Let Us be Grateful to God

[Christsfreeservant]

Summary Hebrews 12:1-24

We, as followers of Jesus Christ, are to cast off every sin which enslaves us, and everything that leads us into sin, and any evil stored up in our hearts that might be leading us into sin, such as bitterness, hatred, unforgiveness, pride, lust, greed and idolatry, etc. And then we need to focus our minds and hearts on Jesus Christ in walking in obedience to his commands (New Covenant) in holiness and in righteousness, in the power of God’s Spirit.

And then we are to accept God’s disciplines in our lives and his corrections and rebukes and chastisements as for our good, in order that we may share in the holiness of God, and that it might yield the peaceful fruit of righteous in our lives, if we have been trained by it, and if we have submitted to our Lord through it all. And we are to strengthen what is spiritually weak in us and then make righteous paths for us to walk in that are of the Lord.

And then we must guard our hearts and minds against the plots of the evil one who will try to drag us back into sin. We must resist him. And we must put on the armor of God with which to fight off his evil attacks against our minds and hearts (Ephesians 6:10-20). And we must not give way to temptation to do evil, to be sexually immoral, to have a root of bitterness, and to be unholy in conduct, but we must repent (turn from) of all sin.

Hebrews 12:25-29 ESV

“See that you do not refuse him who is speaking. For if they did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, much less will we escape if we reject him who warns from heaven. At that time his voice shook the earth, but now he has promised, ‘Yet once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens.’ This phrase, ‘Yet once more,’ indicates the removal of things that are shaken—that is, things that have been made—in order that the things that cannot be shaken may remain. Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.”

And we must not follow the example of God’s people Israel in the Old Testament when they wandered in the wilderness for 40 years and when they engaged in sexual immorality and idolatry and revelry and in testing the Lord, etc. But we are to fear the Lord by believing what his word teaches us we must do, as followers of Christ, and then we must obey the Lord. And we are to make certain that we do not refuse our Lord when he speaks.

For, not everyone who professed God as their God in the Old Testament truly had faith in him. Many of them were merely physical descendants of Abraham but they were not his spiritual offspring because they refused to obey the Lord, and so they chose to do what was sinful, instead. And those who refused to obey the Lord, but who chose to obey their sin, instead, did not enter into God’s eternal rest because of their unbelief (disobedience).

And what they did is written down for us to serve as examples of what not to do and of the consequences of continuing in deliberate and habitual sin and not in walks of obedience to our Lord in holiness and in righteousness. For if we choose to obey sin and to not follow our Lord in obedience to his ways, in practice, we will not have salvation from sin in the end when Jesus returns, and we will not inherit eternal life with God. It is what the Scriptures teach.

So, we need to express our gratitude to the Lord for all that he has done for us by submitting to Christ as Lord, by surrendering our lives to Jesus Christ, by denying self and daily dying with Christ to sin, and by following him in obedience to his ways. Yes, we need to verbalize our praises to him, too, and to thank him audibly for all that he has done for us, but if our praise is with our lips only, and not with our obedience, Jesus is not our Lord.

[1 Co 10:1-22; Heb 3:1-19; Heb 4:1-13; Matt 7:21-23; Matt 24:9-14; Lu 9:23-26; Rom 1:18-32; Rom 2:6-8; Rom 6:1-23; Rom 8:1-14,24; Rom 12:1-2; Rom 13:11; 1 Co 6:9-10,19-20; 2 Co 5:10,15,21; 1 Co 1:18; 1 Co 15:1-2; 2 Tim 1:8-9; Heb 9:28; 1 Pet 1:5; Gal 5:16-21; Gal 6:7-8; Eph 2:8-10; Eph 4:17-32; Eph 5:3-6; Col 1:21-23; Col 3:5-17; 1 Pet 2:24; Tit 2:11-14; 1 Jn 1:5-9; 1 Jn 2:3-6,24-25; 1 Jn 3:4-10; Heb 10:23-31; Heb 12:1-2; Rev 21:8,27; Rev 22:14-15]

Welcome To Our World

By Chris Rice

Tears are falling, hearts are breaking
How we need to hear from God
You've been promised, we've been waiting
Welcome Holy Child

Bring Your peace into our violence
Bid our hungry souls be filled
Word now breaking Heaven's silence
Welcome to our world

Fragile finger sent to heal us
Tender brow prepared for thorn
Tiny heart whose blood will save us
Unto us is born

So wrap our injured flesh around You
Breathe our air and walk our sod
Rob our sin and make us holy
Perfect Son of God
Welcome to our world

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