For Thought and Meditation - Tuesday, April 18

[Pine Baron]

Good morning all. A great message today following yesterday's message of hope and strength. Have a safe and blessed day.

An Essential for Spiritual Survival
by Greg Laurie on Apr 18, 2023

Then the angel showed me Jeshua the high priest standing before the angel of the LORD. The Accuser, Satan, was there at the angel’s right hand, making accusations against Jeshua.
—Zechariah 3:1

On more than one occasion, the Bible describes Satan as an accuser.

We see this illustrated in the third chapter of Zechariah. The setting is a heavenly courtroom, God is the judge, and Jeshua, the high priest, is the defendant. Meanwhile, Satan is the prosecutor, trying to prove Jeshua guilty.

But then God says, “I, the Lord, reject your accusations, Satan. Yes, the Lord, who has chosen Jerusalem, rebukes you. This man is like a burning stick that has been snatched from the fire” (Zechariah 3:2 NLT).

Satan also will accuse us before God when we have sinned. That is where the breastplate of righteousness comes in. In his letter to the Christians in Ephesus, the apostle Paul wrote, “Stand your ground, putting on the belt of truth and the body armor of God’s righteousness” (Ephesians 6:14 NLT).

Paul was alluding to the armor that Roman soldiers wore. The breastplate, or “body armor,” was a crucial element of the armor, protecting the soldier’s vital organs. In the same way, the “body armor of God’s righteousness” is essential for our spiritual survival. It speaks of what God has done for us through Jesus Christ.

God has saved us. He justified us. And He forgave all the sins that we have committed. He erased them and washed them away. Then He placed His righteousness into our account. God gives this righteousness to us. It isn’t based on what we do for Him.

The devil, however, has declared war on followers of Christ. He wants to keep us away from God. First, he tempts us and traps us. Then he condemns us and accuses us before God. He wants to make disobedient Christians doubly defeated.

Yet we are righteous in Jesus Christ through His finished work for us on the cross. So put on the “body armor of God’s righteousness”—and keep it there.

[dverna]

It is stuff like this that makes me question parts of the bible.

If God knows everything, what would be the point of Satan making accusations regarding anyone? Are we to believe God "missed something"?

But to the message. Some ministers love easy challenges and brow beating us with guilt. Yes, we sin. We are designed to sin by God Himself. It is not anything new, and it is not anything that can ever completely change. That is why Christ died for us.

We should try to live as good a life as we can, but we cannot reach the level of perfection needed to be with Him for eternity. God expects us to try, but He knows we cannot earn eternal life with our deeds and actions. We need to be open to how God wants us to do His work as best we can.

[Wayne Smith]

Consider this - the Bible is a teaching tool, not a photographic presentation of who God is. For example "Torah" does not mean "law", it means "the Teaching" - i.e. this is how you think about the law and use it. If you look at Hosea - God made his life a teaching tool. So ... what are we to learn about the passage from Zechariah? To truly know that we need to know the situation in which it was given and to who it was given originally - and how they heard it, if they did at all. For example, in Hosea's time the people called him and Amos crazy, or in our words, delusional, and rejected them completely.

[USMC87]

Amen!

[augercreek]

I don't think we were designed to sin but, we were designed to have a choice to obey or not. We choose to not obey most every day at some point so therefore the Accuser has a case against us. Therefore it is up to us to ask for forgiveness if we believe in Jesus death and resurrection.

[Wayne Smith]

Read Romans 7 - 8:2. In 7 Paul discusses the inevitability of his sin - What I would not I do, what I would I do not, what hope have I in this body of sin? It is in the context of that condition that he writes "There is therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

My Dad told me that "whenever you see a 'therefore' - go back and see what it is there for!" This is important in Romans 8:1 because the chapter breaks artificially break up his thought. I need to confess my sin, but forgiveness is present from the Cross. That is what Christ accomplished - or part of it.

Yes, we were designed to be perfect and immortal, but apparently, we could not maintain that and fell into sin. You are right, it is not our design, it is our responsibility. We are fallen creatures in a fallen universe - and Christ is our only hope because there is nothing I can do to change all that.