All posts by Larry

Assurance

Isaiah 32:17 And the work of righteousness shall be peace; and the effect of righteousness quietness and assurance for ever.

OK, I gave away the answer to yesterday’s question right there in the title. The simple matter is that if assurance was enough there would be no word reassurance. There is something within the experience of being human that causes us to need reassurance. Perhaps it is the relentless attacks of the enemy that causes that.

1 Thessalonians 5:11 Therefore encourage (admonish, exhort) one another and edify (strengthen and build up) one another, just as you are doing. (AMP)

These are forms of reassurance. “You’re doing good, keep it up.” Exhortation is the most commonly used reassurance, but even admonishment is reassurance. “What you said is true but maybe you could deliver that with a little grace seasoning.” Yet the topic yesterday was more about reassurances found in scripture, revealed to you thru the Spirit. Think of it in these terms.

I know my wife loves me, but I still like to hear her say it. My wife does things to show me she loves me, but every now and then she does something unexpected, something special and intimate, just for me that makes me feel so special. Those little treasures hidden in scriptures that God reveals to you are those moments when God is being personally intimate with you. It is your moment and it belongs to no one else but you.

Sadly most Christians do not seek those hidden things. Either they have not discovered that moment because they have not looked, or no one has ever revealed that character of God to them before. I am telling you now, this is how God loves us. You can no longer say you do not know.

Will you go to His Word with a lover’s heart? Will you seek the intimacy which God wants to share with you? Do you wish to be reassured that God really loves you?

Hidden

Isaiah 45:3 And I will give thee the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, that thou mayest know that I, the Lord, which call thee by thy name, am the God of Israel.

This is a continuation off yesterday’s blog. If you have not read “Meaningful” please go and read it now. Without having a base to begin with, this blog will not hold any meaningful for you.

What two deaths must occur in order to actively call on the Lord? Did not Jesus tell Nicodemus that a man must be born again to see the kingdom? Well yes He did but that but one aspect, there is another. This other aspect speaks to the two deaths.

Romans 6:2-3 How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein? Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?

We were dead to God in our sins. We were born spiritually dead, separated from God. Now by faith we are dead to sin, alive in Christ, no longer separated from God. When you become born again, you are born of the Spirit, dead to sin, and then and only then does Jesus Christ become your Lord.

Think of it in these terms, King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden is a King but not my King unless I become a citizen of Sweden. Calling him King, does not make him my King. Neither does calling Jesus Lord make Him your Lord without being a citizen of the Kingdom of God. Our citizenship is in heaven according to Philippians 3:20 ref. NIV, ESV, NASB.

If you can see this as a hidden message within the context of the framework of Genesis and the two deaths, then you have discovered a hidden richness left to you by God in His Word.

Now why would he do that?