If we want to be people centered on Jesus—if we want the joy and peace of the Lord to reign in our lives—then we need to know and keep our attention on the Good News He has for us.
What is the Good News?
THAT JESUS IS KING!
Jesus is alive, risen from the dead, and reigning over all of creation.
If this is true, if Jesus really did rise from the dead everything will be okay.
We don’t have to see the purpose for every season of life in order to know things will be okay; we just have to know Jesus indeed is risen and reigning as King.
Paul seemed to think this was crucial, as well, for Timothy’s success and longevity as a church leader:
Keep Your Attention on Jesus
Keep your attention on Jesus Christ as risen from the dead and descended from David. This is according to my gospel. I suffer for it to the point of being bound like a criminal, but God’s message is not bound. This is why I endure all things for the elect: so that they also may obtain salvation, which is in Christ Jesus, with eternal glory. This saying is trustworthy:
For if we have died with Him,
we will also live with Him;
if we endure, we will also reign with Him;
if we deny Him, He will also deny us;
if we are faithless, He remains faithful,
for He cannot deny Himself.
2 Timothy 2:8-13 (HCSB)
The fact that Jesus is descended from David reminds us (if you remember from the OT) that Jesus is the Messiah—the anointed one come to crush the serpent and rescue Israel from its enemies.
Do we deny Jesus? If we do, the Abrahamic blessings available to us through the resurrection of Jesus will be denied us.
But if we do not deny Jesus, we will live and reign with Him.
Notice how the blessing of living and reigning with Jesus is not contingent upon our own faith or “faithfulness,” as some translations render it. Jesus does not reign as King because we put Him there by our faithfulness. The fact that Jesus reigns as King is Good News precisely because we were unfaithful.
We were “faithless.”
But He has remained faithful.
He, being equal with God, did not cling to His equality with God. But emptied Himself and became obedient even to death (Phil. 2:5).
But He is no longer dead. HE IS ALIVE!
And God has “highly exalted Him and given Him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow — of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth — and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil. 2:6-11).
Even in our failures and hopelessness, God remains faithful to us because He cannot deny Himself, and He, through His Son Jesus Christ, has accomplished for us what the law required (Ro. 8:1-4).
The question is, are we with Him?
Do we know in the deepest part of our hearts that He really is alive?
Those who die with Him will live with Him, and those who endure with Him will reign with Him.
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