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Scripture Reading:
Romans 5:1-2 (Youngs Literal Translation)
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1 Having been declared righteous, then, by faith, we have peace toward God through our Lord Jesus Christ,
2 through whom also we have the access by the faith into this grace in which we have stood, and we boast on the hope of the glory of God.
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Thought for the day:
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Today, we’re going to be concentrating on the last part of verse 2 – ‘we boast on the hope of the glory of God’.
Over the years, I’ve been accused of many things, most of them are entirely accurate but I like to think that in recent times, God has done such a work on and in me that some of those things have changed significantly. When I was younger, I used to be incredibly arrogant and would consistently boast of how I could do this or do that. There is something distinctly off-putting about hearing arrogant people boasting and yet at the time I couldn’t see it in myself. Unfortunately, the word ‘boast’ has been tied to the word ‘arrogance’ and for many of us, they are inextricably linked. It’s hard to think of one word without the other. That means that when we read the phrase ‘we boast’, the connotation is that there is arrogance present and therefore the true meaning of the word is diminished or lost entirely.
Some time ago, a friend of mine was given a ticket to watch a very high-importance Rugby match in Cardiff. The face value of the ticket was about £100 but the sale value ran into thousands of pounds. He’d been given it free of charge! He walked around the office with a grin as wide as the British Channel and couldn’t wait to tell everyone and to show what was in his hand. This is a close example of what it means ‘to boast’ in our verse today.
He had been given the ticket and so there was no grounds to claim credit for the gift. That didn’t stop him being incredibly happy! His exuberance in telling everyone was not due to his character or down to how he chose to behave. It had everything to do with the incredible thing that he was holding. His joy was a reflection of the gift. Some people looked at him with envy, but no-one ever thought that he deserved it!
That’s how we should look at our own lives in relation to all that God has given. We don’t walk around ‘boasting’ but certainly our lives should be a reflection of the gifts we’ve been given.
Justification by faith is beneficial, effective and fruitful.
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Prayer and Application:
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1 Corinthians 1:31 says ‘Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord.’ Another translation says ‘Let him who glories, let him glory in the Lord’. My prayer is that any glory we have is a reflection of the Lord.
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