The Wednesday Word

The Thomas Confession

D G Miles McKee

John 20:28; “And Thomas answered and said unto him, “My Lord and my God.”

Poor old Thomas! He is forever known as the doubter. Although Thomas did not remain in doubt about the resurrection of Jesus, ‘Doubting Thomas’ is the name by which he is remembered.  Perhaps it reflects on how little mercy there is in the church for those who fall.

However, in my opinion, there’s a strong case for remembering Thomas, not as ‘Doubting Thomas’, but as ‘Believing Thomas’ for here, in this verse, he gives a clear and grand confession of his faith. Here, he declares Jesus to be both Lord and God —a declaration which has both strengthened and enriched the faith of believers throughout the generations!

Some misled people have tried to argue that Thomas wasn’t actually making a confession of faith but was calling out in surprised astonishment. Well imagine that!  Apart from charging Thomas with profanity, they expose their desperate and barren thinking to full view. Thomas, far from swearing, made a grand confession of faith as he declared the words, “My Lord and my God.” What he literally said was, “Jesus, you are the Lord of me and the God of me.”

Was Thomas mistaken about the identity of Jesus?  Let’s ask Jesus.  Let’s see how He responds to this confession. Surely, if Jesus is merely a good man and not God, He will rebuke His erring disciple. After all, no good and upright man would allow himself to be called God!  So how did Jesus respond?

Here’s what happened.

Jesus said unto him, Thomas, because you have seen me, you have believed: blessed are they that have not seen and yet have believed’. (John 20:29).

In other words, Christ declares Thomas to be a true believer. That’s hardly a rebuke! True believers, we, therefore, conclude, stand firm on the Deity of Christ.

Matthew Henry writes,

“We must believe his deity-that he is God; not a man-made God, but God made man. The author and head of our holy religion has the wisdom, power, sovereignty, and un-changeableness of God, which was necessary, because he was to be not only the founder of it, but the foundation of it for its constant support, and the fountain of life for its supply’. (Matthew Henry Commentaries).

It is essential, therefore, as followers of Christ that we take a stand for who He is. It is not enough to glibly say, “O I believe that Jesus is the Son of God, but he’s not God.” If that is your position you cannot be considered a Christian. You can be a church member, a deacon, or Sunday school teacher, but you are not a Christian. You have rejected the Christ of Heaven.

Everyone who names the name of Christ must settle this question of Christ’s Deity for himself. The Devil has tried for years to undermine belief in our Master’s Deity, and it becomes all who name the name of Christ to defy the Father of Lies and to refute his falsehoods.

In conclusion, notice how Thomas made his great confession publicly. Henry again comments,

‘He made an open profession of this, before those that had been the witnesses of his unbelieving doubts. He says it to Christ, and, to complete the sense, we must read it, ‘Thou art my Lord and my God’; or, speaking to his brethren, ‘This is my Lord and my God’. Do we accept Christ as our Lord God? We must go to him, and tell him so, —and tell others so” (Matthew Henry Commentaries).

And that´s the Gospel Truth!

Excerpted from Part 2 of “Jesus is God, Always was and Always Will Be.” By D.G. Miles McKee

The Wednesday Word

GODS GLORIOUS GOSPEL

I once heard of an old-time preacher who when he was a young believer asked an older Christian: ” What shall I read? “

“Read the first eight chapters of the Epistle to the Romans,” was the answer. He did so, and duly informed the older man asking,

” What next?”

“Read them again,” came the reply.

Once more the young man diligently perused these chapters, reported progress, then repeated his request for further guidance.

” Read these eight chapters eight times over counselled his senior friend. The young man did so and through time became a very powerful and effective preacher of the Gospel. He said he thanked God over and over again for that splendid start in his Christian life and that to him, Romans Chapter 1-8 were still unspeakably precious.

If we were to read these chapters, we would see that they are filled with glorious Gospel truth.  Let´s look at a few verses from Chapter One.

The first thing we notice is,

 THE SOURCE OF THE GOSPEL.

The Gospel is, ” The gospel of God ” (Romans 1:1) not the Gospel of Man.  It was from God’s mind that the Gospel was planned. Think of it! The Gospel is so simple that a child can understand it, yet it is so profound that the oldest, most mature saint is still fed by it.

The Gospel reveals the heart of God. Just think for a moment what the Gospel does. It takes us from the very guttermost of sin and brings us to the uttermost of glory. (See Romans chapters 1-3).

 Next, we see,

THE SUBJECT OF THE GOSPEL. Many think that they, (the believer) are the subjects of the Gospel, but they are wrong. Yes indeed, the Gospel is for sinners, but it is not about sinners. The Gospel is “concerning His Son “(verse 3).  Having accomplished redemption, He rose from the dead and ascended to be both Lord and Christ.” (Acts 2:36). He was not only divine but also man.  He was made of the seed of David according to the flesh. In Him, every promise of God is established.  May we learn to meditate on Him who is the very subject of the Gospel.

Next, we see

THE SERVICE OF THE GOSPEL. ” For God is my Witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of His Son ” (verse 9).

From the beginning and end of Paul’s Christian life he was a servant of Christ and the Gospel. The preaching of Christ crucified, was Paul´s major concern. May it also be ours.  We may not be called to serve as missionaries or even called to preach.  We may live in a small community with few people but we can pray urgently for the advance of the Gospel.

Then we see,

 THE SUCCESS OF THE GOSPEL. ” For it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth ” (verse 16). There is nothing that the power of God cannot affect, therefore, there is nothing that the gospel of God cannot accomplish.

 Dear believer be encouraged to tell everyone about Jesus and be assured of the almighty power of the Gospel.

Finally, we discover

THE SECRET OF THE GOSPEL. ” For therein is the righteousness of God revealed ” (verse 17).  ” Some people don’t like the word “righteousness” in that verse.   They would rather the text had said “the love of God is revealed,” But read the first 8 chapters of Romans, then read them again, and when you have finished, I think you will say, ” Now I understand the secret of the Gospel is the righteousness of God.  Yes, the Gospel gives us a deep appreciation of His love, but Romans teaches us that God does not save apart from righteousness.

And that’s the Gospel Truth!

The Wednesday Word

The Mighty God

D G Miles McKee

At the Council of Chalcedon in A.D. 451 it was affirmed that Christ was one person with two natures.  Christ, they said, was fully God and fully man.  However, the teaching of Chalcedon on this matter was no 5^th century invention. This was no

 “figment of a pious imagination” for the mighty prophet Isaiah had already given the same key to understanding the mysterious constitution of the person of Christ.  Let’s look at what he says in Isaiah 9:6,

“Unto us a child is born.”

 So, before we go any further, let me ask you, is a child a human?  Of course it is!  But Isaiah goes on to declare that this child is also, “The Mighty God.”

This child is given the full title of Deity being called ‘El Gibbor’, the Mighty God. This is a name reserved for God alone for in Isaiah 10:20-21, we see that it is Yahweh Himself who is this ‘El Gibbor’.

“And it shall come to pass in that day, that the remnant of Israel, and such as are escaped of the house of Jacob, shall no more again stay upon him that smote them; but shall stay upon the LORD, the Holy One of Israel, in truth. The remnant shall return, even the remnant of Jacob, unto the mighty God (El Gibbor).”

According to Deuteronomy 6:4 there is one LORD; thus the child born is Yahweh clothed in humanity.  The child of Isaiah 9:6 and the LORD are one and the same! This child of the manger is ‘El Gibbor,’ the Mighty God.  For God to be God He must have all might, all power and all sovereignty.  So, let me ask, how many mighty Gods are there?  I hope you don’t think there is more than one!  I’m reminded of the man at a prayer meeting who, speaking from the very depth of his ignorance, proclaimed “The Devil is almighty, but our God is even more almightier.” That comment earned the poor fellow a well-deserved round of muffled merriment. Obviously, there is no such thing as the Almighty and the Almightier!  The Bible and logic know of only one Almighty God, and the scriptures declare that this mighty God and the Lord Jesus (the child born) are one and the same! 

If we believe that Christ is human, but not the Mighty God, then we reject the clear record of the Bible.  We are, in this case, treating the Bible like a giant cafeteria from which we can pick and choose the things we like and dislike!  However, Isaiah in this one scripture (Isaiah 9:6) gives us the key to unlock the mystery of Christ’s identity.  This promised one is to be both God and man, both human and divine, or as we have already discovered, one person with two natures. This key opens the door and reveals Christ’s person.  If we throw this key away, we will remain shut out and remain in the dark when it comes to understanding the identity of Christ.

And that´s the Gospel Truth!

                                                  ———————-

Excerpted from “Jesus is God Always Was and Always Will Be!” Part 1, Author D.G. Miles McKee

The Wednesday Word

The Fullness

D.G. Miles McKee

Colossians 2:9, “For the fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily in Him.”

This verse, some commentators tell us, is an illusion to the Tabernacle in the days of Moses.  It looked plain and ordinary on the outside, but inside it housed the very glory and presence of God.  Likewise, in Christ Jesus, God gives a full and complete expression of Himself, yet he clothed Himself as a human to do so.  In Colossians 2 :9 we see a clear declaration of the dual nature of Christ. Look carefully at our scripture and see that the Lord Jesus is both human and divine.  The fullness. of the Godhead dwells bodily in Him.

“Veiled in flesh the Godhead see;
Hail the incarnate Deity,
Pleased as man with men to dwell,
Jesus, our Emmanuel.”

Of course, Christ’s enemies say that here the word ‘Godhead’ does not actually mean Godhead or they say that this verse means that it was merely the power of God which dwelt in Christ. It is astonishing to discover the hatred that men still harbor towards Jesus and the truth of His deity. However, the Bible cannot be clearer on Christ’s identity than it is in this verse. This verse, according to Calvin,

“… means simply, that God is wholly found in him (Christ), so that he who is not content with Christ alone, desires something better and more excellent than God. The sum is this, that God has manifested himself to us fully and perfectly in Christ.”

Calvin’s Commentaries.

In Isaiah 11:2-5, we are given a prophetic picture of the Lord Jesus which conveys something of this fullness.  There we read,

“..and the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord; and shall make Him of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord: and He shall not judge after the sight of His eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of His ears: but with righteousness shall He judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and He shall smite the earth with the rod of His mouth, and with the breath of His lips shall He slay the wicked. And righteousness shall be the girdle of His loins, and faithfulness the girdle of His reins.

Notice how Christ demonstrates the sevenfold spirit of God!

The Spirit of the Lord.

The Spirit of Wisdom.

The Spirit of Understanding.

The Spirit of Counsel.

The Spirit of Might.

The Spirit of Knowledge.

The Spirit of the Fear of the Lord.

The fullness and perfections of the Godhead were and are truly manifest in the Lord Jesus. The foundation of our faith then is that He who died on the cross was God incarnate. When we meet Christ Jesus, we meet with God in His fullness.  This is the foundation upon which we can build our life and eternal destiny.

“Mortals with joy beheld his face,

Th’ eternal Father’s Son;

How full of truth! How full of grace!

When through His eyes the Godhead shone.”

Isaac Watts.

And that´s the Gospel Truth!

The Wednesday Word

Blood that Washes!

D.G. Miles McKee

 “Unto him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood …” Revelation 1:5.

Currently we seem to hear less and less about believers having been washed in the blood of Christ! We are told that such language is outmoded and meaningless in today’s culture.

But is it?

I don’t believe so! Let’s look for a moment then at what it means to be washed in the blood.

It means that we are totally identified with Jesus in His death. The blood of Christ cleanses us, not because it is a ‘heavenly detergent, but by totally immersing and identifying us in and with the death of our Substitute. To be washed in the blood means that legally we have been crucified with Christ. His death was our death; His punishment ours. We are now cleansed by His blood … which is another way of saying that we have been made partakers of the death of Christ.

 Because the blood has been applied to us, we are legally counted as those who have paid the penalty of the broken law. We were once covered entirely with guilt and under sentence of death, but our substitute, the Lord Jesus, shed His blood and washed us clean.

 In God’s eyes, that blood represents both Christ’s death and ours. Jesus died as our substitute. The blood is shed for us and in that way death, which is the law’s penalty, is reckoned legally to us.  Legally we have died. This is good news! We have been crucified with Christ and as a result, our guilt has passed away. We are cleansed; we are washed in His blood.

 This is good news from the good news. This is good news that tells us, not what we have to do, to be saved, but tells us what Christ Jesus has fully done to actually and effectively save us. Let’s be clear on this; only that which God has done for us on our behalf can deliver us.

Deliver us from what?

From the wrath of God for starters! But there’s more! In this life, it is only as we grasp that Christ’s blood has cleansed, covered and paid for us that the troubled conscience can come to peace. There is no other way to be freed from guilt than by applying, by faith, that which the blood has accomplished.

Every question that a guilty conscience can put, is fully answered by the blood. When our conscience condemns us and tells us that God is angry because we have sinned, it is then that we need to preach the gospel to ourselves. We need to say, “Self, the blood of Christ has cleansed and washed you. God does not condemn you today because He has already condemned Jesus at the cross 2,000 years ago!”

That Christ Jesus poured out his blood as the sinner’s substitute is God’s declaration that He loves us and loves us righteously. In the gospel, righteousness and peace have kissed (Psalm 85:10); our sin is condemned and judged in the person of our substitute, the Lord Jesus. The shed blood of Christ is shed instead of ours and God willingly accepts this substitution because He is satisfied with Christ alone.

Although there are those who; while professing to be Christian, slight and scorn it, God is well satisfied with the blood. Believers, therefore, dare not minimize its importance. God is unchangeable when it comes to the importance of the blood for the honour of His Son is bound up in the same. The blood of the gospel is God’s own blood (Acts 20:28); the shed blood was the blood of the God/Man. It was the blood of Him who was and is the brightness of Yahweh’s glory, and the express image of His person (Hebrews 1:3). How then is it possible that God can overlook any affront or indifference to the blood? He cannot! If we reject the blood, we reject Christ. If we reject Christ, we reject God Himself.

And that’s the Gospel Truth!

A Powerful “I will” from the Master

D.G. Miles McKee

I hate it when people´s “I will,” doesn´t amount to, as they say in Texas, ‘a hill of beans.’  Unfortunately, some people often say “I will” when they privately mean “I won´t.” But when it comes to the “I wills” of Jesus, if we studied them, would see that everything He promised to do, He did, does and will do. We can trust Him on that. 

Take for example the “I Will” of Salvation.

In John 6:37 Jesus says: “All that the Father gives to me come to me and He that comes to me I will in no wise cast out.” Literally, I will never, never cast out. We are the Father´s gift to the Lord Jesus and He will never cast us out.  Do you trust this promise He has made to you?

To come to Jesus means to trust Him for salvation.  Unfortunately, there are those who think they are too unworthy to come to Him. If this is how you think, I would remind you that Christ came to save, not good people, but sinners like you and me; people who have gone astray and have come short of the glory of God.

Listen to this “I will”–and notice there are no exceptions. Jesus said, “He that comes to me I will in no wise cast out.”  Not him that comes to church I will in no wise cast out. No! Rather we are to come to Him, to Jesus, the faithful saviour.  I don´t care how bad you feel about yourself, come to Jesus, He will not cast you out.  Come just as you are and take Him at His word.

He will take those who are full of sin.

He will take the despised.

He will take the rejected.

He will take those who have sunk low into the depths of wickedness. Jesus is come to seek and to save that which was lost.” (Luke 19:10).

Spurgeon in his sermon, “The Certainty and Freeness of Divine Grace” tells us that,

“John Newton was a blasphemer of so gross a kind, that even the sailors in the vessel in the storm they encountered thought that they should never get to port with such a sinner as John Newton on board; but Newton looked to Jesus and was not cast out and lived to preach the Word.

“John Bunyan was so foul a blasphemer, that even a woman of the street, who passed him by and heard him swear, said that he was enough to corrupt the whole parish; and he was astonished that a woman of so bad a character should so rebuke him. John Bunyan looked to Jesus, and he was not cast out; he lived to have the honour of suffering for his Master, and to be the winner of multitudes of souls.

“Saul of Tarsus had stained himself with the blood of saints; he was a wolf after Christ’s sheep. He was not satisfied with worrying them in his own land, so he obtained power to persecute them in Damascus; but when he fell upon his face and cried for mercy, he was not cast out.

 “Manasseh was blood-red with the murder of God’s prophets. It is said that he cut the prophet Isaiah in two with a saw; and yet, when out of the low dungeon Manasseh cried for mercy, he was not cast out.”

What a powerful “I will” from the Master, “He that comes to me I will in no wise cast out.”

 You are not so wicked that Christ Jesus will reject you.

And that´s the Gospel Truth!

‘Til He Comes.