How to Use "The Lust Dare"
Day #23: Whatever is Just.
“But you were washed,
but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus
and by the Spirit of our God.” -1 Corinthians 6:11
The third thing mentioned in our
passage about thinking on better things, is the word just. Many translations write
that word as “right.” It is a word that we see all over the new testament. It
is used to refer to righteous people such as Joseph, Zacharias and Elizabeth,
John the Baptist, and even Jesus.
It is used to refer to “the
righteous” in general. (Matt 9:13; 10:41; 13:17,43; 25:46; Mk 2:17)
It is used to refer to that which
is fair or just. (Matt 20:4)
It is used to refer to righteous
blood. (Matt 23:35)
This word is really used in a
multitude of different ways. This one is not as cut and dry as some of the
other words that are used in the passage and thus it leaves us a little more
flexibility. We are left with a multitude of things to think on here. God is
giving us a whole myriad of choices.
We can choose to think on those
that have been righteous in the past, and what it is that made them righteous.
A great way to do this is to look in the Bible to see whom God called
righteous, and then in meditating on that, we can learn from their example. We
are not called to be those people,
but thinking on why God saw them as righteous can greatly help us enhance our
walk with Christ. There is a whole chapter in the Bible that talks on why
people of the Bible gained good report. Hebrews 11, the hall of fame of the
Bible, talks of those that were called righteous because of their faith.
We can choose to think on the way
that God is just. It is only by completely understanding the just and right
nature of God that we can fully understand the significance of the mercy and
grace that He extended us. We know that we are saved, because we are made aware
of what we were saved from. A blind and deaf person who is unaware that they
are about to be hit by a moving vehicle, when rescued by someone, can not fully
grasp the significance of their rescue until it is explained to them somehow
what they were saved from. When we truly see the ugliness of our sin, and the
real just nature of God, we have no choice but to be overwhelmingly grateful
for the gift of grace that has been extended to us.
We can choose to think on the
righteous blood that has been spilled before us. This kind of ties the last two
together. There are those that we can look to, for they were called righteous,
and gave their lives for the sake of Christ. And we can look at the shedding of
the blood on the cross, effectively remembering the righteous blood that was
spilled.
This is what we are called to: to
think on that which is just or good. And God, speaking through Paul, really
knew what He was talking about! He knew that in calling us to think on that
which is good, not only would it replace that which is not, but it would also
cause us to grow in our walk and to better understand the grace of God.
“You shall follow
what is altogether just, that you may live and inherit the land which the Lord your God is giving you.” –Deuteronomy 16:20
Today’s Dare
Go to Hebrews 11, and pick one of the righteous people
listed there. Then go back to the story of that person earlier in scripture and
study it. Figure out why they were called righteous, and meditate on that.
Write an essay on it, or a story that you can tell small children, or narrate
it to your accountability partner that you might be required to think and dwell
on it and thus will remember it better. Make it a habit thus to think on that
which is good, just, and righteous.
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