JESUS TOOK OUR PLACE LONG AGO Then He said to him,I am the LORD, who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land to inherit it.
" And he said, "Lord GOD, how shall I know that I will inherit it?" So He said to him, "Bring Me a three-year-old heifer, a three-year-old female goat, a three-year-old ram, a turtledove, and a young pigeon.
" Then he brought all these to Him and cut them in two, down the middle,and placed each piece opposite the other; but he did not cut the birds in two.
And when the vultures came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away.
Now when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram;and behold, horror and great darkness fell upon him.
Then He said to Abram: "Know certainly that your descendants willbe strangers in a land that is not theirs, and will serve them, and theywill afflict them four hundred years.
"And also the nation whom they serve I will judge; afterward they shallcome out with great possessions.
"Now as for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried at a good old age.
"But in the fourth generation they shall return here, for the iniquityof the Amorites is not yet complete.
And it came to pass, when the sun went down and it was dark, that behold,there appeared a smoking oven and a burning torch that passed betweenthose pieces.
Genesis 15: 7 -17 JESUS IS THE BURNING TORCH This is the account of the covenant that God cut with Abram.
It is so rich with spiritual truths, however right now I just want you to notice one in particular.
The person of Jesus Christ taking the place of sinful man in the cutting of the covenant.
In this culture, cutting a covenant was serious business.
It actually benefited the poorer of the two parties, because it was an exchange of everything.
It meant that your enemies were now his enemies and your friends his friends.
It meant that all of your possessions were his and of of his possessions were now yours.
It was a total exchange, always sealed in blood.
If was symbolic in the fact that it was expected that if you broke the covenant, you would be like the bloody pieces that you walked through.
The way that it was actually cut was that each party to the covenant would start at one side of the row of killed animals and walk through the middle of them until you reached each other in the center.
Notice in the account above that Abram was in a deep sleep and saw a smoking oven (cloud of glory by day) and a flaming torch (pillar of fire by night) walk between the pieces.
This shows us that God knew that Abram could never uphold his end of the bargain so Jesus stepped in to take his place thus cutting the covenant that many years later was manifested in His dying on the cross.
God knows that we are not able to live perfect lives, that is why He sent His Son to save us.
Jesus fulfilled the law, took all of the punishment, and remained.
Only after He had absorbed all of the wrath and punishment for sin did He say, "It is finished!" He then bowed his head, finally finding rest, and dismissed His Spirit just like the King that He is.
JESUS WAS MADE SIN SO WE COULD BECOME THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD IN HIM Brothers and Sisters if Jesus took all of the punishment and absorbed all of the wrath of God in His body on the cross, then why do so many of us still think that we must do something to receive His gift.
By definition if we must do something to receive it, then it is works, not grace.
The law demands but grace supplies.
Enter into the grace that was won on the cross of Christ and live free from sin, sickness, poverty, and lack while gaining His righteousness, His life, His Spirit and His victory.
If you feel that you must stay in a constant state of repentance from wrong works then you are still in the bondage of the law.
Only the grace found in the person of Jesus will set you free from the bondage of the works that the law demands.
Receive Jesus today, He did it all for you.
Thank You and Be Blessed, Joe D.
Willis