How is it that we, as fallen, sinful beings, can be pleasing to a holy God?
Read Romans 8:1 and Romans 5:8. What do these texts teach about our standing before God?
God bestows grace on people prior to any human response. Before anything we say or do, God reaches out to us and gives us the opportunity to accept or reject His love. As Romans 5:8 puts it, “God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (NKJV; compare with Jer. 31:3). And we can be reconciled to God and even pleasing in His sight, by faith through the work of our Redeemer.
Read 1 Peter 2:4–6 and compare it with Hebrews 11:6. What does this tell us about how we can be pleasing to God?
Without God’s intervention, fallen people are incapable of bringing anything valuable to God. Yet God, in His grace and mercy, has made a way, through the work of Christ. Specifically, “through Jesus Christ” we may “offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God” (1 Pet. 2:5, NKJV). Although “without faith it is impossible to please Him” (Heb. 11:6, NKJV), by the mediating work of Christ, God will “make” believers “complete in every good work to do His will, working in you what is well pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen” (Heb. 13:21, NKJV). Those who respond to God by faith are accounted righteous in His sight through the mediation of Christ, whose righteousness alone is acceptable. And those who respond to God’s loving overtures are accounted worthy through Christ’s mediation (Luke 20:35), and He transforms them into His likeness (1 Cor. 15:51–57, 1 John 3:2). God’s redeeming work is not only for us but in us, as well.
Why is the idea of Christ mediating for you in heaven so encouraging?
Supplemental EGW Notes
There is no encouragement given for unbelief. The Lord manifests His grace and His power over and over again, and this should teach us that it is always profitable under all circumstances to cherish faith, to talk faith, to act faith. We are not to have our hearts and hands weakened by allowing the suggestions of suspicious minds to plant in our hearts the seeds of doubt and distrust [Hebrews 3:12 quoted].
The Lord works in cooperation with the will and action of the human agent. It is the privilege and duty of every man to take God at His word, to believe in Jesus as his personal Saviour, and to respond eagerly, immediately, to the gracious propositions which He makes. He is to study to believe and obey the divine instruction in the Scriptures. He is to base his faith not on feeling but upon the evidence and the Word of God.—Ellen G. White Comments, in The Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentary, vol. 7, p. 924.
Everything that God could do, He has done to manifest His great love and mercy. . . . He “so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” Then rest in the assurance of the love of God. Not because we first loved Him did God love us; but “while we were yet sinners,” Christ died for us, making full and abundant provision for our redemption. Although by our disobedience we have merited God’s displeasure and condemnation, yet He has not forsaken us, leaving us to grapple with the power of the enemy in our own finite strength. Heavenly angels fight our battles for us, and cooperating with them, we may be victorious over the powers of evil. As we draw nigh to Him by faith, He draws nigh to us, adopting us into His family, and making us His sons and daughters.—Sons and Daughters of God, p. 53.
[Christ] knew from the beginning, of the apostasy of Satan and of the fall of Adam through the deceptive power of the apostate. The plan of salvation was designed to redeem the fallen race, to give them another trial. Christ was appointed to the office of Mediator from the creation of God, set up from everlasting to be our substitute and surety. Before the world was made, it was arranged that the divinity of Christ should be enshrouded in humanity. “A body,” said Christ, “hast thou prepared me” (Hebrews 10:5). . . .
To bring humanity into Christ, to bring the fallen race into oneness with divinity, is the work of redemption. Christ took human nature that men might be one with Him as He is one with the Father, that God may love man as He loves His only-begotten Son, that men may be partakers of the divine nature, and be complete in Him.—Selected Messages, book 1, p. 250.
The above quotations are taken from Ellen G. White Notes for the Sabbath School Lessons, published by Pacific Press Publishing Association. Used by permission.