Wednesday, August 6, 2014

prosperity from properly understanding the gospel


There is no doubt that there are many lessons in the parable of the sower. There is one however that can greatly affect how we view the scripture. In the parable of the sower Jesus defines the phrase the word of God. It comes from looking at two parallel accounts of the explanation of the seed in Matthew and Luke.  Let’s look at the explanation from both passages.
Matt 13:18-19 KJV  "Hear then the parable of the sower:  (19)  When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart. This is what was sown along the path
Luke 8:11 KJV  Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God.”
In the Matthew passage, Jesus explains to his disciples that the seed is the word of the kingdom or in other words, the gospel. Luke records him saying that the seed is the word of God. It follows then that in Jesus vocabulary, the gospel of the kingdom and the word of God are synonymous. Actually, we have established this in many other posts in this blog, however, it is instructive to see that the redefining of the phrase word of God came from Jesus himself. Luke’s understanding is that one can substitute the phrase word of God for the gospel of the kingdom. This means that when he thought of the gospel or word of the kingdom, he automatically thought of the word of God. The two phrases become interchangeable.
This becomes very important in defining how the phrase word of God was used in the New Testament writings. For example, when Paul writes: Eph 5:25-27 KJV “Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it;  (26)  That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word,  (27)  That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.” The gospel is the washing water. Jesus has cleansed the church with the washing of the water of the gospel. This is why the gospel is so important.
It sounds like this should be an ongoing process from the Ephesians five passage. It is the way that we look continually to the cross. The cross is God’s answer for everything. It is his answer for justification, it is his answer sanctification, it is his answer for health, it is his answer for prosperity, and it is his answer for the washing process. When you add anything to the work of the cross you offend God.
So then, if one looks at this passage from Deuteronomy and believes that it is for all the seed of Abraham, both Jew, and Gentile, then one must simply look to the cross for all of the promises that follow because the cross of Christ handled these two passages once for all:
Deu 28:1-2  KJV And it shall come to pass, if thou shalt hearken diligently unto the voice of the LORD thy God, to observe and to do all his commandments which I command thee this day, that the LORD thy God will set thee on high above all nations of the earth:  (2)  And all these blessings shall come on thee, and overtake thee, if thou shalt hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy God.
All of the blessings that follow in Deu 28 will overtake the one who trusts the cross and nothing else. There is nothing else to do. The passage has been handled by the cross. Perhaps one of the reasons that we don’t see more of these blessings is that we are still trying to add to the cross with our effort. That immediately offends God. When will we stop trying to do and just begin to trust?
The person trusting in the cross will give from the love for God just for knowing that Jesus did it all. Real prosperity is found only in the cross.

 

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