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4 Precious and Exceedingly Great Promises from God

July 22 2019

4 Precious and Exceedingly Great Promises from God

We can find many promises God has made to us in His Word. For instance, He promises to care for us faithfully and to never forsake us. But in 2 Peter 1:4, some of His promises are strikingly described as precious and exceedingly great.

Are these precious and exceedingly great promises related to material things like a better car, a life without financial challenges, or a trouble-free family life with the best spouse and children? To answer this question, let’s first see why God gave these extraordinary promises to us. This will help us see what makes them so precious and exceedingly great.

The purpose of God’s promises

Let’s read 2 Peter 1:4-5:

“Seeing that His divine power has granted to us all things which relate to life and godliness, through the full knowledge of Him who has called us by His own grace and virtue, through which He has granted to us precious and exceedingly great promises that through these you might become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption which is in the world by lust.” 

The context of these verses tells us that the precious and exceedingly great promises Peter speaks of aren’t related to prosperity or a trouble-free life. And they aren’t for something in the far-off future, nor are they for after we die. They’re related to something profound that we can enjoy here and now.

The verses tell us God gave us such promises so that through them we can partake of the divine nature of God today. No wonder Peter calls them precious and exceedingly great. The fact that we human beings can partake of the divine nature of God is tremendous!

To partake of something means to take it into us and experience it. Just as we partake of food daily, we can partake of God’s divine nature through His precious and exceedingly great promises. As we partake of His nature, something happens in us: we begin to express God.

To illustrate, let’s say a person eats a lot of carrots. Eating so many carrots can eventually cause his skin to develop an orange tint, expressing the carrots he’s become constituted with. In the same way, the more we partake of God’s divine nature, the more we become constituted with and express His nature. 

Knowing we can partake of God’s nature will truly revolutionize our Christian life. Expressing God isn’t the result of our self-effort or outward behavior, but of partaking of His divine nature. So as we partake of Him, God works out His purpose to join Himself to us and mingle with us so we become His expression for His glory. 

Note 2 of verse 2 Peter 1:4 in the New Testament Recovery Version says:

“Through and on the basis of the Lord’s glory and virtue, by and to which we have been called, He has given us His precious and exceedingly great promises, such as in Matt. 28:20; John 6:57; 7:38-39; 10:28-29; 14:19-20, 23; 15:5; 16:13-15. All these promises are being carried out in His believers by His life-power as the excellent virtue, unto His glory.”

Now, let’s take a look at just the first four passages listed in this note to get a taste of these promises.

1. Matthew 28:20—“Teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you all the days until the consummation of the age.”

Note 2 on with you says,

“The heavenly King is Emmanuel, God with us (1:23). Here He promised that in His resurrection He will be with us all the days, with all authority, until the consummation of the age, that is, until the end of this age. Hence, wherever we are gathered into His name, He is in our midst (18:20).”

At the beginning of the Gospel of Matthew, an angel told Joseph before the Lord’s birth that Jesus would be called Emmanuel, which means God with us. Matthew ends with the resurrected Lord commissioning His disciples to go forth with the gospel. Then the Lord Jesus’ final word in Matthew is His promise to be with us always. As we journey through life, He is with us—not occasionally, but all the time, every day. He was with us yesterday, He’s with us today, and He’ll be with us tomorrow, until the end of this age. Whatever our circumstances may be, we can enjoy His presence every day. How encouraging is this precious promise from the Lord!

2. John 6:57—“As the living Father has sent Me and I live because of the Father, so he who eats Me, he also shall live because of Me.”

In John 6, the Lord Jesus presents Himself as the living bread from heaven for us to eat. Note 1 on verse 57 explains what eats Me means:

“To eat is to take food into us that it may be assimilated organically into our body. Hence, to eat the Lord Jesus is to receive Him into us that He may be assimilated by the regenerated new man in the way of life. Then we live by Him whom we have received. It is by this that He, the resurrected One, lives in us (14:19-20).”

We live physically by the food we eat. In the same way, we live spiritually by eating Jesus as our food in the Word of God. According to this promise in John 6, if we eat the Lord Jesus in His Word, we’ll live by Him and He’ll be lived out of us. This is how we live the Christian life; it’s not by striving with our own energy but by taking in the nourishing supply of Christ as the bread of life. 

3. John 7:38-39—“He who believes into Me, as the Scriptures said, out of his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water. But this He said concerning the Spirit, whom those who believed into Him were about to receive; for the Spirit was not yet, because Jesus had not yet been glorified.”

First Corinthians 15:45 tells us that in resurrection, the Lord Jesus became the life-giving Spirit. As the Spirit, He’s the living water for us to drink. The Lord promised us that when we come to Him, believe in Him, and drink Him, our inner thirst will be quenched. Anytime, anywhere, we can drink the Spirit by turning to our spirit, where He is. When we drink the Spirit, He satisfies us with Himself as the living water.

The Lord also promises that when we drink of the Spirit, rivers of living water will flow to others. What does this mean? Note 2 of verse 38 explains:

“The rivers of living water are the many flows of the different aspects of life (cf. Rom. 15:30; 1 Thes. 2:13; Gal. 5:22-23), originating from the one unique river of water of life (Rev. 22:1), which is God’s Spirit of life (Rom. 8:2).”

When we drink the Spirit, the unique river, our need is met. Then as we enjoy God this way, spontaneously out of our being will flow love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, and so many more aspects of God’s life to meet the needs of those around us. 

4. John 10:28-29—“And I give to them eternal life, and they shall by no means perish forever, and no one shall snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all, and no one can snatch them out of My Father’s hand.”

Note 1 on eternal life and hand helps us appreciate the Lord’s promise here:

“Eternal life (see note 151in ch. 3) is for the believers’ living. The Father’s hand, by which He chooses in His love according to His purpose (17:23; 6:38-39), and the Son’s hand, by which He saves by His grace for the fulfillment of the Father’s purpose (1:14; 6:37), both of which have the keeping power, are for the believers’ protection. Eternal life will never run out, and the hands of the Father and the Son will never fail. Hence, the believers are eternally secure and will never perish.”

The Lord gives us eternal life for our living today. We have the eternal life, which will never run out, and we’re kept safe in both the Father’s hand and the Son’s hand. We are eternally secure. We’re safe in the hands of the Father and the Son forever! Since we’re so secure in Him, we can partake of His eternal life every day without doubt or fear.

Thank God for granting us these precious and exceedingly great promises! We encourage you to order your free copy of the New Testament Recovery Version so you can read the notes for the rest of the promises listed in note 2 on 2 Peter 1:4, especially those in John 14, a deep chapter in the New Testament. 

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Does God Have a Plan?

July 08 2019

Does God Have a Plan?

When we’re little children, many times we play with our toys in a random way, exploring as we learn. But we have no grand scheme or purpose to our play. We simply make it up as we go.

But can you imagine God doing something like that? Would the God who is wise, loving, and eternal create the universe without a purpose? Could He create human beings without a purpose?

God is a God of purpose

The eternally wise God surely has a purpose for His creation. The orderliness of God’s creation—from the expanse of the universe down to the microscopic structure of an atom—suggests to us that God is a deliberate and purposeful God.

Look at the earth’s precise yearly orbit around the sun and the moon’s monthly orbit around the earth. Both speak not only of order but also of purpose. Their placement and the regularity of their orbits provide the best conditions for life to grow and be sustained on earth with days and nights, new seasons, and new years. Such order shows us that God doesn’t do things randomly or without purpose. God has a plan for everything.

So what is the purposeful God’s plan for us, His highest creation?

God’s plan for man

After six days of preparing the best physical environment, God reached the peak of His creating work—mankind. In all His preceding work, God simply spoke, and the land, the seas, the plants, and the animals appeared. But when it came to creating man, God didn’t just speak. The Bible states in Genesis 1:26, “And God said, Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness.” As a purposeful being, God made man in a very particular way—in His image. Why? Because God had a plan. An illustration here will help us understand what mankind being made in God’s image means and how it’s connected to God’s plan.

A hand and a glove

Let’s say a knitter sets out to make a glove. Since her plan is to put her hand inside the glove, she knits it in a particular way—with four longer fingers, a shorter thumb, and a hole at the wrist. In other words, she makes the glove in the shape, or image, of her hand, with an opening for her hand to get into it.

The knitter then puts her hand into the glove. If the glove could talk, it might say, “This is why I was made—to contain this hand! Now when this hand moves, I move too. What the hand does, I do too. We were meant for each other!”

Similarly, we (the glove) were made in God’s image so that God (the hand) could live in us. By living in us, His life becomes our life. Like the hand and the glove, whatever God does, we do in oneness with Him. We express the God who lives His life in us, and we make Him manifest to everyone around us.

God has a purpose for your life

God’s greater plan for all our lives is that we would have Him as our life and live Him out to express Him. Certainly, God does care about what we study in school, what kind of job we have, who we marry, and where we live. But He doesn’t care about these things aimlessly. God’s purpose and concern for the details of our lives fits within the bigger picture of His eternal purpose—that we express the God who lives in us and who has become our life.

If we’re empty and without God, or if we don’t live a life to gain God and express God, then our having the “right” spouse, career, or house might be nice, but we still fall short of the goal. God’s greater purpose for us remains unfulfilled, and we also feel unfulfilled, since His purpose is why we were created.

Although the details of our individual lives are all so different, God’s plan is actually the same for every one of us. Regardless of our different circumstances, in our day-to-day living while we drive our cars, talk to our family members, or work at our jobs, God wants to live in us so He can be expressed through us in our lives.

Here’s a short prayer we can pray to thank God for creating us with such a wonderful purpose:

“Dear Lord, thank You for showing me that Your plan for my life is greater than what I study, who I marry, or where I live. Lord, thank You for making me part of Your eternal plan. Thank You for making me in Your image so I can be filled with You and express You. Cleanse me, Lord, and fill me with Yourself. Lord Jesus, I love You.”

For more on this subject, you can read chapter 1 of Basic Elements of the Christian Life, vol. 1 for free here.

All verses are quoted from the Holy Bible Recovery Version. You can order a free copy of the New Testament Recovery Version here.

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Learning to Deal with the Accusations of Satan

June 24 2019

Learning to Deal with the Accusations of Satan

We hope you enjoy reading this testimony from a Bibles for America staff member about realizing the effectiveness of the blood of Christ and its power in dealing with accusations from Satan, God’s enemy.

I’d like to share my experience of realizing how amazingly effective the blood of Christ is. I knew His blood cleansed me from my sins, but I didn’t always have such a deep and rich appreciation of its power against Satan, God’s enemy. An excerpt from The Glorious Church by Watchman Nee truly encapsulates my experience. (You can download the entire book for free here.)

The excerpt is from chapter 4, on pages 88-89. It begins:

“Romans 5:9 says, ‘…having now been justified in His blood.’ When many people come into the Lord’s presence, they have no peace in their heart. They also have a feeling of worthlessness and of being wrong within. This is because they have a false hope. They expect that they will have something positive in themselves to offer to God.”

This was my experience over and over. Growing up in a Christian home, I internalized a high moral code. I should be kind; I should be generous; I should never lie; I should live a holy life that expresses Christ—the list went on and on. And my expectation was that eventually, if I tried hard enough, I’d be able to reach that standard. But as time went on, the harder I tried to be good and holy, the more I failed. And the more I failed, the more difficult it was for me to come to God. I was crushed by my failures, and I also thought God expected me to do better, to be better. 

The next part of the excerpt says: 

“When they discover that they do not have anything positive to offer in themselves, the accusations come. An accusation is like this: ‘A person like you will never have anything good to offer to God.’” 

 Satan would accuse me like this so often! I felt worthless in my own eyes and in the eyes of God, and I was deeply ashamed of my failures.

Nee continues:

“But we must remember that we originally possessed no positive goodness before God. There was nothing good in ourselves that we could offer to God. We could only present one thing to Him—the blood. We could only be justified by the blood. We do not have any positive righteousness in ourselves. We become righteous only because of the righteousness which we receive through redemption.”

When I finally realized the fact that only the blood of Jesus is worthy, not me, I felt like I’d been saved all over again! I was released from my constant struggle to improve my behavior, and from the ever-present feeling that I hadn’t achieved an acceptable level of goodness to be able to come to God.

First Corinthians 1:30 in the New Testament Recovery Version says, 

“But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became wisdom to us from God: both righteousness and sanctification and redemption.” 

This verse really helped me see that our righteousness is Christ Himself. We have no righteousness in and of ourselves. Isaiah 64:6 even tells us that our righteousnesses are like a soiled garment. But when I was redeemed and believed in Christ Jesus, He became my righteousness. What an amazing fact!

The excerpt from The Glorious Church continues:

“Every time we come to the throne of grace, we can look to Him for grace. It is a throne of grace, not a throne of righteousness. Every time we come before God, our only qualification is that we have been redeemed, not that we have advanced in our Christian life. No Christian can ever reach the stage where he can say, ‘I have been doing pretty well recently; now I have the boldness to pray.’ No. Every time we come before God, our only ground, our only position, is based upon the blood.” 

Of course, we should continue to grow in our Christian life. We shouldn’t remain the same, just like a baby doesn’t remain the same day after day. However, it was critical for me to realize that advancing in my Christian life isn’t what qualifies me to come into the presence of God; it’s only being redeemed by Christ. My eternal standing before God is the redeeming blood of Jesus.

Nee goes on:

“We must realize that no amount of spiritual growth can substitute for the effectiveness of the blood. Not one spiritual experience can ever replace the work of the blood. Even if someone should become as spiritual as the apostle Paul, the apostle John, or the apostle Peter, he would still need the blood to stand before God.”

No matter where I am in my Christian walk, no matter how my day goes—whether I feel like I did pretty well, or I failed spectacularly—my basic need before God is always the blood of Jesus. 

Nee goes on to discuss how to deal with the accusations of Satan:

“Sometimes when we have sinned, Satan comes to accuse us, and sometimes when we have not sinned, Satan still comes to accuse us. Sometimes it is not a problem of whether or not we have sinned, but a problem of not having a positive righteousness to offer to God; so Satan accuses us. However, we must be clear: We can come into God’s presence only because of the blood, not because of anything else. Since we have been cleansed by the blood and justified by the blood, we are under no obligation whatsoever to accept the accusations of Satan.”

The source of the condemnation I was under for so long was Satan himself. In Revelation 12, he’s called “the accuser of our brothers.” His primary occupation is to accuse God’s children day and night to prevent them from coming to God. I’m learning that when he comes to accuse me, I shouldn’t respond with anything I’ve done, or anything I am. Instead, when Satan tells me, “You’re no good. You can offer nothing to God,” I can point him to the precious blood of Jesus. I can tell him—even “preach” to him—how Christ shed His blood for me, and that He is my righteousness before God. 

I really love Revelation 12:11, which says:

“And they overcame him because of the blood of the Lamb and because of the word of their testimony, and they loved not their soul-life even unto death.” 

Note 2 on blood in the New Testament Recovery Version is really helpful:

“The blood of the Lamb, which is for our redemption, answers before God all the accusations of the devil against us and gives us the victory over him. We need to apply this blood whenever we sense the accusation of the devil.”

Praise God for the precious blood of the Lamb! It’s by His blood alone that any of us are qualified to come to Him. And by His blood, we can overcome the accusations of Satan that hinder us from coming to God.

This chapter of The Glorious Church says much more about dealing with the accusations of Satan by the blood of Christ. I really encourage you to read it for yourself. The passage that I quoted from is on pages 88-89, and you can download a copy of the whole book for free here.

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