40 Days of Passion Devotions

Dear Beloved,
You are about to embark on a life-changing experience by taking your first step on an ancient journey that Christ followers have
been traveling for almost 1700 years. Our focus for the next 40 days will be allowing God to confront our lives through the Cross of
Jesus Christ. We will examine some of the hard teachings of Jesus Christ as he made his way to die for our sins. We will look at what
it means to walk Calvary’s road with Him as we are “crucified with Christ” so that “I no longer live, but Christ lives in me” (Galations
2:20). These 40 days will be a concentrated time of preparation for Easter Sunday, characterized by soul-searching and spiritual
reflection.
Each day is designed to help us consistently explore God's word and find out what God is specifically confronting us to do. For 40
days we will memorize scripture, meditate on God's word, let our minds try to grasp the beauty of the Cross, and spend time being
confronted with the death of Jesus Christ and how he wants to transform our lives through the Cross.
You may be asking, why 40 Days? While there is nothing magical about 40 days, the Bible reveals that God considers 40 days to be a
spiritually significant time period in which people can be transformed. In fact, in the Bible, anytime God wanted to get his people
ready to be used mightily for Him, He took 40 days to prepare them. For instance:
 Noah’s life was transformed by 40 days of rain
 Moses’ life was transformed by 40 days on Mount Sinai
 The city of Nineveh was transformed in 40 days
 Jesus was empowered for ministry by spending 40 days in the desert
 The disciples were transformed by 40 days with Jesus after the resurrection.
Through this 40-day journey, it is my prayer that God will use his Holy Spirit, his word, and these devotions to reveal to you what it
means to be confronted with the Cross of Jesus Christ. It will be a journey in which we must decide to die to ourselves so Christ can
live through us. These forty days are not about physical death, but spiritually dying to our sinful desires so Christ can live in us and
we can have a fresh encounter with God. For every one of us, this journey will be different. The question is: Will you make the effort
to be confronted with the Cross and listen to what God wants to reveal to you as you walk Calvary’s road with Jesus Christ?
Passionately pursuing deeper intimacy with God is open to all who believe. But few of us will really be willing to follow once we
know the real cost. It's a lot more fun to be entertained by Jesus than to walk Calvary’s road with him. It is far easier to sit and listen
at church than to struggle and strain in our pursuit of purity to become the church that God wants us to be. It's much easier to play
the part of a radical follower of Christ than it is to crucify all that you are in order to seek the presence of God. No, confrontation of
the Cross will be hard because the call to die is not for everybody—only for those who are serious about experiencing the greatest
adventure life has to offer.
The road to Calvary is dangerous and frightening but it is the only way. Jesus said, “If any of you wants to be my follower, you must
turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross daily, and follow me” (Luke 9:23). If you choose to answer that call, you will be in for
some very hard moments, but take heart, it's well worth it in the end. Jesus promised that all those that follow him will have
abundant and eternal life (John 10:10, 28). As you walk Calvary’s Road you are headed toward an encounter with God that will
overwhelm you with more joy, engulf you with more hope, and astonish you with more love than you’ve ever known before. If you
choose to take this step and use these devotions for the next 40 days, I guarantee that God will change your life.

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I am asking for all those who call the Journey home to commit to the following:
1. Participate in all six weekend worship experiences and Consume (March 13-April 22). Every week the sermons
will touch on how the Cross confronts us in our lives. Your Life Group will discuss the sermon and you will be
studying the same topic individually during the week in these devotions. This will allow you to study in more
detail the truths taught about on Sunday. It is crucial then that you attend all six weekend worship
experiences. We will end the 40 days of Passion on Good Friday when we come together for Consume, April
22, at 6:30 pm for a night of intense prayer and passionate worship.
2. Read the 40 daily readings in the 40 Day s of Passion Devotional. I want to suggest that you schedule a daily
appointment to sit down and read it. Schedule it and do it every day for the next 40 days. It will take you
about 15 minutes a day. Read the text, think about the principles, and allow God to confront you. I would also
suggest that you have a partner that you can call on the phone and discuss what you’ve read. Don’t go
through this journey alone. Get someone to hold you accountable and help you.
3. Join with others in a Life Group to discuss the week’s teachings. True transformation never happens alone, but
by challenging each other to seek hard after God. Each week Life Groups will be given discussion questions
designed to facilitate a deeper understanding of the Bible and to help you consider how the truths of Scripture
can impact your life. Commit to going to your Life Group consistently every week during the next 40 days. If
you’re not in a Life Group, it’s not too late. You can visit our website (www.thejourneyoc.net) or go to the
Information Center on Sunday and we will help you get into a group.
4. Memorize a simple Bible verse each week from the 40 Day s of Passion Devotional that will help you focus on
walking Calvary’s Road. Every week you will be given a weekly Bible memory verse that fits the theme of the
session. Write this verse out every week and hang it someplace where you will constantly see it (refrigerator,
mirror, computer, etc…), this will help you memorize and mediate on the verse throughout the week. While
scriptural memorization may seem like a challenge for some people, I encourage you to take this opportunity
to grow deeper in your walk with God through this key spiritual habit.
5. Sacrifice one thing over the next 40 days. As a statement to yourself and to God of your commitment to follow
Him, make a decision to sacrifice something for these 40 days. Denying yourself something so you can focus
more completely on God allows Him the opportunity to really work in your life. This means that for 40 days,
you will give up something from your everyday life that occupies your time; in order to free you to spend time
that with God. Here are some ideas:
 You may decide to not listen to the radio in your car so you can spend that time in prayer.
 You may decide no television, internet, movies, magazine reading, or video games. Then you can occupy that time
with prayer and scripture reading.
 You may decide to give up lunch each day so you can spend that time memorizing scripture and reading this book.
 You may give up a bad habit and spend the time you dedicated to that habit going through this book.
Pray about something you can give up in your life so that you have a little extra time to get intimate with God. God will be glad to
show you! If you're still confused, pray again. I know that sometimes when God reveals something I should sacrifice, I have a
tendency to compromise. Don't bargain with God. Fast from the thing that is most distracting to your spiritual life, and replace it
with prayer, study, and worship.
Are you ready to listen as God confronts you with the Cross? Are you ready to take the next step in living a life that pleases God? Are
you ready to step out of the comfort zone of mediocrity and live the passionate life that God desires for you to live? Then let’s join
together for this 40-day spiritual journey as we walk on the Road to Calvary with Jesus and allow the Cross of Jesus Christ to confront
every area of our life.

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 Week 1

Confrontation
The Latin term for confrontation means “to turn your face toward, to look at fully.” Confrontation means that you are turning
toward the relationship and the person and dealing with the issue full on. You are face-to-face, so to speak and fully engaged in
resolving the issue. In confrontation, we face the relationship and out of deep love deal with the issue that needs to be addressed.
This is why God will confront every sin in our life. Sin is an expression of rebellion against God by making something else more
glorious than Him. God desires to confront us in order to make the relationship better, to deepen the intimacy, and to create more
love and admiration between himself and us.
Memory Verse: “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would
save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it.” (Luke 9:23-24)

Take time to write this verse out on a piece of paper that you can hang some place where you will constantly see it (refrigerator,
mirror, computer, etc…), this will help you memorize and mediate on the verse throughout the week.

Day 1 :: March 14 :: Read John 6:25-29

Confronting the issue

During the middle period of his ministry, Jesus was popular—as popular as a top athlete, politician, or a rock star in our own day.
Thousands of people came to see him, hear him, and watch him. He didn't disappoint them. They saw him miraculously heal the sick
and raise the dead. "Man!" they probably said to each other as they smiled and elbowed each other, "This guy is incredible! What's
next?" Crowds of more than fifteen to twenty thousand people would follow him wherever he went, chanting his name. The crowds
couldn't get enough of him.
But popularity was never Jesus' goal. He wanted to make radical disciples and worshipers of God, not groupies. So at the height of
his fame, he made sure no one misunderstood. He confronted the people in no uncertain terms that he was God himself. He said, "I
AM the bread of life." Sounds pretty simple, huh? But to the people of Jesus’ day, his “I AM” statement sounded very much like the
time when God revealed himself to Moses and called himself “I AM that I AM.” Jesus was claiming to be that same God—with the
implication that he should be worshipped, too.
The people began to grumble, “Wait a minute. I like the healing and miracles and eating, but I don't know about this Deity thing...”
They wanted Jesus to back down, to say, “Well, I sure don't want to offend anybody, so let me rephrase that statement.” Instead,
Jesus cranked it up a notch. He told them bluntly, "I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood,
you have no life in you. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For
my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink" (John 6:53-55).
Eat his flesh? Drink his blood? Jesus had confronted them with some hard words and that was too much for them. So the crowd
melted away and the thousands of people went back to their homes and regular lives. After watching them all walk away, Jesus
stood there with only the twelve disciples next to him. Jesus then turned and confronted them, “Do you want to go as well?”
What do you think that moment was like for these guys? Wow, what a crossroads moment! This was full on confrontation in which
they had to decide who Jesus was to them and if they would follow him. Here Jesus was just a few minute ago, the big guy in Judea,
with all the flare, glamour, and admiration of a movie star. Things had been going great! Then he claimed to be worthy of worship
and obedience, and all the people—that's all the people in the crowd—left when he confronted them. I can imagine the twelve
disciples shifting their feet and looking at the ground. Kind of embarrassing for all of them. Then Peter shrugged and said simply,
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God." So the
twelve stayed with Jesus.
Jesus didn't come to entertain us, to make all our earthly dreams come true, or even make life easier for us. Jesus' ultimate goal in
coming was to bring glory to the Father by offering us salvation through his death and resurrection, and the opportunity to intimate
with God. If we expect only to be entertained and given earthly blessings if we follow Him, we will leave the first time he confronts
us to sacrifice something and obey Him. The people in the crowd did. Many of us do, too. But hard words of confrontation are just as
much a part of being a disciple of Christ as all those promises we love to hear about God. In fact, if you are never confronted with
hard words from God, it's a good sign that you aren't his child at all.

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Solomon wrote about our need for discipline; so did the writer to the Hebrews: "My son, do not make light of the Lord's discipline,
and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a
son" (Proverbs 3:11 12, Hebrews 12:5 6).
Only a loveless father refuses to confront his son or daughter, and our Heavenly Father is not that way at all. God loves us to the
point that his heart breaks when we get off the path he has charted for us, so he lovingly confronts us and says, "Hey, it's me. Listen.
You're messing up. Don't go that way. Come back to me." At that point, we have a choice to respond or ignore him.
Not many people like confrontation. In fact most people tend to avoid it. But if you really love someone and you know that what
they are doing is going to destroy not only them, but also your relationship with them, you will do everything to confront them. Your
love would compel you to confront them because the confrontation would preserve the relationship and save the person.
Confrontation occurs when we take off the mask of our lives, stop hiding and really begin to deal with who we are and what God
wants us to be. When God tells us the truth about our lives, he is lovingly confronting us with information that we desperately need.
He is confronting us with himself, presenting himself to us, revealing himself to us, and drawing a distinction between who he is and
who we are. The intent is to make the relationship better, to deepen the intimacy, and to create more love and admiration between
us. It is with these hard words, but loving words of confrontation that God guides us to the Cross.

Day 2 :: March 15 :: Read Matthew 16:24-26

When we least expect it

Jesus' words were unmistakable—and brutal—to his disciples. They knew what crosses were. No, they weren't silver charms worn
on necklaces. They weren't the designs in tattoo parlors. The cross was an instrument of execution, one of the most violent and
horrible ever invented by evil men. I can imagine the disciples gasping when Jesus confronted them with those words in Matthew
16:24. His words must have had a terrifying effect: “For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake
will find it” (Matthew 16:25).
These words are sobering because Jesus makes the price of following Him very clear. This death is not about physical death. It means
that when I follow Jesus as my Savior and Lord, the old self-determining, self-absorbed, self-pleasing me must be crucified and die. I
must every day consider myself dead to sin and alive to God. This is the path of life: “Consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to
God in Christ Jesus” (Romans 6:11).
This is major confrontation. When Christ calls a person, he confronts that person with the strong words of death, but also promises
the reward of real life. This is why Jesus begins this statement with a tiny but important word—“if”. He doesn't take it for granted
that you and I will be willing to follow him along his path of radical obedience to the Father and experience the joys of intimacy with
God. Jesus is no bully. He doesn't try to get us to pack our bags for a guilt trip. No, he simply offers that path with all its hardships
and joys, and says, "If you want the greatest adventure life has to offer, and experience what the ultimate joy your heart was really
created for, then here's what the ticket will cost you."
Quite frankly, the vast majority of people look at the brochure and say, "No thanks. The price is too high. I'll settle for something
else." Only a few are willing to say, "Yes, Jesus. I want to go wherever you go." Fewer still stay on board for the whole journey to the
cross, to die to self and follow Jesus. Jesus makes the offer, and he leads each of us in deciding what we want to do.
Jesus did not go to the Cross and die to make this life easy for us or even prosperous. He died to remove every obstacle that keeps
us from him. Intimacy with Jesus Christ is our everlasting joy. Over the next several days you are headed toward an encounter with
God that has the potential to flood your soul with joy in a way that eclipses anything you might have previously called satisfaction.
But it will require God to confront you on several areas of your life and for you to respond in obedience as he leads. Too many of us
have lost our passion for Christ and over the next several weeks we are going to open our lives up once again to his correction and
begin to pursue hard after Him.
If you are unhappy with your current state of spiritual hunger, if you feel like your love for God has grown cold—then hard—to God’s
people and God’s Word; if God has moved from the passion of your life to the back burner; if instead of straining for more of God—
to put Him first and receive his best—you find yourself unexplainably holding back; and if you feel any of these things in increasing
measure, this is definitely the book for you. This is a book about coming back to the Cross to experience what true life is all about.
Make no mistake about it, this road to Calvary in which we encounter the Cross will be hard. In fact in order to get there, Jesus says
you are going to have to die as you follow Him. He will constantly confront areas in our life that need to be put to death. In some
cases, God will confront you about a secret sin you harbor: pornography, anger, lying, greed, bitterness, or harboring a grudge. But
in many cases, the sins are not hidden at all; they are your greatest strengths and your most valued possessions:
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  He may show you that you love yourself more than you love your boyfriend or girlfriend.
 He may expose your bad attitudes.
 He may show you that academics, sports, or your daydreams are taking too much time and attention.
 He may show you that you care too much about popularity, acceptance and the approval of others.
 He may reveal the bitterness and unforgiveness that resides in your heart.
 He may show you that your looks, clothes, car, career, or some other possession are taking God’s place
 He may show you that your selfish ambition or jealousy is stealing your heart away from God.
 He may show you that you want to avoid making hard decisions; that you wiggle out from under authority; and that
freedom has become your God.
We can't program when, how, and where God will confront us. God will do it when he's ready, not when we think we're ready. And
don’t expect Jesus to go easy on you. He loves you to much to allow you to spend your life pursuing false treasures and wasting your
life on things that will never bring you ultimate joy, hope, peace, and pleasure. The Bible teaches clearly and repeatedly that God
wants to revive our relationship with Him. He wants to confront us with our indifference and apathy towards Him. He wants to wake
us up, to refresh our faith—to fire us up again.
If you feel like your faith is a bit off course, you must know that the first wrong turn in your life is always a move away from God. If
you wake up one morning and find yourself in a spiritual desert, then you must trace your steps back to where you wandered away.
You’ve got to return to the Lord, go back to the Cross. Discover what happened in your life and where there was a failure of faith,
because all pleasure flows from the fountain of joy that is found only in returning to God.
This is where the Cross confronts us to get back on the path, get the goal in view again and pursuing Christ with new passion. As we
examine the Cross we realign our life to seek God and gladly make Him the center of our life.
Maybe you can remember a time when you were fired up about the Lord, but somehow you’ve drifted away. Maybe you’ve just
been showing up lately to go through the motions of pursuing God, but you’re missing the mark. Maybe you could say, “Somewhere
along the line I lost my passion for the Lord.” Well, you can have it back and God wants you to have it back! God wants each one of
us to return back to Him and there’s no biblical reason to doubt it.
Over the next several weeks we will be confronted with the Cross so that you can return back again to the love and joy of intimacy
with God. This is a season of letting God confront you by tuning your heart-strings to the melody you were made to play: a dynamic,
delightful, genuine relationship with Him. No matter where you are or what you’ve done, no matter what you feel or think you need,
the clouds of heaven are now bursting with the favor and fullness God would shower upon every place within you that is parched
and dry. A deluge of dangerous delight in the God who made you is ready to rain down upon you.
If enjoying an intimate relationship with God was easy, everyone would have one. Fact is, most people do not—even those who are
really trying. I know that I didn’t for a long time. But by God’s grace, He’s taught me and brought me a long way. More than anything
I want to share with you the road I’ve traveled as I have been confronted by the Cross. I know that you have some questions and
wonder how it can happen for you. Believe me; the answers will come in the weeks ahead as the Holy Spirit works.
The point is, right now be receptive to his confrontation. When he speaks, be still. Listen. It's not necessarily audible. It's even
louder. It is straight to the heart. God doesn't need your ears to get your attention. Obey. Will it be hard? You bet! Dying is never
easy, especially the tortures death on a cross. But he speaks these words of confrontation because he loves you so much, and he
honors your commitment to follow him with all your heart.

Day 3 :: March 16 :: Read 1 Corinthians 15:1 –4

Repairing the damage

Christ’s miraculous entry into this world, his gruesome crucifixion, and his surprising resurrection leave us all in a position of
response to Him. The cross is indeed confrontational because it demands a response from us. Either we deny that He came and died
for us or we believe it. Either we look away from his death or we look on it in repentance. Either we reject the belief that Christ rose
from the dead or we place our hope in it. Either the Cross of Jesus Christ becomes the most important event in our life or we
treasure something else as more important. These events are not value-neutral. Neither is our response to them. The cross
confronts everything from what we believe about God to what we believe about ourselves.

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This is why the central message of the Bible is the gospel, or good news, about the person and work of Jesus Christ. In 1 Corinthians
15:1–4, Paul provides a clear summary of the gospel: Jesus Christ died on the Cross in our place, paying the penalty for our sins;
three days later He rose to conquer sin and death and give the gift of salvation to all who believe in Him.
But why did Jesus have to die? To answer that question you must understand the story of redemption. It is a story that begins in
Genesis and ends in Revelation, and it tells of a just and loving God calling lost and rebellious creatures back to himself. God has
been writing this grand and glorious narrative of his goodness and grace since before time began. We enter into his story at creation.
For his glory, God created this world good and peaceful and offered us the opportunity of unbroken fellowship with himself.
However, as Genesis 3 tells us, things went wrong. Through one man's disobedience, we fell from this joyful state of fellowship. Sin
entered our hearts, and with that sin, the world became twisted and fractured.
The harmony and peace that creation once enjoyed was damaged by sin and broken in disrepair. Since that time, God has patiently
and purposefully continued the story of redemption. God sent his only Son, Jesus, who came and lived a perfect, sinless life and
offered himself as a sacrifice for our sin on the Cross. Jesus endured God's wrath on behalf of sin. It was a dark and horrendous
moment of suffering and death, yet peace and beauty and hope burst forth as Christ rose three days later from the grave. What was
once broken, God restored through his Son. Through Christ we are offered restoration and reconciliation. God takes that which is
broken within us and around us and makes it new. The Father invites his children into relationship with Him and into the newness of
life Christ offers. This is the good news of what Jesus did for us and this news is very confrontational.
The cross is confrontational because the Cross demands a response from you and me, and from every person in this world. The cross
shows very clearly God's wrath against sin and his grace to repentant sinners. The cross of Christ represents judgment on all our sin.
At the Cross the true state of every person’s heart is laid bare. Will we be drawn to the Cross and cherish its grace or will we ignore it
and live our life centered on something else other than Jesus Christ. According to Jesus "this world" under the dominion of Satan,
"the ruler of this world," will inevitably condemn itself by its treatment of Jesus. The point is very simple, the Cross of Christ is the
judgment of the world and Christ is the judge.
Jesus expressed it this way in John 5:22–23, "The Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, that all may honor the
Son even as they honor the Father," and in 5:26–27, "For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life
in himself and has given him authority to exercise judgment, because he is the Son of man."
The cross glorifies the Jesus Christ because it reveals to us who he truly is, one who loves his Father's glory more than his own life,
who has authority to judge this world, who condemns sin, who has power to cast out Satan, who has the irresistible appeal to draw
all of God's people to himself for salvation, who has the power to forgive us of all of our sin, and who is the only way back to
intimacy with God. This is the glory of Jesus Christ we are to treasure and worship. This is why Paul wrote: “Now I would remind you,
brothers, of the gospel I preached to you.… For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our
sins” (1 Corinthians 15:3).
Paul is pointing us to the one great truth that should define our lives. In the midst of our various responsibilities and many possible
areas of service in the kingdom of God, one overarching truth should motivate all our work and affect every part of who we are:
Christ died on the Cross in order to die for our sins. This, Paul says, is the main thing. Nothing else—not even things that are biblical
and honorable—are of equal or greater importance than this: God sent his Son to the Cross to demonstrate his love in that Christ
would bear God’s wrath for sinners like you and me. If there’s anything in life we should be passionately in love about, it’s the
gospel, it’s the Cross. And I don’t mean passionate only about sharing it with others; I mean passionate in thinking about the Cross,
reflecting upon it, rejoicing in it, loving it, allowing it to color the way we look at the world and all of life.
The cross confronts us to answer the question—What’s the main thing in your life? What do you passionately love? What is truly “of
first importance” to you? It might be something perfectly honorable, perfectly legitimate; but if it’s something other than the Christ
dying on the Cross for your sins so that you may be intimately reunited with God—are you willing to repent to God and reorder your
life? Do you desire the kind of gladness that comes from being satisfied with all that God is for you in Jesus? If so, then God is at
work in your life. What should you do? Turn from the deceitful promises of sin. Call upon Jesus to save you from the guilt and
punishment and bondage of sin.
Paul writes, "All who call upon the name of the Lord will be saved" (Romans 10:13). Start banking your hope on all that God is for
you in Jesus. Break the power of sin's promises by faith in the superior satisfaction of Jesus Christ. Let me urge you to do whatever it
takes to make the gospel of Jesus Christ your passion. Ask God to change your heart so you can personally affirm for your own life
the words of Galatians 6:14, “Far be it from me to boast except in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ?”
Perhaps you have felt God calling you to surrender your life over to Him and receive Jesus Christ as your savior. A person accepts the
gospel by declaring to God that they are turning from their sin and trusting in Christ’s redemptive work on the Cross. This can be
done through prayer that can be done in this fashion:
“I now believe that Jesus Christ is Your only begotten Son, that He came to our earth in the flesh and died on the Cross to take away
all of my sins and the sins of this world. I believe that Jesus Christ then rose from the dead on the third day to give all of us eternal
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life. I now confess to You all of the wrong and sinful things that I have ever done in my life. I ask that You please forgive me of all of
my sins by the blood that You have personally shed for me on the Cross. I am now ready to accept You as my personal Lord and
Savior. I see I am more flawed and sinful than I ever dared believe, but that I am even more loved and accepted than I ever dared
hope. I turn from my old life of living for myself. I have nothing in my record to merit your approval or salvation, but I now rest only
in what Jesus did on the Cross and ask to be accepted into God’s family for his sake. Amen.”
If you prayed this pray, would you please let me know at pastorjameshilton@theJourneyOC.net. I want to encourage you, help you,
and pray for you.

Day 4 :: March 17 :: Read Luke 9:23-27

Making things crystal clear

These are hard words of confrontation, “For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save
it.” It sounds crazy. Why? Because we value our life more than anything else. But out of his love for us, Jesus is challenging us to see
that life is found in him alone and that he is the ultimate treasure. He will constantly confront areas of our life where we put
something or someone before him. It could be a cherished dream, a relationship, a position we want to hold, money, possessions, a
person—whatever we say that we must have to live or desire more than him. When God confronts us he speaks words of love and
rebuke and he makes himself crystal clear, “these things must be put away, they must die, so that you can live in me.”
A rich young man came to Jesus one day. He was, by all outward appearances, a very committed believer. The disciples probably
looked at him and thought, "Hey, here's a guy who is on the same page with Jesus." The man asked a good question: "Teacher, what
good thing must I do to get eternal life?" Jesus repeated some of the Ten Commandments and the young man responded, "All these
I have kept. What do I still lack?"
At that moment, Jesus saw an open door. He undoubtedly had seen it earlier in the conversation, but he waited until the man asked
for more. Jesus saw deep into this man's heart and he confronted him on his most prized possession—money. Jesus, out of great
love, confronted this man and pointed this out: "Go, sell your possessions and give them to the poor, and you will have treasure in
heaven. Then come, follow me." Matthew tells us: "When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great
wealth" (Matthew 19:22).
The main point Jesus was making was that if we genuinely want to follow Christ, we need to be ready for him to confront us with
those things that come between us and him, the thing or the person we cherish more than him. He knows that thing—that dream,
or that person will hinder our intimacy with Him and until we move it to its right place it will continue to kill us. Sure, we can go to all
the meetings and sing all the songs, but until this issue is taken care of and that area removed, it will destroy us and short out the
connection between us and God.
God loves us too much to not confront us, so he lays down the challenge to all those that want to follow Him. Listen to the hard
words of Jesus as he confronts us with the Cross, “If anyone would come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily
and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). When Christ went to the Cross, his aim was to call a great band of believers after Him. The reason for
this is not that Jesus must die again today, but that we must. When He bids us to take up our cross, He confronts us with our need to
come to Him and die.
Has Jesus said some hard words of confrontation to you already? How did you respond? If you didn't respond very well, you may
need to remember that he didn't come to entertain us or give us all our earthly wishes. He came to be our Lord. He's not an actor or
a comedian; he's our Savior. If you and I have responded to him by saying, "Jesus, I will follow you," then he has the responsibility to
show us those things that stand in our way, that must die.
Our "entertain me" culture has made us spiritually soft and emotionally mushy. We expect things to happen simply by pushing a
button or clicking a mouse. Dying to sin is hard, brutal work, and this culture has not prepared us for it. Still, it is essential if we
intend to walk with God. When God shows you that something besides him is occupying the center of your life, don't expect it to just
melt away. It won't. Don't expect it to step down graciously. It won't. Don't expect it to come out without a fight. It won't. Don’t
expect it to die easily—it won’t!
When God points to something in your life, and says, "My child, you love this more than you love me. I will help you tear it from your
heart, kill it, and put me there." You will find a dozen reasons to leave it right where it is. Your heart will plead for more time or
another chance. Be ruthless. Be brutal. This is war. Don't start to bargain. Grab the dragon by the throat and slay it with the Sword of
Truth (the Bible). Don't listen to it plead or scream. Be done with it. The devil does not go easy on us. If you try to get rid of the sin
gradually, it will find a way to hang on and you will be defeated. The quicker method is harsh and brutal, but it is the only effective
way to deal with sin. Our sin must die. Ask God to help you not get hung up on making excuses for your sin.
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When this day happens, remember these things:
 Fix your eyes on Jesus as he dies for that sin and gives you the grace and power to overcome it.
 This may be a difficult struggle, but it will lead to new experience of the presence and power of God.
 Focus on passages of scripture to encourage and direct you as you respond to God’s confrontation.
 Pray and ask God himself to help you with his Holy Spirit.
 Tell a godly friend to get some insight, encouragement, and accountability.
 Stay in the fight. These things don't die once and for all. They try to crawl back into your heart again and again.
Have you been confronted by God? If not, you're in trouble. If you have, it proves that God loves you. The question is will you turn
from whatever it is God is confronting you with and return back to God. Will you follow Christ on Calvary’s road to die so that you
might truly live?

Day 5 :: March 18 :: Read Matthew 13:44

A treasure worth finding

Everyone is searching for something that will satisfy his or her insatiable appetite for fulfillment, but yet it seems very few people
are finding it. Scan through some music stations on your FM dial and listen for the longing. U2 "still hasn't found what they're
looking for." Keane's "getting older" and "needs something to rely on." Linkin Park wants to "heal, wants to feel what it thought was
never real." We are all longing to arrive on the shores of contentment, to find what will ultimately satisfy us.
Perhaps this is why Jesus so often used the motifs of quests and treasures in his teaching. A woman loses a valuable coin and
rejoices when she finds it. A shepherd goes on an all out search, leaving the other sheep to secure “the one that got away.” And
could Jesus be any clearer when He says, “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered
up; then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field" (Matthew 13:44). The fact that Christ compares receiving Him
and his kingdom to discovering a treasure dramatically impacts how we understand the Christian faith.
Jesus' comparison of finding Him to finding a buried treasure won't allow a kind "play it safe" approach to life. Either by faith we
believe He is the treasure, or we keep looking for treasure in other places. Embracing the Jesus of Scripture is not a roll of the dice or
even a reasonable, educated guess. When we receive Christ as Savior we are making a declaration with our very lives that shouts,
"I've found it! Jesus is my treasure!" So when somebody becomes a Christian, the quest is over. The story of that person's life has
come to a happy ending, right? At the risk of sounding a bit political, we can only say yes—and no.
It is true—there is nothing better than Christ. He is the pearl of great price, and it would be worthwhile for us to sell off every other
possession if that's what is required to have Him. He is the answer to the psalmist's question, “Whom have I in heaven but you?”
(Psalm 73:25). The Christian knows that Jesus is not simply the last rest stop before reaching the anticipated destination. Jesus is the
destination. Even heaven, as wonderful a place as it must be, is merely window dressing when compared to the great inhabitant of
Heaven. Jesus did not say to the repentant thief on the Cross, "Today you will be in Paradise," but rather, "Today you will be with me
in Paradise" (Luke 23:4). So, we say yes. When we receive Christ as our treasure, we have found the very thing for which our souls
have most longed. But the Christian's heart is a funny thing.
We also say no, however, since the treasure hunt is an ongoing process as our hearts keep losing sight of what they know to be
supremely valuable. There are times when we allow other things to become more valuable and prized than Jesus, this is the essence
of sin. This is why the call to die is not just a one time action that we make, but a way of life that we must live. In dying to self there
is a battle to be fought, a battle that God can fight in and through us. The battle against our sinful desires is a fight for our lives, the
lives of others, and, most importantly, intimacy with God. This is why Jesus confronts us to kill the sin in our life. But why, even after
deciding to die to self, do we still battle with the desire to sin.
The reason is that we are still living with desires, emotions, and a heart that is sinfully broken. When Jesus confronts us to die, he
understands that we can not completely eliminate indwelling sin and the desires of sin in this life. It will be with us until the day we
die.
To die to a sin means to subdue it, to deprive it of its power, to break the habit pattern we have developed of continually giving in to
the temptation to that particular sin. The goal of dying to sin is to weaken the habits of sin so that we do make the right choices and
live as if Jesus is supremely more valuable, enjoyable, and glorious than anything else.

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Dying to sin involves dealing with all known sin in one's life. Without a purpose to obey all of God's Word, isolated attempts to
mortify a particular sin are of no avail. An attitude of universal obedience in every area of life is essential. As Paul wrote to the
Corinthians, "Let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit" (2 Corinthians 7:1). We cannot, for example,
kill impure hearts if we are unwilling to also put to death resentment. We cannot kill a fiery temper if we are not also seeking to put
to death the pride that so often underlies it. Hating one particular sin is not enough. We must hate all sin for what it really is: an
expression of rebellion against God by making something else more glorious than God.
To die to sin we must focus on its true nature, seeking something else as more valuable than God. So often we are troubled with a
persistent sin only because it disturbs our peace and makes us feel guilty. We need to focus on it as an act of rebellion against God
and his glory. Our rebellion is of course against the sovereign authority of God. But it is also rebellion against our heavenly Father
who loved us and sent his Son to die for us. God our Father is grieved by our sins. Genesis tells us that when "The LORD saw how
great man's wickedness on earth had become…The LORD was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and his heart was filled
with pain" (Genesis 6:5-6). Your sin and my sin are not only acts of rebellion; they are acts that grieve God. And yet, He sent his Son
to die for those very sins that fill his heart with pain.
We must see our sin for what it is and for what it stands for—a rebellion against God, a breaking of his law, a belittling of his
greatness, choosing something else as more valuable than Him, despising of his authority, a grieving of his heart. This is where dying
to sin actually begins, with a right attitude toward sin. It begins with the realization that sin is wrong, not because of what it does to
me, or my spouse, or child, or neighbor, but because it is an act of rebellion against the infinitely holy, majestic, precious, glorious
God who sent his Son to die for my sins. He is the treasure that we seek.
Think of an unusually persistent sin in your life—perhaps some secret desire that lies in your heart that only you know about. You
say you cannot overcome it. Why not? Is it because you value your secret desire above the will of God? If we are to succeed in
putting sin to death, we must realize that the sin we are dealing with is none other than a continual exalting of our desire over God's
known will and valuing something else as more valuable than Him.

Day 6 :: March 19 :: Read Hosea 6:1 -3

Following Jesus

This whole week we have looked at how the Cross confronts us to come and die as we follow Jesus Christ. God is ferocious about
upholding his glory in your life and will constantly confront you with areas that you have not kept watch over. Like me, maybe you've
experienced some parched days in your relationship with God. Maybe you've known the sadness of falling in exhaustion and
watching through weary eyes as your heart begins to shrivel and the darkness of sin invades your life. Maybe you've had seasons
where time with God was non-existent and weekend worship was dead—not because of what we sang or taught about, but because
your heart was in a dark place. I have some great news for you if this is you—Times of refreshing may come as you return to the
presence of the Lord (Acts 3:20).
You—yes, you—can have a fresh downpour of God's grace and mercy upon your life as you confront the Cross. You can gaze in
renewed wonder and awe upon the God who loves you. The heart that beats within your chest this moment can pulse with renewed
joy given by God in response to choices you make and actions you take. Listen to this amazing assurance given by the prophet
Hosea:
“Come, let us return to the LORD; for he has torn us, that he may heal us; he has struck us down, and he will bind us up. After two
days he will revive us; on the third day he will raise us up, that we may live before him. Let us know; let us press on to kn ow the
LORD; his going out is sure as the dawn; he will come to us as the showers, as the spring rains that water the earth (Hosea 6:1-3).
Notice the invitation, "Come." You don't have to be where you are. It's a tenderhearted pleading; you don't have to live the life that
you're living. You don't have to experience the sorrow and heartbreak that you're feeling. You can return to the Lord. You can leave
where you are and return. It's not too late. God is waiting now with open arms; return to Him!
The Hebrew term translated "return" is used more than a thousand times in the Old Testament. It is used more frequently than
almost any term describing what God desires for us. It is a picture of God confronting us where we are and calling us to come back to
Him. It’s turning off the current path we are on and go back to the One that died for us, that loves us, that promises us joy, pleasure,
and hope in his presence. The problems in your life and in my life began when we turned away from God, so let’s turn back; let’s
return.
Returning is a decision made at a particular point in time. The tender call of God is open if we will just listen. Let’s return by igniting a
fresh godly passion within us by deciding to follow God with our whole heart. Are you ready to make that choice right now? You can

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go through these 40 days of Passion and gain no benefit if you don't begin by turning to Him and following him on Calvary’s road.
What should you do?
First, think about your life. The call to return to the Lord begins by recognizing that some things have to go. The things that have to
go are the ones about which you can say—“This is wrong or harmful to me and those I love. This is taking away my passion for God
and I'm returning to the Lord.” You've got to see some things differently. You've got to let God shine his light on your activities inside
and out, so that what used to be attractive is recognized for the sin it really is. No more. I don't want that. You must look at your life
and see what needs to be removed because it's a barrier to the returning you really need.
Second, repent of these things. When you see what got you where you are, you don't want it anymore. You are ready for some total
honesty. You confess, “I'm wrong, God. I'm sorry for what I've done. You deserve better than this. I have no excuse for acting and
choosing as I have. I'm unworthy. I'm undeserving, but I'm returning.” Broken confession and repenting are so important that we are
going to spend a week on each of these, but know for now that there is no deep intimacy with God without returning and there is no
returning without confession and repentance.
Finally, actually take steps to return back to God. if you want to experience the deep intimacy with God, you have to come back to
the place where you were obeying God and centering your life on the Cross of Christ. This is not just an emotional response and a
change of your mind; it's also an exertion of your will to get moving again in the right direction. It is stating, “I'm leaving this sin
behind. I don't want this anymore. I don't want the opportunity to sin anymore. I'm not hanging around that temptation; I’m killing it
at the heart, I'm shutting it off and I'm moving away. I'm returning to the Lord. I want what God has for me. I want God!”
When Hosea says, “let us press on to know the Lord,” he is talking about a passionate pursuit of the Lord. The words “press on” calls
for our enthusiastic effort. Hosea is not casually saying, “let us know God.” He is crying out for urgency, “let us press on with every
fiber of our being, ounce of strength we can muster, so we may know the Lord.” It's like he stops midsentence and says, “let us
know…wait, we need more than everyday energy in the matter of knowing eternal God. Let us press on to know God. ”
The phrase “press on” is a military term that describes the way a victorious warrior conquered, and then vanquished his foe. It's
intentionality and intensity all rolled into one. I'm going after this myself. I am going to pursue it with the greatest passion that I have
and with all my effort. I'm not going to just sit back. I'm going after it! I'm going to pursue it! I'm going to put some intensity into
this!
Let us pursue the knowledge of the Lord. Let's give ourselves to this. It's intense. It takes effort. It takes energy. It takes enthusiasm.
So often as a pastor, I want to say to people, "If Jesus is who he says he is, then quit being so passive. Don't be so lazy and sluggish
about your faith. This is worth more than you're giving it. Get fired up about it." Pressing on to know the Lord means waking up and
giving that pursuit everything you have. God's invitation goes out to all of us to stop being lazy and give our relationship with Him all
that it deserves. Why, because next week we will soon discover that he is holy and glorious and worthy of our pursuit.
Actively and constantly pursuing God is difficult work, this is why we need the help of other Christ followers to engage in the struggle
with us. We need at least one other person of like heart to pray with us, encourage us, and if necessary, admonish us. This person
(or persons) must be someone who is also involved in the struggle to kill sin in his or her own life, so that he or she can enter into
our struggles and not be scandalized by the nature of our deepest sins. It is someone that you can share absolutely everything with
and someone who will help pick up the sword and battle sin with you. This is the type of friend we should pray for and seek out to
help us in our struggle to kill sin in our lives. Remember, however, it is a mutual effort. Each of us in a "one another" relationship
should be committed to both helping and receiving help.
This is why Life Groups are such an essential part of our church, these 40 days of passion, and to your success in killing sin in your
life. If you are not in a Life Group and vigorously being honest, open, and accountable with people in that group about your sin, you
will constantly struggle in sin.
When was the last time God confronted you over your sin and the direction of your life? When was the last time God brought you to
your knees with the weight of weeds growing unwanted and treacherous in the garden of your heart? When did you last have a
deep, heartfelt rekindling of love and passion for God's Word? When was the last time you really praised God because you saw the
wonder of the Cross? How recently has your heart been so tender that you wept over lost people in your family or your coworkers
who desperately need the Savior, and who are in danger of hell if they were to die today? If your honest answer is like most
believers I know, respond now to the invitation: Come, let us return to the LORD.

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 Week 2

Holiness
God calls all people to holiness. God has not called us to be like those around us. He has called us to be like Himself. Holiness is
nothing less than complete conformity to the character of God. But holiness is something that is often missed in our daily life. We're
not even exactly sure what holiness is, let alone how we are to live in holiness. This week we will be confronted with God’s holiness
and examine how his holiness brings us to the Cross. We will never stand in awe of God and deeply worship Jesus Christ until we are
confronted with the seriousness of our sin and God’s holy wrath against us. Before we can ever realize how much God loves us, we
must first see God’s holiness and our sinfulness.
Memory Verse: 1 Peter 1:15–16 As he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, since it is written, “You shall be
holy, for I am holy.”

Day 7 :: March 20 :: Read 1 Peter 1:15-16

The holiness of God

In order to intimately pursue the living God, you must have a right view of God and realize exactly what he is calling you to do. A. W.
Tozer rightly observed that what you think about God is the most important thing about you. It's true whether you realize it or not:
your entire life revolves around your view of God and directs how you live your life. All worship, love, and obedience flow from this
fountain—the God of the Bible is a holy God. A fresh encounter with God begins when you are confronted with God’s holiness and
God’s call for you to live in holiness.
What exactly is holiness? The Hebrew term for holiness is qōdesh, the Greek is hagios. Both mean "to be set apart." When we say
holiness, we mean God is not like us at all, not in any way. He's different. We would say "awesome" or "unbelievable" or
"unfathomable." That's holiness. God is more righteous and pure, more piercing and powerful, more strong and impenetrable than
anything we can imagine. We comprehend only a small part of all that God is.
We talk a lot about the love of God. We love to hear that God loves us, and rightly so, because God’s love is important. But we must
understand that God is also holy. If God were not holy, there would be no demand for his wrath to be poured out on his Son to
suffer and die in our place. Before we can ever realize how much God loves us, we must first be confronted with God’s holiness and
our sinfulness.
God’s law demanded, “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might”
(Deuteronomy 6:5). But we have all loved other things more than God. This is what sin is—dishonoring God by preferring other
things over him, and acting on those preferences. Therefore, the Bible says, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”
(Romans 3:23). We love for and glorify what we enjoy most. And it isn’t God.
The Creator of the universe is infinitely worthy of respect and admiration and loyalty. Therefore, failure to love and obey him is not
trivial—it is treason. It defames God and destroys human happiness.
Since God is holy, he does not sweep these crimes of sin under the rug of the universe. He feels a holy wrath against them. Our sins
deserve to be punished, and he has made this clear: “For the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). “The soul who sins shall die”
(Ezekiel 18:4).
There is a holy curse hanging over all sin. Not to punish would be unjust. The demeaning of God would be endorsed. A lie would
reign at the core of reality. Therefore, God says, “Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the
Law, and do them” (Galatians 3:10; Deuteronomy 27:26).
We have trouble thinking of God in this way. The reason is that we are very quick to dismiss our sin and make excuses for it. We
compare our life, both the good and the bad, against other people and always seem to be morally better than them. But God does
not give us that right. He is the standard of right and wrong. This is why God demands perfect holiness from every living being. He
says to us, “Be holy, because I am holy” (1 Peter 1:16).
Because God is holy he cannot possibly ignore or approve of any evil committed. He cannot for one moment relax his perfect
standard of holiness. The Prophet Habakkuk declared, “Your eyes God are too pure to approve evil, and you cannot look on
wickedness with favor” (Habakkuk 1:13). Because God is holy, He can never excuse or overlook any sin we commit, however small it
may be.
God does not allow us to rationalize our sins or making excuses. He will not tolerate, “Well, that’s just the way I am,” or even the
more hopeful statement, “Well, I’m still working on that area of my life.” No, God’s holiness does not make allowance for any sin, no

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matter how big or small we think it is. God hates every minor sinful flaw, every twisted thought, and every little evil desire that
comes from us.
Hate is such a strong word we dislike using it. We reprove our children for saying they hate someone. Yet when it comes to God’s
attitude toward sin, only a strong word such as hate conveys an adequate depth of meaning. Speaking of various sins in Israel, God
says, “I hate all these things” (Zechariah 8:17). Hatred is a legitimate emotion when it comes to sin. In fact, the more we are
confronted with God’s holiness, the more we will hate sin. David said, “Through your precepts I get understanding; therefore I hate
every false way." (Psalm 119:104)
We often say, “God hates the sin but loves the sinner.” This is true, but too often we quickly rush over the first half of this statement
to get to the second. We cannot escape the fact that God hates our sins. We may excuse our sins, but God hates them because he is
holy.
Therefore every time we sin, we are doing something God hates. He hates our lustful thoughts, our pride and jealousy, our outbursts
of anger, and our rationalization that our sin is no big deal. We need to be gripped by the fact that God hates all these things. We
become so accustomed to our sins, we sometimes lapse into a state of peaceful coexistence with them but God never ceases to hate
them.
In the deceitfulness of our hearts, we sometimes play with temptation by entertaining the thought that we can always confess and
later ask forgiveness. Such thinking is exceedingly dangerous. God’s judgment does not have a soft spot. He never overlooks our sin.
He never decides not to intervene, since the sin is only a small one. No, God hates sin intensely because he is holy and his holy wrath
will be poured out on every sin that you have ever committed. Stop for a moment and let this sink in—God hates sin with such
intensity because He is holy and His holy wrath will be poured out on every sin that you have ever committed. God’s wrath will
punish every sin you have committed, big or small.
It isn’t the love of God that confronts our sinful failures. God’s holiness confronts us about how we have rebelled against the purity
of God’s nature, have twisted his good gifts into loving them more than Him, and how we have fallen far short of his standards of
goodness and moral perfection. If we focus solely on God’s love, we might think that nothing we do matters to God at all. We run to
his love and dismiss ourselves from all responsibility and accountability for what we have done. If this is how we think, we have been
deceived.
Sin deceives us into imagining a god who just loves and loves, and not much else. But such a one-dimensional God is not the holy
God of the Bible. Love is coming, and it is coming with completely overwhelming glory and grace, full of joy and assurance. But first
we must get a glimpse of God’s holiness, his hatred of sin, and our utter unholiness. We will never stand in awe of being loved by
God and deeply worship Jesus Christ until we are confronted with the seriousness of our sin and God’s holy wrath against us.

Day 8 :: March 21 :: Read Romans 1:16 -17

The righteousness of God

With the emphasis on God’s love in the Christian culture, you’d immediately guess that Paul would begin his most famous letter, the
letter to the Romans, describing the greatness of God’s love for us. But he doesn’t. Before Paul could get to the love of God that was
revealed at the Cross, he must explain to us how the Cross displays the holiness of God.
With great astonishment, the Apostle Paul opens his letter to the Romans by stating that it wasn’t God’s love that was revealed in
Christ dying for us on the Cross, but God’s righteousness. What? That sounds so wrong. We expect Paul to say that the Gospel
revealed “the love of God.” But that isn’t what Paul wrote.
When we say that God is righteous, we are saying that He always does what is right and perfect. God’s righteousness is the natural
expression of his holiness. If God is infinitely pure, then He must oppose all sin. When we read that God is righteous, it is stating that
God will do what ever it takes to uphold His holiness. This means in God’s righteousness he will judge, condemn, and punish all sin
because he is holy. God does not just dislike sin, but in righteousness he rages against sin as a mighty torrent of fury. This is why the
scripture says, “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Hebrews 10:31).
The righteousness of God is not a fun thing to think about. It leads us to think about all of God’s rules that we’ve broken. It reminds
us of all the things we have done that God did not approve of, hated, and was unhappy about. It reveals that we are not right. It is
hard to think that God’s righteousness is at the center of the “Good News” or Gospel to us. But it is.
This is why Paul began the great book of Romans by telling us that the Gospel reveals God’s righteousness. His righteousness stands
against all sin and anyone that disobeys his holy law or insults God’s holy nature. Righteousness is a scale of measurement that
compares God’s holiness against our lives, our choices, our thoughts, and, chiefly, our sins. We hear so much about the love of God,

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one might imagine that God is just Love, Love, Love. But it is interesting that the only “triple” name for God in the Bible, is “Holy,
Holy, Holy” (in Isaiah 6).
As you read the rest of Romans you soon realize that the love of God flows from God’s righteousness. This shifts all emphasis we
have been giving to God’s love and it forces us to think about how the Gospel is a proclamation of God’s righteousness, as Romans
teaches.
Make no mistake here, Romans if filled with the love of God. There are some of the loftiest passages in the Bible regarding God’s
love (Romans 8 for example). But before we encounter God’s love we must be confronted with God’s holiness. This is why Romans
begins with the righteousness of God and his judgment against our sins. Then it, and only then, does it move to the Cross of Jesus.
And it is in the Cross that we learn of his love for us. “God demonstrates his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died
for the us” (Romans 5:8).
God could never “wink” at our sins—just forget them, overlook them or let them pass away without a word, or responding to them
in his wrath. God is God; and he is not like man at all. And because God is God, he knows about our sin, and so he must confront sin,
judge sin, and satisfy his justice concerning the sin in this world. The way that God has judged sin in the world is by the death of his
Son on the Cross.
Romans is supremely a book about the holiness of God and his righteous judgment on our sin in the Cross of his Son. All the benefits
that flow from the love of God come to us because the holiness of God has been satisfied by Christ on our behalf. God’s righteous
anger was poured out on Christ through his death, and then God declared us holy because of what Christ did for us.
God’s love is very precious, but it is even more valuable when we understand how we stood before a holy God, condemned for our
sin, and justly deserving his righteous judgment. That is where the Gospel begins. The holy wrath of God was satisfied with the
suffering and death of Jesus. The holy curse against sin was fully absorbed by Christ on the Cross. The obedience of Christ was
completed to the fullest measure. The price of forgiveness was totally paid. The righteousness of God was completely vindicated
because Jesus Christ bore punishment for our sin and rebellion.

Day 9 :: March 22 :: Read Exodus 15:11

There is no other God like You

“Nothing else like it.” That is a phrase that we use to describe a diamond, a very special collector automobile, an especially beautiful
home, or a fabulous boat in the Caribbean. The phrase tells us that there are many imitators, many attempts to present themselves
as the “one in a million” but if that claim is true, the one you are looking at is unlike anything else in the world. It is the only one.
This is why the bible says that God is holy. There is nothing to compare to the Lord. In Isaiah 40:25, God says, “To whom then will
you compare me, that I should be like him?” Who can you compare to God? He's holy. Our words amount to a heap of inadequate
comparisons and you can't come close to describing God—He is indescribable!
God is not like us. He is different in his nature and his character. Not only is God infinite in his knowledge, he is infinite in the realm
in which he dwells, Heaven. He is not bound by time. He is not limited by any measure of strength. God can do whatever he needs to
do, whenever he wants to do it. He is not limited by any shortage of knowledge or wisdom or power. He is never at a loss for words.
He was from the beginning; there was never a time in which he did not exist. He was before creation. He is morally perfect in every
way. There is no deficiency in his moral character. He has never sinned, nor is he capable of sinning, nor of causing any sin. His will is
always accomplished. He is perfect in his knowledge and power. He is never defeated by evil. God is not like us.
There is only one God. All the gods of the nations are just idols—man-made creations that are nothing. The fact that God is like no
one else brings us to a collision-point with God. We can’t escape him. We can’t hide from him. His knowledge of us is complete. God
is never fooled. He can hear your thoughts even though you didn’t speak a word. We can offer no defense before him and we can’t
deny any charge he brings against us, his justice is perfect.
This is terrifying because there is no appeal against the accusations that God brings to us. He is perfect in His hatred of sin and there
is no hiding that we have all sinned. In the end, every one will stand before the holiness of God and every mouth will be silenced by
the majesty of His throne of judgment. There is only one God and every single creature will give an account to Him.
We are on a collision-course in that someday we will meet the holy God of the universe. There were some signs along the roads in
the rural South many years ago; some of them are still there: “Prepare to Meet Thy God.” They just had five words, but they carried
a powerful message about the confrontation we will all have with God one day. There is no one like God and you will stand before
him one day.

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What should make us horrified of this is God’s holiness. If God just used sweet words and gave only hugs we wouldn’t have a
problem. But God is holy. You might be able to fool your friends and even yourself, but you cannot fool God, trick Him, or play games
with Him. You may have a way of getting out of jams, using your skill with words or your winsome ways to avoid conflict. But such
approaches are worthless before the holy God who made you. He knows perfectly the true condition of your soul, the evil thoughts
of your mind, and the callousness of your heart.
We must turn from our sin, and our selfishness. We must run from our "look at me; aren't I a good boy?" and all of our reputation
and self-consuming godlessness. You can not compare your life with the holiness of God. You must turn from these empty things and
embrace Christ by faith as the great treasure of your soul and your only hope for salvation. You must start going hard after the holy
God, by seeking to become holy.
Seeking the holiness of God begins by developing a holy dissatisfaction with your spiritual life. Stand in front of the mirror of the
Word, compare yourself to God’s holy standard, and recognize that you have not yet arrived. No matter how great you think you
are, no matter how many times you have attended church, or given money, or read the bible, you are still so far away from what
God demands of you. Admitting our spiritual imperfections and our moral failures is the starting point for the pursuit of God and
encountering his presence.
Let's pause and clarify this. Many people today would say, "This idea of comparing our lives to the holiness of God is utterly out of
touch with real people. People do not need a negative appeal to think more about their guilt. There already is an epidemic of guilt
and bad feelings about ourselves. Don't tell people that what they need is to develop more dissatisfaction about themselves, people
are already struggling with depression and guilt as it is."
But this is exactly what scripture calls us to do, approach the holiness of God with humbling guilt. I think our problem is not godly
sorrow and holy dissatisfaction, but I think 99% of our bad feelings about ourselves is rooted in pride. For example, suppose you go
to a dinner party and find out when you get there that you are dressed wrong; and then you spill your coffee; and then you don't
know which fork to pick up first; and then the joke you attempt falls flat; and when you are leaving, you call your hostess by the
wrong name. How do you feel about yourself when you get home? Rotten. You hate yourself. You're depressed. You don't want to
show your face. You feel like quitting your job. What's the use when you're such a klutz? Now I ask, where does all that low self-
image and guilt come from? Where do all these depressing, immobilizing, self-denouncing feelings spring from? Is the answer: God's
offended glory because he is holy or your offended pride? People who are depressed and immobilized and angry because their
behavior has injured the glory of God are very, very rare. Most people are depressed, angry, and guilt ridden because their behavior
has prevented them from having a reputation of being good, or cool, or feeling the success of moral victory.
Most of the time our attitude toward sin is more self-centered than God-centered. We are more concerned about our own “victory”
over sin than we are about the fact that our sins grieve the heart of a holy God. We cannot tolerate failure in our struggle with sin
chiefly because we are success-oriented, not because we know it is offensive to God. We never see sin clearly until we see it as
against the holiness of God. All sin is against God in this sense: it is His law that is broken, His authority that is despised, His
government that is rebelled against.
God wants us to walk in obedience—not victory. Obedience is oriented toward God; victory is oriented toward self. This may seem
to be merely splitting hairs over semantics, but there is a subtle, self-centered attitude at the root of many of our difficulties with sin
and the guilt we feel over sin. Until we face this attitude and deal with it we will not consistently walk in holiness.
This is not to say that God doesn’t want us to experience victory, but rather to emphasize that victory is a byproduct of obedience.
As we concentrate on living an obedient, holy life, we will certainly experience the joy of victory over sin, but we must always remind
ourselves that we have so much more to do. This is why we must be developing a holy dissatisfaction with our spiritual life and
current state of holiness.
I am asking for something that is rare in our day. I'm not asking you to feel worse about your inability to appear good, righteous, or
intelligent. I'm asking you to feel worse that you possess so little of Christ, that you think so highly of yourself, and that God’s
holiness hardly ever comes across your radar. I am asking you to honestly examine your life and ask “how I am doing compared to
God’s majestic holiness?” If we truly are going to return back to an intimate encounter with the living God, it begins by feeling bad
and guilty about the right things. Developing a holy dissatisfaction with your spiritual life allows you to see how far you have to go so
that you will pursue holiness with a greater passion.

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Day 10 :: March 23 :: Read Isaiah 40:25 -26
See the holiness of God

God has called every Christian to a holy life. There are no exceptions to this call. It is not a call only to pastors, missionaries, and a
few dedicated godly people. Every Christian of every nation, whether rich or poor, learned or unlearned, influential or totally
unknown, is called to be holy. The Christian plumber and the Christian banker, the unsung homemaker and the powerful heads of
state are all called to be holy.
This call to a holy life is based on the fact that God Himself is holy. Because God is holy, He requires that we be holy. Many Christians
have what we might call a “cultural holiness.” They adapt to the character and behavior pattern of Christians around them. As the
Christian culture around them is more or less holy, so these Christians are more or less holy. But God has not called us to be like
those around us. He has called us to be like Himself. Holiness is nothing less than complete conformity to the character of God.
As used in Scripture, holiness describes both the majesty of God and the purity and moral perfection of His nature. God’s moral code
is perfect and he cannot break it, and truthfully, it cannot be broken. God speaks truth, wisdom, prophetic vision, and he knows the
future. God is glorious and worthy of nothing but our adoration and worship. Nothing can be compared to God.
This is what makes sin so evil, at the core of our sinfulness is our desire to assume that someone or something else is more glorious
than God. Because of the fall that occurred in the Garden of Eden, we were born with the sinful desire to make ourselves god of our
lives. In Genesis 3, Adam and Eve listened to the lie that they could be like God because they craved what belongs to God alone. In
Genesis 11, man again sets out on a foolish plan to make a name for himself by building a tower with its top in the heavens. In
Romans 1 we learn that every human heart exchanges God's truth for a lie and we worship ourselves and creation rather than the
Creator.
Yes, in all of us is a self-centered bent to make myself more glorious than God. At the core of our being is the sinful desire to reduce
holiness so that there's seemingly no separation between us and God. When God is humanized and man is deified, holiness is lost.
Everything gets out of perspective. This is why it is essential that we must be confronted with the holiness of God so that God is
placed back in His rightful place.
When God is recognized as being above me, beyond me, highly exalted over me, and totally separate from me, I am preparing my
heart for deep intimacy with God. When I embrace God for who He is and I understand who I am—when I know God's place, I can
know my place—then things start to fall into place as we seek to know Him more. That's what God's holiness does for us—it puts
everything and everyone in their rightful place.
The more we know God, the more we understand that there is much, much more to be learned of him. The more we study God, the
more we recognize that what we know is amazing, but that we are only just beginning our quest to know him “as we are known.”
Our God is great, what can we compare to him?
The knowledge of God draws us not only to know about God, but to love him. Our service to God not only shows us more of the
nature of God and his wisdom and glory, but it shows us the power of God at work within us. God is at work humbling us, changing
us to be more like him, and submitting our wills more and more to his will. Our view of God changes us. The more we see the
greatness of God the more by faith we want to obey him and enjoy deeper fellowship with Him.
This is the point James is making in his hard-to-understand passage on faith and works (James 2:14–26). He is simply telling us that a
“faith” that does not result in works—in a passionate pursuit of a holy life, in other words—is not a living faith but a dead one, no
better than that which the demons possess. If we really love God and see him as the greatest treasure in the world, we will pursue
holiness because we want deeper intimacy with him.
This is why the pursuit of holiness in our life is required for fellowship with God. David asked the question, “LORD, who may dwell in
your sanctuary? Who may live on your holy hill?” (Psalm 15:1). That is to say, “Lord, who may live in fellowship with You?” The
answer given in the next four verses may be summarized as “he who leads a holy life.”
The psalmist said, “If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened” (Psalm 66:18). To regard wickedness is to
cherish some sin, to love it to the extent that I am not willing to part with it. I know it is there, yet I justify it in some way like the
child who says, “Well, he hit me first.” When we are holding on to some sin, we are not pursuing holiness and this will hurt our
intimacy with God.
God does not require a perfect, sinless life to have fellowship with Him, but He does require that we be serious about holiness. If we
love him and want deeper intimacy with him then we will grieve over the sin in our lives instead of justifying it. The more we see
God’s greatness and magnificence, the more earnestly we will pursue holiness as a way of life because the God we love is holy.

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Day 11 :: March 24 :: Read Hebrews 12:10
Sharing God’s h oliness

Throughout the bible we are told that God is holy and this holiness shouts separation. God is glorious and exalted, and we're not.
God is constantly reminding us that He alone is God and that we are not God. No matter how many times we read this, we need to
be reminded of this fact. We are not God. We can never compare to God—He is more powerful than us, wiser than us, greater than
us. He is holy!
The holiness of God is a view that we have lost in our modern day. Preferring the comfort of his love and nearness, we have lost the
reality of God's holiness. Our generation struggles and wallows in cheap grace and shallow holiness because we have departed from
the biblical picture of God's holy and exalted nature. God is not the "Man Upstairs" or "Big Daddy" or some old grandpa with a long
white beard. God is not whatever my conscience or imagination would like Him to be. God is inexpressible, indescribable glory, and
He dwells in unapproachable light. Scripture constantly warns us that no man can see God and live (Exodus 33:20). God is a
consuming fire (Hebrews 12:29). In a single word: Holy! God is infinite holiness.
It is a long journey from seeing the holiness of God to becoming a person who longs to become more like God in your own personal
holiness. The very quality in God that was so fearsome to you when you first heard of it becomes the most precious quality within
the divine Person. You love the holiness of God.
Leviticus 10:3 reads in part, “Among those who are near me I will be sanctified and before all the people I will be glorified.” When
God is sanctified, he is seen as holy by his people, and those who are near him make God holy by the manner in which they live their
lives. This means that those who become close to God, who are “near him,” are made holy. How could you not be changed when
you are near to God? How could seeing, knowing, understanding, and experiencing who God is and what he desires, how could that
not change you. But it is a change that is created through the love that you have for God.
God is not just making us holy, like puppets that obey the Law but don’t have a relationship with God. He is restoring us from the
dreadful Fall of Adam by restoring what was lost in our relationship with him. God is passionately bringing us back to a closer
intimacy with him. Through the cross, God is giving us the freedom to walk with him, to speak with him, to hear his voice. To be
restored to God is to experience the work of Christ on the Cross, to have his work of reconciliation bring us close to God. So close
that we can say with a certainty that we know God and that he knows us as intimate lovers. We are restored in holiness.
Our restoration puts us into a confrontation with our past. We are restored in holiness and so we break with our old way of living.
We no longer do what we used to do. We do not allow the enslaving power of sin to have its sway in our lives. We come to God with
pleas for deliverance, with cries for renewal and for new ways to walk with God as restored people that are pursing holiness.
When we begin to fall away from the holiness that God calls us, he discipline us. Scripture says, “The Lord disciplines those he loves,
and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son” (Hebrews 12:6). This statement presupposes our need of discipline, for God is not
impulsive in administering it. He disciplines us because we need discipline. He confronts us with his holiness and our unholiness
because he loves us. To persist in disobedience, living in sin, is to increase our necessity for discipline.
God’s discipline of sin in our lives is serious stuff. The reason is that when we indulge our sinful natures and dwell in unholiness, the
Spirit of God is grieved (Ephesians 4:30). These are not times when we fall into temptation and immediately seek God’s forgiveness
and cleansing, but when we are constantly and deliberately living in sin. God’s holiness will not allow him to tolerate continuous,
unrepentant sin in the lives of those that confess to love and follow Him.
Paul tells us that some of the Corinthian Christians persisted in disobedience to the point where God had to take their lives (1
Corinthians 11:30). David described the discipline of the Lord this way: “When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my
groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was sapped as in the heat of summer” (Psalm
32:3–4). When God speaks to us about some sin, we need to heed and take action. To fail to deal with that sin is to risk incurring His
hand of discipline.
Holiness is serious. The only safe evidence that we are in Christ is a holy life. John said everyone who has within him the hope of
eternal life purifies himself just as Christ is pure (1 John 3:3). Paul said, “Those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God”
(Romans 8:14). If we know nothing of holiness, we may flatter ourselves that we are Christians but we do not have the Holy Spirit
dwelling within us.
Everyone, then, who professes to be a Christian should ask himself, “Is there evidence of practical holiness in my life? Do I desire and
strive after holiness? Am I deliberately living in sin and not turning from it? Do I grieve over my lack of holiness and earnestly seek
the help of God to be holy?” It is not those who profess to know Christ who will enter heaven, but those whose lives are holy
because they profess Christ. Even those who do “great Christian works” will not enter heaven unless they do the will of God.

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Listen to these somber words of warning from Jesus, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven,
but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in
your name, and in your name drive out demons, and perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away
from me, you evildoers!’” (Matthew 7:21–23)

Day 12 :: March 25 :: Read Genesis 22:1 -19 and Romans 8:32

The Sacrifice

Genesis 22 tells the famous story of God asking Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. To many readers the story seems heartless and cruel that
God would give such a horrendous command. It just doesn’t make since. The reason is that we do not know the full story of the
bible. We can only understand God's command to Abraham to sacrifice Isaac by reading the rest of the story. The Bible repeatedly
states that, God is holy and because of the Israelites' sinfulness, the lives of their firstborn are automatically forfeit to God. God by
his grace allows the first born to be redeemed through regular sacrifice (Exodus 22:29, 34:20) or through service at the tabernacle
among the Levites (Numbers 3:40 41) or through a ransom payment to the tabernacle and priests (Numbers 3:46 48).
When God brought his holy judgment on Egypt for enslaving the Israelites, His ultimate punishment was taking the lives of their
firstborn. Their firstborn’s lives were forfeit, because of the sins of the families and the nation. Why? Because in ancient culture the
firstborn son was the family. So when God told the Israelites that the firstborn's life belonged to Him unless ransomed, He was
saying in the most vivid way possible in those cultures that every family and person on earth owed a debt and deserved punishment
because they had offended God’s holiness.
All this is crucial for interpreting God's directive to Abraham. If Abraham had heard a voice sounding like God's saying, "Get up and
kill Sarah," Abraham would probably never have done it. He would have rightly assumed that he was hallucinating, for God would
not ask him to do something that clearly contradicted everything He had ever said about justice and righteousness. But when God
stated that his only son's life was forfeit, that was not an irrational, contradictory statement to him. Notice, God was not asking him
to walk over into Isaac's tent and just murder him. He asked him to make him a burnt offering. He was calling in Abraham's debt that
he owed because he has sinned against the holiness of God. His son was going to die for the sins of the family.
Though the command was logical, that did not make it any less terrible. Abraham was faced with the ultimate question: "God is holy.
Our sin means that Isaac's life is forfeit. Yet God is also a God of grace and love. God has said he wants to bless the world through
Isaac. How can God be both holy and just and still graciously fulfill His promise of salvation?"
The masterful Hebrew narrative gives us some tantalizing hints. As Abraham prepared to walk up the mountains in obedience to
God's call he told his servants that "we will come back to you" (Genesis 22:5). It is unlikely he had any specific idea of what God
would do. But he did not go up the mountain saying, "I can do it," filled with willpower and self talk. Rather, he went up saying, "God
will make a way, God will do it ... but I don't know how." Do what? God would somehow remove the debt of sin on the firstborn and
still keep the promise of grace.
Abraham was not just exercising "blind faith." He was not saying, "This is crazy, this is murder, but I'm going to do it anyway."
Instead he was saying, "I know God is both holy and gracious. I don't know how He is going to be both—but I know He will." If
Abraham knew he had sinned against God and because of that sin he was in debt to a holy God. If Abraham did not believe this he
would have been too angry to go. But if he had not also believed that God was a God of grace, he would have been too crushed and
hopeless to go. He would have just lain down and died. It was only because he knew God was both holy and loving that he was able
to put one foot after another up that mountain and climbed the mountain. So with Isaac tied to the offering table and the knife in
Abraham’s hand swiftly about to come down, God lovingly intervened. Isaac was saved.
But why had Isaac not been sacrificed? The sins of Abraham and his family were still there. Abraham still had the debt of sin to pay.
How could a holy and just God overlook them? Well, a substitute was offered, a ram. But was it the ram's blood that took away the
debt of sin? No.
Many years later, in those same mountains, another firstborn son was stretched out on the wood to die. But there on Mount
Calvary, when the beloved Son of God cried, "My God, my God—why hast thou forsaken me?" there was no voice from heaven
announcing deliverance. Instead, God the Father paid the price in silence. Why? Because God’s holiness demanded that someone
pay the debt for our sins. The true substitute for Abraham's sin was God's only Son, Jesus, who died to bear our punishment. "For
Christ died for sin once for all, the just for the unjust, to bring us to God" (1 Peter 3:18). Paul understood the true meaning of Isaac's
story when he deliberately applied its language to Jesus: "He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all—how will He
not also, along with Him, freely give us all things?" (Romans 8:32)

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The Cross is where the debt of your sin was paid through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. It was on the Cross where Christ paid for your
sins, many of which you had no clue about. There his sacrifice and righteousness was accounted to your life. The result is that you
now can face your sin with new freedom, better confession, more joy, and great confidence as you approach God’s perfect nature
and glory. You come because you are forgiven. You come because your imperfections are covered with the perfections of Christ. You
come not because you are holy, but because you were living in darkness and now the light of the Gospel of Christ has shone into
your life. You are not worthy of it, you didn’t deserve the gift of life, and God did it for you without your permission, because you
never would have agreed to it.
Jesus alone makes sense of this story. The only way that the holy God can be both "just" (demanding payment of our debt of sin) and
"justifier" (providing salvation and grace) is because years later another Father went up another "mount" called Calvary with His
firstborn and offered Him there for our sins. There on the Cross the firstborn Son of God was killed to pay our debt. God’s holiness
collided with our sin on the Cross. Only if Jesus lived and died for us can you have a God of infinite love and holiness at once. It is at
the Cross that God’s holiness shines the brightest, and you can be absolutely sure He loves you.

Day 13 :: March 26 :: Read Hebrews 12:14

Only the holy can see God.

Scripture reveals that “without holiness no one will see the Lord” (Hebrews 12:14). But what does this mean? Does our salvation
depend to some degree on our attaining some level of holiness or measure of righteousness before we can see God? To answer this
question we must walk the Road of Calvary and see how the Cross confronts us with the holiness of God.
Have you ever been to a play? If you have, you'll know that a play is quite different from a movie. Plays are performed on stages with
live actors and actresses. Most often they tell a story through a series of "acts" that gradually unfold the plot of the story from
beginning to end. The plan of salvation in the Bible can also be understood as having a series of acts. Like a play that moves the story
forward through its series of Act 1, Act 2, and Act 3, the salvation story of the Bible moves the plan of salvation forward through
three acts.
In Act 1, Adam sins in the garden, eating the forbidden fruit, so that his sin is charged not only to him but also to all who have come
from Adam (Romans 5:12 19). Just like if you used your dad's credit card to buy something, charging the expense to him, so God
charges us with the sin of Adam. In so doing, this brings to Adam and to us both the stain and bondage of sin in our inner lives and
the guilt of sin before a holy God.
Act 2 involves God the Father taking all of that sin—both the sin we received from Adam and all of our own sin—and charging that
sin to Christ. When Jesus died on the Cross, he bore our sin and took the punishment that we deserved. Even though he was sinless
and innocent of any wrongdoing, yet for our salvation, God the Father put our sin on his Son and satisfied his own holy wrath against
our sin through his Son's death. As Paul states, "For our sake he [God the Father] made him [Christ] to be sin who knew no sin" (2
Corinthians 5:21a).
Act 3 is crucial to the story of salvation, and it involves God the Father now crediting us with the righteousness of his own Son when
we put our faith solely in Christ. To credit means to add something positive that increases the value from what was true before.
When you deposit money into a savings account, you credit the account by the amount of that deposit, making the account more
valuable than it was previously. God does this with sinners who turn to Christ in faith. At the moment that they trust Christ alone for
the forgiveness of all of their sins and the only hope they have of receiving eternal life, he credits them with the righteousness of his
own Son. The remainder of 2 Corinthians 5:21 makes this point. The whole verse reads, "For our sake he [God the Father] made him
[Christ] to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God." This means that God can declare you
holy because you have been credited with the complete righteousness of Christ.
These three acts in the plan of salvation are sometimes referred to as the three acts of imputation. To impute is either to charge
someone with something bad or to credit someone with something good. In Act 1, God imputes (charges) Adam's sin to us. In Act 2,
God imputes (charges) our sin to Christ. But in Act 3, God imputes (credits) Christ's righteousness to all those who believe. As you
can see, 2 Corinthians 5:21 speaks of the acts of imputation that happen both in Act 2 and in Act 3. God made Christ to be sin—
imputing (charging) our sin to his Son—so that we might become the righteousness of God through Christ—imputing (crediting)
Christ's righteousness to those who believe. Some have referred to this as "the great exchange." God imputes our sin to Christ, and
in exchange God imputes Christ's righteousness to those who believe. That's the greatest exchange that ever could be!
There's something else about Act 3 that we need to understand clearly. When God imputes (credits) the righteousness of Christ to
those who believe, those believers are seen by God as holy. That is, God views them as being in right standing or in good favor
before him. But here is something very important: the reason God sees them as holy is not because their inner lives have been

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cleaned up and they no longer sin. No; those who put their faith in Christ continue to have sinful inner lives—they continue to
struggle with not always thinking the right thoughts, having the right attitudes, saying the right words, or doing the right things.
But if they continue to have sin within them, how can God view them as holy and being in right standing before him? After all, even
after they've believed, they are still sinners. The answer is amazing, an answer that is at the heart of what the Christian faith is all
about. How can God view sinners as righteous, those that are unholy as holy? Answer: because they have been credited with the
righteousness of Christ, a righteousness that is not their own, a righteousness that is complete and perfect. Their standing before
God is now as sinners who have been forgiven of the guilt of their sin because Christ paid the penalty for their sin on the Cross. By
faith, then, those who have trusted in Christ are credited with Christ's righteousness, they are declared holy. When God looks at
them, he sees his Son's perfect righteousness, Christ’s holiness now as theirs, imputed to them by faith.
One of the most surprising statements in all of the Bible is found in Romans 4. Paul writes: "Now to the one who works, his wages
are not counted as a gift but as his due. And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is
counted as righteousness" (vv. Romans 4:4-5). Did you notice a surprising, even shocking statement? It's in verse 5, when Paul says
that God "justifies the ungodly." To justify is to declare that one is holy or in right standing with God. To justify is to make a legal
statement, as in a court of law, that someone is innocent of wrongdoing.
But notice here that the one whom God justifies—declares to be innocent, holy, and righteous—is an ungodly person! How can this
be? The answer hinges on the fact that the ungodly person has been declared righteous by faith. Look at Romans 4:5 again: "to the
one who does not work but trusts him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness." You see, if this ungodly man
tried to "work" for his righteousness, he could never receive what he worked to get. No amount of works, even all the good works in
the world, could make a sinner righteous and holy before God. But this verse says that the ungodly man "does not work" but instead
"believes in" the One who "justifies the ungodly," so that "his faith is counted [credited to him] as righteousness."
This is the answer to the dilemma of Hebrews 12:14. Without holiness no one will see the Lord, so God because of his grace, credits
sinners with the righteousness of Christ and declares them holy when they put their hope and trust in Christ alone. As sinners trust
in Christ's work, not their own work, God credits them with Christ's righteousness, not their own righteousness. God declares as holy
those who are still very unrighteous only because they have been given the righteousness of another—the perfect righteousness of
Christ. Justified by faith, not by works—this is the heart of what the story of God's salvation plan is all about. This is how unholy
people can approach and see the holy God, only because of the Cross of Jesus Christ.

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 Week 3

Brokenness
We often think that when something's broken we can't use it anymore. That's not how God looks at us. In fact, He won't use us until
we are broken. Every great movement of God and fresh encounter with God in your life will always be preceded by a time of
brokenness. It is a season of humility, a time of tearing down walls, of getting honest with God and others about your true spiritual
condition. It may be hard. It will hurt. But in the end, God will confront you with the Cross so that in your brokenness you will return
to God, rekindle your spiritual passion, reconcile your relationships, and repair your life. A richer, deeper, more God-filled life is
waiting for you. And it all begins with brokenness.
Memory Verse: James 4:8-10, “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your
hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom.
Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.

Day 14 :: March 27 :: Read Romans 1:18–22

The truth, the whole truth

Not many people love going to the doctor. The only reason we go is because we know something is wrong, so we take action to find
a cure. We want a doctor to examine us and reveal to us the problem. What good would it do if the doctor saw a big, dark spot on
our x-ray and sent us home, telling us that everything was fine? "Oh, I wanted to tell them the truth, but I knew it would ruin their
day to know they have cancer," the doctor might rationalize.
What every doctor knows is that the most loving and wisest thing to do for any patient is to confront them with their sickness, no
matter how difficult or life threatening it might be. A correct diagnosis is a relief no matter how serious the prognosis because you
finally know what needs to be done. Last week we were confronted with the holiness of God and got a fresh view of how holy God
is. Have you ever seen that view of God before? Maybe it was the first time you realized how far above and beyond us in every
conceivable way God actually is. Completely different from us. He is Holy!
Understanding holiness and how incredibly high God has set the standard for human behavior reveals to us our deep problem. What
is our problem? From Genesis through Revelation we are given a sobering analysis. Yet one of the most concise diagnoses is found in
Paul's letter to the church at Rome. After a brief introduction of himself and his travel plans, Paul tells the young church at Rome
why the Cross of Jesus Christ is such a precious thing and how the Cross confronts our very desperate condition. Paul does not hold
back his words when he makes his candid observation about our problem. Read the words of Paul again in Romans 1:18–22.
Paul is not talking about a certain segment of people, but the entire human race. Paul tells it like it is. We are in trouble because we
are ungodly, unrighteous, futile in our thinking, fools, and under that wrath of a Holy and just God. There is no dodging this hard
analysis—we are all guilty. On every page, in every chapter of Scripture, this unconquerable human condition is described in horrific
detail. We have all failed to conform to God's holy standard and sought other things as more glorious, beautiful, and desirable than
God both in our actions and attitude.
This depravity strikes to the very core of our being. David wrote in Psalm 51:5, “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did
my mother conceive me.” Even from the womb we are born with a desire to rebel against God. As harsh as it sounds, this makes
every single person born on our planet an enemy of God and totally deserving of his wrath. We do not have to do anything to
become God's enemies; we are born that way (see Romans 5:10; Colossians 1:21; James 4:4). The New Testament refers to those
without Christ as children of wrath (Ephesians 2:3; see also John 3:36). Every person born into this world is born with an inclination
to sin and rebel against God. The depravity of our sin is deep. This means that there is absolutely nothing virtuous or godly about us.
What we deserve from God is not his blessings, but his wrath.
We are horribly ravaged by sin. There's no way any of us could compare ourselves to God's holy stature. Let this sink in for a
moment. I am not talking about someone else—I am talking about you. You deserve the wrath of God for every single horrible act of
treason and rebellion you have committed. You are not a good little angel, no matter what your grandmother told you. God’s
holiness and justice stands forever against the sin you have committed in utter severity.
Though you may think with vague and feeble hope that God is “too kind and loving” to punish the ungodly, you are wrong. This type
of thinking hushes the fears of thousands of people and allows them to practice all forms of sin, while death draws everyday nearer,
the wrath of God is growing, and the command to repent is rejected. As responsible moral beings, we dare not mess around with
our eternal future and God’s holiness.

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“Wait a minute," you say. "I'm a Christian! Jesus paid the debt for my sin and forgave me by dying on the Cross." Yes, He did that in
an extra-ordinary and absolutely gracious answer to our sin problem. Jesus Christ was broken for you. If you placed your faith in
Him, he absorbed that wrath for you, standing as your substitute. Through faith in Him and what He did for you on the Cross your
salvation is secure. That's the eternal picture, but don't make the mistake so many Christians do by confusing God’s work on the
Cross with your work on the Cross.
The work the Lord does in our lives in giving us salvation is just the beginning; the majority of the work remains—the work of the
Cross. Through the Cross, God is continually confronting us with our need to die to sin. God hates sin in your life and will do
whatever is necessary to destroy it. He will not stop working, no matter the price, to transform you into the image of Christ. He is
working to destroy everything that is unholy in you, so that you will be holy as he is holy. This is the path of brokenness.
If we don’t see the horror of sin and God’s holy intensity against sin, we’ll never be able to rightly comprehend or understand why it
needs to die in our lives and why he is breaking us. It is in this confrontation of God’s holy intensity against sin and the indwelling sin
that still lives in our heart that he breaks us.
Brokenness does not come easily. No person arrives "fully formed" as a mature Christian and automatically holy. Growth is a
process—one that includes setbacks, failures, hard lessons, and yes, brokenness. Old habits are not easily changed. Sinful desires
cling to us in spite of our efforts to remove them from our hearts and minds. In many areas, we do not see our own dark side. We
may think we have repented of every sin, only to have God reveal to us yet another area of our life that needs to be subjected to his
forgiving love, tender breaking, then changed, healed, and renewed by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Again and again, we find ourselves being broken in order that our old sinful desires might be torn away. Brokenness is not a one-
time experience or a crisis in my life where everything falls apart. Brokenness is a continuous on-going life lived on the basis of a
decision to surrender everything to God and deal honestly with my personal sin. The process is painful and difficult. And it is
wonderfully good because the reward for brokenness is deeper intimacy with God.
I remember one time coming across a quote from A.W. Tozer that has always stuck with me. It is a quote that I do not like to hear,
but one that I constantly need to hear. Tozer said: “It is doubtful whether God can bless a man greatly until He has hurt him deeply.”
In the measure in which we can be broken, in the same measure we shall experience the life and joy of God. When we have
embraced the work of the Cross in breaking us, our lives will experience a fresh encounter with God and reflect the beauty of our
Savior. The measure in which we will allow the Cross to operate in our lives, to bring death to our own selfish ambitions, our ways,
our rights, our reputation, our interests, in the same measure only will Christ manifest his life through us. Utter brokenness in God’s
holy presence is a prerequisite to any mighty moving of God in your life.

Day 15 :: March 28 :: Read Isaiah 57:15 and 66:2

The heart that God loves

What kind of heart does God really love? What kind of heart does God allow to experience a fresh encounter of his presence? As
you read scripture the answer becomes pretty obvious: "For thus says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity,
whose name is Holy: “I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of
the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite. " (Isaiah 57:15)
Then we hear the words of Jesus. "Blessed (to be envied, happy) are those who are poor in spirit (those who are morally bankrupt,
those who are spiritually poverty stricken) for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. And blessed, are those who mourn (those who mourn
over their sin, those who grieve over that which grieves the heart of God), they will experience the comfort that only God can give”
(Matthew 5:3-4). The heart that God restores and revives is the broken heart. The place where God dwells most intimately is the
broken heart. We tend to think of a fresh encounter with God as primarily a time of joy, abundance, excitement, and enthusiasm.
And so at the right time, it will be. But the way that God prepares the heart for this fresh encounter with Him is through brokenness.
You see, we will never really encounter the presence of God until we have first experienced Him in brokenness.
The epistle of James gives us the great promise of intimacy with God, “Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you." But it also
reveals that for intimacy to happen we must seek brokenness, "Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double
minded. Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to heaviness." (James 4:8-9)
What we find throughout scripture is that brokenness is not a feeling or even an emotion. Brokenness is a choice that we must make
if we desire deeper intimacy with God. It is an act of my will as God reveals my sinfulness and molds me into what he wants me to
be. God will do the breaking, but we must choose to walk the road of brokenness. What then does it look like to embrace
brokenness before God?

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The first step begins with deep humility. Humility is candidly assessing ourselves in light of God’s holiness and our sinfulness.
Someone who is broken has a very clear picture of how their sins separate them from God and grieves the very heart of God. In
Psalm 51, David cries out with humility and brokenness because he is overwhelmed by his sin. He cries to God, “Please don’t take
your spirit away from me!” (Psalm 51:11) Here is a man desperately seeking God’s presence and fully aware of his failure. David is
aware that his sin has crushed the very heart of God, the God that has shown him nothing but mercy, kindness, and love.
True humility is realizing our great need for God. It is knowing that life evolves around Him and not us. True humility is a heart that
wants to continually please God first and foremost above our own needs and wants. This humility comes when we are willing to strip
away our self-reliance and pride. It is when we have no confidence in our own righteousness or justify our sin by comparing
ourselves to other. We cast ourselves in total dependence upon the grace of God working in and through us. We pray God break me
so that I may love you more. Do you want to be broken by God? Do you realize how your sin hurts the very heart of the God that
loves you?
This humility leads to complete honesty about our sin. When we sin we love to make excuses, covering our failures up through lies
and hypocrisy, blaming others. But as God breaks us he reveals our need to stop hiding and face the ugly reality of our sin. It is in
that moment that we choose to come clean, to stop blaming others and take full responsibility for what we have done. Brokenness
happens as we honestly agree with God about the true condition of our sinful heart and the sin that is still in our life. Are you still
hiding your sin? Are you ready to deal with it as God convicts you?
Through honesty we now confess our sin to God. Confession is more than just admitting you feel bad, shameful over your sin, or
worried that you will get caught. It is confessing that you have sinned against God. It is crying out to Him that you are wrong and
want God to restore your intimacy with Him. It is also more than an admission of guilt but is a process of soul-searching to see where
sin has taken root in our lives. Brokenness comes when we obediently respond to the conviction of God by confessing our failures.
Why did you sin? What were you looking to satisfy your heart and life more than God? Are you willing to confess your sins to God?
Confession leads to complete surrender to God. Brokenness is the shattering of my self-will—the absolute surrender of my will to
the will of God. It is saying “Yes, Lord!”—no resistance, no hiding, no stubbornness—simply submitting myself to his direction and
will in my life. It is a willingness to take whatever steps God is leading us to take in order to destroy the sin that is in us.
Contrite is one word that is used in the Old Testament to speak of brokenness. That word suggests something that is crushed into
small particles or ground into powder, as a rock is pulverized. What is it that God wants to pulverize in us? It is not our spirit He
wants to break, nor is it our essential personhood. He wants to break our self-will, our desire to live without him.
God is in the process of changing what we desire, far more than he is in the process of giving us what we desire. God is more
concerned about you being holy and completely committed to Him than he is about you being happy, financially secure, good
looking, in a great relationship, or even healthy. God is refining us, fashioning us, and making us into people that are holy. The
reason is because God knows what will fully satisfy you and give you ultimate joy, pleasure, and security—Him.
God didn't create us to give us our every whim and wish, but rather, to bring us to the position where we will want to do whatever
God desires. He created us for himself. If I asked you, "Do you really want God's best for your life?" I feel confident that you would
say, "Yes, of course!" If I asked you, "Are you willing for God to do anything necessary to bring you to total surrender so that he is
free to accomplish all that he wants to do for you and all he wants to make out of you?" I wonder what your response might be. Are
you willing to surrender everything over to God? If not go back to step one and begin to seek humility.
As God moves you through the process of brokenness, he will always lead you into the need to have accountability in your life. Sin
demands that we live isolated from others in order to hide our ugly truth and habit, so we withdraw from any form of accountability.
The more isolated we are, the more destructive will be the power of sin over us, and the more deeply we will become involved in
our sin. This is why those that are broken “confess their sins one to another” (James 5:16). Brokenness requires that we not confess
in generals, but we deal with concrete sins.
People who are unwilling to be broken are deeply concerned with being respectable and admired. They're concerned with what
others think and they're working to protect their own image and moral reputation. But broken people are concerned with being real,
transparent, and vulnerable because what they care about and what matters to them is not what others think, but deeper intimacy
with God. Through accountability they fight against the sinful instinct to cover up their sin. They're willing to die to their own
reputation in order to find healing through accountability. They are willing to be transparent in order to find victory through
confessing their sins to others that will help them fight for holiness. Are you being honest and transparent with people about your
sin? Are you confessing your sin to a group of people that are helping you grow in holiness? Are you being specific about your sin
when you confess?

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Day 16 :: March 29 :: Read Isaiah 6:1 -6
Your sin, my sin, our sin

Even though you have been forgiven and saved be the work of Jesus Christ on the Cross, there remains in you a definite bent
towards doing things your own way that must be broken. God wants sin out of your life because He is at war to destroy all sin and
it's the only thing that keeps you from experiencing the fullness of his presence in your life. If we don't see the horror of sin and
God's holy intensity and discipline against sin, we'll never be able to rightly comprehend or understand why brokenness needs to
happen in our life.
One of the ways that we avoid brokenness is that we begin to think that we are not as bad as Scripture says we are. Scripture tells us
that our hearts are deceitfully wicked above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it (Jeremiah 17:9). It is this capacity
to deceive ourselves that leads us to believe we are holier than we really are. Our sinful hearts trick us into thinking that everyone
else has problems, but not me. This is a lie—your sin is the problem.
The problem in your life is not the sin of your mom, dad, husband, wife or anyone else in your family—no matter what sin they have
done. The problem in your life is not the sins of your neighbor, friend, boss, coworker, or anyone else you know. The problem is your
sin. It's your sin that hinders you from experiencing deep intimacy with God.
Sin is the answer ever time we shout, “Why don't I feel close to God the way I used to? What happened to my passion for God?" Sin
is what's in the way. For the most part, we are good at seeing sin in our culture and in the lives of others, but we fail miserably at
seeing sin in our own lives.
It reminds of the story of Isaiah. As you read the fifth chapter of Isaiah, you see Isaiah, this great servant of God, pronouncing woes
to all sorts of sins—woe to them who are materialistic, woe to them who are proud, woe to them that are sensual, woe to the
hedonistic pleasure seekers, woe to the immoral. Isaiah had this list down. He was an upright guy and compared to almost everyone
else in Israel, he was pretty holy. Then one day God broke through, revealed his holiness to Isaiah, and broke the pious prophet.
God reveals himself to Isaiah and Isaiah sees the Lord, high and lifted up; "Holy, holy, holy." And no longer is Isaiah seeing himself in
the light of all the sinful, wicked people around him; but now he sees himself compared to the holiness of God. Now he no longer
cries woe to them, but the first words out of his mouth, as he sees the holiness of God are, "Woe to me, woe to me." All the other
times Isaiah was pronouncing guilt and God’s judgment on other people’s sins. Now he is pronouncing guilt and God’s judgment on
his own sin. Why—because now God is breaking Isaiah and his sins are exposed in the light of the presence of God. At that moment,
Isaiah recognized his true condition. He was ruined. And in that sense, God wants to ruin our already dead lives in order to resurrect
in us real life.
If and when, like Isaiah, we get the slightest clue what God is really like, we quickly realize that we fall short—way short. God’s
majesty and holiness swamp our petty selfishness and religious comparisons, and in that moment our pride and religious merit is
shattered. We are ruined, broken, helpless, and hopeless—unless God himself touches us. We can't be broken until we realize how
holy God is and how intense he hates sin. Once we catch a glimpse of this we become aware—painfully aware—of how bad we are.
That realization always brings us face to face with change.
In the presence of God’s holiness and greatness all our self centered plans and goals will be ruined. Relationships, how we spend
time and money, laziness and discipline, how we love, and who we love and obey … everything will be turned upside down. Our lives
will then be driven by conviction, not just convenience. God doesn't design this experience to merely crush you, but to break you so
that he can cleanse you and fill you with himself. As he crushes the old life, he replaces it with new, true life in Him. No one can
make us have this kind of vision of God. God himself must reveal himself to us. We can prepare our hearts and put ourselves in a
position to be receptive to God's voice, but ultimately, the Lord himself must break through our calloused hearts to show us what he
is like. Then it is our responsibility to respond to the brokenness of God and deal honestly with our sin. This is why one of the
greatest prayers you can pray is “God break me!”
It is in times of brokenness that we are more open to God, and God uses these openings to speak to our hearts. When you and I feel
insecure, suffer, or are hurting we are more open to God speaking to our hearts. Stability often produces passivity: the same old
same old. But upheaval—a move, graduation, a job change, a broken relationship, sickness, emotional despair, a deep
disappointment—breaks our hearts, reveals our needs, and somehow opens us to listen to God.
God revealed himself to Isaiah. As he got a glimpse of a holy, holy, holy God, Isaiah got a glimpse of his own depravity (unholy,
unholy, unholy...). The prophet said, "I'm ruined! I'm not what I should be!" He had nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, no way to fix
his problem. He had to be honest about his sin. There is no brokenness as long as the finger of blame is still pointed at another and
you justify your sin.

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Are you willing to be honest about your sin? Are you willing for God to break you so that you can experience more of his grace and
joy in your life? The Psalmist wrote, “The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit” (Psalm
34:18). Notice the promise that God gives to those that choose brokenness—“the Lord is close.” The opposite if this is true as well.
For those that do not embrace brokenness—the Lord will seem far away. The way to have God near to you is to be humble and
broken over the sin in your life. As long as we are stubborn and hard and unbending to God’s confrontations, He will be far from us.
But the kinds of people God will never despise or walk away from are the individuals who live with a broken spirit and a contrite
heart. “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart—these, O God, You will not despise” (Psalm 51:17).
Pray today that God will break you.

Day 17 :: March 30 :: Read Romans 2:5

How brokenness reveals our hearts

There are wonderful illustrations in the Scripture of broken people. Many times those illustrations are set in contrast to the lives of
those who were not broken. Think, for example, of two Old Testament kings who sat on the same throne. One committed horrible,
scandalous sins against the heart of God. He committed adultery. He lied. He committed murder to cover up his sin, and then lived
for an extended period of time in rebellion trying to cover up his treacherous, two-timing sin against God and against his nation. Yet
in the Scripture we are told that Kind David was a man after God's own heart.
Now think of the king who came before David. Saul began as a humble leader, but over the years, little by little, he began to harden
his heart. He refused to be broken of his own ways and began to rebel against God. Saul’s sin, by comparison, does not seem
anywhere near as horrendous as that of King David. All that it seems Saul was guilty of was incomplete obedience. And yet in
response to his sin, Saul lost his kingdom, his family was destroyed, and he was killed.
Why the difference? Both men were confronted by prophets over their sin. And both men said verbally, "I have sinned." But you see
when King Saul confessed his sin, his confession was in the context of blaming the people, defending himself, making excuses,
rationalizing, justifying himself. In this moment of God trying to break Saul, Saul revealed the true condition of his heart. In the same
breath he said "I have sinned," and then quickly, added “but it was not all my fault and please don't tell the people." He rationalized
his sin, he justified his sin, and he covered up his sin.
Whereas King David, when confronted with his sin, he fell on his face before God in confession, and the evidence of that broken and
contrite heart was that he penned for the entire world to see those psalms of confession and repentance that we read in Scriptures
today. Broken people stop trying to cover their sin up, they stop making excuses, rationalizing, and shifting the blame. They confess
their sin and are open about it. God was not as concerned about the nature of the sin itself as He was about the heart attitude and
response of these men when confronted with their sin. David responded with brokenness which resulted in experiencing a
refreshing of God’s presence and the blessings of God. Saul responded with unbrokenness which resulted in experiencing deeper
depression and the discipline of God.
In each of these comparisons both kings had sinned. God was breaking both David and Saul by confronting them with their sin. The
only difference between the two was in their response to God’s confrontation. God is just as much offended, by the arched-back,
stiff-neck, haughty eyes, excuse driven spirit as he is by the sodomite, the prostitute, the adulterer, or the murderer.
Saul paid a great price because of his unbrokenness. Scripture also points out how Saul’s unwillingness to be broken did not just
affect him, but also the people he led, loved and lived with. The same thing happens in our lives when we refuse to humble
ourselves. Not only does our resistance prolong the process and delay the good work the Lord is trying to bring about in our lives,
but it also affects those around us. Oftentimes when we resist the work of God, our family and loved ones suffer. Our relationships
and our jobs suffer because we become difficult people, hard to get along with and living with internal tension that soon manifests
itself in our external lives.
Unbrokenness is a fearful thing. Why? It is fearful because any one of us has the ability to harden our hearts in the same manner as
King Saul and by this set ourselves up for the discipline of God. But something else is even more fearful. Our unbrokenness and
willful disobedience against God may reveal that we never really trusted him as our Savior and Lord in the first place.
If we continue in life failing to make the goodness and glory of God the center of our lives, never turning to God in brokenness, and
being honest about our sin, this is a sign that the wrath of God is upon us. Paul tells us in Romans 2:5, “Because of your
stubbornness and unrepentant heart you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous
judgment of God." In Romans 2:8, "[Those who] do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, [will receive] wrath and fury."
When we hear words like this—that we are all "under sin" and that sinners will receive the "wrath and fury" of God—we need be
still and let that sink in.

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These are terrible words. When the all powerful God has wrath and fury, no greater negative force can be conceived. We speak of
the fury of a hurricane that flattens buildings or the fury of a tornado that snaps off trees like toothpicks. But these forces are as
nothing compared to the power and fury of the wrath of God.
In Revelation 14:10-11, John fumbles for language to describe the length and depth of hell. He says that sinners “will drink of the
wine of the wrath of God, which is mixed in full strength in the cup of his anger; and he will be tormented with fire and brimstone in
the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever; they
have no rest day and night.” There is nothing more fearful in reality or in imagination than the prospect of everlasting, never-ending,
omnipotent, unimpeachably just and righteous divine wrath and fury. This is the consequence of your sin.
Are you unwillingly to allow God to break you? Are you unwilling to die to your sin and follow God in every area of your life? If you
are not willing to yield to God’s confrontation of your sin and turn from it, then this should be a wake-up call that you need to
examine whether or not you really have trusted in the gospel. You may have prayed a prayer when you were younger, been baptized
as a child, and have a perfect attendance record at church, but have you turned from your sin and desired to follow God totally in
your life. The consequences of your sin are too great to be toyed with, and God’s holy intense wrath towards sin is not a joke.
For true believers, we must get a greater view of God’s holy wrath and discipline towards sin. This must becomes clear in our heads
and powerfully felt in our emotions, or the love of God will be reduced to sentimentalism or to mere assistance for our self-help
improvement plans. To us, the cross of Christ will not be the infinitely precious, tremblingly embraced treasure that it really is. Have
you seen the beauty of the Cross of Jesus Christ because there God’s wrath is absorbed for your sin?

Day 18 :: March 31 :: Read Job 42:1-6

Evidence of brokenness

Are you a broken person? You say, "How do I know? Well, we need to come to see God as He really is. The closer we get to God, the
more we will see our own needs. I think of Job, a righteous man, enduring intense suffering as part of that cosmic plan of God and
the warfare between Heaven and hell; just a bit player in a sense. But under the philosophies and input of his friends, Job began to
reveal a heart of self-righteousness. He spent many chapters defending himself, protesting his innocence, and building up his
righteousness to prove that the breaking God was allowing to happen was unfair.
Job talked on and on and on until finally God said, “I'd like to speak.” And for chapters, God began to reveal himself and his ways to
Job. And when God finished, Job could hardly breathe. He said, "Oh God, I have heard of You with the hearing of my ear, but now my
eye has seen You, and now I abhor myself, and I repent in dust and ashes" (Job 42:5-6). No more self-righteous, rather a broken man
pleading with God for mercy.
What are some of the characteristics, the evidences of the person that no longer just hears about God’s holiness, but who has
encountered God’s holiness and is now broken? Let me just share with you some differences from a person that is living an
unbroken life and a broken life before God.
Unbroken people focus on the failures of others, but broken people are overwhelmed with a sense of their own spiritual need.
Unbroken people are self-righteous. They have a critical, fault-finding spirit. They look at everyone else's faults with a microscope
but never really examine their own faults. They love to look down on others. But broken people are compassionate. They can forgive
much because they know how much they have been forgiven. They think the best of others, and they esteem all others better than
themselves.
Unbroken people have to prove that they are right, but broken people are willing to yield the right to be right. Unbroken people
desire for self-advancement, but broken people desire to promote others. Unbroken people have a drive to be recognized, to be
appreciated. They're wounded when others are promoted and they are overlooked. Broken people have a sense of their own
unworthiness. They're thrilled that God would use them at all in any service. They're eager for others to get the credit, and they
rejoice when others are lifted up.
Unbroken people feel confident in how much they know, but broken people are humbled by how very much they have to learn.
Unbroken people are self-conscious, but broken people are not concerned with self at all. Unbroken people are quick to blame
others, but broken people accept personal responsibility and can see where they were wrong in the situation.
Unbroken people are defensive when criticized, but broken people receive criticism with a humble, open spirit. Unbroken people are
concerned with being respectable and seeking the approval of others. They're concerned with what others think, and they're
working to protect their own image and reputation. But broken people are concerned with being real. What they care about and
what matters to them is not what others think but what God knows, and they're willing to die to their own reputation. They are
secure in God’s love for them so they are free from being addicted to people’s acceptance and approval.
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Unbroken people find it very difficult to share their spiritual needs with others, but broken people are willing to be open and
transparent, vulnerable, and honest with others as God directs. Unbroken people, when they have sinned, want to be sure that no
one finds out. Their instinct is to cover up, but broken people once they've been broken they don't care who knows or who finds out.
They are willing to be exposed because they have nothing to lose—God has forgiven them.
Unbroken people have a hard time saying, "I was wrong. Will you please forgive me?" But broken people are quick to admit their
failure and to seek forgiveness when necessary. When confessing their sin, proud people tend to deal in generalities or how others
helped them sin, but broken people are able to deal under the conviction of God's Spirit to acknowledge specifics and take full
responsibility for it.
Unbroken people are concerned about the consequences of their sin, but broken people are grieved over the cause, the root of their
sin. Unbroken people are remorseful over their sin, sorry that they got found out or caught. But broken people are truly, genuinely
repentant over their sin, because it has grieved the God that they so dearly love. Unbroken people are sorry over the pain that their
sin brings them and to those around them. Broken people are heartbroken over how their sin was an open act of rebellion against
the infinitely holy and majestic God.
When there's a misunderstanding or conflict in relationships, proud people wait for the other to come and ask forgiveness, but
broken people take the initiative to be reconciled. Unbroken people compare themselves with others and feel worthy of honor, but
broken people compare themselves to the holiness of God and feel a desperate need for his mercy. Unbroken people are blind to
their real heart condition, but broken people walk in the conviction of the Holy Spirit. Unbroken people don't think they have
anything to repent of, but broken people realize that they have need of a continual heart attitude of repentance.
Unbroken, unbroken people don't think they need revival, but they're sure that everyone else does. Whereas humble, broken
people continually sense their need for a fresh encounter with God, for a fresh filling of his Holy Spirit.
The key to seeing brokenness is the Cross. As we are confronted with the incomprehensible gap that our sin creates between us and
God, we are brought to a point of awe as we see God’s grace demonstrated through the Cross of Jesus Christ. We see the gift of his
Son being broken for us so that we can be forgiven. It is in that moment that we affectionately move closer to Jesus out of awe when
we truly see how much he does love us. We see that it is our sin that put Him on the Cross. Our sin that drove the nails deep into His
hands. Our sin that caused God’s wrath to be poured down on the innocent life of Jesus Christ. Our sin that broke Him. This leads us
to walk with Jesus in brokenness.
As you read the differences between the unbroken person and the broken person, what do your actions and heart reveal? Did God
find you having a broken, contrite heart? Or are there more evidences of unbrokenness in your heart and life? Will you cry out to
God right now to give you a broken heart?

Day 19 :: April 1 :: Read 1 Timothy 1:12-17

The worst of sinners

In the book of Isaiah, we get a glimpse of God’s heart for the broken. In Isaiah 66:2, God says, “This is the one I esteem: he who is
humble and contrite in spirit, and trembles at my word.” But here is the problem—so many times we are totally opposite of the one
whom God esteems. We are unbending, self-centered, self-absorbed, self-ambitious and never wanting to give in. We are part of a
world in which we are told, either directly or indirectly, “Fight for your rights! Be your own person! You are great! What matters is
success, beauty, ability, personality, position, being important and first class in everything.”
Sin is a persistent problem for all of us. Yet, as bad as we can be, the Apostle Paul seems to think he's even worse. Maybe we can
learn something from him. Paul wrote to Timothy, “The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus
came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost” (1 Timothy 1:15). Pretty stark, isn't it? Not a lot of wiggle room
there. Paul leads off by calling this a “saying that is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance.” That's the ancient equivalent of
putting the little exclamation mark on an email you send—this is of high priority!
Paul’s “saying” has two parts. “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. . .” This confronts us with the Cross, catapults us to
the heart of the glorious gospel, and prepares us for part two: “... of whom I am the foremost.” Now what are we supposed to do
with that? How can the great Apostle to the Gentiles—the original poster child of the Christian faith—honestly say that he is the
worst of sinners? Who in the world is he comparing himself? And what standard is he applying? Because if Paul thinks he is the
worst sinner on planet earth—what in the world does that make us?
These are important questions. We dare not dismiss Paul's statement as a passing exaggeration or an empty exercise in false
humility. This is the Word of God, and a profound point is being made here.

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First, it's clear that Paul is not trying to objectively compare himself to every other human being, because most of them he had never
met! This tells us that his focus is not primarily outward. It's inward. He's also not suggesting that his moral character is bankrupt or
his spiritual maturity is zero. He is simply talking about what goes on in his own heart.
He is saying, in effect, “Look, I know my sin. And what I've seen in my own heart is darker and more awful; it's more proud, selfish,
and self exalting; and it's more consistently and regularly in rebellion against God than anything I have glimpsed in the heart of
anyone else. As far as I can see, the biggest sinner I know is me.”
This is the language of a man that has been broken and one who understands the sinfulness of his heart. He knows the sinful desires
and evil impulses that churn within. And I don't think it's a stretch to say that he knew he was capable—given the right
circumstances—of the worst of sins and the vilest of motives. Paul was honest. He wanted to see God and himself clearly. No hiding
behind a facade of pleasantness or building up his religious resume as a cover.
Now let's look at the very next verse. “But I received mercy for this reason, that in me, as the foremost (that is the foremost of
sinners), Jesus Christ might display his perfect patience as an example to those who were to believe in him for eternal life” (1
Timothy 1:16).
With the passing of each day, two things grew larger for Paul as he was broken: his sinfulness in light of the holiness of God, and
God's mercy in the face of his sin. Knowing both God and himself accurately was not at all discouraging or depressing for Paul.
Rather, it deepened his gratitude for the vastness of God's mercy in redeeming him, and the patience of Christ in continuing to love
and identify with him in his daily struggle against sin.
Paul's confession to Timothy presents us with a stunning example of brokenness. Paul was acutely, even painfully, aware of his own
sinfulness which resulted in him turning from sin and magnifying his Savior!
As God confronts us with a greater awareness of our sinfulness this often stands side by side with great joy and confidence in God
because we stand in wonder of the Cross. The same Paul who could call himself the worst of sinners could exult two verses later, "To
the King of ages, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen" (1 Timothy 1:17). What's going on
here? Is this some kind of bipolar spirituality at work? By no means! It is the joy of brokenness having its way in our life.
The more we see how sinful we are compared to God’s holiness, the more broken we become. This brokenness sends us to the
Savior, who brings God's holiness and mercy together in the Cross. If we think flippantly of sin, seeking to justify, blame, excuse,
rationalize, cover, and even defend sin in our life we will never see sin for what it really is. If this happens, we will never treasure the
Savior who was broken for that sin. The person that has stood before his God, convicted and condemned, with the death before his
eyes, is the man to weep for joy when he is pardoned, to hate the evil which has been forgiven him, and to live for the honor of the
Redeemer by whose blood he has been cleansed.
Like Paul, you must allow yourself to be broken and recognize the enormity of your sin. You must see yourself as the worst of
sinners. Only then will you understand how much you have been forgiven and the cost of that forgiveness. That's when brokenness
begins to make sense. I start to see God as he truly is. His grace becomes bigger than my failures. His goodness comes to me even
though I'm not good.
So this sin—my sin and yours—is supremely ugly. You and I are the worst of sinners. Our sin is vile, it is wicked. God is at work to kill
it all in our life. But at the same time it is the backdrop to a larger drama. We may be works in progress who are painfully prone to
sin, yet we can be joyful works, for—thanks be to God—we have been redeemed by grace through the death and resurrection of
Jesus Christ. Our Savior has come to rescue us from the penalty of sin and grant us an abundant life by his Spirit. This is the
confrontation of the Cross, that through dying we really begin to live.
The cross makes a stunning statement about us: we are the worst of sinners and our only hope is grace. Once we embrace a life of
brokenness before God, we can find 1 Timothy 1:15-16 trustworthy—we know that we are indeed the worst of sinners. This means
that my biggest problem in life is not the sins of others, but my sins. When this finally drops in our minds and hearts we co me
running to the cross in order to honestly confess our sins and to find healing, grace, and forgiveness. It is in brokenness—a pride-
crushing, vision clearing, humble honesty of confessing my sin—that I experience the forgiveness of God and worship the beauty of
the one that is being broken for me on the Cross.

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Day 20 :: April 2 :: Read Matthew 26:39-42
Embracing brokenness

Every step of Jesus’ life led to the hill outside Jerusalem where he was to die. He knew the prophesies. He knew the Messiah had to
die for the sins of the world. He had told his disciples over and over again that he was going to be killed, and he rebuked them when
they tried to talk him out of it. But now the time had come. His death wasn't just theory anymore. It was reality. He faced
excruciating pain and agonizing death.
Over those last three years, Jesus had many pleasant times with his followers. They had talked with him about the Father, they had
laughed and told stories, and they had seen Jesus heal the sick and raise the dead. Those were some good times—really good times.
The disciples had also watched as the Pharisees and Sadduccees accused Jesus of all kinds of heresy. These religious bigots confused
people, but Jesus defended the truth with grace and strength. In a way, even those times were good, too.
As the Cross drew closer, however, the good times quickly evaporated. It was now Jesus' last night with the disciples. He told them
all the things they needed to know, but they still didn't get it. He told them he was going to die a horrible death. He asked them to
pray for him. They went to sleep. As Jesus fell on his face in prayer, he was utterly and absolutely alone. In a few hours he was going
to take on his shoulders all the ugliness and pain of hatred, selfishness, murder, rape, anger, envy, and every other sin of every single
man, woman, and child who ever lived or ever would live that would place their faith in him as Savior. For a time, Jesus would be
pushed away from perfect unity with his Father. He would pay for all our sins alone. The lies and taunts and spit of those lining the
streets and those near the Cross would compound his pain. The whip, the nails, and the thorns would sear his flesh, and awful thirst
would make his tongue swell and cling to the roof of his mouth. He would be alone. He knew all this was coming, and in his flesh,
Jesus wanted out.
As you and I walk with God, we feel His daily breaking, as the Spirit chisels off the unwanted mess of sin and conforms the contours
of our attitudes and behavior to be more like Christ. That is a continuous process, day after day. But so often, we experience the
collision of our will against God's. The reality of his call to obey confronts us and we simply don't want to do it. In our flesh, we want
out! We do not want to be broken. We do not want to die. However, as Christ chose obedience in his spirit, we, too, must choose
obedience through his grace.
Jesus first asked the Father to take the cup of sacrifice away from him, but he affirmed his willingness to drink it. When the Father
told him there was no other way, he must die for the sins of the world, Jesus accepted it as final. Between those two moments was a
struggle in his soul so titanic in its intensity that the blood vessels in his forehead broke and blood dripped from his face. Would he
follow the will of the Father and die or follow his own will and live? The collision of wills took Jesus to the brink. It takes us there,
too.
The cup the Father wanted Jesus to drink was one of sacrifice. Jesus had to totally surrender everything over to the will of the Father
in order to be broken. The prospect of all that pain that this brokenness would bring made the heart of Jesus shudder. But in the
crucible of the choice, Jesus followed the will of the Father. You and I only rarely are faced with any choice that even vaguely
compares, but this account is written for our instruction, as an example of how to respond when we are faced with a choice of this
magnitude.
What might it look like in our lives? I believe it invariably involves sacrifice. We want a certain person or a certain thing or a certain
career, but God confronts us and says, "No, my child. I have chosen a different way for you. Follow me." In this moment we can
either run in rebellion or allow God to break us. When we have been broken of our own ways and our own life, we walk as Jesus did,
in true submission.
This is not just an outer compliance to the things of God, but an attitude of our hearts. Scripture says that Jesus “endured the Cross
for the joy that was set before Him” (Hebrews 12:2). He knew the Cross would bring pain, but in the end he knew his obedience to
the will of the Father would bring great joy. He had to fight the desires of his flesh to allow brokenness to come, and this is where we
must fight for brokenness as well.
Being confronted with brokenness is a call for us to kill our own unholy sinful desires and wishes. Sin most often appeals to us
through our desires. Not all desires, of course, are sinful. We can desire to know God, to obey Him, and to serve Him. There are
many good, positive desires.
The Scriptures, however, speak of deceitful desires (Ephesians 4:22), evil desires (James 1:14, 1 Peter 1:14), and sinful desires (1
Peter 2:11). It is evil desire that causes us to sin. All sin is desired, or perhaps the perceived benefits of the sin are desired, before it
is acted upon. Satan appeals to us first of all through our desires. Eve saw “that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing
to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom” (Genesis 3:6). Note how the concept of desire is implied in “good for food” and
“pleasing to the eye,” as well as explicitly mentioned in “desirable for gaining wisdom.”

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Sin carries on its war within us by entangling our desires, drawing them into an alliance against what we know is right and leading us
to run from the commands of God. This is the struggle depicted by the Apostle Paul when he wrote, “For the sinful nature desires
what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do
not do what you want” (Galatians 5:17). We may say that we love God, but if sin controls our desires, it has seized a fort from which
it will continually assault our life. This is why the call of brokenness is mainly directed at killing the sinful desires in our hearts. They
must be mortified; that is, subdued and weakened in their power to entice us into sin.
It is always emotionally painful to say no to those sinful desires, especially when they represent recurring sin patterns, because those
desires run deep and strong. They cry out for fulfillment. That is why scripture uses such strong language as "put to death." But the
problem is that we can not do this on our own. Paul writes, “so I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the
sinful nature" (Galatians 5:16). It is as we live by the Spirit, that is live in dependence on and obedience to the Spirit, that we will not
gratify the desires of the sinful nature. That is what Jesus did and it is what he calls us to do.
By the filling and help of the Spirit of God we must keep going back to face the Cross. It is only when we confront the Cross that we
will be honest about our sin and follow the will of God. We must see the love, joy, and pleasure that come from obeying God over
our own desires. And when we fail for the umpteenth time, only the Cross reveals to us the grace and forgiveness of God that will
give us the courage to get up again and keep on going. No matter how miserably I have failed, God's grace, love, and forgiveness is
greater than my sin. This is why we keep seeking to be broken.
We fix our eyes on Jesus Christ and embrace brokenness as He did. With joy Jesus did what the Father told Him. He never sought his
own will or followed sinful desires. He came to do only what the Father desired. In everything He was in submission to the Father.
We are to live the same way, in submission to the Lord and with joy in our hearts.

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 Week 4

Repentance
Repentance is the door to greater openness and honesty before God and deeper intimacy with God. Through the Cross, God
confronts us to repent so that we can return to Him and allow Him to bring real transformation in our life. Through repentance God
changes me—not a change of spouse, not a change of job, or where I live or who I hang out with. Repentance is change in the place
where it's needed most—inside me. If you study all the Hebrew and Greek terms together, you get this three part definition:
repentance recognizes sin for what it is, followed by a heartfelt sorrow, culminating in a change of behavior as I treasure God more
than anything else in life. I see it for what it is (changing my mind). I experience heartfelt sorrow (changing my heart). I determine to
change my behavior (changing my will) so I may pursue the joy of Christ.
Memory Verse: "Repent therefore, and turn again, that your sins may be blotted out, that times of refreshing may come from the
presence of the Lord." (Acts 3:19-20)

Day 21 :: April 3 :: Read 2 Corinthians 7:10

Desperate for repentance

If we really want to live each day in the presence of God, then repentance is essential. Repentance is the funnel through which all
personal encounters with God flow. Repentance is the natural next step on our confrontational journey. We have been confronted
with God's holiness. We have been challenged to face our sin and brought to a place of personal brokenness. Now we are
confronted with repentance. Repentance is the first step in a personal cleanup of the wreckage that sin brings. Refusing repentance
only takes us down and never takes us up. Denial of sin only takes us backward and never forward. Repentance alone opens the way
to a fresh outpouring of God's favor and presence in our lives.
No wonder repentance is such a common theme in God's Word. Though repentance might seem like a bad thing at first glance, you
need and want more repentance in your life. Though it's not an easy or pleasant thing, it is a good thing. If you want to get to a
better place with God, we must be confronted with repentance.
The church at Corinth that Paul was writing to was the most problematic church in the New Testament. The people in this worldly
church were filled with themselves; they were carnal and divisive. We know from studying the New Testament that Paul wrote four
letters to the church at Corinth. Only two of them were ever found and declared as Scripture by the early church. In the letter we
call 2 Corinthians, Paul pleaded with them to halt their sinful behavior. In 2 Corinthians, Paul refers to an earlier corrective letter that
he had written them: “For even if I made you grieve with my letter, I do not regret it.” Apparently the earlier letter was to the point,
as in, “Hey, repent or else! I mean it, knock it off and repent or you're going to get it big time! ”
Paul’s harsh rebuke of the church in Corinth was difficult for him to give. But deep down, Paul knew that leading them to a place of
grief over their sin was for their own benefit. It's good for us to feel sorrow over the wrong choices that we're making. It's right to
feel grief over sin because that can lead us to some very important choices. You don't get to a better place with God until you
recognize that the sinful place where you are is not the place that will give you the joy and pleasure that you are after.
Sometimes you have to receive a hard word, something that you'd rather not hear, in order to get to the place you've always
wanted to be. Paul felt that tension after he had written this strong, rebuking letter. Apparently they were wounded by the truth,
but it was only temporary. Eventually they repented, and that was the cause of Paul's rejoicing (v. 9).
Many times I pray with people who are grieving over their sin. In my heart I feel compassion for their pain, but I don't want to short
circuit what God is doing in their hearts. In my flesh I want to say, "It's O.K.; don't be so upset about what you've done." But I know
they need to feel grief over sin in order to fully experience God's grace. Paul rejoiced because he knew that only when the
Corinthian Christians were wounded by the reality of their sinful choices could they begin to experience the renewing power of His
Spirit at work in their lives. Paul rejoiced, not because they were grieved, but because they were grieved into repenting (2
Corinthians 7:9).
The more that we are confronted with God’s holiness and our brokenness, the more likely we will repent of our sin. It's this life
change that makes hearing the hard truth not only worthwhile but cause for rejoicing. No doubt about it; repentance is a very good
thing.
Repentance is the moment when everything changes. God is not reluctant or unwilling to draw close to you and allow you to
experience a fresh encounter of his presence. God is ever ready to cover you with grace and mercy at the moment of genuine
repentance. Picture it now by faith: all of God's favor, all of God's grace, all of God's blessing, curling like a mighty wave and breaking
upon the shore of your life. This comes only through repentance.

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Repentance is the funnel through which all personal encounters with God flow. No wonder repentance was the method in the
mouth of every biblical messenger. Repent was the one word sermon from every Old Testament prophet. Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel,
Hosea—all of them preached this one word message. It was plagiarism to the max. They would show up before a group of people
and say, "Good morning…repent…let's pray." This was the message God used to move His people to return back to Him.
Now in case you're thinking that was just an Old Testament thing, consider the prominence of repentance in the New Testament.
Jesus said John the Baptist was the greatest prophet ever born to a woman. What was his message? "Repent, for the kingdom of
heaven is at hand" (Matthew 3:2). Mark 6:12 says that Jesus sent them out and they went and proclaimed that people should
repent. In fact, Luke 15:7 makes an amazing assertion that there's more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-
nine other people who are like, "I'm kind of tired of reading about repentance; I think I'll just stay were I am."
As you move through the New Testament, we continue to see this message of repentance. Directly after the Holy Spirit came,
Peter's first message was, "Repent!" In Acts 3:19, Peter preached, "Repent therefore, and turn again, that your sins may be blotted
out, that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord." We all are desperately in need of "times of refreshing from
the Lord." Wouldn't you love a new, fresh experience with God? I know I get so tired of living on leftovers: "When I was in college,
God did this." "When we were newly married, we saw God do amazing things in us." What about today? What about what God
wants to do in your life—today? Repentance is the absolute essential that can bring those "times of refreshing."
Do you ever think, “I thought by now I'd be further along in my spiritual life and in deeper intimacy with God; what should I do?” The
answer is repent. Wake up to the reality that you're not progressing as you want to in your faith because there are some things that
need to change in your life—and that happens through repentance. Repent and return to the way you saw yourself and your sin and
God's holy requirements when you first turned to Him.
This is the heart of Christ for the church today even if it takes drastic measures. In Revelation 2:16, the Lord says to the church,
"Therefore repent. If not, I will come to you soon and war against them with the sword of my mouth." Jesus Christ Himself is moving
today in resistance against every person who will not humble himself and repent of his sins. I know that this doesn't sound like the
Jesus we love to hear about. Too often Jesus is characterized like some overindulgent parent who gives us whatever we want and
turns a blind eye to all of our sinful acts. But hear what He really says: "As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Therefore be zealous
and repent" (Revelation 3:19).
I don't know what your life has been like. I don't know where you've been or what you've done. You may have chosen some paths
that you're not proud of, done some things that you would be ashamed for others to know. Believe me on this: God can and will
wipe all that shame and sadness away if you will only repent. Scripture cries out to us, “Come now, let us reason together, says the
LORD: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool
(Isaiah 1:18). How can that happen? How can you leave your past behind you? Only through repentance!

Day 22 :: April 4 :: Acts 3:19-20

Repentance and sorrow

The only road the leads to the Cross is the road of repentance. All those who come to the Cross of Christ have something in
common: they all repented. This is an out of style word and it seems far removed, not pertinent or necessary for how we live today.
Repentance might bring up a mental picture of a scary looking Charlton Heston portraying John the Baptist dressed in camel-skin,
calling the people of Jesus’ day to repent (see him in The Greatest Story Ever Told).
Most of us don’t hear about repentance as a modern phenomenon. We don’t talk about it with our friends. It seems old and far
removed from our world. In the past it was more common for people to hear about a nation repenting, or even to hear of kings or
princes repenting as they humbled themselves and admitted their need for redemption–they confessed their sins and some of them
fell to the ground in self-abasement (humble self-emptying) lying on the ground in true humility—the kind of humility that only God
can cause within a human heart.
Repentance ought to be in our vocabulary and in our lives. Where repentance is true and honest, God is working. Repentance isn’t a
one-time event. It should be part of our lives every day. Let’s learn about repentance.
The emotions of repentance
Psalm 38:18, “I confess my iniquity; I am troubled by my sin” (see Psalm 51; 2 Corinthians 7:9–10). Karl Menninger caused a big stir
back in 1973 with his book, Whatever Became of Sin? He wrote as a Jewish psychiatrist, and he was astonished that our culture was
ridding itself of any semblance of guilt or responsibility for any action. He wrote that the modern world was wrenching any shame or
remorse they ought to feel when they acted on their inclinations and lusts and ought to have felt some remorse about what they
had done.
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Modern therapy was focused on helping people not feel too “bad.” People were flooding to the psychiatrists to get help for their
sadness and grief, their shame and their embarrassment, because they were overwhelmed for what they had been up to. They
hoped that through counseling they might be freed from their guilt. Menninger’s point was that it isn’t a call for therapy that should
follow our bad behavior. Your sin should trouble you but you shouldn’t stop there. Repentance turns you from your sin and it turns
you to God for restoration and forgiveness.
Beginning to repent
Repentance begins with sorrow for sin and grief for what you’ve done. 2 Corinthians 7:9 is a section about sorrow unto repentance.
The purpose of sorrow is to lead us to turn from our sins.
People can be superficially sorry they got caught. They can be sorry their actions caused them to lose a friendship, destroy a
marriage, or break trust with a child. They might be sorry that those things happened, but that isn’t repentance. The sorrow of
repentance begins a much deeper and more difficult journey that drives us to examine our relationship with God. It takes us past
just being sorry for what we’ve done. But it begins there.
The “godly sorrow” is not momentary and light. It is a sorrow that creates a change within the person. Some people are perpetually
“apologetic.” “I’m sorry I got drunk at your sister’s wedding.” “I’m sorry I was late for work again for the fifth time this week.” “I’m
sorry I was going 89 in a 65 mph on I-4.” Sorry is easy. Repentance is difficult.
Do you know someone who gets stopped for speeding over and over and all she can do about it is complain about the police? Or the
person who doesn’t perform her duties at work, but is incessantly critical of her boss? Or the person who is unkind to his 14-year-old
boy and all he can think to do about him is blame the boy’s friends for his behavior? These are symptoms of people who have not
repented. They might be sad, even filled with sorrow over the things that are happening in their lives, but they are not repentant.
Repentance moves you to take an action that will make your situation better. It is a healthy and joyous decision to take responsibility
for your life, to stop blaming others, and to live your life for God
Psalm 51 is the most important passage on repentance in the Bible. It was written by David after his affair with Bathsheba (Psalm 32
probably was written then too; both Psalms are on the mark in learning about our subject). The Psalm teaches us that there is an
intellectual, a “knowing” aspect to repentance. David said, “I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me ….” You need
to know what you have done, and who you have offended by your action. You need to not just feel a generalized discomfort with
your sins, but to have specific sins in mind; to repent you must deal with specific things that you have done.
A repentant man knows what he has done. There really is no question about what is on the table. Some people are just sad that
their lives aren’t going well for them. But sadness about the course of one’s life is not repentance. Repentance understands sin, it
admits to what you have done, and it has sorrow, it grieves, it is remorseful, it is broken-hearted.
Godly sorrow is what causes a person to lie on the floor, collapsed and surrendered, powerless before God, crying out in sadness
and in humility to God. Godly sorrow understands the sin, the failure, so clearly that there is no misunderstanding, no avoiding of
the issue, no hiding things away hoping they will disappear, or refusing to name the offense to God. We become very aware of our
sin.
Lamentations 3:40, “Let us examine our ways and test them, and let us return to the Lord.”
Romans 3:20, “Therefore no one will be declared righteous in *God’s+ sight by observing the law; rather, through the law we
become conscious of sin.”
God’s Word and especially God’s Law tells us where we have sinned against God. The law is our guide to Christ. If a person does not
have a true knowledge of their sin, they have no knowledge of the nature of God. The nature of God is most clearly and simply
explained in his Law. The Law tells us about God’s character. When we place our lives against the Law, it convicts us of our failures, it
convinces us of our sins, and it shows us how far away from God we are. If a person does not recognize their actions have missed
God’s ideal for goodness—taken a good gift from God and twisted it for another purpose, or has been in open rebellion against what
God by breaking the commandments and violating God’s law—that person can never have true sorrow for their sins or begin to
repent of them.
The Law of God is the starting point for our repentance. The Law was not given to congratulate us on how well we’ve been living. It
was given to convict us and to consign all humanity under a curse. The Law brings a curse. Grace and mercy come through Jesus
Christ.
The Cross gives us the courage, the victory, the strength to confront every sin, any mistake, all our wanderings and failings, all our
short comings and failures, and the many ways we sought to find our greatest joy anywhere but in God.
The Cross is the intersection between Heaven and Earth. It is where God deals with our sin. It is where we agree with God about
them. The games are over. We become conscious of our sins—and even that is a gift of God—and we repent of them. They become

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burdensome, horrible in our sight, we can’t stand the sight of them, we hate them with all we are. And in true repentance, we plan
to never do them again.
If you repent today and repeat the offense tomorrow, you don’t know godly sorrow. You don’t know repentance at all. Repentance
begins a new life with God. It turns you to him.

Day 23 :: April 5 :: Read Luke 15:11-20

The heart of repentance

In Luke 15, Jesus tells us a story of what repentance really looks like. The prodigal son is the poster boy for repentance. There was
this know-it-all kid who came up with a rebellious plan. He demanded of his father all the money from his inheritance in order to live
the life of his dreams. The essence of the son’s rebellion, comes out in his request, “Give me what is mine.” What is the son’s
ultimate love? It is the father’s things. The younger son may have lived with his father and may even have obeyed his father, but he
didn’t love his father. The thing he loved, ultimately, was his father’s things, not his father. His heart was set on the wealth and on
the comfort, freedom, pleasure, and status that wealth brings. His father was just a means to an end. He believed that true joy and
pleasure could be found away from his father. He knew that the request would be like a knife in his father’s heart, but he obviously
didn’t care.
What Jesus is revealing to us is the true essence of sin. Jesus is revealing that we all sin because we excessively love something; we
put our faith in something other than our Heavenly Father to give us joy, peace, pleasure, and identity. We love relationships,
wealth, our reputation or something else too much, inordinately, more than God and that is why we sin. Our hearts are twisted by
disordered loves. We love and rest our hope in, and look to things to give us the joy and meaning that only God can give. That is the
essence of sin. Disordered
The prodigal son in total rebellion ran from the father. Then according to Luke 15:13, the son squandered his property in reckless
living. The younger man’s lostness was clearly seen when he ended up in the pigsty. He ran out of friends, money, and resources
because of his self-indulgent, undisciplined and foolish behavior. What he thought would give him life led to a complete life collapse.
At this point the younger brother realized that he ‘lost his way’ and desired to return back to life with the father.
What Jesus wants to show us in this story is that in order to return to the father, there must be repentance. What causes the father
to come out and lavish this love on the son? What causes the father to throw a party and rejoice? It is repentance! In the previous
passages, Jesus has told us that God rejoices and loves a repentant heart (Luke 15:7 and 10). What Jesus is getting at here is that the
fuse that ignites the love and grace and power of God in the gospel to explode in your life is repentance. Repentance is the key to
everything. This is why in this story he gives us the elements of repentance.
First, he was awakened to his sin. Luke 15:17 says, he came to himself or "came to his senses." He recognized the sin in his life for
what it was—that is the first step to repentance: changing your mind about sin. Repentance starts when God begins to work in your
life and opens your eyes to the reality of your sin. The sins that cause the most problems in our lives and relationships are the ones
of which we are unaware. This blindness to our sins is called denial. “Coming to our senses” is something that happens to us as God
works in our lives. God allows the circumstances and consequences of your sin to hit you and in this reality he opens your eyes. This
means that repentance comes in response to those moments when the Holy Spirit breaks us open, and we see the truth about
ourselves, our sin, and God. It takes the intervening grace of God to make this happen. It takes God pulling out his proverbial 2x4 to
whack us upside our thick heads and hardened hearts so we can see our sin for what it really is and where it is leading us. When
grace does intervene and we do come to our senses spiritually, we begin repenting.
Second, we must accept full responsibility for our sin. Notice that the younger son does not try to shift the blame. He does not say, “I
messed up, Dad, but it was your fault for not giving me everything I wanted. If you had given me the things I asked for, I would never
have left home. It’s your fault I left.” Instead he owns up to sin: “I have sinned.” Repentance means accepting full responsibility for
my sin without blaming anyone else.
Third, there is godly sorrow. The son cried out with a deep sense of unworthiness before God: “I have sinned against heaven, and in
your sight; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.” (vs. 18-19). He felt shame over his actions and more like a slave than a son.
That's changing his heart about sin and realizing he has sinned directly against his father. Godly grief and guilt occurs in
understanding that you sinned against the goodness and greatness of God. It’s not, “Oh, I feel bad that I’ve been outed and now
people know what a dog I am.” That’s not godly grief. Godly grief is, “I have sinned against the Lord. I have wronged the Lord.” You
see, David looked down at Bathsheba on the rooftop and had disrespect in his heart for God’s goodness and greatness. How?
Because he’s going, “All that you’ve given me, God, all that you’ve provided for me, every way that you’ve cared for me and what
you’ve given me as a gift isn’t adequate. What I need you cannot give me; God, she is what I want and need.” That’s contempt for
God’s greatness and disapproval of God’s goodness. He used Bathsheba as someone without a soul to satisfy his sinful pleasures. He
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lies, he murders, and all of it is an offense against a holy, righteous, jealous God. And David finally got it and repented, “Against You
and You alone have I sinned” (Psalm 51:4).
We have to be cautious because there is a huge difference between godly regret and repentance and worldly regret and repentance.
Remember that Paul wrote, “For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief
produces death” (2 Corinthians 7:10). Here is why we must be cautious: what is it that wakes you up to your sin? Most of the time it
is the guilt, grief, and pain the consequences of your sin bring you when your life collapses. When pain wakes you up, what you
naturally want to do is get rid of the pain and guilt. The response to this, if you are not careful, can be self-preservation, not humble
repentance. What this takes is coming to the point that you begin to see your sin as total rebellion against God, no matter what sin
it is, that you have believed the lie that there is more joy, pleasure, security, hope, significance in things other than God.
This is an internal change of mind and thinking about our sin so that we are guilty and grieved over our sin because it has grieved the
very heart of God. Coming to God is not enough. Many people come to God, sharing their story of pain and how sin has caused
major, painful consequences in their life. But what they want is for God to fix the problem, not fix them. The problem is that they are
still in love with the stuff God offers, not God. They are broken over the pain of their sin, not their sin.
This young guy in the story is not turning to the father because he is afraid that he is going to be beaten or wants more money; he is
turning to the father because he realizes that he has lost the only real thing that gave him joy—intimacy with the father. You repent,
not just because you broke the rules, but in your heart you are sorrowful because you have broken God’s heart. Your sin is against
the goodness of God; it helps you to begin to hate the sin, not merely the consequences. Then you begin to change because your
heart is changed toward sin.
The final step in repentance is a change of the will, resulting in a change of behavior. The son said, “I will arise and go to my father…
and he arose and came to his father” (Luke 15:18 & 20). Repentance is an internal change of will that always leads to an external
change of living. If you remove either one of those pieces, you no longer have what the Bible calls repentance. His thoughts changed,
his feelings changed, his actions changed.
Repentance involves your mind (recognition of sin), your heart (accept full responsibility for our sin), your emotions (heartfelt
sorrow over your sin), and your will (producing a specific plan of action for change).
I know you're serious about getting on a fresh page with God. But here's the truth: you can agree that you need to return to God,
but still not experience a fresh encounter of God’s presence in your life. Why? Because we fail at this point of repentance.
Want more of God's presence and deeper intimacy with Him? He longs to give it to you, but it's not going to be given to you until
you put away your sin. Want more of God's presence, power, and peace? Absolutely! But not without a pure heart crying out in
repentance. God's greatest blessings are yours, but not without a turning. We must be confronted with the fact that true,
transforming grace and the overwhelming joy of God flows only to the heart that is repentant.

Day 24 :: April 6 :: Read Luke 15:20 -24

Coming close to God

How do we escape the shackles of sin so that we can repent? How can the inner dynamic of the heart be changed from one of fear
and anger to one of joy, love, and gratitude so that we will repent and return to God? Where do we find the motivation to repent of
our sin? The answer to each of these questions is found as we are confronted with the Cross of Jesus Christ. It is only when we see
the love that was poured out for us on the Cross and how much it cost God to bring us back that we will find the courage and
motivation to repent.
In Luke 15:11-19, Jesus shared that the younger son had rebelled against his father’s love and was lost. The rabbis of Jesus’ day
taught that if you had disrespected your family in the midst of the community an apology was not sufficient—you also had to pay for
the rebellion. The son intends to say: "Father, I know I don't have a right to come back into the family. But if you apprentice me to
one of your hired men so I can learn a trade and earn a wage, then at least I could begin to pay off my debt." That was his plan.
There in the pigsty the younger son rehearses his speech. When he feels he is ready for the confrontation, he picks up and begins
the journey home.
The younger son comes within sight of the house. His father sees him and runs—runs to him! He runs to his son and, showing his
emotions openly, falls upon him and kisses him. This almost surely would have taken the younger brother by surprise. Perplexed, he
tries to roll out his business plan to pay his father back for his sin. The father interrupts him, not only ignoring his rehearsed speech,
but directly contradicting it. "Quick!" he says to his servants. "Bring the best robe and put it on him!" What is he saying?
The best robe in the house would have been the father's own robe, the unmistakable sign of restored standing in the family. The
father is saying, "I'm not going to wait until you've paid off your debt; I'm not going to wait until you've duly groveled. You are not
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going to earn your way back into the family; I am going to simply take you back. I will cover your nakedness, poverty, and rags with
the robes of my office and honor." Out of love and pure grace the father welcomes the son back and throws him an epic party.
What a scene and what a story! Listen to the startling message Jesus is giving us about what happens when we repent: God's love
and forgiveness can pardon and restore any and every kind of sin or wrongdoing. It doesn't matter who you are or what you've
done. It doesn't matter if you've deliberately oppressed or even murdered people, or how much you've abused yourself. The
younger brother knew that in his father's house there was abundant "food to spare," but he also discovered that there was grace to
spare. There is no evil that the father's love cannot pardon and cover; there is no sin that is a match for his grace.
Jesus shows the father pouncing on his son in love, not only before the son has a chance to clean up his life and evidence a change of
heart, but even before he can recite his repentance speech. Nothing, not even utter contrition, merits the favor of God. The Father's
love and acceptance are absolutely free. But is it? Someone has to bear the expense so that the younger brother can be brought
back in. What Jesus is going to share is that while God’s love and approval are absolutely free to all those who by faith repent, there
is a price for redemption, forgiveness and reconciliation that will cost God and it will be a cost that He will pay.
In the story, Jesus shares that the younger son knows how much he is loved before he repents to his father. His father is embracing
him when the younger son says: “I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.” Do you
remember the next line he had rehearsed? “Treat me as one of your hired men.” The father never lets him say that next line!
Repentance means admitting that you have sinned and that you are not worthy of forgiveness. However, we cannot make
restitution to God and we cannot pay God back for all the wrong that we have done. That is the difference between Christianity and
every other religion in the world. All other religions say that we have to make restitution to God ourselves. We have to follow certain
rules to earn God’s approval and pay off the debt we owe him. But the message of the gospel is that there is nothing we can do for
God that will make restitution for our sin. God must pay the price for us.
Forgiveness and reconciliation always have a cost. For example, if someone breaks your lamp, you could demand that she pay for it.
The alternative is that you could forgive her and pay for it yourself (or go about bumping into furniture in the dark). Imagine a more
grave situation, namely that someone has seriously damaged your reputation. Again, you have two options. You could make him pay
for this by going to others, criticizing and ruining his good name as a way to restore your own. Or you could forgive him, taking on
the more difficult task of setting the record straight without vilifying him. The forgiveness is free and unconditional to the
perpetrator, but it is costly to you.
Mercy and forgiveness must be free and unmerited to the wrongdoer. If the wrongdoer has to do something to merit it, then it isn't
mercy, but forgiveness always comes at a cost to the one granting the forgiveness. While the younger brother's restoration was free
to him, it came at enormous cost. The father could not just forgive the younger son, somebody had to pay! The father could not
reinstate him except at the expense of someone else. There was no other way. This is where Jesus comes in; he is the one who is
willing to pay any cost to seek and save that which is lost.
Jesus did not just run down the road to save us or go to the next country to find us, but he came all the way from heaven to earth.
He was willing to pay not just a finite amount of money, but the infinite cost of His own life to bring us into God's family, for our debt
is so much greater. We all have rebelled against the Father; we are all lost. We deserve alienation, isolation, and rejection. The point
of the story is that forgiveness always involves a price—someone has to pay. There was no way for the younger brother to return to
the family unless someone paid the cost. That is what Jesus did on the Cross; He paid our debt in our place so we could return home.
There Jesus was stripped naked of his robe and dignity so that we could be clothed with a dignity and standing we don't deserve. On
the Cross Jesus was treated as an outcast so that we could be brought into God's family freely by grace. There Jesus drank the cup of
eternal justice and wrath so that we might have the cup of the Father's joy. There was no other way for the heavenly Father to bring
us in, except at the expense of Jesus Christ.
This is how the heart can be changed from a dynamic of fear and anger to that of love, joy, and gratitude so that we repent and
return to God. You need to be confronted with the sight of what it cost to bring you home. It is only when you climb Calvary’s hill
and see that God can be trusted and that he really loves you will you, in return, be willing to repent and return back to him. The
radically cost of the Cross of Christ transforms our hearts toward God so that we can finally love God and return to God through
repentance.
Jesus Christ, who had all the power in the world, saw us enslaved by the very things we thought would free us. So he emptied
himself of his glory and became a servant (Philippians 2). He laid aside the infinities and immensities of his being and, at the cost of
his life, paid the debt for our sins, purchasing for us the only place our hearts can rest, returning to God.
Peter tells us that this is the greatest thing Christ died for: “Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that
he might bring us to God” (1 Peter 3:18). Why is this the essence of the good news? Because we were made to experience full and
lasting happiness from seeing and savoring the glory of God. If our best joy comes from something less, we are idolaters and God is
dishonored. He created us in such a way that his glory is displayed through our joy in it. The gospel of Christ is the good news that at

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the cost of his Son’s life, God has done everything necessary to enthrall us with what will make us eternally and ever-increasingly
happy—returning to him.
God sent Christ to suffer “that he might bring us to God.” This means he sent Christ to bring us to the deepest, longest joy a human
can have. Why wouldn't you want to offer yourself to someone like this? The selfless love of Christ dying for us on the Cross destroys
the mistrust in our hearts toward God that makes us not want to repent so that we can brought into intimacy with God. Be
confronted with the Cross of Christ so that you can hear the invitation to repent, see the motivation to repent, and turn from “the
fleeting pleasures of sin” (Hebrews 11:25) and come to “pleasures forevermore.” Repent and come to Christ.

Day 25 :: April 7 :: Read Psalm 51:7-12

When repentance comes

Repentance is not just a set of emotions. It is also a group of actions. The thief on the Cross is a precious person who will, perhaps,
become a good friend in Heaven. Luke 23:42 records his last words to Jesus, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your
kingdom.” The thief was not a great theologian. He was a criminal and he deserved the penalty the Centurions were meting out.
Jesus, on the contrary, was innocent.
The thief gives us hope because he cast himself on the mercy of Christ at the last possible minute, just before he died. He rebuked
his fellow felon and with his last words embraced Christ by faith, a saving and true faith. His repentance was free from blaming
others. It accepted his punishment as a result of his own hand. He saw Jesus as his only hope in the life to come, and he believed in
him. Jesus confirmed his faith was true and that they would be together after they had both died. It is a wonderful account.
The thief didn’t have long to repent, but he did it well. Romans 2:4 tells us that it is the kindness of the Lord that leads us to
repentance. In Chris Tomlin’s song Kindness, he uses the same phrase, “It’s your kindness, Lord, that leads us to repentance.”
There are several ways to experience repentance in our life, but they are different roads to the same destination. Here are some
ways in which Scripture reveals that repentance comes:
1.) Considering God’s Works and Ways. Deuteronomy 4:39, “Acknowledge and take to heart this day that the Lord is God in
Heaven above and on the Earth below. There is no other.” The repentant person sees God. That vision alone gives insight,
strength, and courage to repent. Seeing God makes all the difference.
2.) Trials and sufferings can lead us to truly repent. Job 16:20, “My intercessor is my friend as my eyes pour out tears to God;
on behalf of a man he pleads with God as a man pleads for his friend.” Psalm 42:3, “My tears have been my food day and
night, while men say to me all day long, “Where is your God?”’ Verse 5 goes on to say “Why are you downcast, O my soul?
Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.” James 4:8, “Come near
to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve,
mourn, and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom.” Sorrows and suffering are painful experiences
that no one seeks or hopes will increase in their life. But sorrows can bring the fruit of repentance into your life. Sorrows
can make many secondary issues vanish so you can hear God’s voice and see God’s face in the face of Jesus Christ.
3.) God moves his people to repent. Isaiah 22:12, “The Lord, the Lord Almighty, called you on that day to weep and to wail, to
tear out your hair and put on sackcloth.” Isaiah 45:22, “Turn to me and be saved, all you ends of the earth, for I am God and
there is no other.” God is much more concerned about your repentance than you are. Sinful man does not want to stop
sinning. He loves his sin too much. He loves his freedom to do what he wants to do, too much. God can intervene and give
us the gift of repentance and everything starts new and fresh.
4.) Raw guilt can drive us to repentance. 1 Samuel 24:5, “Afterward, David was conscience-stricken for having cut off the
corner of *Saul’s+ robe. He said to his men, ‘The Lord forbid that I should do such a thing to my master, the Lord’s anointed,
or lift my hand against him; for he is the anointed of the Lord.’” 24:17, “When David saw the angel of who was striking
down the people, he said to the Lord, ‘I am the one who has sinned and done wrong. These are but sheep. What have they
done? Let your hand fall upon me and my family.’” In the New Testament, Acts 2:37-38, “When the people heard this, they
were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, ‘Brothers, what shall we do?’ Peter replied, ‘Repent and be
baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the
Holy Spirit.’” True guilt comes from doing what you know is wrong. There is no more dangerous position than to have a
heart that cannot grieve your sin. Let guilt do its work: Repent of your wickedness.
5.) Repentance comes through self-examination and silent personal reflection. Psalm 4:4, “In your anger do not sin; when you
are on your beds, search your hearts and be silent.” Galatians 6:4, “But let each one test his own work, and then his reason
to boast will be in himself alone and not in his neighbor.” Silence is needed for self-examination. You cannot think seriously
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 about your life while watching a ball game or texting. Personal reflection requires your entire and focused attention. Our
world does everything it can dream up to keep us surrounded with distractions, noise, messages, interruptions, and
conversations. The world despises silence. Repentance requires it.

Day 26 :: April 8 :: Read 1 John 1:5-10

Good news in repentance

As you read the teachings of Jesus, you soon discover that Jesus taught that the entire life of believers will be one of repentance. On
the surface this looks a little bleak! It seems to be saying Christ-followers will never be making much progress in fighting sin. But of
course that wasn't Jesus’ point at all. Jesus was saying that repentance is the way we make progress in pursuing Christ; it is the road
to Calvary. Indeed, pervasive, all-of-life-repentance is the best sign that we are growing deeply and rapidly into the character of
Jesus and dying to self.
The cross constantly confronts us with our need for repentance and it is the Cross that helps us to repent. We must never lose focus
of what Jesus did for us on the Cross or repentance is drastically changed. The gospel affects and transforms the very act of
repentance. In 'religion' the purpose of repentance is basically to keep God happy so he will continue to bless you and answer your
prayers. This means that 'religious repentance' is selfish, self-righteous, and bitter all the way to the bottom. But in the gospel the
purpose of repentance is to repeatedly tap into the joy of our union with Christ and see the price that was paid for our salvation in
order to weaken our need to do anything contrary to God's heart.
In religion we are only sorry for sin because of its consequences to us. We realize that sin will bring us punishment and that is
something we want to avoid. So we repent. But the gospel tells us that sin can’t ultimately bring us into condemnation (Romans 8:1)
Its heinousness is therefore what it does to God; sin displeases God, grieves the heart of God, and dishonors him. Thus, in religion,
repentance is self-centered; the gospel makes it God-centered. In religion we are mainly sorry for the consequences of sin, but in the
gospel we are sorry for the sin itself.
Furthermore, ‘religious’ repentance is self-righteous. Repentance can easily become a form of ‘atoning’ for the sin. Religious
repentance often becomes a form of punishing ourselves in which we convince God (and ourselves) that we are so truly miserable
and regretful that we deserve to be forgiven. In the gospel, however, we know that Jesus suffered and was miserable for our sin. We
do not have to make ourselves suffer in order to merit forgiveness. We simply receive the forgiveness earned by Christ. In 1 John
1:9, John says that God forgives us because he is ‘just.’ That is a remarkable statement. It would be unjust of God to ever deny us
forgiveness, because Jesus earned our acceptance! In religion we earn our forgiveness with our repentance, but in the gospel we just
receive it through what Christ did for us on the Cross.
Religious repentance is also “bitter all the way down.” In religion our only hope is to live a good enough life for God to bless us.
Therefore, every instance of sin and repentance is traumatic, unnatural, and horribly threatening. Only under great duress does a
religious person admit they have sinned, because their only hope is their moral goodness. But in the gospel the knowledge of our
acceptance in Christ makes it easier to admit we are flawed because we know we won't be cast off if we confess the true depths of
our sinfulness.
Our hope is in Christ’s righteousness, not our own, so it is not so traumatic to admit our weaknesses and failures to God. In religion
we repent less and less often. But the more we are confronted with the Cross of Christ, the more we see that we are accepted and
loved by the grace of God, and this, in turn, will lead to more and more repenting. And though, of course, there is always some
bitterness in any repentance, in the gospel there is ultimately a sweetness. This creates a radical new dynamic for personal growth.
The more you see your own flaws and sins, the more precious, electrifying, and amazing God's grace appears to you. But on the
other hand, the more aware you are of God's grace and acceptance in Christ, the more able you are to drop your denials and self-
defenses and admit the true dimensions of your sin. The root cause of all sin is a lack of joy in Christ Jesus.
Repentance makes the way clear. Everything is pulled out. All the rocks and boulders are removed. Your sin is brought before the
God of Mercy. Every sin is forgiven (all of them). The closeness of a child with his Heavenly Father is restored. Peace is given. Hope is
received. Assurance is established. Joy has come.
Or, you can refuse to repent and be doubled over with guilt and shame, refuse to speak with God, stay isolated and live apart from
God. You could refuse to confess the sins that God already knows all about. You could refuse to come to the Cross of Christ and be
forgiven. You could babble on and on and on in your stupid prayers about your selfish longings. Or you could repent. Turn from your
sin. Turn back to God.
If you clearly understand these two different ways to go about repentance, then, and only then, can you profit greatly from a regular
and exacting discipline of self-examination and repentance. You are the only one who can do this for you. Here are some examples
of ways that we may be confronted with repentance as we view the Cross:
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Deep humility vs. pride: Have I looked down on anyone? Have I been devastated by people criticizing me? Have I felt snubbed and
ignored by people and now I am deeply offended by them? If so, repent like this: Consider the free grace of Jesus until I sense A)
decreasing disdain (since I am a sinner, too), B) decreasing pain over criticism (since I should not value human approval over God's
love.) In light of his grace I can let go of the need to keep up a good image; it is too great a burden and now unnecessary. Consider
free grace until I experience grateful, restful joy in Jesus Christ and His love alone.
Burning love vs. indifference: Have I spoken or thought unkindly of anyone? Am I justifying myself by exaggerating how bad they are
and how good I am? Have I been impatient and irritable? Have I been self-absorbed and indifferent and inattentive to people? If so,
repent like this: Consider the free grace of Jesus until there is A) no coldness or unkindness (think of the sacrificial love of Christ for
you), B) no impatience (think of his patience with you), and C) no indifference. Consider free grace until I show warmth and
affection. By His grace, God was infinitely patient and attentive to me.

Day 27 :: April 9 :: Read Luke 15:7

Desiring repentance

This study on repentance brings up several terms that we need to be careful to define. Penitence is one we need to be especially
clear about. Start with two questions: Does God want you to feel bad about your sin? Or does God want you to be rid of your sin?
Feeling bad about something we did might lead us to repent of it, to pray about it, and to make amends. But is that really the point?
Feeling bad about our sin is just feeling bad about our sin. It doesn’t really change anything. But getting rid of sin, not sinning as
much tomorrow as we are sinning today, that is a good plan to be working on.
Penitence comes from an Old French word that means to desire to be forgiven. The only words we have that are like it in English
sound like penitentiary, which is a place of punishment for wrongs. But this word doesn’t focus on punishment, it longs for and it
seeks forgiveness. Let’s keep in mind that the penitent person is seeking forgiveness with every fiber of his being.
In Malachi 3:7, the Lord speaks to his people, he describes their sin, he promises restoration if they will come, and then they
responds to God with these sweet words of penitence: “How are we to return to you?” The sinner comes to God not to negotiate for
better terms, not to demand from God better treatment while God is punishing them. They surrender to God’s invitation by saying,
“How are we to return? Tell us what you want us to do?” The penitent, when pulled over for speeding says, “What do you want me
to do, Officer?” The husband who has broken the heart of his wife says, “What could I possibly do now to rebuild our love?” A
student who has damaged the reputation of a friend out of spite, “What can I do that can make this right?”
Part of penitence is restitution. We are so grace-overloaded today that we think that we can hurt anyone we want or do any type of
damage we care to do and get away scot-free. If we confess it, then we are forgiven. Not quite. The Penitent seeks to make
restitution for what he has done to another person. For example, pretend that while backing up your car at a friend’s house you run
over your friend’s mailbox. It was an accident, of course. But the next day you come by with a new mailbox and take the time to
install it. It is one thing to say, “I’m sorry I ran over your mailbox.” It is another to go to the store and buy your friend a new one. This
is restitution.
Restitution is the heart of a penitent person to be sorry for wrongs, and to do all that is in their power to make it right. If there was
damage, replace what was broken. Sadly, not everything we harm can be repaired. Hurting a reputation is far more difficult to repair
than a teapot or broken window. That is, perhaps, why gossip is such a terrible sin; the damage can never be repaired. This may be
what James had in mind in James 4:8b, “Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.” We are not just
forgiven, but we are to wash our hands and purify our hearts.
God desires for you to repent. It doesn’t help God if you repent. It helps you. Psalm 34:18, “The Lord is close to the brokenhearted
and saves those who are crushed in spirit.” God has great compassion for sinners. He loves his people and he is quite sure they will
sin. What God loves is a heart that is broken over sin and honest over what happened. You do not need to hide anything from God.
You can confess everything to God. But this isn’t just a forgiveness party where you get forgiven so you won’t go to Hell. God forbid!
Repentance is how to stay in an intimate relationship with the God of Glory. Repentance brings deep sorrow for sin. It confesses
everything. In repentance we hide nothing. We know that God is offended by our sin and that hurts us, so we quickly repent.
Repentance is turning from a sin and planning, praying, believing God that you will never, NEVER do it again. Make restitution where
you can. Bring over those teapots. Make it right. If you broke something that can’t be fixed, you can still ask for (but not demand)
the other person to forgive you. You can’t demand that someone forgive you, but if you truly repent and are penitent (genuinely
sorry and earnestly desiring to be forgiven), they might forgive you. “God is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are
crushed in spirit.”

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 Week 5

Love
The death of Jesus Christ is the most important event in the history of the world and the crux of how a relationship with God is made
possible. Christianity is not based upon ideas or philosophies, but rather upon the one man, Jesus Christ, and the one event, his
death by crucifixion. It is at the cross that we most clearly are confronted with the extent of God’s love for us. The cross is the
greatest love story ever told—the love story of a passionate God who pursues humanity with immense love. At the cross we can
reflect on how deep our sin goes and how much God does truly love us. His love changes everything. Nothing in us is untouched.
Everything is changed.

Memory Verse: Romans 5:8 God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Day 28 :: April 10 :: Read Romans 5:8

All you need is love.

More songs have been written, movies made, books penned, and poems created on the subject of love than any other idea in
history. Every single person on this planet wants to be loved and to love someone. Yet in our contemporary culture, love has been
magnified to an astonishing degree. We buy fragrances, eat chocolate, and even change our body shape, all for the prospect of love.
Our culture has become overly dependent on being in love. Without a romantic relationship of some kind, our lives feel meaningless,
worthless, and broken.
We search for someone to give us meaning by loving us. We say to ourselves, “If I had him or her, finally something would be right in
my miserable life. If I had her, it would fix things.” All the longings of our heart for meaning and affirmation would be fixed if we
could just find someone to love us, if we could find someone to love.
From life’s outset, we find ourselves on the prowl, searching to satisfy some inner, unexplained yearning. Our hunger causes us to
search for people who will love us and complete us. There is a wonderful line from the movie Jerry Maguire, where Jerry, played by
Tom Cruise, looks with great intensity at his love and states: “I love you. You—you complete me.” That is what we are looking for, a
love that will complete us.
But here is the problem: the man or woman who lives only for the love and attention of others will never be satisfied—at least, not
for long. We will never find completeness and ultimate joy in the love of another person, no matter how great that love is. Our
desire to be loved is a symptom of a deeper need, a need that was placed there by God himself.
We each have a yearning inside of us to be loved that only God can satisfy, but we all spend our lives seeking things on earth to
satisfy it, which leaves us on an endless and unsatisfying quest. It is this deep longing that causes us to look to our relationships to
fulfill us and give us life. But because only God can meet those needs, our relationships will ultimately fail us. The need inside us is
“God-shaped,” which means he truly is the only one who can satisfy us with his love. We must understand that this hunger for
ultimate love that completes us is God-given and can only be satisfied by him.
The reason is that no human relationship can bear the burden of giving us the love that we crave. No matter how we may idealize
and idolize people and want their love, people will inevitably reflect earthly decay and they will shine their imperfections towards us.
We want something from our lovers that they cannot possibly give us. What we are longing for in our human relationships can only
be fulfilled by God. What we are longing for, searching for in people is a love that comes from beyond this world. We desire a love
that will never fail us. That kind of love comes only from God.
God’s love is unfailing. Proverbs 19:22 says, “What a man desires is unfailing love.” This is what we want, but soon realize that this
type of love can not be found in any human relationship. Now we have a choice: we can either stop searching to find this type of
love, or seek it in God. Lamentations 3:22-23, tells us, “Because of the LORD’S great love we are not consumed, for his compassions
never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.” And in Isaiah 54:10, we find God’s words to us, “‘Though the
mountains be shaken and the hills be removed, yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken nor my covenant of peace be
removed,’ says the LORD, who has compassion on you.” And Jesus promises, “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you”
(John 14:18).
This craving for love and this helplessness to find it, proclaims that man once experienced this type of love. This is why we try in vain
to fill our lives with everything around us to satisfy this desire for love. But this infinite abyss can only be filled with an infinite and
immutable object, in other words by God himself.
The Cross of Christ confronts us with God’s unfailing, overwhelming, unconditional love for us. We need to hear the Lord say, “I am
the true Bridegroom. I am the true Friend. I am the true Father. I am the ultimate Lover of your soul.” God declares, “There is only
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one set of arms that will give you all your heart’s desire, and await you at the end of time, if only you turn to me. And know that I
love you now.”
If you seek people to like you expecting them to approve of you so that you feel like you are meaningful, it is certain they will
disappoint you. It's not that you should try to seek and love less people, but rather that you should know and love God more.
“God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). Paul says that we were spiritually
dead, living in open rebellion against God, yet in His great love for us, Jesus Christ died for us.
It will take all of eternity to comprehend the wealth of his love and grace. Instead of looking for love and acceptance in others, let
these words penetrate your heart—you are infinitely, eternally, unconditionally, irrevocably, loved by God through the Cross. The
Cross shouts to us that you no longer have to fear punishment for your sins or rejection by God. Christ has paid for all your sins—
past, present, and future—when you placed your faith in him to save you.
Who can you turn to whose love and acceptance is so overwhelming that your heart will finally be satisfied in its quest for love?
There is only one answer to this question. As the poet George Herbert wrote, looking at Jesus on the Cross: “Thou art my loveliness,
my life, my light, Beauty alone to me.” Gaze hard on the Cross and see your Savior’s love for you. He is dying for you. He is bleeding
for you. He is crying out for you. He is demonstrating the depth of His love for you. Find your life and completeness in his love.

Day 29 :: April 11 :: Read 1 John 4:19

Love God first and most

The Old Testament contains hundreds of laws given by God about every conceivable relationship, conflict, and behavior. Yet, Jesus
revealed that the entire law of the Old Testament can be summarized in just two commands: love God and love others.
Our first priority is to love God. Simple, isn't it? But if it's so simple, why do we get off track so far and so often? Some of us get off
track because we are so caught up in pursuing riches, popularity, approval, success, and pleasure. We let these things crowd God out
of the center of our lives. Others of us are closer to the mark, but we get confused. We focus on the things of God (prayer, Bible
study, church attendance, etc.) instead of on God himself.
John gives us a radical new understanding of how we are to love God in 1 John 4:19, "We love because he first loved us." Our love
for God is begun and built in response to his love for us. We can't manufacture it. We can't read about it and take "four easy steps"
to love God. We can't find a list of things we can do to create love in our hearts for God. No, our love for God is always in direct
relation to our perception of his love for us. This is a radical concept: the more that you understand God’s love for you, the more
you, in turn, will love God and love others. This means that if I really want to obey God by loving him and loving others, I first need to
be confronted with his love for me.
God isn't a list of principles or steps that we must follow. He is the lover of our souls. He passionately pursues you and me to sweep
us off our feet and convince us of His incredible love. How much does He love us? Enough to give His life for us. He didn't have to do
it. When Jesus was being arrested, Peter tried to stop the soldiers from grabbing Jesus by taking out his trusty sword. Fishermen
never really make good soldiers because instead of cutting of the guys head, Peter cut off the guy’s ear.
Jesus immediately stopped Peter and told him, "Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more
than twelve legions of angels?" (Matthew 26:53). Most people think of angels as happy, fat babies with bows and arrows, but angels
are some of the most powerful spiritual beings ever created. In 2 Kings 19:35, we read of a single angel who killed 185,000 Assyrians
in one night. Jesus said He could have called twelve legions of these guys! A legion was usually 3,000 to 6,000 soldiers, so that would
be 36,000 to 72,000 of these amazingly brutal, battle-hardened soldiers to fight for Him!
Jesus could have stopped the process leading to the Cross right then and there, but he didn't. Think of what the angels must have
thought. In response to mankind brutally mocking and murdering their Lord, it was as if the mighty angels peered over the edges of
heaven with their swords drawn and their teeth clinched, shouting, ‘Lord Jesus, say the word and we’ll slay them all!’ Jesus knew all
he had to do was say that word and the fight would be over. But instead, Jesus looked at those who betrayed him and those that
were killing him and cried something shocking and totally unexpected—“Father, forgive them, for they don't know what they are
doing” (Luke 23:34).
The Cross is about the incredible love of Jesus—his saving love for you and for me. He could have escaped the pain of the Cross. He
could have annihilated the entire planet in an instant in his wrath against our sin, but he endured the suffering to glorify God and to
demonstrate his love for us.
When I read of Christ’s love for me on the Cross, I have to ask myself, “Do I really understand that type of love? Is my greatest
delight found in that love?” If not, then I need to reassess my view of God’s love. Something has gone wrong.
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Romans 5:8 says, “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” However, our
human view of God’s love is distorted. Some of us have had authority figures in our lives who have been harsh and condemning. We
assume God grits His teeth at us, too, and snarls when we mess up.
Some of us have been neglected by those who are supposed to love us, and we believe, “God loves Jim or Mary, but he sure doesn’t
care about me.” We feel alone, abandoned, an outcast far from God. We may see God as a cop, a judge, a waiter, or a kind and
slightly senile grandfather. None of those are accurate pictures of God and his love for us. Only Jesus is.
If you don’t delight in the beauty of the Lord’s love, begin by being honest. Start right where you are. Tell him how you see him and
ask him to take you down the path of new insights about his character and love. Some of us can look at our parents and say, “I can
see some of what God is like because I’ve known the love and strength my parents provided for me,” but some of us need to say,
like King David, “For my father and my mother have forsaken me, but the LORD will take me in” (Psalm 27:10).
Remember, God is not just a principle and his love is not a theory. He’s a person who loves you so much he’s seeking you out—even
when you don’t understand. He is the greatest pursuer that has pursued you with love since the beginning of time. When you try to
push him away, he is still nearby with his heart open and his hand out, waiting. Always waiting. In fact, Paul lets us know in Romans 8
that absolutely nothing can separate us from the love of God.
The number one priority in our lives is to love God, but our love for him is only a response to his incredible love for us. Once we have
truly been confronted with the love of the Cross, we are overwhelmed by it. We want more of it, and we can’t stand for anything to
get in the way. Like someone hopelessly in love, we long to spend time with our lover. David wrote about this longing for God: “O
God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no
water. Because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you” (Psalm 63:1, 3).
Look through the Psalms and experience the beauty of the Lord. Let our heart be filled with his kindness, compassion, and joy. He is
thrilled when we respond to his love, and he is always ready to comfort us when we are honest that we don't feel his love. Both
responses are open doors to letting God convince us of his love for us.

Day 30 :: April 12 :: Read 1 John 4:9 -10

Unconditional love

It is only through the gospel, by seeing the love that was lavished on us through the Cross, that we can really begin to see that God
loves us, not because we are lovable, but because he is. Christianity is not fundamentally an invitation to get more religious and
improve your life, but to respond to the love of God that was shown to us on the Cross.
It is essential for us to be confronted with the love of the Cross. The Cross alone guarantees us of God’s love and the way that we are
intimately reunited with God. As long as you are trying to earn God’s love through your goodness, you will never be sure you have
been good enough. Religious, moral people always lack assurance of God’s love because they simply aren't sure God loves and
delights in them.
This is tough for us to grasp because in our everyday life and world our performance determines our acceptance. You don’t get
accepted into a prestigious college by having average grades. You get in by performing above normal. The one who makes partner in
the law firm is the one who bills 15 hours a day, not the one who bills 8 hours a week. Statues of greatness are never given out to
the underachievers in our world. Our acceptance and love is based on how well others see us excel. We define success on the basis
of our performance in whatever it is we do and whatever it is we value. On the playground, in school, or in the boardroom, you have
to perform in order for people to approve of you.
Achievement is the basis for your approval and love in this world. But it’s not the gospel. The gospel says it’s what Christ achieved for
you on the Cross that allows you to be approved and loved by God. But even as Christians we still fall into the trap of thinking that
our moral achievements and righteous deeds make God love and accept us more. What If I asked you one-on-one, “How are you
doing as a Christian? How can you be sure God loves and accepts you today?” Most of us would draw our assurance of God’s love
based on things we do or how we feel. We tend to think that God loves us more when we have emotional fervor for God, are
involved in churchly activities, or for our ability to avoid habitual sins, rather than relying on Christ’s finished work on the Cross as
the basis for our assurance of God’s love and acceptance.
But how can you ever know if you are doing enough for God to love you? How can you be sure that God accepts you today if you are
currently struggling? Performance-driven Christianity is neurotic, depressing, and enslaving. It pushes us away from God in fear and
away from others in superiority or inferiority. It steals the peace, joy, and hope that are meant to be ours because we are children of
a loving Father.

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This performance-driven Christianity leads to one of two poles: a critical and heartless, superiority or a worthless, self-loathing
despair. We as Christians tend to start each day with our personal security of God’s love resting not on the finished sacrifice of
Christ, but on our present feelings or our recent achievements. If you base God’s love and acceptance of you on your performance
and morality, you will never be assured of God’s love. This lack of assurance will then kill you and suck every passion for God out of
your life.
What are the signs of this lack of assurance of God’s love? Every time something goes wrong in your life or a prayer goes
unanswered, you wonder if it's because you aren't living right in this or that area. Another sign is that criticism from others doesn't
just hurt your feelings, it devastates you. This is because your sense of God's love is abstract and has little real power in your life, and
you need the approval and love of others to bolster your sense of value. You will also feel irresolvable guilt. When you do something
you know is wrong, your conscience torments you for a long time, even after you repent. Since you can't be sure you've repent ed
deeply enough, you beat yourself up over what you did. You look for ways to atone for your sin so that you can feel the hurt that you
think you deserve.
Perhaps the clearest symptom of this lack of assurance of God’s love is a dry prayer life. Though religious people may be diligent in
prayer, there is no wonder, awe, intimacy, or delight in their conversations with God. Think of three kinds of people—a business
associate you don't really like, a friend you enjoy doing things with, and someone you are in love with, and who is in love with you.
Your conversations with the business associate will be quite goal oriented. You won't be interested in chitchat. With your friend you
may open your heart about some of the problems you are having. But with your lover you will sense a strong impulse to speak about
what you find beautiful about him or her.
These three kinds of discourse are analogous to forms of prayer that have been called “petition,” “confession,” and “adoration.” The
deeper the love relationship, the more the conversation heads toward the personal, and toward affirmation and praise. Religious
people may be disciplined in observing regular times of prayer, but their prayers are almost wholly taken up with a recitation of
needs and petitions, not spontaneous, joyful praise because they are in love with God. In fact, many religious people, for all their
religiosity, do not have much of a private prayer life at all unless things are not going well in their lives. Then they may devote
themselves to a great deal of prayer, until things get better again. This reveals that their main goal in prayer is to control their
environment rather than to delve into an intimate relationship with a God who loves them.
Not long after Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection, his followers, when they started this new movement, embraced the kind of
radical faith that is found in the gospel. They realized that God’s love for them is based not on their moral performance, but because
of the Cross of Christ. This idea was so different from the other religions of the world that the Romans actually had a name for the
early Christians. Do you know what they called them? They called them atheists, because there was no paradigm in which their
understanding of religion would fall. They had never heard of a God who accepted them based on love and grace. They were used to
earning their god’s love and approval based on obeying rules. All of a sudden, Jesus turned everything upside down and said, “You
are accepted by God and loved by God through the work I did for you on the Cross.”
Listen to how Paul assures us of the love of God through the Cross of Christ. “God shows his love for us in that while we were still
sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). Listen to how John affirms this truth: “In this the love of God was made manifest among us,
that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he
loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:9–10). Now the reason we obey God, serve God, kill the sin in
our life, and sacrifice to honor him is not to earn his love, because we now know He loves us. The more I am assured of God’s love,
the more I will die to myself that I may have more of His presence in my life.

Day 31 :: April 13 :: Read Luke 10:25 -29

When obedience isn’t enough

In Luke 10:25, an expert in Biblical law stood up in public and asked Jesus a question. Luke tells us that the law expert wanted to put
Jesus to the test, to trap him. Perhaps he had seen how so many non-religious people flocked around Jesus, people who did not
diligently obey the law in every facet of their lives, as did the Pharisees and other religious leaders. The man may have been thinking
something like this: “Here is a false teacher who shows little respect for the necessity of obeying the law of God!” So he asked Jesus,
“What must I do to inherit eternal life?”
He may have expected Jesus to say something like, “Oh, you only have to believe in me,” or some other statement that would reveal
him to be unconcerned with full obedience to God's Word and law. Jesus, however, responded by asking the man a question. “What
is written in the law?” The only way to answer such a question is either to spend a week reciting the whole body of Mosaic
regulations, or to give a summary of them. The man took Jesus to mean the latter. It was commonly understood that the entire
Biblical moral code could be summarized as two master commandments—to love God with all the heart, soul, strength, and mind,

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and to love one's neighbor as oneself. The law expert recited these. “That's right,” Jesus replied. “Do them, and you will live. Just
obey those two commands fully, and you will have eternal life.”
It was a brilliant move. This man thought that he could merit God's love and salvation by his good works and moral efforts. Jesus,
however, turns the tables on him and beats him at his own game. In effect Jesus’ message was something like this: “Have you
actually looked at the kind of righteous life that all these specific laws are really after? Have you seen what kind of life God really
wants from you? Do you love God with every fiber of your being every minute of the day? Do you meet the needs of your neighbor
with all the joy, energy, and carefulness with which you meet your own needs? That is the kind of life you owe your God and your
fellow human beings. If you can give God a life like that, you will certainly merit eternal life.”
This was, of course, an impossibly high standard, but that was the point. Jesus was showing the man the perfect righteousness the
law demanded so that he could see that he was ultimately powerless to fulfill it. Jesus was seeking to confront the man of sin, of the
impossibility of self salvation, by using against him the very law he knew so much about.
Jesus said in effect: “My friend, I do take the law seriously, even more seriously than you do. If you can do what it commands, you
will live." He was seeking to humble the man. Why? It is only if we truly see the love God requires in his law that we will be willing
and able to receive the love God offers in His gospel of free salvation through Jesus. Jesus was encouraging the man to seek the love
of God by the grace of God, not by his own merits.
The law expert is shaken by Jesus’ move. The text tells us “he wanted to justify himself” (Luke 10:29), which, of course, is what Jesus
had discerned about his heart already. This man’s response reveals that his obedience is only formal and external. He was filled with
self righteousness and was motivated by a desire to justify himself and control God, not actually love God. He was complying with
his religious observances as a way of “getting ahead” with God so he could make sure that he would receive eternal life. This is the
universal religion of the world.
Almost every religion teaches that if you live a good moral life, then God will accept you, bless you, and love you. But Jesus Christ
changes everything. As we are confronted with the love of the Cross we are taught that you receive God's acceptance, blessing, and
love as a free gift through Jesus Christ. Though we deserve the wrath of God and punishment for our sin, Jesus Christ came and
stood in our place. He lived the life we should have lived and therefore earned the blessing of salvation that such a perfect life
deserves. But at the end he died on the Cross and took the curse that our imperfect lives deserve. When we repent and believe in
Jesus, all the punishment we are due is taken away because he received it in our place. This means that all the acceptance and love
that Jesus is due for his righteous life and death is given to us. By faith, we are now loved and treated by God as if we had done all
the great moral and righteous things that Jesus did.
Jesus was pushing this man to see that he needed God’s grace and could not live up to the standard he was asserting. Jesus wanted
this man to feel the inadequacy and failure of his moral achievement so that he would turn to God for mercy. This man wanted to
make following God’s laws a means of earning God’s love and receiving salvation. What Jesus is doing is showing him that he takes
the law of God so seriously that Jesus is willing to pay the penalty of disobedience on our behalf, so we can be saved by sheer grace
and love.
This means that Christians have a unique attitude toward the law of God and moral obedience. On the one hand, we are freed from
the moral law as a way to earn God’s love and acceptance. God’s love for us is no longer tied to our moral performance; we are
God's children, loved unconditionally based on what Christ did for us on the Cross. On the other hand, we know how supremely
important the law of God is, since it reveals the nature and heart of God. It reveals the things God loves and hates, the things that
are good and evil. Jesus took it so seriously that He made Himself completely obedient to every law, in our place, and died to pay the
penalty of the law, in our place.
This means we can never see obedience as only an option. Instead, we must love and delight in obeying God. The love Jesus Christ
showed us by dying on the cross for our rebellion changes our hearts and changes our behavior. Behavioral compliance to rules
without heart change will always be superficial and fleeting. We will do it, but will hate it all the way. But if we are confronted with
the Cross and really experience God’s love in our lives, then we will be changed and our behavior will be radically different. We obey
not to earn God’s love, but because we realized that we are fully loved by God.
In Titus 2:11-15, Paul calls his listeners to “say ‘No’ to ungodliness and worldly passions” and “to live self controlled...lives.” How
does Paul tell them to get this self control? Remarkably, he says it is the “grace of God that brings salvation,” which “teaches us to
say ‘No’ to ungodliness.” He explains what he means by the “grace of God” in Titus 3:5: “he saved us, not because of righteous
things we had done, but because of his loving mercy.” This is how we say “no” to temptation and obey God.
Think of all the ways you can say “No” to ungodliness. You can say, “No—because I'll look bad!” You can say, “No—I'll hurt my
family.” You can say, “No—because then God will not bless me.” You can say, "No—because I'll hate myself in the morning and feel
guilty." Virtually all of these motives, however, are really just motives of fear and pride—the very things that also lead you to sin.
You are just using the same self centered impulses of the heart to keep you obedient to external rules without really changing the

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heart itself. Also, you are not really doing anything out of love for God. You are using God to get things—self esteem, prosperity, love
from others, emotional health, social approval—so your deepest joys and hopes rest in those things, not God.
The gospel, if it is really believed, removes the need to be constantly loved by others, respected, appreciated, and well regarded. It
removes the need to have everything in your life go well and the need to have power over others. All of these great, deep needs
continue to control you only because the concept of the glorious God delighting in you and loving you with all His being is just that—
a concept and nothing more. Our hearts don't believe it; our lives have never really confronted the love of Christ, so we never really
change.
Paul is saying that if you want to really change, you must let the love of Jesus Christ drop from your head—knowing God’s love as a
concept learned in church, to your heart—experiencing his love in every area of your life. The love of God in the gospel must train,
discipline, coach you—over a period of time. You must let the gospel argue with you. You must let the gospel sink down deeply into
your heart until it changes your motivation and views and attitudes.
This is what Jesus was trying to get the man to see. He was trying to show him how utterly impossible obedience to the law was so
that he would run to God for gracious love. We must see that we are loved by God, not based on our good record or moral deed, but
through God’s great love. Until that happens, the Cross will never be our ultimate hope and Christ our ultimate treasure. We will
stay in our sin and refuse to die to self because we are unsure if God really loves us. But the more we see the love that was lavished
upon us by Christ on the Cross, the more we will run to Him for forgiveness, mercy, and grace. We will cry out, all the more, to be
broken, quickly repent of our sin and walk joyfully in obedience to Him.

Day 32 :: April 14 :: Read Luke 10:30 -37

Breaking boundaries

We continue our story in Luke 10. Jesus is trying to reveal to a very moral man that his morality is what is keeping him from
experiencing the love and the acceptance of God. But Jesus’ first effort was not enough to put this law expert off his self justification
project. Though he felt the weight of Jesus’ argument, the man saw another way to defend himself. He countered, "Who is my
neighbor?"
The implication was clear. "OK, Jesus," he was saying. "Yes, I see that I have to love my neighbor—but what does that really mean,
and who does that really mean?" In other words, the law expert wanted to whittle down this command to make it more achievable.
He wanted his own righteousness to be the reason God accepted him.
"Surely," he implied, "you don't mean I have to love and meet the needs of everyone!"
In response, Jesus tells the story of the Good Samaritan. A Jewish man was riding through a mountainous, remote area where he
was robbed, beaten, and left in the road "half dead" (Luke 10:30). Along came first a priest and then a Levite, one of the temple
workers who assisted the priests with the sacrifices and offerings. These were both righteous figures that should have stopped to
give aid, because the Jew was their brother in the faith. But they didn’t. They “passed by on the other side,” possibly because it
would have been extremely dangerous to stop on a desolate road in a region infested with highwaymen. Or they just didn’t want to
be bothered.
Then a Samaritan came along the road. Samaritans and Jews were the bitterest of enemies. Samaritans were seen by Jews as racial
"half breeds" and religious heretics, and so there was great animosity between them. Yet when the Samaritan saw the man in the
road, he was moved with compassion. He braved the danger by stopping, giving him emergency medical aid, and then transporting
him to an inn. He then paid the innkeeper and charged him to care for the man until he had fully recuperated. That would have been
a substantial expense.
What was Jesus doing with this story? He was giving a radical answer to the question—what does it mean to love your neighbor?
What is the definition of "love"? Jesus answered that by depicting a man meeting material, physical, and economic needs through
deeds. Caring for people's material and economic needs is not an option for Jesus. He refused to allow the law expert to limit the
implications of this command to love. He said it meant being sacrificially involved with the vulnerable, just as the Samaritan risked
his life by stopping on the road.
But Jesus refuses to let us limit not only how we love, but whom we love. It is typical for us to think of our neighbors as people of the
same social class and means. We instinctively tend to limit for whom we exert ourselves. We do it for people like us, and for people
whom we like. Jesus will have none of that. By depicting a Samaritan helping a Jew, Jesus could not have found a more forceful way
to say that anyone at all in need—regardless of race, politics, class, and religion—is your neighbor. Not everyone is your brother or
sister in the faith, but everyone is your neighbor, and you must love your neighbor.

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And so Jesus ended the story with a question: “Who was the neighbor to the man in the road?” The law expert must admit that it
was “the one who showed mercy” (Luke 10:37). He had to agree that, if he had been the needy man in the road, and had been
offered neighborly love from someone from whom he would have expected rejection, he would have nonetheless accepted it. It was
only then that Jesus says: “Go and do likewise.” He had made his case, and the law expert had no response.
One of the remarkable “twists” that Jesus gave to his parable was the placement of the Jewish man in the story. Remember that
Jesus was telling this story to a Jewish man, the law expert, so Jesus put a Jew in the road as the victim. In other words, he was
asking each listener to imagine himself to be a victim of violence, dying, with no hope if this Samaritan did not stop and help. How
would you want the Samaritan to act if that was your situation? Wouldn't you want him to be a neighbor to you, to cross all racial
and religious barriers to love you? Of course you would.
Jesus was saying something like this: “What if your only hope was receiving help from someone who hated you and only owed you
revenge? What if your only hope was to receive love based on pure grace from someone who had every good reason to crush you,
based on your relationship to him and the way you had treated him in the past?
You see, Jesus was going a little deeper here than it first seems. Remember the man’s main question, “Teacher, what shall I do to
inherit eternal life?” (Luke 10:25) This is what Jesus answer to the original question, but the law expert did not have the vantage
point to see what we can see. According to the Bible, we are all like that man, dying in the road. Spiritually, we are “dead in
trespasses and sins” (Ephesians 2:5).
When Jesus came into our dangerous world, he came down our road. And though we had been his enemies, though our entire life
we had run from him, mocked him, belittled him, he was moved with compassion by our plight (Romans 5:10). He should have
crushed us, but out of love, he came to help us. He came to save us, not merely at the risk of his life, as in the case of the Samaritan,
but at the cost of his life. On the Cross he paid a debt we could never have paid ourselves. Jesus is the Great Samaritan to whom the
Good Samaritan points. The love of Jesus Christ is the answer to the man’s ultimate question, “What shall I do to inherit eternal
life?”
Only if you see that you have been saved by the gracious love of Christ dying for you on the Cross will you catch the heart of the
story. The Cross confronts us with the reality that nothing we do can earn God’s love; it is freely given to us through Jesus Christ. All
we have to do, like the beat-up half dead guy in the road, is accept it.

Day 33 :: April 15 :: Read Deuteronomy 10:16 -19

A New Commandment

The more that I am confronted by the love of God on the Cross, the more God confronts me to love others. The biblical motivation
for loving others is the love of God in redemption. This theme does not just begin in the New Testament. In Deuteronomy, Moses
said to the people:
“Circumcise your hearts, therefore, and do not be stiff necked any longer. For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords,
the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes. He defends the cause of the fatherless and the
widow, and loves the alien, giving him food and clothing. And you are to love those who are aliens, for you yourselves were aliens in
Egypt” (Deuteronomy 10:16-19).
The Israelites had been poor, hurting, racial outsiders in Egypt. How then, Moses asks, could they be callous to the poor, hurting,
racial outsiders in their own midst? Through Moses, God said: “Israel, you were liberated by me. You did not accomplish it, I
performed it for you, by my love and grace. Now go and love other the way I loved you. Out of love untie the yoke, unlock the
shackles of the hurting, feed and clothe the poor, as I lovingly did for you.”
Notice how Moses begins his exhortation with “circumcise your hearts” (Deuteronomy 10:16). Circumcision was the external sign
that a family had come into a covenant relationship with God. Heart circumcision was a passionate commitment to love God on the
inside. Meeting the needs of the orphan, the widow, and the poor immigrant was a sign that the Israelites’ relationship with God
was not just formal and external, but internal as well as they loved others.
The logic is clear: If a person has grasped the meaning of God's love in his heart, he will lovingly serve others. If he doesn't lovingly
serve others, then he may say with his lips that he is grateful for God's gracious love, but in his heart he is far from God. If he doesn't
care about the poor, it reveals that at best he doesn't understand the love he has experienced, and at worst he has not really
encountered the saving love of God. God’s love should make you loving.
Another example of this reasoning is found in Isaiah 58:2. God sees the Israelites fasting. The only fast commanded by law was for
the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur (Leviticus 23:26-32). All during the year the Israelites were to obey the moral law diligently, but

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God knew that this was not something that they would ever do satisfactorily or sufficiently. Our sins create a barrier between God
and us, but by his grace the Lord makes a provision for sin. So once a year the high priest entered the sanctuary of the tabernacle
and offered a blood sacrifice, atoning for the sins of the people.
The Day of Atonement meant that God's relationship with his people was based on his gracious love and forgiveness. That was why
fasting was an appropriate way to observe Yom Kippur. By abstaining from pleasures, particularly food, they exhibited humility
before God and showed they believed in the basic message of Yom Kippur, namely, that we are all sinners saved only by God’s
gracious love.
But God was deeply displeased with the Israelites' fasting: “‘Why have we fasted’ they say, ‘and you see it not? Why have we
humbled ourselves, and you take no knowledge of it?’ Behold, in the day of your fast you seek your own pleasure, and oppress all
your workers. Behold, you fast only to quarrel and to fight and to hit with a wicked fist. Fasting like yours this day will not make your
voice to be heard on high.” (Isaiah 58:3–4)
God sees economically comfortable people abstaining from food, “going without” for a day or two, but not being willing to stop
exploiting their workers. Though they demonstrate the external sign of belief in God’s love—fasting—their lives reveal that their
hearts have not been changed. This is why God proclaims:
“Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and
to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the
naked, to cover him, and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?” (Isaiah 58:6–7)
Fasting should be a symbol of a pervasive change in the person’s entire life. People who are confronted and changed by the love of
God should go, as it were, on a permanent fast. Self indulgence and materialism should be given up and replaced by a sacrificial
lifestyle of giving to those in need. They should spend not only their money, but “themselves” (Isaiah 58:10) by loving others.
What is this permanent fasting? It is to lovingly work against injustice, to share food, clothing, and home with the hungry and the
homeless. That is the real proof that you believe your sins have been atoned for, and that you have truly been humbled by that
knowledge of God’s love and are now living a life submitted to God and shaped by knowledge of him. People who fast and pray
ritually, but still show pride and haughtiness toward the poor and needy reveal that no true brokenness has ever penetrated their
hearts. If you look down at the poor and stay away from their suffering, you have not really understood or experienced God's love in
your life.
You cannot be confronted by the love of the Cross and not respond with love towards others. Listen to the words of Jesus: “A new
commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people
will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:34–35). Does your love for others reveal that you
have been confronted by the love of Jesus Christ on the Cross?

Day 34 :: April 16 :: Read Ephesians 2:4–7

The love of God and holiness

The love of God is the primary power behind your choices to live for God. Understanding and receiving the love of God in Jesus
Christ not only does things for you—forgives your sins, gets you to heaven, gives you great friends–it also does a great work within
you. The love of God changes every other love in our lives. It is impossible for us to know the love of God and not have it change us
substantially, essentially, and profoundly.
The Cross of Christ is the greatest expression of the love of God for sinners. There is nothing like it. It is the most glorious expression
of his love because it was so undeserved, so filled with mercy, grace, and peace. Why God loves us is completely beyond our ability
to understand. We have turned away from him, mocked him, resisted him, scorned him, and in a million other ways have slighted
God. So, clearly God's love is not based on how lovable we are, just the opposite, we are wretched sinners and disgraceful in his
sight. And then we hear the words of Paul, and it takes our breath away: "But God is so rich in mercy, and he loved us so much, that
even though we were dead because of our sins, he gave us life when he raised Christ from the dead” (Ephesians 2:4–5). For reasons
we will probably only come to understand in eternity, God has shown the riches of His love for sinners who deserve the fullness of
his wrath. Amazing love, how can it be?
His love would have been notable had it just been that Christ came to show us what the Father was like. Doing miracles and teaching
us wonderful truths about God would have been astonishing in their own right. But to come to die for our sins, to pay our debt, to
take our guilt upon himself, to make us his own people—all come through the love of God in Jesus Christ our Lord.

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Being confronted with God's unconditional love is foundational for all future growth. We must understand and rest in the fact that
we don't have to do things in order for God to accept us or love us. We are accepted and loved by God completely as we are because
of the Cross. Our actions and works should be in response to God's love for us, not an attempt to earn his love and approval. This is
why finding our love and acceptance in Christ serves as a basis for our relationship with other people. We no longer have to look for
love and acceptance in others because we are accepted and loved by God. Now we can honestly love and accept others because we
will not use others to merely build up our own worth and develop our identity on their approval of us.
The love of God frees us from our captivity to sin (Romans 6:22). It teaches us by divine example what and who we should love and
how we should love them. The love of God transforms us so that we love others with the love of God. Our love for others is the
testament that we have received God’s love for us. You might expect John to have written, “God demonstrates his love for us, so we
respond by loving God.” But it doesn’t say that. It says we respond to the love of God by loving others in Christ. Receiving God’s love
was not just so we can love God back; God has a greater design. He confronts us with his love in order to change every relationship
we have with others.
But there is more. Not only does God’s love confronts us to love other people, but it transforms your life so that you become more
holy. If you love God, you love what God loves. You also begin to hate what God hates. You embrace more and more of God, you
love his Word, and you do his will. You also see evil and sin within yourself and in the lives of those you love and you pray against it;
you strive with all your might against it. You fight against it with all you strength. Hating what God hates is not license to be angry. It
expresses your love for God and, beginning with yourself, you are waging war on the sin that hinders you, that causes you to fall,
that robs you of joy, and that keeps you at a distance from your Father in heaven. When you have a love for God, you want more
and more of God’s life, the fullness of his Spirit, the riches of his Word, the joy of Christian fellowship, and obedience to his will. How
could the love of God not substantially change you?
The love of God gives unshakable confidence when we come before God. It reminds you that all your sins are forgiven for Christ’s
sake. You are confirmed as a son or daughter of God. It heals the wounds of the worst of sinners and makes enemies of God into his
best friends, and his most beloved children.
The love of God gives you confidence, courage to face your most difficult sins, and to turn from them. The love of God helps you face
your sinful nature, your selfishness and pride, your greatest weaknesses and failures and to run to God for mercy, to stand before
him forgiven, clean, pure, beloved, and holy because of the Cross of Christ and not because of anything in you at all.
People are often stumped when it comes to growing more in their Christian life. The question is asked, “How can I become more of
the person that God wants me to be?” “How can I become more holy, more godly, not in a superficial or falsely religious sense, but
in real terms that change my life?” The answer is: Love God more.
Obedience driven by duty will exhaust and break you. Holiness done by your sinful nature will result in your pride and self-praise.
Service done because you love to be thought well-of by others will end up with you being worse off, not better for it. Obedience
motivated by the love of God (God’s love for you and your love for God) results in praise to God (for the Cross and the work of
Christ), in true holiness (the Spirit of God will help you live as you ought to live), and joyful conformity of your will to the will of God.
Serving will be in your heart because you love God.
If you engage in love, service, obedience, godly practices, reading the Bible, prayers, attendance at worship, all of them can fail
miserably if they are not flowing from the love of God. God’s love comes to you, and God’s love dwells within you (Romans 5:5).
The love of Christ can control us, guide us, direct us (see 2 Corinthians 5:14–15). If you want to know and do God’s will, the best
course of action is to grow in your love for God. That love is so powerful, so transforming, so filled with his grace, so reflective of his
glory, it will change everything in your world.

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 Week 6

Grace
Grace is the heart of God that you see at the Cross. Grace is what moved God to save sinners. Grace is how people who were
enemies of God were made friends of God. It is through grace that people who were under the curse of sin are brought into God’s
family, forgiven of every sin, and given the holiness of Christ. Without grace there is no salvation, no new life, no reconciliation, no
forgiveness, no hope, and no Heaven. Grace brings every gift that God wants to give into our lives. Grace is immensely bigger than
we imagine. It is as strong as God. When we look at the Cross, we are confronted with the clearest expression of grace that God has
ever spoken.
Memory Verse: Ephesians 1:7 In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the
riches of his grace…

Day 35 :: April 17 :: Read Ephesians 2:8-9

Grace

The Cross of Jesus Christ is the signature symbol of the most important event in the history of civilization. But think for a moment of
what it represented. The Cross was a hideous instrument of torture, shame, and death. This was not beautiful, but gruesome. Yet
today, we depict the Cross as common. Jewelers pound it into all sorts of finery so we can staple it to our ears and wear it around
our necks. Merchandisers manufacture the symbol of the Cross into everything imaginable, from fuzzy mirror ornaments to cross
watches.
From coffee mugs to t-shirts, the Cross has cornered the market on modern religious pop culture. The Cross itself has become big
business. But it was never intended to be some lucky trinket. This is profanity in the truest sense. Is it any wonder we have lost the
wonder of what happened on Calvary?
The resurrection of Christ was the event that completed salvation and verified Christ's victory over death. But it was the Cross of
Jesus Christ that accomplished our salvation and showed us the grace of God. Everything that God wants us to know about himself
comes together in those crossbeams.
This week we will spend time being confronted with the grace of the Cross. Think on him there. In your mind's eye, picture Jesus
stretched out against the sky. What's he doing there? That's the question we will explore.
Across the broad span of humanity, there are only two ways that people have by which they may seek to be reconciled to God. Only
two. The first way is to qualify for God’s love by some act of merit, some choice or decision that is made by man to give him
acceptance and to have positive goodness in God’s eyes. All the religions of the world except Christianity are of this first type.
The second way, and this way is completely contrary to Way #1, is that God qualifies man for his favor and love solely because God is
gracious. This second Way holds that man deserved God’s displeasure and wrath, but God who is rich in mercy determined to pay
for the sins of the world by the Cross of his Son, Jesus Christ. We are not saved based on our own merit but through the merit of
Jesus Christ. We had no merit of our own. Every person who is saved by the grace of God is undeserving of it. There is no human
merit, no qualifying deed for the grace of God. It is not given to any because they were worthy of it. The whole of the human race is
under the stain and curse of sin, “All have sinned and have fallen short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).
Way #1 tries to earn or qualify for God’s affection; Way #2 abandons any thought of the goodness of man and trusts in the grace of
God. The two Ways could not be more different from each other; they are utterly at odds with one another.
We are confronted by grace because there is within every person a need to earn or qualify for what we receive. This quality is why
we want to be paid for our labor, why we like to be recognized for an achievement, why we enjoy putting our diplomas on the wall,
or telling over and over about our exploits on the high school football team. But such an approach is offensive to God. There is no
qualification we have to meet for God’s mercy. There is no reward that can be received that can take us high enough to come before
the God of Heaven. Grace challenges the very notion of our goodness. Instead of qualifying for some favor or for God’s love, the
Bible is very clear: We do not qualify for anything but God’s wrath; and his furious rage against sin is never-ending. The Bible says
“None is righteous. No, not one” (Romans 3:10).
Grace is either a wonderful gift or it is utterly unnecessary. If it is a wonderful gift of God, then we have this mercy because God gave
it to the undeserving. If it is unnecessary, Christ died for no good reason. These two systems could not be more at odds.
Grace confronts any sense that we have done something that God can justly reward. Now from our point of view there are many
things we do that are rewardable. We are kind to children, help the little old lady across the street, help feed the poor, and things

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like that. Those things are very nice, and they are commendable for people to do them. But commendable by whom? Who has the
measuring stick of what is good? How good does it need to be? If it needs to be merely better than most people, we might squeeze
through. If it needs to be as good as God, we are in trouble. And that is the confrontation: Grace challenges any notion that we are
as good as God is good. Grace says that only God is as good as God. The challenge of using Way #1: is how can we be as good as
God? People with good sense will, at that point, see their need for the grace found in Way #2.
We are still sinners, but God by his grace, paid for our sins by the Cross of Christ. God then gives us who follow Christ the gift of
Christ’s righteousness, his perfections. We didn’t deserve it. It was God’s gift. We didn’t qualify for it, he gave it to us. We failed
miserably in every way, but Christ was obedient, always faithful, obeyed God’s Law in every way, and he never sinned—not even
once. By faith, God now sees us as if we had done everything good that Christ did.
Grace, therefore, assaults, attacks, does full-scale-all-out-war on any claim we make about our goodness. Grace says we didn’t have
any. God gave us all we have. We don’t deserve God’s love, but God loved us in spite of our sin, and he paid the penalty for it by the
death of Christ. We will never be as good as God; by the gift of Christ’s righteousness, we are qualified to be with God and to know
God, and to love God despite the fact that we could never earn it, qualify for it or deserve it in any way. That is the grace of God.
To receive the grace of God we must first abandon Way #1. You can’t trust in the grace of God, believe in the Cross of Christ and the
righteousness of Jesus AND try really hard to qualify for the love of God by what you do. The Bible says that to do so would be to
nullify God’s grace. Here is the verse: Galatians 2:21, “I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law,
then Christ died for no purpose.” You can’t start by grace and end with your effort.
The Cross of Christ stands atop Mount Calvary as a monument to human sin. And, even more, to the saving power of the Grace of
God. This is why Paul writes, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of
God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9).
Grace works at enmity—is an enemy—to any notion of self-righteousness. Grace convicts men of sin. It shows us to be incapable of
any God-ward inclinations. It lays us guilty before the measure of God’s holiness and perfection. Grace assures us that salvation is
from God (Psalm 37:39; Philippians 1:28; Hebrews 2:3; Revelation 7:10; 12:10; 19:1).
But because of pride we naturally hate grace. We think that we can do enough to qualify for God’s mercy and earn his love. This is
why Way #1 is the most popular notion among people. People think they are born naturally good and live morally good lives. Why
would God not allow them into heaven? Most people believe that they do not deserve any punishment from God because they are
not that bad, and they certainly do not deserve Hell.
So, when people want to use Way #1, they think they are already good enough. Or the other-way-around, people don’t think they
are all that bad. Graded on the curve, they are better than most, as good as some, and at least they aren’t hypocrites.
Another variant on Way #1 is that people believe that they haven’t been good enough, but that God’s grace is there just to make up
for the part they can’t do. It’s like they have run the marathon but they need God just to push them over the Finish Line. But using
grace in this way is offensive to God and it dishonors Christ.
Grace is all or nothing. It is this way because it is the only way God can deal justly with our sin, give us his love and grace and not
assault his own holiness, and the biggest reason is that it gives God all the glory for our salvation. He has done it all; he deserves all
the glory. Men are not permitted to steal God’s glory from him. He gives it to no one else. But he shares his love and grace with
those who have faith in and follow Jesus Christ.
What must we do, then, to be saved? We must learn how to repent of the root of all sins and the root of our self-righteousness—the
sin of seeking to be our own Savior and Lord. We must admit that we've put our ultimate hope and trust in things other than God. In
both our wrongdoing and right doing, we have been seeking to get around God or get control of God in order to get things from
God. To find God we must repent of the things we have done wrong, but if that is all you do, you may become very religious, but you
are placing your faith in Way #1. To truly become a Christian, we must also repent of all the times we were morally good and
righteous for the wrong reasons. Those following Way # 1 only repent of their sins, but Christians repent of the very root of their
self-righteousness as well.
It is only when you see the desire to be your own Savior and Lord—lying beneath both your sins and your moral goodness—that you
are on the verge of understanding the gospel and becoming a Christian indeed. If you in any way are relying on your own good deeds
or religious attainments as the reason for your salvation, you need to seriously consider if you are truly a Christian and repent of
these “good deeds”. When you realize that the antidote to being bad is not just being good, you are on verge of understanding
grace. The more you are confronted with grace, it will change everything: how you relate to God, self, others, the world, your work,
your sins, your virtue. It's called the new birth because it's so radical.
We are saved by grace alone. Salvation is by grace from first to last. Grace doesn’t add to your merit; it is your only merit. Grace
doesn’t just help you finish the race; it is the beginning, the middle, and the end of your relationship with God. There it is. Grace, not
works. Way #2, not Way #1.
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Day 36 :: April 18 :: Read Galatians 2: 17–21
Grace that changes everything

The grace of Jesus Christ is the Gospel. That phrase is the sweetest line in all human language, from every era, in all that has been
written, spoken, or sung. There is nothing as wonderful, nothing as glorious, there is no thought or idea so full of power and majesty
as the grace of Jesus Christ. There is nothing else like it in Heaven or on Earth.
This grace of Christ was something that God created out of his heart. No one compelled him to do it. He certainly did not look upon
the world and think to himself, “These people deserve my love.” There is a passage in Deuteronomy that pulls the curtain back a bit,
even in the Old Testament era, on what grace is. In Deuteronomy 7:7–8 Moses gives the reason why God chose and loved his
people. These two verses ask a question and then gives an answer. Read it carefully and you will see grace fully formed in the Old
Testament.
Knowing why God loves you is extremely important. For any relationship you need to know why a person loves you. If a person was
seeking to form a relationship with you merely because you had a lot of money, that would change everything. If you knew the
person loved you unconditionally, selflessly, and sacrificially, then you’d be safer in the relationship, able to trust that person’s love.
Knowing why God loves us is important to building a growing, healthy, trusting relationship with God, too. So why does God love
you?
In Deuteronomy 7:7, the verse begins with a question about God’s love for Israel, his people: (some translations make it a
statement, but the point is the same) “Did the Lord love you because you were more numerous than other peoples, for you were the
fewest of all the people?” Then the answer is given in 7:8. It reads in part, “It was because the Lord loved you and kept the oath he
swore to your forefathers …” In other words, “Why does the Lord love you? Because he loves you.”
That is grace. He loves you because he loves you. That’s the only reason. That is reason enough. There was nothing in the nation of
Israel that distinguished them so that they deserved God’s love and choice. They were a tiny nation with nothing in them to
distinguish them or make them deserving of God’s love. God loves them only and purely because he loves them. The grace of God
comes from God, is of God, and brings glory to God.
The greetings at the beginning of the New Testament letters are easy to pass over. We like to put past the introductions and get into
the heart of the letter. But letter-writing was different then. The greeting at the beginning was a justification for the letter. It was a
return address; it told who wrote the letter and it also told something about his authority, his reason for writing and to whom the
letter is written. The greeting is important. Some of the closings are filled with important things that he wanted them to have ringing
in their ears when they finished reading. Here are some of those greetings and closings. Look for grace in them:
Romans 1:7b, Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Romans 16:20b, The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.
1 Corinthians 1:3, Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
There are many more, but you get the idea. Grace is central to the understanding of the Gospel. Without the grace of God, there is
no Gospel of Jesus Christ.
2 Timothy 1:9, “who has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his
own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time ….”
The collision we have with grace comes from the phrase “not because of anything we have done.” Our pride cries out, demanding
that we must do something to deserve God’s love. Another part of our heart cries out that we already are deserving. And at times
another part says we can never deserve it, and therefore have no hope. And all of them are wrong.
Grace leaves the saving to God. It trusts in the love of God, the mercy of God, the wisdom of God, the power of God. It believes in,
and loves without limits, and gives everything to know, Jesus Christ. That’s what grace does.
Grace silences our pride. It stops our bragging about what we have done, how fabulous we are, how lucky God is to have us living
and doing good things on the planet. It gives us, instead, a new kind of honesty about who we are. We can now face our appalling
selfishness, our moral failures, our utter disregard for the presence of God who made everything, and whose glory is seen in every
glimmer of sunlight, every song of a bird, every color in sky and leaf. We have been walking around as blind and deaf men, waiting
for ourselves to make us happy, to give us riches, to give our lives meaning. And God comes with grace instead, and with that grace
he gives us riches beyond measure, hope that can never be taken from us, joy that is immense and uncontrollable, and life
everlasting.

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Grace doesn’t leave anything untouched. It changes every relationship. It shifts the value system we had in place and it puts in an
entire new measurement of what is truly precious. The gold we had before is now valueless. The grace we now have is more
precious than the gold which perishes. We now have the love of God, when before our love was just an empty desire to get what we
wanted. Grace exposed our sin for what it was. It brought us to Christ empty. It filled us so full that it will take eternity to grasp all
that God has given us in his Wonderful, Amazing Grace.

Day 37 :: April 19 :: Read 2 Corinthians 5:21

The Substitute

Jesus lived His life on earth at a time of revolution and unrest in the nation of Israel. The Romans had conquered and subjugated the
land, and every day Hebrew insurgents battled in the streets. People didn't need TV; they watched drama right in front of them as
their hometown boys were captured as resistance fighters and injured, killed, or carted off to prison. You can imagine how the
families and communities suffered in the aftershock of such conflict on a daily basis.
So, with that background, we enter the story at the time of the Passover. This is Jewish culture's most celebrated time of year. They
were commanded by the Old Testament to remember the exodus from Egypt (Exodus 12:43). Over the centuries it became like our
Christmas and New Year's celebrations combined.
The "Passover party" culminated in a popular custom where the governor would release a prisoner of the people's choice to
appease their anger and reduce their frustration with the Roman occupation. This was Pilate's perfect opportunity to avert the
murderous demands for Jesus' death by offering either Jesus or the most notorious prisoner called Barabbas. Pilate was trying to
position Jesus as the favorite to be released. He said, "You choose. Do you want this mad revolutionary or Jesus?" He believed their
sense of self preservation and kindness would force them to choose Jesus.
In effect, Pilate was offering, "Do you want Osama bin Laden or Jesus? The murderer or Jesus?" Surely they would want Jesus. But
the chief priests and the elders had a plan. They had “persuaded the crowd to ask for Barabbas and destroy Jesus” (Matthew 27:20).
Destroy is a very strong word; it actually means “annihilate him,” to erase not only his person, but the memory of his having ever
lived. Wipe him out as if he never existed.
The plan of chief priests and the elders worked because the crowd shouted they wanted Barabbas to go free. Pilate then asked,
"Then what shall I do with Jesus who is called Christ?" They all said, "Let him be crucified!" Pilate was stunned, knowing that
Barabbas was dangerous and Jesus was innocent. So he asked, "Why, what evil has he done?"
Everyone knew the evil that Barabbas had done. He was evil and a revolutionary. Scripture tells us that Jesus was crucified between
two robbers. In the original language, "robbers" doesn't refer to burglar types who comb neighborhoods looking for homes where
the owners forgot to lock their patio doors. It literally means "revolutionaries." The two men crucified on either side of Jesus were
revolutionaries. What scripture is revealing is that the Cross in which Jesus died was intended for Barabbas, the most notorious
revolutionary, in between the other two revolutionaries. Jesus literally took the Cross that had been reserved for Barabbas. Jesus
died in Barabbas' place.
This is the meaning of the Cross. You can't understand the gospel until you understand this idea of substitution. Barabbas should
have died on that cross for the sins he had committed, but so should I, and so should you. Each of us deserves to die in payment for
our own sin, but by the grace of God, Jesus stepped in and took that penalty for us. I deserve to die that death, but the gift of God is
eternal life through Jesus Christ. That's substitution. Jesus took my place on the Cross. This is the central tenet of the historic gospel;
without God’s gracious substitution, there is nothing else to say.
Picture Christ on the Cross and ask yourself: "What's He doing there?" Answer: He's subbing for you. He's taking God's wrath for
your sin. He's satisfying the just demands of a holy God. He's paying the price that God's holiness requires so you and I can be
forgiven. Romans 6:23 says, “The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Every sin that you and I have ever committed deserves to be punished. There is a holy curse hanging over all sin and God’s holy
wrath will crush all those that have rebelled against his glory. But because of the grace of God, there is hope. God sends His own Son
to absorb His holy wrath, to pay the debt of our rebellion, and to bear the curse of sin for all who trust Him. “Christ redeemed us
from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us” (Galatians 3:13). This is the meaning of the word “propitiation” used in
scripture (Romans 3:25). It refers to the removal of God’s wrath by providing a substitute. The substitute is graciously provided by
God Himself. The substitute, Jesus Christ, does not just cancel the wrath; He absorbs it and diverts it from us to himself. God’s holy
wrath is just, and it was spent and poured out, not withdrawn.
Christ realized this when he prayed in the garden the night before his death (John 17). On that night he asked the Father to take
away this “cup” of suffering and sorrow. There is in this prayer the knowledge that it would be unimaginably difficult for Christ to
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come to the Cross and give everything for our salvation. The holy Son of God dying for sin, suffering the wrath of the Father against
our vile, wicked, selfish acts, thoughts and words, must have been for God the Son, unspeakably horrible.
Jesus Christ delivers us from the wrath of God by becoming our sin. On the Cross as our substitute, Jesus was made to be the worst
of what we are. This does not mean that Jesus never sinned. Rather, it means that He was made sin. As a result, in that moment
when Jesus cried out that He had been forsaken by God the Father, Jesus became the most ugly, wicked, defiled, evil, corrupt,
rebellious, and hideous thing in all creation. In that moment, Jesus became a homosexual, alcoholic, thief, glutton, addict, pervert,
adulterer, raging lunatic, coveter, idol worshiper, whore, pedophile, self-righteous religious pig—and whatever else we are. This was
the great exchange. Scripture declares that on the Cross Jesus exchanged His perfection for our imperfection, His obedience for our
disobedience, His intimacy with God the Father for our distance from God the Father, His blessing for our cursing, and His life for our
death. Scripture teaches us that “for our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the
righteousness of God" (2 Corinthians 5:21).
Jesus took the penalty for our sins in our place so we do not have to suffer the just penalty ourselves. The wrath of God that should
have fallen on us and the death that our sins merit fell on Jesus. But there was something else at work here. The Cross was not just
violence and wrath; it was the clearest, most beautiful, most glorious expression of grace; it was the point of grace for all eternity.
Grace drove Christ to the Cross. The Perfect Man, for love of you, willingly gave himself, to save you from your sins. Christ was not
forced, dragged to the Cross against his will—this may be the most amazing fact about the Cross—he chose it. Scripture repeatedly
stresses this point:

 But He was wounded for our transgressions; He was crushed for our iniquities; upon Him was the chastisement that
brought us peace, and with His stripes we are healed" (Isaiah 53:5).
 He poured out His soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet He bore the sin of many, and makes
intercession for the transgressors" (Isaiah 53:12).
 [He] was delivered up for our trespasses" (Romans 4:25).
 But God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8).
 Christ died for our sins" (1 Corinthians 15:3).
 For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that He might bring us to God" 1 Peter 3:18).
 He is the propitiation for our sins, and not ours only but also for the sins of the whole world" (1 John 2:2).
 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us" (Galatians 3:13).

Christ our substitute is the author of grace, the means of grace, the source of grace, the fullness of grace, the victory of grace, the
love of grace. Christ is the grace of God. His substitution for us gives us grace. All grace comes through Christ. There is no grace apart
from him.

Day 38 :: April 20 :: Read John 8:1-11

Grace, beginning and end

Grace is where you start. Grace is how you live. Grace is how you grow. Grace is why you serve. Grace is the way you pray. Grace is
power to endure suffering. Grace is how you learn. Grace is the means by which you know God. Grace is how you are made holy.
Grace is hope when you die. Grace is the grand Theme of Heaven and the Song of the Angels.
God forgives sinners because it pleases him to be gracious to us. This point is played out one morning as Jesus was teaching in the
Temple. Suddenly, some lawyers and Pharisees burst into the room dragging a woman in front of Jesus. When they accused her, the
people understood why her hair was messed up and she was barely clothed. She had been caught in the act of adultery, and these
religious leaders wanted to have her stoned to death for her sin. Imagine how she felt at that moment—caught in the act, dragged
out into public half naked, accused publicly of a scandalous deed, and facing a horrible death. Jesus could have said, "Yes, that's
what the Law says. Come on, everybody. Pick up a rock, and let's get it over with!" But he didn't.
She deserved death. Jesus gave her grace. After all the accusers had left the room, Jesus stood alone with the woman. Jesus asked
her, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?" "No one, sir," she said. "Then neither do I condemn you," Jesus

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declared. "Go now and leave your life of sin" (John 8:10-11). Notice what Jesus is saying; this women was not just saved by God’s
grace, but is commanded to live in that grace.
God’s grace doesn't excuse sin and say, "Oh, she couldn't help it." Grace doesn't minimize it and say, "It wasn't that bad." The grace
of God looks sin in the face in all its ugliness—and forgives. Our sins deserve condemnation. They deserve the righteous wrath of
God to be poured out to punish us. That's why God's great grace is so wonderful: We deserve just the opposite! But God's goodness
is displayed toward our unworthiness.
No matter what you've done, God's grace is greater. No matter how big or how bad your sin may be, God's grace provides
forgiveness, hope, and restoration. His grace is unlimited. Almost every relationship we experience, every class we take, and every
job we hold is based on performance. We get what we deserve. That perspective is so pervasive that it is difficult for many of us to
realize that God breaks this mold. He treats us very differently. We don't get to heaven based on what we've done. We get there in
spite of what we've done—even the worst of us.
Have you noticed all the rules and commands listed in the Scriptures? Do they seem to be demanding, difficult, and guilt producing?
These laws are God's perfect standard of holiness for us, and they show us how far we miss that standard. Paul wrote, "The law was
added so that the trespass (and our awareness of sin) might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more"
(Romans 5:20). Do you see it? The more we are aware of our sinfulness, the more we will be aware of God's grace!
Those who think they don't sin very much don't have much appreciation for the forgiveness and kindness of God, but those who are
very aware of the dark parts of their hearts are very thankful for God's grace. Paul then asks a question: "What shall we say then?
Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase?" His answer: “By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?"
(Romans 6:1-2). Paul's conclusion is very similar to the statement Jesus made to the woman caught in adultery: When we are
confronted with the grace of God, we won't take forgiveness for granted. We will "go and leave our life of sin.” This is why grace is
not something that merely gets us into the door of intimacy with God, but it is what motivates us to live for God everyday.
We have to stop thinking of grace only in terms of the point of our salvation experience. Certainly, the grace of God brings us to
repentance so we are born again, but grace is an "all day, every day" thing. Every day we must be confronted with grace of God so
that we dive in head first and soak our hearts in God’s grace. The more we meditate on this truth, the more that we will die to self
and fight sin in our life.
Over and over again in the New Testament, the writers use the term "in Christ" to describe believers. When God looks at you and
me, he sees the righteousness of Christ because we are "in him." How much does the Father love you and me? As much as he loves
Jesus. How much does he provide for you and me? As much as he provides for Jesus. How much does the Father accept you and me?
As much as he accepts his own Son, Jesus, because we are "in Christ." All day, every day.
Some of us think God shakes his head and grimaces when he dispenses grace to us. We think he is reluctant to be kind to us, but
that's not true at all. God delights in showing his goodness and forgiveness to us. When Jesus talked to the woman caught in
adultery, he did not tell her in anger or with a terse voice, "Neither do I condemn you." He told her in love and joy. The grace of God
reveals his glory and his nature. When we understand more about grace, we understand more about God's heart. It changes us.
We tend to make two mistakes regarding the grace of God: When things are going well, we don't even think of God; when things are
going bad, we think it's so bad that even God can't fix things. You must realize that your best days are not so good that you are
beyond the need of God's grace; however, on your worst days, you're not so bad that you are beyond the reach of God's grace. The
grace of God is at work in our lives from beginning to end.
Even our desire to please God is a result of his grace working in our hearts. Our choices to obey are by the grace of God. The grace of
God is not an ointment we dab on when we feel bad. It is the air we breathe in our relationship with Christ. As we soak up the grace
of God, we gain three things:
 We have hope and assurance that God forgives, God cares, and God provides. No sin is bigger than God's grace, and no
situation is too difficult for it.
 We are full of thankfulness. Like the woman in John 8, we realize that we deserve condemnation, but we received kindness
and love.
 Our motives for obedience are clarified. Grace turns a teeth gritting, "do or die" attitude into a thankful, "do because he
loved me" gratitude. We obey out of love, not because we're afraid of him.
By now you've been working through this devotional for several weeks. You may have really struggled with some things you feel that
God has told you to do. You may have disobeyed God, and you feel conviction. If that is the case, remember the grace Jesus showed
to the woman caught in adultery. She blew it, too—big time!—but Jesus spoke to her with kindness, gentleness, and forgiveness. He
encouraged her to respond to his grace by doing better.

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Or in the past few weeks, you may have been faithful to do every exercise in this devotional and you've learned a lot. You're so
proud of yourself that you can't wait to tell people how great you're doing and the pearls of wisdom you're learning every day! You
need to remember the grace of God, too. You aren't more acceptable to God because you've done your homework or almost
completed the 40 day challenge. You are acceptable only because Jesus Christ died to pay for your sins - including the sin of pride.
How are you responding to the darkness in your life? If you are down, remember God's grace in his kindness and encouragement. Or
maybe you are seeing wonderful changes God is making in your life. If you are doing great, remember that these changes are not
your doing. They are the deep work of the goodness and power of God. Either way, his grace is truly amazing.
The Christ-follower must keep grace at the center of every part of his relationship with God. To forget grace is to invite a spirit of
independence from God to creep into the Christian faith. The greatest failures of the church have been failures to understand, to
teach, to hold firmly to, and to worship God, by grace. Grace brings people to love God utterly, absolutely, and without reservation.
Grace is from first until the last; it is everything in living for God.

Day 39 :: April 21 :: Read Luke 23:26 -47

More and more grace

The source of all grace to you is by the Cross of Jesus Christ. Make no mistake about it: Without the Cross there would be no grace.
Through the grace of the cross: we are adopted into God’s family, our sins are forgiven, we have the right of access to the Presence
of God, every great and precious promise of God is ours, we have the promise of the Holy Spirit, we know the love of Christ, we have
the assurance of the Father’s delight, are held by the Father’s strong hands, are protected by the power of God, and much more
than could be listed here. The grace of God is his highest glory, our greatest treasure, and the gift of our loving Savior.
It is with the Cross in mind, that Peter calls us to “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter
3:18). The life-long quest of a Christ-follower is to grow to understand grace more, and to know Christ better. The reason this 40 Day
devotion was written was to challenge, to encourage, to help you grow in grace. We who worked on it have also been challenged by
these great themes of Scripture and we, too, have been growing and learning.
As we reflect on the Cross of Christ in a focused and special way today, we can put the grace of God before us in a way that may not
be possible at other times. As we approach Good Friday we understand a bit more, can sense the depth, the richness of it. But there
remains some great mysteries here that we will never understand. How could the Father forsake his Son? How could such horror
result in my salvation and forgiveness? Why? Why would God do this for us? The mystery of the Cross, the love of God for sinners,
the power of his death over sin, and death, and Hell, will take an eternity to study, and to take into our hearts.
For now there are some practical steps we can take to grow in grace. This list is a beginning and much more could be said. But let’s
start here.
Confession of sin. Grace requires the confession of sin. It acknowledges that we need the grace of God. There is not more important
preparation for growing in grace than to confess our sins to God. Here is a verse from Job. Job didn’t believe he had much to confess
at this point in his story.
Job 13:23 How many wrongs and sins have I committed? Show me my offense and my sin.
But when God appears and reminds him of his sin and his wretchedness, Job’s tune quickly changed. The question is where we begin
to grow in grace: We must first confess our sins.
Psalm 106:6, We have sinned, even as our fathers did; we have done wrong and acted wickedly.
Daniel 9:4, I prayed to the Lord my God and made confession, saying, “O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps
covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, 5 we have sinned and done wrong and
acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules. 6 We have not listened to your servants
the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land.
James 5:16, Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a
righteous person has great power as it is working.
Love. When the grace of God showers down on a person’s life, they are overwhelmed with the love of God. That love is not theirs
alone; it is overflow through them to others as well. How could a person receive the grace of God with the unmerited love of God,
the adoption as sons and daughters, the forgiveness of sins, the hope of Heaven, and not have it impact their love for God and their
love for other people? The love of God’s people is a powerful proof of the grace of God. The grace of God is the greatest motive for
loving God and people.

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 Romans 5:5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy
Spirit who has been given to us.
Romans 8:28 And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called
according to his purpose.
1 Thessalonians 4:9 Now concerning brotherly love you have no need for anyone to write to you,
1 John 4:7–12 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows
God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among
us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God
but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love
one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.
Dying to Self. As Christ gave his life for us, we are to die to our sinful nature. We are crucified with Christ. We take up the Cross and
follow Jesus. We walk in his steps. We die with Christ in our baptism, and are raised to newness of life.
Grace provides us the means by which we understand our sin, and it give us the remedy for it as well. Grace shows us our great need
and provides us with the only Savior of sinners. It brings us to the Cross with sorrow for our sins and grief for our failures, and it
raises us to newness of life, filled with love for God, adoption as his sons and daughters, and our lives as dwelling places for the Spirit
of God.
We are alive because we died with Christ. We died to our sin so that we might be alive to God. The death of Christ not only redeems
us to God and pays the penalty for our sins, it reconciles us to God. We are not merely forgiven; we are greatly loved, precious, and
acceptable to God for Christ’s sake, by the Cross.
By the grace of God we can die to our sinful desires. There is no sin that we must commit. God promises not a rescue from every
trial, but an assurance that with his power there is no sin that is greater than the power of God for salvation to everyone who
believes.
1 Corinthians 10:13 No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be
tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to
endure it.
Dying to self means that you will not fall into sin so much. There is no sin you must commit. You are free not to sin.
Romans 8:12-14 So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according
to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For all who are led by the
Spirit of God are sons of God.
Galatians 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live
in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Day 40 (Good Friday) :: April 22 :: Read Romans 3:21 –26; 8:1–34

This side of the Cross

Jesus taught the foolish, fed the hungry, healed the sick, encouraged the brokenhearted, counseled the wayward, and loved the
sinner. Yet, Jesus was emphatic that the primary purpose of His coming to earth was to glorify God by suffering and dying for our
sins. In John 12:27-28, which chronicles the week leading up to Jesus’ death, He says, “Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say?
‘Father, save Me from this hour’? But for this purpose I have come to this hour. Father, glorify Your name.” In that moment, Jesus
was setting His gaze on the Cross. The closer Jesus approached the day that he would die, the greater his soul agonized.
But what troubled Jesus? Some suggest it was the physical torture and agony of the Cross that Jesus agonized over. In the next
twenty hours or so, He will go without sleep, be on trial six times, be scourged, mocked, punched, spit upon, and deprived of all
physical comforts. The pain of crucifixion was so horrendous that a word was invented to explain it, “excruciating,” which literally
means "from the Cross." A crucified person could hang on the Cross for days, passing in and out of consciousness as their lungs
struggled to breathe while laboring under the weight of their body.
To ensure maximum suffering, scourging preceded crucifixion. Scourging itself was such a painful event that many people died from
it without even making it to their Cross. Jesus’ hands would have been chained above His head to expose His back and legs to an
executioner's whip. The whip was a series of long leather straps. Some of the ends had heavy balls of metal intended to tenderize
the body of a victim. Other ends of the straps had hooks made of either metal or bone that would have sunk deeply into the
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shoulders, back, buttocks, and legs of the victim. Once the hooks had sunk deeply into the tenderized flesh, the executioner would
rip the skin, muscle, tendons, and even bones off the victim as he shouted in agony, shook violently, and bled heavily.
After his horrendous beating, Jesus was then forced to carry His roughly hewn wooden crossbar of perhaps one hundred pounds on
His bare, traumatized, bloodied back and shoulders to the place of His own crucifixion. Despite His young age and good health, Jesus
was so physically devastated from His sleepless night, miles of walking, severe beating, and scourging that He collapsed under the
weight of the Cross, unable to carry it alone. Once he arrived with help at His place of crucifixion, the soldiers pulled Jesus’ beard out
(an act of ultimate disrespect in ancient cultures), spat on Him, and mocked Him in front of His family and friends. Hundreds of years
prior, the prophet Isaiah predicted the results of Jesus’ torture: “Many were astonished at His appearance; He was so marred,
beyond human resemblance, and His form beyond that of the children of mankind.”
Jesus the carpenter, who had driven many nails into wood with His own hands, then had five to seven inch, rough, metal spikes
driven into the most sensitive nerve centers on the human body in His hands and feet. Jesus was nailed to His wooden cross. Jesus
was in unbearable agony as they lifted Him up, and His cross dropped into a prepared hole, causing His body to shake violently on
the spikes. At this point during a crucifixion, the victims labored to breathe as their body went into shock. Naked and embarrassed,
the victims were left to die. Jesus’ crucifixion must have been a grotesque scene.
But was Jesus merely a coward in his last night on earth. The answer, of course, is no, Jesus is no coward to physical pain. He is
brave. But in the garden of Gethsemane on the night before he dies, we find Jesus in utter agony, dismayed, and crying. This begs
the question: what is it that Jesus is wrestling with here that causes Him such distress? The ensuing physical challenges, though
great, are not what He is wrestling with. The careful reader will notice that Jesus tells us precisely what He is wrestling with—
“Father, let this cup pass” (Luke 22:42). But to understand His anguish and agony over the “cup”, let's back up and consider
something Jesus knew all too well: the Old Testament.
The Old Testament Jew was well acquainted with a number of metaphors for God's wrath. Darkness, thunder, the winepress—such
images pictorially captured the severity of God's hatred of sin. But there was another symbol that Israel was quite familiar with. The
following passages depict it graphically:
But it is God who executes judgment, putting down one and lifting up another. For in the hand of the Lord there is a cup
with foaming wine, well mixed, and he pours out from it, and all the wicked of the earth shall drain it down to the dregs.
Psalm 75:7– 8
Wake yourself, wake yourself, stand up, O Jerusalem, you who have drunk from the hand of the Lord the cup of his wrath,
who have drunk to the dregs the bowl, the cup of staggering. Isaiah 51:17
The cup was a dreadful symbol of the deserved holy wrath of God being poured out on all those that oppose him in sin. When the
Almighty visited a city with His cup of wrath, His enemies had to drink it down to the very bottom. But never had the total measure
of God's wrath, the eternal weight of it, been poured out before. Yes, there were "previews" of that wrath throughout the Old
Testament when places like Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed, the first-born Egyptians were killed, and the Amalekites
slaughtered. Yet the full fury of that wrath towards evil and sin had yet to be poured out. It was with this understanding in mind
that Jesus is on the ground, sweating drops of blood, because He is wrestling with the cup of His Father's wrath. "Father, if you are
willing, remove this cup from me," Christ asks (Luke 22:42).
What Jesus struggled with there was unspeakable: the full measure of the God's wrath, the punishment that should have been
poured out on those who deemed God worthless and had rebelled against his glory and goodness. But Christ emerges from His time
of prayer, prepares to be arrested, and sets His face like flint to enter the hell waiting for Him.
What does this tell us about the love and grace of Jesus Christ? We are so deeply loved by the Savior that He was willing to swallow
hell itself for us. When Jesus cried out, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" on the Cross, He was actually experiencing
the forsakenness and wrath we deserve. The cries of Christ are the scream of the damned that were cried for us.
Christ drank the cup so that we who trust in him will never have to drink the cup of God’s wrath. There is a real judgment that is
coming to all those that do not by faith trust in Christ. The Bible describes “a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that
will consume the adversaries” (Hebrews 10:27). It calls us to live “with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire”
(Hebrews 12:28-29). Jesus warned the people of his day to “flee from the wrath to come” (Matthew 3:7). For Jesus himself will be
“revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who
do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord
and from the glory of his might” (2 Thessalonians 1:7-9).
Some pictures of this final wrath of God are almost too terrible to ponder and also point back to the cup that Jesus drank for us.
Ironically, it is John, the “apostle of love,” who gives us the most graphic glimpses of God’s punishment of sin. Those who reject
Christ and give their allegiance to another “will drink the wine of God’s wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and . . .

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will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their
torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest, day or night” (Revelation 14:10-11).
Until we feel some measure of dread about God’s wrath, we will probably not grasp the sweetness and greatness of the saving work
of Christ for us on the Cross. Jesus Christ, and he alone, can save us from the wrath to come because he absorbed the wrath of God
for us on the Cross. Without him, we will be swept away forever. Praise be to God that Jesus drank the cup of God’s wrath bone dry,
leaving not a drop for us to drink because we have trusted in Him as our Savior. Climb Calvary’s hill and be confronted with holiness,
brokenness, repentance, love, and grace of the Cross of Jesus Christ.

Completing the 40 Days Devotions

These 40 Days have taken us through some of the great themes of Scripture. We have read about the love of God, the grace of God,
the holiness of God. We have considered repentance, fasting, brokenness and confrontation.
We have this shared experience of learning about and contemplating these great subjects. All of us who have taken this 40-day
adventure have come under some of the great texts of the Bible. What a blessing to think about these great subjects, but most of all
the greatest privilege is to think about God.
The Cross is now behind us. Everything in our relationship with God is dependent on the Cross. All that God wants to give us comes
through the means of the Cross. Our future in Heaven comes to us by means of what the Cross makes possible. We are not only
reconciled to God, forgiven by God, promised to see the Glory of God, but most miraculously, we love God.
This study mentioned the Cross more than 190 times. The Cross is the center of our Christian faith and it is the way we come to God.
We can spend our entire lives studying the Cross and having its power change everything in our relationship with God. It is a
privilege to study the Cross.
If this little guide helped you in even a small way to grow in your faith, and to love God with more of your heart, soul, mind, and
strength, then we give praise to God for using this study for his glory.
If you have worked through this and you still have questions about your faith and your relationship with God, please share your
questions with one of the pastors, or with one of the many faithful leaders at the Journey.
Thank you for walking this way.

James Hilton
Thomas Warren
March, 2011

This 40-day devotional is to be used for educational purposes only, and cannot be sold or reproduced without prior consent from the
Journey at First Baptist.

Some ideas, thoughts and material from the following books were used in the writing of this 40-day devotional.

Downpour: He Will Come to Us Like the Rain by James McDonald

A Call to Die: A 40 Day Journey of Fasting from the World & Feasting on God by David Nasser
Pursuit of Holiness by Jerry Bridges
Generous Justice: How God’s Grace Makes Us Just by Timothy Keller

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