Grace to Speak

It was pointed out to me that in my last post I overemphasized the failings of how one man spoke (I removed that section, since I did not speak with him, he is not a public person, and he would have been identifiable). He did try to speak in such a way as to glorify God, and if you listened you could probably hear it. I did not listen well, in part, because he was preceded by the pastor pointing us to the glory of God in a clear way. This man did not live up to that, and, in that light, his failures were made more visible. If he had done it before, I probably would not have noticed the failings nearly so much. Then again, in light of Christ's perfection, it is likely I would have seen as many failings in the pastor's talk.

Speak, you will fail. Yet you have been commanded to speak. Our God will provide the words to say, as he sees fit. We all fail to point to God as much as we ought. Yet Christ never failed to point to the Father's glory. In this is our hope: even as all our human words fail, the Word has paid the penalty of all those who will believe, and thus, all those who will believe, will believe. Even as we pray for the forgiveness of our various sins, even of inadequately expressing the glories of God, we know that Christ came to perfectly show us how glorious is our God, since Christ is God, and anyone who has seen him has seen the Father, so we, though we have not seen him with human sight, yet we have seen by the Spirit some degree of the glory of God in Christ, since by him we have been saved. Though we cannot express the magnitude of the glory of our Savior, yet he shows himself to those he has chosen, thus granting that they might understand--even in some small way--how great the glory of God is.

I do not wish to say that the failings I spoke of before were absent, but that it was inevitable that there would be failings, and that the failings are covered by the blood of Jesus Christ. Further, I ought to have looked harder to see how what he said was already intending to point to God. In this I failed, yet I must hope that what came of it might produce good fruit despite that, for God did not make a mistake in allowing my sin, though I did and am therefore culpable. Therefore I repent, and pray that the Spirit would give me eyes to see more clearly the righteousness he works in others. And because I am hid with Christ Jesus, this sin has been taken from me, so that I no longer need fear the death which would be the just wages of it, since it was taken upon Christ on the cross, and the wages paid to my savior as he died. Therefore, in both these failings, we are each made to depend upon the blood of Christ Jesus our Lord to save us from the penalty of death which we would otherwise deserve. Hallelujah! He is truly a cause for joy to the world.