Archive for 2019

Here’s the reality: even when you do all the good things that you’re supposed to do, even when you avoid all those bad things that everybody else seems to be doing, it doesn’t bring you up a level. Because there are no “levels.” We are all the same. All human beings are equally sinful. And yet all human beings are equally loved by God. So that means all human beings are equally candidates for grace. . . .

If you think about it, God could have done it a different way. God could have told Isaiah, and Peter, and James, and John, and you, and me, to stay out of his way and not mess his ministry up. God could have told us “I don’t want my gospel message in your sinful mouths ““ I’m sending an angel to go do my outreach instead.” But God didn’t do that. Instead, when he purified us from sin and put faith in our hearts, he also put his Word on our lips so we could go and share it with other people.

Jesus couldn’t speak the good news any more clearly. God had finally sent all of mankind what we had needed for thousands of years ““ a Savior from our sins! A ticket to eternal life in heaven! But most of the people in Nazareth didn’t even listen to the beautiful content of that message, because they were too distracted by the messenger…

Champion warfare was a common practice in the ancient world. The purpose, really, was to save lives. Instead of hundreds of thousands of soldiers shedding their blood all over the battlefield, you just had two soldiers face off, 1-on-1, each one risking their life to potentially save many others.
That’s what Jesus did when he was tempted by the devil in the wilderness: he put his life on the line for all of us, and he came away victorious.