The Devotional - A Look at the Book #873

by Jesse Abel

 

Thoughts from Papa “J”

 

It is amazing how we can be so like-minded in faith, joy and godliness but so different in life, liberty and happiness!

 

Good Morning

 

2 Corinthians 1:15-2:1 – We are accountable for our words, our deeds and our actions; again this is not new information to any of us. Yet when it comes to owning up to these works we tend to disconnect our self from that responsibility by blaming others. This accountability is to God and man. Acts 24:16

 

Where or what are we to do? Well, if we claim salvation by grace through faith then we have a plan, God’s plan and one that is always resting in the person of Jesus Christ. The plan is that we would express the grace of God through our faith in God. I confess that I do not always do that, in that my plans are sometimes selfish and bent on pleasing me.

 

Pleasing self is opposing God, one look at Jesus and His ministry to the people around Him reveals that His faith rested in His Father and so too should our faith rest in God who we claim as our Father. Jesus did not rely on faith in people, but He did marvel and comment on faith when He observed it in people. Matthew 8:10.

 

So I believe that the apostle Paul in our passage of 2 Corinthians 1 and 2 is saying this as well. That God provides his sons and daughters with comfort through suffering, sincerity and confidence in our relationships (both with God and man) through a working faith. The writer of Hebrews expresses this same thought with the idea of a faith/rest in Hebrews 4:1-8.

 

If we are not resting in the promise of faith in our position in Christ our yes and no response to these critical issues of living life will waver and be unstable. Even James the half-brother of Jesus expresses the same thought in James 1:2-8 as he explains how we are to profit spiritually through the trials of life in Christ. So here we have two or three writers expressing that our yes and our no responses to godliness should be taken serious that is assuming that you agree that faith rest is godliness in action.

 

No person is to have dominion over the faith of another and it is simple really in that if my yes and no is personal, I can destroy the faith of another. My yes and my no then should always be in godliness, for in godliness there is great gain because we are fellow workers in the joy of the LORD and by this our joy is standing in a strong and likeminded faith with others.