Tag: exhort

25.j. “Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, “Today, if you hear his voice,”

 

2 Corinthians 6:3  Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation. We put no obstacle in anyone’s way, so that no fault may be found with our ministry, but as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: by great endurance, in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger; by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, the Holy Spirit, genuine love; by truthful speech, and the power of God; with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left; through honor and dishonor, through slander and praise. We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold, we live; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing everything.

 Ezekiel 16:8    “When I passed by you again and saw you, behold, you were at the age for love, and I spread the corner of my garment over you and covered your nakedness; I made my vow to you and entered into a covenant with you, declares the Lord GOD, and you became mine.

 Luke 19:42-44    saying, “Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side  and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation.”

 Hebrews 3:7     Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, “Today, if you hear his voice,

 Hebrews 3:13   But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.

 Hebrews 4:7    again he appoints a certain day, “Today,” saying through David so long afterward, in the words already quoted, “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.”

  God has an acceptable time for us to work with His grace. God has a day of salvation that will not last forever. This is no time for Christian lives consumed with ease and comfort and self-focus. It is time to get busy for the Lord and to be workers together with Him.  What is it that keeps us from seeing, knowing, and doing the Work of God?  Is it trials? Is it ease and comfort? Are we deceived or influenced into believing He can’t or won’t use us?  Do we find excuse after excuse, time and time again?  I am not knowledgeable in the bible enough to be used by God.  I am too busy.  I am not good enough.  I am not brave enough.  I am not worthy enough.  The list is as long as the number of excuses we make that keeps us from making a commitment to listen and then obey.  Is the world influencing your ability to listen?  Does it steal time away from working for God? Does it deafen your ears to hear His leading and calls for action in your life?  

When we understand that our purpose in this life is to honor and glorify God in all we say, think, and do, it is then we will begin to understand His leading and calling and purpose and plans for our lives.  Today is the day.  Now is the moment. Right now.  Make an intentional choice to make God-honoring and God-glorifying the reason for all you say, think, and do.

19.v. “For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.”

Romans 18:18   For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.

 2 Corinthians 4:17-18  For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison,  as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

 Colossians 3:4  When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

 2 Thessalonians 1:7-12     and to grant relief to you who are afflicted as well as to us, when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels  in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.  They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might,  when he comes on that day to be glorified in his saints, and to be marveled at among all who have believed, because our testimony to you was believed.  To this end we always pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his calling and may fulfill every resolve for good and every work of faith by his power,  so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.

 2 Thessalonians 2:14   To this he called you through our gospel, so that you may obtain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.

 1 Peter 5:1    So I exhort the elders among you, as a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, as well as a partaker in the glory that is going to be reveale

 1 Peter 4:13    But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.

Paul was not ignorant or blind to the sufferings of human existence. Yet he still considered that the future glory far outweighed the present sufferings.  Without a heavenly hope, Paul considered the Christian life foolish and tragic. Yet in light of eternity, it is the wisest and best choice anyone can make. (Guzik) 

God has put this glory into the believer right now. In heaven, the glory will simply be revealed. “The glory will be revealed, not created. The implication is that it is already existent, but not apparent.” (Morris)  “Creation is not undergoing death pangs… but birth pangs.” (Morris)

It is in the waiting we currently find ourselves.  We wait for the Glory of Jesus Christ to be revealed and in this revealing we also.  Creation has waited since the beginning of time for this revealing to come.  Our wait is but for a moment.  Our wait is to be in the hope and assurance of this revealing Glory of Jesus Christ and our eternal lives with Him forever and ever.  Let us not get weighted down by trials, troubles, and the chaos of this life.  Keep your eyes on Jesus, look full into His wonderful face, and the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of His Glory and grace.