Past, Present, and Forever Grace in My Redeemer – What She Said #15 – Week 4, Day 5

TODAY'S TREASURE

There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.

Acts 4:12 ESV

Transcript

What She Said #15

Past, Present, and Forever Grace in My Redeemer

Guest Writer, Lauri A. Hogle

Today’s Treasure

There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.

Acts 4:12 ESV

My Jesus, my Redeemer

Enduring electric shocks of hot-searing nerve pain, enduring needle after needle, enduring intractable pain and torturing unhealing cuts into nerve endings, You draw so near.

Remembering the suffering You took upon Yourself, my own affliction nestles itself in Your nail-pierced hands of love. I agonize over every bit of my sin when I imagine Your suffering on the cross in my place.

My Redeemer’s suffering for me, past grace

But Your entire earthly life was marked by intentional suffering—a life of victorious battles against the enemy’s temptations to sin, a perfectly stainless life that completely fulfilled Your law. In Your holy perfection, You are the sacrificial “Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.”

But O what gentle terms

What condescending ways,

Does our Redeemer use

To teach his heavenly grace!

My eyes with joy and wonder see

What forms of love he bears for me.

Jesus, Your propitiating death on the cross completely satisfied our Father’s just punishment for my sin. In Your becoming a curse in my place, You redeemed me “from the curse of the law,” for I could never keep the law perfectly. It’s impossible. Only You could pay that debt every human owes for our sin. Thank You, Jesus. 

Join all the glorious names

Of wisdom, love, and power,

That ever mortals knew,

That angels ever bore;

All are too mean to speak his worth,

Too mean to set my Savior forth.

All of it is our Father’s love and grace in sending You, God the Son, for this very purpose. But it’s even more astounding! Your holy and righteous life is now what our Father sees when He looks at me. Your perfect righteousness is now my own in Christ. 

This gracious gift overwhelms me as I suffer. This means that I can gaze on You as my Redeemer in Your victory over sin and our enemy and know Your last words are true…” It is finished.”

Arrayed in mortal flesh,

He like an angel stands,

And holds the promises

And pardons in his hands.

My Redeemer suffering with me, present grace

By Your continual grace, Your blessing, Your power, the Holy Spirit within, keep me from losing heart. Help me to cast every one of my anxieties onto You, because You care for me. Remind me…Your “grace is sufficient” for me. Why? Because it’s Your power that is “made perfect in weakness.” In every temptation this suffering brings, You’re able to help me…because You also suffered when You were tempted. “Content” me, in Your presence, with Your always present and sanctifying grace, Lord.

Commissioned from his Father’s throne.

To make his grace to mortals known.

My Redeemer’s gift of hope, His sufficient grace and blessing

It’s Your current blessing as I suffer, to set my hope where it belongs. It’s a sure hope for my future, because You’ve mysteriously already done it! God “who began a good work in [me] will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ!” You are my life, and when You appear, then I “also will appear with [You] in glory!” When I’m tempted to despair of life itself, fix me on every future blessing to come. For in this very process, You’re blessing me in turning me to You, in my desperate need, with Your grace.

LIFE-GIVING ENCOURAGEMENT

Grace upon grace, from eternity past to eternity future, Jesus our Redeemer is suffering with us now. In our storms, thorns, tribulation, and affliction, His grace will lead us home to Himself. Let’s take heart as we sing of His amazing grace to us in today’s suffering.

PRAYER

Blessed Redeemer, focus me on Your past grace to endure my sufferings with Your present grace. Fill my heart with songs of thanksgiving to You so that I can walk into Your plans for my future, knowing Your forever grace will be there too. In Your saving name, amen. 

This devotion is adapted from Praying God’s Blessings in Christ as We Suffer: Scripture Prayers for the Hardest Days. Order o

(1)  “Join All the Glorious Names,” Watts, I., p. d. Sing to the tune of “Rejoice, the Lord is King!”

(2) “Amazing Grace,” Newton, J., 1779