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The Daily Word of Righteousness
Belief and Righteousness, #14
Jesus gave them this answer: "I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does. For the Father loves the Son and shows him all he does. Yes, to your amazement he will show him even greater things than these." (John 5:19,20—NIV)
The rest of God is described above. It is not a matter of mentally assenting to the Divine promise. It is that of seeking Christ until we know what He is doing. Then we do the same thing. We interact with Him on a daily basis, judging as He is judging; speaking as He is speaking; understanding as He is understanding; acting as He is acting. As He is, so are we in this world. This is the true Christian life. This is what God has desired for man from the beginning of time. But somehow we do always err in our heart.
The Jews chose to bury themselves in the Law rather than live in daily interaction with God.
In the first century many Christians chose to follow the Christian-Gnostic path of "believe only" rather than live in daily interaction with God.
The Catholic Church substituted its many rituals, plus the Virgin Mary, for living in daily interaction with Christ.
Today we Christians are back to the Christian Gnosticism of the first century.
We simply are unwilling to present our body a living sacrifice, living twenty-four hours of every day in constant communion with Christ.
We say we are saved by "faith alone."
Let's think about this unscriptural expression for a moment.
The eleventh chapter of the Book of Hebrews is the "faith chapter" of the Bible.
It is introduced in the tenth chapter by the familiar "the just shall live by faith."
But my righteous one will live by faith. And if he shrinks back, I will not be pleased with him. (Hebrews 10:38—NIV)
The eleventh chapter is a definition of "My righteous one will live by faith."
There is not one instance, that we can see, in the eleventh chapter of Hebrews, of belief in the facts of theology. Rather the type of faith described here is interaction with the living God and obedience to God.
-"By faith Abel offered God a better sacrifice than Cain did."
-"By faith Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in holy fear built an ark to save his family."
-"By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise."
Notice carefully the following:
-"For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God." And, "By faith Abraham, even though he was past age—and Sarah herself was barren—was enabled to become a father because he considered him faithful who had made the promise."
To be continued.