SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/10/2019 8:42 PM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-1”The
Gifts of Christ to Individual Believers”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Ephesians
4:7
Message of the
verse: “But to each one of us grace
was given according to the measure of Christ’s gift.”
I find it interesting that this verse, and sentence
begins with the word “but.” This word is
used here as an adversative, rather than as a simple conjunction according to
John MacArthur. He states that the
beginning of this verse could begin with “in spite of that” or “on the other
hand,” as this would contrast the previous subject matter with what is about to
be said.
In verses 3-6 the theme echoed unity and this parallel
emphasis of diversity, which is the theme verses 7-11. It will set the individual (each one) over
against the “all” that is in verse six in regard to unity in the Body of
Christ. MacArthur then goes on to write
“The reading of but as adversative is and is perfectly consistent with
diversity of gifts. God’s gracious
relation of ‘all’ is also a personal relation to ‘each one’ (cf. 1 Cor. 12:7,
11) and a personal ministry through ‘each one.’
Thus Paul moves
from the unity of believers to the uniqueness of believers.”
What do you think of when you think of the word
“grace?” When we look back at Ephesians
2:8 we read “For by grace you have been saved through
faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God;” and so what
we see in this verse according to the word grace is the definition of the
gospel, for the gospel is
the good news of God’s grace to sinful mankind, so a one word definition
of the gospel is the word “grace.” It
would be fair to say that the nature of grace is giving, and when we study the
Bible we see that it speaks much more about giving than getting, and that is
because God’s nature is to give, and what a wonderful nature that is. Unfortunately we as human beings are very
selfish and many times do not think of giving, but getting. God’s grace has nothing to do with anything
we have done or have failed to do; it can only be received.
The reason that God is gracious is
because that is who He is as it is one of His attributes. God is not gracious because of who or what we are, as He has
always been gracious and always will be because that is who He is and He is
immutable, (never changing). God’s grace
is therefore unmerited, unearned, and undeserved. It depends totally on the One who gives it, not on those who are
receiving it. Grace is God’s
self-motivated, self-generated, sovereign act of giving. These statements kind of or should make us
want to dwell on them for a while, as they take us out of the picture as far as
receiving any favor from God by our own efforts, as it only comes from
God.
This is Sunday
and Sunday’s are hard on me (in a good way) but still hard on me as when one
teaches the Word of God it takes a lot out of you.
The verse that
goes along with the quotation from Benjamin Franklin comes from Psalm 90:12 “So
teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.”
3/10/2019 9:10
PM
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