think about it...

"what man calls balanced, God calls a mixture"...think about it...

listen forever...

"....And don't forget to listen to the voice of grace as God speaks forgiveness and acceptance and love to you from his throne. You just might want to listen to it forever."

In plain ol' english

"The case lies plainly here: Every true believer, that hath acted faith on Jesus Christ distinctly, and hath lodged his eternal salvation, and his everlasting acceptance with God, on the virtue of Christ's sacrifice, this man chargeth Christ's death with being in vain, if conscience rise again, and lie hearken to it. I know sin will be, and conscience will check for sin; but remember this, Christ died not in vain: the virtue of Christ's death remains still; it made that peace that no future transgressions shall be able to weaken or impair."

Get it?

Prepare for lift-off !

"I feel we are steppin off the boat...the gentle cruise into His graceland,

and as we are being established in the message of grace, we are now

boarding a rocket ship, with Jesus as our pilot, and about to explode

into His glory realm...bring it on Lord!!

each one of us...Amen...Amen...Amen!!!"

Let the love of God wrap around you like a blanket!!

Russell...aka...Soldier of the Lord!!!


Russel Fuller, Gracelife Church, 27th August 2009, Durban, South Africa

As a man thinks so he is....

"The thinking of one under grace should be in perfect harmony with the thinking of God.

II Cor 10:5, "...we take captive every thought and make it obedient to Christ."

If every thought is made obedient to Christ, the overt conduct would also be obedient to Christ. Because overt conduct has its source in thought."

For the believer every thought should bow to this one.... through Christ, i AM the righteousness of God, no matter what.

I love what Joseph Prince says...."through the gift of righteousness we reign in life!!"

How do i approach the throne of grace?

Heb 4:16, "Let us then approach the THRONE OF GRACE with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need."

How do i "approach" the throne of grace?

• Do i go into a room and close the door?
• bow down on my knees?
• lie on my back?
• read my bible more ?
• pray more?
• go see the Pastor?
• fellowship more?
• give more?

Not really, approaching the throne of grace is an attitude not necessarily an action...those things can be good in and of themselves but they are not what the writer of Hebrews is trying to get us to do...

The whole book of Hebrews is an awesome look at what we have in Christ in the New Covenant....with THIS thinking, with THIS new mindset, with THIS understanding, he says, approach the throne of grace....

you can approach the throne of grace...

• in the car
• on the beach
• in the toilet (sounds bad but its true :-)
• in that meeting
• falling asleep
• running
• jumping
• sitting
• climbing
• sky diving
• swimming
• watching TV
  

WHY??

Believe right and the grace and mercy you need will flow abundantly to you. You will receive help, only don't try and work for it, rest, believe and watch what God does...

Oh and BTW....when you do believe right, you approach the throne of grace...WITH CONFIDENCE!!!! because every promise God has given you is ALWAYS yes and amen in Jesus!!

HIS PROVISION...

EL SHADDAI...
He IS more than enough.
ENOUGH SAID.....

;-)

Dont preach the fruit, preach the Root...

"The core of the Gospel is Christ as our righteousness. I find myself preaching less salvation, prosperity, healing, and signs and wonders than before. Instead I preach Jesus Christ our righteousness – and salvations, healings, signs and wonders follow."

Peter Youngren

Not Even a Little Yeast

Gal 5: 2- 3 "Mark my words! I, Paul, tell you that if you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will be of no value to you at all. Again I declare to every man who lets himself be circumcised that he is obligated to obey the whole law"

"This is a powerful statement by the “champion of grace”. The way I understand this to be is that he is telling them that if they allow even a little law in, then it will begin to change their whole way of thinking and eventually they will begin to change even their way of living and before they know it they will be completely back under law. “ A little yeast works through the whole lump”. Either Christ is not enough and they need to add a little law as well, or He is enough in which case if they do add a little law, Christ will be of no value. ">We cannot allow any law, human traditions and principals into our thinking or into the thinking of the people in our care, “Christ is the end of the law” to us it is over, we now live by the Spirit. And in us He produces His fruit, and “against such things there is no law”

Brad Dearlove (www.thexpoint.com)

a faultfinding covenant...

"Imagine every day you live your life with someone who says; “Oh you did that wrong, that wrong and you should have done that, oh what are you doing? Oh you are pathetic! You are useless, why did you do that? You are a failure! You shouldn’t have done that! You did that badly! God is not happy with that! God can’t stand that!”. That is a faultfinding covenant – that is the law covenant." Ryan Rufus


That is why its is spelled out in Romans...we have to die to0 the law (in our minds) in order to bear fruit to God. Think about this...when your boss ( or your natural father) praises you, tells you how good you are, what an asset you are to the team etc, it makes you want to work harder doesn't it. But, if he says the opposite, you lose morale and your production is effected...it is the same with God, surely...

You see the enemy will come in and break you down and try and get you to believe its the Holy Spirit...he will tell you how useless you are, that as a Christian you wont amount to anything, cause you're not spiritual enough, he will say, if only you were more like your leaders, look how busy they are, look how God is blessing them because of it....what happens? we lose morale and don't want to "do" anything...

The devil uses the law to do this, remember he is called the Accuser, why? cause he will accuse, simple...and what does he use to accuse you with..THE LAW, what else is there...BUT...when we realize the law HAS been abolished and the devil is disarmed and that we ARE the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus, no matter our behavior...its a great morale booster and causes good fruit to overflow to the glory of God...but this revelation needs to be taught over and over and over again to the church.

Look at the church worldwide and you WILL see this revelation is missing...mainly cause its missing in the leaders...leaders change, the people will change..

LOOK, IT'S OVERFLOWING !!

2 Cor 4:15 "....so that (the) grace that is reaching more and more people may cause thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God.""

...do you see that?"

When the revelation of Gods grace comes, it causes thanksgiving ( and praise, worship, wonder, awe, faith, love, forgiveness, generosity...)...TO OVERFLOW....(not pressured, forced out, stirred up through self effort or have to cause I'm a Christian...) to THE GLORY OF GOD !!!!

A strong and unshakable assurance.

Romans 8:38-39: Nothing in all creation can separate us from God's love for us in Christ.

"Nothing can deny or undo our salvation. Not sin, not law, not death, not the law of sin and death, or the fact we are not Jews. Because our relationship with God is not based on any thing variable or changeable but on Christ to whom God has united us by his Spirit.

All of this Paul intends as strong and unshakable assurance. The world, which continues to relate to its 'god' kata sarka (in the flesh), assumes that suffering undermines confidence in one's relationship with God, undermines and nullifies the doctrine of justification by faith, rendering it impossible for anyone to know without a shadow of a doubt that God accepts them. Everything is conditional, everything is uncertain, and the presence of suffering intensifies that conditionality and that uncertainty.

Sadly, many Christians, to whom God has ceased to relate kata sarka (in the flesh) because they have believed in his Son, continue in their own hearts and minds and from their perspective, to relate to God kata sarka. Their awareness of peace with God is non-existent or fragile, they constantly fear God's condemnation and punishment, they still live as though trapped and enslaved by the law of sin and death, they have no assurance of salvation. To them suffering is God's punishment ' a payout for some demerit or some failure of faith.

To these Paul hammers it home: we rejoice in suffering! (5:3) It can never again be perceived as punishment. It has no ability to sever us from the love of God in Christ. Nothing can do that. Christ has taken all the punishment. Christ has borne all the rejection and separation. It will never be experienced by the believer. Never. All that could ever separate us from God has been dis-empowered forever."

the law can not achieve our...

"According to Rom 3:19,20, the law can not achieve our justification or right legal standing in the presence of God; and according to 8:4, it could not enable us to fulfill its righteous requirements. This was because it was weakened by the sinful nature (read 'flesh') ...

It (flesh) refers to any man standing by himself in the presence of God - this sarx (flesh) may be clearly morally corrupt, or it may be, to our human eyes, very good, as were the Pharisees, but it is still 'flesh', it is still man cut off from God, man in his rebellion and independence, standing' naked, exposed and alone in the presence of the God from whom he is severed. It includes me in my own righteousness as well as me in my obvious sinfulness. It includes me standing in God's presence thinking that my little handful of goodness, or of Christian service, might purchase for me some favour or blessing from his hand. It is me seeking to relate to God on the basis of my own performance, instead of relating to him always, only and ever in and through Jesus Christ my Lord and Saviour. (The only person who can stand in the presence of God kata sarka (in the flesh), and not be condemned and rejected, is Jesus Christ.)

At a deeper level of understanding, this relating to God kata sarka - this effort to stand alone and merit our own access to God - is sin at its foundational and original level: it was this desire to stand alone, to be independent of God, that was the original sin in Genesis 3. When Christians, even for a moment, assume that they, by what they are or do, earn, merit or deserve their relationship with God, they are relating to God kata sarka-according to flesh, and indulging in the sin of Adam."

there is now no condemnation ...

"'no condemnation' ... an absolute statement, not a 'maybe', not 'a little bit of condemnation left', not 'the possibility of some condemnation in some circumstances' ... but a straight, unequivocal 'NO' condemnation. Remember what it was that put us under condemnation? ... Adam's sin (5:16,18). What makes us aware of that sin and condemnation? ... The law (3:20, 5:20, 7:7-12). What releases us from sin/law/death condemnation? ... the death of Jesus Christ as our substitute, which is considered our death (6:1-11, 7:1-6)."

We died to sin...

"'': If we do not understand this brief statement correctly then we will fail to understand Paul's whole doctrine of salvation. Many Christians make the mistake of taking Paul to mean by'we died to sin' that we have personally arrived at the point where sin has no more ability to tempt us and trip us up. As a consequence of this understanding Christians are divided into two groups - those who have arrived at this point where they have no more trouble with sin, and those who have not arrived at this point. But Paul is not talking about that, as he clarifies in the verses that follow. He is talking about the identification and union of every true believer with Jesus Christ, our substitute, in his death, a death in which he bore the penalty incurred by sin - our sin.

In Christ, our substitute, we have died the death penalty which sin imposed on us. As Paul stated in 5:21 'sin reigned in death': it was in charge, it was in control, it called the shots, it involved us in an inescapable condemnation, it held us bound in death and it demanded our death. In our union with Christ in his death we have fulfilled all that sin could justly demand of us. Its rightful authority over us has been terminated. We died to sin. In other words, as far as sin is concerned, it has no authority to do anything more to us, because all that it could legally do to us was done completely and effectively in the death of Jesus Christ for us."

Before your very eyes...

"Through the preaching of Paul and his companions the Galatians had had the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, and the significance of that crucifixion placarded before them. They had been taught what the cross was all about. They had been taught its meaning - the substitutionary atonement, the justification, the reconciliation, redemption and forgiveness that is obtained there by the sheer grace of God. They had learnt how this cross had brought to an end all the strivings of man for acceptance with God. They knew its message. They knew its power."

Martyn Lloyd-Jones from 'Romans. Exposition of Chapter 6: the New Man'

'The true preaching of the gospel of salvation by grace alone always leads to the possibility of this charge being brought against it. There is no better test as to whether a man is really preaching the New Testament gospel of salvation than this, that some people might misunderstand it and misinterpret it to mean that it really amounts to this, that because you are saved by grace alone it does not matter at all what you do; you can go on sinning as much as you like because it will redound all the more to the glory of grace. That is a very good test of gospel preaching. If my preaching and presentation of the gospel of salvation does not expose it to that misunderstanding, then it is not the gospel.

'If our preaching does not expose us to that charge and to that misunderstanding, it is because we are not really preaching the gospel. - it was brought frequently against Martin Luther. ... It was also brought against George Whitefield two hundred years ago. It is the charge that formal dead Christianity - if there is such a thing - has always brought against this startling, staggering message, that God 'justifies the ungodly', and that we are saved, not by anything we do, but in spite of it, entirely and only by the grace of God through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

' ... I would say to all preachers: If your preaching of salvation has not been misunderstood in that way, then you had better examine your sermons again, and you had better make sure that you really are preaching the salvation that is offered in the New Testament..."

Martyn Lloyd-Jones

HIS GRACE GAVE US ETERNAL ENCOURAGEMENT

2 Thess 2:16-17, "May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and BY HIS GRACE GAVE US ETERNAL ENCOURAGEMENT and good hope, encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and word." The benediction of grace in the Christian life is "eternal encouragement and good hope culminating in encouraged hearts and strength in every good deed and word."

"There is nothing in life for which there is not grace. Because grace is so essential for every detail of the believer's life, there can be no danger of teaching too much grace. The real danger is in not understanding grace and in not teaching it enough."

THE ISSUE AS I SEE IT!

'THE WORLD DOESN'T HAVE A SIN PROBLEM,
IT HAS A SON PROBLEM"

Dont give in!

"They (the Pharisees and Sadducees) saw Jesus as a threat to their control over the people. So they thought that through flattery and offering hospitality to Him they could disguise their hostility and weave their manipulative control over Him. They arrogantly presumed that they could get Jesus safely into their camp and be controlled. They thought then they could work on Him and sterilize Him and emasculate Him of His spiritual testosterone but they took on far more than they bargained for - for the Son of God is not only called the Lamb of God but He is also called the Lion of the Tribe of Judah!

Lions were never meant or created to live in cages. The great roar from the lungs of Jesus is so full of supernatural power that it shook these religious leaders to the very core of their perverted hearts. Jesus understood that you cannot submit to the to the grace-hating spirit even for a moment and today so many Christians are naive and deceived by the grace-hating spirit."