The Hooray Chapter

I’m including this gorgeous picture of Brian's--a Tucson sunset because I forgot to do so last week—it has nothing whatsoever to do with the subject of my blog, but isn’t it beautiful?.                                               

 And yes, the colors really were that vivid.

Hooray or hurrah or yippee—Dean and I have finally reached the last chapter in J.I. Packer’s book BELIEVING GOD. Not done yet but will be by next week. What a tussle, but so very rewarding because it has really made us stretch our gray matter.  I can already see I need to check it out of our church library next year and read it again—Yikes!

Packer calls his last chapter, "The Adequacy of God" and focuses on that wonderful 8^th chapter of Romans. He prefaces it with Luther’s statement about the book of Romans, being “the clearest gospel of all.” Then Packer alludes to Romans 8 as a sort of microcosm of the Gospel

Case in point: the chapter starts out with “there is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus” and ends with “[nothing]… can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.”  In between we find such precious nuggets as “All things work together for good to those who love God…”(verse 28) and “If God is for us, who can be against us?” (verse 31b). And because of Jesus’ death on the cross and His resurrection, we finite, puny human beings can call the Creator of the Universe, "Abba, Father" (verse 15)--remember, Abba in Hebrew is like saying Daddy in American. I think that’s a pretty awesome privilege!

I’ve recently enjoyed participating in the Beth Moore DVD/Bible study titled “The Inheritance.” God is so gracious and kind to us, His adopted children. The 8^th chapter of Romans is a great picture of our inheritance through Jesus. If you feel like you need some spiritual rejuvenation, sort of like a “battery jump” for your spirit, go to Romans 8. You will either realize again what you have been given in Christ, or you will realize what you need—which is a personal relationship with the Great I AM.

I would love to dialogue with any readers interested in discussing this topic. In the meantime have a great weekend (if you read this when I post it).