He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him —2 Corinthians 5:21

Sin is a fundamental relationship— it is not wrong doing, but wrong being— it is deliberate and determined independence from God. The Christian faith bases everything on the extreme, self-confident nature of sin. Other faiths deal with sins— the Bible alone deals with sin. The first thing Jesus Christ confronted in people was the heredity of sin, and it is because we have ignored this in our presentation of the gospel that the message of the gospel has lost its sting and its explosive power.

The revealed truth of the Bible is not that Jesus Christ took on Himself our fleshly sins, but that He took on Himself the heredity of sin that no man can even touch. God made His own Son “to be sin” that He might make the sinner into a saint. It is revealed throughout the Bible that our Lord took on Himself the sin of the world through identification with us, not through sympathy for us. He deliberately took on His own shoulders, and endured in His own body, the complete, cumulative sin of the human race. “He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us. . .” and by so doing He placed salvation for the entire human race solely on the basis of redemption. Jesus Christ reconciled the human race, putting it back to where God designed it to be. And now anyone can experience that reconciliation, being brought into oneness with God, on the basis of what our Lord has done on the cross.

A man cannot redeem himself— redemption is the work of God, and is absolutely finished and complete. And its application to individual people is a matter of their own individual action or response to it. A distinction must always be made between the revealed truth of redemption and the actual conscious experience of salvation in a person’s life.

When it pleased God . . . to reveal His Son in me . . . —Galatians 1:15-16

I now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ, for the sake of His body, which is the church . . . —Colossians 1:24


We take our own spiritual consecration and try to make it into a call of God, but when we get right with Him He brushes all this aside. Then He gives us a tremendous, riveting pain to fasten our attention on something that we never even dreamed could be His call for us. And for one radiant, flashing moment we see His purpose, and we say, “Here am I! Send me” (Isaiah 6:8).

This call has nothing to do with personal sanctification, but with being made broken bread and poured-out wine. Yet God can never make us into wine if we object to the fingers He chooses to use to crush us. We say, “If God would only use His own fingers, and make me broken bread and poured-out wine in a special way, then I wouldn’t object!” But when He uses someone we dislike, or some set of circumstances to which we said we would never submit, to crush us, then we object. Yet we must never try to choose the place of our own martyrdom. If we are ever going to be made into wine, we will have to be crushed—you cannot drink grapes. Grapes become wine only when they have been squeezed.

I wonder what finger and thumb God has been using to squeeze you? Have you been as hard as a marble and escaped? If you are not ripe yet, and if God had squeezed you anyway, the wine produced would have been remarkably bitter. To be a holy person means that the elements of our natural life experience the very presence of God as they are providentially broken in His service. We have to be placed into God and brought into agreement with Him before we can be broken bread in His hands. Stay right with God and let Him do as He likes, and you will find that He is producing the kind of bread and wine that will benefit His other children.

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September 30, 2014

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

Lord, this devotional feels like Chambers is lecturing his students on how to accept the pain and martyrdom of being believers and disciples. However, there is another way to view this is there not? Is it a condition of being a follower of Christ that we become martyrs, and that we be broken and poured out for others?

And God says…”If you want life and life more abundantly, it is necessary that you give up your own ideas, your own will and surrender. And often it will feel like you are giving up “being crushed in your own spirit and will” as you discover that your will and your very brightest ideas do not work for you anymore. You may not become a martyr in the truest sense of the word, but you do, after being connected to Me, become aware that you are to leave your old notions and ideas behind. Acknowledge Me in all our ways, and do not rely on our own ways and means, and I will make your paths straight.  My ways are higher than your ways. For I know the plans I have for you, they are plans for good and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. Seek first the kingdom of God, which is Jesus, and everything else you require, including the shaping of your heart, mind and soul, will be provided just when it is required. And when you fail to hear Me because your own voice speaks too loudly, do not worry; my grace and mercy is sufficient for that time. Delight yourself in the Lord and I will give you the desires of your heart.”

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. . . for necessity is laid upon me; yes, woe is me if I do not preach the gospel! —1 Corinthians 9:16

Whoever compels you to go one mile, go with him two—Matthew 5:41

Our Lord’s teaching can be summed up in this: the relationship that He demands for us is an impossible one unless He has done a super-natural work in us. Jesus Christ demands that His disciple does not allow even the slightest trace of resentment in his heart when faced with tyranny and injustice. No amount of enthusiasm will ever stand up to the strain that Jesus Christ will put upon His servant. Only one thing will bear the strain, and that is a personal relationship with Jesus Christ Himself— a relationship that has been examined, purified, and tested until only one purpose remains and I can truly say, “I am here for God to send me where He will.” Everything else may become blurred, but this relationship with Jesus Christ must never be.

The Sermon on the Mount is not some unattainable goal; it is a statement of what will happen in me when Jesus Christ has changed my nature by putting His own nature in me. Jesus Christ is the only One who can fulfill the Sermon on the Mount.

If we are to be disciples of Jesus, we must be made disciples supernaturally. And as long as we consciously maintain the determined purpose to be His disciples, we can be sure that we are not disciples. Jesus says, “You did not choose Me, but I chose you. . .” (John 15:16). That is the way the grace of God begins. It is a constraint we can never escape; we can disobey it, but we can never start it or produce it ourselves. We are drawn to God by a work of His supernatural grace, and we can never trace back to find where the work began. Our Lord’s making of a disciple is supernatural. He does not build on any natural capacity of ours at all. God does not ask us to do the things that are naturally easy for us— He only asks us to do the things that we are perfectly fit to do through His grace, and that is where the cross we must bear will always come.

If you bring your gift to the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar, and go your way. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift—Matthew 5:23-24

It is easy for us to imagine that we will suddenly come to a point in our lives where we are fully prepared, but preparation is not suddenly accomplished. In fact, it is a process that must be steadily maintained. It is dangerous to become settled and complacent in our present level of experience. The Christian life requires preparation and more preparation.

The sense of sacrifice in the Christian life is readily appealing to a new Christian. From a human standpoint, the one thing that attracts us to Jesus Christ is our sense of the heroic, and a close examination of us by our Lord’s words suddenly puts this tide of enthusiasm to the test. “. . . go your way. First be reconciled to your brother. . . .” The “go” of preparation is to allow the Word of God to examine you closely. Your sense of heroic sacrifice is not good enough. The thing the Holy Spirit will detect in you is your nature that can never work in His service. And no one but God can detect that nature in you. Do you have anything to hide from God? If you do, then let God search you with His light. If there is sin in your life, don’t just admit it— confess it. Are you willing to obey your Lord and Master, whatever the humiliation to your right to yourself may be?

Never disregard a conviction that the Holy Spirit brings to you. If it is important enough for the Spirit of God to bring it to your mind, it is the very thing He is detecting in you. You were looking for some big thing to give up, while God is telling you of some tiny thing that must go. But behind that tiny thing lies the stronghold of obstinacy, and you say, “I will not give up my right to myself”— the very thing that God intends you to give up if you are to be a disciple of Jesus Christ.

He . . . said to them, ’Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem . . . ’ —Luke 18:31

You call Me Teacher and Lord, and you say well, for so I am . . . . I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master . . .—John 13:13, 16

You are those who have continued with Me in My trials —Luke 22:28

When you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place . . . —Matthew 6:6

The primary thought in the area of religion is— keep your eyes on God, not on people. Your motivation should not be the desire to be known as a praying person. Find an inner room in which to pray where no one even knows you are praying, shut the door, and talk to God in secret. Have no motivation other than to know your Father in heaven. It is impossible to carry on your life as a disciple without definite times of secret prayer.

“When you pray, do not use vain repetitions . . .” (Matthew 6:7). God does not hear us because we pray earnestly— He hears us solely on the basis of redemption. God is never impressed by our earnestness. Prayer is not simply getting things from God— that is only the most elementary kind of prayer. Prayer is coming into perfect fellowship and oneness with God. If the Son of God has been formed in us through regeneration (see Galatians 4:19), then He will continue to press on beyond our common sense and will change our attitude about the things for which we pray.

“Everyone who asks receives . . .” (Matthew 7:8). We pray religious nonsense without even involving our will, and then we say that God did not answer— but in reality we have never asked for anything. Jesus said, “. . . you will ask what you desire. . .” (John 15:7). Asking means that our will must be involved. Whenever Jesus talked about prayer, He spoke with wonderful childlike simplicity. Then we respond with our critical attitude, saying, “Yes, but even Jesus said that we must ask.” But remember that we have to ask things of God that are in keeping with the God whom Jesus Christ revealed.

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Journal DJR
Good Morning Lord,
Chambers says we must ask for the right things in order to benefit from Matthew 7:8 Everyone who asks receives. So in the many times that I’ve asked and not received, (at least not how I wanted to receive) I assume that I did not ask correctly, or that I had not connected with you and received your heart and your will on the subject before asking. Sometimes I wonder if I’m just making up excuses for you … or for me. Sometimes I just back away and dont deal with some of this stuff that I dont understand and use this as the answer. Then, there’s Isaiah 55:8-9

8 “My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts,” says the Lord.
“And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine.
9 For just as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so my ways are higher than your ways
and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.

I agree, my thoughts are nothing like your thoughts and your ways are beyond my imagination. But I try. Try to think your thoughts, See what you see, and do things as you would do …. Basically try to be like you and live like you as in John 5:19

Jesus explained, “I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself. He does only what he sees the Father doing. Whatever the Father does, the Son also does.

Since it hasn’t worked out too well, I must be missing something????

Whenever you “try” to do something in your own willpower, you are doomed to less than the best results. Oh, you can get results, but if you do it my way you won’t be stressed out and the the results will be better. Actually all you should concern yourself with is staying in the process … leaving the results to me. The only thing you should strive to do is maintain connection with me. Seeing and hearing in my realm. Everything else can flow out of that.

Back to the key verse today, “go in your room and pray….” The whole purpose of that is to calibrate you, not to motivate me. It is true, that bumper sticker that you have … Prayer changes things. The main thing it changes is you. From that changed place, you have a different view of your circumstances. When you are successful at merging your heart and eyes and ears with mine you will then pray with great effect and all your prayers will be answered. That is the only thing to strive for. People will say you are  awesome. You are not. You will have just connected with an awesome God and that makes you an awesome warrior in my Army.