Gerrie and Claudi Engelbrecht
Ephesians 1:4-6 (MSG)
The God of Glory
How blessed is God! And what a blessing he is! He’s the Father of our Master, Jesus Christ, and takes us to the high places of blessing in him. Long before he laid down earth’s foundations, he had us in mind, had settled on us as the focus of his love, to be made whole and holy by his love. Long, long ago he decided to adopt us into his family through Jesus Christ. (What pleasure he took in planning this!) He wanted us to enter into the celebration of his lavish gift-giving by the hand of his beloved Son.
- Even before the foundations of the earth were created, we were not yet been born to be qualified or worthy depending on what we did and did not do. Before even our actions came into play God thought of us and because He loved us so much, He wanted us to give His Son Jesus through whom we could understand God’s love for us.
1 Corinthians 1:21 (TPT)
For in his wisdom, God designed that all the world’s wisdom would be insufficient to lead people to the discovery of himself. He took great delight in baffling the wisdom of the world by using the simplicity of preaching the story of the cross in order to save those who believe it.
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God chose simplicity of the story of the cross over world’s complex reasonings and logical understanding to discover God.
Colossians 1:21 (NKJV)
And you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled
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Jesus demonstrated God’s love by dying for us on the cross so that we could be reconciled back to our heavenly father whom we alienated in our minds.
1 Peter 1:2 (AMP)
Who were chosen and foreknown by God the Father and consecrated (sanctified, made holy) by the Spirit obedient to Jesus Christ and to be sprinkled with His blood.
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When we embrace God’s love and understand his sacrifice on the cross, we receive his love. His love has the power to show us our true identity that we are made Holy, created in righteousness and that we carry his DNA because we are made from the very beginning in the image and likeness of God. Holy and blameless as he is our heavenly father.
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He created Adam in His likeness and Image. Before the fall happened Adam’s source of influence was only God and His love. He wanted all mankind to bear that image and be their source of Life. God himself was the source of Life to Adam.
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For example when God created plants and trees, He spoke to the soil. Soil was sustenance for plants and trees growth. But when creating Man he spoke to himself meaning He was the source of creation and sustenance for Mankind.
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When we receive the words of Jesus, We will not walk in darkness because we receive Him, the light of life.
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When we receive him, we receive the gift of eternal life as He is the source of Life.
Colossians 1:12-14 (AMP)
Giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints (God’s people) in the Light.
The Incomparable Christ
For He has rescued us and has drawn us to Himself from the dominion of darkness, and has transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption [because of His sacrifice, resulting in] the forgiveness of our sins [and the cancellation of sins’ penalty].
Colossians 1:22 (AMP)
Yet Christ has now reconciled you [to God] in His physical body through death, in order to present you before the Father holy and blameless and beyond reproach—
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When we see how much he loved us, rescued us, delivered and redeemed us from the power and clutches of sin and death.
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When we embrace his love. We begin to finally see who we are and how he created us -holy and blameless.
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We partake in what Jesus has done for us and it becomes ours.
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We believe that our sins are forgiven through the blood of Jesus on the Cross. We are made holy through Jesus to be reconciled to God and to live in His presence.
1 Thessalonians 3:13 (AMP)
So that He may strengthen and establish your hearts without blame in holiness in the sight of our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all His saints (God’s people).
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We stand in the sight of our God and Father, holy and blameless, without fault of sin, in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Hebrews 10:10 (AMP)
And in accordance with this will [of God], we have been made holy (consecrated and sanctified) through the offering made once for all of the body of Jesus Christ (the Anointed One).
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God demonstrated his love to us by choosing to sacrifice Jesus Christ. Sin has deformed our original authentic design and purpose of God’s creation. Sin produced death in the end. Sin was killing us.
James 1:15 (AMP)
Then when the illicit desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin has run its course, it gives birth to death.
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So God chose to strip the power of sin and death over us. When we embrace His love, we receive power over sin and death.
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When any temptation comes our way, We have to remember we belong to Jesus who has crowned us with Glory and we are made Holy because of our relationship with him.
Ephesians 1 (TPT)
Who have been made holy by being one with Jesus, the Anointed One.
To elaborate, when a woman marries because of her new found relationship she becomes Mrs. So and so. It’s her relationship with her husband that changes her status. It's the intimate relationship with her husband that internally transforms her into being an awesome wife. No one externally has to tell her – don’t commit adultery, don’t speak lies etc. The relationship of love between them transforms her into being an awesome wife.
Same way, when we intimately know Jesus, His goodness and love will transform us. Belonging to Him will establish our own identity of being kings and queens, royal priest, holy people and will set us apart unto him.
Praise Jesus we belong to him, in belonging to him our identity is established. We are made Holy and blameless (without fault) in His Love.
-Gerrie Engelbrecht