Founded on the Rock Grace

After Jesus finished preaching the Sermon on the Mount the people were amazed.  They said to each other, “He speaks as one with authority and not as one of the scribes.”  The words of Jesus were the very voice of God.  He was the Word of God incarnate.  The words that He had spoken were words of guidance, hope and peace.  He had authoritatively declared the meaning of the law and its application to life.  He didn’t mince words and He boldly asserted that to ignore His words was to ignore the hope and grace of God.

One of Haldor Lillenas’s great hymns is “The Bible Stands”.  Jesus compared obedience to His words as having a house built on a rock.  That house would stand.  Today there are too many people discounting the authority of God’s word and trying to substitute some weakened down socially acceptable version of their own.  The grace of God in Christ comes through the words that Jesus spoke and the authority with which he upheld the words already given by the Old Testament.  God’s grace, purpose and peace shine clearly in all the words of our Holy Bible and are not found in the reasoning of men however esteemed. 

The first stanza of Lillenas’s hymn reads, “The Bible stands like a rock undaunted
’mid the raging storms of time; its pages burn with the truth eternal, and they glow with a light sublime.”  We hear people howl today about the Bible being obsolete or out of date or not in tune with modern thinking.  Only on the last point are they correct.  It is not in tune with our thinking, ancient or modern.  It is the very thoughts and ideas of God that are eternal and surpass our thoughts and ideas by such a degree as to be disparaged by men.  But, they have stood and will stand and all men will be judged by them.  Therefore, in His great grace God has given them to us so that we know what He wants and what He will do.  When Jesus spoke He spoke with this authority. 

The third stanza of this hymn reads, “The Bible stands and it will forever, when the world has passed away; by inspiration it has been given, all its precepts I will obey.” Rejoice in the grace of God that He has spoken.  Rejoice that He has given us in His word the means of salvation through His Son Jesus Christ.  His authority is without end.  His grace is eternal for all who come to Him.  

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