The Grace to Live by Faith
Jesus calls us to live by faith - but we really can not do that unless He helps us. I must rely on His help for me to live by faith.
When you look at a piece of artwork by an Impressionist painter up-close, you will see the brush-strokes and movement of the color, and in that proximity, the image looks like a mess. It is only when you step away from the painting does the masterpiece seems to arise.
When a person "Lives by Faith" things can often look like a mess, but the cross of Christ provides us the grace to see the image of God arises in each of us.
We can get so inundated with the details of our own life we loose sight of what is going on around us...we loose sight of what God may want to do in us.
If you are like me - I can find it quite easy to justify myself. No one knows me better than me.
17 "If, while we seek to be justified in Christ, it becomes evident that we ourselves are sinners
When I come to Jesus - I look to him to make me right. I look at myself in comparison to Jesus - I realize how short I fall.
Like it says - "it becomes evident that we ourselves are sinners"
For many - that is where they get off the bus. We blame the church, the pastor, someone else for making them feel bad about themselves, and they try to manage their life as best they can - on their own.
18 If I rebuild what I destroyed, I prove that I am a lawbreaker.
Even when I try to manage my own mess, the messes in my life that I make, even then I prove to myself that I am a mess maker
When I try to fix my own problems - even then I prove to myself - and also to others - I am a sinner - I cant win - if I try to play chess with God - I will end up in checkmate everytime.
When I am ready and willing to admit "I cant really do this" then I am truly in a position to reach out and find God's grace
Be Honest with yourself
19 For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God.
I have to be willing to give myself up - give in.
When I was younger, I liked to wrestle with my dad, and invariably I would end up in some position where I could not move. I would squirm and writhe around, sometime when I was small I would start to cry and my mom or other ladies around would get on to my dad or uncle or gradfather - "Let him up"
Not until he cries "Uncle"
Eventually I would give in - when I was honest with myself that I was not, could not win and was willing to admit that
That is an important lesson in life.
The Truth is: - As a follower of Jesus and one called to live by faith
Faith demands trust - I am trusting in someone or something else greater, stronger, more stable, richer, better than me.
This means I am willing to be honest with myself that I need Jesus
And I am willing to ‘give in' choose to ‘give up',
20 I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
I have been crucified with Christ...
Jesus died for my sin - he willingly made a choice, he obeyed his father - and by faith went to the cross
Luke 22:42 "Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done."
To truly experience God's grace - I must be willing to give something up - that something is me. My own sense of doing it on my own, cleaning up my own messes, going into mess management.
I willingly lay down my own life - that sounds noble, and I still live,
I still get up every morning, I kiss my wife, I get the kids around, I go to work, I do things, talk to people, come home, eat dinner, pay bills, watch the news, go to bed and start it all over again.
In the course of all that, I make messes in my life and in the lives of others. I sin. Sometimes I do what God tells me to do and sometimes I don't. sometimes I lie and sometimes I don't. sometimes I promote myself and sometimes I don't. sometimes Christ's presence in my life is real and present and sometimes I push him back into some corner and ignore him all together.
To bring him out of the corner I must be willing to step aside and willingly chose to let him take over and trust him that He will really bring good into my life.
To let Christ live in me
1 Cor 6:19 Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; 20 you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body.
My life - my body is God's - His temple, I belong to him and I give myself to him.
My ego is no longer central. It is no longer important that I appear righteous before you or have your good opinion, and I am no longer driven to impress God. Christ lives in me.
The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
I give myself to Him - I receive Him into my life
I give him me and get him -
Now I live realizing that it is truly God's grace that allows me to live by faith.
Like helping a child learn how to walk - sometimes it takes a long time. They may not want to do it, but it is the grace of the parents and others who encourage them, challenge them, help, hold, let them cry and loves them all the way.
It is God's grace that helps us, holds us, challenges us, sometimes lets us cry, but He loves us all the way because He knows we are learning - like a child - what it is to live by faith, learning to trust new legs in new ways that used to let us crawl but now we are learning to walk and He knows that soon we will want to run.