The only meeting place between God and man is Calvary. It is there and there alone that faith is recognized.
“For the Law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect.” Hebrews 10:1
The Mosaic Law, or ANY law for that matter, can make the comers perfect. Even the Mosaic Law and the sacrifices thereof could not take away the sin of man but would only cover sin. It is the Blood of Jesus alone that TAKES AWAY sin of the world.
Those who are called by His Name, we who have freely chosen to follow the Lord Jesus Christ, have been forgiven of our sins. Our sins and our iniquities are remembered no more. Many are quick to point out the heathen we once were, even some professing Christians, but the fact of the matter is the Blood of Christ Jesus washed those sins away and they have been tossed into the sea of forgiveness. The fact that we once did the same thing sinners do (because we too were sinners) doesn’t mean we were right in doing so.
“9 Then said He (JESUS), Lo, I come to do Your Will, O God. He takes away the First (Covenant), that He may establish the Second (the New Covenant).
10 By the which will we are Sanctified through the offering of the Body of Jesus Christ once for all.” Hebrews 10:9-10
Vain philosophies with sincere intentions will not sanctify the Believer…even when cloaked in Scripture. Going to the Cross of Christ with our humanistic psychology, sanctimonious rituals and traditions of man for victorious Christian living is a type of Cain’s offering and not of faith. Our faith cannot be in two things. We cannot have 99% faith in the Cross of Christ for Sanctification and 1% in “our part”. Our part is not of God. Our part contaminates His Part.
It is the ministry of the Holy Spirit to write God’s laws on our heart (Hebrews 10:16). The Holy Spirit can and will remove those things that are not pleasing unto God and replace (not rehabilitate) them with His desires as long as we approach the place HE ordained for our Sanctification with utter dependence and faith upon HIS Prescribe Order of Victory ALONE…no leaven, no poison, nothing added to the Cross of Christ Jesus but faith in His Sanctifying power.
We are Sanctified through the Body of Jesus Christ once and for all. One Sacrifice did it all. Perfection has not put on perfection this side of glory but daily there remains a work to do in our hearts for they are indeed deceiving. Our hair may gray, the wrinkles may form but the heart that is perfect toward God, is a heart that is being divided asunder where His strength may be made perfect and Jesus Christ glorified. Be careful of judging the perceived weak Christians, those whose humility is deemed as weakness, for it is often their hearts and prayers that the Lord is seeking to reveal HIS glory.
The fight of faith is not an easy fight. The world, the flesh and the devil are battling to redirect that faith. But knowing this, knowing that our old man is crucified with Christ, that the body of sin might be destroyed, we know that we have been freed from sin’s power (Romans 6:6-7). Knowing in Whom we have believed, we are determined to know nothing else. The fads and vain philosophies that we once chose are now as dung. We have seen the Lord move in our hearts when our faith was redirected back to Him, Who He is and what He did. When we returned to our first Love, Jesus Christ and Him crucified, the only meeting place between God and man, our heart was quickened and we once again believed. Our belief wasn’t for Salvation for we were already born again, but for Sanctification, for victorious Christian living…for the power of sin to be broken by the Blood of Christ – just like the Bible says.
Jesus still stands at the door knocking, bidding those to come…whosoever will come; come back to the only place where God and man can meet; the only place where we can approach the Throne of God with boldness…the Cross of Christ and be determined to know nothing else among you.
-Donna Clark Warren
Living in The Spirit 