God used Moses to deliver His people from slavery from God’s wrath upon Egypt and to lead them to the Promised Land. So also, God sent His only begotten Son to deliver us from slavery to sin and from death and to lead us to the eternal Promised Land. God is glorified in the satisfaction of His perfect justice.
Tag Archives: Gospel
Prayer from the Depths of Woe
Indeed, salvation belongs to the Lord, for our Lord said, “just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth” (Matt. 12:40). Yet, unlike Jonah, the Lord Jesus regarded the Scriptures as the very breath of God, down to the iota and dot.
The Thief of Contentment
As we learn this, we can look at all that is our neighbor’s and be content with, what our catechism calls, “a right and charitable frame of spirit” (WSC Q. 80). We can be genuinely happy for our neighbor’s sake, because we trust the providence of God. And we can be content with our own lot, knowing “we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out…” (1 Tim. 6:7).
The Son Gives Life
As God the Father has ordained, God the Son has accomplished, and God the Spirit gives us life and sanctifies us, giving us joy and revealing God’s glory to the world through his church. We enjoy a blessed union to the glory of God, and it is a union we enjoy through the life he gives.
Walk by the Spirit
God’s goodness to you includes his empowering presence to make you more like Jesus. That is indeed the good that every Christian wants, walking by the Spirit.
Trials Teach
Trials teach. They teach us to honor and glorify God. They teach us to walk humbly before him.
And they teach us to rejoice in God’s provision. Let us be faithful to listen.
Ordinary Providence
When considering the pain and suffering of this life, many people make one of two assumptions about God. He is either good but not all powerful, or he is powerful but not all good.
Lawless Deeds, Definite Plan
Sometimes, do the circumstances of life make you wonder: Is God really in control? Perhaps doctrinally you know better, but do your thoughts and actions tell differently? Do you wonder sometimes: If God is good, and if “for those who love God all things work together for good” (Rom. 8:28), then do bad things mean that God has lost control? Is he merely a spectator, watching as events unfold? Or, does he wait to respond or react as necessary?
The Gospel of Resurrection
In Christ, paradise lost becomes paradise regained. And in Christ’s final act of subordination, he will submit the kingdom to God, that God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit may be “all in all.” As Calvin summarizes, “all things will be brought back to God, as their beginning and end.”
Made to Worship
The world is searching for significance, and at this time for an affirmation that there is more to life than mere survival. Let us not point them to the idols of our culture but instead let us point them to Christ. For, only in Christ are we redeemed to do precisely what we were made to do: glorify and enjoy God forever.
Planter, Pastor, Preacher 