Once again here is a message that is so good. You may want to catch tomorrow's message as well. But, the emphasis on the Gospel is so inspiring. I could just imagine this kind of message being preached to the Youth of today. It is direct and right to the point and not spoon fed with sugar or some kind of media or method to make it more tolerable to swallow.
I have heard recently a pastor focus on the commission of certain sins like going over the speed limit or other seemingly small and insignificant sins. To where someone could make a case for not being that bad of a person. "God surely would not be so unfair and not consider them as a good person." The pastor mentioned a few sins and said that if you were to only sin 3 times a day for a year and multiply that say by 60 years. That's a whole lot of sinning. However, the pastor forgets that we sin every second of every minute, hour, day, month year, life and that is a whole lot of sinning. But, the focus, unfortunately, is on sins and not on the fact that we do not love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and we do not love our neighbors as ourselves. So, the emphasis should really move away from the acts of sin to the fact that we are SINNERS. And as Jonathan Edward's puts it, "we are sinners in the hands of an angry God". Now, we don't like looking at God from this standpoint because we have squelched this attribute of God and have only embraced the ones that we like. But the truth is that we are wicked people. And the law gives us the realization that we are in fact deserving of God's condemnation. As Alistair says, (paraphrasing) if we were to get a grade on how well we were doing in the school of righteousness, we would all get "Fs". No matter what effort or good deeds we do will ever change our grade to anything but an "F".
So, now we know why we celebrate Christmas... "Joy to the World, the Lord has come". We now have someone that gets the grade "A" on our behalf. We are in need of a Savior to come and rescue us from this life of destruction. I can praise Him and share Him as a gift that has come into this dark world. We can't help but share this gift of Christmas since we are blessed by God that His Grace was given. This present was already given and already opened by His Son Jesus Christ.
I listened to the story of Saul and David recently and it was quite interesting to here how God was working in the heart of David and how God protected David. God had to protect David because the son or descendant that would come out from him would also be David's Lord. The Son of God. The Savior of the World. This was promised to Abraham as well.
Remember when Saul threw the spear at David and all the times he pursued him to kill him? God protected David. He preserved him and this gift to come way before the Angels and the shepherds were to witness the birth of Jesus. And God continues to keep us and protect us as a humanity that was created as a gift from the Father to the Son. But, the Son had to come to Earth to be the Redeemer and redeem the gift (us) and be our atonement.
Why did He do this?
1. Because He loves His Father.
2. Because He loves the gift (us) He receives from the Father.
Isn't that the picture provided by the 10 commandments? Isn't that what the 2 greatest commands tell us? Not only our sins condemn us but our lack of perfect love and holiness condemn us.
That is just mind boggling if you really think about it.
Now that's a Christmas present worth showing to the whole world.
Praise God from whom all blessings flow.
Praise Him all creatures here below.
Praise Him above ye heavenly hosts.
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. AMEN!!!
Grace and Peace,
Chris Allen
Coram Deo!!!
Listen Now: Listen in Mini-Player
The breaking of the 10 Commandments are offensive against a holy God. What can we do to restore our relationship with Him? The first step is to discover some “Good News for Lawbreakers” on Truth For Life with Pastor Alistair Begg.
Recent Broadcasts Good News for Lawbreakers, Part A
Romans 3:20-31, Series: Pathway to Freedom
1 comment:
chris, Well I have listened to each one of the sermons Alistair Begg preached on the Ten Commandments for the past couple of weeks and they were excellent,and John MacArthur mentioned in his video sermon sunday that the Ten Commandments have been basically put on the back burner by the evangelical church because sinners don't want to hear that and they don't understand that. I think this is true and I think we need to begin teaching these more in our churches.
Thanks
Gary Cryer
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