Quit Torturing Yourself!

Yesterday, for the first time 3 people came from the church at my house. SO, we were four total. No, it was not something planned by the church, but something we have planned because we want to grow together in Jesus and also we want to pray together for the issues going on in this world like islam rising up, our children, marriages, and ourselves.

It was really good. We talked about how sometimes we try so hard to live by the Old Covenant(OC) laws and the new. We cannot do both. Hebrews says that the OC is almost perishing. Now, there is a purpose for us to have it. It is our history, but Jesus showed up and now we live by grace.

I am really irritated with people that believe grace is to sin now because you are forgiven. I am also irritated with a teaching that says we should ignore grace out of fear of not being like the previous people.

We have it all wrong. I struggled with this for years and finally about a month ago God gave me an answer. Grace is not freedom to sin and grace is not only for salvation.

See, under the OC people were considered righteous based on their good actions. God gave the Law exactly becuase the people could not handle being free when HE brought them out of Egypt. God wanted to teach them all to just hear His voice, like Moses did. But they told Moses to hear God for them...

So, God gave them laws to show the ridiculousness of them trying in their own strength to fulfill them. And they struggled. I admire those who actually made it to Heaven under that covenant. But even they sinned. They couldnt keep the laws and that is why they had to bring sacrifices for their sins.

Finally after years like that, Jesus came and said, " Enough! You cannot keep the laws, but I can. So I will come and do it and those who believe in Me and die to themselves and let Me live through them will be able to keep it". Now we need to be careful of something. People think that there is a little bit of our flesh and a little bit of Jesus that COEXIST and walk in righteousness. In Romans Paul mentions many times that we need to RECKON ourselves dead to ourselves and alive to Christ. God never says we can change, or we can improve on ourselves, or we can do better. Have we succeeded? If we can do better than why did He come? He came exactly becuase we cannot. What we are supposed to do is not better the flesh(because the flesh cannot be improved on), but die to it. That is what Paul says. The flesh needs to die because it is no good. Now what is the flesh? It is everything that you try with your own strength to prove God how good you are and every wicked intention in your heart.

Paul even says that when we came to Christ we already died. Some people keep praying, " Help me die Lord". That is not biblical. The Bible says that you are already dead. And Paul says to reckon. You do not need to keep dying because you already are. You just need to reckon( or to acknowledge).
So what does it mean to live by grace? It means that since you are dead, now you are just the suit. And Jesus gets into your suit and now He makes the moves, the actions, He says the words that need to be sad...because you are dead. Your head has His mind now. So, if he is inside and He makes the moves, then would He make anything sinful, would He act sinful? Of course not! That is why Paul says that Christ is not a servant of sin, meaning He doesn't serve sin. He doesn't sin. So, when people look at you and me if we are really dead and Christ is inside, they will see His actions, not yours. Yeah, it look like you, but you are just the suit. He is directing you actions. This is not hard to understand.

So, that is why John in 1 John says that those who still sin, they never really got it . It means they never really died or reckon themselves dead to themselves. It is still them. They havent given their body to Christ as a suit. So, if you see someone living in sin ans they say they are a Christian, you know that Christ is not using them as His suit and He is not really living THROUGH them. They are still living.

Now, we all still let the flesh sometimes come out and not let Christ live, but that is because we fail to reckon that we are dead. We have no more right to act. Christ is. Now, one thing God doesn't take away is our personality. It doesn't mean we do not exist at all. It's just that our mind was overtaken by His, our heart melted with His....it is like you cannot tell the one from the other because we are ONE with Him. God uses our personality to express Himself.

Just like when a factory makes suits.They have different types that serve special purposes. So it is with us. I am made a certain way by God, a certain suit, so He can fulfill something through me that He wants fulfilled. Then you are created different so that still HE can achieve something else. Our personality is not gone, but it became His.

So, grace is God saying, you cannot do it, die! And let me do it. I am not requiring anymore that you will act, just die, lend me your suit, and I will do it through you. That is grace: you are not required to live by your action like under the OC. You give Jesus your body, your mond, your life, your spirit, your soul, and He CAN live the life you on your own cannot. He can fulfill the Law again and again because He has before. Grace is God comign down and doing things you could not do but using your body. God is Spirit and a spirit needs a body to express himself. That is why evil spirits or demons posess bodies because they need a body to express themselves. That is why Paul says in Ephesians 6 that we do not wrestle against flesh and blood or against people, but against spirits that are in them.

The Holy Spirit needs a body to express Himself. We are those bodies He uses.

So, it is not about keeping the laws, its about letting Him to use our bodies to keep these laws. He can.