CHRIST-DAILY
DEVOTIONS
 March 24th

ABOUNDING WITH THANKSGIVING

"Rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving" (Col. 2:7).

Paul challenges and reminds us, "As you have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him" (Col. 2:6).  The Father sent the Holy Spirit to teach us of our need of Christ to save us from our sinful condition.  When we heard the Holy Spirit's word of Christ, faith came into us (Rom. 10:17).  By faith we believed in the 100% grace of our Lord's finished work on the cross for our sins.  We believed in the Father's 100% satisfaction with His atoning work, proven by the Father raising Jesus from the dead.  We were saved by the 100% grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and that not of ourselves (Eph. 2:8-9).  Even the faith that came to us, came by the Holy Spirit's word of Christ to us (Rom. 10:17).  Sure, we made a choice and believed, and that is important for sure. However, more important is it for us to realize that without the 100% grace of God extended to us, that choice and belief on our own would not have been possible.  It was not because of our heritage or background, not of our own selfish will, nor found in our heart, except that God did a 100% work of grace in us that we were saved (John  1:13).

If we were saved by the 100% grace of God,  then Paul challenges and reminds us, that we need to live by the 100% grace of God.  We need to be deeply rooted and grounded fully in Christ.  Christ is our 100% grace. Christ is our 100% life in every respect. Christians get into trouble, when they start living, thinking they are somebody aside from Christ.  No, we were gloriously born again 100% by the Spirit, and now we gloriously live this life – 100% by the Spirit.  We were not born again by the Spirit, to go back and live by the means of the flesh (Gal. 3:3).  Paul tells the Galatians, that they are foolish to think that way (Gal. 3:1).   We need to live in, by, and through Christ in us as us.

Now the Father has sent the Holy Spirit to continue His teaching and revealing of Christ in us as Christians.  We need to have His full revelation.  We need to fall in love with Jesus so much, that we let the Holy Spirit renew us to everything about Christ in us as us.  We need to understand everything that was 100% finished and done by Christ on the cross, so that we can walk in the full liberation of the Christ-life in this world today.  We need to be built up into the full knowledge of what it means to be in Christ and Christ in us as us.  We need to be so established in Him, and taught by the Holy Spirit with a full renewal of mind and heart in us.  Then, the Christ-life will be flowing in and through us to the Father and others spontaneously and fully.  We will be abounding with the presence of the Lord and the Christ-life in us as us, flowing in His love-for-others Spirit.  When Christ is spontaneously, regularly, and fully expressed in us; we will be abounding with thanksgiving to our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ for such 100% love and grace in us!  V

Written by Dwight Davis
Christ-Ministries
 

                                               

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