Today is the seventh day in the study. We want to use this day to check up on your progress before we continue, for unless you have completed these first steps, you will find it very difficult to take the others. So, as honestly as you can, answer these questions:
- Have you confessed all known sin?
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- If not, stop now and confess. The rest of this study depends upon you having a clean heart and a renewed Spirit.
- Have you made all relationships right through confession, repentance, reconciliation, and restoration?
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- If not, stop now and make a list of those you need to see. Ask God to bring them into your life and to make you willing to do whatever it takes to have a right relationship with them.
- Are you seeking God’s will in every area of your life?
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- If not, what are the areas you are still holding on to? Make a list of those areas and surrender the unto the Lord by giving up your rights in those areas.
Let’s review our Bible study times. See how many answers you remember.
- Paul said that we were dead without Christ, but God made us alive again by His mercy.
- God demonstrated His love for us, in that while we were yet, still sinners, Christ died for us.
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- Grace—means I do get what I do not
- Mercy—means I do not get what I do
- Definitions:
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- Sin—Falling short of God’s glory
- Iniquity—Involvement in things God has not approved
- Transgression—Disobedience to God’s law
- The two things that God desires we receive are Truth and Wisdom.
- The evidence that David had received a willing spirit was:
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- He would teach transgressors, and sinners would be converted!
- Close the day meditating on Psalm 139:7-12—thanking God that He is always near.
“Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.” Psalm 139:7-12
PSALM 139
In this Psalm, David, that he may dismiss the deceptive coverings under which most men take refuge, and divest himself of hypocrisy, insists at large upon the truth that nothing can elude the divine observation—a truth which he illustrates from the original formation of man, since he who fashioned us in our mother’s womb, and imparted to every member its particular office and function, cannot possible be ignorant of our actions. Quickened by this meditation to a due reverential fear of God, he declares himself to have no sympathy with the ungodly and profane, and beseeches God, in the confidence of conscious integrity, not to forsake him in this life.
Calvin’s commentaries, Vol. 12: Psalms, Part V, tr. By John King, [1847-50], at sacred-textd.com
I invite you back tomorrow for DAY EIGHT of “REDISCOVERING YOUR FIRST LOVE!”