Day 4039 of the 7 day Bible verse challenge.

Galatians 3:13 NIV

The redemption

It’s the active expression of what it is to redeem which is defined as either:

1- To compensate for the faults or bad aspects of, i.e. make up for or make amends for

2- To gain or regain possession of something in exchange for payment, to exchange

3- To fulfill or carry out a pledge or promise, to make good on one’s word

4- To obtain the release or restoration of, such as from captivity, by paying a ransom

5- To make someone or something seem less bad, to improve

6- To free from a lien or debt by payment of an amount secured thereby

7- To deliver from sin and its consequences by means of a sacrifice offered for the sinner

And what’s amazing, or at least ought to be curious enough to inspire in us a willingness to read of Him is that the Gospel of Christ Jesus is built upon the completion of every single one of every single aspect, idea, intention, direction, decision, devotion, determination and definition listed above. He accomplished on our behalf every possible way for our to be brought back by His paying our debt in an effort to buy us back from the sins to whom we’ve all sold our souls seeking from the funds secured thereby to gain what’s long been, in our eyes, all that mattered more.

Than what?

Than everything. Indeed, all of us have succumbed to this idea, to this lie that this life as is lived in this place is thus best to be lived as if this place. And by that I mean that we’ve lived as if this place is both the best example for our to follow, an idea leading unto our sharing of all the sins running rampant here still and thus us as nothing more than a too-fallen reflection of what remains a revolting rebellion aimed against He who, again, did all of that I listed above for all of us.

And what’s even more is that we’ve not only lived as if we are of this place, as if we are this place, but we’ve thus set our sights on seeking then for nothing more than this place thereby perpetuating the cycle of what’s become such a cynical outlook upon both Christ and thus Christianity that the vast majority here both always has and has currently, for a while longer at least, this overall estimation of His insinuation of our being sinners being nothing more than some fairy tale designed to impress or distress those too weak to want more of what’s here.

Yes, to those who are perishing the message of the cross is foolishness because, well, they don’t know they’re perishing. Rather, as is a matter of growing obviousness and blatancy, most amongst this still falling humanity seem to still assume, through eyes blinded to hope by a false hope placed in every false god we have made or will make out of, well, just about anything to be honest, that He didn’t do all the Bible says He did all because if He did then we are wrong and that is bad.

Why?

Because despite our longstanding high opinion of ourselves as is poured in pride and planned in arrogance, we know we can’t do what He did. And so, if we are really sinners who’ve thus angered a righteous God who is then to be undeniably justified in His seeking for Himself justice in whatever form such fury might be both met and then finally satisfied, well, we’re doomed. Because those who’ve charged a debt are often those without the means to pay it back, at least when it comes to spiritual debts.

And true, there have been loans or favors that we have paid back. And I think that this is what forms at least one part of our continued misunderstanding as to the majesty of His amazing grace. It’s that so often in life we measure all such unknowns as all that He is by the things that we do know that we can only, at best, assume and/or hope are at least close to those things we do know.

But you see my friends, this only serves to deepen the problem.

Because in our trying to estimate God via the things and theories of this place we’re in, something we’ve all done because we can measure them, we’re thus limiting Him once again. And by once again I mean as in we’ve done the same before. In fact, we’ve done this very limiting of God every single time that we’ve ever said, done, thought or bought anything that turned out to be wicked or wrong that we only wanted because we either couldn’t or simply wouldn’t see it as such in the first place.

Indeed, every single empty word that we’ve ever spoken exists now as a glowing token of our having taken for granted He who gives us the ability to speak.

Every time that we’ve done wrong thinking it right, a national pastime at this point, we’ve done so having willfully forgotten He who gives us the knowledge of what is good.

Every time that we’ve acted outside of His will, doing as He blatantly called us not to do, we’ve thus shown Him that we neither trust Him nor then feel the need to honor Him.

And in truth, every single time that we’ve even pretended that we knew not what to do and acted anyway, doing then anything on our own or at the input or inspiration of another, we’ve thus too placed a mere human in the position of He who died to lead us in the way we should go so as to lead us back home, thus too turning Heaven into a hope held inside this place that we are both living in and living like.

Neither of which was His plan or purpose for us.

Granted, He did place us here, but friends, what here has become at the hands of whoever it is that we too have become, it’s not what He intended for any of this to be. No, at first He created a Garden and then placed in it those first of our kind to tend said creation, enjoying forever the fruits thereof.

But even then it still wasn’t enough.

For such has been the longest lie ever told. That there’s something more here that we’re missing. That there’s more inside of us than we’ve ever dared imagine. That there exists inside of us an ability to rely on us, to trust in us, to seek for us then these thrones from which we exist to guide the rest unto their emulation of our estimation as to what all of this means and thus how best to live accordingly.

Yes, the devil has never once changed his game. Tactics? Yeah. Tricks? Sure. But he’s never once changed his game because, well, he doesn’t need to. Rather we all just awake every single day to once again play right along with his well-told purpose of stealing and killing and destroying.

A fact proven in that all such things are now common things that we do ourselves.

Indeed, to steal is something so common that anymore many don’t even blink an eye whenever someone does. To kill has likewise become something that we’ve all become so accustomed to that we barely skip a beat whenever we see the breaking news. And thus, those two and all their criminalistics like combined, so too are we then either actively partaking in or at the very least tuning in to what is then a world that we are destroying.

Yes, we are doing the devil’s bidding and watching civilization as we once knew it fade into a fallout from which there will be no forgiveness.

And yes, you read that right.

There comes a day, and probably quite soon considering the degree of darkness we see and how it’s only ever deepening, upon which the opportunity at forgiveness will be gone forever. Why? Because despite His being patient with us, at some point common sense and reality simply must win out. And, well, common sense tells us that there are just some of us who will never turn from our wickedness.

 And that’s because, well, many in this place seem as of yet quite unable to even see their wickedness. Rather most here continue to abide inside this lie that has them thinking that they’re winning.

And granted, I suppose they are. I guess you could say that everyone here is in fact winning something. Actually, the Bible itself tells us plain that there will be many who have lived in this place who, having lived seeking their rewards here, have indeed come to find their rewards here. And actually the Bible says that of such there will be many.

Why?

Because, thus far, all of us have sought our rewards in this place. Every single person who has ever lived has lived seeing this world, at least at times, as being everything from their home to their hope. Yes, every human has given themselves over to this suggestion that we should seek for ourselves something in and of this world to make our lives lived both in and sadly too of this world more lavish, more lovely, more impressive, more amazing, more comfortable and thus relaxing.

And yet it’s within this that we’ve then relaxed. We’ve grown comfortable. We’ve in fact grown then complacent because, well, who having become both comfortable and commended would then dare turn from their doing of whatever they did to arrive at such a pleasing destination?

No, this is why the devil has again never really had to change his game. For our adversary knows that so long as he can keep us convinced that there’s something in this world that we need to make our lives go just right, look just right, feel just right, he knows then that we’ll lose sleep at night trying to find some way to force said ideals into our lives.

The devil knows there’s nothing we won’t do to have more of the riches and fame that are being found by so many in this place.

Why?

Because another of our favorite lies is this idea of comparison that we’ve continued to accept as something of a reasonable use of our existence.

And yet, again, it’s only then another sin because God never once created us to compete with anyone else in what’s become nothing more than some race in which we live as if everybody wins.

Indeed, down here we’re all about participation trophies and rounds of applause given just for trying.

Why?

Because anymore anyone who does dare to try has indeed done far more than most.

Because most everyone else gave up long ago. Again, we got comfortable. We grew complacent. We willfully succumbed to this life of such moral debasement that we now have no basement to limit the depths to which we’ll go seeking for more of whatever grows in the ever-deepening depravity of this place. No, we continue to prove a people who will go always further, reach always higher, crave always more and do always the same seeking to stave this lust living inside of us.

There is no limit to our sinfulness as neither is there a limit to sin.

No, death will always be more than happy to kill even more. Indeed, there is only one place in this world that has never proven full or satisfied. And that’s the grave. Rather that place has become the finish line for every single life ever lived here as none who have been here have ever managed to stay.

And yet we go on living as if we will.

We go on giving our days away to this idea that this world has something that we need. We give our time to the doing of things that we may not even want to do all so that we can have something that we’ll only have to lose. We give our minds to trying to find some way to make our lives into whatever it is that we’ve grown to desire them to become as is made of all that we see, hear, like and love within this land.

And thus, again, we live looking to, leaning on, learning from and lusting for all that’s here.

Meaning then that God has never been on our radar thanks to our having become spiritual retards who seek not for things outside this world. No, rather we’ve all delighted to contain our every want and worry to a world that we’re promised to be leaving. Which is something only done so long as we refuse to accept that we are leaving. Which is also something done only because we neither want to leave and have lived as if there’s nowhere else to go.

Once again denying Him who’s called us openly to come unto Him as He hung upon our place upon that cross paying for our debt, ransoming our lives, securing our salvation, forging our forgiveness, giving us then the promise of eternal life thanks to His having overcome the death we’ve all lived to love.

And yet we turn Him down.

We turn away. We turn back toward the way of life we’ve always known doing only what we can only at best hope is good enough to amount for us some existence in which we’re comfortable, comparable, competitive and hopefully then victorious.

In what remains a race to the one place none of us should want to go.

And how can we know?

Look at the cross!

Friends, the suffering seen upon that scene is something that is but a taste of the entirely justified vengeance God has against us thanks to our having lived going against Him. Christ endured the misery that is death in a separation from God for three days.

Those without Christ are promised to experience it forever.

What then are we doing here? That is truly one of my favorite verses and questions in all of Scripture! What are we doing here defines the fact that God had to come find us thanks to our having run off from the kind of life He calls us to live doing the things that we’re thus not interested in doing. And indeed, we’ve all spent our lives doing just about everything other than honoring God. We’ve done everything we could ever think of to keep us distracted from that even being an idea!

And Jesus died to show us how wrong we were in doing it all.

Such is now where life stands. It’s nothing but each of us at this crossroads split between our continued doing of things as we’ve always done them and our doing now something different.

For that is now the price of our existence.

Because you see, Christ has now paid for our sins. He has given Himself as a ransom meant to redeem us from the years we’ve spent in willful rebellion. He has become the propitiation for our degeneration. He has made us new. But friends, if we don’t do anything new then no, we’re clearly then not in Him and He not in us and thus we’re just still whoever we were.

Problem is that who we were before He came was nothing more than a sea of sinners eating their dinners as if He didn’t die because He never lived.

How is God supposed to be good with this?

Friends, the existence of hell says He isn’t. And granted, we walk amongst a many who still claim they can’t see hell from where we’re all still standing. But is hell not glimpsed in our world going from bad to worse all the time? Is it not witnessed in part in all that’s falling apart in this place? Is it not seen inside the things people are doing still? Can we not see images of hell within all the hatred that has folks hurting and harming one another?

And can we not then imagine Heaven as everything that this place isn’t?

Indeed, we can imagine Heaven as God himself has placed the place inside our minds. He gives us all the ability to imagine something better, someplace better, someone better than we know we’ve become.

Only difference is that to be proven between those who do something about it and those who go on doing only nothing different.

Either way the simple fact remains that God has redeemed us with the precious blood of Jesus. He has set us free and offered to forgive us our sins, our debts, our deaths if we’ll accept Christ as the fulfillment of His promise to at first punish us for the wrongs we’ve done and then welcome us as if we’d done none of them. Something that can only happen thanks to His having taken our sins upon Himself and paying the debt that every single one of them owes.

A debt that we then shouldn’t go on living only continuing to charge.

That’s what has to change. That’s what should change. That’s what we should want to change! Seeing Him suffering and knowing that it was because of us should instill in us an unbridled inspiration to do none of what we have and remain nothing of who we were.

Because such a price should help us see that we’re worth more than we’ve been living for.

Do we see it yet?

Or, like most, are we still living for only all that’s already dead?

Friends, the fact is that as this world is passing away, so too then is everything herein also doing the same. Everything here is dying and, again, we see this all the time. Our culture is collapsing and He’s only allowing it to get this bad so that we can see that we shouldn’t want any part of this world nor what it’s become nor then who we’ve become having become of the mind to spend this life doing as the world does.

He has something better for us and it is in fact so amazing that Christ died in our place so that we too could share in where He went afterward.

But that ride doesn’t come free as freedom never does.

No, there is rather a price still to be paid for our salvation. Because since He became a curse on our behalf, we should seek to be no longer a burden unto His. Rather we should seek out whatever remains in us that He died to remove from us and indeed insist it gone. Not because it’s easy but because neither is what He endured for us to have that opportunity.

Because what an opportunity it is that we do have!

To be again sons and daughters of a Father who loves us so much that He sent His only Son to come and find us, to die to save us, to then take from us this worldly insinuation that it’s on us to find our own way to the best of all possible destinations.

It isn’t.

Rather Christ is the Way and Heaven the finish line.

The only thing that we’ve to finish with along the way is all the sinfulness and selfishness that He helps us to see in us.

And no, it will never be easier. It will never feel better. It will not, in this world, become any simpler. But that’s because there is nothing simple about laying down a life but also because He’s made it so simple having laid down His for us to simply do the same.

That is why He came. It was to lead the way through the fire to the Father.

And yes, while this world will continue doing as all of us have done and shy away from the former, so too does that mean they’ll only continue to fall short of the latter.

And there is nothing acceptable, nor now redeemable about our continuing to do so.

For doing as we’ve done even after learning of the Son only proves that to us He’s not enough. But friends, there exists no other sacrifice. We either accept Christ or we don’t.

And don’t get me wrong, I understand how hard it is to accept Him in light of all such a journey will cost. But again my friends, everything here is already lost so what do we really have to lose?

And, well, what more do we stand to gain when we no longer stand in His way of His doing for us what He’s done for all?

#LeaveNoSoulUntold