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If salvation is undertaken as this kind of therapeutic act of self-fulfillment rather than as the hospitality of self-emptying, it is an act completely at odds to how Christ directs one to live out the rest of the Christian life.
We have a name for this hospitality of God—the host-like grace of God that he shows to all human beings, which often gives us an awareness of God even before we come to see that we are sinners and Christ is our savior. We call this prevenient grace.
Pastor Foley speaks to a group of Russian Christians about the Normal Christian Life from Hebrews 11.
We Protestants believe is that in the Lord's Supper, it is not the bread and wine that are transformed, but the meal itself. Christ isn’t drawn back down to earth but we are drawn up into heaven to eat and drink with him there. That is, the communion meal becomes something more than just a bunch of people eating bread and drinking juice!
An acceptable fast is something altogether different than mere personal abstinence. It's about public engagement with those you normally don't engage with.
The Scriptures don’t show a single time when Jesus is inviting someone to go to the synagogue (the Jewish “church meeting” of his day) with him. But the Scriptures do show that the most common invitation Jesus offers to people is to share bread with him. God loves to fellowship with his creation around the dinner table!
Does your food come from your own work? If so, it will spoil. If it comes from your own work, points to your own work, and is it used only to fuel your own work and the work of the others who eat it, then that food will spoil. That is not why God gave food. God gave food for fellowship with him—fellowship in body, soul, and spirit.
As regards when and how much and how often to give, you’ll notice that these things are not specified in the Nicene Creed. The Scripture gives us ample guidance in these matters, of course, and one recurring theme—which is especially important to note as we conclude this month’s emphasis, on the Work of Mercy of doing good—is that our giving should be planned and purposeful.
The Christian life is very physical. We are here because God creates a physical world in which his glory may be manifested, and he creates human beings in his image to manifest his glory. Through the sin of the first Adam, human beings abandon their vocation; through the victory over sin of the second Adam, human beings recover their vocation, in him.
God wants us to see that every time an enemy hurts us, he is present. Not only is he present, but we can trust him. We know that he loves us. He hasn't abandoned us.
