Posted on 01/11/2022 7:45:34 AM PST by metmom
God is undivided. He’s not split in any way. He’s altogether lovely, pure and loving. There is only one God, and this God is one in fullness and perfection. He’s totally unified with all things that are holiness.
We were by God created to be holy, to be loving, to be one, as Peter writes in the New Testament. “Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, since it is written, ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy.’” (1 Peter 1:13-16, ESV).
Ideally, you act loving, and you are loving; the actions show that you are whole and holy. However, there’s this really big problem called the flesh. The Bible says the spirit and the flesh are at war with one another.
We are all divided. There’s a psychological condition called schizophrenia, and I think all of us have a touch of that ailment in God’s understanding. There are many splits in our personality.
If you ask my wife, “Is Kevin loving?” she would say, “Yes.” If you ask her, “All the time?” she couldn’t say yes because she’d be lying. I’m not loving all the time, even though I wish I could be. The reason I feel that way is because God is one, and in his oneness he is holy. When I’m not being holy, I’m not being the way I was meant to be as a person made in God’s image, and I’m out of synchronization with God. That’s why people who don’t even know God feel bad when they do something wrong, because they weren’t created to act divided that way.
Fortunately, we have hope that our spiritual schizophrenia can be healed. “But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do” (Galatians 5:16-17). The Spirit can start fixing those divisions in us and make us holy!
The Return ping
Law and Gospel.
Right-hand of God and Left-hand of God.
Righteousness before God is a free gift from God.
Ephesians 2:8-10
This devotion is missing much.
Intersting devo. Thanks for posting.
I'm currently teaching a Bible Class on Leviticus. And I recognized right away that passage from 1 Peter is a quote From Leviticus. At least 10 times in Leviticus God commands us to "Be Holy."
Being holy is THE theme of Leviticus. The word being used over 90 times.
And just HOW does one become holy? God does it. God makes you holy.
20:8, 21:8, 22:9, 16 and 32.
Leviticus is such a cool book.
The sole purpose of our lives is to,be comformed to,the image of Christ, which is primarily the responsibility of the holy spirit, although he needs our cooperation to work in our lives. Even the most trivial of sins, which we commit each day, work to poison our relationship with God little by little, and we happily allow it, thinking it’s no big deal, perhaps because we don’t see it or refuse to acknowledge it as a direct flat out rebellion against God.
THANKFULYY God will lift away, as he has covered our sins completely. For our part, we “should” strive to allow the Holy,Spirit to get to work on the little sins we think little of throughout each day, to ask for help to see them, to ask for help to acknowledge them as direct rebellion, and to ask for help to overcome them as we learn little by little to submit the Holy Spirit. This however is a,lifelong process of development and growth, each person uniquely in their own level of growth
Folks think of sin as “liberty and freedom” but nothing could die further from the truth, it is bondage to the lower desires that inhabit each of our nature’s. But the more we learn to reach out for forgiveness for our rebellion, for failing to live up to the fsct that we were created to be comformed to,the image of Christ, the more we find true freedom that isn’t plagued by a conscience that grills us about our sins relentlessly, unless we have sunk so far as to sear our consciences altogether.
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