Turning Sinners into Winners

UV 1355/10,000 Turning Sinners into Winners
Yea, he loved the people; all his saints are in thy hand: and they sat down at thy feet; every one shall receive of thy words.
Deuteronomy 33 v 3

God so loved the children of Jacob, the nation of Israel that He sent Moses, redeeming him first from a watery grave among the papyrus reeds in the Nile, to redeem them from slavery to Pharaoh. God so loved the world that He sent His only Son begotten of a woman, Jesus to redeem us from our slavery to sin and death. We are no longer sinners or losers but winners over death and sin. Christ the perfect son of God and perfect man dying on the cross, with forgiveness on his lips and in His heart, is the ultimate and absolute demonstration and proof of the love of God. Now neither troubles nor hardship, persecution, famine, nakedness or danger or sword or guns or bombs or diseases can separate us from the love of Christ. Neither can death or life, angels or demons, height or depth of misery or glory, nor anything else in heaven or on earth can separate us from the love of God that is demonstrated in Jesus. The evidence of this inseparable love is the hundreds of believers who have been slaughtered and tortured like sheep by cruel ISIS executioners in the troubled lands of the Middle East. They died without denying their faith in such absolute love. They died without murmur as they were anaesthetised by a vision of the love and glory of God. Now these martyrs are translated as saints in His hand and are at His hand. They are winners over fear and hatred. They are more than conquerors as the latter feared death even as they fought bravely but they submitted to death with only the name of Jesus on their lips and love in their hearts even for those who so cruelly slayed them.

The greatest honour is to be declared a saint by faith and grace. The greatest teacher is Jesus. Paul learnt at the feet of the greatest teacher of the time Gamaliel but it only taught him pride, stubbornness and hatred. But his life began to be transformed the moment he heard the voice of Jesus. There was a dramatic change in vision, in his priorities and in his actions. Where earlier he hated people with different beliefs than his, he now loved them. Where earlier he sought to harm and kill them, he now sought to bless and equip them to be winners like him.
The Lord loves the Jews as He made a covenant with their ancestor Abraham. The closest thing to a covenant in earthly terms is marriage. It is the deepest, unbreakable and most personal relationship of love. He loves us when we make a covenant with Him believing in His Word that we hear and receive. Our bonds with God in Christ are now indissoluble and eternal, outlasting death, troubles, vicissitudes of life. We learn at His feet. We learn from the best teacher to be the best. His words have a sufficient answer for every question of man. His words are beyond human knowledge and wisdom. His words are nourishment and sanctification. We are now declared winners in our lives. We are also winners of souls for the Lord. We and the Lord are inseparable. We have no destiny apart from Him, no power, no purpose, no meaning apart from Him. In Him, with Him is our destiny fulfilled, our power manifest, our purpose attained, meaning imparted to all that happens in our lives.

Prateep V Philip