Given All That Which Is Good

Two precious gifts which God gives us are grace and glory. That truth we find presented in Psalm 84:11 . In that verse we read, "For the Lord God is a sun and shield: the Lord will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly."

Now grace is favor. It means that we have not earned salvation and its blessings, but have it given to us apart from anything which we did. And glory is the radiation, the shining forth, of virtue. Take hold then of that comforting truth that God will not withhold from us any good thing, and will always give us that which is good for us.

Since God will not withhold any good thing from those who walk uprightly, we must believe that, in all circumstances of life, what He sends upon us is for our good and serves, bringing us to the glory He promises His people. So very clearly this is revealed in the birth of our Savior. In His grace God sent His own Son to die for us. We do not deserve it. Christ most assuredly is the most precious gift which God gave us in His grace. He, Christ, brings us out of our guilt, and thus out of hell; and He brings us to heaven where the highest glory for human beings will be bestowed upon us.

Christ's birth, then, is that good thing which He in His grace gave us so that we would reach heavenly glory. Joseph supplied nothing, and Mary was God's tool whereby He brought us our Savior. God's grace used Mary so that we could come out of the curse and be raised to glory.

Walk uprightly, then, and you will have the assurance that Christ came for you, and that He most assuredly will bring you to the glory that Christ now has and is realizing for all His people.

Therefore also walk uprightly, and you will have reason to rejoice and have peace of mind on the day when we celebrate Christ's birth. Then you will know that His cross is God's work of grace for your glory.

Read: Psalm 84

Meditations on the Heidelberg Catechism

Through the Bible in One Year
Read today:
Micah 5; Micah 6; Micah 7 
Revelation 7:1-17 
Psalm 135:1-21 
Proverbs 30:5-6 
****

Quote for Reflection:

The apostle takes it here for granted that God designed a ... state of perfection, unto the church; and that as unto its worship as well as unto its faith and obedience. We find, by the event, that it answered not the divine wisdom and goodness to bind up the church, during its whole sojourn in this world, unto a worship so carnal, burdensome, so imperfect, so unsuited to express his grace and kindness towards it, or its sense thereof. And who can but pity the woeful condition of the present Jews, who can conceive of no greater blessedness than the restoration of this burdensome service? So true is it what the apostle says, the veil is upon them unto this present day; yea, blindness is on their minds, that they can see no beauty but only in things carnal: and like their forefathers, who preferred the bondage of Egypt, because of their flesh-pots, before all the liberty and blessings of Canaan; so do they their old bondage-state because of some temporal advantages it was attended withal, before the glorious liberty of the sons of God.

~ John Owen-- (Hebrews, vol. 5, p. 419).