Is God good? How good is God?
Is God mighty? How mighty is God?
If it doesn't sound too good to be true then it's probably not the Gospel.
But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. 1Cor1:27
Yet we still try to understand the love of God with a contrary way of thinking, and then we reject the truth when it sounds too good to be true.
The Israelite's complained about the old covenant being too difficult to keep, and now we don't fully accept the new covenant because it just sounds too good to be true, so we form a mixture of the two.
Neither do people pour new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the skins will burst; the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved." Matthew 9:17
Here we see that we cannot balance the old and new covenant. The new covenant is the fulfilment of the old. Either you live by all six hundred and something laws, or you live by grace.
To live under the law:
For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it. James 2:10
All who sin apart from the law will also perish apart from the law, and all who sin under the law will be judged by the law. Rom 2:12
Or, to live by grace:
God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. 2 Cor 5:21
Consequently, just as one trespass resulted in condemnation for all people, so also one righteous act resulted in justification and life for all people. 19For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one Man the many will be made righteous. Rom 5:18-19
If at this point you are hearing "you are now free to sin" then you probably need to repent of your lack of faith in "the obedience of the one Man" Jesus Christ, because when He died, He died to sin, but we weren't left as forgiven sinners, but we became new creations! New minds! New hearts! New life!
1What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? 2By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? 3Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. Romans 6:1-4
You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness. Rom 6:18
Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as He is, so are we in this world. 1 John 4:17
The only thing that Jesus asks us to give up when we receive Him, is who we never were. We were created in His image. We are His workmanship created for good works. Eph 2:10
The reason why I struggled to accept and receive the grace of Jesus Christ, was effectively because I didn't trust Him. It all comes down to us not fully trusting in the finished work us the cross, in that He has made us righteous, by grace alone. If we have His mind, if we are as Christ was, if we bear His Spirit, if we are His children, then we truly are slave to righteousness! Sin is not apart of our new nature. It is dead! Nailed to the cross!
I share this truth openly because I have found this to be more real, more true, more freeing, and I am seeing more lives receive Jesus and His healing around me than ever before with any other revelation that is contrary to the revelation that Jesus did it all for us and that we have been made new!!! It is my passion to share this with others, as it is for freedom that we have been set free, and if believers are not living in freedom, this is not God's intention, but merely a poor understanding of God's intention and of the effect of the cross.
As a man thinks, so is he. Prov 23:7 If you believe yourself to be a sinner, then you should be content when you sin, because you are only true to your belief.
It is good news! It is for freedom that we have been set free! Stay in His love! Stay in His Peace, Stay in His joy! Stay in His abounding grace!
