A Letter to a Brother in Christ

Do you ever come across old emails that encourage you? I came across an email letter I wrote to a dear Brother in Christ back in 2007. I wanted to post this as an encouragement for the Body of Christ....

Brother,

Thank you for your candid email. I actually was prompted by the Lord a few days ago to intercede in prayer for you in this specific area of temptation. So, I have already been praying for you and I will continue to pray for you in this spiritual battle.

I have been reading that book on the Pursuit of Holiness (great book). The author identifies essentially two points of the Christian life: the love of God and the fear of God. These must go hand in hand. They are basically two sides of the same coin. The author claims a lot of times we as Christians get this unbalanced. Sometimes we are flippant about sin and the fear of God and just "dwell" on His love and start to say sin is okay or "is under grace". Other times we do not dwell on His love and because of sin and failure with the fear of God we never recover and are continually in despair. I feel this must be in equilibrium or balanced in the Christian life by the Holy Spirit.

I believe you have the right idea to start at the Cross. That is where we all need to go and receive repentance and restoration from Jesus. We must really grasp and understand what the atonement really is especially in regards to the area of sin in our lives. I believe at the Cross of Christ we can develop and understand both the love and the fear of God.

I think a lot of times we look at the Cross of Christ as a point to where Jesus was physically tortured and died a gruesome dead (which is true), however, we fail to see the spiritual implications of the "scandal of the cross". In all reality God turned His back on His Son which I believe was the most "painful" point for Jesus who is part of the Trinity of God but at the point of the cross God's wrath was poured out on Jesus Christ on mine and your behalf. He became sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of God. How awesome is that!! Praise the name of Jesus!

However, we must remember that sin is a serious thing to God. It essentially is the opposite of holiness. Since God is holy He cannot be around sin. In the Old Testament the priest would enter the holy of holies once a year to give a sacrifice to God for the sins of the people. Their legs would be wrapped with ropes and bells so that when they started to jingle someone outside would pull them out from the presence of God because they would be devoured because of their sin (this particular concept is not explicitly described in the Bible but is more of a Jewish tradition – but the point is well made).

God cannot stand sin and neither can He be in the presence of sin. However, this is where we come back to the "scandal of the cross". Jesus who knew no sin and is the perfect Lamb of God took our place at the "gallows" so to speak. Since God cannot be in the presence of sin He turned His back on His one and only Son and His wrath was poured out on Him for us. This is a very serious thing. So along with Jesus our Lord we must die to our sin (Jesus was sinless of course but took our sin onto Himself) because He died in our place. We also must live in this life because He is Life and has purchased life for us; so that we may no longer be bound by the things of this world.

The story does not end there. He rose again! He conquered sin and death and we now have an opportunity to live righteously before Him by the blood of Jesus. Your identity is no longer of this world but your identity is found in Jesus Christ. Let the life of Christ reign in your mortal body so that you may not fulfill the lust of the flesh.

My advice would be to stick close to Jesus. Worship Him and adore Him. Study His Word and grasp His love for you and develop the fear of the Lord which is the beginning of all godly knowledge - which will propel your life towards godliness and holiness. His love will penetrate those ugly areas of our lives and they will start to dissolve, but our responsiblity is to keep in step with the Spirit.

Remember to cleave to your wife in all circumstances. Do not let the enemy get between you and cause division. Do not let your sin become "habit", and I believe that is why you wrote this email to the brothers. I see the conviction of the Holy Spirit upon you and that is a good thing.

Let the Holy Spirit search your heart and cleanse you and build you up. It is all about relationship with Jesus.

Have a wonderful New Year! Use this New Year as a "new season" in this battle to walk blamelessly before the Lord.

Hang in there and fight the good fight of faith! Jesus loves you and we do too. I feel prompted to leave you with a few verses bunched together for you to meditate and dwell on.

Blessings,
E

“But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death. Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren.

He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?
He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its lusts, and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law but under grace.

How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled under foot the Son of God, and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of grace? For we know Him who said, "VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY" And again, "THE LORD WILL JUDGE HIS PEOPLE." It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God.”