The Upper Room Daily Reflections in Nashville, Tennessee, United States for Sunday, 12 March 2017 "The Gift of Salvation"

The Upper Room Daily Reflections in Nashville, Tennessee, United States for Sunday, 12 March 2017 "The Gift of Salvation" 

Today’s Reflection:

SALVATION IS FREE, but the cost of discipleship is enormous. I try to hide from the truth, but when I read the Gospels and seek to live in communion with God, I discover both parts of the statement are dead-center truth.
I can do nothing to earn my salvation. My redemption is a pure gift of grace, a gift offered to me without qualification or reservation. I am God’s child, and no one or no thing can change that fact. Jesus Christ lived, died, and lives again to bring this gift of salvation to me in all its fullness.
My faith can appropriate this gift, but even my greatest doubt cannot change its reality. I am God’s beloved, embraced in God’s love for now and eternity. All words are inadequate to describe the extravagance and grandeur of the gift of salvation.[Rueben P. Job, Norman Shawchuck, and John - S. Mogabgab, A Guide to Prayer for All Who Walk with God]
Reading for Reflection by Rueben P. Job, page 129 in A Guide to Prayer for All Who Walk with God by Rueben P. Job, Norman Shawchuck, and John S. Mogabgab. Copyright © 2013 by Upper Room Books. All rights reserved. Used by permission of Upper Room Books. http://bookstore.upperroom.org/ Learn more about or purchase this book.
Today’s Question:
How do you define “salvation?”
Today’s Scripture:
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”[John 3:16, NRSV]
This Week: pray for grandparents and grandchildren.
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In need of prayer? The Upper Room Living Prayer Center is a 7-day-a-week intercessory prayer ministry staffed by trained volunteers. Call 1-800-251-2468 or visit The Living Prayer Centerwebsite.
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This week we remember: Perpetua and Felicity (March 7).

Perpetua and Felicity
March 07In 202, the Roman Emperor Septimus Severus forbade his citizens to convert to Christianity or Judaism. Vibia Perpetua, a young noblewoman, wife and mother in Carthage, was arrested and imprisoned because of her Christian faith. Arrested with her was Felicity, her pregnant slave. In The Passion of Perpetua and Felicitas, Perpetua recounts her imprisonment, giving earthy details of her feelings about her family and breastfeeding, as well as illustrating her faith and telling of visions she received.
Felicity gave birth to her child in prison. Both women's children were entrusted to others to raise, which gave them comfort as they faced death.
Even when urged to recant her belief in Jesus to save herself, Perpetua calmly replied, "I am a Christian." The night before the women were to be sent to the arena to die, they celebrated a "Love Feast" with other Christians. When the women survived an attack by a wild cow, they were ordered to death by sword. In a last act of courage, Perpetua guided the sword to her neck.
These two North African martyrs inspired the early church. Perpetua was twenty-two years old when she died in 203.
If Perpetua and Felicity had taken the Spiritual Types Testthey probably would have been Mystics. Perpetua and Felicity are remembered on March 7.
Image by Gaetan Poix. Stained glass window of St Perpetua of Carthage (church of Notre-Dame of Vierzon, France, 19th century): martyrdom of St Pepetua and her fellows in the stadium of Carthage; saint Felicity on her left.

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Lectionary Readings
Sunday, 12 March 2017
(Courtesy of Vanderbilt Divinity Library)
Genesis 12:1-4a
Psalm 121
Romans 4:1-5, 13-17
John 3:1-17
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Scripture Text: Genesis 12:1 Now Adonai said to Avram, “Get yourself out of your country, away from your kinsmen and away from your father’s house, and go to the land that I will show you. 2 I will make of you a great nation, I will bless you, and I will make your name great; and you are to be a blessing. 3 I will bless those who bless you, but I will curse anyone who curses you; and by you all the families of the earth will be blessed.”

4 So Avram went, as Adonai had said to him, and Lot went with him. Avram was 75 years old when he left Haran.

Psalm 121:(0) A song of ascents:

(1) If I raise my eyes to the hills,

from where will my help come?

2 My help comes from Adonai,

the maker of heaven and earth.

3 He will not let your foot slip —

your guardian is not asleep.

4 No, the guardian of Isra’el

never slumbers or sleeps.

5 Adonai is your guardian; at your right hand

Adonai provides you with shade —

6 the sun can’t strike you during the day

or even the moon at night.

7 Adonai will guard you against all harm;

he will guard your life.

8 Adonai will guard your coming and going

from now on and forever.

Romans 4:1 Then what should we say Avraham, our forefather, obtained by his own efforts? 2 For if Avraham came to be considered righteous by God because of legalistic observances, then he has something to boast about. But this is not how it is before God! 3 For what does the Tanakh say? “Avraham put his trust in God, and it was credited to his account as righteousness.”[Romans 4:3 Genesis 15:6] 4 Now the account of someone who is working is credited not on the ground of grace but on the ground of what is owed him. 5 However, in the case of one who is not working but rather is trusting in him who makes ungodly people righteous, his trust is credited to him as righteousness.

13 For the promise to Avraham and his seed[Romans 4:13 Genesis 15:3, 5] that he would inherit the world did not come through legalism but through the righteousness that trust produces. 14 For if the heirs are produced by legalism, then trust is pointless and the promise worthless. 15 For what law brings is punishment. But where there is no law, there is also no violation.

16 The reason the promise is based on trusting is so that it may come as God’s free gift, a promise that can be relied on by all the seed, not only those who live within the framework of the Torah, but also those with the kind of trust Avraham had — Avraham avinu for all of us. 17 This accords with the Tanakh, where it says, “I have appointed you to be a father to many nations.”[Romans 4:17 Genesis 17:5] Avraham is our father in God’s sight because he trusted God as the one who gives life to the dead and calls nonexistent things into existence.

John 3:1 There was a man among the P’rushim, named Nakdimon, who was a ruler of the Judeans. 2 This man came to Yeshua by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know it is from God that you have come as a teacher; for no one can do these miracles you perform unless God is with him.” 3 “Yes, indeed,” Yeshua answered him, “I tell you that unless a person is born again from above, he cannot see the Kingdom of God.”

4 Nakdimon said to him, “How can a grown man be ‘born’? Can he go back into his mother’s womb and be born a second time?” 5 Yeshua answered, “Yes, indeed, I tell you that unless a person is born from water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God. 6 What is born from the flesh is flesh, and what is born from the Spirit is spirit. 7 Stop being amazed at my telling you that you must be born again from above! 8 The wind blows where it wants to, and you hear its sound, but you don’t know where it comes from or where it’s going. That’s how it is with everyone who has been born from the Spirit.”

9 Nakdimon replied, “How can this happen?” 10 Yeshua answered him, “You hold the office of teacher in Isra’el, and you don’t know this? 11 Yes, indeed! I tell you that what we speak about, we know; and what we give evidence of, we have seen; but you people don’t accept our evidence! 12 If you people don’t believe me when I tell you about the things of the world, how will you believe me when I tell you about the things of heaven? 13 No one has gone up into heaven; there is only the one who has come down from heaven, the Son of Man. 14 Just as Moshe lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up; 15 so that everyone who trusts in him may have eternal life.

16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his only and unique Son, so that everyone who trusts in him may have eternal life, instead of being utterly destroyed. 17 For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but rather so that through him, the world might be saved.

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John Wesley's Notes-Commentary: Genesis 12:1-4a

(Read all of Genesis 12)

Verse 1

[1] Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee:

We have here the call by which Abram was removed out of the land of his nativity into the land of promise, which was designed both to try his faith and obedience, and also to set him apart for God. The circumstances of this call we may be somewhat helped to the knowledge of, from Stephen's speech, Acts 7:2, where we are told, 1. That the God of glory appeared to him to give him this call, appeared in such displays of his glory as left Abram no room to doubt. God spake to him after in divers manners: but this first time, when the correspondence was to be settled, he appeared to him as the God of glory, and spake to him. 2. That this call was given him in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Charran, and in obedience to this call, he came out of the land of the Chaldeans, and dwelt in Charran or Haran about five years, and from thence, when his father was dead, by a fresh command, he removed him into the land of Canaan. Some think Haran was in Chaldea, and so was still a part of Abram's country; or he having staid there five years, began to call it his country, and to take root there, till God let him know this was not the place he was intended for.

Get thee out of thy country — Now, (1.) By this precept he was tried whether he loved God better than he loved his native soil, and dearest friends, and whether he could willingly leave all to go along with God. His country was become idolatrous, his kindred and his father's house were a constant temptation to him, and he could not continue with them without danger of being infected by them; therefore get thee out, (Heb.) vade tibi, get thee gone with all speed, escape for thy life, look not behind thee. (2.) By this precept he was tried whether he could trust God farther than he saw him, for he must leave his own country to go to a land that God would shew him; he doth not say, 'tis a land that I will give thee nor doth he tell him what land it was, or what kind of land; but he must follow God with an implicit faith, and take God's word for it in the general, though he had no particular securities given him, that he should be no loser by leaving his country to follow God.

Verse 2

[2] And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing:

Here is added an encouraging promise, nay a complication of promises, 1.

I will make of thee a great nation — When God took him from his own people, he promised to make him the head of another people. This promise was. 1. A great relief to Abram's burden, for he had now no child. 2. A great trial to Abram's faith, for his wife had been long barren, so that if he believe, it must be against hope, and his faith must build purely upon that power which can out of stones raise up children unto Abraham. 2.

I will bless thee — Either particularly with the blessing of fruitfulness, as he had blessed Adam and Noah; or in general, I will bless thee with all manner of blessings, both of the upper and nether springs: leave thy father's house, and I will give thee a father's blessing, better than that of thy progenitors. 3.

I will make thy name great — By deserting his country he lost his name there: care not for that, (saith God) but trust me, and I will make thee a greater name than ever thou couldst have had there. 4.

Thou shalt be a blessing — That is, thy life shall be a blessing to the places where thou shalt sojourn. 5.

I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee — This made it a kind of league offensive and defensive between God and Abram. Abram heartily espoused God's cause, and here God promiseth to interest himself in his. 6.

In thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed — This was the promise that crowned all the rest, for it points at the Messiah, in whom all the promises are yea and amen.

Verse 4

[4] So Abram departed, as the LORD had spoken unto him; and Lot went with him: and Abram was seventy and five years old when he departed out of Haran.

So Abram departed — He was not disobedient to the heavenly vision. His obedience was speedy and without delay, submissive and without dispute.

Psalm 121

(Read all of Psalm 121)

Verse 1

[1] I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.

Hills — To Sion and Moriah, which are called the holy mountains.

Verse 5

[5] The LORD is thy keeper: the LORD is thy shade upon thy right hand.

Shade — To keep thee from the burning heat of the sun.

Verse 6

[6] The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night.

Smite — With excessive heat.

Moon — With that cold and moisture which come into the air by it. Intemperate heats and colds are the springs of many diseases.

Romans 4:1-5, 13-17

(Read all of Romans 4)

Verse 1

[1] What shall we say then that Abraham our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found?

That our father Abraham hath found — Acceptance with God.

According to the flesh — That is, by works.

Verse 2

[2] For if Abraham were justified by works, he hath whereof to glory; but not before God.

The meaning is, If Abraham had been justified by works, he would have had room to glory. But he had not room to glory. Therefore he was not justified by works.

Verse 3

[3] For what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness.

Abraham believed God — That promise of God concerning the numerousness of his seed, Genesis 15:5,7; but especially the promise concerning Christ, Genesis 12:3, through whom all nations should be blessed.

And it was imputed to him for righteousness — God accepted him as if he had been altogether righteous. Genesis 15:6.

Verse 4

[4] Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt.

Now to him that worketh — All that the law requires, the reward is no favour, but an absolute debt. These two examples are selected and applied with the utmost judgment and propriety. Abraham was the most illustrious pattern of piety among the Jewish patriarchs. David was the most eminent of their kings. If then neither of these was justified by his own obedience, if they both obtained acceptance with God, not as upright beings who might claim it, but as sinful creatures who must implore it, the consequence is glaring It is such as must strike every attentive understanding, and must affect every individual person.

Verse 5

[5] But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.

But to him that worketh not — It being impossible he should without faith.

But believeth, his faith is imputed to him for righteousness — Therefore God's affirming of Abraham, that faith was imputed to him for righteousness, plainly shows that he worked not; or, in other words, that he was not justified by works, but by faith only. Hence we see plainly how groundless that opinion is, that holiness or sanctification is previous to our justification. For the sinner, being first convinced of his sin and danger by the Spirit of God, stands trembling before the awful tribunal of divine justice ; and has nothing to plead, but his own guilt, and the merits of a Mediator. Christ here interposes; justice is satisfied; the sin is remitted, and pardon is applied to the soul, by a divine faith wrought by the Holy Ghost, who then begins the great work of inward sanctification. Thus God justifies the ungodly, and yet remains just, and true to all his attributes! But let none hence presume to "continue in sin;" for to the impenitent, God "is a consuming fire." On him that justifieth the ungodly - If a man could possibly be made holy before he was justified, it would entirely set his justification aside; seeing he could not, in the very nature of the thing, be justified if he were not, at that very time, ungodly.

Verse 13

[13] For the promise, that he should be the heir of the world, was not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the law, but through the righteousness of faith.

The promise, that he should be the heir of the world — Is the same as that he should be "the father of all nations," namely, of those in all nations who receive the blessing. The whole world was promised to him and them conjointly. Christ is the heir of the world, and of all things; and so are all Abraham's seed, all that believe in him with the faith of Abraham

Verse 14

[14] For if they which are of the law be heirs, faith is made void, and the promise made of none effect:

If they only who are of the law — Who have kept the whole law.

Are heirs, faith is made void — No blessing being to be obtained by it; and so the promise is of no effect.

Verse 15

[15] Because the law worketh wrath: for where no law is, there is no transgression.

Because the law — Considered apart from that grace, which though it was in fact mingled with it, yet is no part of the legal dispensation, is so difficult, and we so weak and sinful, that, instead of bringing us a blessing, it only worketh wrath; it becomes to us an occasion of wrath, and exposes us to punishment as transgressors. Where there is no law in force, there can be no transgression of it.

Verse 16

[16] Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace; to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed; not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham; who is the father of us all,

Therefore it — The blessing.

Is of faith, that it might be of grace — That it might appear to flow from the free love of God, and that the promise might be firm, sure, and effectual, to all the spiritual seed of Abraham; not only Jews, but gentiles also, if they follow his faith.

Verse 17

[17] (As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations,) before him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were.

Before God — Though before men nothing of this appeared, those nations being then unborn.

As quickening the dead — The dead are not dead to him and even the things that are not, are before God.

And calling the things that are not — Summoning them to rise into being, and appear before him. The seed of Abraham did not then exist; yet God said, "So shall thy seed be." A man can say to his servant actually existing, Do this; and he doeth it: but God saith to the light, while it does not exist, Go forth; and it goeth. Genesis 17:5.

John 3:1-17

(Read all of John 3)

Verse 2

[2] The same came to Jesus by night, and said unto him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him.

The same came — Through desire; but by night - Through shame: We know - Even we rulers and Pharisees.

Verse 3

[3] Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

Jesus answered — That knowledge will not avail thee unless thou be born again - Otherwise thou canst not see, that is, experience and enjoy, either the inward or the glorious kingdom of God. In this solemn discourse our Lord shows, that no external profession, no ceremonial ordinances or privileges of birth, could entitle any to the blessings of the Messiah's kingdom: that an entire change of heart as well as of life was necessary for that purpose: that this could only be wrought in man by the almighty power of God: that every man born into the world was by nature in a state of sin, condemnation, and misery: that the free mercy of God had given his Son to deliver them from it, and to raise them to a blessed immortality: that all mankind, Gentiles as well as Jews, might share in these benefits, procured by his being lifted up on the cross, and to be received by faith in him: but that if they rejected him, their eternal, aggravated condemnation, would be the certain consequence.

Except a man be born again — If our Lord by being born again means only reformation of life, instead of making any new discovery, he has only thrown a great deal of obscurity on what was before plain and obvious.

Verse 4

[4] Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born?

When he is old — As Nicodemus himself was.

Verse 5

[5] Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.

Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit — Except he experience that great inward change by the Spirit, and be baptized (wherever baptism can be had) as the outward sign and means of it.

Verse 6

[6] That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

That which is born of the flesh is flesh — Mere flesh, void of the Spirit, yea, at enmity with it; And that which is born of the Spirit is spirit - Is spiritual, heavenly, divine, like its Author.

Verse 7

[7] Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again.

Ye must be born again — To be born again, is to be inwardly changed from all sinfulness to all holiness. It is fitly so called, because as great a change then passes on the soul as passes on the body when it is born into the world.

Verse 8

[8] The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.

The wind bloweth — According to its own nature, not thy will, and thou hearest the sound thereof - Thou art sure it doth blow, but canst not explain the particular manner of its acting.

So is every one that is born of the Spirit — The fact is plain, the manner of his operations inexplicable.

Verse 11

[11] Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen; and ye receive not our witness.

We speak what we know — I and all that believe in me.

Verse 12

[12] If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things?

Earthly things — Things done on earth; such as the new birth, and the present privileges of the children of God.

Heavenly things — Such as the eternity of the Son, and the unity of the Father, Son, and Spirit.

Verse 13

[13] And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven.

For no one — For here you must rely on my single testimony, whereas there you have a cloud of witnesses: Hath gone up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven.

Who is in heaven — Therefore he is omnipresent; else he could not be in heaven and on earth at once. This is a plain instance of what is usually termed the communication of properties between the Divine and human nature; whereby what is proper to the Divine nature is spoken concerning the human, and what is proper to the human is, as here, spoken of the Divine.

Verse 14

[14] And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up:

And as Moses — And even this single witness will soon be taken from you; yea, and in a most ignominious manner. Numbers 21:8,9.

Verse 15

[15] That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life.

That whosoever — He must be lifted up, that hereby he may purchase salvation for all believers: all those who look to him by faith recover spiritual health, even as all that looked at that serpent recovered bodily health.

Verse 16

[16] For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

Yea, and this was the very design of God's love in sending him into the world.

Whosoever believeth on him — With that faith which worketh by love, and hold fast the beginning of his confidence steadfast to the end.

God so loved the world — That is, all men under heaven; even those that despise his love, and will for that cause finally perish. Otherwise not to believe would be no sin to them. For what should they believe? Ought they to believe that Christ was given for them? Then he was given for them.

He gave his only Son — Truly and seriously. And the Son of God gave himself, Galatians 4:4, truly and seriously.

Verse 17

[17] For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.

God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world — Although many accuse him of it.

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