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But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness Gal 5:22 |
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Dear
Friend,
If you do not already have a habit of gathering daily manna the first thing in the morning (we can look at the example given to us in Exodus 16 and find the pattern for make it a habit. Establish your life and your schedule to allow you the necessary time to do your daily collection first thing every morning to give you the strength to make it through the day. And remember that today’s manna will not be sufficient for tomorrow; tomorrow’s manna must be collected tomorrow morning. Thursday, April 4, 2024
Today's Passage : Today's Passage :Peace with God Through Faith Bible Verse:Romans 5:1-5 (ESV) "Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God‘s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us." Message:
The word “Therefore” at the start of Chapter 5 indicates a turning point. Paul sums up, in two sentences, the long discussion he has just made. We are justified in our existence by our faith, and by virtue of this faith, Christ has brought us grace. Our sins will be forgiven, God‘s wrath will be avoided, and we will inherit eternal life and peace.
This is a turning point in Romans; Paul is starting a new section. He begins it by saying that we rejoice in our sufferings; really, he is saying we should rejoice in our sufferings — he uses “we” in this odd way throughout Romans. You might read “we” to mean “I and the other Christians who are fully instructed,” or something like that.
blood of Christ
But still, who is happy about suffering? Nobody, really (except some very odd people, such as someone extremely ridden by guilt). What Paul is saying is that he rejoices even when he suffers, because he suffers for Christ. He goes through an odd chain of causes and effects. Part of it is practical psychology: suffering builds character, he says, a phrase that has caused many a teenager to roll his eyes and sigh.
But Paul was, legitimately, one tough cookie. He spent his entire adult life traveling in the hostile lands of Turkey and Greece. Discomfort, insecurity, beatings, stonings, arrests, shipwreck and near-misses were his life. So he is well-placed to instruct us on how to handle suffering. And his instruction is that, if we suffer in Christ‘s name, we will do well to rejoice in the victory it will bring us; through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us, we will be sustained by God‘s love.
This can be helpful to us, for if we practice Christ‘s words in our daily lives, we will sometimes suffer. For example, if someone hits us (literally or metaphorically) and we turn the other cheek, we might get hit again. But there is advantage; because if we are hit again on the other cheek, it has meaning; it is pain we have endured solely by faith. Forgiving someone we hate can be really painful; but the pain will have compensation, for the Holy Spirit will give us peace.
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