Year 5, Day 45: Ezra 7

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Information, Imitation, Innovation

• Information: This is the initial phase of become a disciple of Jesus.  Before we can do anything meaningful we must begin to understand what we are doing.  We may never gain full understanding of God and His ways, but God calls us to study Him, His Son, and His ways as the foundation of being His follower.
• Imitation: This is the second over-arching step of the discipleship process.  First we gain information, then we imitate our spiritual mentor.  Imitation leads to innovation of spirituality in our own life.
• Innovation: When we have studied God and learned to imitate Him, then we can begin to apply what we have learned and practiced into our life in new and innovative ways.  In this way we truly become the person of God that He sees us to be.

I love the description of Ezra in Ezra 7:10.  Ezra studied the Word of God.  Then he did it.  Then he taught others to do it.  To me, this is absolutely a demonstration of the information → imitation → innovation model.

Ezra studied the Word of God.  If we want to be God’s people, we must be rooted in His Word.  How can we ever hope to talk meaningfully about God if we do not know His Word?  Now don’t get me wrong.  Academic knowledge of the Word is not enough.  As Satan demonstrates when he tempts Christ in the wilderness, even Satan has an academic understanding of God’s Word.  Therefore, academic knowledge of God’s Word is not the end.  But it is absolutely the beginning.  We begin our relationship by learning about who God is and what God wants from us.

Then, we learn to imitate what we see.  We imitate Christ.  We imitate the followers of Christ that we hear about in God’s Word.  We imitate the people of Christ that we see in this world.  In other words, we put what we learn to practice.  Our lives change as we let God’s Word become alive within each of us.

Then we learn to innovate it into our lives and the lives of the people around us.  As we grow in faith and become more skilled in allowing God to shine through us, we find ourselves in positions to teach other people.  We find ourselves to be in a position to invite other people to learn and study God’s Word.  As we approach the innovation stage, through God’s hand we are capable of inviting people around us into the beginning of the information stage.  We see this lived out and celebrated in Ezra in this chapter.

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Year 5, Day 44: Ezra 6

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Provision

• Provision: God gives us what we truly need.  God knows our needs better than we can know them.  We learn to trust God to provide for us.

God’s provision is amazing.   He knows what we need and when we need it.  Quite often, even while He knows what we need God supersedes that very need into the realm of surplus.  I’m not saying we worship God because He gives us everything.  But He knows the difference between a need and a want.  And He meets our needs.

Look into the chapter.  The Hebrew people are obedient to God.  They are building His temple in spite of persecution around them.  When people go and try to stir up trouble with King Darius, God takes care of His people.  Darius not only writes a letter to the persecutors to get them to stop hindering the work, but they also are told that the work is to be paid for out of the royal treasury!  Talk about windfall!

These Hebrew people now have the verbal and financial backing of the king of Persia.  That’s provision indeed.  They have all that they need to finish the job.  And they do finish it in obedience.

Before we leave this topic of provision, though, let’s look at one more thing.  Look how the people respond.  They worship God.  These are people who hadn’t been able to celebrate the Passover for generations.  The celebrate God’s provision by worshipping Him.  That is worth noting.  We should take God’s gifts and toss them aside or use them unthinkingly.  God’s provision should draw out our praise for Him.

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Year 5, Day 43: Ezra 5

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Character

• Character: Having the interior life that is necessary to support the work that God sets before a person.  It is hearing from God and obeying.  It is doing the right thing when nobody is looking.

I really like the hidden nature of Ezra 5.  At first this chapter seems like such a normal chapter.  Here come complaints against the building process once more.  Here come more people who want to interfere with what God is doing in the world.  On the surface, this chapter seems to be about the world and its disruptive influence.

However, this is a chapter that sets us up to understand the character of God.  Yesterday we learned that the sins of the pre-captivity Jews earned them a reputation that caused work on the temple to stop.  But today we see that God is going to use the decree and character of Cyrus to bring forth His righteousness.  Because Cyrus followed God and listened to God’s desires, he made a decree that the temple should be rebuilt.  Cyrus’ character is the tool that God is going to use to save the reconstruction effort!

Isn’t it neat how God can use the character of one person to pave the way for His greatness into the life of another?  Isn’t it neat how God can freely use our character when we are devoted to Him?

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Year 5, Day 42: Ezra 4

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Ambition

• Ambition: We all need a goal to which we can strive.  When our ambition comes from God, we find fulfillment in our obedience into that for which we have been equipped because our Out is in proper focus.  But when our ambition comes from ourselves, we find ourselves chasing after our own dreams and trying to find fulfillment in accomplishments of our own making.

Look at the inhabitants of the land and how they react to the Hebrew people returning.  They see what is going on in Jerusalem and ask to participate.  Now, it is possible that they genuinely want to help.  We aren’t told.  But the reality is that when they are refused they go out of the way to hinder the work being done in Jerusalem.  For this reason, many Bible scholars imply that the native inhabitants of the land were merely offering to help so they could sow dissention and problems into the rebuilding project.

In any case, the native people of the land are refused.  So look what they do.  The go to the regional leaders and bribe them to get work to stop.  They write a letter to the king reminding him about the rebellious nature of the Hebrew people.  They want to win.  They seek their own will.  They aren’t willing to leave well enough alone.  Because of their ambition and their need to “win” or “be right,” they pit themselves against God.

And here’s the scary thing.  In the short term, they win.  In the beginning, it looks like they win the day.  Human ambition always does this.  We think we win when we get our own way.  But quite often what we have to realize is that when we win from an ambition perspective we actually lose.  When we pursue our own goals and our own agenda – we are ultimately going to pit ourselves against God and His will.  That’s precisely what these native people are doing in this chapter.

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Year 5, Day 41: Ezra 3

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Up

• Up: Up is the word we use for what we worship.  If we are following God’s will, God will occupy the Up position.  Our life, our identity, our mission, our family on mission is all derived from Up.  This is why God needs to be in our Up position.

It is easy to get a sense of the Up that was felt by the returning exiles coming out of Persia.  Ezra is a book that should naturally feel to us like a people starving for Up.  So how do we see that in Ezra 3?  It is most clear in that one of the first things that is built with respect to Jerusalem is the altar.  The people want a place to worship God.

I think that this is a difficult perspective for us to imagine.  Remember that these people were plucked from their homes about 70 years prior by the Babylonians.  (The people of Israel were plucked about 150 years prior to the people of Judah, too!)  They had gone several generations away from their homeland.  They had gone several generations away from their ability to offer sacrifice to the Lord.  They had god several generations without a proper worship time.  They had gone several generations without the assurance of the atonement that comes through the sacrifice.

Can you imagine?  Imagine going several generations without being able to worship.  Imagine going several generations without being able to hear about forgiveness with any kind of assurance.  Imagine a community where most of the religious people around you can’t even remember what worship looks like and feels like.

Can there be any wonder that the people built the altar first and worshipped God first?

I know I can take much from this chapter.  I can’t imagine going a day without seeing a church, much less going more than two weeks without being inside one.  I can’t imagine going several generations!  It is easy for me to take God – and my Up – for granted.  It is too easy to take God for granted.  I rejoice today that because we have Christ, I don’t have to go more than a few seconds without being reassured of God’s forgiveness and love.  Now that deserves the worship of God!

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Year 5, Day 40: Ezra 1 & 2

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: King

• King: This is the pinnacle of the Kingdom Triangle.  When we look towards God’s position in the universe, we acknowledge that He is an omnipotent king.  Authority comes from Him.  Power comes through His authority.  He is looking for representatives for His kingdom.

I was humbled as I read through my blog post from 3 years ago.  I was reminded of the fact that Ezra was written after the Jews are allowed to return to the land after 70 or so years in exile.  I wasn’t humbled by this fact; I was humbled by the nature of God that hangs over this fact like an umbrella.

You see, 70 or so years prior, Jeremiah the prophet watched his people dragged into exile.  He watched many of them die from starvation, disease, and the invading army.  He watched as the treasure of God was stolen away from the temple.  He watched, but more importantly God watched too.

I was reminded of this fact that I learned three years ago.  God saw His people go into exile.  God saw His people receive the consequences that were a long time in coming.  God saw His people get punished for a lesson that they refused to learn.  But God watched as the people He loved and all of their possessions were escorted away into a land that belonged to a foreign people.

And why?  How can God let this happen?  How can God sit back and watch as these horrible consequences come down upon His people?  He can watch because He is king.  He can watch because even though a nation is moved from Canaan to the Babylonian Empire they are still His people.  Even though the temple furnishings are escorted out of the temple and into the treasury of King Nebuchadnezzar God knows that he will get them back.  He is king.  You just can’t take anything out of His hand.

How can God watch?  Because from God’s perspective, nothing changes.  What’s His is His and always shall be His.  Sure, His people might be enduring the pain and suffering that they deserved.  But they are still His.  Even in captivity He is still king of the universe.

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Year 5, Day 39: Romans 16

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Competency

• In: This is the word we use to express our relationships with our spiritual family.  These are often the people who hold us spiritually accountable.  They are the ones to whom we typically go for discussion and discernment.  These are the ones with whom we learn to share leadership.  They are the ones with whom we become family on mission.

Do you ever wonder who Paul’s In was?  With Jesus, we know that His In was His disciples.  But what about Paul?

Sure, there was Barnabas who took him under his wing.  But they eventually split apart.  There’s Peter as far as other church leaders go, but we really don’t get the sense that Paul and Peter got along all that well.  There’s John Mark the Gospel writer, but they had a rough start to their relationship and likely only were able to patch it up towards the end.  And of course there is Timothy, Paul’s spiritual son, who is the closest thing that Paul has to family.  Of this list, probably only Timothy is In.

Then, of course, there are the people who traveled with Paul.  The aforementioned Timothy would be at the head of that list.  Of course there was Silas.  And Titus.  And Luke, of course.  We can’t forget Phoebe, who is likely the messenger who brought this letter to Rome from Paul.  And there are a few other people, too.

But what I love about Romans 16 is that it gives us some great insight into other people that Paul likely considered In – even though he didn’t travel with them.  At the top of this list is Prisca and Aquila.  This is a married couple that Paul met in Corinth and traveled to Ephesus with after being in Corinth.  Then there is Epaenetus, who likely converted in Ephesus and then took to the road with Prisca and Aquila much like Timothy took to Paul.  There is kinship in the disciple-making process.  Then we meet Andronicus and Junia, who were imprisoned with Paul.  I’m guessing that if Paul ended up in jail with them that it was about God!

These are Paul’s In.  They lived with him.  They lived like him. They followed the same God.  They had the same heart.  Their mission was the same: from God.

Romans 16 is Paul’s Family on Mission.

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Year 5, Day 38: Romans 15

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Competency

• Competency: Being able to accomplish what one is called to do.

Romans 15:18 is a powerful verse.  “For I will not venture to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me to bring the Gentiles to obedience.”  Now there is focus.  There is an agenda.  There is a man who understands God’s calling in his life and has the competency to accomplish it.

Imagine what this looked like in Paul’s life.  Everywhere that Paul goes he is looking for ways to speak about Christ and invite people into a relationship with Christ.  Everywhere Paul goes is an opportunity.  Every thought he has is directed to his ministry and his calling.  Again, that’s a comment upon the competency that Paul ahs within him.

Now, do get me wrong.  I’m sure Paul had good days and bad days.  I’m sure there were days that he kept focus more easily.  After all, non e of us are able to be perfect.  But Paul sets a high standard.

I have to ask if that is the standard that I set for myself.  Sure, I don’t attain that standard every day.  But is it even the standard to which I try and attain?  Do I live my life so that I may boast only about what Christ has accomplished through me to bring the Gospel to others?  If I want to be competent in Christ, that’s a great place to begin.

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Year 5, Day 37: Romans 14

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Authority

• Authority: Our calling.  This comes from God as king.  Because He calls us as His representatives, He gives us authority to go and do His will.

I often feel like Christianity takes on a synonymous meaning as conformity.  That is, it is easy to feel as if in order to follow Jesus I have to do what everyone else is doing.  Or, perhaps more correctly, that if I’m not doing what every other Christian is doing and if I’m not feeling what every other Christian is feeling then I must be wrong.

This is horrible thinking.

After all, would we call Jesus a conformist?  Was Paul a conformist to either Judaism or early Christianity?  I don’t think so.  Jesus and Paul were mavericks, willing to do what the Father asked of them even if it was out-of-the-box new and extraordinary.

You see, this is ultimately a question of authority.  If God asks me to do something that serves Christ, then what right does any human have to tell me to not obey God?  What right does any human have to tell me that being obedient to God in different mannerisms than they have is wrong?  Do I get my authority from the people around me or do I get my authority from the King of the universe?

Now, don’t get me wrong.  We need to remember that Paul isn’t giving us authority to do anything we want.  We should not cause a brother or sister in Christ to sin.  We should not go that far.  But neither should we let the authority of other human beings damper the authority that comes to us from God.

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Year 5, Day 36: Romans 13

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Father

• Father: This is the pinnacle of the Covenant Triangle.  God is the Father.  He is the creator.  He is love.  Our relationship with the Father is rooted in His love for us.  We get our identity through Him.  When the Father is in our life, obedience becomes clear.

As I was reading through my blog post from three years ago on Romans 13, I came across a very humbling thought.  This thought humbled me 3 years ago, too.  I am so fallen that I need help loving a perfect God.  I can’t even love a perfect God on my own!

Now, I don’t say that to be depressing.  There is no point beating myself up for that fact.  It’s reality.  It’s a sad reality.  But it is a reality that God already knows, understands, and accepts.  It is a reality that He accepts and still comes to me so that I can love Him in spite of my failings.

This leads me to Romans 13.  I need God to be my Father.  I need God to be my Father so that I can submit to Him.  I need God to be my Father so I can learn to submit to Him and live like Him.  I need God to be my Father so I can learn to submit to Him and live like Him and not partake in the sinfulness of the world around me.

That’s precisely what the second half of Romans 13 is all about.  Because God comes to us and we are in a relationship with Him we can know love and we can live apart from sin.  It all starts with Him.  It all starts with the Father and His relationship with us.

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Year 5, Day 35: Romans 12

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus:

• Identity: Our true identity comes from the Father.  Only when our identity comes from God can we be obedient in ways that satisfy our person to our core.
• Obedience: Genuine and satisfying obedience comes out of our identity.  Our true identity comes only from our Father.

What an incredible chapter!  I think this is one of the most challenging chapters in the Bible, yet I think this is also one of the chapters in the Bible where I feel the most at home.  Reading this chapter is like cuddling up in a favorite blanket in a safe place for me.

Look at the challenge put forth in this chapter.  It screams identity at us in the beginning.  “Do not be conformed to this world.”  “Be transformed.”  God wants us to be challenged into a new identity.  God isn’t interested in a Christianized version of my sinful self.  God is interested in a godly version of me.  He doesn’t want “me with a Christian spin.”  He wants a person who is casting of himself and genuinely following Him with my whole heart.  He wants my identity to be fully vested in Him.

Look where Paul then takes this at the end of the chapter.  Paul tells us what a Christian looks like.  The list is rather challenging.  Be patient in tribulation.  Contribute to the needs of the saints.  Seek to show hospitality.  Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them.  Live in harmony with one another.  Do not be haughty.  Associate with the lowly.  Never be wise in your own sight.  Repay no one evil for evil.  Live peaceably with all.  Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God.  If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink.  Overcome evil with good.

Do you hear the challenge of those concluding verses of Romans 12?  They are all about obedience.  God is saying to us through Paul that if we are actually going to be transformed then we need to be obedient to what He is doing within us.  We should be living as He leads – if in fact He is truly leading us.  It is difficult to be a Christian in the world around us.  But if our identity rests in God, then our obedience to God will come out in our life as well.

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Year 5, Day 34: Romans 11

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus:

• Identity: Our true identity comes from the Father.  Only when our identity comes from God can we be obedient in ways that satisfy our person to our core.

Identity is a funny thing, isn’t it?  In fact, identity can really get us into trouble when it gets misplaced.  If I identify with the wrong things, my behavior can change to produce a poor result.  If my identity is coming from things that are unhealthy, I will have rhythms and patterns in my life that are equally unhealthy.

That’s actually what Paul is talking about here in this passage with respect to the Jews.  Some of them were getting their identity not from God but from their lineage.  They believed that because they were the offspring of Abraham that they could do no wrong and God would be forced into loving them simple because of their genealogy.  They weren’t getting their identity from God, they were preventing relationship with God by focusing on the wrong thing!

The same thing can be true with Christians.  It is easy for us to judge other people or other denominational practices.  It is easy for us to focus on the wrong things – things like the instruments we play, the format of the service, or the version of the Bible that we read.  It is easy for us even to look down upon the Jews because we at least acknowledge Christ!  But there’s a problem in that.  If a loving God who looked down upon sinners like us wants to be in a relationship with God, could we be so judgmental if our identity was really coming from Him?

No, in the end we have to take this identity question seriously.  If our identity is coming from God, we will be obedient to His ways, of course.  But if our identity is coming from Him then we will not feel the need to judge others and look down upon them.  If our identity is coming from God then we will be humbled by our salvation and look upon others in love rather than judgment and condemnation.

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Year 5, Day 33: Romans 10

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus:Prophet

• Prophet: A prophet is one of the fivefold ministry categories that is used throughout the Bible and especially lifted up in Ephesians 4:11.  The prophet is primarily concerned with whether or not the people are hearing the voice of God.  The prophet is also concerned about whether or not the people are responding to God’s voice.

Paul opens this chapter talking about why people reject God – even people who claim to be in God’s family!  But I really like where Paul takes this logic in the end.  While the opening is about why people reject God, the conclusion of this chapter is that we need to preach even harder.  People need to hear God’s truth in their life.  That’s where the prophet comes into play.

How will people repent if they don’t hear truth?  How will people be able to hear truth if we don’t go to them?  How will we ever go to them unless we understand the importance of their need?  We need to value the truth-speakers – the prophets – in our life.  They are the ones who tell us the hard message when we need to hear it.  The prophets are the ones who tell it like it needs to be told when it needs to be told.

There is another reason why we need to value the prophets.  As Paul confesses at the end of this passage, not everyone will listen.  In fact, I’m willing to bet in reality it is more like “few will listen.”  The job of a prophet is not easy and it is often thankless and often feels fruitless.  But God knows what this feels like.  After all, as Paul quotes from Isaiah, “All day long I have held out my hands to a rebellious and disobedient people.”

Value your truth-speaker in your life.  How beautiful are the feet who bring words from God into your life!

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Year 5, Day 32: Romans 9

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Invitation

• Invitation: God is always inviting us into relationship with Him. He desires that we know Him and that we know His desire for us.
• Challenge: God does not merely wish us to be in relationship with Him as we are.  He challenges us to grow, stretch, and transform as we take on the mantle of being His representatives to this world.

The path to salvation always begins in invitation.  That’s largely what we spoke about yesterday.  God calls us to be righteous.  God calls us to follow Him.  God calls us to know His Spirit.  All of those things are true, and all of those things fall under the greater umbrella of invitation.

God invites to be in a relationship with Him.  He doesn’t tell us that we are not worthy.  Rather, He accepts that we are not worthy and then brings the invitation.  He recognizes our weakness and our struggle.  And He invites us anyway.  This is why salvation is by God’s grace and not by our works.  That's why both Jew and Gentile can have a place in God!

However, We must also realize that challenge follows invitation.  While God recognizes our depravity and our inability to be in relationship with Him, He doesn’t want us to stay there!  He wants us to be children of the promise, not children of the Law!  God promises that if we turn to Him and if we seek Him that we shall find Him.  He also promises us that the reward is great for those who sacrifice their own agendas in order to follow Him.

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Year 5, Day 31: Romans 8

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Calling

• Calling asks whether or not God has called the person to the particular work at this point in their life.

I’m going to go a bit outside of the tradition perspective on calling today.  Normally we talk about calling with respect to a particular task or work.  But today I want to talk about calling with respect to grace in general.  Before we can ever get to what God is calling me to do, I really need to understand that God is calling me to Him in the first place.

This is such an important point to remember.  Yes, God calls us to do certain things in our life.  But God’s ultimate calling is to approach Him.  God’s ultimate calling is to have us get our identity in Him.  God’s ultimate calling is for us to take a position where we submit to Him as king, thus giving up our own personal agendas.

God calls us out of our sinfulness.  The only reason we can be righteous at all is because He calls us to be righteous and paved the way for us to be righteous with the blood of His own Son.  The only reason we can be righteous is because He has called us to receive His Spirit.  Everything we do for God and in God’s name starts here.  It all starts with the call of God beckoning us to be righteous.

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Year 5, Day 30: Romans 7

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Guidance

• Guidance: God grants us His guidance.  Sometimes this guidance is God leading us away from temptation.  Sometimes this guidance is helping us to follow in a direction for which He has chosen.  Our default position should be to wait for God’s guidance and then follow when it comes.

I think that this is an interesting chapter with which we can deal with the topic of guidance.  After all, in this chapter Paul tells us that the Law is unnecessary for the person who is in Christ.  Yet on the other hand, the Law is righteous.  So what is the real truth of the Law?

Here’s Paul’s point.  When we are obeying God, we are walking in God’s ways.  We are receiving and listening to the Holy Spirit within us.  We are being guided by God and following Him.  In this situation, things are working out well as our relationship with God is fruitful and meaningful.

However, this is not the only possibility.  We are all sinful.  We all follow the passions of our own hearts.  As we turn to our own passion, we need guidance to turn back to God.  The Law reminds us of our sinfulness.  The Law reminds us of how to obey God.  The Law helps to put us back on the right path and remind us of our need for Jesus Christ.

So we can see that God has richly set His guidance before us.  We have His Holy Spirit to follow.  But when we do not desire to follow the Spirit, we have the Law to remind us that we have instead chosen to follow the desires of our own heart.  In either case, God has lavished us with opportunities for guidance.

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Year 5, Day 29: Romans 6

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: King

• King: This is the pinnacle of the Kingdom Triangle.  When we look towards God’s position in the universe, we acknowledge that He is an omnipotent king.  Authority comes from Him.  Power comes through His authority.  He is looking for representatives for His kingdom.

I had a hard time choosing the topic today.  Not because I didn’t know where to go but because I saw three options.*  Ultimately, I settled on the idea of King.  Let’s look at what Paul is saying in Romans 6 about how we relate to God as King.

Paul makes it really clear in this passage that we are not free.  We submit to something in our life.  The question is, to whom or to what do we submit?  Do I submit to the perspective of the world?  Do I submit to the value systems of the culture around me?  Or do I submit to God as king over my life, giving Him the sovereignty to rule over my life as I follow Him and His ways?

Paul makes it very clear in verse 16 that we are slaves.  We are either slaves to righteousness or slaves to sin.  I am either submitting to the world and its empty promises or I am submitting to the one true king.  I think it is important to make this distinction clearly, because it is really easy to say one thing but live the lifestyle of the other.  I think it is important to stop and pause and make sure that I am living as if God is king over my life.

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* The three options I was choosing between were:

1. King: Who am I submitting to, God or some other power in my life?
2. Obedience: Am I truly willing to be obedient – which as Paul says leads to righteousness?  Or do I talk a good talk but I am really not obedient to God but rather obedient to my own will?
3. Identity: What is my identity?  Do I consider myself a person who is free to do whatever they want and be whatever I want to be?  Or is my identity coming from God as I submit to Him as His slave in righteousness?

Year 5, Day 28: Romans 5

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Forgiveness

• Forgiveness: Forgiveness is when our sins are absolved by God.  We do not deserve this forgiveness, but God grants it to us anyway.  We cannot earn forgiveness, but God gives it to us anyway.  As we are forgiven by God, He also asks us to forgive others.  In fact, Jesus Himself teaches us to pray for our forgiveness in the Lord’s Prayer when He says, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.”

I cannot help but to read this chapter and think about forgiveness.  For me, there is such a profound depth of forgiveness when Paul says: just as sin came into the world through the trespass of one man, so through one man God’s grace came into the world.  We’re all sinful.  It was a part of Adam; it’s a part of us.  God didn’t have to save us.

But God did.  God sent His Son to deal with our problem.  God forgave us so that we could be in relationship with Him.  We deserve nothing; He gives us everything.  We should be condemned; in Him we find life.

That’s forgiveness.  That’s grace, love, and mercy.  That’s the God that I serve.

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Year 5, Day 27: Romans 4

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Calling

• Calling asks whether or not God has called the person to the particular work at this point in their life.

Today I’m going to continue the trend of looking at a very deep theological passage from a slightly different perspective.  In Romans 4 Paul does the vast majority of his theological work on salvation by grace rather than salvation by works.  It is in this chapter that we understand that righteousness is credited to us by God’s grace rather than due to us by God because of our work.  God allows us to be counted as righteous before we can ever do anything to earn it.

But let’s take a step back.  God calls us into righteousness.  God wants us to come to Him.  He wants us to find Him.  He wants us to know grace rather than wrath.  The reason He extends grace first is because He desires it for us in our life.

Regardless of whatever else God may be calling you into, know that God is calling you into righteousness first and foremost.  Before God wants you to do anything else He wants you to know His grace.  Before He sets any other plan before you He wants you to be wrapped in righteousness.  Righteousness is so much more than a state of existence.  It is a calling.

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Year 5, Day 26: Romans 3

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Discipleship Focus: Provision

• Provision: God gives us what we truly need.  God knows our needs better than we can know them.  We learn to trust God to provide for us.

As I look at the idea of provision, I get it.  Everything good comes from God.  The food that I eat comes from God.  The house over my head comes from God.  The job that I have has come directly from the hand of God.  Everything I have is a direct result of God’s provision for me in my life.

However, I think sometimes we get so caught up in the provision of worldly stuff that we forget where provision begins.  Paul tells us that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.  Paul tells us that nobody is righteous.  He tells us that nobody understands.  He tells us that nobody seeks God under their own power.  The truth is that left to ourselves, we all deserve condemnation.

But in the face of that verdict God provided an answer.  God sent His Son to die for our sake.  God sent His Son as a sacrifice that I couldn’t make.  That’s where God’s provision truly began.  God’s plan of salvation was Jesus Christ all along.  Without the foundation of Christ, I wouldn’t even be able to see God’s provision in other things.

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