Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread,"
If you are beginning ever so slightly to see God in a different light, as One who is on your side as you never imagined He is, be glad for the revelation.
Almost everyone these days has the feeling that entertainment is stronger than prayer meeting--the lure of the world has more appeal than the service of God. Like a weak distant signal jammed by a powerful radio or TV station nearby, the Holy Spirit seems barely able to come through, compared with the appeal of the world. But Paul says, No: "Where sin abounded, grace abounded much more, so that as sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord (Rom. 5:20, 21). Heaven's signal is stronger!
Before we understood the gospel, Paul says, "sin reigned" like a king, beating back the power of grace like Saul kicking against the "goad" (Acts 9:5). But when we understand the gospel, grace reigns like a king and beats back the power of sin. This has to be true, because if there is not more power in grace than there is in temptation, John would be wrong when he says, "This is the victory that has overcome the world--our faith" (1 John 5:4). That would mean that the gospel could not be Good News.
Remember, the battle is never an even one: it's not 50/50. Grace abounds "much more." It is literally true that "if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new" (2 Cor. 5:17). You have a new Father, so that the power working within you for good is much stronger than our tendencies to evil, as our heavenly Father is greater than our earthly parents.
--Robert J. Wieland
From: The Good News Is Better Than You Think, 2002.
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