June 3, 2012 – Pastor Tim – “The Past Tenses of God’s Word” – Click to download
It is important for seekers after the mercies of God to see that appropriating faith is taking and using what God offers to us. Hope is expecting a blessing sometime in the future; but faith is taking now what God offers.
We are to believe what God says He has done for us and act upon it—taking our blood-bought liberty just as the slaves of the south did after the “Emancipation Proclamation” by Abraham Lincoln.
“The Gospel is a world-wide emancipation proclamation of liberty from service and bondage to the old tyrant master of sin and sickness—the devil.” When Jesus said, “It is finished.” He meant that the work was done—completed as God sees it; and God expects us to reckon as done what Jesus says was done. The past tenses of God’s word mean a settled, sealed, and final decision of His Will.
God wants us all to appropriate the past tenses of His Word regarding His redemption of our souls and bodies from sickness and disease and go forth in obedience acting as if we believed Him. When God puts a promise in the past tense, He authorizes and expects us to do the same. Nothing short of this is appropriating faith.
The farmer has to get the sowing of his seed into the past tense before it is possible to reap a harvest; and the permanent receiving of God’s Word—the “imperishable seed” into the “good ground” of our heart, thus getting it into the past tense, is necessary before the seed can begin to work.
With our natural eyes we see only the temporal and inferior things of earth, but with the enlightened eyes of our understanding we behold the superior, satisfying and lasting realities of God’s spiritual and eternal Kingdom.
This week’s scripture references (all verses quoted in New King James Version unless noted):
– Galatians 3:13
– Matthew 8:17b
– 1 Peter 2:24
– Mark 11:24
– John 11:41
– 1 John 5:14-15
– Matthew 8:13
– Genesis 17:5
– Hebrews 11:1
– Jonah 2:8
You must be logged in to post a comment.