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Thursday, October 14, 2010

SALT Challenge - God's Righteousness

This week it was my turn to set the SALT challenge! Here's my write up from the blog... Last week we had a guest speaker at our church and his sermons really stuck with me as he raised some very common questions that I, and I suspect others, hear frequently when talking about God. One of those questions was, “Is God righteous?” The only way to effectively answer such a question is to head straight to the Bible. Romans 3:21 states, “But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe.” Matthew Henry has these helpful comments on these verses, “Never was there such a demonstration of the justice and holiness of God as there was in the death of Christ. It appears that God hates sin, when nothing less than the blood of Christ would satisfy for it. The iniquities of us all being laid upon Him, though he was the Son of his love, yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him. Mercy and truth are so met together, righteousness and peace have so kissed each other, that it is now become not only an act of grace and mercy, but an act of righteousness, in God, to pardon the sins of penitent believers, having accepted the satisfaction that Christ by dying made to his justice for them." The one thought that I walked away with from hearing those sermons was that God is good. There is nothing in us that deserves God’s favor, it is only His mercy and long suffering that sustains us, even through those times that we walk away from Him or ignore His kindness. It may be argued that we deserve whatever we want or that God’s requirements are too heavy, too hard. Yes, God requires something from us but it is merely faith, faith in the One who was sent to deliver us from our sins. Christ is the answer, He came to take away the sting of death to stand in our place and take the punishment that we deserve. How great is His love and how righteous His works! May God be pleased to show you the love of Christ today! We're blessed when you share your artwork and thoughts with us...If you feel inspired by this week's study and/or art please leave us a comment on the SALT blog with a link back to your blog or gallery...we'd be delighted to see your creations! For my ATC, I used a lovely stamp set from Sweet 'n Sassy. The embossing on the ATC base is from Tim Holtz.

6 comments:

Hazel said...

Thank you for such a thoughtful challenge and for your beautiful ATC - such rich colours x

Lythan said...

Thanks for this Kim. It was a really thought provoking challenge that reminded me that I know what God's righteousness is - jsut not how to explain it in words. And actually I think "God is good" suims it up perfectly! Beautiful ATC too

Stampvanwinkle said...

Kim, this is just beautiful.

artfulstampin said...

God is truly GREAT, thank you Kim x

Korin said...

So lovely, Kim. God IS good!

Monika/Buzsy said...

Gorgeous ATC Kim. Love the fabulous image, the BG... the great lay-out... TFS!