The accuser may go away rebuked by this, that God has justified us; the judge may go away rebuked by this, that the Lord Jesus has died - has already suffered the judgment, and His work has been accepted to the full in heaven itself; the executioner may go away rebuked by this, that all the malice of earth and hell together shall never drag us away from the firm embrace of our God.
There is, therefore, no fear of anything coming to light that might cause Him to change or reverse His thought of blessing and acceptance. -C.A.C.
Our acceptance with God in Christ is perfect, and therefore unimprovable.
And it is very important for us not to mix the acceptance itself with our enjoyment of it.
Our acceptance is in Christ,' and therefore eternal; the enjoyment is by the Spirit,' and therefore (because of the working of the flesh) often hindered. -J.B.S.
How comforting to know that we are accepted by God because of His Beloved Son.
And like the Israelites, we also start to murmur with dissatisfaction of our lot – almost dismissive of the great price that our Salvation and acceptance cost Him.
One day we rejoice in our salvation, but the next we question our acceptance, One night we bathe in His presence, but the next we despair of His love.
Too often we dismiss that great truth that we are accepted by God in Christ.
May He open the eyes of our hearts with a fresh understanding, of what it truly means to be accepted in the Beloved Son of His love.
a trust that accepts what He writes in His written Word – that by His grace, He made us accepted in the Beloved.
Faithful Men
Few have received such an astonishing promise, but those who did receive such a pledge, had to accept it, unquestioningly by faith..
And he was able, through the Spirit’s leading to grant his young disciples request.. for Elijah said: if thou see me when I am taken from thee, it shall be so.” 2Kings 2:10 your request shall be answered. By faith Enoch, Elijah, Simeon believed the promise and lived in expectant waiting. Enoch waited his translation. Elijah waited his transport and Simeon waited to see the Lord’s Christ. Enoch waited over 400 years and Simeon waited for the rest of his life. Their promise was given, accepted, believed and they waited – they waited in humble anticipation.
Romans 8:1
The Spiritual Walk
Our acceptance by God has no conditions.
Our acceptance by God is unconditional.
You have to be restored to fellowship, and when you are, you find your acceptance with God unchanged and unchangeable.
Accepted in Christ
God does not change, and He recognises Christ’s work on the cross as finished and complete – and because of that, God accepts you in Christ.
You were reaching after some object that you wanted, which you thought was necessary and very important, but somewhere there was a secret personal interest, personal concern - unconscious perhaps, but in God's sight very real - which was making it impossible for you to accept that situation.
The Lord had to bring a crisis in your experience, where you were perfectly willing to accept that trial in the will of God; that if so be the Lord wished it then you gave your full consent, and said: Well, Lord, if this is Your will for me I accept it wholly and fully.
All that I ask is to know that it is Your will, and, given that, then I accept it from my heart.
Messiah and Saviour
This was a tough concept for religious Jews to accept, who were steeped in tradition.
But increasingly in John’s gospel, we find the suffocating regulations of the perfect Law, starkly contrasted with willing, gentile acceptance, of Christ’s grace and truth.
Self-righteous Pride
Nicodemus, a pious Jewish leader, struggled with the idea of grace rather than human merit to gain God’s acceptance. Self-righteous pride may be the most difficult obstacle to overcome when free grace is offered, for one relies on the merits of man while the other rests on the grace of God. The constant strivings of the religious man to become acceptable to God by works is a far cry from the submitted heart of a broken sinner, who is thirsting for salvation.
Inner Peace
This positional truth needs to be accepted and reckoned on as fact. It is the glorious truth that we can live in consummate, inward peace in Christ. It is an amazing fact of scripture that nothing need disturb our peace of mind. It is the thrilling assurance that we are delivered from the fear of the future – because your life is hid with Christ in God. 1Cor.16:13
Simply Profound
These truths are profoundly simple and yet simply profound. They are simple truths that are life-changing and life-transforming, They are profound truths we need to accept and appropriate in their simple grandeur. These are real life-facts we need to affirm and believe as God’s steadfast oath – to us.
Men’s hearts are failing, for fear of what is coming onto the world, for lack of knowledge, and the hearts of many believers today are also being shot to pieces – because they have not yet accepted their secure position in Christ.
One New Man
But many lessons they needed to learn would come through the apostle Paul. They would have to come to understand that God is no respecter of persons – but it was to be a steep learning curve for every Jewish believer in Christ. They would need to accept the gospel was equally for Jew and Gentile alike. They would need to come to an understanding of the one new man in Christ.
The times of refreshing had arrived – all Israel needed to do to repent of their sins – to repent of the nations' apostasy – to turn back to God – to accept her King.
Stop Striving
When you cease from all your striving, and know you are accepted in Him you will find rest for your soul.
When you refrain from your personal struggles, abide in His love and move your focus from past rejection to His consummate acceptance of you – then He will show Himself to you, in a new and deeper way.
And how we love to read these words and try to imagine His above-all abundance. But do we honestly accept these words as fact or view them as a lovely fantasy?
While Ephesians 1:5-6 tells us that: Having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He made us accepted in the Beloved.
Human Acceptance
Does he really accept me? Does he truly love me? Does he fully trust me..
Am I still accepted by the one I love? Does He still love me? These are the assurances every wife and lover yearns to have from her beloved. These are the eternal questions buried deep in the heart of every-woman….
God’s Acceptance
But how often does the believer desire such reassurance of God’s acceptance? How often does a Christian crave to be thus comforted by his own Lord?
How often does he ask - Does God fully accept me?
Am I still accepted by God?
Preordained Acceptance
But God preordained that all who believe in Jesus are fully accepted in His beloved Son. The peace and love and acceptance of God is only through His beloved Son. Without assurance of this precious fact, many live a life of daily dissatisfaction. Without confidence in His Word, many spend their years in constant mistrust. If the failing beauty of a wife doesn’t influence the ardour of a devoted husband, how much more God’s never-failing acceptance is of the believer in Christ. God’s acceptance of you and His acceptance of me is based on one thing – the finished work of the Lord Jesus, on Calvary’s cross: being justified by faith, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Unchangable Acceptance
God’s love never changes, His truth never alters, His acceptance never ceases. His love for you does not depend on your attributes and your achievements. His acceptance of me is not influenced by my foibles and lack – my silly traits. His truth is the same forever. His truth is the same for everyone of His own. He is not influenced by our efforts or our qualities. He doesn’t”t change towards us due to our inadequacies or outbursts. Many presume that their lack, inadequacies and the remembrances of old sins requires repeatedly renewal of acceptance with God.. lest He withdraws His acceptance of them and withholds His love from them. But God never alters.
He is unchanged and the unchangeable God forever. His acceptance of you and of me rests on the finished work, accomplished by Christ.
Accepted in Christ
But “Oh Dear!” – you cry.
You are accepted in the Beloved. “Ahhh Woe is me – I am a man of unclean lips, I live in the midst of evil people!” God never changes.
You are accepted in the Beloved. “Pity me – I have failed, I have not loved; I have not trusted as I should.. I have allowed sin to influence me and the flesh to rule my thoughts today!” God never changes.
You are accepted in the Beloved. “Help me- I have allowed pride to seep in and conceit is lurking deep within my heart” God never changes.
You are accepted in the Beloved.
Sin, Fellowship, and Acceptance
Sin may certainly affect close fellowship with the Lord. Evil doing and ungodly attitudes – may stem your intimate communion with Him, but God never changes.
You are accepted in the Beloved. If we live in the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye and the pride of life.. He will certainly judge us according to our works – which will burn as wood, hay, and stubble, but God never changes.
You are forever accepted in the Beloved.
You are accepted in the Beloved. There is no other basis for our acceptance – except as we are accepted In Him.
Darby put it this way: When the Holy Spirit reasons with man, He does not reason from what man is for God, but from what God is to man. Souls reason from what they are in themselves as to whether God can accept them. He cannot accept you thus. You are looking for righteousness in yourself as a ground of acceptance with Him. You cannot get peace whilst reasoning in that way.
Bestowed Grace
William R Newell puts it this way: There being no cause in the creature why grace should be shown, the creature must be brought off from trying to give cause to God for His care. He has been accepted in Christ, who is his standing! He is not on probation. As to his life past, it does not exist before God – he died at the cross, and Christ is his Life. Grace, once bestowed, is not withdrawn.. for God knew all the human exigencies beforehand.
Assured Acceptance
Newell continues by pointing out how to live: 1) To believe, and to consent to be loved while unworthy – is the great secret. 2) To refuse to make ‘resolutions’ and ‘vows’ – for that is to trust in the flesh. 3) To expect to be blessed – though realizing more and more ones lack of worth. 4) To rely on God’s chastening (His child training hand) – as a mark of His kindness. 5) To ‘hope to be better’ ( i.e.
despite her foibles, weaknesses, failing beauty, silly traits, eccentricities and outbursts – so must the believer rest in the arms of Gods total, full, reassuring acceptance. God never changes.
You are accepted in the Beloved. Now may our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, and our God and Father, Who has loved us and given [us] everlasting consolation and good hope by grace, comfort your hearts and establish you in every good word and work. 2 Thessalonians 2:16-17. For you are accepted in the Beloved.
God Himself has told us in His word that we are accepted by Him - in Christ.
It is to the praise of the glory of His GRACE, in which HE has made us accepted in the Beloved.Ephesians 1:6
God has made all believers accepted in the Beloved.
and it is to the praise of the glory of His grace, in which He has made us accepted in the Beloved.
Underlying Hope
Perhaps there is no greater yearning in the heart of everyman than to love and to be loved.. to be accepted, truly accepted – to be really and truly and honestly accepted.
It brings with it connotations of being accepted in spite of everything and anything.
It has an underlying principle that nothing can change or remove our acceptance.
we are accepted. How we all long to be truly accepted.
Acceptance by Man
But we know the condition of our own heart and the fickleness of every man. We sometimes do things to be accepted and sometimes say things to become accepted..
but in our heart, we know our acceptance by others teeters on very insecure ground. And one day we find we are removed from their acceptance list, that meant so much – for when we base our being accepted on human terms, we will be disappointed.
Acceptance by God
But acceptance by God is very different from acceptance by man.
The divine viewpoint of acceptance is very different from the human viewpoint. Divine acceptance is rooted in a different set of criteria from human acceptance.
Unchanging Fact
God does not accept us on what we are or do or say. - what we have or don’t have.
God accepts us on one unchangeable and unchanging fact... the Lord Jesus Christ. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be ACCEPTED.
Finished Sacrifice
God accepted Christ’s finished sacrifice, and because of that, He accepts us.
God accepted the finished work of the cross, and because of that, He accepts us.
God accepts US, because we are IN-Christ – we are accepted 'in the Beloved. Our acceptance is based on one fact – we are accepted because we are in CHRIST.
We are accepted because we trusted Christ as Saviour.
We were accepted, by God, in the Beloved from the first moment we believed, and we will remain accepted by God, in the Beloved, through time and forever.
Free Gift of God
Not one atom of character or conduct or choice is what is accepted by God. We are accepted in the Beloved.
We are accepted in Christ – accepted in HIM.
And all who believe gain this free gift of acceptance in Christ.
We have done nothing and can do nothing to merit acceptance by God in Christ.
Acceptance is a gift that is freely available – to all, and any, who believe on Jesus.
Acceptance by God depends on faith in Christ – trusting His finished work.
We are made acceptable by God – in and through the Beloved Son of His love. This is a truth, whether we know it or not. This is truth, whether we believe it or not. If we are a believer – we are accepted by God – whether or not we accept it !!!!
Victorious Life
If we accept the truth of our acceptance, our life becomes victorious.
If we don’t accept the truth of our acceptance, our life becomes defeated. But whether we believe this truth or not we ARE accepted in the Beloved.
God expects us to believe what He says – to believe that we are accepted in Christ.
Faith in His person, pledges, and revelation is the only response that God expects. And God Himself has told us in His Word that we are accepted. Now believe it… 'for it is to the praise of the glory of His GRACE, that we have been made accepted in the Beloved'.
It is a wonderful moment for the believer when we by faith occupy our standing in the favor of the Father - when we know that we are received by Him in all the acceptance of the Lord Jesus Christ.
We think of the Lord Jesus - His perfections, His suitability to divine favor, His infinite acceptance with the Father - and by faith, we have access into the favor of which He is so worthy. -C.A.C.
This is the way of certain triumph; to accept God's will, however painful it may be, and to trust Him in the certain faith that His will must triumph in the end.
Complete in Christ
A believer’s acceptance by God starts and ends at rebirth and we are complete in Him.
As our substitute, we are accepted by God in the Beloved - alone.
Our Consecration
We are to accept without reservation that we are unconditionally accepted by God. We are to recognise that there is no self-effort that can draw us closer to Him. We must “K-R Y” to Him – to Know..to Reckon..
It is not just life; acceptance; redemption and righteousness that are in Him, but the creation; our hope; spiritual blessings; consolation… and consummation – and Peace and Effectual Prayer and Strength and Riches are all “In Christ”.
Accepted in Christ
Life experiences, feelings and pressures may all combine to cause a believer to doubt the truth of God’s word, but life experiences, feelings, and pressures are no criterion for God’s truth.
From the moment a sinner believes in Christ by faith, God undertakes to keep that believer eternally secure, and it remains God’s responsibility from that day forward, for we are all accepted in the Beloved – forever,
To the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He made us accepted in the Beloved.Ephesians.1:6
Fixed Status
Until we can believe that we are accepted in the Beloved..
Until we can accept that we are complete in Him..
Being accepted in Christ and complete in Him is the fixed status of all believers. But chose to disbelieve the truth, and you will build up a lie in your mind.
Believing that we are accepted in Christ is simply trusting God’s word, as fact.
To appropriate His Word, is to accept as a practical reality what belongs to you.
It is appropriate – is to take, accept, receive, and act upon God’s unfailing word.
Accepted in Christ
Until we can believe that we are accepted in the Beloved, we will be defeated.
Until we can accept that we are Complete in Him, we will be incomplete.
Believing that we are accepted in Christ is simply trusting His Word as fact.
Worship and Praise
The only possible response to being accepted in the Beloved is to worship and praise.
Accepted Time
How important in these closing days of the dispensation of grace, that we earnestly desire to become peacemaking, children of God. Now is the time we should be applying this grace to our lives with all diligence. Now is the time we should be peacemakers in a world of beauty marred by strife. Now is the accepted time – for tomorrow could be too late.
A Free-Will
God in His gracious kindness has endowed every person with volition – a free-will. All can accept God’s grace – but not all members of the human race choose to do so.
Work of Christ
If we don’t repent or change our mind – we remain dead in our trespasses and sins. When we do repent or change our mind about God’s free gift of grace, that is offered to all sinners who are dead in trespasses and sins we are born again.. and the Holy Spirit places us in Christ as part of God’s family – FOREVER. Let us never add to the amazing work of Christ on the cross when by His blood alone He paid the price for your sins and mine. But rather let us simply accept God’s free gift of grace – by faith alone.
It is perhaps the most alarming symptom of decay to be seen amongst evangelical believers today, that so many have accepted (at any rate mentally) the fact that they cannot be justified before God except by the sacrifice for sin once made for all upon Calvary, proceed to build a new legal code by which to live, and seek to be sanctified by their own efforts and endeavors.
Timely Word
To lovingly receive a timely word from a friend is wise indeed. To graciously accept a friends’ counsel demonstrates humility of spirit:- for as iron sharpeneth iron, so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend.
He says, I am time and eternity all in a moment, and you need not accept anything in the matter of time; you accept Me, and you may be well-nigh dead in the morning and be very much alive before the day is over. 'I am the resurrection and the life.' Mary said, i>I know that He will rise again in the last day.For her resurrection was a matter of time.
Man’s Need of Acceptance
Satan has robbed many believers of their full ASSURANCE of eternal salvation, and many crave for reassurance of spiritual life here and eternal life to come. Many seek through good works and spiritual activity to confirm their acceptance..
Life, power, blessing, deliverance for others - and nothing for thyself, but to lie in the will of the Father, and accept from His hand all that He pleases to permit to come upon thee.
God in His eternal attributes endued man with free-will to accept, or to reject Him, and God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy, set apart, and blameless before Him – in love.
The entire present system of Christianity as generally accepted would be impossible if the meaning of this letter were received as a heavenly revelation in the power of the Holy Spirit.
We have to accept the fullness of that thing in an act.
We have to accept that once for all in a definite act of commitment, that from henceforth everything that is of self is going to be smitten unsparingly with that Cross, and whenever self comes in it will not be allowed to have a standing.
Self, then, not as we know it, but as He knows it through and through, is to be brought under the power of that Cross, and this we accept in an act.
Their deliverance from Satan is that they should have a fresh apprehension of the absolute satisfaction of the Father in His Son on their behalf, and that they find their standing before the Father in acceptance.
Grace Thru Faith - STUDYProduct of Saving Faith
Living by faith is a foundational fact of the Christian dispensation, and that means that we just believe what God has said in His Word, for we live by faith and not by sight. 2 Corinthians 3:7 Accepting that we are 'accepted in the Beloved', is another fact of this Church age.
And that means that God sees us as perfect – just as Christ Jesus is perfect, for He looks at us through Christ, Who has removed all sins, wherein He hath made us accepted in the Beloved.
And after initial acceptance in Christ, is the 'learning obedience' in life.
Slowly we begin to receive and accept what was already ours from our ‘re-birth‘… that: I am complete in Him.
Example of Nature
As as we gaze upon His loveliness and inhale the perfume of His person; the eyes of our our understanding are enlightened; the hope of our calling becomes secured; the riches of His splendour and His exceeding greatness becomes our reality – and the wonders of the glory of His inheritance in us is recognised and accepted as truth.
In the latter we have the surrender, but it is not to get, or to attain; it is because he has entered into what is his; he has accepted the wondrous fact of his death with the Lord Jesus, and of the Spirit's presence and ministry.
No Evidence
Abel had no president that God would accept His offering, but He trusted God.
Let us accept His word by faith, for faith is the confidence of future things and the evidence of things not seen – for without faith it is impossible to please God.
For instance… when confronted by the prophet Nathan with his sin, David accepted his correction.
David accepted her discerning wisdom and turned from His dishonouring plan.
Man of God
David was prepared to accept responsibilities for his life – not to blame others. David was prepared to often confess his sins and faults to the Lord..
Third -
THIRD: David accepted responsibility for his actions, his thoughts and his choices.
He will not quietly accept this rival to the rule of Christ, so He stands, with His great weapon of the Cross, to render inoperative everything which is a menace to the life of Christ in us.
Crucified Life
In writing this verse Paul is stating what should be true in the life of all believers. This should not be seen as an unattainable hope, but as the norm of all Christians. This is not something to strive for but something that we should accept in essence, but the life that is lived by most believers is not the life that God wants us to live. The Christian life should be a crucified life – until it is no longer I – but Christ.
often labelled ‘vegetables‘ by Social Service, I had a responsibility and I had a choice – accept the ‘professional’ opinion or discover their premise to be false.
It is pardon that is apprehended and not acceptance.
Acceptance embraces God's side - how He feels, and this should be chief, for we as sinners have offended Him.
We cannot enjoy acceptance but in the way in which it was acquired or effected for us, and if we are in the acceptance we know that no improvement of the flesh could commend us to God, and that we cannot be before Him but in Christ.
But if we are in any degree dark as to the crucifixion of the old man, we are not in acceptance experientially, we are not in the daily benefit of it, and our liberty by the Spirit can never go beyond our conscious acceptance. -J.B.S.
There is something here much more than typology interpreted and the interpretation accepted as to salvation from sin and judgment; it is the essential and indispensable heavenly relatedness and life of the Lord's people as inwardly detached from the natural life even in a religious sense.
Enemy’s Tactics
Our position is safe and secure – it is eternal and affords the riches of God’s grace, but we should not be complacent about the many dangers that stalk our path. We need to be aware of the many ways that the enemy desires to destabilise our faith. We should be aware that the enemy’s ploys to undermine the truth of our acceptance.
more is added. For those who take to heart and apply these truths to their lives, there is more, for just as you accepted Christ Jesus as your Lord, you must continue to follow Him.
Twisted Truth
If twisted truth is believed long enough, it becomes ‘truth’ to that man.. it becomes his ‘truth’! If ears are tickled by false teaching long enough, it finally becomes accepted as true.
Grace Thru Faith - STUDY
Basic Acceptance
There is one and one basis alone for your acceptance and mine.
We are accepted by God in the Beloved.
We are accepted by God, because of what Christ did on the cross.
But Christ
You are accepted in God because He has accepted you in the Beloved.
You are accepted in Him and you are accepted because of Him – and because of Him alone.
There is nothing too good or worthy that an unbeliever can do to gain acceptance – except: believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.
Many Christians find this total acceptance by God, very difficult to understand… and they spend much of their lives seeking to remain in His good books, by being 'good', ..and so their foot slips, or temptation strikes, and they think His acceptance of them is lost.
Never Changing
But there is one and one basis alone for your acceptance and mine.
We are accepted by God – in the Beloved.
We are accepted by God, because of what Christ did on the cross.
Nothing you can do, or omit to do, will influence His acceptance of you in Christ.
Never Failing
Those times when days or years seemed dark, never influenced His acceptance of you.
But dark clouds of rebellion or doubt, only hide His face, but never His acceptance.
Never Stopping
It is those times when He appears to have withdrawn His every blessing from you, that He is drawing you closer to Himself, with cords of love for you, because you are accepted – accepted in the Beloved.
He is waiting for you, child of God, to accept His terms and not your own – for without Me you can do nothing.
For I am persuaded that nothing shall separate us from the love of God, for we are accepted – eternally accepted, and we are accepted unconditionally in the Beloved.
Significant Issue
Nothing is more important for a Christian than to know he is eternally secure, and until and unless you are fully assured of this biblical truth, you will always have a doubt in your mind as to your acceptance by God, and your final destination.
If I, once a lost prodigal, want to know the measure of my acceptance with the Father, He alone defines it for me.
It is only as I know what the Lord Jesus is to the Father in glory that I can in any degree truly estimate my own acceptance in Him: Had He my sins laid on Him?
How is He now accepted?
For as He is now accepted, so am l; and therefore it is the Gospel of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Try for your own acceptance, and it will always be a dubious and imperfect thing.
Get to understand His acceptance, and your soul will be enlarged into all the fulness and blessedness not only of His, but of your own, because you are in Him.' -J.B.S.
No man's heart will ever be gladdened by the joy of divine acceptance until he has learned that there is not a single bit about him, as a man in the flesh, that does not deserve the judgment of God. -C.A.C.
It is a wonderful moment when by faith we appropriate and occupy our position in the favor of the Father - when we know that we are received by Him in all the acceptance of His Son.
We think of the Lord Jesus - His perfections, His suitability to divine favor, His infinite acceptance with the Father - and by faith we have access into the favor of which He is so worthy. -C.A.C.
Trust requires the man – the whole man to accept God’s Word, without reservation.
God’s Forgiveness
If pardon is offered on the condition of repentance, I need faith to accept it.
I must believe what He promises, accept His gift and refuse to be anxious, or I live a defeated life — a life where I see the condition of my problems, instead of my position, as a blood-bought Son of the Highest.
We can never hope to overcome them unless we remember that there is in the presence of God for us a Savior who suffered the full agony of these things, but accepted them as part of the cup which the Father had given Him to drink.
Accepted in Christ
We’re accepted in Christ – but God accepts us only through His beloved Son.
His love towards us and His acceptance of us, through Christ, is on every page.
They must be accepted as truth and applied in our lives.
We must accept as fact what has already been made ours through faith in Christ, but we must be aware of our need of these truths in our daily walk – and only the Holy Spirit can reveal these truths to the seeking believer: for the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God, they are foolishness to him: neither can they be known to them, because they are spiritually discerned. 1Corinthians.2:1 There are many ways to live that fail to deal with ‘self’ and the ‘self-life’. We have to recognise that God’s way, to self-denial, is at the cross.
Assurance of deliverance from the sphere of the ‘flesh’ and of the de-thronement of ‘the old man’ rests upon the apprehension and acceptance of this fact of co-crucifixion” (Life on the Highest Plane, Vol.
Accept by faith the further fact that you died with Him, i.e., that your ‘old man was crucified with Him'” (The New Life, p.51).
We have started all over again, but when we accept that place: Now I have everything to learn, I am open and eager to learn, I know nothing, then the Lord can teach.
Until we can accept how terrible sin is and its shocking and deadly consequences we can’t begin to appreciate or comprehend God’s amazing redemptive grace.
Every unbeliever has a choice – to accept or reject God’s free gift of deliverance, and all who reject salvation by grace through faith in Christ, are condemned.
Every believer made the right choice – to accept God’s free gift of deliverance, for only those that trust Christ for salvation, by grace through faith, are saved.
But it is of greater benefit finally to us, and much greater glory to God, if we simply accept His Word and learn to walk in the power of it by naked faith; which asks no longer certain ecstasies, but being sure of God's truth because it is His truth, maintains an attitude of faith therein; attitude - a fixed heart.
True Forgiveness
Forgiveness not only covers forgiving those that have deeply wronged us, but sometimes we too need to accept that we have been truly forgiven.
No Fishing
The great D.L Moody once noted that if God promises to cast all our confessed sin into the depth of the sea, we must not get out a fishing line and keep pulling them back in. If God has forgiven you, then accept His forgiveness and forgive yourself as well.
Renouncing Anger
To forgive others you need to renounce anger and resentment against the other, but have you been willing to accept God’s forgiveness of all of your sins? Are you prepared to bestow on another the gift you received from God? Can you honestly withhold forgiveness towards another, when the Lord gave His beloved Son’s life in order to forgive you?
We must first lay them at Christ's feet, to be accepted and cleansed by Him.
When He has accepted them, and set His stamp upon them, we receive them back, to hold them as His property, to wait on Him for the grace to daily use them aright, and to have them act only under His influence. -A.M.
Truthful God
And the God-breathed Word cannot lie, for He is Light and He is Life and He is Truth: “and He that is mighty hath done to me great things, and Holy is His name,” Luke 1:49. Can you say with Mary, “He that is mighty hath done great things to ME:… or are you wallowing in your own guilt and shame? Can you accept His Word..
or are you unable to accept His Truth? Can you proclaim the wondrous things that the Lord has done for you.. or are you racked by past actions and attitudes, that sear your soul with self-condemnation?
Accept the staggering truth contained within the following astonishing verses. The eyes of your understanding are being enlightened; that ye may know what is the Hope of His calling, and what are the Riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints (and that includes you – beloved child of God), according to the working of His mighty power, which He wrought in Christ, when He raised Him from the dead, and set Him at His own right hand in the heavenly places. Ephesians 1:18-20
Exalted God
Reflect, recognise, and fully accept this fact - Far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come. And hath put ALL things under His feet. And has given Him to be the Head over ALL things – TO THE CHURCH” (that includes you), “which is His Body, (that includes you) – the fullness of Him that fills all in all.
The overcomers will always be, so far as the larger Christian world is concerned, a lonely company, having to go on, with few able to follow.Caleb could not accept the popular voice, his heart was too set upon the Lord.
I can choose to accept His 'boot-camp' training – or kick against the pricks. I can invite Him to examine my inner-self so as to identify areas that need His scalpel.
Accepted in the Beloved
Just ponder for a moment on the intensity and abundance of this truth.
Hence it is the Father‘s will that I accept this in gratitude, in love, and in all humility.
It is His desire that I accept this position without hesitation or doubting, because I am accepted by the Father – accepted in the Beloved, for time and through eternity.
It is a rare and beautiful thing to have a soul-mate who understands me; a confidant who knows my hopes and understands my fears; a kindred spirit who commends my endeavours, however mean or foolish they are! What a blessing to have a bosom friend who will gently point out my faults, and yet accept my outbursts – a close confidant, who sympathises my aspiration and who accepts me for who I am, despite my faults, foibles and foolishness.
There is nothing that I can do to secure my salvation – I can only accept it as a free gift of God’s grace.
Myriad of ways have been designed to get man to be accepted by God – and in man’s foolish attempt to get himself to God, man put faith in foolish alternatives to provide for their need.
the promises of God are all ‘yes’ and ‘amen’ in Christ 2Cor.1:20. Let us accept that God’s best purpose in our life is being carried out despite life’s twists. We are being changed into the likeness of Christ so that we too will be a sweet aroma unto the Lord..
The secret is to know and accept that God uses all things in life for good, and then to thank Him by offering up a freewill ‘burnt sacrifice’ of praise to the honour and glory of His name. For only as we recognise and Grasp that we’re being changed into Christ’s likeness will we be prepared to cry.
The Mystery of the Church
Even Peter found the inclusion of Gentiles believers into Christ’s sheepfold and their equality in God’s eye difficult to accept, and he, and the other apostles, had to discover the truth through the apostle Paul – Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles who was given the mystery of the Church – the mystery of the kingdom – a parenthetical period of time, when God would call out of the Gentiles a people for His name – the Church.
Performance Orientated
We live in a world system where the culture of the age is performance orientated. Acceptance at home or at school is all too often dependent on what we say and do. The legalism that is inherent in society is often transferred into the spiritual realm. We transfer the way the world thinks and acts into our relationship with the Lord – but this is counter to God’s way of working and opposite of His way of thinking.
Oh, what lessons there are for all to learn, who also travel the believer’s path in this world, as we accept the deep and unanswerable questions in our lives, and press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
Are we prepared to accept our union with the crucified and risen Lord, not only as the basis of being received by the Father, but also as the way we walk day by day?
The captivity is not to a conceived truth or a superimposed doctrinal acceptance.
When all was accepted according to the mind of the Lord, then the heavenly places became the eternal expanses of his walking about, and earthly bondage gave place to heavenly freedom.
Fourth
We are to fully accept who we are in Christ and the position we have in Him.
Fourth
We are to know and accept that we are complete in Christ and need nothing more. We are to recognise Christ as the full and final authority over all rule and principalities. We are to trust all that Scriptures tell us of the treasures that are contained in Christ – For you are complete through your union with Christ, Who is the head over every ruler and authority – principality and power. Colossians 2:10
We are conversant with man in death and sin and distance from the Father, for that is our state by nature; but to know the Man in glory, One in acceptance with the Father according to all His moral greatness, is new to us and magnificent.
If a child or servant of God in his or her secret walk and history with God is led to move in a way that is not according to the recognized and established system, but new and different, and seemingly in violation of all the accepted and fixed conventions or associations, there is all too often a repetition of what took place in Jerusalem; a suspicion, a contention, and an opposition.
Read the Gospels and the Acts again, and ask the question as you proceed, How can this, and that, and that be interpreted or construed as doing violence to an accepted and long established Divine order?
Available Peace
His peace is not the false, fractured peace of a world at war with God and man. His is the peace that passes human understanding – and He gives it freely. But the gifts that the Lord bestows upon His children must be received by them, a gift is no gift that is not taken and accepted, appropriated, and acted upon.
Mary took time to kneel at the Master’s feet and accept His gifts of love and peace.
When once we see and accept our Father's purpose for our lives to the extent that it becomes our will also, the time and details of His process cease to matter.
A total identification with the oblation was pictured here – a full transferral of trespasses, as sins passed from the sinner to the sacrifice. The innocent animal was to die. The guiltless creature was offered in the stead of the sinner. The life of the sinless beast was thus to be fully accepted – fully accepted as the life of the sinful man.
All we need to know is that in so doing we are accepted by God – just as He is accepted by God.
Letters of Grace
Often a sermon on salvation is beautifully woven into the initial letters of GRACE, G – Salvation is a Gift of God – a Good Gift that is Granted to allR – Salvation is Redemption – Received by faith, Reuniting us with GodA – Salvation is Accepted by God’s love, Available to All, Accessible through faithC – Salvation Comes thru Christ Crucified Who paid the Cost at the CrossE – Salvation Ends in Eternal life and is an Everlasting gift – and an Escape
down and initiating reconciliation of man to Himself. (Jn. 1:14; 2 Cor. 8:9)A..It is God’s Abundantly giving us more than we could ever expect or deserve. (Jn. 1:16; Rom. 5:17; 2 Cor.9:8; Eph. 2:7; 1 Tim. 1:14)C..It is about God Caring enough to send Jesus to die in our place. (Eph. 1:7; 2 Thess.2:16)E..It is about being Eternally unendingly, unconditionally accepted in Christ. (Eph.1:6; 2 Tim.1:9; Titus 3:7)
Beloved of God
Every child of God is in Christ and every believer has been accepted because of Him. We are in Christ and we are accepted by God and we are loved because of Jesus.
The I AM of Scripture
We are to know that we are accepted in the Beloved and accepted by God. We are to glory in the privileged position into which we have been placed. We are loved and cherished by God, Who chose us from before the beginning of time – but we are to bow to the Person behind our glorious acceptance by God.
Truth or a Lie
What’s your reaction to Christ’s words to men who supposedly believed in Him? He knew if they would not accept absolute truth, then they would believe a lie. He knew that rejecting absolute truth meant accepting a relative agenda.
Waves of error; the swing of the pendulum to some fresh popular acceptance; a great war with its horrors and many-sided tests of faith; all these have swept away multitudes and left them in spiritual ruin.
Pick and Mix
Some people like to play ‘pick and mix’ with the words of Scripture. A teaching or doctrine that tallies with experience or understanding is accepted, but one that is hard to comprehend or just plain illogical is often simply shelved. If the truth is not believed then the truth is dismissed.
Bread of Life
Jesus claimed to be the Bread of Life, and all who eat of Him will live... but this truth was a difficult statement for many of His followers to accept and from that time many of his disciples went back, and walked with Him no more. Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away?
and so many left Him, because they could not accept the truth of His word.
Does it alter the love and acceptance that the Father has for them?
we would do well to accept every truth that is written in Holy Writ – and then to apply it to our lives, EVEN when it seems to scream the opposite.
Search the Scriptures
We need to become as little, trusting children – dependent for everything on Him. We need to be prepared to shelve our biases, built up over a lifetime in Christendom... and really and truthfully see, accept, and apply what Scripture says.
If, in the midst of others, the Lord can get but two of His children, in whom His Life is full and free, to live on the basis of that Life, and not to seek to gather others to themselves or to get them to congregate together on the basis of their acceptance of certain truths or teaching, but simply to witness to what Christ means and is to them, then He has an open way....
Walk of Life
Take the hand of the One that knows how to lighten those that sit in darkness. Walk with the One Who will truly guide your feet into the way of peace, and you will have contentment in this age despite the hardships and disappointments – and in the age to come – the Millennial Age, you will discover joys unspeakable, for you will live 1000 years, in time – time recaptured from the today’s devouring locusts. Only put your hand into His and say:- order my walk; order my every moment… order my way and my life to your good pleasure – for whither Thou goest I will go. What you decide I will accept.
We must be careful to accept totally, that His grace is sufficient.
blameless. Let us accept His ideal for our lives, as step by step our hearts are established in peace, through the little by little the process of holistic, practical sanctification.
He has in the first place rejoiced greatly in the forgiveness of his sins, and his acceptance by God; but sooner or later he begins to realise that all is not well, and that he has failed and fallen from the high standard from which he set himself to reach in the first flush of his conversion.”
Austin Sparks
Austin Sparks made this profound observation: Everything which demands that we accept a fresh measure of the meaning of His death, means that as we accept it, there will be a larger measure of Him in risen life – so that the meaning and value of Christ risen, as an inward life, is a reproduction of Him in us – and there is no other way. The increase of the number of the Lord’s own, is not by joining something to the outside, it is by coming to the cross and dying – that is the only way.
Sanctification
Norman Harrison wrote: The secret of sanctification is the cordial acceptance of a life thus bounded, with a joyful appropriation of the transforming power, found alone within these bounds.
3-Fold Names
Can you be content to accept Him in each of His threefold names?
To be willing to accept crucifixion with Christ, to leave all yourself, your plans and your longings, your abilities and your possessions, all of them at the Cross, so that you only trust and love and live for the Lord Jesus, hurts a great deal.
The freedom is so entirely in Christ Jesus, and the maintenance of our living union with Him is so distinctly and entirely the work of divine power, that it is only as we see that the Spirit dwells within us for this very purpose, and know how to accept and yield to His working it, that we can really stand in the liberty with which Christ has made us free. -A.M.
Psa.139:16. No born-again believer need ever fear rejection, for we are accepted in the Beloved Eph.1:6. Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love – with loving-kindness I have drawn you.
Allotted Tasks
Whether we meet Him on a Damascus Road or speak with Him on an Emmaus Way, or if we see Him in a revelatory Patmos vision, such as God gave to His servant John, we are all without fame or favour, background of service – accepted in the Beloved, and we all are ‘sent from God,’ and we all have a definite and allotted task to do.
then He patiently starts to call us and sooner or later we respond to His call – until we recognise and accept Him as Saviour and we tell of our glorious discovery.
Accepted IN Christ
Many believers fail throughout their entire Christian life to fully accept this truth..
to understand they are totally and unreservedly accepted in Christ: accepted in the Beloved.
Positioned IN Christ
Until we can fully believe that we are unconditionally and unreservedly accepted..
until we can truly accept that it must be none of me and all of Him..
His Grace
Contemplate on these words that Paul writes… To the praise of the glory of HIS grace, wherein HE hath made us ACCEPTED in the Beloved.
Oh, he saw enough to take the heart out of any man at the end of such a life, but he did not say: or me to live is to see my life work standing as a monument, intact; to have all my old friends faithful and around me; to know that my message has had universal acceptance and appreciation!No!
Distorted Views
Some lay particular weight upon His love, but ignore His justice. Some lay particular emphasis upon His justice, while disregarding His love. Some go overboard with grace, and are drawn into licentious living. Others focus upon the law, pointing an accusing finger at so many other people. Some believe that God requires certain rituals or He cannot not accept us. Others believe they are under God’s wrath because of pre-christian indiscretions.
Are we to bemoan these evil days and sink deeper into a Slough of Despond? Are we to simply to sit back and sanctimoniously accept prophetic inevitable? – for scripture tells us that the error of lawless men will wax greater in end times.
Sufficient Grace
I think not – important though it is to recognise the signs of the approaching “day”, we shouldn’t accept the inevitable by allowing it to submerge our witness and walk.
to prepare us for ultimate maturity and though we are accepted in Him, we need to be conformed into His likeliness. And so God has built His universe upon certain unchangeable principles and precepts -life principles -relational principles -business principles -national principles. As with the dispensation of Law, there are specific of principles for the age of grace… for we are not under the law, but under grace.
The unsaved sinner has the need of a Saviour and the Spirit convicts him of this need. When the unsaved sinner has been born again this initial need is satisfied – and from that day he is accepted in Christ..
as perfect in God’s sight as His only begotten Son. The saved saint similarly has ‘need’, without which spiritual growth will fail. He is accepted in the Beloved fully and perfectly, for time and through eternity..
If we are seeking to go on with God to any degree beyond that which is commonly accepted as a true Christian life; if we are called to pioneer the way for any further advance in spiritual life or Divine service; if we are given a vision of God's will and purpose not seen by the general mass of God's people or even the larger number of the servants of God ours will be a lonely way.
The opposite of this, and that which we are seeing to be so much more needed, is a burdening of the hearts of chosen vessels with God's own most pressing concern at this time, resulting in an all-consuming passion which will accept all the cost of its realization....
Power of Death
His death is sufficient for it satisfied God’s judgement of sin, in your life and mine. His resurrection is sufficient for it broke the power of death in all who believe. Christ’s glorious sufficiency meets every need in this life and the one to come, and we are fully accepted by God for time and eternity, because of His sufficiency.
We are fully accepted by God for time and eternity, because of His sufficiency.
All- Sufficient
The wonders of Christ sufficiency should stagger the mind and humble the heart. There is nothing we can do to get right with God except believe on the Lord Jesus – but those that accept His free gift of salvation discover Him to be sufficient.
Perhaps the most precious promise there, is that we are accepted in the Beloved. Nowhere in Scripture is His glorious grace more evident than in this little book – or we are like Mary highly favoured.
Accepted in Christ
Ephesians gives us a glimpse of the wonders of being accepted in the Beloved - in a fountain of superlatives and glorious truths that God bestows on His Church.
The power effectively to present Christ as Lord, is by means of revelation deep within us, bringing into being an unshakable knowledge of His authority and might, and making us content to accept our weakness and nothingness in order that we may see the pleasure of the Lord prosper in His hand (Isa. 53:10). -J.C.M.
Spiritual Discernment
And it is through Christ that we have been so endowed. It is by Christ that we have been brought into God’s family. It is in Christ that we stand and in Him that we are accepted by the Father. It is Christ and Christ alone that is the means that has brought about our eternal bliss. All Scripture is given by God to teach, train, and encourage the whole church of God, but the wealth of knowledge within its pages are only for those that trust in Christ. The unsaved man is incapable of trawling the depths of the wealth of Scriptures..
Spiritual Discernment
And it is through Christ that we have been so endowed. It is by Christ that we have been brought into God’s family. It is in Christ that we stand and in Him that we are accepted by the Father.
He will plant doubts in your mind suggesting that God could not accept you!!
Position
But our worthiness is not of us but from faith in Christ, And our eternal seat is secure for we are positioned in Christ, And we have been forever accepted by God because of Christ. This is why it is vital to know our God and to know our position in Christ.
Trust
This is why it is crucial to trust God that we truly are accepted in Him. This is why it is paramount to maintain unbroken fellowship with the Father. In so doing we recognise our conscience and confess our sins.
The solution to the problem of suffering does not lie in being philosophical; it is not in fatalistic resignation his is my lot; I suppose I must accept it.It is not in passive or active suppression of desire.
We are not according to our Father's pleasure, nor are we in simple restfulness as to our acceptance, if we do not enter by faith into the new position to which He in His grace has placed us.
God commended His love to us in that while we were sinners Christ died for us, and EVERYONE has a choice to accept or to reject God’s free gift of salvation.
But believing is a choice – for God ordained that man should be given a freewill to accept or to reject His gift.
Free Will Choice
No one is predestined to be saved, for salvation is a free gift to be received, by faith. No one is predestined to be lost, for all men are given a free-will to accept or reject.
Those who accept God’s free salvation, by grace through faith in Christ, are saved.
God foreknows all who will accept salvation and all that will refuse His gift. But foreknowledge is not predestination and predestination is not foreknowledge.
Self Condemnation
Salvation is a free-will choice to be accepted or rejected by every man and woman. Those that accept Christ as Saviour were foreknown by God and predestined by Him.
The choice to accept or reject this stupendous offer, still stands today, for to you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, Who is Christ the Lord.
Therefore, you must not regard yourself as bound to accept all that legal doctrine of sanctification, which has been and still is predominantly, the sine qua non of orthodox belief. -W.R.N.
Gift of Salvation
The Lord Himself pleads with sinners to accept His free gift of salvation. He is like a judge imploring a condemned criminal to accept a free pardon – He is like a father aching for the prodigal to cry, 'I have sinned against you'.
On the contrary, we which live are always delivered unto death for Jesus' sake.' I say this that you may not think it strange when the collar which you have rightly accepted becomes trying or difficult to you; for surely if it be service it must be so; the servant must be more or less a sufferer.
It is essential for the believer to see that his old nature has been completely rejected by God at Calvary, and that as a new creation he is fully and eternally accepted in the Lord Jesus.
To truly minister to others is always to accept new happiness and new distress, both of them forever deepening and entering into closer and more inseparable union with each other, the more profound and spiritual the ministry becomes.
Satan may challenge my clearance and my acceptance; he may raise all kinds of questions about what I am and what I have done, but he can raise no questions as to the worthiness or acceptance of my Saviour.
your eternal salvation is secure, for you are forever accepted in the Beloved, but check if Christ is the main influence on you or is 'Self' manipulating your life-deeds?
There is no condemnation to those that are in Christ Jesus, for we are accepted. 2.
All religions have this soulish feature in common, more or less, and it is here that the fatal blunder has been made by many religious people who contend that other religions, which are undoubtedly devout and sincere, should not be interfered with, but the good in them should be recognized and accepted.
God setteth the solitary in families (Ps. 68:6), and there is no doubt about it, whether or not you understand or accept the doctrine of it, you can prove very quickly in experience that our spiritual enlargement does come by way of true spiritual and heavenly relatedness with other believers.
The Accepted Day
I challenge you as I challenge myself to prayerfully read Mark 7:20-23, and adhere to the Lord’s earlier words: if any man have ears to hear, let him hear.
Now is the accepted day – now is the day of salvation of the ‘soul’ The Lord is coming – at His appointed time and He won’t be late.
They have to discover how little they have really got, and in many cases to find that they are perfect strangers to the liberty and joy of acceptance.” -C.A.C.
Abound in all Faith
How do we abound in all FAITH? Well, we trust the word of God in everything and accept His Word as fact. We believe His Word to be true.
Our Father has taken us over Jordan and placed us in Canaan, but the reality of it is never known until by faith we accept the fact on the basis of having died with Christ, and that therefore heaven is our place, and we know it to be our place now; and that this side is not our place, and we know that it is not.
Christian Challenge
We too are called at such a time as this, to accept this self-same challenge. We too are called to such a place as this, to be despised of the world and rejected. We too are called to come out from among them and be separate. We too are called to obey His commandment, to love deeply, and suffer long.
Am I to accept as the norm a life that is set apart, holy and different.
It is the spontaneous outworking of spiritual forces released, in the acceptance by faith of tremendous facts concerning Christ; which facts are proclaimed out of experience in the power of the Holy Ghost.
God organised it like that for nothing that is from me can be accepted by Him – including my own form of consecration rather than a life truly set apart to God.
Nor must ambition, soul-gratification, enlarged prospects for the Lord, wider acceptance in Christianity, or any such thing, color our judgment or affect our decision.
He is apart from the whole thing, that is, he has not accepted the conditions; he is not responsible for the state of things; he certainly repudiates the whole thing, and does not for one moment agree with it, and yet he is in this thing as though he were responsible for it; as though God could lay it all at his own door.
Accept the deity of Christ, and the Bible becomes an intelligible and ordered revelation of God in the Person of Jesus Christ.
Those who accept the free gift of Salvation, which God freely gives to all who trust in His Son as saviour, (by grace through faith) revere Christ as God manifest in the flesh.
The next thing I am going to say may be difficult to accept, just as it is difficult to say, and yet faithfulness demands that things like this should be said.
So he must pull you down, he must get you down, he must get you to accept something less than God full place and mind for you, and then he will undo you.
The call of God to some fuller and higher acceptance of truth and ministry; of testimony and witness; of surrender and experience, will undoubtedly come by one or another of the Divine forms of visitation to such as the Lord wishes to lead in grace.
These are the accompaniments of all calls of God to advance with Him beyond accepted standards.
Our spiritual blindness has gone and God’s wrath is removed for there is now no condemnation to those that are in Christ Jesus – for we are accepted in the Beloved. We were once spiritually alienated from God and without hope in the world, but all enmity with God is washed away and we are clothed in the righteousness of Christ. Thanks be to God for His indefinable gift!
It cannot understand that our Lord Jesus was willing to accept exactly the same basis of life with its limitation in which we live, although without sin.
No, He is the second man, the Lord from heaven.' He is a heavenly man, the Last Adam - head of a new race; beginning of a new creation - and you and I who believe are in Him,' seen and accepted before the Father in His Beloved.' The full image of Him we have not yet: true.
Until we accept our place of humiliation, we cling fast to own rights and reason.
and I must decrease in every aspect – until I am nothing and He is everything. But if you are man enough (or woman enough) to accept this challenge, it will mean your mortification and death to self.
The battle all through the ages has been in this very connection, as to whether the church would maintain or retrieve the loss of its heavenly high position, or for any reason at all, by prosperity or adversity, accept something lower.
It is grace that accepted us in the Beloved and crowned us with the riches of His grace – and it’s grace that has seated us together with Christ in heavenly places – in Him.
Generating Centre
We are expected, by faith, to listen to His Word and to accept His explanation, for Jesus is the only medium, the only link – the only channel to the Father.
While an end is written large in the Cross, and while that end is to be accepted as our end indeed, so that there can be no more of anything so far as we are concerned, Jesus lives!
But I would beg you not to accept it merely because I am saying it and emphasizing it, nor even because I tell you that so far as some of us are concerned, it is a proved thing.
If the Lord has willed us to the place where we are, our acceptance of it in faith may prove that it becomes a far bigger thing than any human reckoning can judge.
for you are accepted. His plan, purpose and will for your life is that Christ is formed in you – that we are conformed into the image and likeness of Jesus, Rom.8:29
It is possible for a man to be marked by an analytical mind, so that he wants to argue out everything, reason out everything and subject everything to the microscope of his own brain, his own reason, and just see the whole thing right through in that way not accept it until he can understand it like that.
And so he becomes very analytical, very investigating in his mind over the thing, and until he can have the very best answer to all his questions from every side, he is not going to accept it.
But God’s word is also shocking to believers, who often will not accept its disturbing truth, and are unprepared to view themselves through God’s eyes.
If we cant accept one area of truth we put a question mark over the rest.
If we cannot accept His everlasting love, it affects all our thoughts of Him.
If we would only accept God’s Word as a little child it is as simple as the A.B.C.
God calls enough: “I have more than enough of burnt offerings, of rams and the fat of fattened animal,” we read in Isaiah 1:11 So we can only rely completely and wholly on God’s acceptance of the Sacrifice..
Accept or Reject
He is not a scientific formula to be discovered or a physical law that can be tapped. Child and scientist alike, must accept or reject God as indiscoverable phenomena. Infant and philosopher likewise, have no recourse but to believe – or to reject.
Seat of Power
But Christian doctrine has been twisted in many areas to elevate mans supremacy. Man may accept God’s gift as His Saviour and may even sacrifice much for God.. but man prefers to remain the crowned king on the throne of his own life.
When we sin we need to confess our sins and then trust His word and accept His grace – for if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness – and to restore us back into fellowship.
If you do not feel you can accept it; if you disagree; if you revolt; if you feel it cuts clean across all your training, all your acceptance; if you feel that it runs counter to all that you know, all I ask of you is honesty with God.
But true hope in Christ the Lord explodes into true glory of unimaginable joy – a true acceptance of the father-heart of love, births into inconceivable blessings.
One of the subtleties of the enemy is to get us so busy, so occupied, so much on the go and on the rush with as we think things for the Lord and the work of the Lord, that our prayer is cramped and pushed up into a corner and limited, if not almost entirely ruled out; and the Lord will never accept the excuse: Lord, I am too much engaged in Your interests to pray.
Light of Truth
We are called to walk in the light as He is in the light, and in so doing He draws us deeper and deeper into the mysteries of His love. He opens our understanding to the shining truth concerning Himself. He corrects our awareness of the shocking truth relating to ourselves! When His truth shows us our error, we must accept His Truth. When His light reveals in us our darkness, we must renounce its blackness – and walk back into His marvellous Light.
It was then and only then – after what seems like a lifetime of unendurable hurt, that Job was enabled to 'see' God in the only way that God will accept… where self-worth, self-satisfaction, and self-help are of no effect to God – where self-righteousness gives way to Christ-righteousness.
“How can He possibly have accepted someone as rotten as you?” To doubt the character of God is a greater agony than to doubt His existence, for better that there is no God that He should prove unworthy and untrue.
Acceptance Versus Rejection
as His presence seems to be overshadowed by darkness, diminishing to nothing, and the question of His acceptance and His love, fall heavily on the conscience.
And others seem to be more readily accepted, while we appear spurned and ignored.
to inhibit their life’s purpose, without recognising their position in Christ – a position in Christ that has gained them complete acceptance with God.
but none of us know the date and time that the end of our life will be, but from the moment of believing faith, we were accepted by God, through Jesus.
From the first act of faith we were born again and accepted in the Beloved.
Full Consecration
Now is the accepted time to ensure that lives are fully consecrated to the Lord. Now is the time to be sure that our lamps are trimmed and lighted. Now is the time to ensure that our lives are fully surrendered to Him.
What is so hard to accept is that God takes His time to bring us to perfection!
He has in the first place rejoiced greatly in the forgiveness of his sins, and his acceptance by God; but sooner or later he begins to realise that all is not well, and that he has failed and fallen from the high standard which he set himself to reach, in the first flush of his conversion.
Psalm 90:6 But Today is the accepted hour. Today is the day of Salvation. Today, if you will hear his voice, do not harden your hearts. Today you have been ordained for the service of the Lord.
All-Embracing Word
The word ‘salvation’ is one all-embracing word that unites a variety of concepts; redemption; rebirth; justification; security; sanctification; growth; maturity; foreknowledge; election; predestination; righteousness; glorification; grace; reconciliation; new-life-in-Christ; new creation; adoption; saved by grace; born-from-above; baptised into Christ; accepted-in Him; citizens of heaven - and more.
Our new-life-in-Him, our acceptance-in Christ.
Acceptance by God, eternal life, and glorification have nothing to do with our merit.
Indeed, God will not accept any aspect of Salvation any other way than by GRACE.
If we walk after the flesh, instead of after the Spirit, this may call for His loving rebuke and chastening (child training); but that in no way interferes with the precious truth of our continual acceptance and position in the risen Lord Jesus Christ, by whose one offering we have been perfected forever.
Leave traditionalism alone that is, the set order of things as it has always been; that framework of things as it has been constituted and set up and established by man; that Christianity which is the fixed, accepted system of things and you will escape a great deal of trouble.
He has in the first place rejoiced greatly in the forgiveness of his sins, and his acceptance by God; but sooner or later he begins to realize that all is not well, and that he has failed and fallen from the high standard which he set himself to reach in the first flush of his conversion.
You Are Accepted
One great saint wrote this… There are two questions that every believer must settle as soon as possible… the one is: does God fully accept me?
He continues: What devastation often permeates the life of one, young or old, rich or poor, saved or unsaved, who is not sure of being accepted, even on a human level, and yet so many believers, whether 'strugglers' or 'vegetators', move through life without this precious fact to rest on and build upon.
We read in Ephesians 1:5-6 ‘Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He hath made us accepted in the Beloved'.
Scriptural Fact
If you have not once and forever accepted your acceptance by God.. you will live a defeated life until the rapture or your death – and this is a non-negotiable fact in Scripture.
If you have not once and forever accepted your acceptance by God, you will live a defeated life until the time that you die or until Christ returns.
Biblical Truth
Read, mark, and learn Ephesians 1:6: He hath made us accepted in the Beloved. Live, walk and sleep: Ephesians 1:6: He hath made us accepted in the Beloved. Know that you know that you know: Ephesians 1:6: He hath made us accepted in the Beloved. Accept this verse means what it says: He hath made us accepted in the Beloved. There is one and one basis alone for your acceptance and mine.
We’re accepted by God in the Beloved.
We’re accepted by God because of what Christ did on the Cross.
He is faithful, and He is true to His word – He hath made us accepted in the Beloved.
is it today…? Few have received such an astonishing promise, but those who received such a pledge, must accept it, unquestioningly by faith.
Expectant Waiting
By faith Enoch, Elijah, Simeon believed the promise and lived in expectant waiting. Enoch waited his translation, Elijah his transport and Simeon to see the Lord’s Christ. Enoch waited for over 400 years and Simeon waited for the rest of his life. Their promise was given, accepted, believed, and they waited in humble anticipation.
Faith in Jesus
For 3½ years the very revelation of God walked this earth, but He was not accepted. He came unto His own creation and His own people did not receive Him, but as many as did receive Him to them He gave the power to become sons of God, even to them that believe on His name.
Should we not count all things loss for the excellence of knowing Him? Should we not accept that in this life we will have many troubles and sorrow? But He has overcome this world, for love of you for love of me.
Author and Finisher
Let us in this life accept His child-training – His chastening – our sufferings: looking unto Jesus, Who is the Author and Finisher of our faith; Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the suffering of the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. Heb.12:2. Yes, Jesus..
Unique Visitation
Abel was accepted through a bloodied sacrifice – Peter by the shore of Galilee. Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord – Paul found His grace was sufficient. The shepherds were led by a host of angels – the Wise Men followed a star. And on and on – each encounter different, distinct, dissimilar from the other.
Christ’s Cross
However, man in his arrogance and pride does not think that God’s way is best, and man in his conceit and vanity has tried to circumnavigate the Word of God. Man in his foolish ignorance – has superimposed his own criteria over God’s Word. But we are all guilty sinners – and we all stand condemned before a righteous God. We have nothing God can accept in payment for our sins – except Christ’s cross.
How Jesus, creator of the universe loves us – is mind-blowing. How we are accepted in the Beloved shatters the imagination – but it is true, for His Word says it – and His Word is truth.
He hath made us accepted in the Beloved.Ephesians 1:6
You are accepted by God because He has accepted you in the Beloved, in Christ.
You are accepted in Christ and you are accepted because of Him alone.
There is nothing so good or worthy that can gain an unbeliever His acceptance – except believing on the Lord Jesus Christ. It never has and it never will depend on man – it all depends on Him.
Man’s False Perception
Many Christians find this total acceptance by God, very difficult to understand. Many spend much time seeking to remain in His good books, by being “good”, They think that if their foot slips, or temptation strikes, that God’s favour is lost – Not so !!
There is one and one basis alone for your acceptance by God, and mine. We are both accepted in Christ, and that acceptance has nothing to do with us.
God’s Full Satisfaction
Our heavenly Father is fully satisfied with His Son on our behalf, which means He is fully satisfied with us, because of Christ. Nothing in heaven and nothing on earth can alter this eternal gracious truth. Nothing you can do, or omit doing, will influence His acceptance of you, in Christ.
Finger of Grace
Those times when the days seemed dark, do not influence His acceptance of you.
He is like the shining sun, ever there to bestow His blessings upon His children, but dark clouds of rebellion or doubt, only hide His face, but never His acceptance.
He waits for you simply because you are accepted in Christ.
He waits for you to accept His terms of acceptance, not your own efforts to please.
I am persuaded that nothing shall separate us from His love, for we are accepted eternally and unconditionally in the Beloved.
Channels of Blessing
We ourselves must be in a position to accept that which He comes to bring. We also must be in a condition to receive all that He comes to give – to welcome His gifts through whatever channel He chooses to send them.
Hearts of Unbelief
It is often because of unbelief, that God’s power is prevented from working within. He is able, and He is willing and He is ever-present to help in time of need, but He will never force us to accept His gifts.
But ungodly men who refuse to accept Christ's payment for their sin as a free gift of God's grace, will be punished and judged according to their works - which can never be good enough for a holy God: For there is none good, not even one.
The Law of God demanded that only the shed blood of a perfect, sacrificial 'Lamb' could be accepted as a trespass-offering - a sin offering to pay for the price for humanity's sin.
God has baptised them into Christ, sealed them with His indwelling Holy Spirit, promised them eternal life, and given an assurance that ALL are accepted in the Beloved.
ALL are accepted by God because of what CHRIST has done.
The enemy will try to flood your mind with doubt and try to discredit the character of God, but God is faithful and true, His Word is forever sure, and all who are believers have been accepted in the Lord Jesus.
It was because of Israel's failure to trust in God, keep His covenant, and obey His commands, that the Lord has allowed fallen man to assume authority over the whole earth... until Israel is ready to repent of her sin and accept God's anointed Son as their Messiah.
The only reason that we are declared righteousness is because we are positioned in Christ by faith, accepted in the Beloved, and covered in His cloak of righteousness.
Indeed, in a world where social media, and other impersonal ways of communicating, have become the accepted norm, it is sad to see so many Christian brothers and sisters adopting this impersonal medium to post critical challenges or make contentious comments, in order to accuse and attack others or simply to instigate a fruitless argument or accusation.
Nevertheless, the Bible is the Word of the living God and should be accepted as the plumb-line for truth.
There are only two types of people on earth today... the sinners and the saved... those who reject God's offer of salvation and live in direct opposition to His will and those that have accepted His gift of salvation.
Praise God that there is no condemnation for those that are in Christ Jesus - their sins are remembered no more and they are accepted in the Beloved and covered in His perfect righteousness - by faith.
So let us accept life's fiery trial as a beautiful child-training tool to conform us into Christlikeness, and yield to His gracious child-training so that in the end, we will come forth as pure gold.
Jewish believers in the early church found it very difficult to accept that the Aaronic priesthood, given by God, could be superseded because it was weak and useless, by comparison!
And the gift of God that the Lord Jesus spoke of to this woman-at-the-well is His free gift of salvation, which is openly available to all who will accept God's gracious offer of redemption and be cleansed of their sin, by faith in Christ.
Nor are we likened to some lonely, poverty-stricken, unsupported widow, for we are children of God, beloved of the Father, accepted in the Beloved, and inheritors of the kingdom of heaven.
that He started to give a message that was increasingly difficult for His followers to accept - it was a message which caused many of them to leave Him and to walk with Him no more.
He details the wonderful truth of our acceptance in the Beloved and lists some of the many precious promises that we posses as members of God's heavenly family.
Should not we, who have been accepted in the beloved and been made children of God, walk in the spirit of unity, one with the other, and show forth His grace within us to others?
We are accepted by the Father, in Christ, and we are loved with an incomprehensible love by the Lord Jesus Himself, Who has called us to abide in His love.
It is God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Who is to be highly praised, for He gave His only begotten Son to be born into the human race and to die for the sin of the world, so that we might be accepted in the Beloved by faith in His saving work at Calvary, and be seated together with Him in heavenly places.
Samson had compromised his Nazarite vow and sinned against the Lord long before his head was shaved, and as he languished in a Philistine prison, he had to accept that God had, justifiably, withdrawn from His servant and finally we read: Then Samson called to the LORD and said, 'O Lord GOD, please remember me and please strengthen me just this time, O God, that I may at once be avenged of the Philistines for my two eyes.'
However, it will not be until He is accepted and crowned by Israel as their King, that He will return to earth to set up His heavenly kingdom in the earthly Jerusalem.You see, EVERY prophecy concerning Christ MUST be fulfilled if He is to return to earth and complete God's programme of redemption and the salvation of the world.
Since we have been justified by Christ's blood, accepted in the Beloved, and been made children of God, how much more shall we be saved from the power of sin by means of Christ's own resurrected life within?
But many staunch Jews who believed in Christ, could not accept that the dispensation of the Law with its Aaronic priesthood, sacrificial offerings, male circumcision, and Sabbath days, had been set aside and a new dispensation initiated.
The scornful scoffers and deriding mockers that belie the fast approaching Day of the Lord, are unaware that every passing moment is not slackness or disinterest on God's part, nor is God's acceptance or indifference towards man's sin, but just another expression of His long-suffering grace and His unwillingness that any should perish, but that all should turn from their sin to Jesus as the substitute offering for their sins and their glorious Saviour.
We are to bear the burdens of each day without complaint - and we are even exhorted to accept unjust suffering without complaining, for when we suffer unjustifiably, we gain the approval of our Heavenly Father.
However, if we suffer for doing the right thing and accept it with grace and patience, God is pleased with us and honoured by our life.
Too often, ungodly actions are accepted or ignored, while spiritual gifts are abused when certain groups or individuals use their God-given gifts and talents for self-glorification or self-centred motives.
helplessly; simply; trustingly; without personal merit; without any learned biases and with a open mind that is ready to accept the truth willingly and joyfully.
It must have been hard for Jews to accept the administrative change that took place at Calvary.
It was very hard for them to accept that Gentile believers were equally accepted by God as Jewish believers and that together they made up a new category in God's economy; the Church, which is the Body of Christ.
But Christ's sacrificial death and glorious resurrection was the one and only price that a holy and just God could accept in full payment for sin... and so we read that Christ tasted death for EVERYONE..
Every person who has accepted the free gift of salvation through the shed blood of Christ has peace with God from the moment of salvation and continuing for the whole of their life.
There are times that we become overly familiar with terms such as 'born again', 'a new creation in Christ', 'made the righteousness of God in Him', 'accepted in the Beloved', 'ministers of reconciliation', 'ambassadors of Christ', 'seated with Him in heavenly places', 'hid with Christ in God', ' Christ in you the hope of glory' or 'bone of His bone and flesh of His flesh'.
Unsaved Jews would not recognise Jesus as Messiah, while many who believed in Him could not accept that the rites and rituals required of Israel were not a requirement for the Church.
He has sent Me to proclaim freedom to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free the oppressed.Jesus pronounced the fulfilment of this ancient prophecy from Isaiah, and the people there wondered at the gracious words that fell from His lips, yet they sought to slay Him for they could not accept the truth – but He passed through their midst, for His time had not yet arrived.Although Jesus was rejected in His hometown of Nazareth and an attempt was made to kill Him, He fulfilled this and many more astounding ancient prophecies, over the course of His life.The Spirit of God was indeed upon Him, for He submitted to the leading of the Spirit throughout His life, spoke only those things He heard from the Father, carried out His Father's will, and fulfilled every prophecy relating to His first advent.He did preach the good news of salvation to the poor, proclaiming freedom from sin, Satan, death, and hell – by faith in Him.
Poor, poverty-stricken people more ready to respond to the gospel of grace with an open heart, ready acceptance, and trusting faith, than prosperous persons who too often find difficulty in casting all their cares on Christ - preferring to centre their hope on cryptocurrencies, commodity markets, and their capital assets.
They failed to recognise and accept that Jesus is the visible representation of the invisible God - the Word made flesh Whose very life was a beautiful reflection of His Father in heaven.
His sacrificial death paid the penalty for our sin, but the icy grip of death could never hold Him in the grave, because eternal deity possesses immortality and perfect, sinless manhood is not subject to the sentence of death nor the curse of the Law (and we who believe Him, who are in positioned in Christ, are similarly not subject to the sentence of death or the curse of the Law, for by faith in Him we are accepted by God in the Beloved).
And the day is fast approaching when this mortal will put on immortal and this corruption will put in incorruption, for we are ONE with Christ and accepted in Him, and through Him we have life eternal.
By His redemptive work, we have been made a new creation in Christ, fully pardoned from sin, endowed with eternal salvation, permanently in-dwelt with His Holy Spirit, and forever accepted in the Beloved, by our Father in heaven.
They cried with a loud voice, We will not have this Man to rule over us, and so the kingdom was set aside for a season and Jesus, the Crown-Prince of heavenly glory, returned to His Father's throne until a future time when He would be accepted by His people, seated on the throne of David, and crowned as their eternal King, Sovereign Lord, and promised Messiah.Today, the kingdom has been postponed and the Prince of Peace continues to be Israel's 'King-in-Waiting'.
Abram strongly rejected the king's back-handed offer, refusing to accept so much as a shoe-lace to tie up his sandal strap, and then we read: After these things the Word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision, saying, 'Do not fear, Abram, I am a shield to you.
He was the one who would turn the heart of many back to the Lord, and Jesus identified him as the greatest of all men born of women, with the following statement: And if you are willing to accept it, John himself IS Elijah who was to come.
Following Israel's rejection of their Messiah and the birth of the Christian Church at Pentecost, God's chosen nation fell into two camps: those that accepted Christ as their Saviour and those that rejected His offer of salvation.
Before we were born again, we had a spirit that was dead in trespasses and sins, but when we accepted Christ as our Saviour we were given a new life in Christ, a new, free, human spirit which is able to commune with His Holy Spirit.
One principle we must understand and accept is detailed in verse 16 of Roman chapter 6: Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness?
Any good actions or kindly deeds that are carried out in our original, fleshly sin nature which we received from the first Adam, will never, ever be acknowledged or accepted by the Lord.
This was not a doctrine that the orthodox Jews of Pauls' day could accept.
Indeed much of the resistance to the glorious gospel that Paul proclaimed, is even challenged today by those that find the teaching hard to accept and understand - that gentile believers are equal in the sight of God with Jewish believers.
It is not an intellectual assent as to His historical existence or the acceptance of His moral teachings that identify a believer, but whosoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of the living God.
And may we also be ready and willing to accept any corrective advice from other believers without allowing it to destroy our fellowship, but use it as a means to re-establish our spiritual growth in grace.
Jesus Christ made the Law of no effect by giving His sinless life to pay the full price of all sin, which was the only payment that a holy God could accept.
Many Jews were prepared to add 'believing in Christ' to their religious rites, but very few could accept the gospel Paul taught; that faith alone in Christ alone was sufficient for salvation and that no man living would be justified by works of the Law.
The eternal truth is that the Cross is offensive to legalists; very offensive because it insults the pride of those who want to make some sort of 'recompense' to God for their salvation, and having to accept salvation as a free gift is an affront to their vanity!
It is a gospel truth that is deserving of full acceptance, for it is the glorious gospel of God.
YES indeed, it is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.
We need to fully and unhesitatingly accept, receive, embrace, and take to heart the astonishing truth that these profoundly simple words proclaim.
And like ALL the trustworthy sayings in Scripture, it is worthy of our full acceptance, because it brings us to the foot of the cross and an important decision, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved.
This is indeed, a statement that can be trusted and is deserving of complete acceptance.
It is a commendable and faithful saying, and worthy of full and universal acceptance.
This is indeed, a noble and glorious truth that is deserving of full, total and praiseworthy acceptance and warrenting our eternal praise, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief.
Although we are not told in Scripture, it is likely that the tithe Abraham gave to Melchizedek was a tenth of his own, personal wealth, in thanksgiving and praise for God's protection and providential care during his dangerous rescue mission, for he vigorously refused to accept so much as a shoelace from the wicked king of Sodom for saving the people of Sodom and returning their stolen wealth.
God gave man free will to choose or to reject His gracious offer of salvation, but God in His omniscience knew, from before the foundation of the world, who would accept His gift and who would reject it.
We read in Romans 8 that God foreknew all who would exercise their free will and choose to accept Christ as their Saviour.
And God, in His omniscience, foreknew all of us who would choose to accept Christ Jesus as Saviour: He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will.
They were being called to remove everything in their lives that hindered their walk with the Lord, and accept the King Whom God had anointed to rule over them – they were to repent of their sins.
We have been called to share forth the good news of the glorious gospel of grace to a lost and dying world, for God in His omniscience, knew who would accept His gracious offer of salvation, by faith.
They would not accept that we are saved by God's grace, through faith in His only begotten Son, and for this reason, Paul used illustrations from the Old Testament to validate his line of reasoning.
In other words, we are accepted by Him in the Beloved.We should never take this sacred privilege lightly, for it is a gift from God and a blessing to us.
We should never forget that even our most consecrated praises, sanctified service, and holy prayers can only be accepted by God – THROUGH Christ.
There is probably no higher pinnacle of praise to the glorious grace of God than the first few chapters of Ephesians, and there is possibly no more staggering truth for believers than to be accepted in the Beloved: Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ.
He also made known to us the mystery of His will and has made us accepted in the Beloved.
We are accepted by God simply because we trust in Jesus.
But the moment that we believed in Jesus and were born-again in-Christ, we were also baptised into His Body, became part of His Church, sons of God, and were accepted in the Beloved.WOW!
No matter what you have said or done, you are accepted in the Beloved.
No matter what sins you have committed or will commit in the future, you are accepted in the Beloved.
No matter how gross your life was you remain accepted in Him and even if you stray far from God, He still accepts you in Christ.
It is because we are accepted in His Beloved that when God looks at you He sees you as being placed in Christ and identified with His righteousness.Some Christians suggest that God's freely bestowed grace is reserved for 'good' Christians or 'spiritual' believers, but this distorts the character of God for it implies that you have to do something to stay saved or to remain accepted in the Beloved.
But Christ's sacrifice is fully sufficient.If you have trusted in Jesus as Saviour you are born again and accepted in Him.
Some Christians say that our great salvation and God's gracious acceptance of us is too easy, and encourages believers into licentious living and a careless attitude, but I suggest to you that as a believer grows and matures in the faith and starts to see the incredible, glorious grace of God and the staggering truth that is outlined in the first few chapters of Ephesians, it will open your eyes to that amazing love of the Father and compel you to glorify His holy name.
Despite this unparalleled onslaught, Job maintained his integrity and would not accuse God of evil against him: Shall we indeed accept good from the Lord and not accept adversity?
Most of that generation missed their Messiah and are placed under condemnation as prophesied, but the little remnant of Israel who accepted Christ's message of salvation at His First Coming, received the promised restoration; the forgiveness of sins and life everlasting.
Elijah came both figuratively and literally 2000 years ago, but he was not accepted by the majority in the person of John, whose ministry was cut short.
Had Israel accepted Christ at His first coming, the world would have been ready for His kingdom - then and there.
Some accept this unspeakably precious gift and others reject it, but the gift of God to humanity, which is too wonderful for words, was nonetheless given to ALL.
The moment God's gift of grace is accepted, He opens the floodgates of the riches of His grace over the blessed beneficiary.
Simply rejecting this unspeakably precious gift from God (which happens when people refusing to accept and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God), results in everlasting condemnation and spiritual death, which means eternal separation from God which Revelation tells us happens in the Lake of Fire.
While-ever there is life, the unspeakably precious gift from God is still available to whosoever will accept God's indescribable gift - His only begotten Son.
Suffering should be understood as part of a normal Christian life and when we understand and accept this, our whole attitude towards suffering will change.
If we could simply alter our outlook and accept that the persecution of Christians in this world honours Christ and that any suffering we endure for righteousness’s sake brings glory to our Father in heaven, then we would be able to rejoice in the midst of our suffering, knowing that name of Christ is lifted up and the Spirit of glory rests upon us!
This beautiful truth nestles in the midst of the section in Romans where Paul expresses his deep desire that all his fellow Israelites, who had not accepted Jesus of Nazareth as their Messiah, would come to saving faith in Him as the Messiah of Israel and the Saviour of the world.
She accepted her astonishing commission without hesitation, acknowledging her own need of a Saviour, and though wonder must have flooded her soul that she had been chosen to bear the Messiah promised so long ago by the Most High God, she scarcely could have understood the significance of this unique child's birth.
Blessed are the poor in spirit for it is only the heart that is broken before the Lord and truly humbled under a deep conviction of one's own unworthiness before a holy and righteous God, that a man or woman of faith can offer to the Lord the sacrifice of a broken heart - a living sacrifice, worthy of His acceptance.
Atonement for sin and the gift of life that accompanies it, comes through God's acceptance of the shed blood of the correct sacrifice, as written in God's Word.
And for His sake, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, giving us the right to call Him: 'Abba Father' As His children we have received the authority to boldly approach His throne of grace in Christ's name, for we are accepted in the Beloved by faith.
Man is free to choose to accept Christ as Saviour and believe in His finished work at Calvary... but man is equally given the choice to reject His free gift of grace and unconditional love.
Praise Him that we were chosen in Him before the foundation of the world and accepted in the Beloved by faith in Him.
Christ Jesus was born into the human race to be our sin-substitute, but He also gave each man and women a freewill to choose to accept or to reject His offer of salvation; to either believe in the death, burial, and Resurrection of Christ, or to refuse to believe in this free gift of grace.
Every person has a choice to accept salvation as a free gift of grace or to reject His gracious offer.
How we praise our Heavenly Father for Calvary: that our sins are forgiven, that there is no more condemnation for those that are in Christ Jesus, that we have been placed in union with Christ, and accepted forever in the Beloved.
How vital that we do not carry out our kind actions and considerate deeds from the source of our old sin nature, for when we do good works that are produced by ME, rather than by God working through me, they are works of the law - works of the flesh - works of the old sin nature - works that God will not accept, for God will not share His glory with ME.
this does not mean that all men will be saved, for man is given a free-will to choose to accept God's free gift of salvation or to reject His offer of grace, but it does mean that God is doing all He can to save sinful man from eternal separation from Himself.
Nicodemus had to come to accept that no one is exempt from God's righteous judgement.
Nicodemus, like us, had to come to accept that we are all sinners and that every sin we commit must be punished.
And so, Jesus used a beautiful Old Testament illustration to demonstrate to this highly educated Jewish rabbi that salvation is a free gift of grace which can be accepted or rejected by faith: For as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, on the Cross, to pay the price for the sin of the world.
Our assurance rests on His victory cry... it is finished, for we are accepted by God, in the Beloved, through time and into eternity - accepted through the merit of God's only begotten Son.
May we hold fast to the truth of God's Word and not allow the foolish scoffing of ungodly men who are willingly ignorant and refuse to accept the truth... that by the Word of God the heavens existed long ago, and the earth was formed as recorded in the Word of God.
Christ knew that sinful man in his fallen state cannot be accepted into the spiritual realm of a holy God unless he becomes as perfect as God and as holy as the Father in heaven is holy, which is only possible if he is forgiven of his sins, accepted in Christ, and covered with the garment of Christ's perfect righteousness.
He warns of the deeply held view of gnostics who did not accept that Jesus came to earth in the flesh (one of the fundamentals of the Christian faith - that Christ was not only fully God but also fully human).
As John was advancing in years, one of his main concerns for the Church was the increasing numbers of false teachers and demonic doctrines that were not only infiltrating the local churches, but also being accepted, embraced and believed by many gullible Christians.
But in His grace, God offered man an astonishing gift of salvation, whereby one act of righteousness from the sinless son of His Heavenly Father, would affect the righteous standing of everyone who accepted His offer of salvation and believed on Him.
He had been specifically sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, and yet in these early chapters of Matthew's Gospel, we can already see that Christ's message was not understood by the Jewish crowds nor were His Messianic claims accepted by the religious leaders.
But that time is still future for the lost sheep of the nation of Israel who have yet to accept Christ as their Messiah and King.
Pentecost was a tiny foretaste of what is yet in store for the nation of Israel, when they shall look upon Him Whom they have pierced and accept Christ as Saviour and Lord.
There are many people who accept a historical Jesus that lived on earth and was crucified on a Cross... but they do not trust Him as Saviour and remain under God's eternal condemnation.
Peter had started keeping some particular aspects of the Law of Moses to appease certain Jews who could not accept that Christ had fulfilled the Law on our behalf (through living a sinless life and dying a sacrificial death on behalf of Jews and Gentiles who would believe on Christ's atoning work on the Cross).
We are free from the burden of having to constantly strive for perfection because we are already accepted and beloved of God.
We can trust in the gift of grace that God has given us and accept the love He offers us.
May this verse encourage us all to remember that it is only through God's grace that we are given the freedom to live in righteousness, and may we be filled with peace and joy as we accept this gift of grace that God offers us.
Before they could accept Jesus as their Messiah, the entire nation was to first have to turn away from their rebellious ways and idolatrous practices, repent of their sins, and return to the Lord their God.
We have an eternal, unbreakable union with the Lord Jesus, for we have been eternally accepted in the Beloved by grace through faith – but sweet fellowship with Him can be broken and our life can dishonour His name – for if we choose to walk in darkness, we are lying and not practicing the truth.Holy living is not simply a spotless exterior but an inner mind that is clean, and a heart that is broken before the Lord; a spirit that rejoices in the truth; a soul that delights itself in the Lord.
Many Jewish believers found it very hard to accept that the new covenant in Christ's blood had superseded the old covenant given at Sinai, and which was a shadow of things to come.
We who are identified with Him are likewise accepted in the Beloved, and declared righteous by God - because we are associated with Him, and identified with all that He has, and all that is His.
Many people find it very difficult to accept that the Lord Jesus is equal in all aspect of deity with the Father, while remaining the unique Son of God and second Person of the Trinity.
He further details our complete and unconditional acceptance by God because we are positioned in Christ by faith, and he rejoices in the hope of our calling, the riches of His inheritance in the saints, and the exceeding greatness of His power towards us which is manifest in the salvation of Jew and Gentile together in one new Man.
John rejoiced because like him, they were accepted in the Beloved, indwelt by the Holy Sprit, seated in heavenly places, and walking in spirit and truth.
It is sad that Paul had to defend his ministry to the carnal Corinthians, but he had discovered that these believers often resisted his teaching before they would accept it and apply it in their lives.
And by virtue of His finished work and unchanging Word, we are fully persuaded that we are accepted in the Beloved and that God Who started a good work in us, will complete it in the day of Christ Jesus.
Not only did Daniel's prayer include confession of sin and rest securely on the promises, precepts, and prophecies of God, but it also was founded on a profound understanding and total acceptance of the perfect character and holy attributes of God.
Although we have no tangible evidence of our future hope, nevertheless we accept it by faith because God has spoken in His Word, and God is faithful to His Word for God has even set His Word above His holy name.
As the floodgates of apostasy and paganism continue to pour into the lives of believers today and pollute their faith, it is important to remain securely anchored to this important message of clarification from the apostle Paul: the gospel message of salvation which we have received, accepted, welcomed, and appropriated in our hearts.
Let us seek, as He did, to live our lives in constant and continuous communion with the Father, in the power of the Spirit, for we are all one with Christ and as such are accepted as beloved children of the Father.
Pharisaic adherence to rules and regulations, behaving legalistically in the keeping of feast days and fast days, a mechanical attitude towards worship and religious ordinances, and the meaningless repetition of prayers or invocations, are futile and the Lord will not accept such hypocritical behaviour.
Man has been given a free will to accept the light of the glorious gospel of grace, and all who trust in Him for salvation will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life as an abiding presence within.
While Paul was specifically making this point to his Jewish brothers in Christ who were finding it hard to accept that they were no longer bound by the Mosaic Law, it is important for all Christians, Jews and Gentiles alike, to realise that the Law is to show us that we are sinners in need of a Saviour, and to point us to Christ.
We are accepted in Christ, and those who are found in Him cannot boast of having our own righteousness, for we have been clothed in His perfect righteousness.
If God has done this marvellous deed and separated us forever from our sin, should we not accept as fact that there is now NO condemnation to those that are in Christ Jesus and not keep trying to win His favour?
Should we not in humility of heart and poverty of spirit accept God's gracious free gift of salvation?
And the wise advice from this learned sage follows the same logic - be careful not to accept the offerings of a selfish man, and do not hanker after his choice food or costly possessions, for his outer conduct and magnanimous gestures, may be hidden behind a mean and miserly streak.
His name is Jesus, and He came to His own, created world in His Father's name and was not accepted by His own people... and yet there is coming a false and idle shepherd who will come in another name, pretending that he is the Messiah, and he will be accepted - how tragic.
How sad that Israel rejected their true Shepherd, but will accept this worthless, counterfeit fellow.
Praise to our thrice holy God should be the ongoing song of rejoicing of all the elect, for we have not only been forgiven of our sin and saved from the shocking consequences of sin, but we have been accepted by the Father in the Beloved and seated with Him in heavenly places.
What an amazing privilege it is to be a new creation in Christ; forgiven of our sin, loved by the Lord, accepted in the Beloved, heirs of God, and joint-heirs with the Lord Jesus.
Before we were accepted in the Beloved by grace through faith in His sacrificial death and Resurrection, we were spiritually dead and doomed to eternal separation from God.
These four blessings stand in stark contrast with the four bitter woes that are the just desserts of those that refuse to accept Christ's offer of salvation.
Although there is no sin that cannot be cleansed by the efficacious blood of Jesus and despite being positioned in Christ, accepted in the Beloved, enclosed in the everlasting arms of our God and Saviour, and standing on a Foundation that can never fail, we must nevertheless heed the warning in this verse, lest like Israel we fall into complacent unbelief.
Having outlined the person of Christ, the incarnate Word of God Who would be rejected by His own people but accepted by all who would believe on His name, John gives increasing insight into the incarnation of Christ: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God..... and the Word became flesh and dwelt amongst us.
As in so many of his epistles, Paul contrasts the way of the wicked, who reject God's gracious gift of salvation and the final devastating outcome of their choice, with those who have accepted His call to trust in Christ's sacrificial death and glorious Resurrection.
And from the moment that we accepted Christ as Saviour, God's foreknowledge became a reality in our life.
How we thank God that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us and sent His Holy Spirit into the world to convict us of our guilt before a righteous God and of the need to turn from our sins and accept His gracious offer of salvation.
The baptism of fire - a baptism of judgement - was reserved for those that would not turn from their sins and accept Christ, but those that accepted the Lord Jesus as their Messiah were to be baptised with the Holy Spirit one day in the future.
To be patient in tribulation is to know and accept that in this world we will have tribulation, but to wait patiently in our suffering without murmurings.
This should comfort us, for we have been accepted in the Beloved, by grace through faith, and no matter what we have said or done or will do, God knows us and He loves us.
We who, at some point in our life, have chosen to accept His gift of salvation, were elected as God's children before the foundation of the world.
We, whom God knew would accept His free gift of salvation became 'called' the very moment we first believed on the only begotten Son of God.
For once we are saved by grace through faith, God accepts us in Christ, we are positioned in Him, we are accepted in the Beloved, we are sealed unto the day of Christ by the Spirit, and we are also elected and called because we believed on the only begotten Son of God.
It was a truth that was staggering to God's chosen people and which was strongly resisted by many Jews, who could not accept that God in His mercy and kindness and stepped into history and elevated Gentile believers to enjoy equal position, privileges, status, and title with other Jewish believers.
We are accepted in Christ as children of God, and we are called to love others as Christ loves us, and to live and move in the power of His indwelling Holy Spirit.
Although it was agreed at the Jerusalem council that Gentiles should not be placed under the Mosaic Law, certain Jews, from 'the party of the circumcised' would not accept the decision made at their council meeting, refusing to eat with uncircumcised Gentiles. These men taught a false gospel, a gospel of condemnation, that placed believers back under the curse of the Law, rather than proclaiming the wonderful freedom that is found in the gospel of grace.
They could not accept that salvation was by faith in Christ's sacrificial work and glorious Resurrection.
For at the moment of salvation we are accepted in the Beloved, and His overcoming work has made us overcomers, heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ.
Let us accept this truth in righteousness and true holiness by faith, and in everything we do, let us do ALL, to His praise and glory, from this day forward - even forevermore.
Jesus was a Man that went about doing good, but those who knew Him as a young lad in the little village of Nazareth, were unable to accept Him and His teachings.
This was the incarnate Son of God Who had laid aside His heavenly glory, so that He could be born into the human race, that He Himself had created, in order that you and I could become a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, and children of God - accepted in the Beloved.
But spiritual blindness, the hypocrisy of their leaders, and disobedience to God's written Word, would result in Christ's rejection by the nation He love, and a gracious invitation being extended to all who would hear His Word and accept His free gift of salvation, both Jew and Gentile alike.
But the only virtue we possess and the only righteousness and strength that God will accept from His children is the righteousness of Christ - which only comes by faith in Him, and has nothing to do with our own personal performance or human merit.
We are to remember that God will never share His glory with another and no holy angel nor angelic messenger of the Lord, has ever accepted worship from men, as we are reminded by John in his Revelation of Jesus Christ - for He is the incarnate God Who alone is worthy of all worship and praise and honour and glory.
Though their sins may have been scarlet and their fleshly works as filthy rags, they are accepted in the Beloved through faith in Him, clothed in His righteousness, and freed from all condemnation.
This biased company could not accept that Christ's wisdom was from God, and did not applaud Him for His stunning spiritual understanding, nor did they wonder how He carried out the mighty miracles He performed.
They could not recognise Jesus as their promised Messiah and would not accept that He was the 'Horn of their Salvation' Who had been born of the house of God's servant David, in fulfilment of prophecy.
The wages of sin is death, and the only way for man to be saved is EITHER - to live a perfect, sinless life, OR - to accept God's offer of salvation, for the forgiveness of sin, through Jesus Christ.
This was especially the case in Galatia where many legalists and Judaisers found it very difficult to accept that a change in God's management had taken place.
Those days arrived when Christ was born, and had Jesus been accepted as Israel's prophesied Messiah, He would have set up His earthly kingdom there and then - a kingdom which had been promised to Abraham and his Seed many years before - for God's anointed King was in their midst and all Israel had to do was to repent, turn back to God, and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ Whom He had sent.
The Church age, which began on the day of Pentecost and ends with the Rapture, is the interim period between Christ's shocking rejection at His First Coming and His glorious acceptance as God's anointed King at His Second Coming... when Israel will finally accept Jesus as their Messiah and will once again cry, Blessed is He Who comes in the name of the Lord.
Sadly, in Paul's day... as today, there are those that cannot accept that we are no longer under the Law of Moses and living in 'the dispensation of the grace of God'.
It was difficult for Jews to discover that the Law of Moses had been superseded by the Law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus, and many refused to accept that the dispensation of Law ended at the Cross and had given way to the dispensation of the grace of God.
The Church of Christ is made up of the family of believers that have accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as their Saviour and God in this dispensation (from Pentecost to the Rapture).
They had become so twisted and depraved in their minds that they became wearied by their evil schemes and wicked plans, and deception and lies were the accepted standard of behaviour.
As children of our Heavenly Father, we are instructed to reflect on His righteous impartiality, and we should never base our assessment of someone's worth or acceptance on their outward appearance.
It identifies the Messiah as the true Shepherd of Israel, speaks of His rejection and betrayal, and foretells of Israel's acceptance of a worthless, idle shepherd, who will rob and slay God's people during a time of Great Tribulation.
It does not mean to believe the fact of Scripture, as an intellectual exercise. 'To believe in His name', means to accept everything that the Bible teaches about the Lord Jesus Christ - that He was sent by God to pay the price for our sin - that He is the Word of God made flesh, Who dwelt among us and died as the sacrificial substitute for the sin of mankind.
And so their Messiah-King ascended to the right hand of the Majesty on high and He remains seated there until He returns at His Second Coming, when Israel as a nation WILL accept Him as their God and King.
May we not be influenced by those who misunderstand the reason the Law was given and misrepresent the truth of Scripture with an insistence that the Mosaic Law must be added to our faith, for we are accepted by faith in the Beloved and not by works of the Law.
This servant of God would not accept so much as a sandal strap from this sneaky, pagan king who wanted to boast that he had made God's servant wealthy.
Every one of us has the same opportunity to follow in Abram's footsteps and trust God at His Word, and with it receive heavenly blessings from our great God and Saviour OR we can choose to accept the glittering prizes of this passing age and forfeit all that God has prepared for us.
But it is only through His divine power that we have been equipped by God to live such a godly life, for we have been imputed with Christ's righteousness, indwelt by Christ's Holy Spirit, identified with all His goodness and grace, and have been accepted by the Father in the Beloved, by grace through faith in Him.
We have not been called, chosen, redeemed, and accepted because of our own merit but by His glory, His goodness, His virtue, and His grace.
Many could not accept that Jesus was Immanuel, the Alpha and the Omega, the great I AM - despite His clear teaching which said, believe on God, AND Jesus Christ Whom He has sent.
They were a stiff-necked people who would not accept discipline nor receive instruction, and throughout his lifetime, Jeremiah's prophetic injunctions fell on deaf ears.
We are accepted in the Beloved and have the permanently in-dwelt by His Holy and life-giving Spirit.
We all enjoy equal acceptance by means of this same precious faith, simply because we trusted in the death, burial, and Resurrection of our Lord and Saviour for salvation.
Pre-marital, extra-marital, and gay-marital sex, together with every other ungodly or unbiblical practices may be accepted by a community, or embraced by a culture, but they remain an abomination to the Lord.
Christ's finished work on the Cross paid the full price for our sins and has already been fully accepted on our behalf by our Heavenly Father: For there is now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus.
As we read this chapter, we discover the overflowing riches of God's grace and the tender love that the Father has bestowed on all who trust in Christ as Saviour, for we are accepted in the Beloved and have become eternally united with our Saviour, by grace through faith in Christ alone.
We can accept the truth of God's Word and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved - OR we can reject the truth of God's Word and refuse to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and be lost.
All that is required of us is to admit, in humility of heart, our lack, and accept His gracious offer to cast all our cares on Him, knowing that He cares for us and is well able to give us help in time of need.
It was very difficult for Jews in the early Church to come to accept that the covenant of Law and the Aaronic priesthood, had been superseded by a new and better covenant and heavenly High Priest.
Many found it difficult to accept that Christians were no longer under 'The Dispensation of the Law' but were living in a new dispensation: 'The Dispensation of the Grace of God' that came through Christ.
God purposed that salvation would be a free gift of God's grace which would be appropriated by faith - and no attempt, by man to achieve righteousness any other way or through any other person, would be accepted by God.
We who have been bought with the precious blood of Christ Jesus our Lord, should arm ourselves with the same courage and determination and to accept suffering in this life for the sake of our God and Saviour.
Jesus shed His blood on the Cross for our transgressions and rose again the third day so that we might be born from above, born anew, born of the Spirit of God, positioned in Christ, clothed in His perfect righteousness, and accepted in the Beloved for His name's sake.
And we are one with Him: we are eternally united with Him, permanently positioned in Him, and forever accepted in the Beloved, for by grace through faith we have become His Body and He has become our Head.
They crave after all this world offers, without realising the satanic trap into which they will fall - for if they do not accept salvation on God's terms, they will face the pit of hell and the lake of eternal fire.
But their message was an affront to the Jewish rulers who attempted to silence their voices, for had they accepted the truth of the glorious gospel, their authority would have been challenged because the old order had been set aside and a new order had started - the dispensation of the grace of God.
But it was his reliance on the logic of man, and his inability to see truth beyond his physical senses, that caused him to become labelled with the uncomplimentary title, 'doubting Thomas', for he would not accept the multiple eyewitness accounts of Christ's Resurrection because he himself, had not seen His resurrected Lord with his own eyes, nor had he touched the risen Saviour with his own hands - and so he made the astonishing claim, unless I see in His hands the imprint of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe.
He warns that there is only one way by which man may be saved, and that is by faith in the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ Who is the propitiation for our sins, and through Whom the redemption price for the sin of mankind was paid in full and accepted unconditionally by the Father.
The death He died was accepted by the Father as FULL payment for our sins: payment for every sin so that whoever believes on Him will not perish but have everlasting life.
At rebirth we were positionally sanctified, we were set apart forever unto God by grace through faith in Christ, we were born again, we were accepted in the Beloved, and declared holy unto God.
We are positioned in Christ, in union with Him, indwelled by the Holy Spirit, and accepted by God the Father in the Beloved, and it is all by grace through faith in Him.
The curtain in the Jewish Temple, which represented the separation of incurably sinful man from eternally Perfect God, was torn from the top to the bottom, ripped asunder from heaven to the earth, demonstrating that the finished work of Christ Jesus was accepted and sufficient.
Because Christ paid the full price for all sin on Calvary's Cross and the Father accepted Christ's offering for sin, IT IS FINISHED for all who have trusted in His redeeming work on the Cross.
The counsel in Proverbs 3 is to accept that chastening rod of God, for as an earthly father corrects his son, so our Heavenly Father disciplines His children.
When we were saved by grace through faith in Christ, we were transferred from Satan's kingdom into the family of God, and accepted into the bosom of the Father.
To believe that humanity is fundamentally flawed based on Adam's sin in the garden, is not accepted by the philosophy of the world and yet the Bible teaches that we are not sinners because we sin.
Paul calls the unbelieving man or woman who is dead in their trespasses and sins and has not accepted the free gift of grace, by faith in Christ's finished work at Calvary: The natural man.
Paul points out that the foolishness of God is wiser than the wisdom of the sinful man, and the weakness of God is stronger than strength of the unsaved man: For a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him.
And until a sinner is convicted of their sin and guilt before a holy God and turns from the lie to the truth by faith, they will remain blind and deaf to spiritual things: For the natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.
In Christ we have been made children of God and accepted into His heavenly household.
As we reflect upon the glorious gospel of Christ and the amazing grace by which we have been accepted in the Beloved, should we not seek to walk worthy of our calling every moment of the day, with lowliness of heart and gentleness of spirit?
No wonder Paul wrote that there are not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty according to man's viewpoint, and not many noble that come to accept the message of the Cross, for they have substituted self for God on the throne of their life.
But the majority of God's chosen people are impervious to the truth and do not accept that their Messiah died on Calvary, two thousand years ago, and is risen from the grave, seated in heavenly places at the right hand of God the Father, and is coming again to rule and reign on the throne of his earthly father, David, forever.
The permanently indwelling Holy Spirit, Who would Himself baptise all believers into the Body of Christ at salvation, was a further staggering truth the early Church would have to learn, but so too was the unprecedented realisation that Gentile believers in Christ were equally accepted by God as Jewish believers in Christ.
The fact that Gentiles were also given the indwelling Holy Spirit by faith in Christ, was the first step towards a fuller understanding that there is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither male not female, neither bond nor free, neither old nor young, neither black nor white, but that we are all one in Christ and accepted in the Beloved, lest anyone should boast.
It was a very steep learning curve for Peter and the early Jewish Church to accept that there is no partiality with God.
To accept that we have nothing about which to boast, helps each one of us to realise that without Him we can do nothing - for all we are, and all we have, and all that has been given to us, is from His bountiful supply.
However, He came to His own people in His hometown and they refused to accept Him or pay heed to His message.
And although they acknowledged that Jesus spoke words of wisdom with great authority, they would not believe that He had come from God and could not accept that He was endowed with wisdom from on high.
The contempt the townsfolk had for Jesus was partly due to their refusal to accept the virgin-birth.
John 3:16 tells us the glorious news of the gospel of salvation: Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved. But the subsequent verses give us context, meaning, and the gravity of the situation for those who chose not to trust in Jesus and accept His free gift of salvation: For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.
And yet as Luke records, Jesus wept over Jerusalem and grieved for His people, for despite their fleshly adoration of Him, they neither accepted Him as their Messiah nor acknowledged Him as God's anointed King.
On that day, the entire nation of Israel will repent of her national sin against the Lord, as they call on the name of the Lord for salvation and accept Jesus Christ as the Lamb of God and King of the Jews.
One by one, Paul exposed their errors that confidence in the flesh through one's parentage, lineage, race, or tribal connections is NOT required for acceptance by God.
Similarly, he denounced traditional practices, works of the Law, cultural customs, and religious orthodoxy as a requirement for acceptance by God.
Both John and Peter knew that after God's full and final sacrifice for sin had been accepted through the blood of their Messiah, then simply believing on the God of their fathers and the Holy Spirit was not enough for the forgiveness of Israel's sins.
God spoke the world into being in the beginning, and later: God spake all these words to Israel, and entered into the special covenant relationship with His singular covenant people, when they accepted God's spoken terms on Sinai, so long ago.
And yet, throughout the Old and New Testaments, we discover with astonishment the foolish depravity to which the human race has fallen and man's arrogant refusal to accept God's free gift of salvation.
And although some accepted Jesus as Messiah in principle... many refused to surrender their position as God's witnesses on earth to the Church... unless they adhered to Jewish rites and rituals as well as believing in Jesus.
He was the King of the Jews, and had He been accepted by them, the kingdom would have been established on earth, there and then.
Some subtract from this truth and refuse to accept that the Bible teaches that lost souls are eternally damned.
It tells us that there is no condemnation to those that are in Christ Jesus (to those that are born again), because they are positioned in Christ, imputed with His righteousness, baptised into the Body of Christ (which is the Church) and accepted in the Beloved.
BUT the truth is laid out in the Scriptures and when you accept the truth from the Word of God - that ALL the essential essence of Deity inhabits the Lord Jesus in His bodily form, and that you have been made complete in Christ as fact, then you have the most wonderful security in God, which allows you to rest in the Lord Jesus.
But this is what we are, and this is what we remain, and none can ever pluck us out of this secure love of the Godhead, for we are accepted by the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Who is the Beloved Son of His love.
The Galatians had to be retaught and Timothy had to be reminded that the Law is a schoolmaster that brings us to Christ...and that any attempt to keep the Law through works of the flesh will NEVER be accepted by God.
Adding works to Christ's finished Work of salvation, will NEVER be accepted by God. 'Believe AND be baptised'. 'Believe AND give money'. 'Believe AND evangelise'. 'Believe AND do good works' 'Believe AND attend church, AND go to confession, AND say the rosary...............' And so on...
He paid the purchase price for our redemption so that those who believe on His name become God's own purchased possession - for we are in Christ and accepted in the Beloved.
At first, they complained that they knew his mother and father and refused to accept that He was God incarnate Who came down from heaven to offer them life eternal.
These Jews were blinded by their preconceived notions and would only accept a majestic Messiah that would come in the clouds of glory and defeat their earthly enemies.
The shocking price for sin and the only price that God would accept was the shed blood of the sinless Son of Man.
God would not force people against their will to become part of His new race of humanity, and from the beginning, God equipped man with a free-will to choose to accept Him and His free gift of salvation or to reject Him thus rejecting His gift of salvation.
What is more astonishing is that the majority of humanity refuses to accept God as their Creator and ignores His gracious offer of salvation.
The writer of Hebrews is talking to Christians who have accepted the Lord Jesus as Saviour, being born again and in so doing, have entered into Christ, have become a part of His Body, and have entered into the rest of Jesus.
And yet, there are those that hear the wonderful gospel of grace, receive it as trustworthy and true, and accept Christ as Redeemer, Saviour, Lord, and God, by grace through faith.
And to those that believe in His name, He has stored up for us grace upon grace and poured out blessing upon blessing, for we are accepted in the Beloved and eternally secured in Christ.
ALL members of the Body are equally beloved of the Lord and all are accepted in the Beloved... by grace through faith in Christ's finished work at Calvary.
God honoured his prayer and accepted the sacrifices that king Solomon offered; fire came down from heaven and consumed the offerings, and the glory of the Lord filled the Temple.
He was a knowledgeable Pharisee who had studied under some of the greatest teachers of his day, but he had been brought low before the Cross of Christ and dared to break with the accepted traditions of the day.
Certain misguided Jews, who may or may not have been truly born-again, could not accept that keeping the Mosaic Law was not a requirement for salvation or that circumcision was not a legal requirement to become a Christian.
They despised Paul's doctrine and attempted to undermine his teachings, and although they claimed to believe in Jesus, they did not understand the gospel of grace or accept that Israel had been set aside for a season during the Church age (the dispensation of the grace of God).
Indeed, one of the most difficult things for sinful man to accept is that salvation is a free gift of grace from God to those who simply believe on Christ as Saviour, those who believe that He died on the Cross to pay the price for our sins, and through believing on Him are given life everlasting.
But like her Gentile neighbours, apostate Israel lacked the standard of holiness required to be accepted by God, and to stand in His awesome presence and be accepted into fellowship with Him.
We are now under grace; forgiven by God; accepted in the Beloved; covered in Christ's righteousness and freed from the power of sin and the curse of the Law because we died and our life is hid with Christ in God.
Paul paints in spectacular technicolour what it means to be children of God, accepted in the Beloved, dead to the power of sin in our lives, and alive unto God through the life of Christ, now resident within and able to work in us and through us, to the glory of God.
Perhaps, more than any other passage in Scripture, Joshua's long day has sparked an increasingly intense debate where the geo-centricity of an immovable, flat earth, where the sun and moon rise from one end of the heavens and circle to their other end, is taken literally rather than the currently accepted heliocentric model where a moving earth orbits a travelling sun in an ever-expanding universe.
Let us never forget that we are justified by faith in Christ, accepted in Christ, fully justified by His grace, clothed in His righteousness, and redeemed from the curse of the Law through Christ Jesus our Saviour.
We who were dead in trespasses and sins and without hope in the world, have been covered with His love, forgiven of our sins, saved by grace through faith in His only begotten Son, in-dwelt by the Holy Spirit, accepted in the Beloved, given an eternal inheritance, and are today seated together with Christ in heavenly places.
Jesus came to set His people free from the curse of the Law and the chains of sin and death, but they could not accept that they were sinners in need of salvation.
When Jesus spoke these words, He was speaking to the Jews of His day who refused to accept His offer of Salvation.
They refused to accept that they a slave of sin in need of a Saviour.
Paul had a great love for all who had heard and accepted the gospel of grace through his ministry, and longed to see them again and to fellowship with them in person.