COV LIFE BLOG

Matthew 28:18-20 and Acts 1:8 – CLC Mission: Gospel Renewal

What a calling! What a mission! God calls you to do what only he can do, and what he has chosen not to do without you — open the eyes of the blind and raise the dead and awaken faith and give eternal life. Getting into the kingdom of God, Jesus said, is like a camel going through the eye of a needle. And when the disciples blurted out, “Who then can be saved?” Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26).

You are called to join God in doing the impossible. This is why God is going to be glorified when you reach the lost. You yourselves are walking miracles of life and grace to the glory of God, and you are going to be used by God to do the humanly impossible. You are going to open the eyes of the blind. And give life to the dead. And because you can’t do that, when you do it, God will get the glory.

So here’s the point — and it is immensely important if you aim to reach the lost with spiritual life. If anyone is going to be born again, it will happen by hearing the word of God, centered in the gospel of Jesus Christ. They will be “born again through the living and abiding word of God . . . the gospel.” God causes the new birth through the living and abiding word of God spoken by you as the best news in all the world about Jesus Christ crucified for sinners.

When you speak the word of God and God gives them life through the new birth, you will stand in awe of his power, and you will give him glory. You will say with Paul, “But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart” (Romans 6:17). Not glory to me for my boldness or glory to them for their spiritual sensitivity, but glory to God who gave them life and repentance and faith.

Only God can raise the dead. Only God gives spiritual sight to the blind. But wonder of wonders, he will not do it without a gospel-telling human being. He is making much of you by making your words indispensible in the miracle of salvation. “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!” Because “faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ” (Romans 10:15, 17). In the mouth of the fallible, sometimes failing human beings.

And God, in great love to us, makes our nothing, in his hand, beautiful and indispensable, in such a way that he gets the glory and we get the joy.

John Piper

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SCRIPTURES FOR THIS WEEK
Read Acts 1:8 and Matthew 28:18-20 and consider the call on our lives to make disciples through the proclamation of the gospel. How often do reflect on the beauty of what God has done in  your own life in giving your salvation? In what ways can you grow in being an ambassador of the reconciliation that you have received?

SONG FOR THIS WEEK
Let the Nations Be Glad by Matt Boswell