Thursday in Pentecost Week
“I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to Him; but the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith.” (Explanation to the Third Article of the Apostle’s Creed)
In the Name of Christ. Amen. Our human nature doesn’t want to listen to the explanation of the Third Article. We want to fight against it and believe that there’s something we can do to make God love us.
But think about it. Outside of a zombie flick, when was the last time you saw any dead people get up and walk around? If we are honest about our sinful condition, we realize that we are dead in our sins, and there’s no way we can revive ourselves – radioactive waste, spaceborne viruses, and other weird plot lines notwithstanding.
Since there is no way for us to save ourselves, the Holy Spirit does the work for us. Through the Gospel, the life-giving and life-saving Word of Christ, the Holy Spirit calls out to us and makes us alive again.
He takes the work of Christ Jesus and applies it to us to make us a new creation in Him. He drags us, kicking and screaming, through the waters of Baptism and recreates us as the children of God.
St. Paul mentions over and over again in his epistles that what we are after God gets through with us is a new creation – a completely new person, someone who is filled with Christ.
The Holy Spirit takes that new creation and keeps it alive by the same means that He brought it to life in the first place. He keeps us in that living faith with the read and preached Word of God and the Lord’s Supper.
Go, live in the state of grace that the Holy Spirit has worked for you. Rejoice that He keeps after you, constantly bringing the words of God’s love and forgiveness to your ears. Rejoice that He keeps you in the true faith for all eternity. Amen.
“Glory and praise, still onward reaching, Be Thine, O Spirit of all grace, Whose holy pow’r and faithful teaching Give me among Thy saints a place. Whate’er of good by me is done Is wrought by grace divine alone.” (TLH #243, v.4)Daily Lectionary:
Thursday
Ezekiel 37:21-28 1 John 2:18-29 Matthew 10:16-23This devotion is found on the
Higher Things website. I am thinking I will post up these devotions here because I like where they are coming from and as an exercise to strengthen the habit of starting out each morning with the higher things of God.