Unity
# 8: A Royal Priesthood
AND
Dear Father,
I praise You that You are our Lord, Master, and King. You have complete
control over all that we are, and we surrender our spirits into Your righteous
and just hands. We trust that You will continue to make us more like Your Son
and that You are working, even through our trials and failures, to bring
holiness to completion in us. Please teach us to fear You and to pray. I hear
of Your great saints who have spent enormous amounts of time in prayer. These
saints have been filled with Your power to advance the Gospel and to have a
boldness during the crucifixion of their flesh, knowing by Your past training
of their souls that You have been consistently good each and every time.
Satisfy us with Your goodness and teach us to submit to You until the End. You
will, Father.
In Jesus Christ’s Name,
Amen
Dear Beloved,
As we continue daily in our belief in the Gospel of our
salvation, we are remembering Jesus, who continues forever and upholds His
priesthood permanently. Because He is our eternal high Priest, He is able to save
forever those who draw near to God through Him, since He always lives to make
intercession for them (Heb 7:25). We have no portion among the inheritance of
the desires of the flesh, because the Priesthood of our Lord is our
inheritance. (Josh 18:7). Indeed our inheritance is the knowledge of Christ!
Now that we have been granted this eternal covenant
through His blood, we, as living stones, are being built up as a Spiritual
house for a holy priesthood, to offer up Spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God
through Jesus Christ (1 Peter 2:5). What kind of sacrifices do we offer? We
offer our bodies as living sacrifices,
holy and acceptable to God as our reasonable service (Rom 12:1). We offer sacrifices of praise and thanksgiving,
the fruit of our lips which confess His Name (Heb 13:15). Christ has offered
Himself as a perfect sacrifice to atone for our sins, and now as His people, we
offer ourselves to Him. We are not conformed to the pattern of this world, but
we are transformed daily by the renewing of our mind (Rom 12:2). We are a CHOSEN RACE, a royal PRIESTHOOD, a HOLY NATION,
a PEOPLE for GOD’S OWN POSSESSION, so that we may proclaim the excellencies of
Him who has called us out of darkness into His marvelous light (1 Peter 2:9).
As a royal priesthood, we follow in the footsteps of
Christ. His Spirit is on us and He has
anointed us to preach good news to the afflicted, to bind up the
brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to captives and freedom to prisoners, to
proclaim the favorable year of the Lord and the Day of vengeance of our God, to
comfort all who mourn, to grant the mourners in our midst, the garland instead
of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the mantle of praise instead
of a spirit of fainting. We will be called oaks of righteousness, the planting
of the Lord, that He may be glorified.
We will rebuild the ancient ruins of godlessness, Gospel-ignorance, and the aimless
traditions passed down from our fore-fathers. We will rise up these former
devastations and repair the ruined cities and the desolations of many
generations. Strangers and foreigners will stand and pasture our flocks and be
our farmers and vinedressers in the Spiritual Kingdom. That is, many will be
brought to faith. We will be called the
priests of the Lord, ministers of our God. We will eat the wealth of the
nations (souls brought into the Kingdom), and in their riches we will boast
(the riches that Christ has granted them). Instead of our shame, we will have a
double portion, and instead of humiliation we will shout for joy over our
portion. Everlasting joy will be ours.
For the Lord loves justice, and hates robbery. He will faithfully give us our
recompense and He has given us an eternal covenant. Let us rejoice greatly in the Lord and may our souls exult in our God. For
He has clothed us with garments of salvation and wrapped us with the robe of
Christ’s righteousness. The Lord God will cause righteousness and praise to
spring up from us before all the nations. (Is 61:1-11)
The
purpose of our priesthood is to declare the Excellencies of Christ (1 Peter 2:9). The Scriptures, foreseeing that God would
justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the Gospel beforehand to Abraham,
saying, “ALL THE NATIONS WILL
BE BLESSED IN YOU” (Gal 3:8). We are to
proclaim the Gospel and have a heart’s compulsion: “Woe to me if I do not preach the
Gospel” (1 Cor 9:16). Jesus told us that the Gospel
of the Kingdom shall be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all the
nations and then the end will come (Matt 24:14). He commissioned all of His followers to go
therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the Name of the
Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that
He has commanded us. And behold, He is with us always, to the end of the age.
(Matt 28:19-20). The Lord stands by us and strengthens us so that the
proclamation might be fully accomplished. He rescues us from the lion’s mouth.
He will rescue us from every evil deed, and will bring us safely to His
heavenly Kingdom; to Him be the glory forever and ever. (2 Tim 4:17-18)
We
are not ashamed of the Gospel,
for It is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew
first and also to the Greek (Rom 1:16). Jesus told us that whoever is ashamed
of Him and His Words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when He comes in
His glory, and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels (Luke 9:26). We
are not ashamed because we have been granted the Spirit of faith. Because we
truly believe we are able to speak; deep in our hearts we know that God who
raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and will present us with
the saints before Him. The grace of the Gospel is spreading to more and more
people and causing the giving of thanks to abound to the glory of God. (2 Cor
4:13-15).
True
faith in the Blood of the Lamb results in the proclamation of His Gospel. Thus
we overcome the evil one by the Blood of the Lamb and the Word of our Testimony (Rev 12:11). In our hearts we honor Christ the Lord as
holy, and we must be always prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks us
for a reason for the hope that is in us; yet we do it with gentleness and
respect (1 Peter 3:15). For as we preach the Gospel, we are not serving
ourselves, but our Lord and His chosen people by His Holy Spirit sent from
heaven (1 Peter 1:12). At the time of the End, an angel will fly in midheaven,
having an eternal Gospel to preach to those who live on the earth, and to every
nation, tribe, tongues, and people (Rev 14:6).
As we share our faith, the fellowship of our
faith becomes effective through the knowledge of every good thing which is in
us for Christ’s sake (Philemon 1:6). There
are blessings of our sonship that we will come to know as we share the Gospel! The
apostle Paul charges us in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to
judge the living and the dead, and by His appearing and His Kingdom: preach the Word, be ready in season and out
of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction (2
Tim 4:1-2).
As
a royal priesthood, we offer prayers up to God for the saints. If one among us suffers, we must pray. Our prayers
offered in faith bring restoration, healing, and forgiveness. Thus, we are to
confess our sins to one another, and pray for one another so that we may be
healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much. (James
5:13-16) If someone among us strays from the Truth and we turn him back away
from the error of his way, we will save his soul from death and cover a multitude
of sins (James 5:19-20). We must show mercy to those who doubt, save others,
snatching them out of the fire; and on some have mercy with fear, hating even
the garment polluted by the flesh (Jude 22-23).
To Him who loves
us and released us from our sins by
His blood— 6 and He has made us to be a kingdom, priests
to His God and Father—to Him be the
glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen. Rev 1
Excellent Messages:
(starts at minute 11 after a clip from
Paul Washer)
Let
us Walk in the Light of the Lord Sermon by John Piper
The
Nature of Saving Faith Sermon by John MacArthur
Love in Christ,
Preethi
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