Skip to main content

FAITHFUL TO HELP

Hebrews 2:14-18

“Because God’s children are human beings—made of flesh and blood—the Son also became flesh and blood. For only as a human being could He die, and only by dying could He break the power of the devil, who had the power of death.  Only in this way could He set free all who have lived their lives as slaves to the fear of dying. We also know that the Son did not come to help angels; He came to help the descendants of Abraham. Therefore, it was necessary for Him to be made in every respect like us, His brothers and sisters, so that He could be our merciful and faithful High Priest before God. Then He could offer a sacrifice that would take away the sins of the people.  Since He Himself has gone through suffering and testing, He is able to help us when we are being tested.”

Everyone who has ever followed Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, Rescuer, Redeemer, and covenant Friend knows the frailty of their own humanity. Before the Lord revealed Himself to us, giving us grace to turn from sin and death and to surrender all we are to live under His gracious rule, we characters were educated and developed in sin. Going our own way was a natural as breathing.

When the Holy Spirit made clear the true condition of our lives, being dead in sin, there was only one singular hope for us. We needed the Holy Spirit to bring about in us a “new birth” that was from heaven, not achieved by human effort. We realized that being spiritually dead and broken, there was no way we could “fix” ourselves. We had to see there was no one more ineffective than a dead man. We desperately needed supernatural help from outside ourselves.

Jesus Christ, being fully human, knows our limitations and weaknesses without ever having sinned. He never internalized nor personalized sin. He alone knows the full-bore power of temptation as He resisted it always to the “nth” degree. His triumph of obedience to the Father out of love took Him to a Roman cross, where in time and in history, He bore the penalty for the sin of the whole of humanity. He alone could break the power of sin, the grave, death, and the devil.

Jesus knows how much we need Him. He is not surprised by our struggles. In fact, He is never disappointed in us because we never surprise Him by what we do amiss. Someone has said that the Lord had already factored in our stupidity when He called us out of death and into life. The Lord knows how to help us when we are tested a little or a lot. We don’t know how He needs to help us and it is folly to think we can advise Him on what we need. He alone knows what we need in times of trial and suffering. We simply need to believe Him and to call out, “Lord Jesus, I am Yours, save me.” That is the prayer martin Luther’s Abbot taught him in a black moment of doubt and fear.

Praying, “Lord, please help!” is a prayer the Lord will never ignore. Trust Him. He really does know you, and is there to help you because you are His disciple and child. He loves you.




Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

 HE IS RISEN! IT IS FINISHED! After the Israelites had passed through the Red Sea by God opening the way for them to be saved, the whole of Pharoah's army, his horsemen and chariots pursued God's people into the opened way. Once they were all in, the waters flowed back into their place with suddenness and fury. Not one of the enemies survived. All perished in those waters. When Jesus Christ hung on the cross, all that sin contained, the full measure of the rebellion of mankind for all time, all the wickedness that was ever in human hearts were absorbed into the Lamb of God as He died our death, received our just judgement from God for all time, taking all that sin and death contained. In Him, sin and death died once and for all. They were overwhelmed, covered and drowned in the sea of His precious blood, poured out for the sin of the whole world. Not one enemy remained alive, all were stripped of their power to hold us in slavery to sin any longer. All their weapons were confis...
Post a Comment
Read more
WHAT DO YOU BLESS? It would be an act of utter folly and disaster were I to choose to "bless" what God will not bless. God's wrath is set against anything and anyone that would try and hinder you becoming all He created you to be and to grow in by being united to Him through the sacrifice and resurrection of Jesus Christ. There is nothing arbitrary about the Word of God. He is very specific on what will make for life and what will not. Human life only becomes human life when the Holy Spirit becomes Life withing a believer. Being united to the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the follower of Jesus becomes a new creation and begins to live Life as God intended. God begins the good work, and He is the One who will bring it to competition. Somethings will NEVER make for life. What God calls sin, missing the mark of what will make for life, is always sin regardless of what culture anywhere and anytime say to the contrary. Sin cannot save, heal, redeem, restore or remake...
Post a Comment
Read more
 CONVICTION When the Holy Spirit convicts us of sin, He doesn't ask us to make it right. We can never add to what Jesus Christ has already done on the cross to deal with the totality of our sin. The Holy Spirit asks us to accept the truth, turn from sin and turn to the Lord. Then He will make it right. Remember Who our faith depends on from start to finish, that salvation is of the Lord alone. Laying aside every hindering weight and the sin that so easily trips us up (different for everyone), we are to run the race He has given us to run with perseverance, fixing our eyes on Jesus. He is the One upon Whom our faith depends on from start to finish. He will never run out of eyesight any more that a good shepherd would go ahead of the sheep he was leading where they couldn't see to follow. Hebrews 12:1-2 "Surrounded then as we are by a great cloud of witness to the life of faith, let us strip off everything that hinders us, as well as the sin which dogs our feet, and let us r...
Post a Comment
Read more