And when God hides His Face – we are dismayed. And when God stops our breathing, we return
to the dust from which we are created.
And again, someone may object, “What about accidents and
suicide? Do you mean we can blame God
for them?”
No, what the psalmist is saying is that God set a time
for our death, and we will die at that time, and there is nothing we can do to
hasten our death or stop our death.
Although death will be thrown into the lake of fire when Jesus returns,
God is sovereign over death. Every death
occurs exactly when God intends it to occur.
“So, God intended for all these people to die of Covid?”
God is Sovereign over every death and its time, though
that does not answer the question as to why any given person died at any given
time or in any given way.
And, the psalmist tells us, it is God the Holy Spirit Who
creates life and restores life – spiritually and physically. He is the Holy Spirit Who causes the baby to
grow in the womb. He is the Holy Spirit
Who causes our hearts to come alive and receive Jesus as God and Savior. He is the Holy Spirit Who will raise us from
the dead and unite our bodies and souls again on the last day. The Holy Spirit is the Lord and Giver of
Life.
Paul writes “Not only that, but we rejoice in our
sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces
character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame,
because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who
has been given to us” (Romans 5:3-5, ESV).
Paul goes on to say that this is so because Christ lived
and died to save us before any of us had any interest in being saved. The work is Christ’s and the Holy Spirit
applies Christ’s Work to us and helps us, preserves us, raises us, and assures
us in His salvation.
This is the One Who is given that first Pentecost. Prior to Pentecost, the Holy Spirit came upon
people, but He did not reside with them eternally. Now, the Holy Spirit not only causes a person
to believe in the Savior, but He resides within us forever. God lives within us to lead us and empower us
and convict us and assure us as we live our lives to His Glory and praise.
You and I, and all of Creation, are in the Hands of God
the Holy Spirit, and that should comfort and amaze us.
God
is to be praised as He gives, sustains, and renews life.
Third,
God is to be praised for His Sovereign Wisdom, Power, and Goodness.
“May the glory of the LORD endure forever; may the LORD
rejoice in his works, who looks on the earth and it trembles, who touches the
mountains and they smoke!”
The psalmist prays what will surely be – we remember that
God answers “yes” to every prayer that is in accordance with His Will – and
prayer is learning to align ourselves with God’s Will – the psalmist prays that
God’s Glory will endure forever – that God will be eternally glorified for Who
He is and all that He has done – that there will be an ongoing unfolding of the
Character and Attributes of God..
He
prays that God will rejoice in Himself – in everything that He does. Does that sound strange? God’s greatest joy is found in Himself – God
rejoices most and best in Himself and all that He does. Why?
Because He is deserving and the Only One Who can do all that makes God
rejoice eternally.
And
that’s not pride since it is true. It is
a reality.
Remember,
this is the God Who can look at the world and have it tremble, Who can touch a
mountain and turn it to smoke. We
remember early on in Isaiah – when Isaiah meets God in the Temple – the Temple
itself was shaking down to its foundations with God in it. This is the idea that
God is Absolutely Sovereign, Wise, Powerful, and Good.
Since
this is true, the psalmist can do nothing less that sing to God and praise God
forever – in this life and in the life to come.
“I
will sing to the LORD as long as I live; I will sing praise to my God while I
have being. May my meditation be pleasing to him, for I rejoice in the LORD.”
This
is a picture of life in the Kingdom:
“No
longer will there be anything accursed, but the throne of God and of the Lamb
will be in it, and his servants will worship him. They will see his face, and
his name will be on their foreheads. And night will be no more. They will need
no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will
reign forever and ever” (Revelation 22:3-5, ESV).
What
will we do in the Kingdom? We will
worship – we will glorify the Lamb, Jesus.
So,
our lives now are a preparation for that day when Jesus returns and restores
the earth for His Kingdom. So, we ought
to pray that our lives now would be lives of praise to God – Father, Son, and
Holy Spirit. God chose us to be
His. God saved us through His work. God changed our hearts and lives within us
and will raise us to eternal life in body and soul on the last day.
Let
us pray that God the Holy Spirit will help us to pray better, to praise better,
to worship better, to be more pleasing to God.
And we should not be discouraged, but strive by the Power of the Holy
Spirit to be the men and women God has called us to be – and when we have no
idea what or how to pray, ask the Holy Spirit.
As
Paul writes, “Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know
what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with
groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind
of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the
will of God” (Romans 8:26-27, ESV).
But
it is not that way for the wicked.
“Let sinners be consumed from the earth, and let the
wicked be no more!”
And notice this is how we should pray – not for any
specific person to suffer Hell, but that sinners and the wicked would be
gone. That God would be purely praised
by holy hearts – and the Holy Spirit is making us so.
“Bless the LORD, O my soul! Praise the LORD!”
The Father and the Son sent the Holy Spirit to indwell
everyone who believes. As the Giver of
Life, He created us, sustains us, and bring us to life – spiritually and physically
on that final day.
And so all praise is to God Who chose us and loved us and
made us a people for Himself – Who gives us the indwelling of God the Holy
Spirit so we will live and survive and be transformed into the Image of Jesus
Christ.
Bless the Lord, O my soul! Praise the Lord!
Let us pray:
Almighty God, we thank You for choosing a people for
Yourself and sending Jesus to live and die to save us. We thank You for the Holy Spirit Who created
us and sustains us and applies the work of salvation to us so we will be Yours
forever. Help us to strive after
holiness knowing that God lives within us – another Helper, as Jesus promised –
so we have the ability, now, to do all You have commanded. And we ask this is Jesus’ Name, Amen.
Sunday, May 24, 2020
Review: "Death in a White Tie" (manuscript)
Blackmail. It’s a nasty word. But some of the people in the upper class are being blackmailed – and during the season when the debutantes come out! Inspector Alleyn calls on his old friend – and friend to everyone who is someone – Lord Robert “Bunchy” Gospell to do some digging for him.
When Bunchy’s keen eye directs him to the killer, he calls Alleyn, but is interrupted, and later murdered for his trouble.
What had Bunchy figured out. A cast of oblivious elites and scoundrels in white ties have to be sorted through before Alleyn can catch the blackmailer.
I said #6 in the series was my favorite – well, #7 might be even better. In fact, Dashiell Hammet said that this is “the best detective story I have ever read.”
See if you can figure it out.
[This review appears on my blog, my YouTube channel, Amazon.com, and Goodreads.com.]
"Ascension -- Who Cares?" Sermon: Psalm 47:1-9 (manuscript)
“Ascension – Who Cares?”
(Psalm 47:1-9)
May 24, 2020 YouTube
Christmas! Immanuel!
God with us! Baby in a
manger. Shepherds. Magi.
Easter! Christ is risen! The stone is rolled away. Jesus has conquered hell and death and sin.
Ascension Day. Well.
Jesus went back to Heaven. Who
cares?
Remembering that Jesus ascended back
to the Father forty days after His resurrection tends not to be treated with
the excitement of Christmas or Easter. This
is Ascension Sunday. Should we care?
Luke tells us:
“In
the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and
teach, until the day when he was taken up, after he had given commands through
the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. He presented himself alive
to them after his suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days
and speaking about the kingdom of God. And while staying with them he ordered
them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father,
which, he said, ‘you heard from me; for John baptized with water, but you will
be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.’
“So
when they had come together, they asked him, ‘Lord, will you at this time
restore the kingdom to Israel?’ He said to them, ‘It is not for you to know
times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. But you will
receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my
witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the
earth.’ And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was
lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. And while they were gazing
into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, and said,
‘Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was
taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into
heaven’” (Acts 1:1-11, ESV).
Jesus physically rose from the dead
and physically ascended back to His throne at the Right Hand of the Father.
One of the Psalms that we associate
with Jesus’ Ascension is Psalm 47. This
is one of the seven enthronement psalms which talk about universal rejoicing in
the universal reign of God.
We see, first, all humans are called
to rejoice that God is King.
The
sons of Korah write:
“Clap your hands, all peoples! Shout
to God with loud songs of joy!”
All humans throughout time and space
are called upon to clap their hands, to shout to God, to shout with loud songs
of joy. This is raucous rejoicing. Everyone is to give everything they have in
rejoicing – in singing songs of joy – to God.
Why?
We are given three reasons.
First, “For the LORD, the Most High,
is to be feared, a great king over all the earth.”
We are to rejoice that God is King
because He is the fearsome King over all the earth. Our God is great and terrible. He is the Holy God Who cannot stand sin in
His presence. He is the God Who causes
Isaiah to come undone in His presence.
We remember that Isaiah pronounces a curse on himself for finding himself
in the presence of God because he knows he is a sinner before the Holy God and
God would be righteous in damning him eternally right then and there to the
fullness of God’s Wrath.
We rejoice in this fearsome King
because He has provided One Savior for all those who will believe. The authors of the Psalm looked forward to
that Savior. And this Savior, Jesus,
makes us righteous and holy before God, so we do not need to fear Him. Rather, we rejoice in Him for the just
substitution of Jesus for all we who will believe, and we are in awe of Him.
Second, “He subdued peoples under
us, and nations under our feet.”
The sons of Korah look back on the
history of Israel and God’s deliverance of her again and again – how God freed
her from oppressors – from Egypt, the Assyrians, Babylonians, Medo-Persians,
and on and on. As we have seen in
Isaiah, even though Israel needs to be taught and disciplined, God keeps His
promise that a remnant will remain. The
chosen of God will be saved.
Paul writes, “For he must reign
until he has put all his enemies under his feet” (I Corinthians 15:25, ESV).
And again, “And he put all things
under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his
body, the fullness of him who fills all in all” (Ephesians 1:22-23, ESV).
We rejoice in God as King because He
has put all of our enemies under His feet – He has subdued them and punished
them – and He will put all of our enemies and His – under His feet – in the
end, all those who never believe savingly in the Savior will receive the full
Wrath of God in eternal Hell.
Understand, we rejoice in God our
King not for the sake of the suffering of the lost, but because God is King,
and He saves a people for Himself out of the lost.
Third, “He chose our heritage for
us, the pride of Jacob whom he loves.
Selah”
We rejoice in God our King because
before Creation, He chose a people for Himself – and He cannot lie or break His
promise.
Paul puts it this way:
“Blessed be the God and Father of
our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual
blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the
foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In
love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ,
according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with
which he has blessed us in the Beloved. In him we have redemption through his
blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace,
which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight making known to us the
mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as
a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven
and things on earth.
“In
him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the
purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so
that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his
glory. In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your
salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who
is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the
praise of his glory” (Ephesians 1:3-14, ESV).
God,
the King, chose a people for Himself from before the Creation, and we are sons
and daughters of God now and forever, with an inheritance that can never be
taken away, because of the work that Jesus did to save us.
All humanity is called on to praise
God our King because He chose a remnant and made them His sons and daughters
through the work of Jesus, our God and Savior.
Second, all of humanity is to praise
our God, the Sovereign King.
“God has gone up with a shout, the
LORD with the sound of a trumpet. Sing praises to God, sing praises! Sing
praises to our King, sing praises! For God is the King of all the earth; sing
praises with a psalm!”
Here we come to the allusion that
refers to the Ascension – “God has gone up with a shout, the LORD with the
sound of the trumpet.”
How did the sons of Korah understand
this?
The shofar – the trumpet – was blown
in ancient Israel for a number of reasons:
war, gathering for holidays and fasts, when God gives the Law, and for
the anointing of the King (https://hoshanarabbah.org/blog/2012/05/15/when-was-the-shofar-blown/).
We saw that this is an enthronement
psalm, so the sons of Korah would have understood this as God being enthroned
and anointed – recognized – as King.
Similarly, Jesus ascends back to His
throne at the Right Hand of the Father – so He is again enthroned and anointed
– recognized – as King.
Paul writes, “He who descended is
the one who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all
things” (Ephesians 4:10, ESV).
Though Luke does not record a
“shout” or a “trumpet” with Jesus’ Ascension, the angels say He will return in
parallel fashion.
And Paul writes, “For the Lord
himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an
archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ
will rise first” (I Thessalonians 4:16, ESV).
And so, we remember that our God –
our God and Savior, Jesus – is enthroned.
We will remember that repetition in
Hebrew is the way to convey emphasis.
The sons of Korah five times say to “sing praises”! And they say that our King, the King over all
the earth – the Sovereign King – is to be praised for who He is – He is to be
praised with the psalm.
The language that the sons of Korah
use tells us that all of humanity is to praise God our Savior musically and
with knowledge – with understanding of Who He is. This is not a blind or haphazard worship –
this is a worship of the God we know using the best of our musicality.
So,
all humans are called to know God and praise God with the best that we have
because He is the Sovereign King.
Third, our God reigns.
“God reigns over the nations; God
sits on his holy throne. The princes of the peoples gather as the people of the
God of Abraham. For the shields of the earth belong to God; he is highly
exalted!”
Our God reigns He reigns over the
nations. Jesus reigns over the nations. He sits on His holy throne. The sons of Korah would have seen the throne
of God either in the Temple, and/or in Heaven.
Likewise, Christians see the throne of God on earth after the
Restoration and in Heaven.
Also, we see the throne of God – of Jesus
– of God the Holy Spirit – in our hearts.
When Jesus ascended, He promised that God the Holy Spirit would indwell
every believer and reign over our hearts.
The Holy Spirit is transforming us into the Image of Jesus, our Lord and
Master.
And the remnant God has chosen as
His people are the sons and daughters of Abraham – not biologically, but
spiritually. God reigns over all humans
– rich and poor, slave and prince, man and woman, but He reigns in a special
way over His people – all we who believe throughout time and space.
Since God reigns over all of
humanity and His people in a special way, we exalt God. We hold our Triune God in high regard, we
speak highly of Him and praise Him and rejoice in Him, we acknowledge Him to be
the Ultimate Power, the Sovereign King of all, and we rejoice in His Character
and Attributes and strive by the power of the Holy Spirit to be like Him.
Everything was created by God. Everything is under the Sovereign rule of our
God and King and Savior. And we are His
people, so we ought to be a people who burst forth with well thought-out and
musical praise and rejoicing.
God is the Father and the Son and
the Holy Spirit, One God, equal in authority and power and dignity and worth of
praise. And so, when we hear that Jesus
has ascended back to His throne at the Right Hand of the Father, it ought to
cause us to rejoice and praise and lift up our voices to Him in thanksgiving
and awe.
If we are still unsure and to make
it clear, The Heidelberg Catechism, one of our standards of faith
explains three reasons why we should rejoice and praise Jesus on Ascension Day
(http://www.heidelberg-catechism.com/en/lords-days/18.html):
First, because of the Ascension
Jesus is our Advocate before the Father.
Jesus prays for you and me – He asks His Father on our behalf and for
our good.
Paul writes, “For there is one God,
and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,” (I
Timothy 2:5, ESV).
Second, because Jesus ascended as
the physically risen Christ, we are assured that on the last day, we will be
raised, incorruptible, in our same physical bodies. God created humans wholly good – our bodies –
thought they decay and fail us, our bodies were created good and will be
restored and remain physical bodies.
As Job says, “For I know that my
Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin
has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see for
myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. My heart faints within me!”
(Job 19:25-27, ESV).
Third, as we have already seen, it
is when Jesus has ascended that the Father and the Son sent the Holy Spirit to
indwell all we who believe. In so doing,
we become the Temple of God, and God the Holy Spirit gifts us, grows us, and
empowers us to do everything God would have each of us do and be each day.
Without the Ascension, we do not
have the indwelling of God the Holy Spirit as our pledge of salvation, we do
not have surety of our physical resurrection, and we do not have the Savior,
Jesus – 100% God and 100% man – as our Mediator and Advocate before the Father.
So, we should care, shouldn’t we?
We should rejoice that our God is
King. We should praise our Sovereign
King. And we should cry out, “Our God
reigns!” And take comfort in His doing all things according to His perfect Will
– even working through your life and mine.
Let us pray:
Almighty God – Three-in-One, we
praise You and rejoice in the Ascension of Jesus to His throne. We thank You for the lives You have given us
to learn to trust and acknowledge Your Sovereign Rule. We thank You that Jesus is our Mediator, that
our bodies are good and we will live on as real humans, and You have gifted us
with the indwelling of God the Holy Spirit so we are able to do all You have
called us to do. Help us by Him Who
indwells us to trust and to strive to live as You have called us to as we
strive to become transformed into the Image of Jesus, our God and Your Son, Who
sits at Your Right Hand in Power and Glory.
For it is in Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)