Word of Encouragement (8/20/2020)

Yesterday, we meditated on the foundation of the divine promises. Today, we will meditate on the spring of the divine promises: “If the foundation of the promises of God is His covenant promise to be our God, then the fountainhead from which they flow to us is Christ” (p. 19). This is so because God cannot promise anything good to sinners without Christ’s atoning work, by which sinners are made acceptable and pleasing to God. The authors present the six respects, in which Christ is the spring of the divine promises, which Andrew Gray spoke of. We will consider three of them today.

“First, He is the fountainhead because He purchased the promises by His own blood. ‘There is not a promise in all the everlasting covenant but it is the price of the blood of the Son of God.’” How we should treasure each promise of God and be diligent to experience and enjoy it since Christ was willing to pay the costly price for that very purpose! Are many of God's promises "still in the box, unwrapped" because we're not paying attention?

“Second, Christ is the fountainhead because He is the One to whom the promises of the covenant were first made, and through Him they are given to us.” God's promises were given to Christ in a covenant of works. He had to earn each of them by His perfect obedience. Having earned them, Christ gives them freely to us in the covenant of grace, which we receive by faith.

“Third, Christ is the fountainhead of the promises of God because in Him we have a right to all the promises (1 Cor. 3:22-23 “whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours, and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s”). Andrew Gary says, ‘If once a soul close[s] with [that is, to draw near to] Christ in the covenant of promise, there is not one promise in Scripture but he may write this superscription above it, this is mine, this is mine.’” We do not deserve any of God’s promises (and we should never think or act like we deserve them), yet they are ours by law, by covenant, by divine right because Christ earned them for us and gifted them to us! Should we not claim them, not with a sense of entitlement, but with a deep sense of gratitude and love toward God?

Have a blessed day by cherishing God’s wonderful grace to us in Jesus Christ!

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