When I survey the wondrous Cross
On which the Prince of Glory died
My richest gain I count but loss
And pour contempt on all my pride
Forbid it Lord that I should boast
Save in the death of Christ my God
All the vain things that charm me most
I sacrifice them to His blood
See from His head His hands His feet
Sorrow and love flow mingled down
Did ere such love and sorrow meet
Or thorns compose so rich a crown
Were the whole realm of nature mine
That were an offering far too small
Love so amazing so divine
Demands my soul
My life my all
When I survey the wondrous Cross - by Isaac WattsWhen I contemplate the Cross of my Lord Jesus Christ I’m overwhelmed by two things. The
holy hatred of GOD toward sin and the
deep love of GOD demonstrated toward sinners.
“My richest gain…my pride…all the vain things that charm me most…” Isaac Watts, like me, was all too familiar with his own sin – before and after his union with Christ. Before my conversion,
“my richest gain,” manifest itself in all manner of sin. I not only failed to do the things I knew were good and right, but I rebelled against all of GOD’s commandments. I desired things that didn’t belong to me – covetousness/greed. I stole things that didn’t belong to me. I told many lies to save my skin. I did everything I could to “save” my life (so I could seek my pleasure) while all along my soul was lost, lame, blind –
DEAD. I was spiritually dead toward GOD and under His wrath because I rebelled against Him. In all truth I was unable to respond rightly toward GOD or man.
I shook my puny little fist at Him, so to speak, by using His name in a disrespectful vile manner. Indeed, I was an enemy of GOD. The life that I lived before my union with Christ was one of self-seeking, self-exaltation, self-worship and
my pride. Not only did I sin through acts of outward rebellion; violating His law at every turn, but the
vain things that charmed me most was heart-sin against GOD. In my heart I committed adultery by looking with lust. I committed murder in my heart each time I harbored bitterness, anger, or hatred toward another person. I never thanked GOD for air, food, water, family and I didn’t give Him the honor, praise, and worship that are due to Him alone. I was guilty and deserved to be punished as a guilty criminal who had violated the law.
According to God’s character and nature: holiness, goodness, righteousness and justice – this guilty sinner deserved to be punished for the crimes I’d committed against this infinatly perfect Being and Judge of all of the universe. The punishment that the Creator of the universe has ascribed is punishment in Hell.
But, in spite of my sin, by His grace alone, through faith alone, in Jesus Christ alone, GOD set me free from the power of sin and death. Jesus Christ lived a perfect life - not for His own sake but in order to merit righteousness
for His people. When this perfect God-man hung on the Cross, the sins of His people were placed on Him and God the Father made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us and He punished Jesus
in the place of His people. He poured out His just wrath on Jesus
instead of us - as our
Substitute. Jesus
bore the wrath of God and died on the Cross. He was placed in a tomb and three days later He rose from the dead, proving that God the Father accepted the ransom payment that Jesus made for His people.
AMAZING LOVE! See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are!
Through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ I’ve been reconciled to GOD and have a new relationship with Him. I am His child and no longer a slave to sin. However, the more I know Him the more I know myself and see in myself this falleness.
Positionally God has declared me righteous in His site.
Relationally I am a child of God. T
ransformationally the Person of the Holy Spirit is at work sanctifying me in Christlikeness - desires, habits and character. I count myself dead to sin. However, when I get a glimps of the holiness of GOD, while in this body, I still say with the prophet Isaiah, “Woe is me, for I am undone!”
In the saving of sinners GOD takes pleasure and is glorified. The death of His Son was no mistake! It was the plan and purpose of the Triune Godhead from
all eternity past.
This blog, “Cross Bearing Servant” is a response to the Person and work of Jesus Christ, The Cross Bearing Servant, in my life. Out of gratitude for what He’s done and doing in me, I desire to make much of Him here and everywhere. The love of Christ compels me to love Him, His people who have been saved and those who have not yet come into the fold and all people everywhere!There is a multitude that GOD has planned to save. It is my desire and pleasure to speak the Gospel to
all people everywhere –
without discrimination. Along with a local church, I'm so excited to be a witness and proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ! Why? Because I have
no doubts that GOD will save those whom Christ died for and He will be glorified in and through it all. We proclaim the gospel to
all people - the outward call of the gospel. But
GOD will inwardly summons those individuals who Chirst died for and they
will come – all the way to glory!
By way of further explaining what exactly I believe about the atonement of Jesus Christ, please read the statements below. These are glorious truths that will make your heart glad in Christ.
I didn’t write the statements below. I took them from
Bethlehem Baptist Church’s website. However, I do hold firmly to these truths. I’ve edited these statements a bit in that I’ve removed the “We believe” portion at the beginning of each statement.
Fix your eyes on
THE CROSS BEARING SERVANT!
God, from all eternity, in order to display the full extent of His glory for the eternal and ever-increasing enjoyment of all who love Him, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His will, freely and unchangeably ordain and foreknow whatever comes to pass.
God upholds and governs all things – from galaxies to subatomic particles, from the forces of nature to the movements of nations, and from the public plans of politicians to the secret acts of solitary persons – all in accord with His eternal, all-wise purposes to glorify Himself, yet in such a way that He never sins, nor ever condemns a person unjustly; but that His ordaining and governing all things is compatible with the moral accountability of all persons created in His image.
God‘s election is an unconditional act of free grace which was given through His Son Christ Jesus before the world began. By this act God chose, before the foundation of the world, those who would be delivered from bondage to sin and brought to repentance and saving faith in His Son Christ Jesus.
Although God created man morally upright, he was led astray from God‘s Word and wisdom by the subtlety of Satan‘s deceit, and chose to take what was forbidden, and thus declare his independence from, distrust for, and disobedience toward his all-good and gracious Creator. Thus, our first parents, by this sin, fell from their original innocence and communion with God.
As the head of the human race, Adam‘s fall became the fall of all his posterity, in such a way that corruption, guilt, death, and condemnation belong properly to every person. All persons are thus corrupt by nature, enslaved to sin, and morally unable to delight in God and overcome their own proud preference for the fleeting pleasures of self-rule.
God has subjected the creation to futility, and the entire human family is made justly liable to untold miseries of sickness, decay, calamity, and loss. Thus all the adversity and suffering in the world is an echo and a witness of the exceedingly great evil of moral depravity in the heart of mankind; and every new day of life is a God-given, merciful reprieve from imminent judgment, pointing to repentance.
In the fullness of time God sent forth His eternal Son as Jesus the Messiah, conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary. When the eternal Son became flesh, He took on a fully human nature, so that two whole, perfect, and distinct natures were inseparably joined together in one Person, without confusion or mixture. Thus the Person, Jesus Christ, was and is truly God and truly man, yet one Christ and the only Mediator between God and man.
Jesus Christ lived without sin, though He endured the common infirmities and temptations of human life. He preached and taught with truth and authority unparalleled in human history. He worked miracles, demonstrating His divine right and power over all creation: dispatching demons, healing the sick, raising the dead, stilling the storm, walking on water, multiplying loaves, and foreknowing what would befall Him and His disciples, including the betrayal of Judas and the denial, restoration, and eventual martyrdom of Peter.
His life was governed by His Father‘s providence with a view to fulfilling all Old Testament prophecies concerning the One who was to come, such as the Seed of the woman, the Prophet like Moses, the Priest after the order of Melchizedek, the Son of David, and the Suffering Servant.
Jesus Christ suffered voluntarily in fulfillment of God‘s redemptive plan, that He was crucified under Pontius Pilate, that He died, was buried and on the third day rose from the dead to vindicate the saving work of His life and death and to take His place as the invincible, everlasting Lord of glory. During forty days after His resurrection, He gave many compelling evidences of His bodily resurrection and then ascended bodily into heaven, where He is seated at the right hand of the Father, interceding for His people on the basis of His all-sufficient sacrifice for sin, and reigning until He puts all His enemies under His feet.
By His perfect obedience to God and by His suffering and death as the immaculate Lamb of God, Jesus Christ obtained forgiveness of sins and the gift of perfect righteousness for all who trusted in God prior to the cross and all who would trust in Christ thereafter. Through living a perfect life and dying instead, the just for the unjust, Christ absorbed our punishment, appeased the wrath of God against us, vindicated the righteousness of God in our justification, and removed the condemnation of the law against us.
The atonement of Christ for sin warrants and impels a universal offering of the gospel to all persons, so that to every person it may be truly said, ―God gave His only begotten Son so that whoever believes in Him might not perish but have eternal life. Whosoever will may come for cleansing at this fountain, and whoever does come, Jesus will not cast out.
The death of Christ did obtain more than the bona fide offer of the gospel for all; it also obtained the omnipotent New Covenant mercy of repentance and faith for God‘s elect. Christ died for all, but not for all in the same way. In His death, Christ expressed a special covenant love to His friends, His sheep, His bride. For them He obtained the infallible and effectual working of the Spirit to triumph over their resistance and bring them to saving faith.
I’m sure it’s not an original idea – using the holiday Easter as a springboard to talking with people about the things of eternity. In fact, I’ve heard Todd Friel, from Wretched Radio, do it many times. If you’re not a regular listener of Wretched Radio, here is a link to a free segment of the show where Todd uses Easter as a springboard into talking to people about the things of GOD.
.JPG)
