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Welcome to Examining Scripture.
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We seek to encourage believers in Jesus Christ to drink from the Word of Life.
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As God's revelation to mankind, we want to demystify the Bible and help you find what
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God has to say about the circumstances you are facing.
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We're not pastors or theologians.
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We're sinners just like you, who, by the grace of God, have come to saving faith in
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Jesus Christ.
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If we can thirst for Scripture, so can you.
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Hi, I'm your host Bob Redd, along with co-host Anne Burke.
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Thank you for joining us in another episode of Examining Scripture.
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Hello Anne, how are you doing today?
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I'm doing great Bob, how are you?
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I'm doing wonderful.
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By the time people hear this podcast, it will be just before Christmas and it's always
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a busy time.
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Certainly in most of our households.
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It can also be a time of great angst and it can be a time where people feel overwhelmed
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or they feel lonely, they miss loved ones, they're not with them, what have you.
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So certainly our hearts go out to all those who are preparing for Christmas.
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Our wish for you and our prayer for you is that we all stay focused on why we're celebrating
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this particular holiday, which is really to celebrate the Advent, the coming in the flesh
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of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
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So to all out there who are listening, welcome and a Merry Christmas in advance.
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This is our last podcast in the series.
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It's been a very long and wonderful walk.
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For those of you who are just joining us, this is the last in a podcast series we called
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Reform Theology.
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It is what we as believers in Jesus Christ believe in and this came out of the Reformation
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and we have the life of Reformers we touched on briefly in the first podcast, how they
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really didn't introduce a new belief system, a new theology far from it.
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What they really did is turned back to the first century.
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They turned back to Christ, this great and glorious God of ours who came and were about
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to celebrate in Christmas.
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They brought us all the way back to His coming in the flesh, to His ministry on this earth.
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And in the second, third, fourth and fifth podcasts, we talked about the four of the
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five solas.
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So it was Sola Scriptura, which is scripture alone, Sola Cristo, Christ alone, Sola Gratia,
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by Grace alone, Sola Fidei through Faith alone.
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And today we'll be looking at the fifth Sola, which is Sola De La Gloria, which is to the
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glory of God alone.
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Before we do that, Anne, why don't you recap last podcasts?
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My pleasure.
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So the last podcast was Faith Alone and there's so much that we could say about faith.
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It was hard to fit it all into one podcast and there was a lot that we didn't have time
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to say, but as I recall, the main points that we shared were that, number one, the most
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important thing is the object of our faith.
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Who or what are you putting your faith in?
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And for us as Christians, we put our faith in Jesus, Jesus alone, and that makes all
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the difference.
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And the other thing was we said that faith is the only part that we have in our salvation.
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It's not about our good intentions or our best wishes or even our good deeds.
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We don't work to earn our salvation.
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God has done the work.
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It was God who set the plan of redemption into motion.
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It was Jesus who went to the cross on our behalf to pay the price for our sin.
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He offers us the great gift of salvation.
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Our job is to accept it, to acknowledge that we can't do anything to save ourselves, to
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put our faith in the work that Christ did at the cross.
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So we confess with our mouths that Jesus is Lord and believe in our hearts that God is
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raising from the dead and we are saved.
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And so the moment we place our faith in Jesus for our salvation, our eternal life begins
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here on earth and our journey toward heaven starts.
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And while we acknowledge that there will likely be many trials and difficult times, possibly
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even some persecution, we know that we're not alone in those struggles.
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We have faith that Christ walks with us and His Holy Spirit in us enables us to overcome.
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Yeah, amen to that, right?
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So thank you for the recap.
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I think that was excellent.
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We turn now to the fifth and final, if you will, Sole Deo Gloria, that is to the glory
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of God alone.
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All that God has done is to His glory.
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But before we get too far down the road of talking about God's glory and maybe if you
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could give us the dictionary.com or the Webster dictionary version of glory, if you would.
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Sure.
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Well, Google this morning told me that glory is high renown or honor, won by notable achievements
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or magnificence or great beauty.
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And we know that God certainly is magnificent.
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I'm sure there are scriptures that will tell us more about God's glory, but that's what
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the world, so to speak, that's what the world would say.
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Yeah, it would.
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What in it?
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The question is, well, what does the Bible have to say about God's glory?
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The first thing to sort of step back before the creation of the world, God in His relationship,
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right?
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God is not one in essence, but is eternally existing in three persons, Father, Son, and
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Holy Spirit.
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And they were perfect in love.
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They were perfect in their glory.
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God created the heavens and the earth to manifest, that is to show His glory.
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At the center of that universe, He created a being man, and He created man in His own
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image.
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And He said to man, go and subdue the earth.
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One might say, go and take care of the earth.
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So we were commissioned at that point in time to do two things, to commune with God in the
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garden and to watch over His creation.
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Of course, in the garden, we had that perfect relationship with God, as it says, Adam and
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Eve walked in the cool of the day with God, but man sinned.
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And through one man's sin, as it says in Hebrews, all sinned.
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And so Adam and Eve were expelled from the garden and thus began the humankind's walk
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with sin.
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So as Adam's ancestors, the minute we're born, we're born into sin.
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As Adam's descendants.
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As Adam's descendants.
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I'm sorry, Paul writes in Romans 3.23, says, all have sinned and fall short of the glory
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of God.
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And it's this glory of God we want to address today.
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The first thing God requires of Himself because He is perfectly righteous is that He cannot
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look on sin.
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So the question becomes, how can a sinful man have a personal relationship with God if
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He's not righteous?
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God provided us the way.
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If you turn to 2 Corinthians 5:21, it says there that God made Him, this Him is Jesus
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Christ, who knew no sin to be sinned for us, so that through His righteousness we might
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have the righteousness of God.
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So the work of Christ on the cross is actually the way in which God provides for us and has
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provided for us as sinful man to be righteous.
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And so the work of Christ on the cross was to pay for our sin past, present, and future.
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The acceptance of that payment of debt was done by God the Father when He raised Jesus
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from the dead.
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Now, not that Jesus couldn't raise Himself, He could of course, but He allowed the Father
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to have that act of raising Him to show that the Father accepted Christ's payment on our
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behalf.
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In fact, in Philippians chapter 2, 5 through 11, it says, have this attitude in yourselves
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that was also in Christ Jesus, who was in essence God but did not regard equality with
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God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself by becoming a servant and taking the form
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of men.
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Having been found as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to death, even death on
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a cross.
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And it goes on to say, God highly exalted Him by giving Him the name which is above
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all other names, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth
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and under the earth, and that every creature confessed Jesus Christ's Lord to the glory
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of God.
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It is through Christ's work and God, the Father's acceptance of that work, that provides us a
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way through saving faith to come to a holy and righteous and glorious God.
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Anne, I think maybe a way to tie in all of this, and for those of you that have listened in
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on our podcast before, this might be a little departure.
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We have picked two chapters of Scripture that we feel really talks and addresses this whole
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idea of God's glory.
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And it's in 2 Corinthians chapter 3 and chapter 4.
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I think to make it more understanding, what we'll do is we'll have Anne read the paragraph,
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each paragraph, and then I'll provide a little commentary around what it is that the writer,
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in this case the writer is Paul by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, is writing to the church
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in Corinth.
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Second Corinthians chapter 3 verse 1.
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Are we beginning to commend ourselves again, or do we need, like some people, letters of
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recommendation to you or from you?
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You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everybody.
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You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with
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ink, but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of
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human hearts.
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Just a little quick background for those of you.
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So Paul is writing to the church at Corinth, and this is, it says 2 Corinthians, so it's
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conceivably a second letter, but there was another letter between 1 Corinthians and 2
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Corinthians, so this is actually his third letter.
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The Corinthian believers who Paul is writing to here were struggling.
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They were struggling first off with people in the church that were questioning Paul's
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authority, and in the times with which Paul is writing in the first century, many times
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people were bringing letters of commendation, or people requiring letters of commendation
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saying, hey, this person is legitimate, or if they weren't legitimate, they may create
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these letters and essentially so they're apostate or they're lying.
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The question was from the Corinthian church, what authority do you have, Paul?
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Paul is addressing that here by saying, we don't need letters.
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Our letter is during our ministry with you when we were in Corinth, you in coming to
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saving faith in Jesus Christ through our teaching and preaching to you, that you in fact are
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the letter, that you have come to saving faith in the true and living God in Christ Jesus.
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There's no need for any letter, man-made letter of commendation, because the letter is exhibited
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in the hearts of the true believer, who are you at Corinth that I'm writing to?
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That's a great commendation for the people in Corinth and testimony that lives are changed.
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God, when we're saved and we receive the Holy Spirit, he starts a transformation that
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people can tell, this is real.
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This is evidence that God is working in your life.
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Yeah, he's commending the Corinth people, isn't he, that you have a saving faith, we've witnessed
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it, and you should trust in it.
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Verse 4, such confidence as this is ours through Christ before God.
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Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence
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comes from God.
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He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the
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Spirit, for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.
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Yeah, so again, he's expanding on this idea, the new covenant, the new covenant versus the
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old covenant, and we'll cover that more detail later in this reading, but he's really talking
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about the Old Testament.
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The Old Testament was, people would say, the letter of the law.
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You've heard that expression before.
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The idea is you have to follow the letter of the law, and if you don't, you're breaking
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the law is the connotation here.
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But in the new covenant, with faith in Jesus Christ, by His grace, the new covenant, you
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are now covered in Christ's righteousness, like what we read in 2 Corinthians 5:21 earlier
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in this podcast.
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Paul is reminding them now when one comes to saving faith, we receive the Holy Spirit,
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the third person of the Triune God.
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Given that receiving of the Spirit within us, the Spirit Himself works within us to help
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us become more like Christ, to increase our righteousness, to be more Christ-like.
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Verse 7, Now if the ministry that brought death, which was engraved in letters on stone, came
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with glory, so that the Israelites could not look steadily at the face of Moses, because
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of its glory, fading though it was, will not the ministry of the Spirit be even more glorious?
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If the ministry that condemns men is glorious, how much more glorious is the ministry that
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brings righteousness?
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For what was glorious has no glory now in comparison with the surpassing glory, and
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if what was fading away came with glory, how much greater is the glory of that which lasts?
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So here, what Paul is talking about, the time that Moses and the Israelites were in the
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desert and specifically at Mount Sinai, and there are Mount Sinai's where God Himself
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gave the Ten Commandments to Moses to give to the people of Israel.
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The Ten Commandments were altogether glorious and righteous because they were from God,
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but the Ten Commandments were not something that man could possibly perfectly work out.
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And if one could perfectly work out the Ten Commandments, then they would be found righteous.
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Unfortunately, because we are sinners, it is impossible for us to meet God's holy requirement,
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which is found in the Ten Commandments.
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The whole purpose of the Ten Commandments was not to be something we could work out
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and claim as our own righteousness, self-righteousness, if you will, but they were God's righteousness,
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and the whole purpose of the Ten Commandments was to show that it was impossible for us to
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work within ourselves and work out God's perfect righteousness on our own accord.
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The reference there about Moses and his face fading as it was, Moses said to God
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on Mount Sinai, he wanted to see God, and God says, you can't do that, but what I will
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do is show you my glory.
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And so God put Moses in the clef of a rock and went past Moses the awesome, unbelievable
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glory of the Lord, shown on Moses' face that it actually transformed his face in such a
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way that he required a veil so that people, the Israelites, could not look on him directly.
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It was that imposing, that awesome God's glory for which he saw.
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Yeah, I remember that from the Old Testament also, that after Moses was in the present
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presence of God, his face was shining, reflecting the glory of God, right?
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And we too as Christians, we have Christ living in us, and our faces should also reflect his
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glory.
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It's our prayer, right?
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That when people look at us and watch us and watch our behaviors and actions, that they'll
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see something different that makes them say, oh, I'm noticing something, right?
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And they might not recognize it as the glory of Jesus, but we can testify to that if conversations
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ever start.
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But yeah, that's a good reminder that we as Christians reflect his glory.
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Right.
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How many times do we pray?
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You know, Lord, we pray that they see Christ's glory through us, right?
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That they don't see us, but they see Christ's glory in us.
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And that's actually, it's a great point, Anne in that that's actually what Paul was saying
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earlier in the letter that we just read about you, yourselves, Corinthians, are the letter.
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It is you who your behavior, your Christlikeness, the fact that people see that you're different
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as you put it, like you put that Anne.
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All right.
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Well, there's a little bit more about Moses here in the next section.
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Verse 12, therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold.
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We are not like Moses who would put a veil over his face to keep the Israelites from
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gazing at it while the radiance was fading away, but their minds were made dull.
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For to this day, the same veil remains when the Old Covenant is read.
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It has not been removed because only in Christ is it taken away.
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Even to this day, when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts.
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But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away.
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Now the Lord is the Spirit.
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And where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.
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And we who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory are being transformed into
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his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
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There is so much there.
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And I think that it's actually this particular part of Scripture when people talk about the
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Spirit of the Lord and where does it say that the Spirit is God?
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Anne just read in verse 17 and 18, Scripture unequivocally says that the Spirit is the Lord.
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And I love how it puts it where the Spirit of the Lord is.
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There is freedom or there is liberty.
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Yeah.
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So here Paul, in contrast, is talking about using this contrast of Moses' veiled face
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because he has seen the glory of the Lord and the glory of the Lord in Moses' face is
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being reflected.
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The talk here is about this Old Covenant.
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And when the people are reading the Old Covenant, they're hardened.
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What he's really saying there is to continue on the path of trying to meet God's standard,
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which is in the law, which is in the Ten Commandments, it's impossible to do.
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Think of it as degrees.
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If it says, I shall not commit adultery, what exactly is that?
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Is that the act itself?
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And of course, we're told in Matthew with Christ's Sermon on the Mount, chapter 5, that
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if you commit adultery in your heart, it's as if you had done the act.
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And so the point is, the Ten Commandment is impossible for man to work out and to achieve
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in and of themselves by their own works and by their own righteousness.
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It's impossible.
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What Christ talks about here is with us as believers, the veil is removed.
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And again, in the Sermon on the Mount and in chapter 5 of Matthew, Christ talks about
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believers.
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He's talking to believers, he's talking to his disciples, that they are the salt of
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the earth and they are the light of the world.
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What Christ says in the Sermon on the Mount there is, he says, well, salt, if it loses
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its saltiness, is no good.
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And he says that you don't put a basket over the lamp, that the lamp is meant to shine
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the light.
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This is the light of us as believers.
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And it's this, in the same way Paul talked about, we are the letter.
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It is our behavior Anne mention.
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It's who we are, it's how people look at us because we are ever seeking to be more Christ-like
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that they see, I think how you put it, Am, we're different.
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We should be.
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That's the goal anyway, right?
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Right, we seek to be.
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It's so important what is being said here in verse 17 and 18.
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And it says that us all with unveiled faces are beholding as the Lord, the glory of the
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Lord.
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That is scripture.
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We have this wonderful thing called the Bible.
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We behold this and the Bible, if I could put it succinctly, is God's revelation to mankind
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about himself.
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So everything we want and need to know about God is in scripture.
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And because we're made in God's image, we have a blueprint from God that says, because
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we're made in your image and because you've given us your word in scripture, the revelation
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of who you are, you've told us all that we need to know about how we ought to be in order
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to help bring you glory.
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So I love how it puts us in my translation.
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It says, being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the
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Lord the Spirit.
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What that's saying there, what Paul is saying to us, once we've come to saving faith in
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Jesus Christ, we then live the rest of our life ever seeking greater and greater righteousness.
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And so through scripture, through having a relationship, direct relationship with God,
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through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, we receive this Holy Spirit and it's the spirit
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within us, the spirit of God who, through scripture, who's helping us to discern and
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understand how we ought to live in God's economy.
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Right, and Romans 12-2 tells us, do not conform any longer to the pattern of the world, but
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be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
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And how do we transform and renew our minds by reading the scripture, by letting the spirit
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do his work in us, right?
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And as we are transformed more into his likeness, we will prayerfully be better reflections
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of his glory.
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I love that, and actually in 2 Corinthians 5:17 it says, if anyone is in Christ Jesus:
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they are a new creation.
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The old ways have passed, behold, new things have come.
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Yeah, and Paul tells us, I think, in other letters about taking off our old nature, putting
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away malice and anger and bitterness and putting on kindness and compassion.
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And he's telling us a new way to live, but it's sometimes hard to strip off all the
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old layers.
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And sometimes some things cling a little more closely, a little stronger hold on us than
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others.
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And as we continue to yield to the spirit, he will continue to work on those things that
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are getting in the way and blocking the light of his glory.
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As he continues to purify us, we can do a better job of showing the world the glory of
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God.
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Yeah, and back to verse 18, we are being transformed from glory to glory.
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So the glory that we receive at salvation when we first come to saving faith is undoubtedly
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wonderful and awesome, but the glory that we gain as we continue to live our life seeking
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to be more righteous the way I like to put it, if you want, from a negative standpoint,
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we're sinners.
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Until we leave to go to be with the Lord in eternity, we will still be sinners.
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Paul talks about that in Romans chapter 7, I do what I don't want to do and the things
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I want to do, I don't do.
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But the reality is, as believers in Jesus Christ, having come to saving faith, we sin
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less and when we sin it affects us more.
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We seek to be Christ-like, we cannot achieve it.
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And it's back to the proof of which is in the law, meaning we can never meet while we're
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in this impure world, in these impure bodies.
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We can never fully achieve the perfect righteousness of God that is called for in the glorious
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Ten Commandments in the law, but we have already achieved it when we come to saving faith ,in
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Jesus Christ because of his atoning sacrifice, the work on the cross where he paid the price
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of our sins past, present, and future.
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So when you say we'll never achieve perfection here because we still struggle with our sin
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nature, but that shouldn't discourage us.
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It says in Second Corinthians 4, the first verse, we don't lose heart because even though we're
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never going to be perfect here, God can still use us.
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God uses us in our brokenness and he can still work through us and through our lives to draw
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other people to him.
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Amen to that.
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So let's turn to chapter 4.
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Therefore, since through God's mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart.
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Rather, we have renounced secret and shameful ways, we do not use deception, nor do we distort
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the Word of God.
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On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly, we commend ourselves to every man's
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conscience in the sight of God.
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And even if our gospel is vailed, it is vailed to those who are perishing.
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The God of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers so that they cannot see the
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light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.
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For we do not preach ourselves, but Jesus Christ is Lord, and ourselves as your servants
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for Jesus' sake.
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For God, who said, let light shine out of darkness, made His light shine in our hearts
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to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.
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We're told here in the first part of chapter 4, things are hidden, and that's just the
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work of God.
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Having the Holy Spirit within us, having come to saving faith, having the Word of God, they
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work in unison for all of us who believe.
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And for you who do not believe, we recognize and the Bible tells us that it's discordant.
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It doesn't make sense.
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It doesn't reach you at the core of who you are.
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We understand that, and the Bible says that.
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These verses are saying, before you come to the Lord, you have blinders on.
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And in God's tining, He will open the eyes of people that are going to accept Him.
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And when they come to understand that they need Him and they accept Him as their Savior,
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our eyes are opened, and we can understand who Jesus is.
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We confess Him as Lord and ask for forgiveness and accept the gift of salvation.
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We receive the Holy Spirit who further enables us to understand Scripture.
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Even as a Christian, I've read a bunch of these Old Testament books more than once,
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and they didn't make sense to me until maybe the last time I read them, a verse finally
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clicked.
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Because as my relationship with the Lord is growing, the Spirit is teaching me more,
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I can understand a little bit better some things of the Lord, it's just part of the
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growing process that the first time we read a verse, we may not understand it.
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Some verses are easier than others, and they're not all mysterious.
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Some of them are very straightforward, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
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That's an easy one for everybody to understand, hard to accept, but easy to understand what
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the Scripture is saying.
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But to people that don't know Jesus when it says the gospel is veiled, God doesn't want
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that to be mysterious, but because of the God of this age, right, Satan is out there
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trying to keep people from understanding and accepting the Lord.
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Yeah, and whereas in the end of chapter 3, Paul is talking about how we ourselves are
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seeking greater righteousness in Christ, that we're seeking greater Christ likeness.
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Here in the beginning of chapter 4, it turns a bit and it talks about how having come to
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saving faith, having now become this light, we are to share.
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We don't preach ourselves, but we preach Jesus Christ as Lord.
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Having come to saving faith, the first thing we hope is that we are different and that
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we appear different.
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We appear as that light in a dark world, but that's not the end of our commission.
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That's the not the sole purpose.
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Having come to saving faith, we as believers, our eyes have been opened.
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We've become that new creation and we want others to have it.
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The second part of who we are as Christians is to share our faith.
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It's to share what Christ has done in our lives.
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And that's what this is saying here in the beginning of chapter 4.
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Yes, I understand that some people can feel as though we're proselytizing to you as a
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non-believer, but it's only the fact that it's coming out of our heart.
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Not only do we want to show that we're different, show that light coming through us as Christ
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in the way we are behaving in as much as we can behave well in this world, but we're also
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called to share the message of the gospel and what Christ has done for us.
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Verse 7, But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power
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is from God and not from us.
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We are hard-pressed on every side, but not crushed, perplexed, but not in despair, persecuted,
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but not abandoned, struck down, but not destroyed.
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We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may all
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also be revealed in our body.
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For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake so that his
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life may be revealed in our mortal body.
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So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you.
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Yeah, so this is a great little paragraph because really it's talking about us as while
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we're on this earth, we're in these imperfect clays of jars.
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It's our body, right?
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It's the fallen nature that we live with back to what Paul says in Romans chapter 7.
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The reality is the gospel, living in Christ's likeness, is not easy.
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There's not a prosperity gospel.
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Come to believe in Jesus Christ and all your cares will go away.
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Come to faith in Jesus Christ and all of a sudden you're going to be rich and life is
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going to be a joy.
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No, it's not that at all.
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The reality is that life is hard and life is hard whether you're a Christian or you're
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not and it's just the way of this world.
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So in spite of that, when we are in Christ Jesus, we understand our destiny in the physical
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body is death and yet our hope is in the eternity, eternal life with the true and living God
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in Christ Jesus.
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Yes, Jesus said, in this world you will have trouble but take heart for I have overcome
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the world and in Revelation there are great rewards promised to those who overcome and
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we can overcome in Jesus by the power of His Spirit.
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So yes, he didn't tell us it was going to be easy but it's going to be worth it.
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Yes, it will.
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Amen to that.
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Let's carry on.
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Verse 13, it is written, I believe therefore I've spoken with that same spirit of faith
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we also believe and therefore speak because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus
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from the dead will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you in His presence.
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All this is for your benefit so that the grace that is reaching more and more people may
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cause thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God.
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Yes, so again as believers in Jesus Christ when we come to saving faith we are bringing
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glory to God.
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The whole purpose of God's creation, the whole purpose of creating mankind in his image
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is to be able to worship and glorify God.
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We are here to be a part of and commune with and to have a relationship with the Almighty
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and glorious God and in doing so we bring glory to Him.
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We do so in our prayer.
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We do so in reading scripture.
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We do so in being able to sing and praise him for who he is, the holy and righteous
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and eternal God and it starts with believing through faith in the one who paid the price
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for our sins in Jesus Christ that we are glorifying God, the omniscient, ever present, all knowing
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God who is one in essence and eternally existing in three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
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So let's finish up the chapter, Anne.
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Okay, verse 16, therefore we do not lose heart, though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly
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we are being renewed day by day, for our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us
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an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.
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So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, for what is seen is temporary,
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but what is unseen is eternal.
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And that's the whole point of why we spend time sharing our faith with people who don't
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believe and it's also why we come together as believers in Jesus Christ to share our
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faith to help lift each other up.
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The fact is that we have, no one has to make a point or no one has to argue the fact that
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each and every one of us humans on this earth will one day die.
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That's a fact, it's a physical fact.
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The difference between believers in Jesus Christ and anybody who doesn't believe is
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we have this hope assured of eternity in the presence of the true and living and righteous
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altogether, holy and glorious God.
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Knowing that, we are compelled to share it, to live it out, and to make it known to those
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who don't have this hope of eternal life.
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00:38:25,760 --> 00:38:32,720
Anne, would you like to finish this up with reading from Revelation chapter 5?
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I think it sums up the role of us who have been brought into God's creation and what
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we will one day be doing eternally in heaven.
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00:38:45,960 --> 00:38:52,120
Yes, in John chapter 1 tells us that Jesus was there at the beginning at creation, He
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created all things and all things have life because of Him.
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And so in the book of Revelation, we see this amazing picture of Jesus as the Lamb of God
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and all of creation, every creature that He ever made giving Him glory.
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In verse 13 it says,Then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all that is in them, saying:
“To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb
be praise and honor and glory and power,
for ever and ever!”
The four living creatures said, “Amen,” and the elders fell down and worshiped.
Yeah, that's so wonderful.
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00:39:30,680 --> 00:39:37,400
And I think I'm always reminded of this great doxology that's at the end of the book of
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Jude.
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It says, Now do him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to make you stand in the
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presence of his glory with great joy, to the one God our Savior through Jesus Christ our
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Lord, be glory and majesty, dominion and authority, before all time, now and forevermore.
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00:39:58,840 --> 00:40:04,020
We hope you've enjoyed the podcast series here on Reformed Theology.
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00:40:04,020 --> 00:40:12,080
We hope that it's become clearer to you that the Reformers were not creating a theology
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of its own, this idea of Protestantism versus Catholicism.
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In reality, what they were doing is bringing us back to the first century, bringing us
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back to Christ.
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And that we have this all glorious and well-preserved Word of God, that is the written Word of God
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in Scripture to lead us and guide us, those who have come to saving faith.
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And it's also an important tool to demonstrate for those who don't believe that God is speaking
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to them as well, if only they'd open their heart.
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And the way to your open heart is through Christ Jesus, according to God's mercy, according
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to Christ's grace, and the way to saving faith is a true heart deep in your soul, coming
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00:41:04,040 --> 00:41:11,160
to faith in Jesus Christ, recognizing you can't do it on your own, that you have a need for
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a Savior and we have one, and that is Christ Jesus.
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00:41:15,520 --> 00:41:21,880
Coming to Him will make you a changed person, and that you can have a direct relationship
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with the awesome, Almighty God.
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And through that faith, what comes from that is a continual posture of praise and thanksgiving
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00:41:33,440 --> 00:41:40,200
and worship that is to His glory, and it certainly is to your good.
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00:41:40,200 --> 00:41:42,440
Anne, will you take us out in prayer?
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00:41:42,440 --> 00:41:43,440
Yes.
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Father God, we praise you for your goodness, for your greatness, for your love, for your
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00:41:50,560 --> 00:41:51,560
magnificence.
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00:41:51,560 --> 00:41:55,800
Lord, you are holy, you are kind, you are compassionate.
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We thank you that you created us in your image, the best part of your creation.
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00:42:00,480 --> 00:42:03,720
Lord, and we are sorry that we have sinned.
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00:42:03,720 --> 00:42:10,520
We confess that we make wrong choices, but we praise you that you send Jesus and that
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00:42:10,520 --> 00:42:14,960
you made a plan for us to be redeemed and to be able to be reconciled back to you.
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We thank you for His righteousness, that when you look at us, you see Jesus and that you've
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made a way for us to spend eternity with you.
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00:42:22,360 --> 00:42:26,800
Lord, we thank you for the gift of the Holy Spirit who lives in us, who enables us to
519
00:42:26,800 --> 00:42:31,360
make better choices, who enables us to live according to your word, who teaches us your
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00:42:31,360 --> 00:42:36,240
word so that we can know and understand the ways that you would have us to act toward
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others.
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00:42:37,240 --> 00:42:41,240
Father, we are just so thankful for your grace and your goodness to us, and we pray that
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00:42:41,240 --> 00:42:45,760
you would enable us to pass on that grace and goodness to others, that we would be a
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00:42:45,760 --> 00:42:50,160
reflection of you, that we would be a reflection of your love, a reflection of your light,
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00:42:50,160 --> 00:42:55,400
and that our actions and our words, the meditations of our heart, that those things would bring
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00:42:55,400 --> 00:42:59,560
you glory, Lord you deserve all honor and glory and praise.
527
00:42:59,560 --> 00:43:00,560
And we just thank you.
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00:43:00,560 --> 00:43:03,160
We want our lives to honor you.
529
00:43:03,160 --> 00:43:05,880
We thank you that you've given us your spirit to enable us to do that.
530
00:43:05,880 --> 00:43:06,880
In Jesus' name we pray.
531
00:43:06,880 --> 00:43:07,880
Amen.
532
00:43:07,880 --> 00:43:08,880
Amen.
533
00:43:08,880 --> 00:43:09,880
Thank you, Ann.
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00:43:09,880 --> 00:43:13,120
Well, there you have it.
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00:43:13,120 --> 00:43:17,680
You've enjoyed our conversation today and hope that you feel more equipped to examine
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00:43:17,680 --> 00:43:23,960
Scripture to find what God has to say about the important circumstances you're facing
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00:43:23,960 --> 00:43:25,120
in your life.
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00:43:25,120 --> 00:43:31,240
Until next time, examine the Scripture, drink from the Word of Life, and let the Bible feed
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00:43:31,240 --> 00:43:43,480
your spirit.
00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:04,600
Welcome to Examining Scripture.
2
00:00:04,600 --> 00:00:09,400
We seek to encourage believers in Jesus Christ to drink from the Word of Life.
3
00:00:09,400 --> 00:00:14,440
As God's revelation to mankind, we want to demystify the Bible and help you find what
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00:00:14,440 --> 00:00:17,640
God has to say about the circumstances you are facing.
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00:00:17,640 --> 00:00:19,520
We're not pastors or theologians.
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We're sinners just like you, who, by the grace of God, have come to saving faith in
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Jesus Christ.
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If we can thirst for Scripture, so can you.
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Hi, I'm your host Bob Redd, along with co-host Anne Burke.
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Thank you for joining us in another episode of Examining Scripture.
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Hello Anne, how are you doing today?
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I'm doing great Bob, how are you?
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I'm doing wonderful.
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By the time people hear this podcast, it will be just before Christmas and it's always
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a busy time.
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Certainly in most of our households.
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It can also be a time of great angst and it can be a time where people feel overwhelmed
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or they feel lonely, they miss loved ones, they're not with them, what have you.
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So certainly our hearts go out to all those who are preparing for Christmas.
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Our wish for you and our prayer for you is that we all stay focused on why we're celebrating
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this particular holiday, which is really to celebrate the Advent, the coming in the flesh
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of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
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So to all out there who are listening, welcome and a Merry Christmas in advance.
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This is our last podcast in the series.
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It's been a very long and wonderful walk.
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For those of you who are just joining us, this is the last in a podcast series we called
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Reform Theology.
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It is what we as believers in Jesus Christ believe in and this came out of the Reformation
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and we have the life of Reformers we touched on briefly in the first podcast, how they
30
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really didn't introduce a new belief system, a new theology far from it.
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What they really did is turned back to the first century.
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They turned back to Christ, this great and glorious God of ours who came and were about
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to celebrate in Christmas.
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They brought us all the way back to His coming in the flesh, to His ministry on this earth.
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And in the second, third, fourth and fifth podcasts, we talked about the four of the
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five solas.
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So it was Sola Scriptura, which is scripture alone, Sola Cristo, Christ alone, Sola Gratia,
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by Grace alone, Sola Fidei through Faith alone.
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And today we'll be looking at the fifth Sola, which is Sola De La Gloria, which is to the
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glory of God alone.
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Before we do that, Anne, why don't you recap last podcasts?
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My pleasure.
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So the last podcast was Faith Alone and there's so much that we could say about faith.
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It was hard to fit it all into one podcast and there was a lot that we didn't have time
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to say, but as I recall, the main points that we shared were that, number one, the most
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important thing is the object of our faith.
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Who or what are you putting your faith in?
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And for us as Christians, we put our faith in Jesus, Jesus alone, and that makes all
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the difference.
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And the other thing was we said that faith is the only part that we have in our salvation.
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It's not about our good intentions or our best wishes or even our good deeds.
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We don't work to earn our salvation.
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God has done the work.
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It was God who set the plan of redemption into motion.
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It was Jesus who went to the cross on our behalf to pay the price for our sin.
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He offers us the great gift of salvation.
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Our job is to accept it, to acknowledge that we can't do anything to save ourselves, to
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put our faith in the work that Christ did at the cross.
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So we confess with our mouths that Jesus is Lord and believe in our hearts that God is
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raising from the dead and we are saved.
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And so the moment we place our faith in Jesus for our salvation, our eternal life begins
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here on earth and our journey toward heaven starts.
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And while we acknowledge that there will likely be many trials and difficult times, possibly
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even some persecution, we know that we're not alone in those struggles.
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We have faith that Christ walks with us and His Holy Spirit in us enables us to overcome.
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Yeah, amen to that, right?
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So thank you for the recap.
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I think that was excellent.
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We turn now to the fifth and final, if you will, Sole Deo Gloria, that is to the glory
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of God alone.
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All that God has done is to His glory.
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But before we get too far down the road of talking about God's glory and maybe if you
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could give us the dictionary.com or the Webster dictionary version of glory, if you would.
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Sure.
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Well, Google this morning told me that glory is high renown or honor, won by notable achievements
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or magnificence or great beauty.
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And we know that God certainly is magnificent.
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I'm sure there are scriptures that will tell us more about God's glory, but that's what
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the world, so to speak, that's what the world would say.
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Yeah, it would.
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What in it?
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The question is, well, what does the Bible have to say about God's glory?
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The first thing to sort of step back before the creation of the world, God in His relationship,
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right?
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God is not one in essence, but is eternally existing in three persons, Father, Son, and
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Holy Spirit.
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And they were perfect in love.
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They were perfect in their glory.
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God created the heavens and the earth to manifest, that is to show His glory.
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At the center of that universe, He created a being man, and He created man in His own
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image.
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And He said to man, go and subdue the earth.
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One might say, go and take care of the earth.
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So we were commissioned at that point in time to do two things, to commune with God in the
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garden and to watch over His creation.
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Of course, in the garden, we had that perfect relationship with God, as it says, Adam and
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Eve walked in the cool of the day with God, but man sinned.
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And through one man's sin, as it says in Hebrews, all sinned.
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And so Adam and Eve were expelled from the garden and thus began the humankind's walk
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with sin.
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So as Adam's ancestors, the minute we're born, we're born into sin.
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As Adam's descendants.
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As Adam's descendants.
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I'm sorry, Paul writes in Romans 3.23, says, all have sinned and fall short of the glory
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of God.
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And it's this glory of God we want to address today.
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The first thing God requires of Himself because He is perfectly righteous is that He cannot
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look on sin.
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So the question becomes, how can a sinful man have a personal relationship with God if
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He's not righteous?
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God provided us the way.
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If you turn to 2 Corinthians 5:21, it says there that God made Him, this Him is Jesus
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Christ, who knew no sin to be sinned for us, so that through His righteousness we might
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have the righteousness of God.
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So the work of Christ on the cross is actually the way in which God provides for us and has
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provided for us as sinful man to be righteous.
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And so the work of Christ on the cross was to pay for our sin past, present, and future.
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The acceptance of that payment of debt was done by God the Father when He raised Jesus
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from the dead.
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Now, not that Jesus couldn't raise Himself, He could of course, but He allowed the Father
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to have that act of raising Him to show that the Father accepted Christ's payment on our
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behalf.
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In fact, in Philippians chapter 2, 5 through 11, it says, have this attitude in yourselves
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that was also in Christ Jesus, who was in essence God but did not regard equality with
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God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself by becoming a servant and taking the form
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of men.
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Having been found as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to death, even death on
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a cross.
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And it goes on to say, God highly exalted Him by giving Him the name which is above
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all other names, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth
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and under the earth, and that every creature confessed Jesus Christ's Lord to the glory
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of God.
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It is through Christ's work and God, the Father's acceptance of that work, that provides us a
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way through saving faith to come to a holy and righteous and glorious God.
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Anne, I think maybe a way to tie in all of this, and for those of you that have listened in
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on our podcast before, this might be a little departure.
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We have picked two chapters of Scripture that we feel really talks and addresses this whole
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idea of God's glory.
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And it's in 2 Corinthians chapter 3 and chapter 4.
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I think to make it more understanding, what we'll do is we'll have Anne read the paragraph,
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each paragraph, and then I'll provide a little commentary around what it is that the writer,
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in this case the writer is Paul by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, is writing to the church
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in Corinth.
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Second Corinthians chapter 3 verse 1.
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Are we beginning to commend ourselves again, or do we need, like some people, letters of
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recommendation to you or from you?
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You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everybody.
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You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with
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ink, but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of
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human hearts.
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Just a little quick background for those of you.
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So Paul is writing to the church at Corinth, and this is, it says 2 Corinthians, so it's
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conceivably a second letter, but there was another letter between 1 Corinthians and 2
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Corinthians, so this is actually his third letter.
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The Corinthian believers who Paul is writing to here were struggling.
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They were struggling first off with people in the church that were questioning Paul's
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authority, and in the times with which Paul is writing in the first century, many times
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people were bringing letters of commendation, or people requiring letters of commendation
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saying, hey, this person is legitimate, or if they weren't legitimate, they may create
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these letters and essentially so they're apostate or they're lying.
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The question was from the Corinthian church, what authority do you have, Paul?
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Paul is addressing that here by saying, we don't need letters.
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Our letter is during our ministry with you when we were in Corinth, you in coming to
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saving faith in Jesus Christ through our teaching and preaching to you, that you in fact are
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the letter, that you have come to saving faith in the true and living God in Christ Jesus.
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There's no need for any letter, man-made letter of commendation, because the letter is exhibited
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in the hearts of the true believer, who are you at Corinth that I'm writing to?
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That's a great commendation for the people in Corinth and testimony that lives are changed.
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God, when we're saved and we receive the Holy Spirit, he starts a transformation that
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people can tell, this is real.
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This is evidence that God is working in your life.
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Yeah, he's commending the Corinth people, isn't he, that you have a saving faith, we've witnessed
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it, and you should trust in it.
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Verse 4, such confidence as this is ours through Christ before God.
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Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence
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comes from God.
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He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the
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Spirit, for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.
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Yeah, so again, he's expanding on this idea, the new covenant, the new covenant versus the
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old covenant, and we'll cover that more detail later in this reading, but he's really talking
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about the Old Testament.
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The Old Testament was, people would say, the letter of the law.
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You've heard that expression before.
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The idea is you have to follow the letter of the law, and if you don't, you're breaking
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the law is the connotation here.
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But in the new covenant, with faith in Jesus Christ, by His grace, the new covenant, you
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are now covered in Christ's righteousness, like what we read in 2 Corinthians 5:21 earlier
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in this podcast.
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Paul is reminding them now when one comes to saving faith, we receive the Holy Spirit,
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the third person of the Triune God.
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Given that receiving of the Spirit within us, the Spirit Himself works within us to help
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us become more like Christ, to increase our righteousness, to be more Christ-like.
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Verse 7, Now if the ministry that brought death, which was engraved in letters on stone, came
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with glory, so that the Israelites could not look steadily at the face of Moses, because
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of its glory, fading though it was, will not the ministry of the Spirit be even more glorious?
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If the ministry that condemns men is glorious, how much more glorious is the ministry that
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brings righteousness?
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For what was glorious has no glory now in comparison with the surpassing glory, and
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if what was fading away came with glory, how much greater is the glory of that which lasts?
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So here, what Paul is talking about, the time that Moses and the Israelites were in the
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desert and specifically at Mount Sinai, and there are Mount Sinai's where God Himself
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gave the Ten Commandments to Moses to give to the people of Israel.
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The Ten Commandments were altogether glorious and righteous because they were from God,
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but the Ten Commandments were not something that man could possibly perfectly work out.
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And if one could perfectly work out the Ten Commandments, then they would be found righteous.
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Unfortunately, because we are sinners, it is impossible for us to meet God's holy requirement,
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which is found in the Ten Commandments.
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The whole purpose of the Ten Commandments was not to be something we could work out
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and claim as our own righteousness, self-righteousness, if you will, but they were God's righteousness,
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and the whole purpose of the Ten Commandments was to show that it was impossible for us to
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work within ourselves and work out God's perfect righteousness on our own accord.
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The reference there about Moses and his face fading as it was, Moses said to God
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on Mount Sinai, he wanted to see God, and God says, you can't do that, but what I will
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do is show you my glory.
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And so God put Moses in the clef of a rock and went past Moses the awesome, unbelievable
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glory of the Lord, shown on Moses' face that it actually transformed his face in such a
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way that he required a veil so that people, the Israelites, could not look on him directly.
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It was that imposing, that awesome God's glory for which he saw.
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Yeah, I remember that from the Old Testament also, that after Moses was in the present
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presence of God, his face was shining, reflecting the glory of God, right?
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And we too as Christians, we have Christ living in us, and our faces should also reflect his
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glory.
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It's our prayer, right?
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That when people look at us and watch us and watch our behaviors and actions, that they'll
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see something different that makes them say, oh, I'm noticing something, right?
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And they might not recognize it as the glory of Jesus, but we can testify to that if conversations
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ever start.
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But yeah, that's a good reminder that we as Christians reflect his glory.
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Right.
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How many times do we pray?
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You know, Lord, we pray that they see Christ's glory through us, right?
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That they don't see us, but they see Christ's glory in us.
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And that's actually, it's a great point, Anne in that that's actually what Paul was saying
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earlier in the letter that we just read about you, yourselves, Corinthians, are the letter.
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It is you who your behavior, your Christlikeness, the fact that people see that you're different
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as you put it, like you put that Anne.
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All right.
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Well, there's a little bit more about Moses here in the next section.
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Verse 12, therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold.
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We are not like Moses who would put a veil over his face to keep the Israelites from
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gazing at it while the radiance was fading away, but their minds were made dull.
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For to this day, the same veil remains when the Old Covenant is read.
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It has not been removed because only in Christ is it taken away.
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Even to this day, when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts.
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But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away.
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Now the Lord is the Spirit.
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And where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.
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And we who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory are being transformed into
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his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
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There is so much there.
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And I think that it's actually this particular part of Scripture when people talk about the
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Spirit of the Lord and where does it say that the Spirit is God?
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Anne just read in verse 17 and 18, Scripture unequivocally says that the Spirit is the Lord.
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And I love how it puts it where the Spirit of the Lord is.
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There is freedom or there is liberty.
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Yeah.
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So here Paul, in contrast, is talking about using this contrast of Moses' veiled face
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because he has seen the glory of the Lord and the glory of the Lord in Moses' face is
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being reflected.
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The talk here is about this Old Covenant.
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And when the people are reading the Old Covenant, they're hardened.
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What he's really saying there is to continue on the path of trying to meet God's standard,
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which is in the law, which is in the Ten Commandments, it's impossible to do.
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Think of it as degrees.
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If it says, I shall not commit adultery, what exactly is that?
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Is that the act itself?
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And of course, we're told in Matthew with Christ's Sermon on the Mount, chapter 5, that
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if you commit adultery in your heart, it's as if you had done the act.
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And so the point is, the Ten Commandment is impossible for man to work out and to achieve
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in and of themselves by their own works and by their own righteousness.
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It's impossible.
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What Christ talks about here is with us as believers, the veil is removed.
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And again, in the Sermon on the Mount and in chapter 5 of Matthew, Christ talks about
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believers.
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He's talking to believers, he's talking to his disciples, that they are the salt of
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the earth and they are the light of the world.
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What Christ says in the Sermon on the Mount there is, he says, well, salt, if it loses
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its saltiness, is no good.
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And he says that you don't put a basket over the lamp, that the lamp is meant to shine
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the light.
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This is the light of us as believers.
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And it's this, in the same way Paul talked about, we are the letter.
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It is our behavior Anne mention.
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It's who we are, it's how people look at us because we are ever seeking to be more Christ-like
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that they see, I think how you put it, Am, we're different.
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We should be.
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That's the goal anyway, right?
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Right, we seek to be.
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It's so important what is being said here in verse 17 and 18.
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And it says that us all with unveiled faces are beholding as the Lord, the glory of the
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Lord.
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That is scripture.
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We have this wonderful thing called the Bible.
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We behold this and the Bible, if I could put it succinctly, is God's revelation to mankind
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about himself.
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So everything we want and need to know about God is in scripture.
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And because we're made in God's image, we have a blueprint from God that says, because
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we're made in your image and because you've given us your word in scripture, the revelation
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of who you are, you've told us all that we need to know about how we ought to be in order
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to help bring you glory.
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So I love how it puts us in my translation.
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It says, being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the
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Lord the Spirit.
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What that's saying there, what Paul is saying to us, once we've come to saving faith in
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Jesus Christ, we then live the rest of our life ever seeking greater and greater righteousness.
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And so through scripture, through having a relationship, direct relationship with God,
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through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, we receive this Holy Spirit and it's the spirit
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within us, the spirit of God who, through scripture, who's helping us to discern and
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understand how we ought to live in God's economy.
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Right, and Romans 12-2 tells us, do not conform any longer to the pattern of the world, but
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be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
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And how do we transform and renew our minds by reading the scripture, by letting the spirit
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do his work in us, right?
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And as we are transformed more into his likeness, we will prayerfully be better reflections
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of his glory.
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I love that, and actually in 2 Corinthians 5:17 it says, if anyone is in Christ Jesus:
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they are a new creation.
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The old ways have passed, behold, new things have come.
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Yeah, and Paul tells us, I think, in other letters about taking off our old nature, putting
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away malice and anger and bitterness and putting on kindness and compassion.
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And he's telling us a new way to live, but it's sometimes hard to strip off all the
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old layers.
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And sometimes some things cling a little more closely, a little stronger hold on us than
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others.
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And as we continue to yield to the spirit, he will continue to work on those things that
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are getting in the way and blocking the light of his glory.
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As he continues to purify us, we can do a better job of showing the world the glory of
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God.
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Yeah, and back to verse 18, we are being transformed from glory to glory.
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So the glory that we receive at salvation when we first come to saving faith is undoubtedly
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wonderful and awesome, but the glory that we gain as we continue to live our life seeking
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to be more righteous the way I like to put it, if you want, from a negative standpoint,
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we're sinners.
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Until we leave to go to be with the Lord in eternity, we will still be sinners.
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Paul talks about that in Romans chapter 7, I do what I don't want to do and the things
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I want to do, I don't do.
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But the reality is, as believers in Jesus Christ, having come to saving faith, we sin
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less and when we sin it affects us more.
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We seek to be Christ-like, we cannot achieve it.
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And it's back to the proof of which is in the law, meaning we can never meet while we're
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in this impure world, in these impure bodies.
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We can never fully achieve the perfect righteousness of God that is called for in the glorious
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Ten Commandments in the law, but we have already achieved it when we come to saving faith ,in
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Jesus Christ because of his atoning sacrifice, the work on the cross where he paid the price
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of our sins past, present, and future.
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So when you say we'll never achieve perfection here because we still struggle with our sin
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nature, but that shouldn't discourage us.
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It says in Second Corinthians 4, the first verse, we don't lose heart because even though we're
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never going to be perfect here, God can still use us.
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God uses us in our brokenness and he can still work through us and through our lives to draw
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other people to him.
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Amen to that.
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So let's turn to chapter 4.
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Therefore, since through God's mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart.
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Rather, we have renounced secret and shameful ways, we do not use deception, nor do we distort
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the Word of God.
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On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly, we commend ourselves to every man's
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conscience in the sight of God.
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And even if our gospel is vailed, it is vailed to those who are perishing.
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The God of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers so that they cannot see the
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light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.
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For we do not preach ourselves, but Jesus Christ is Lord, and ourselves as your servants
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for Jesus' sake.
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For God, who said, let light shine out of darkness, made His light shine in our hearts
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to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.
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We're told here in the first part of chapter 4, things are hidden, and that's just the
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work of God.
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Having the Holy Spirit within us, having come to saving faith, having the Word of God, they
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work in unison for all of us who believe.
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And for you who do not believe, we recognize and the Bible tells us that it's discordant.
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It doesn't make sense.
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It doesn't reach you at the core of who you are.
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We understand that, and the Bible says that.
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These verses are saying, before you come to the Lord, you have blinders on.
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And in God's tining, He will open the eyes of people that are going to accept Him.
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And when they come to understand that they need Him and they accept Him as their Savior,
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our eyes are opened, and we can understand who Jesus is.
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We confess Him as Lord and ask for forgiveness and accept the gift of salvation.
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We receive the Holy Spirit who further enables us to understand Scripture.
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Even as a Christian, I've read a bunch of these Old Testament books more than once,
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and they didn't make sense to me until maybe the last time I read them, a verse finally
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clicked.
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Because as my relationship with the Lord is growing, the Spirit is teaching me more,
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I can understand a little bit better some things of the Lord, it's just part of the
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growing process that the first time we read a verse, we may not understand it.
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Some verses are easier than others, and they're not all mysterious.
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Some of them are very straightforward, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
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That's an easy one for everybody to understand, hard to accept, but easy to understand what
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the Scripture is saying.
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But to people that don't know Jesus when it says the gospel is veiled, God doesn't want
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that to be mysterious, but because of the God of this age, right, Satan is out there
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trying to keep people from understanding and accepting the Lord.
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Yeah, and whereas in the end of chapter 3, Paul is talking about how we ourselves are
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seeking greater righteousness in Christ, that we're seeking greater Christ likeness.
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Here in the beginning of chapter 4, it turns a bit and it talks about how having come to
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saving faith, having now become this light, we are to share.
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We don't preach ourselves, but we preach Jesus Christ as Lord.
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Having come to saving faith, the first thing we hope is that we are different and that
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we appear different.
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We appear as that light in a dark world, but that's not the end of our commission.
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That's the not the sole purpose.
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Having come to saving faith, we as believers, our eyes have been opened.
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We've become that new creation and we want others to have it.
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The second part of who we are as Christians is to share our faith.
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It's to share what Christ has done in our lives.
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And that's what this is saying here in the beginning of chapter 4.
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Yes, I understand that some people can feel as though we're proselytizing to you as a
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non-believer, but it's only the fact that it's coming out of our heart.
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Not only do we want to show that we're different, show that light coming through us as Christ
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in the way we are behaving in as much as we can behave well in this world, but we're also
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called to share the message of the gospel and what Christ has done for us.
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Verse 7, But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power
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is from God and not from us.
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We are hard-pressed on every side, but not crushed, perplexed, but not in despair, persecuted,
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but not abandoned, struck down, but not destroyed.
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We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may all
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also be revealed in our body.
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For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake so that his
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life may be revealed in our mortal body.
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So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you.
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Yeah, so this is a great little paragraph because really it's talking about us as while
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we're on this earth, we're in these imperfect clays of jars.
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It's our body, right?
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It's the fallen nature that we live with back to what Paul says in Romans chapter 7.
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The reality is the gospel, living in Christ's likeness, is not easy.
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There's not a prosperity gospel.
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Come to believe in Jesus Christ and all your cares will go away.
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Come to faith in Jesus Christ and all of a sudden you're going to be rich and life is
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going to be a joy.
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No, it's not that at all.
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The reality is that life is hard and life is hard whether you're a Christian or you're
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not and it's just the way of this world.
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So in spite of that, when we are in Christ Jesus, we understand our destiny in the physical
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body is death and yet our hope is in the eternity, eternal life with the true and living God
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in Christ Jesus.
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Yes, Jesus said, in this world you will have trouble but take heart for I have overcome
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the world and in Revelation there are great rewards promised to those who overcome and
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we can overcome in Jesus by the power of His Spirit.
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00:35:06,600 --> 00:35:11,680
So yes, he didn't tell us it was going to be easy but it's going to be worth it.
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Yes, it will.
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Amen to that.
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Let's carry on.
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Verse 13, it is written, I believe therefore I've spoken with that same spirit of faith
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we also believe and therefore speak because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus
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from the dead will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you in His presence.
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All this is for your benefit so that the grace that is reaching more and more people may
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cause thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God.
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Yes, so again as believers in Jesus Christ when we come to saving faith we are bringing
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glory to God.
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The whole purpose of God's creation, the whole purpose of creating mankind in his image
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is to be able to worship and glorify God.
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We are here to be a part of and commune with and to have a relationship with the Almighty
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and glorious God and in doing so we bring glory to Him.
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We do so in our prayer.
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We do so in reading scripture.
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We do so in being able to sing and praise him for who he is, the holy and righteous
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and eternal God and it starts with believing through faith in the one who paid the price
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for our sins in Jesus Christ that we are glorifying God, the omniscient, ever present, all knowing
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God who is one in essence and eternally existing in three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
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So let's finish up the chapter, Anne.
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Okay, verse 16, therefore we do not lose heart, though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly
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we are being renewed day by day, for our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us
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an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.
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So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, for what is seen is temporary,
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but what is unseen is eternal.
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And that's the whole point of why we spend time sharing our faith with people who don't
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believe and it's also why we come together as believers in Jesus Christ to share our
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faith to help lift each other up.
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The fact is that we have, no one has to make a point or no one has to argue the fact that
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each and every one of us humans on this earth will one day die.
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That's a fact, it's a physical fact.
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The difference between believers in Jesus Christ and anybody who doesn't believe is
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we have this hope assured of eternity in the presence of the true and living and righteous
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altogether, holy and glorious God.
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Knowing that, we are compelled to share it, to live it out, and to make it known to those
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who don't have this hope of eternal life.
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00:38:25,760 --> 00:38:32,720
Anne, would you like to finish this up with reading from Revelation chapter 5?
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I think it sums up the role of us who have been brought into God's creation and what
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we will one day be doing eternally in heaven.
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00:38:45,960 --> 00:38:52,120
Yes, in John chapter 1 tells us that Jesus was there at the beginning at creation, He
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created all things and all things have life because of Him.
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And so in the book of Revelation, we see this amazing picture of Jesus as the Lamb of God
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and all of creation, every creature that He ever made giving Him glory.
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In verse 13 it says,Then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all that is in them, saying:
“To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb
be praise and honor and glory and power,
for ever and ever!”
The four living creatures said, “Amen,” and the elders fell down and worshiped.
Yeah, that's so wonderful.
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And I think I'm always reminded of this great doxology that's at the end of the book of
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Jude.
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It says, Now do him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to make you stand in the
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presence of his glory with great joy, to the one God our Savior through Jesus Christ our
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Lord, be glory and majesty, dominion and authority, before all time, now and forevermore.
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00:39:58,840 --> 00:40:04,020
We hope you've enjoyed the podcast series here on Reformed Theology.
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00:40:04,020 --> 00:40:12,080
We hope that it's become clearer to you that the Reformers were not creating a theology
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of its own, this idea of Protestantism versus Catholicism.
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In reality, what they were doing is bringing us back to the first century, bringing us
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back to Christ.
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And that we have this all glorious and well-preserved Word of God, that is the written Word of God
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in Scripture to lead us and guide us, those who have come to saving faith.
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And it's also an important tool to demonstrate for those who don't believe that God is speaking
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to them as well, if only they'd open their heart.
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And the way to your open heart is through Christ Jesus, according to God's mercy, according
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to Christ's grace, and the way to saving faith is a true heart deep in your soul, coming
501
00:41:04,040 --> 00:41:11,160
to faith in Jesus Christ, recognizing you can't do it on your own, that you have a need for
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a Savior and we have one, and that is Christ Jesus.
503
00:41:15,520 --> 00:41:21,880
Coming to Him will make you a changed person, and that you can have a direct relationship
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with the awesome, Almighty God.
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And through that faith, what comes from that is a continual posture of praise and thanksgiving
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and worship that is to His glory, and it certainly is to your good.
507
00:41:40,200 --> 00:41:42,440
Anne, will you take us out in prayer?
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Yes.
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Father God, we praise you for your goodness, for your greatness, for your love, for your
510
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magnificence.
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Lord, you are holy, you are kind, you are compassionate.
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We thank you that you created us in your image, the best part of your creation.
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Lord, and we are sorry that we have sinned.
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We confess that we make wrong choices, but we praise you that you send Jesus and that
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you made a plan for us to be redeemed and to be able to be reconciled back to you.
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We thank you for His righteousness, that when you look at us, you see Jesus and that you've
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made a way for us to spend eternity with you.
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Lord, we thank you for the gift of the Holy Spirit who lives in us, who enables us to
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00:42:26,800 --> 00:42:31,360
make better choices, who enables us to live according to your word, who teaches us your
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word so that we can know and understand the ways that you would have us to act toward
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others.
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Father, we are just so thankful for your grace and your goodness to us, and we pray that
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you would enable us to pass on that grace and goodness to others, that we would be a
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reflection of you, that we would be a reflection of your love, a reflection of your light,
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and that our actions and our words, the meditations of our heart, that those things would bring
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you glory, Lord you deserve all honor and glory and praise.
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And we just thank you.
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We want our lives to honor you.
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We thank you that you've given us your spirit to enable us to do that.
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00:43:05,880 --> 00:43:06,880
In Jesus' name we pray.
531
00:43:06,880 --> 00:43:07,880
Amen.
532
00:43:07,880 --> 00:43:08,880
Amen.
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00:43:08,880 --> 00:43:09,880
Thank you, Ann.
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00:43:09,880 --> 00:43:13,120
Well, there you have it.
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00:43:13,120 --> 00:43:17,680
You've enjoyed our conversation today and hope that you feel more equipped to examine
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Scripture to find what God has to say about the important circumstances you're facing
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in your life.
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Until next time, examine the Scripture, drink from the Word of Life, and let the Bible feed
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your spirit.
