Can you begin this new and uncertain year with a pure heart? “But, I can’t,” you say? “My heart isn’t pure and I don’t know how to make it pure. I can try to be better, but there are stains and dirt from previous sins.” A pure heart contains no mixture. Part this, part that. Part God, part other. Jesus told us that seeing God is for the pure in heart. That leaves us in a dilemma. No one is…
Have you read the Beatitudes in Matthew chapter 5 lately? It talks about being poor in spirit and pure in heart. Jesus said that it will be the pure in heart that sees God. And He says that the kingdom of God is for the poor in spirit. Pure in heart? Do you know anyone that is pure in heart? What about poor in spirit? What does that mean? What does that mean today? Are they just nice-sounding words that…
Through Adam’s transgression all sin. His transgression introduced God’s judgment and condemnation resulting in death, eternal separation from our creator. That’s our “gift” through inheritance from Adam. Through the life and death of Jesus Christ, we have been given the gift of grace. His death and resurrection bring us the gift of righteousness(being made clean) and justification (being made right in God’s sight). We no longer have the sentence of death awaiting us. Instead, we have His gift of eternal…
I mentioned previously that I would search for the key to life abounding in the life of Christ. Paul tells us how this works in Romans 6-8. Specifically, when Jesus died we died, when He was buried we were buried, when He was resurrected to a new life so were we. By faith, we reckon it so. Count it done. Credit it to our account. So how does this work? Resurrection leads to life abounding As believers raised from the…
