The Wednesday Word

Gospel Mercies, Part 2


by D.G. Miles McKee


The gospel comes to us with many benefits.  These are what we call Gospel Mercies.  In the first of this series of messages we discussed ‘Forgiveness’ as one of the excellent mercies from the Throne of Grace.  Today we will consider ‘Accepted as Righteous’ and ‘Adoption.’

Accepted as Righteous.
Because of the doing, dying and rising again of Christ we are accepted as being righteous. Think about it.  We are not merely declared innocent; we are beyond innocent.  We are declared righteous and all because of the work of another.  We are accepted, in Heaven, because we are in Christ Jesus (Ephesians 1:6). 

Righteousness is a wonderful gospel benefit whereby God looks at us and says we have done everything right.  We are righteous!   We have been acquitted of all charges and Christ’s actual righteousness has been reckoned to us. 

This is like getting our past expunged and being given a totally new identity. It’s better than being in a witness protection program that is 100% secure! 

Since all things are now new, we have no time to run around the place feeling guilty. What do we have to feel guilty about? We have dealt with all our sin at the cross. All the rotten wretched things we have ever done are under the blood:  They are forgiven, forgotten, buried and done away with in Christ! We believers, as lawbreakers, used to be under a curse (Galatians 3:10), but now Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law having been made a curse for us at the cross (Galatians 3:13).  God now reckons us as being righteous. 

That is why we read in 1 Corinthians 1:30,
"Christ is made unto us righteousness.” Get absorbed in this truth and guilt will never again take a hold of you. Bathe yourself in the knowledge that all your guilt and sin was charged to Christ’s account and that all His righteousness is reckoned to yours. We can never hear enough of this glorious truth! 

Adoption
It’s good to be forgiven and accepted as righteous, but it’s even better to be made a child of God. And that’s exactly what happened to us as a result of the gospel. We are children of God by faith in Christ Jesus (Galatians 3:26). As His children, the Father loves us in the same way He loves Christ! 

We don’t have to try to make God love us.  A child doesn’t have to cajole a good parent into love.  It’s not, therefore, a presumption for us to say (and to keep saying), “God loves me.”  The fact is, if you are a believer, He’s crazy about you!

Hard for us to believe isn’t it? That’s because we know what we are really like. We live with ourselves.  Everywhere we go, there we are!  We’ve taken a good look at ourselves and found that there’s not too much to love in there. Too often we don’t feel loved because we feel unlovable.  Many of us have developed, ‘
an orphaned heart’! We feel the Lord couldn’t really love us.

Listen to me, I’ve got some good news.  The more we know the gospel and its mercies, the more we will realize that we don’t have to feel loved. We need to stop trying to feel His love and, instead, begin to believe His love. We are His children; we are in Christ and we are loved!  Confess it and claim it.  Believe this gospel mercy and begin to enjoy life.

Before we finish, listen to this …
“Behold what manner of love the Father has given unto us that we should be called sons of God” (1John 3:1).

What manner of love indeed!

And that’s the Gospel Truth!



http://milesmckee.com/

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