Tuesday, December 13, 2011

The Holy Spirit: Power Presence and Purpose Part 129

The Gifts Part 34

Prophecy continued...

The second thing of great import is the fact that my pen has a pre-established value because I paid a certain price in order to acquire it. I know exactly how much my pen is worth, because I already paid for it. My pen doesn’t know what it is worth, but I do, and since I know what it is worth I care for it.

Now before I start getting e-mails accusing me of going to the dark side and buying a thousand dollar pen, no, I still write with a regular old rollerball pen that I’ve had forever and bought for under three dollars, but the point that I’m trying to make is that just as I know the worth of my pen because I paid for it, God knows the worth of every soul because He paid the price in full.

Although we may undervalue ourselves, although we may sometimes think ourselves worthless, God never will, for His Son paid for your life with His life, and God knows exactly how much the life of His beloved Son was worth.

Isaiah 43:4, “Since you were precious in My sight, you have been honored, and I have loved you; therefore I will give men for you and people for your life.”

This was the promise God made to Israel, and as overwhelming as it might be to know that He would give men for them and people for their life, what God gave for us was far more precious still, incomparable to any amount of gold or silver, or wealth of any kind. God gave His Son Jesus, and too often we forget the value of the blood that the Christ shed for us, we forget the value of the life that He gave for us, but though we might forget God never will.

I have said this in sermons from time to time, but in this context it bears repeating because it highlights the value that God placed on each and every one of us.

If there was any way, and I mean absolutely any way for God to spare His Son, for God to use a different means by which He could reconcile man unto Himself, He would have done it. It matters not what that thing might have been, from all the cattle in the world, to all the rams in the world, to all the doves in the world, to all three together and many more beside, if there was any way for Jesus to be spared, for God to spare His only begotten Son, He would have done it.

If animals would have sufficed, the world would have been one giant funeral pyre, black smoke ascending into the heavens, the smell of charred meat overwhelming. God loved His Son, but He also loved His creation, and as such He attached a value to the souls of men, so much so that the blood of His Son was the only recompense that would have sufficed.

1 Thessalonians 5:9-10, “For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him.”

God watched as His Son was beaten and whipped bloody, He watched as Jesus carried His cross, He watched as He was nailed to it, He watched as He agonized, He watched until He could watch no more, until He turned His face, all so that you and I might obtain salvation through Him, all that so you and I might be called sons and daughters of God.

Isaiah 53:10-11, “Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He had put Him to grief. When you make His soul an offering for sin, He shall see His seed, He shall prolong His days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper His hand. He shall see the travail of His soul and be satisfied. By His knowledge My righteous servant shall justify many, for He shall bear their iniquities.”

Jesus bore our sins when no one else could, He was put to grief for our transgressions and iniquities, and God the Father watched the travail of His Son’s soul, and knew that the debt had been paid, the penalty for you and me was satisfied in full on the cross.

At any moment Jesus could have called upon legions of angels, at any moment He could have called upon the hosts of heaven to come and rescue Him, but He endured until the end, taking the full measure of all that we deserved upon Himself.

How could we, even for one second doubt the love that God has for us? How could we even for one second doubt the grace and mercy that God has poured out upon us? How could we even for one second doubt that the trials and hardship of this present life have a purpose, and it is to bring us closer to Him? How could we even for a second doubt that when we are no longer able to walk He will carry us?

The value that God has placed upon you is the life of His Son. This is what you are worth in His eyes. His desire is that we not perish, His desire is that we not be condemned, His desire is that we walk in victory, His desire is that we walk in His authority, His desire is that we walk in faith, His desire is that we grow in Him, His desire is that we grow in the power of His Holy Spirit, and He has facilitated all these things, He has made them available to us, if only we would believe, if only we would not doubt, if only we would trust Him.

John 3:16-18, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believe din the name of the only begotten Son of God.”

With love in Christ,
Michael Boldea Jr.

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