Our Spiritual Richness

I am about to look at what Ephesians 4:4-6 with emphasis on verse 6 which states, that being, "There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, Who is over all and through all and in all." But before I do I will again call on Norman Grubbs and Pastor Hoekstra and his writing on Grace as our needed prerequisite for life, spiritual life. Taking his thoughts from Jesus. And as always I depend on the LORD to provide more and often deeper insight to His revelation of transformation and reformation than is provided. And I will also use the ESV translation when I get into my subject matter, which  may require another posting.


Romans
By Norman P. Grubb

"This is what took place in the case of Esau. Notice it doesn’t say that Jacob would be accepted and Esau would be rejected. He said “The elder shall serve the younger." Then he quotes from Malachi, “As it is written afterwards, “Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated.” Now something else has come in there. That first prophecy before birth didn’t say that. It just said that they would have a certain relationship. One would serve the other. But, long afterwards, it says this, “Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated.” You see hate is only love in reverse. Every opposite is only the thing in reverse. “No” is ‘yes’ in reverse. It is just saying “yes” turned around, that is all. Hate is the reversal of love. If love loves one way, it must hate in the opposite way. If love identifies with self-giving-love, it must hate self-loving-love. If love identifies with self-giving-love, it must hate self-loving-love. Of course it must. So hate and love are one thing.

It is said of Jesus in Hebrews 1:9 “Thou has loved righteousness and hated iniquity, therefore God, even thy God hath anointed Thee with the oil of gladness above Thy fellows.” That is a statement about the Lord Jesus Christ in Hebrews 1. If you love in the right way you must hate the wrong ways. Of course we do. The seriousness is our identification with the right or the wrong. When we as persons identify, then we are of course in the love dimension. If we identify with the wrong, that hate is on us. As we see later on, it is a hate that can be reversed. The reason it can be reversed is all of us are an Esau. We don’t start as Jacobs. Jacob is the one whose heart was set on GOD and who moved into the new birth and bought the birthright promises and remains all the way, GOD’s precious person.

We all start out in life as an Esau; of course we do. Esau represents people who are self-against GOD. Mind you, if a person is born the elder and has the elder’s birthright privileges and he is taught by his parents what the real privileges are—that GOD is your God and GOD has eternal destiny, eternal purposes for you, eternal operations—and then you wipe God out and despise Him, and sell Him for a bunch of lentils, that is pretty contemptuous. See, that person was contemptuous of GOD or he wouldn’t have sold his birthright for a bowl of lentils—if he had any thought of the wonder of GOD. He was a man of the flesh. He had no wonder of GOD and His promises and all that became to him nonsense. That is what the world despises. Well you see you are then in the hate realm. As you see later on that doesn’t mean that you can’t be love, because everybody starts out hating, really. We have all been an Esau, we all start in life rejecting GOD in our own way—turning our back on Him and being bound to the flesh and to the world and to the devil. We have all been an Esau."


"Jesus' Example of Grace Developing Our Lives"
By Pastor Hoekstra

"And the Child grew and became strong in spirit, filled with wisdom; and the grace of God was upon Him . . . And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men." (Luke 2:40, 52)


"In our previous devotional, we looked at the suffering that prepares us for GOD's Grace to work in our lives, developing us spiritually. Jesus was given as the primary example of this truth. In our present verses, we see Jesus as the example of grace developing our lives comprehensively.

When the Son of GOD came into the world as a man, He laid aside the independent exercise of His deity: "who, being in the form of GOD, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, and made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a servant" (Philippians 2:6-7). He then developed as any man should (except, He was without sin). "And the Child grew and became strong in spirit, filled with wisdom." Jesus grew in spiritual strength, as the LORD wants us to do: "strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, for all patience and longsuffering with joy" (Colossians 1:11). The wisdom of the Father began to permeate His life, as He also desires for us: "that you may be filled with the knowledge of His Will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding" (Colossians 1:9). When Jesus was twelve years old, His spiritual maturity and wisdom were evident, as He discussed the faith with the leaders of Israel. His parents "found Him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, both listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard Him were astonished at His understanding and answers" (Luke 2:46-47). 

Jesus continued to develop in spiritual maturity, pleasing His heavenly Father and impacting the people. "This is My beloved Son, in Whom I am well pleased . . . Now about the middle of the feast Jesus went up into the temple and taught. And the Jews marveled, saying, 'How does this Man know letters, having never studied?' " (Matthew 17:5 and John 7:14-15). The LORD wants our walk with Him and our testimony before others to grow, just as in Jesus' life. "Walk as children of light . . . proving what is acceptable to the LORD . . . that you may become blameless and harmless, children of GOD without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world" (Ephesians 5:8, 10 and Philippians 2:15). 

In Jesus' life, this godly progress was accomplished by the Grace of GOD at work: "and the Grace of GOD was upon Him." So it is to be in our lives. "