Blog In Audio:
Greetings,
Today I am heading home after a great week in Bulgaria. The presence of God was rich and full in Sofia, Blagoevgrad, and Plovdiv. The people were hungry for God and ready to be God’s voice in the land for His increasing glory. The season has shifted from mere blessing to being a blessing for the purposes of God in the earth. Be ready for divine connections for God’s divine purpose. God’s grace is working in the nations for His purpose and plan.
Grace makes us right people in Christ and being right people in Christ gives us the power to reign in life. God wants us to be righteous, but our righteousness is not of the flesh. It is a righteousness that is found in Christ. I believe that there are two ways we are made righteous. Mercy qualifies us to be children of God and a righteousness by God’s mercy is enough to get us to heaven. Grace also changes who we are and that it is enough to get heaven in us. God’s grace enables what is in heaven to become something heavenly in our lives here upon the earth. How He is, is how we become in this world. It is an increasing glory!
Romans 5:21 …so that as sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
In these verses the Holy Spirit is proactive in our lives. Something is happening. He is causing us to reign in life. Sin reigned before, but now grace reigns. There must be a change. There must be a change in our desires, thoughts, reasoning, strategy of thoughts, a change in our imaginations, and even a change in our emotions. There is a change in us, because Christ is in us is the testimony God’s grace empowering us to reign in life. It is a continual increasing glory unto eternal life. I believe it goes with us into heaven, but it also increases in the lives of people in this earth that we affect and influence. That affect and influence increases in the generations that follow us, even after we go to heaven. We are not on this earth just to live a life and then move on. We are on this earth to bring the influence of heaven in and through our lives that affects the world around us and affects the world beyond us. So, when we go to heaven something heavenly is still happening in the earth because of us. This is the power of grace. This is stronger than the power of law. It is in us and through us, not merely a controlling instruction to us.
Romans 6:4 Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
Our old man died in Christ, but then our new life was raised in Christ. The life we live, we live in Christ. It isn’t just a grace to get us to heaven. Mercy justifies us to go to heaven and surely grace will get us there, but the objective is to walk in newness of life in this world. Every year we grow in Christ we should walk in an increasing reality of a newness of life. There should be an increasing glory. There should be a continually increasing character change in each of us. We should increasingly experience a newness of our nature and way. It should be seen in the way we do things and the way we think, and it affects the way we act. We should walk in an increasing newness of power and authority. Our influence of life into this world should increase. It is good news for our friends and for our neighbors. It is good news for our spouses, our children, and our grandchildren. It is good news for every area of responsibility in our lives and for the people within the sphere of our influence in life. Grace is empowering us to walk in newness of life.
Romans 6:13 And do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. 14 For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace.
We are under the influence of grace. Being under the influence is being under the power of something. In the law, we are under the influence of obligation and condemnation. Being under grace puts us under the influence of a change in, nature, way, increasing power, and authority. God’s grace puts us under the influence of true liberty. True liberty gives life to others. Grace doesn’t give us liberty that gives us life while destroying others. It is a liberty that gives life in every way.
Grace empowers us to walk in newness of life. We don’t walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit – but we do walk. We accept the practical responsibilities of our lives. We fulfill our practical responsibilities in a grace empowered way. Grace empowers us to be good friends and neighbors as citizen of heaven and earth upon the earth. It can be seen in the way we steward our possessions. It is evident in the way we accept our responsibilities of taking care of our homes and our yards in a life-giving spiritual way. It is by God’s grace that we are who we are. It is by grace that we do what we do. We are under the influence of grace. Grace is not just a theory. Grace is the presence of the Holy Spirit at work in our lives.
Blessings,
Ted J. Hanson
If God gives you the means to help, please consider making a donation to House of Bread Ministry.
Thanks Again – Ted J. Hanson
Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:
Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:
House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225
