The blessed benefits of reconciliation, Pt1
Scripture: Eph 2:18-22.
Stream or download The Unsearchable Riches of Christ, Pt32
Having considered how Christ has accomplished reconciliation between the sinner and God and between the Jew and the Gentile, we move on to consider the benefits that arise out of reconciliation with God.
I. ACCESS TO GOD
1. How glorious is the reconciliation Christ accomplished! Verse 18. “Access unto the Father.” We are ushered into the very presence of the Father. Do we fully recognise this? Do we rightly evaluate this? Do we truly avail of this?
2. Access is through Christ. Not Mary, saints or self-merit but Christ alone. How blasphemous of the RC church to proclaim “new” intermediaries such as “padre Pio”! For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, 1 Timothy 2:5. Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them, Heb 7:25. Christ appears constantly before His Father representing us and therefore we may at any time approach God. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us, Romans 8:34.
3. Access is by the Spirit. Christ has opened the way but without the grace supplied by the Holy Spirit we could not walk that way, (John 5:7.) We need the HS’s grace to overcome our own weakness and disinclination to pray. Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered, Romans 8:26.