Romans 5:18-21
Back in October, 2015 I was the taxi for my two grandsons
this week, and it’s some schedule they keep, Zack has to be at swim team by
6:30 and John Mark has to be at school for a workout at the gym by seven, and
that means granddad is up by 5:30 getting breakfast cooked and making sure all
are up and ready to go. I am sharing
this because today taking John Mark to school, we saw one of the Geek cars and
I said, I wonder if he has a master’s in Geeking? J.M said those guys are really smart and I
ask him to define smart, for they do know a lot about computers, but does that
make them smart?
I’m back home ready to put words into the computer and I’m
reading Romans 5:18-21, “Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for
all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all
men. For as by the one man's disobedience the many
were made sinners, so by the one man's obedience the many will be made
righteous. Now the law came in to increase the trespass,
but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, so
that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness
leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Maybe
for many of you there is no need to define smart, but if my observation is
correct we have an enormous problem, and it is not a new one.
The Scripture states that one man’s act
of rebellion led to condemnation for all men, but the act of Jesus Christ’s
obedience to His Father by taking on flesh and choosing to be the pure sin
sacrifice for the sins of all of mankind by His death on the cross. T. W. Hunt in the “Mind of Christ” page 116
shares this insight with the reader; “Finally, about
noon (“the six hour,” Mark 15:33), came the dread moment for which Jesus had
sweated blood. By now the whole of His
holy being was dreadfully, terribly gripped by all the filth, dirt, and slime
of our sins – a distress far worse than any of the outward, physical anguish. God “made Him who knew no sin to be sin on
our behalf” (2 Cor. 5:21). Jesus was now
ugly. He was hideously deformed,
repulsive, and repugnant. He was guilty;
although it was our guilt He was bearing.
He was sin.” But that was
not the worse thing, no not even close, for the first time ever fellowship was
broken between the Father and the Son, for God the Father cannot gaze upon
sin. For the first time Jesus was exiled
from His Father, and T. W. shares, He was also helpless. “Guilt is also
helpless and irreversible. Guilt is
powerless to help itself. Jesus
deliberately remained powerless so that we would have the power to accept His
work. We are not helpless in our guilt
because He was. He had to accept
helplessness if we were to be redeemed.
In these terrible moments, all the fury of offended absolute holiness
was poured out on the vileness of our guilt, then on His shoulders.”
Would you agree that a wise person, a
smart person would examine all the facts before making a decision that could
change life in the now and for all of eternity?
So here is the question for each person, what will you do with this
information? The computer dictionary
states the following: informal having
or showing a quick-witted intelligence: if he was that smart he would never
have been tricked. But if you have not examined the evidence
and believe yourself to be smart, you have been tricked by the one Jesus calls
the thief in John 10:10, for his game plan is to kill, steal and destroy, and
he is the great deceiver.
From the Back Porch,
Bob Rice
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