Today's Gift: Hope

Today's Scripture: 1 Peter 1:13
Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. (ESV)

Today's Focus: Our True Hope is in Christ
As we prepare our hearts to celebrate the first coming of our Lord, think hard on the second advent, the second coming of Christ. The longing we have to see the brokenness of this world to be fixed is not unlike what was felt in the longing for the first coming of the Messiah. Our hope is not to be found in the solutions offered by this world but in the singular solution of God: the coming of Christ. So, our gift today is the gift of hope, hope that is found only in Jesus Christ because He is our Hope.

Today's Gift: Faith

Today's Scripture: Eph 2:8
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God. (ESV)

Today's Thought
The central doctrine of true Christianity is justification by faith alone. We are justified, declared righteous before God, by the grace of God alone through our faith alone in Jesus Christ alone. Our salvation through faith is the gift of God. To be clear that our justification is all of grace Paul continues by writing in Eph 2:9 that it is "not a result of works, so that no one may boast." Even our faith itself is a gift of God. As Paul writes in Phil 1:29, it was "granted...to believe in Him." Indeed, God assigns to each of us "the measure of faith" we have (Rom 12:3). So, today we rejoice in the gift of faith that God has given to us, faith that is a gift of grace that saves us from our sin.

Today's Gift: Justification

Today's Scripture: Matt 1:21
She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. (ESV)

Today's Thought
His name is Jesus. Why? Because "he will save his people from their sins." Jesus is the Greek form of the Hebrew word Joshua (Yeshua), which means "God saves." Jesus' name literally means "God saves," or to personify it slightly more, "God's Savior." Savior from what? From sin. And why do we need to be saved from sin? Because our sin, our rebellion against God, makes us His enemy who deserve His wrath and judgment. So who can save us from God's wrath? Jesus. He is "God's Savior", the only Savior sent from God (Acts 4:12). But why would Jesus save us? Because this is the Father's will (John 6:40). And what did Jesus do to save us? He lived a sinless life and then died on the cross for our sins (not his own). And how do we take hold of this unearned and undeserved gift of salvation? By placing our faith alone in Christ alone, believing and knowing that His life and death were utterly sufficient to secure our salvation from sin. And the result? JUSTIFICATION! We are declared righteous before God the Father, not because of any work we do but because of the work that Christ has done on our behalf. 

Today's Gift: Expiation

Today's Scripture: Psa 103:12

As far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us. (ESV)

Today's Thought
As followers of Christ, we don't just want to be free of the guilt of sinning, we want to be free of sin, freeing of sinning itself (1 John 2:1). We want sin itself removed from our lives, not just the ill effects of sin. John Owen calls this "the proper purpose of the doctrine of the gospel." (Owen, Indwelling Sin in Believers, 105) And this is what Psa 103:12 points us to. God does not merely remove the guilt of sin from our life; His work is to remove sin itself from our lives. This is what "expiation" means: "removal of, or cleansing from, sin." For believers who are "in Christ" we stand positionally "in Christ", which means that He has already done and accomplished what is needed to remove sin from our lives. That is the "already" reality. But in our lives right now, through the process of sanctification we are growing in holiness and in the removal of sin. And ultimately, what is true of positionally now and will be true of us personally in the future (Rev 21:4): sin will be completely gone from our lives. This is the gift of expiation: positionally, gradually, and ultimately sin will be removed from our lives.

Today's Gift: Propitiation

Today's Scripture: 1 John 4:10
In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. (ESV)

Today's Thought
Propitiation is a term that we don't typically use day-to-day, but it has HUGE implication for our lives! Like the gift of expiation (the removal of sin) that we looked at in yesterday's devotional, propitiation is a gift from God that is part of Christ's death on the cross. Propitiation is the satisfaction of God's wrath against us for our sin, our rebellion against him. Our sin against God demands a just punishment from God. The gift of Jesus' death on the cross includes for those who believe in Christ that Jesus bore the just wrath of God against us for our sin. Jesus dying for our sins is simultaneously an act of justice by God the Father and an act of mercy and love by God the Father (Rom 3:26; Rom 5:8). Rather than receive just wrath for our sin, we receive the gift of just forgiveness because by grace through faith in Jesus we are in Christ, whose death on the cross was the propitiation for our sin (Rom 3:25). Through the atoning work of Christ on the cross, God's wrath against us for our sin is turned to God's favor towards us for our being in Christ!

Glory to God in the highest,
and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!
Luke 2:14 (ESV)

Today's Gift: Reconciliation

Today's Scripture: 2 Cor 5:18
All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation. (ESV)

Today's Thought
Today we celebrate that in the coming of Christ, our reconciliation with God is made possible. The coming of Christ, living a sinless life, and dying a death for our sin accomplished for us what we could not accomplish: reconciliation with God. No matter our desire, no matter our effort, no matter our sacrifice, nothing we can do will ever reconcile us to God. One and only one man (who is also fully God) can do and did this: Jesus. And God did not leave this up to us. Rather, He took the initiative; He gave us His son so that we could be reconciled to Him. Rather, than living in rebellion with God, being alienated from Him, God planned and accomplished all that was necessary to reconcile us to Himself.

Today's Gift: The Church

Today's Scripture: Col 3:11
Where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free: but Christ is all, and in all. (ESV)

Today's Thought
The body of Christ, the Church, is a gift from God. More, our own local body of Christ, our own local church, is a gift from God. We are a people who gather to remember and to celebrate over and over, week in and week out, the gospel and our God. We live together in the body of Christ to bear one another's burdens, to encourage one another in times of hard ship and suffering, to celebrate with one another in times of blessing and joy. In short, we love one another. And we do all this for one central reason: we are all in Christ, everyone of us is a follower of Christ. Our background, our socio-economic status, our struggles, our sins...none of this matters. What matters is that everyone of us has embraced Christ as our Lord and Savior by faith. We are the people that Christ has saved. We are His people. And we are his people together as the Church universal and the church local, the people who God saved by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone.

Today's Gift: Power

Today's Scripture: 2 Pet 1:3
His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence. (ESV)

Today's Thought
One of the great gifts that Christ's first coming (his life and death) accomplished was that those who place their faith in Christ are now granted "all things that pertain to life and godliness." "All [these] things" come to us "through the knowledge of him." This knowledge is "the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord" (2 Pet 1:2). The great gift is that God grants to us the power to truly live lives of godliness that bring Him glory through growing our knowledge of Christ. The more we know Christ (not merely know about Him), the more we grow in our likeness of Him. There is true power at work in our lives through God the Holy Spirit to conform us to the image of Christ (Rom 8:29) by renewing our minds (Rom 12:2) so that "his own glory and excellence" will be on display. Today's gift from God to us is the power to display His glory and excellence through our becoming more and more like Christ.

Today's Gift: Love

Today's Scripture: Mark 10:21a
And Jesus, looking at him, loved him... (ESV)

Today's Thought
Today we are reminded of this: we can't earn God's love. He loves us in our sinful state. Jesus' love for us is undeserved. While we are our sin, He looks on us in love. This is what he does towards the Rich Young Ruler in Mark 10. He looks upon him in love. The Rich Young Ruler thinks he can do something that would allow him to inherit eternal life. So Jesus tells Him he must give up what he treasures and follow Christ. Jesus did not tell the Rich Young Ruler this to condemn him but to show to the Rich Young Ruler that what he needed was a radical reorientation of what he loved. And Jesus loved Him despite that lack of radical reorientation. This is what Christ does for us: "God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us" (Rom 5:8). God's love for us does not come because we deserve it. Quite the opposite. God's love for us comes because God loves us while we are still sinners, while we are still in rebellion against Him and in an utterly undeserving state. So today, we rejoice in the gift of the love of God that He looked upon us and loved us even while we were sinners.

Today's Gift: Imputation

Today's Scripture: 2 Cor 5:21
For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (ESV)

Today's Thought
Imputation is a word we may not be familiar with. It originates from Latin as an accounting term meaning "to credit to one's account." It's the idea that you are given a credit on an account including when you haven't done anything to deserve it. We all love this when we owe money. We should love it more when we owe for our sin. And this is what God does in our justification. He imputes, or credits, Christ's righteousness to us. This is what has been called "the great exchange." Christ takes our sin and Christ's righteousness is credited to us. Christ takes on what He never deserved: sin. We gain what we never deserved: righteous status before God. We stand in right relationship with God because we are credited Christ's righteous status. We do not deserve this; we do not earn this; it is "the free gift of righteousness" (Rom 5:17). This is entirely a gift from God the Father earned through active and passive obedience of Christ and credited to us because of our faith in Christ.

Today's Gift: Wisdom

Today's Scripture: Col 2:3
[Christ] in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. (ESV)

Today's Thought
In Christ are twin TREASURES of wisdom and knowledge. We don't come to Christ to merely to gain information and knowledge; we come to Christ gain wisdom along with true knowledge. We see, believe, and are compelled to live out truths like 1 Cor 13:2: that if we don't have love with all of our knowledge and abilities we have nothing. We long and earnestly seek to bear the fruit of the Spirit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control and fight against the works of the flesh, things like impurity, idolatry, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, envy, and "things like these." The wisdom given to us in Christ that comes with the true knowledge given to us in Christ is a great gift because we know what true godliness, true righteousness, true flourishing are. Those who don't know Christ, at best, only get to see a glimpse of this glorious gift of wisdom, and at worst, miss it altogether. So, today, rejoice in the gracious gift of wisdom in Christ that God has given to us.

Today's Gift: Contentment

Today's Scripture: 1 Tim 6:6
But godliness with contentment is great gain. (ESV)

Today's Thought
Contentment, being satisfied with what we have, is such a soothing and calming gift. There is so much in life that can drive our discontentment that manifests itself in worry, anger, and anxiety. The nagging questions of "Why don't I have what I so deeply desire?" and "Why does that other person have it?" can stir in our hearts discontentment. It can seep and manifest itself in all areas of our lives: relationships, health, spouses, children, family, security, success...the list is seemingly endless. Discontentment is the seed bed of bitterness, self-pity, and envy. The way to root this out is to see the blessings that God has given us. The greatest blessing is that of Jesus! The Word became flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14) giving up his divine privileges, humbling himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross (Phil 2:8) so that we could be reconciled to God by Jesus' death (Rom 5:10) and be presented as holy and blameless and above reproach before God (Col 1:22). Christ's death gave to us the great gifts of reconciliation and godliness which should well up in us gratefulness and contentment!

Today's Gift: Victory

Today's Scripture: Col 2:15
He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him. (ESV)

Today's Thought
Jesus has triumphed over the spiritual authorities of this world and disarmed them. And our great gift? His victory becomes our victory through our faith in him. But exactly what does this mean? Second Corinthians 4:4 describes Satan as "the god of this world". But the point is not that Satan has absolutely sovereignty over everything in this world. The absolute sovereign ruler of this world is God. Rather, 2 Cor 4:4 shows what is meant: Satan "has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God." The great gift is that in Jesus' death he has won victory over Satan so that through the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives we can now see "the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God." The gift of Christ's victory is that we can know and see the glories of the gospel of Jesus Christ!

Today's Gift: Rest

Today's Scripture: Heb 4:9
So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. (ESV)

Today's Thought
The Christmas season can be exhausting. There are so many demands that wear us out: parties to plan, events to attend, gifts to buy, cards to write, etc. etc. etc. We get worn out physically, spiritually, and emotionally. But the writer of Hebrews reminds us that true rest from the unrelenting demands of our life is given to us from God. This rest is not just for the Christmas season but for every day and eternity. True rest comes from God through faith in Jesus not through our own works. Trying to find satisfaction in our working (doing things to appease/make happy ourselves or other people) is never ending. But never ending rest is found only in Jesus. One thing that life teaches us is that no amount of working we do will ever bring permanent rest. And today we are reminded that in Jesus is found the great gift of rest in our soul from the relentless demands of the world. (Matt 11:28-29)

Today's Gift: Sanctification

Today's Scripture: 2 Cor 3:18
And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit. (ESV)

Today's Thought
Sanctification is becoming more and more like Jesus. We are "transformed into the same image", the image of Jesus. God did not merely save us FROM the punishment of our sin. He saved us TO become like Christ. Truly beholding Jesus causes us to become like Jesus. This work of transformation "comes from the Lord who is the Spirit." The Holy Spirit works in our lives is to make us more and more like Christ. This is the gift of sanctification: God the Holy Spirit works in our lives so that as we behold the glory of Christ we become more and more like Christ.

Today's Gift: Glorification

Today's Scripture: 1 Cor 15:51
Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed. (ESV)

Today's Thought
The day will come when it will no longer be this way. We live in a world permeated with sin. The world around us needs to be redeemed from sin and "groans" waiting to be freed from it. (Rom 8:22) And so do we: we groan inwardly for the day that sin will be no more. (Rom 8:23; Rev 21:4) And therein lies the gift we reflect on today: the day will come in which "we shall all be changed," the day in which we will be "glorified." (Rom 8:30) Our glorification, being permanently freed entirely from the presence of sin and its effects upon our lives, is guaranteed. That day will come. It will no longer be this way. So, we have hope, true hope, "hope of eternal life, which God, who never lies, promised before the ages began." (Titus 1:2) Thus, today we are reminded of the gift that is to come, the gift of our glorification. As we celebrate the first coming of our Savior we also glory in his second coming, "waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ" in which sin will be no more.

Today's Gift: Justice and Vindication

Today's Scripture: Luke 1:52
He has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted those of humble estate. (ESV)

Today's Thought
​One of the challenging aspects of life can be the injustices that we experience. Often, we may question if they will ever be addressed and rectified. Today's verse, Luke 1:52, comes from Mary's praise of God for being chosen to be the mother of Jesus. In her praise, she rejoices that "He has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted those of humble estate." Mary proclaiming in her rejoicing that God shows no partiality among men (Rom 2:11). It does not matter if you are powerful like kings on their thrones or humble like those with no position, God considers both the same. And there is rejoicing that God will judge all people not according to their status among humans but by their status before Him. So, while justice may be delayed in this life, it will never be denied by our God. All people -- great or small, rich or poor, those in comfort or those in suffering -- will give account to God for themselves (Rom 14:11). So, rejoice today that justice will always be done because God is always, now and forever, in sovereign control over everything and everyone.

Today's Gift: Freedom

Today's Scripture: 2 Cor 3:17
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. (ESV)

Today's Thought
Our focus today is on the gift of freedom. But this freedom is not the freedom to do whatever we want. Rather, this is the freedom from the slavery of sin where we have to do what sin demands. (Rom 6:7; 8:2) This is the freedom that Christ brings. It is the freedom of being the true disciple of Jesus. (John 8:31) It is the freedom of hearing Jesus' words and truly following him. And when you listen to Jesus and truly know the truth, it will set you free. (John 8:32) When you trust Christ and embrace him as Lord, committing and seeking to follow him, then you will be free indeed (John 8:36), free from the bondage of being driven by sin to sin.

Today's Gift: Priesthood

Today's Scripture: 1 Pet 2:9
But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. (ESV)

Today's Thought
The Son of God became flesh as Jesus. He came to us. And by God coming to us, we can come to God. When we put our faith in Christ, He grants to us access to God the Father through the Holy Spirit. As Paul wrote, "For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father." (Eph 2:18) We no longer have earthly priests that are temporary because they are subject to sin and death (Heb 7:23); we have a sinless, permanent, eternal high priest (Heb 7:24) who intercedes for us eternally. And because of this we no longer need earthly priests to intercede for us before God; Christ is our intercessor (Heb 7:25) so that we now have access through the Holy Spirit to God ourselves as a royal priesthood. For all those who are in Christ, we have direct access to God.

All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation.
2 Cor 5:18 (ESV)

I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life. 
1 John 5:13 (ESV)

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Rom 6:23 (ESV)

These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.
John 15:11 (ESV)

For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. 
John 1:16 (ESV)