2 Corinthians 13:14\u00a0<\/b>–\u00a0May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ,\u00a0and the love of God,\u00a0and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit\u00a0be with you all.<\/i><\/p>\n
\u201cMay the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ\u2026\u201d\u00a0\u00a0What is the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ?\u00a0\u00a0We commonly, and rightly, understand grace to be unmerited favor from God.\u00a0\u00a0What does \u201cunmerited favor\u201d mean?\u00a0\u00a0Simply that we don\u2019t deserve, or merit, His grace.\u00a0\u00a0What is it the result of the Lord\u2019s grace upon us.\u00a0\u00a0It means that we receive favor from Him.\u00a0\u00a0What does that mean?\u00a0\u00a0It means that we are moved from being enemies of God, which we all were at birth due to the sin passed down to us from Adam (Romans 5:12<\/b>), to being daughters and sons of His.\u00a0\u00a0At birth we were all on a huge horizontal escalator (moving sidewalk) with the end of the ride (that is, death) being hell.\u00a0\u00a0Jesus came to change our final destination from hell to heaven.\u00a0\u00a0When one accepts Jesus as their personal Savior and Lord, Jesus takes us off that moving sidewalk that we all cannot get off of by our own ability.\u00a0\u00a0John 3:18<\/b>\u00a0states \u201cWhoever believes in him is not condemned,\u00a0but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God\u2019s one and only Son.<\/i>\u201d\u00a0\u00a0So we see that salvation from our Adam inherited damned destination is changed only through Jesus.\u00a0\u00a0Yet it is important to notice that those who reject Jesus stand (remain) \u201ccondemned already.<\/i>\u201d\u00a0\u00a0This is one of the verses that illustrates that every person born, even our own children, are all born infected and ravaged from sin.\u00a0\u00a0Because of this we are all born with an end destination of hell.\u00a0\u00a0I know, awful to think of, but we can thank Adam and Eve for that.\u00a0\u00a0But in the preceding verse we see that Jesus saves us from the path we were on.\u00a0\u00a0He snaps the chains of our bondage to that moving sidewalk, lifts us off of it and sets us on the moving sidewalk to Heaven.\u00a0\u00a0And the thing about it is that we don\u2019t deserve it, but God has done it for us anyway.<\/p>\n
Grace is the noun that describes the how God has given to us, though we have done nothing to deserve it, unmerited favor.<\/p>\n
Remembering that all that God does comes from the essence of who He is (He is faithful to who He is [2 Corinthians 2:13<\/b>]), then grace is an essential element of God.\u00a0\u00a0Grace lives in God.\u00a0\u00a0Digging deeper we know that a prime attribute of God, along with righteousness, is love.\u00a0\u00a0It is His love that is all encompassing, cannot be defeated, will never tire, and is intended for all created beings, but finds its home and bears fruit only in those who embrace it as given to the world through Jesus Christ, Savior and Lord.\u00a0\u00a0Does God love the unsaved?\u00a0\u00a0Of course He does (John 3:16<\/b>)!\u00a0\u00a0But Jesus clearly taught that unless the grace of God is received in the way God has ordained it to be received, it falls on the hard ground and bears no fruit, but if one has a soft open heart to God, then the love is received and bears fruit in accordance with the very nature of God. (Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23<\/b>)\u00a0\u00a0Everything God does is from who He is.\u00a0\u00a0Love and grace are part of who He is and entirely who He is.\u00a0\u00a0So as He looks on us from the core of His being He loves us and offers to us this unmerited favor that is called \u201cgrace.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cand the love of God,\u00a0and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit\u00a0be with you all.<\/i>\u201d\u00a0\u00a0The reference here is to our Father God.\u00a0\u00a0As we have previously reviewed.\u00a0\u00a0Those who love the Son have the love of the Father and those who do not love the Son do not have the love of the Father (1 John 2:23<\/b>).\u00a0\u00a0Father God sent His Son Jesus to the earth suffer horribly and die so that we may have peace with God and therefore also have His love, His very self, live within us. How will we He allow anyone who rejects His Son, who has in obedience to Him suffered and died for all, to enter into His house?\u00a0\u00a0He will not!\u00a0\u00a0If anyone rejects our children, we know they are not welcome in our house.<\/span><\/p>\n The Holy Spirit is a full member of the One Holy Triune God.\u00a0\u00a0He is not less than God the Father or God the Son. All three, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are all equally God in will, intent, power, divinity and stature.\u00a0\u00a0It is prevalent for modern Believers to be taught about God our Father and about Jesus our Savior and Lord, but not of the Holy Spirit and His works within us.\u00a0\u00a0Family, God does not give us two thirds of Himself, but He gives us the entirety of Himself.\u00a0\u00a0Do we tell God, who is all three, that we only want to love and fellowship part of Him but care not for the other third of Him.\u00a0\u00a0Let it be known that we cannot do that.\u00a0\u00a0God is One and He is not divided and no-one can divide Him.\u00a0\u00a0If we don\u2019t love the Son then we will have neither the Father nor the Spirit.\u00a0\u00a0If we don\u2019t love the Father then we don\u2019t have the Son or the Holy Spirit and if we don\u2019t love the Spirit, then we don\u2019t have the Father or the Son.\u00a0\u00a0In fact, the Holy Spirit is the very proof that we belong to God through Jesus. (Ephesians 1:13<\/b>)\u00a0\u00a0Family, do we love and talk (pray) to the Father and the Son but ignore the Holy Spirit, then we are in error and are losing out on having the fullness of the blessing of fellowship with God.\u00a0\u00a0Let\u2019s remember that Jesus said that if a person speaks against Jesus that can be forgiven, but one who speaks against the Holy Spirit is in danger of never being forgiven (Matthew 12:31-32<\/b>)\u00a0\u00a0Now Jesus spoke clearly here and yet many would say of this verse that it does not mean what Jesus clearly said.\u00a0\u00a0Yet these same people will quote that the golden rule of Bible interpretation as \u201cWhen the plain sense of scripture makes common sense, seek no other sense…\u201d\u00a0\u00a0Jesus was not speaking in a parable and was not giving an esoteric teaching.\u00a0\u00a0Also, nothing about what he here said contradicts anything else in scripture.\u00a0\u00a0He said do not speak against the Holy Spirit.\u00a0\u00a0With such a warning we are reminded of the preciousness, the holiness and the divinity of the Holy Spirit.\u00a0\u00a0Brothers and Sisters, if one of us does not personally know and fellowship with the Holy Spirit, well then, it\u2019s time to start.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The whole and full triune God loves us, that is, every part of us.\u00a0\u00a0Shouldn\u2019t we love the fullness of Him as He loves all that we are?\u00a0\u00a0All of the triune God has a role in every part of our salvation.\u00a0\u00a0Doesn\u2019t God deserve us to love Him in full and not in part?\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Family, let us relish the grace of God and the full fellowship of God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.\u00a0\u00a0Let us praise God that we have the honor to do so.\u00a0\u00a0Praise God!<\/span><\/p>\n Psalm 150:6<\/b>\u00a0–\u00a0Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.\u00a0 Praise the Lord!<\/i><\/p>\n Micah 7:7<\/b>\u00a0–\u00a0But as for me, I watch\u00a0in hope\u00a0for the\u00a0Lord, I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear\u00a0me.\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n Micah 6:8<\/b>\u00a0–\u00a0He has shown You, O man, what\u00a0is\u00a0good; And what does the\u00a0Lord\u00a0require of You but to do justly, to love mercy, And to walk humbly with Your God<\/i>.<\/p>\n Numbers 6:24-26<\/b>\u00a0\u201cThe\u00a0Lord\u00a0bless you and keep you; 25\u00a0the\u00a0Lord\u00a0make His face shine on you and be gracious to you; 26\u00a0the\u00a0Lord\u00a0turn His face\u00a0toward you and give you peace.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 2 Corinthians 13:14\u00a0–\u00a0May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ,\u00a0and the love of God,\u00a0and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit\u00a0be with you all. \u201cMay the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ\u2026\u201d\u00a0\u00a0What is the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ?\u00a0\u00a0We commonly, and rightly, understand grace to be unmerited favor from God.\u00a0\u00a0What does \u201cunmerited favor\u201d mean?\u00a0\u00a0Simply that…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1192],"tags":[129,1841,100,101,94,1874,17,10],"class_list":["post-2022","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-devotion","tag-corinthians","tag-ephesians","tag-john","tag-matthew","tag-micah","tag-numbers","tag-psalm","tag-romans"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2022","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2022"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2022\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2023,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2022\/revisions\/2023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2022"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2022"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2022"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}