Why did Jesus chose to live in a human body?

“Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death – that is, the devil – and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by fear of death.”

-Hebrews 2:14-15

 

Death – for me, I could say that it is the most feared thing by every man on this planet, especially of those people who are greatly attached to the wealth of this world. Death really is scary, as it serves as the period of our life here on earth. It terminates all the biological functions of our human body which sustains us from living in this world. No doubt, simply by knowing this and judging it by its description, we could say that it has the rights to be called the “most feared” thing by every man as no normal person can overcome it.

But you know what? This death, which we all fear has been beaten over 2 thousand years ago! Our God, the Lord Jesus Christ beat this death for us! Yes, us, being normal human being, weak and fragile, can never beat an inevitable enemy. Death is just something we could not simply overcome. Ideas about being immortal came out from intelligent men, but no one succeeded on their studies on this. Only our God, who has the power above all things has the ability to beat death, that is why He, Himself took charge of defeating this enemy to remove our fear from it. See how He loves us very much?

That’s not all. As it was written on Hebrews 21:14, in order to beat death, He must take our form – this is the reason why Jesus lived in this world in human flesh. But too, this flesh had suffered temptations and lots of testing just like us. Jesus had overcome them though, even death, so that we could have the eternal life. See how great the things that our God has done for us?

“For surely it is not angels he helps, but Abraham’s descendants.”

-Hebrews 2:16

Simply by this revelation, I cannot say anything but thanks to our God. Thanks to Him that he sent Jesus to earth in human form! Thanks be to God that Jesus died and rose from the dead in order to destroy death and give us an everlasting life! And above all, thanks be to God for His eternal love for us. Amen.

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The BETTER Covenant

And it was not without any oath! Others became priests without any oath, but he became a priest with an oath when God said to him: “The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind: ‘You are a priest forever.’” Because of this oath, Jesus has become the guarantee of a better covenant.

-Hebrews 7:20-22

What’s so great about the new covenant that God has created through Christ? Well, the Jews had their own covenant which has originated from the time of Moses, why would God need to renew the covenant when there is already the one that is established for many years? What good does this new covenant has for both the Jews and us, which are considered Gentiles?

Well, we must all know that we have be very thankful that God that He made this new covenant! We had a lot of benefits because of this, which we all should be very thankful of. To justify these, I have written below some of the benefits I could think of which we can get from this.

One benefit we had in this is that we need not to be righteous by our works anymore in order to be saved! The grace of God had become accessible because of this! Before, in the old covenant, in order to be righteous, we must perfectly obey the 10 commandments, which is impossible, as every man who tried has failed. And so, it is impossible to become righteous. But now, because of God’s grace and the new covenant, we could now be righteous by faith. And just by this, by putting our faith in Christ, we all now could be saved! Being righteous is just up for grabs for anyone!

Another benefit we had here, which I believe we all must be very happy of is that we people which are considered Gentiles are now adopted to become God’s child through Christ! What else could be greater than that? In the old covenant, only the Israelites have fellowship with God. But now, any person that comes from any nation can have fellowship with Him!

And last that I could think of is that we have an access to ask for forgiveness ANYTIME! If before, in the old covenant, in order for the people’s sins to be forgiven, they would need to offer sacrifices which the priest would use as atonement for their sins. Well, thanks be to God we wouldn’t need to do this anymore! Jesus has now become the priest which serves as the mediator, on which we could ask for forgiveness anytime. And what’s great with this is that there is no need to offer any other sacrifices, as He Himself had become the sacrifice for us.

These three benefits that I’ve wrote are just some of the many benefits we could get. But aren’t these three overwhelming enough? This is why we should rejoice every time and in thanksgiving for this new covenant that God has made for us. Thanks be to God! Shalom!

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The Path to extreme happiness

All of us can choose any path we want in this life, but the question about this is where would this path lead us? There are so many paths we can take, and all of them can lead us into having different kinds of lifestyle. Some could become successful, and some could even destroy their own lives. So let’s stop and ponder on to this question: Can the path I am taking now lead me to the happiness I desire? Well for me, I believe that there is only one path we could take which would lead us to the extreme happiness.

“After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen in the east went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was.”

-Matthew 2:9

 

In the second chapter of the book of Matthew, it was the star that showed the path to the Lord Jesus Christ to the Magis. Now, this star represents the Word of God! It is the Word of God that will lead us back to Him! The path that the Word of God shows is the only path we should take in this life if we want to be with God, where there is happiness, and there is no other way. The other paths we could take in this life will only lead us away from God, His protection, and the extreme happiness, which would lead us to our own destruction. Even though some people had become successful in their lives, without the Word of God guiding them, they would never experience the true and extreme happiness. The only thing that could meet or even exceed the happiness we desire is the Word of God. Just like what happened to the Magis in the following verse.

“When they saw the star, they were overjoyed.”

-Matthew 2:10

The other paths we could take in this life could give us temporary happiness, and that’s just it. And at times, this temporary happiness could even lead us to our own destruction. So what path should we choose now?

As for me, now that I have seen the beauty of God through His Word, there is no way I would take the other paths other than what His Word shows me. Why should I ever exchange the eternal happiness I would get from Him to the other things that would only give me temporary happiness? The happiness or joy I would get from Him is just incomparable. That’s why I choose this path. The path that we all call the “Christian Walk”.


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Don’t look back! Look straight ahead!

I believe that gaining success in life is up for grabs for anyone. I think that it really doesn’t matter whether we are born in a rich or a poor family, for I have seen and heard that there are people who experienced the “Cinderella story” happened in their lives. No doubt, many had become unsuccessful, as it is very visible in our world. Now if anyone can be successful in their lives, then what keeps the people from gaining success?

What keeps people from gaining success in their lives, I believe, is the past. Well it is mainly because that is the only place where failures dwells in. We must know that our failures could greatly affect our future if we keep looking at it. Living in the past can make us stop from attaining our goal. Getting bombarded by our failures will hinder us from growing, learning, and living. Our mindset determines where we are going. And if we set our minds on failing, then that’s where we are destined to. But what should we do if we want to become successful?

“But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.”

-Philippians 3:13

We all know that Apostle Paul had become successful in his Christian life, and here in this verse, he shared to us the secret of his success. I believe that this secret is not just applicable to our Christian lives, but to any ministry we are in; whether in sports, or in our work, or in our studies. Well what are these secrets shown in this verse?

First is forgetting what is behind. As I have said earlier, past is the dwelling place of failures. If we really want to gain success, then we must leave that one thing that could hinder us from gaining it. Christ has already redeemed us from these failures, for he had carried them all when he was crucified. This is something that we must all remember: In Christ, we are destined to overcome, and not to fail.

Second is straining toward what is ahead and pressing towards the goal. To gain success, our goal must be clearly drawn and set to our mind. As I have said earlier, our mindset determines where we are going. And if we set our minds to become successful in our Christian lives, or in the other things we do, then that is where we are headed to. But setting our minds to the goal isn’t enough, though. We must work hard and strive to attain that goal. And these are the secret to success.


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What should we boast about?

Being humans, do we have any rights to boast about our strengths? In our nature, we love to boast because we want other people to look up to us and get praises from them, but do we have any rights to do this? The truth is, we don’t. And for us believers of Christ, we must always take note of this.

As believers of Christ, we must always know that we only succeed by the grace of God. All of our strength came from it, and I personally believe that we have no rights to boast above anything, knowing that the strength we use for succeeding didn’t come from us. Also, being believers of Christ, we must not live by the flesh, for it’s very common to a man who lives by his flesh to be boastful about himself. But we must live by spirit instead, for in the spirit, we would know the will of God. And it is God’s will for us to not be boastful about our strength.

But even though we have no rights to boast about our strength, we must know that there is still this one thing that God allows us to boast about.

What is this one thing that God wants us to boast about?

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.

-2 Corinthians 12:9, NIV

Like what Paul said in the verse above, we can boast about our weakness. Why should boast about our weakness? Because it is where the real strength comes from! If we are broken enough every time we do anything, accepting with all our heart that we are nothing and we can do nothing without the help of God, then that’s the time where God’s grace will move into us. And this grace that moves into us becomes our own strength that will help us to overcome in every obstacle in our lives! This power that God has granted to us through His grace is the only thing we could ever boast about, and in this, I believe.

That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

-2 Corinthians 12:10, NIV

So with this, we must rejoice every time, whether when we are strong or weak, for by God’s grace, we are made overcomers. This grace that has been granted is something that we should rejoice for, for without it, we are nothing.

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Live by FAITH!

“Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands.”

-2 Corinthians 5:1, NIV

As believers, we must know that life here on earth is just like a small period compared to that in eternity. The truth is God just let us experience this life in flesh for the preparation of what is about to come. This earth is not really our home, just like what Paul said in the above verse when he compared this planet to a “tent”. Only our flesh is what belong to this world, for we came from dust, but our soul came from the breath of God, which shows that our real home is in God.

God entrusted us this life on earth to see if we would be obedient to Him. This serves as our test before we enter eternity. Now that answers why problems and temptations enters our life! All of these happened so that we would be prepared before the eternity comes. But only those people who would pass this test, I believe, would be the only ones who would be granted with eternal life. This means that we should not be relaxed in this life, and we must take this seriously. We must not think that this earth is our real home, for this planet will pass away.

What should we do so that we would not be attached from this world?

“Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord. We live by faith, not by sight.”

-2 Corinthians 5:6-7, NIV

It’s not that easy for a man to lose his attachment to this world, for his body came from it. But we must know that only our body came from this world. It is this world and our flesh that separates us from God. So if we want to come back to God again, where our soul came from, then we must stop living by the human standards. In human standards, we live by what we see. But by God’s standards, we live by believing in Him.

So if we don’t want to be attached from this world, then we must live by the spirit, and not by the flesh. We must live by faith, in Him who created us, and not by what we see, which only man has created. We must set our eyes with an eternity with God as our goal. Only by this, that we would remove our bond with this earthly tent.


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Beware of the false gods!

“The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is in the image of God.”

-2 Corinthians 4:4, NIV

Though there are many religions existing today that talks about Christ, we still cannot say if all their members are “real believers”. It could be because that the other gods that exists in our generation is blocking them from knowing the real and only living God. Being a member of a religion that believes in Christ doesn’t mean that you’re already a real believer. Most of the time, these religions only becomes a label to the people, for they believe more and follow on other gods more than the real God, Himself.

So what/who could be the god/s of this generation that blocks men from knowing the real God? For me, I believe that these gods could be in any form that a man idolizes. For example, a man who is hooked into pornography. This man spends all of his time and money watching porn. This man has now made pornography his god, for it blocks him and blinded him from knowing the real God. Another example is the love of money. A man who loves money disregards all of Christ’s teachings, especially on giving to the poor. His love for money blocks him from knowing the real God. There still are many other gods that exists in this generation, but these few examples gives us the picture on why many are blinded from the light of the gospel.

So with these many false gods that exists in this generation, is there anything we could do so that we would not be blinded by them?

For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ.

-2 Corinthians 4:6, NIV

Now for us believers who were already taken out by God from the darkness into the light of the gospel of Christ, we must guard ourselves so that we would not be taken back by the gods of this generation. Now that our eyes are widely opened, we must not let ourselves be taken back to blindness. We must stand firm and be strong to our faith, set our eyes and our heart to the gospel of Christ.

Like what Paul has said on the verse above, this light of the knowledge of God’s glory that is displayed through Christ will keep us away from being pulled back into darkness. With this knowledge of Christ, by being consumed by the Word of God, we will always be on guard from every false god of this generation. Thanks be to God that He has given us the knowledge of Christ. Amen.


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