Gratia Dei | Thank You God

"So I find this law at work: although I want to do good, evil is right there with me...Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our LORD!" - Romans 7:21,25.

Photo by Thirdman from Pexels

St Paul in Romans 7: 21-25 says, "So I find this law at work: although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our LORD!" 

Reflecting on the beautiful and honestly painful confession of St Paul. He acknowledges the conflicting pull of the sinful nature at war with the spiritual nature that is imparted into all believers at the point of conversion when the Spirit of God had chosen to indwell in unclean vessels, i.e. our human bodies and transform each of us into a Holy Temple of a Holy God. This Divine Act of imputed righteousness is given through faith in the One Time Perfect Sacrifice of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ to all who believe. Yet despite the indwelling Spirit of God, the old sinful nature doesn't die off immediately, and we are given free will daily to either walk by faith in step with the Spirit or succumb to the old sinful natures.

For many years, after receiving Christ as Lord and personal Saviour in 2005, I found my mind entwined and trapped in bondage with deep dark sinful habits, and desperately tried on many occasions to breaks those chains by my own power. I had experienced brief periods of respite when I was able to stop those habitual patterns by my own willpower only to fall into despair when a single thought or image in my broken sinful mind led me back into the deep dark pit of the sinful habits.

Until one day, like the young man who had squandered his youth and father's inheritance on wanton living, I came to the end of my human ropes, battling daily with despairing thoughts of wanting to end my own miserable life. I had no other choice but to cry out to ABBA Father, "Father, I have sinned against You, I'm sorry, help me please." And just like the young man I found a Heavenly Father who had been staring into the distance, hitched up His long royal robes and ran towards me and embraced me with the strongest and most loving Fatherly hug. He restored me and welcomed me back into His beautiful royal household. So that today, just like St Paul, I can say, "Thanks be to God who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord." I will conclude my sharing with these verses from St Paul, in 1 Corinthians 1:27-30:

"But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him. It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption."

And a beautiful worship song invoking the Power of the Holy Spirit to fall upon all of us through this pandemic, to spark a fresh outpouring of His anointing and set the earth ablaze like He did over 2000 years ago with the first Pentecost, that the Message of the gospel shall be preached to the ends of the earth. Amen. Wishing all a blessed month of November ahead.

YouTube link to the song: https://youtu.be/OeAQvFP-Xy0

Come Holy Spirit (Fall on Me Now)

Come Holy Spirit, fall on me now

I need your anointing, come in Your power

I love You Holy Spirit

You captivated my soul`

and everyday I grow to love You more.

I'm reaching for Your heart

You hold my life in Your hand

Drawing me closer to You

I feel Your power renewed

Nothing compares to this place

Where I can see You face to face

I worship You in spirit and in truth.

Reflection on Romans 7:14-25 by Chris Tan