Saturday 18 September 2010

Ezekiel 33-36

I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
Ezekiel 36.26


There are verses in this chapter that slam Israel's failure, but over 20 times God says "I will" followed by a different promise of restoration. What's the point? You couldn't do it, so "I will". Peter wrote that:

[God's] promises...enable you to share his divine nature.
2 Peter 1.4.


So we become holy by believing in a promise. His work, not mine. His will not mine. His glory, not mine. Holiness does not begin with my behaviour. Holiness comes through changing my beliefs. Do I really believe I can access the nature of God?

Jesus did not just die to forgive my sins, He died to make me one with Him. He didn't just deal with the stone tablets that condemned me (the stone heart) he brought me into His nature, (His heart of flesh). This is why Paul wrote:

I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.
Galatians 2.20


I died when He died, and I experience His nature the same way I experience His forgiveness: by faith in the promise of Jesus Christ.

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