The
Kindness and Severity of God: An Advent Devotion
Text: Ephesians
2:1-7
“But God,
being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even
when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by
grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in
the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,” (Ephesians 2:4-6)
As
you reflect with your families upon the coming and birth of Christ, it is
important that we understand that what Joseph and Mary witnessed that evening
in Bethlehem, was the historic incarnation of the eternal Son of God. We
understand and believe that in eternity past, the triune God made a covenant of
redemption between the persons of his Holy Trinity. In which the Father, Son
and Spirit work together to accomplish the historical redemption of the people
of God. In order for you or I, or any other sinning son or daughter of Adam to
be brought into fellowship with God, someone had to die. Grace and love cannot
be experienced at the expense of justice. There had to be a transferral of righteousness
to the account of the guilty, and a removal of, and payment for, the guilt of
the guilty. The Son of God came and entered into his creation in order to accomplish
that mission. He alone, fully obedient to the Father, has become righteous, and
he alone can bear the weight of the sin of God’s people; so that when he drinks
from the cup of God’s wrath on our sin, he drains the entire challis and no
condemnation is left for us. When he dies, we also die with him, and we, who
could not have tasted God’s wrath and lived, are also raised up with him when
he conquers death. Those initial two words in verse 4 are so extraordinarily
lovely. Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones spoke well when he said that they, being so
beautiful, “in a sense contain the whole of the gospel.”
In the midst of our
misery, as wicked children of wrath, the almighty God has tenderly loved us and
because of his love, he purposed and accomplished our salvation in his beloved
Son. Yet not only are we made alive together with Christ, we are also raised up
with him and seated with him in the heavenly places. We are not left with a
potential salvation, but an actual, historically accomplished, and efficacious
salvation. Though we be faithful saints now (Eph. 1:1) we were all once dead
(Eph. 2:1). Willful and witless, we followed our evil captain to increasing
disobedience. It is against the backdrop of that great darkness that the grace
and kindness of God shines bright in the face of Jesus Christ, a child born and
a Son given. This truly is the gospel, and in the reality explained in those
two words, “But God,” we find and anchor all our hope.
For further reading and discussion:
Proverbs 17:15
Romans 3:23-26
Isaiah 53:4-6
