Arise, believer, and behold the Lord Jesus yoking the whole of His divine Godhead to the chariot of salvation! How vast His grace, how firm His faithfulness, how unswerving His immutability, how infinite His power, how limitless His knowledge! All these are by the Lord Jesus made the pillars of the temple of salvation; and all, without diminution of their infinity, are covenanted to us as our perpetual inheritance. The fathomless love of the Saviour’s heart is every drop of it ours; every sinew in the arm of might, every jewel in the crown of majesty, the immensity of divine knowledge, and the sternness of divine justice, all are ours, and shall be employed for us.
~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving. See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ. For in Him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in Him, who is the head of all rule and authority. In Him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised with Him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised Him from the dead. And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This He set aside, nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in Him.
~ Colossians 2:6-15
This writer spends a fair amount of time in prayer and ministry of the Word. His Word is truth, and by it we are set apart more fully for His use every time we avail ourselves to it. And during these times He will show us things. Things that will bring deep thankfulness if we let them…
i am 46, but realized that the four men i pray with on Thursday mornings make up about 70 years of friendship in my life. i have known my best friend for over 25 years. And all of these men have been through deep water with me and are still my friends. And now He is still pouring new friendships into my life. i am, perhaps among men, most blessed.
And then i realized that Jesus is now actually my best Friend. Not figuratively… not institutionally… not heroically… Really. Jesus and i are best friends. He is so very Strong and Holy and Kind and Good and G_d and Right and True and Funny and Wise and Smart and Loving and Real.
And He likes me. We get along really well. (Oh, by the way, He likes you too!). Do you know Him? He is so wonderful!
But then it gets even way more better.
This is not just a friendship. This relationship is everything. Check out this wonderful truth-bomb from 2 Corinthians 5
From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard Him thus no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to Himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making His appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.
Can we see it?
Jesus is G_d.
Jesus will never change.
Jesus is our best friend.
Jesus has made us like Him.
This is very good news. No, this is very very extremely good news!
As C.H. says above, “behold the Lord Jesus yoking the whole of His divine Godhead to the chariot of salvation.” How about we simply yoke ourselves to Him and see where this beautiful friendship goes!
Friendship with God means that there is now something of the nature of God in a man on which God can base his friendship.~Oswald Chambers (1874-1917)
