The Majesty of Receiving

I have heard it said that the current revival we are seeing impact the United States is a "grace" movement.  God's grace is all about what God has done on our behalf through the finished work of Jesus Christ, as opposed to what human beings try to do to reach God.  Jesus introduces the New Covenant in the Sermon on the Mount completely opposite of the Pharisee and Sadducees of the day. They required more and more laws and rules of the people to be acceptable to God, while Jesus begins with "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." (Matthew 5:3)  This is like the torrents of heaven's waters being opened up among a people living in a spiritual desert for the last 400 years who lived daily with their oppressors.

In stark contrast to the mounting 600+ Levitical laws that were administered by the increasingly legalistic Pharisees and Sadducees, Jesus offered to those spiritually parched living water that the only requirement was to admit their need.  Jesus introduces a radical New Covenant that is based on believing and receiving, instead of the Law which stirred orphan hearted desires of earning, striving, legalistic obedience, anxiety, performance, competition, jealousy, envy, and the like.  The Law was good and Holy, yet there lie a sickness in each person's heart that was exposed by the Law but had gone unhealed like a growing cancer.

The New Covenant in God's love came to address the deepest cancers of the heart, mind, soul, and body through a restored relationship with the Father in Christ's blood.  The most difficult part of this Covenant is that there is no room for pride, selfish ambition, earning, or performance.  We need to learn to receive from Father as a child, because He has everything that we need, long for, and crave.  Romans 5:17 says, "For if by the transgression of the one, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ."

I will be honest I struggle to rest and receive from God this abundance of grace that I see spread out across the pages of the New Testament and the majestic life of Jesus.  There are many reasons and excuses I could make for not being a good receiver, yet I look again to Jesus.  Jesus Christ as the Son of God received every word, direction, affirmation, and thought from the Father while on the earth.  As a son He was always attentive to His Father and through the intimate relationship delighted to do His Father's will.  Father mold me into image of the Son as a receiver that I may also be a giver as Jesus was.

Learning Sonship,
Bret