Inferior and despised

God does not merely want to ignore, cast aside or overlook some things, but wants to literally destroy them – so to speak expose them and pull the ground out from underneath the feet of many false ideas, to make clear His position of eternal, sovereign, unilateral grace. As well as to ensure, once and for all, that there is no doubt. Everything is grace! We Christians believe in this grace and don't merely assume (hopefully) to have deserved God's election to salvation, or somehow earned, sought-after or procured it (2 Timothy 1:9). Whoever thinks that he can believe in God with a worldly spirit, will not really comprehend anything concerning forgiveness, grace or the love of God – he only believes in a religious manner. We read in 1 Corinthians 2:11-12: “ For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.” God Himself needs to open our right senses for that which has to do with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and how it concerns me personally. We cannot reach it by ourselves. When we, as Christians, allow the worldly spirit to occupy too much of our time, it overshadows our spiritual discernment and ultimately our faith. Then it can happen very quickly, that we become superficial and arrogant with regard to spiritual matters. An arrogant Christian is actually a contradiction in itself. What is faith? Answer: a power of God (1 Corinthians 2:5 “That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.”) When we have comprehended that truth spiritually and also live it in practice, our faith-life will also surprise and inspire us time and again. If it depended solely upon me to be faithful and stay faithful, as well as to find strength and motivation in everyday life (year in and year out) – how far would I get?

But when we, in actual sense, believe in God and His works (so not only contemplate “the faith”) something wonderful and amazing occurs in our thinking and our feelings which uplifts the soul. We read in Isaiah 40:28-31: “Hast thou not known? Hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary? There is no searching of His understanding. He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might He increaseth strength. Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall: But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.” It becomes clear that we cannot from within ourselves increase our power and strength to counteract our weariness in faith and our inability. Therefore, we must believe and hope in Him who can and wants to supply us with it – God in Jesus Christ, the Author and Perfecter of our faith (Hebrews 12:2). Then we also understand a little better why Matthew 6:33 exhorts us to, above all else, first seek the Kingdom of God and His righteousness. The result is: all else with follow. That certainly also includes power in weakness and strength in inability and, not least, the vision and freedom of an eagle soaring through the air. Who however assumes, like Daedalus in ancient Greek mythology, that he can build himself wings (from wax) in order to rid himself of his worries (“above the clouds...) will burn his fingers and experience a hard landing. God destroys those who think they need to have a say and lend a hand with regard to the very own things of the LORD (the Gospel). We cannot keep God, God keeps us – and gives us pure, loving and eternal grace, the salvation of our souls (1 Peter 1:9). And that yesterday, today and also tomorrow – praise God!

Jörg Bauer