Thursday, October 10, 2013

Grace - Christ in You

From The Saving Life of Christ, Major W. Ian Thomas, pp. 18-19

"How much...can Jesus Christ do through you and through me?  Everything!  He is limited only by the measure of our availability to all that he makes available to us, for 'in Him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.  And Ye are complete in Him' (Col. 2:9-10a).  What then is the faith that releases divine action?  How may you be saved by His life, as you have already claimed to be redeemed by His death?  This is the critical question of Christian experience, and the answer is simple--'The just shall live by faith' (Romans 1:17c)

Faith in all its sheer simplicity!  Faith that takes God precisely at His Word!  Faith that simply says, 'Thank You'.

If you are to know the fullness of life in Christ, you are to appropriate the efficacy of what he is as you have already appropriated the efficacy of what He has done  Relate everything, moment by moment as it arises, to the adequacy of what He is in you, and assume that His adequacy will be operative; and on this basis in 1 Thessalonians 5:16 you are exhorted to 'rejoice evermore!'  You are to be incorrigibly cheerful, for you have solid grounds upon which to rejoice!

Again, 'Pray without ceasing' (1 Thess. 5:17), and here the word 'pray' does not mean to beg or to plead as if God were unwilling to give--but simply to expose by faith every situation as it arises, to the all-sufficiency of the One who indwells you by His life.  Can any situation possibly arise, in any circumstances, for which He is not adequate?  Any pressure, promise, problem, responsibility, or temptation for which the Lord Jesus Himself is not adequate?  If He be truly God, there cannot be a single one!
...the office of the Holy Spirit is to make known to you, and to make experiential to you, all that Christ is in you."

Grace=Peace,


Jeremy

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