VIRTUES OF THE CROSS 1B

Take note of the following virtues:

1. Virtues of worship and giving.
Understand that true worship is devotion to God, complete devotion, unalloyed devotion to God born out of correct placement of value in your relationship with him. True worship is being so fanatically in love with God that the very idea of substituting that love for anything else does not even remotely exist. Worship is ‘worth-ship’ – what is your relationship with God worth? Some people relate with God as if he is their errand boy; they don’t know anything about the God they serve. One of the reasons why Adam fell was because he was not a true worshipper. It is dangerous to go to Church and not be a true worshipper; the danger lies in the fact that such a person may end up like Adam. A perfect man in a perfect environment with just one command – a perfect man was not a true worshipper. Who do you blame for this?

Adam made wrong choices based on the exercise of his will. Your will is your deciding self; it is your right to choose. Like I usually tell people, yes, you have a right to choose but for every decision, there is price. Gen. 3:15, “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel”. This is the first messianic prophecy. After Adam sinned and fell, God judged his sin as well as the creature that caused Adam to sin. In judging the creature, God went ahead out of his love and divine benevolence to establish a way of escape for fallen man. The seed of the woman will bruise the head of the serpent and the serpent will bruise the heel of that seed. That messianic prophecy was fulfilled on the cross.

When man fell, he realized that he was naked and quickly tried to fix it by himself – self will. He sewed leaves together and used it to cover his nakedness. God said no and instead brought animal skin which he used to cover the nakedness of man. Before you can have an animal skin, you must have killed the animal. Blood had to be shed for there to be remission of sin; without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin (Heb. 9:22^b). Take note of this. A bloodless sacrifice is a worthless sacrifice. While sin causes man to be naked, the glory of God covers man. You need to understand that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. The glory cover can only be restored with the judgment of sin. Sin was judged on the cross. Jesus was made sin for all, he became sin for us in order to fulfill the righteous requirement of a holy God.

Pray

• Dear Heavenly Father, I worship and adore you. Thank you so much for sending your son Jesus Christ to die for my sins. I appropriate the fullness of the blessings of the cross of Christ upon every area of my life and I give you all the glory in Jesus’ name.

TO BE CONTINUED……..