LIVING WORTHY.

DAILY DEVOTION.

DAY THIRTY THREE.

EPHESIANS 4:1. I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called. 

In the verses prior to this Paul had been praying for the church at Ephesus that they would have the revelation of the power of the love of God, that they would know what it was to know the fullness of God's love irrespective of what situation they were in. He went on to say that as they did this that God would be able to do things way beyond what they could even ask or think and that He would be glorified. In this verse Paul is pleading with them that they would walk worthy of their calling, that their conduct and behavior would reflect the love of God, that they would continue to walk in the Spirit. The concept of walking worthy there speaks of the responsibility that we have to be aware of what Christ has done in our lives through the work of the cross, it is not walking in our own worth, it is not reliant on how we see ourselves but how God sees us in Christ, God sees us as His sons, accepted in the Beloved, accepted in Christ because of what He did on the cross. It is so important that we understand that when Jesus went to the cross He paid the full debt for us, there is nothing that we can do to earn God's love, we can't add to the worth that Christ has placed in our lives through His love. To often Christians think that we somehow have to prove our worth, to show that we are worthy of God's love, no you can't do that. It says in Romans 5:8 that God demonstrated His love towards us that while were still sinners Christ died for us. He knew you before the foundation of the world, God knew what you would do  before you even thought of it and He still loved you and placed your destiny in Christ. You were in Him when He went to the cross. It says in Ephesians 2:10 That we are His workmanship in Christ, created for the good works that God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. We are His workmanship created in Christ, we are who we are in Christ because of what Christ did on the cross and because of who He is in us, we are being transformed into His image, from glory to glory through the Spirit of the Lord. The good works are walking in His holiness, walking in such a way that we bring glory to God, fulfilling His purpose and desire for our lives. It is in this, as we walk in this that we will walk worthy of the calling that God has on our lives, that our lives will bring glory to God and we will reflect the love of Christ to those around us. AMEN. 

THE OLD MAN CRUCIFIED.

DAILY DEVOTION.

DAY THIRTY TWO.

ROMANS 6:6.  Knowing this, that your old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin.
This is such an important verse for us as Christians, the revelation of this verse and what Christ has done for us on the cross will transform our lives and help give us victory over the power of sin in our lives. When Jesus went to the cross and died for our sin through His broken body and shed blood He not only opened the door for our sins to be forgiven but He rendered the sin nature powerless. As it says in 2 Corinthians 5:21 He became sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Him, we are no longer dead spiritually, cut off from God but we are now new creations in Christ, there is now a new man living on the inside, your spirit is now been born again or rejuvenated, brought back into relationship with your Heavenly Father and as it says in 2 Peter 1:4 we are now partakers of God's divine nature, His Spirit lives in our spirit, God has removed the heart of stone and given us a heart of flesh. So how does this help us in our daily walk? How does this help us in dealing with sin and the flesh? As Paul said in Galatians 2:20, "I have been crucified in Christ, it is no longer I who lives but Christ who lives in me, and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave His life for me." Through the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ, which lives in us we now have the ability to surrender our lives to Him, we have the authority within us, not within our own flesh, but in the power of the Spirit, to know that sin no longer has any power over us and we can walk free from it, yielding our lives to Christ as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable. We now know, when temptation comes our way, we can boldly say no to it, we can stand in the righteousness of Christ and say with all assurance, "I am free from the power of this, The cross of Jesus has set me free and given me authority over every work of the flesh and every temptation that the enemy will try to bring against me". As Paul said in Galatians 2:20, it is by faith that we are in Christ, we are seated in Him, this is our spiritual position, our place of authority, we are seated in Heavenly places in Christ, far above all power and dominion and authority that would try to come against us. The old man was a slave to sin, under the power of satan with no real power to resist the pull of the world and its temptations, as hard as we could try to in the flesh we would ultimately walk in rebellion to God and fall into sin. Praise God for the cross of Christ and what it has done in our lives, Let us all be like Paul and say, as he did in Galatians 6:14, "God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world" My prayer is that we would all get a greater revelation of the power of the cross in our lives, it is only through the power of the cross, what Jesus did on that cross for us, that we can truly know the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives, that we can truly know that we don't have to live in the strength of our own lives, but that we can know that it is Christ in us, the hope of glory, that gives us the power to live victorious lives. AMEN.