The greatest need of the Church today is not miracles, it is the revelation of Jesus Christ, the Son of God; it is the full understanding of Who He is, what He has done for us, what and who we are in Him, by virtue of what He has done for us. The greatest tragedy of today’s Church is not Satan, it is ignorance. Satan’s edge over Christians and the Church is founded on the element of ignorance.
We have been very vehement in putting forward our sinfulness and inability to please God, yet we are in serious poverty of the truth of what Jesus has done for us—all that is available to us by faith.
If Christ is of no other value to us now, except in saving us from our sins and making us heaven-ready, then we are nothing but Christian men and women having a miserable earthly experience while waiting for death to transport us into glory. When the word of God describes us as the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus (2nd Corinthians 521), and that tells us that we have been justified (declared righteous) before God (Romans 51), it isn’t something just 'reckoned' to us ideally, when realistically we see ourselves as no-good, unworthy sinners saved by grace.
That could only be true if we haven’t received Jesus in our hearts, believing in His finished work of redemption, but because we believe in Him, we must see ourselves exactly the way God sees us as revealed in His word. It is not humility to think less of yourself when God sees you as holy and blameless through Jesus (Colossians 119-22; Ephesians 13-6), that is contradicting the word of God.
Furthermore, we must understand that our sinfulness and inability to please God was revealed when God gave Moses the law, but when He gave us grace and truth through Jesus (John 116-17), our righteousness and ability to please Him was revealed.
The Church has acknowledged the grace factor but we are yet to walk in the truth. This blog is not about grace, it is about grace and truth! Grace is impotent without the truth. The devil has tried to pervert the gospel of grace by keeping us in the dark, but when we know and walk in the truth, we will break Satan’s power over our lives.
If we as Christians are living in weakness when we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us (Philippians 413); if our bodies are ravaged by sicknesses and diseases when Jesus’ stripes paid for our healing (Isaiah 534-5); if God has given us a new nature in Christ (2nd Corinthians 517) and we walk around with the thinking we’re just humans, with the propensity to sin, then we are yet to know the truth.
Redemption is a two-fold work, it is substitutionary and vital. Grace is the good news of Jesus’ substitutionary work for you and me, we identify with His death and resurrection into newness of life by faith thereby taking His place in righteousness, health, peace, prosperity and blessing because He took our place in sin, affliction, poverty and curses (Galatians 220; Romans 64-8). However it will take the revelation of the truth of God’s word to bring us into the vital experience of all that Jesus paid for by His death and resurrection (2nd Corinthians 318).
Do you know who you are in Christ as becoming a Christian? Nothing terrifies the devil more than a man who lives in the light of who he is in Christ.
Reciting the words in the Bible just to put a check mark on your religious lifestyle will yield little profit in Christianity, it is having the eyes of your understanding enlightened in the revelation of the knowledge of Christ that unlocks the unsearchable depths of God’s glory and His mighty power over your life (Ephesians 115-19).
God’s Spirit is calling us deeper. It is time to manifest the Christ in our Christianity, the revelation of grace and truth is the key.
Dear Reader,
If you want to come into right standing and have peace and an intimate relationship with God, Jesus Christ paid the price. All you have to do is make this confession with faith in your heart:
Lord Jesus, I acknowledge you as the Son of God who died for my sins, and on the third day you were raised again for my justification. I ask you to come into my heart, even as you cleanse me from my sins with your precious blood. Thank you Lord, Amen.
Remain kept by God’s grace.
Bright Benson blogs at Timeless Gospel.
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