Foundations of the Christian Life. Chapter 9 The Work of Christ: The Divine Exchange.

Foundations of the Christian Life.
Chapter 9. The Work of Christ: The Divine Exchange.

SUMMARY:

In the previous chapters we saw that the Early Church came to a certain understanding of the Work of Christ that became foundational for understanding the whole of the Gospel. The key idea was that Christ came to be mediator of a New Covenant between God and man. We saw that in the Bible the idea of mediation is as follows:
1. The Mediator is not an independent third party but must, in himself, embody the two parties needing reconciliation, otherwise he cannot be the mediator. Thus Christ, being already the Word, God the Son, took on human form so that he could embody both God and man.
2. As the “God-man” he was then able to work mediation. Here again the Bible idea is different from ours’. The parties at war do nothing to bring about the mediation, but the Mediator has to fulfil all the conditions required of both parties and bring the Covenant to a state of completion. The Mediator has to work the mediation on behalf of the two parties.
3. The Mediator then can offer the completed covenant to the parties involved as a gift. They simply receive the covenant already in place, already set up. They receive it as a gift.
4. In the last chapter we saw how Christ removed the obstacle to relationship with God (i.e. sin) through his death on the Cross. He satisfied the demand of God’s holiness that sin be punished by becoming our substitute and taking the punishment for us.

In this chapter I want to touch on two ideas:
1. Not only did Christ take our sins; he also took our sinful nature.
2. The work of Christ exchanged all of our brokenness, due to our fallenness, for the image of God.


CHRIST TOOK ON (“ASSUMED”) OUR SIN NATURE:

The Teaching of the Church Fathers:

If we are to understand the work of Christ we need to understand what the Fathers of the Church taught concerning it.
The Fathers taught as follows (This, in part, is a summary of the ideas of St Athanasius, “On the Incarnation of the Word”):

1. In Creation all things were made from “nothing”(Genesis 1:1-3, Romans 4:17). They were given existence and form by the Word of God (John 1:1-3, Hebrews 1:2). Mankind was thus created by the Word of God (“Let us make man…” Genesis 1:26) such that the nature of mankind was grounded in the Word of God. In this way man was made “in the image of God”, being grounded in the Word of God who is Himself the image of God (Colossians 1:15). Thus we derived our “image” from him who is the image of God.

2. However with the sin of Adam, the Fall, mankind broke free from the Word of God as his ground and source. Through disobedience to the word (the command) we broke free from the Word (The Divine Lawgiver). We “fell away” from the Word which/who gave us form and substance and are now in a state where we hang suspended above “nothingness”. We are in danger of falling totally into nothingness, the nothingness from which the world was originally created. The image of God in us is shattered. By being divorced from the Word who gives us the image we lose access to the image and so we live lives that deny the image.

3. The human problem is that we are now cut off from the Word, the ground and source of our being and we have no way of re-establishing contact with that Word, if left to ourselves. Therefore God, in his love, stepped into our situation by sending his Son, the Word of God, to earth as a human being to reunite humankind with the Word of God. He did this so that we could again find our being and purpose in God. It was fitting that the Word of God, who was the ground of the creation made from nothing in the beginning, should enter into that same creation as a man and reclaim that creation from the curse of nothingness (vanity) it was under, for the glory of God.

4. To do this the Word, the Son of God, became man (Philippians 2:6-8). Retaining fully his divine nature (as the Word) he took on (“assumed”) humanity. Thus he had two natures, human and divine, each perfectly preserved and fully intact in the one person. This is what we call “The Incarnation” from the Latin words meaning, “to be in the flesh”, i.e. a body.

5. Then in every stage of life, being as we are in the world, he was fully tempted, but instead of sinning (as Adam did) at each point of test he brought to bear his Divine nature (the Word) onto the human situation so that the human nature was again connected to the Word of God. In doing this he regrafted the nature of man to the Word of God as it was in the beginning. (This, of course, assumes that the human nature he began with was not grafted to the Word when he started the process, i.e. his human nature was what we would call “fallen”.) Through this process, of “re-identifying” humanity with the Word, the image of God in mankind was restored. The fallen human nature was exchanged for the Divine nature, the Word. This exchange happened “in Christ”, in his own being. The Fathers called this “The Divine Exchange”.

6. By the end of his life on earth this fallen human nature he had perfectly converted back into the image of God grounded in the Word.

7. This perfect man he was then able to offer as a sacrifice on our behalf, thus paying the penalty for sin (1 John 3:5) and putting to death the old fallen Adamic nature once and for all (2 Corinthians 5:14).

8. Now, Christ having been raised from the dead, this new humanity-in-the-image-of-God is offered to us as a gift. We too can be converted in our inner nature by believing and receiving the Word of God.

This leads to another question:

Who Needed Reconciling?

Answer: God and sinful man.
So the mediator had to embody God and sinful man.

It would be no good if he embodied God and “non-sinful” man – because:
1. No such men exist, so in this case he would reconcile nobody to God.
2. If they did exist they would not be in rebellion against God so would not need reconciling.
3. The reconciliation of such “non sinful” men to God would not help sinful men who are lost in their sin and rebellion.

Not only did God become a man; he assumed fallen humanity – he became a “fallen” man.
About this the Church has always agreed. It is affirmed in Scripture.

2 Corinthians 5:21
“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

There is general agreement that this is not the idea of Christ simply taking the punishment for our sins, i.e. our acts of wrongdoing. It rather indicates he took on the very fallen nature of sin that we need redemption from.

St. Athanasius put it this way: “Whatever is not assumed is not healed”.
By this he meant that if Christ had not assumed our fallenness then we could not be healed from it. But we can – and will be – healed from it.

While the Church has agreed Christ took on our fallenness, there has been debate about when he actually assumed the fallenness of humanity. (Note: It is not disputed that he assumed our fallenness. That he took on our fallenness has always been the view of the Evangelical Church. The only question is this: “When did he assume our fallenness?”)

To this question two answers have been given:
1. The answer of Athanasius and the Fathers at the two Church Councils was that he took our fallenness on himself in the incarnation, i.e. at conception. This is still the view of the Eastern Orthodox Church today. This implies that in his human nature from conception, and right through his life, he (like us) struggled with a fallen human nature.

T.F. Torrance is representative of an Eastern view:
“Since, in Jesus, God has come into our human being and united our human nature with his own, divine nature, then atoning reconciliation takes place within the personal Being of the Mediator. His person and work are one. What he does is not separate from his personal being. I.e. the work of Christ does not take place outside of Christ but within him, within the incarnate constitution of his person as Mediator. Redemption is thus linked with the incarnation...
“In Jesus Christ, the Son of God became incarnate within our fallen, guilt-laden humanity. Through his own atoning self-sacrifice and self-consecration, he did away with our evil and healed and sanctified our human nature from within and thus presents us to the Father as those redeemed and consecrated in himself.”

2. The Western Church, some time after the Councils, moved to a view that said he assumed our fallenness only while he was on the Cross. This would imply that during his life on earth he did not have a fallen human nature. Rather he assumed our fallenness only when he was on the Cross as part of his final Passion. This is the generally held view of both Catholic and Protestant Churches.

Derek Prince, “The Atonement” is representative of a Western View:
“At the Cross an exchange took place, divinely ordained and predicted. All the evil due, by Justice, to come to us came on Jesus so that all the good due to Jesus earned by his sinless obedience, might be made available to us.”

I have not studied when the change in the West came or exactly why. However I suspect the influence of Greek philosophy on Western theologians. The ideas of God held by the philosophers (as listed in Chapter 7) would tend to produce such a shift. One of the facts about the Nicene Creed was that it was – at every point – a contradiction of some tenet of Greek Philosophy. This contradiction centred on Christ: In Christ, the perfect, sinless God took on sinful humanity. Thus Christ is the absolute contradiction of Greek philosophy which said God, being perfect, could not come into contact with corruption. The Fathers at Nicea clearly understood this but Greek philosophy later again infiltrated the Church at several points and this appears to have been one of them. Secular Rome at the time was in the grip of Greek philosophical ideas and they seem to have crept back into the Church at this point.

Another verse that is relevant to this discussion is:

Romans 8:3
“For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful man, ….”

* It is clear here that the issue is our "sinful nature" and that Christ took on himself. This is not talking about sins, i.e. acts of wrongdoing, but about the nature of sin.
* The word “likeness” does not mean the English sense of “like but not the same as”. Rather the Greek means, “It is like, that is, exactly the same as…” So the meaning is that “God …sending his own Son as a sinful man…”
* The language used, “sending”, sounds more like a reference to the incarnation, his birth, than to the Cross.

It is hard to imagine how Christ could have taken on our sin nature at the Cross, but it is easy to see how it could happen at the incarnation: Jesus would have inherited it from Mary. Jewish belief is that we inherit our spirituality from our mother, not our father, so this would make sense. The Catholic Church recognises this difficulty and so has put forward the doctrine of “The Immaculate Conception of Mary”. This is not a doctrine about the conception of Christ, but rather of Mary. They recognise that if she was fallen then her children would be also, including Christ. Thus to overcome this they suggest Mary herself was “unfallen” because she was “Immaculately conceived.” The problem with this is that it just pushes the problem one step further back. How was it that she was immaculately conceived? Was her mother sinless? And so the problem reappears. There are several other points that could be raised that make the Western position unlikely but they are beyond the scope of this course.

Scholars in the West are coming back to the Eastern/ Orthodox view because it really makes more sense.

Another discussion of this question is found on my blog:
salvationhistory.blogspot.com
Chapter 16, Christ as Mediator.
I touch there on some of the reasons why I feel the Eastern view is correct and answer an objection from the West.

In this series on foundations we are going to assume that the view of Athanasias at Nicea was correct, the Orthodox view, I.e. Christ assumed our fallenness in the incarnation. Detailed argument as to why this view is taken is beyond the scope of this course. But the implications that flow out of it are amazing.

It is said that Einstein, when he first presented his Theory of Relativity, had not actually proven it. But the scholars who heard his presentation were convinced of the rightness of his theory because of the inner beauty of it. It actually took several decades more work to prove it to be true. It is my feeling that sometimes disputes over Bible interpretation cannot finally be proven one way or the other – we just don’t know enough to give a final answer. But it is my feeling that the beauty of the flow-on implications of the Orthodox view is so great that the approach has to be true.

At the heart of this is a concept that grows out of the idea of Christ as Mediator – the idea of:

THE DIVINE EXCHANGE.

The Church has from the beginning taught this:
(The following notes are largely, but not totally, taken from Derek Prince, “The Atonement”. This book, though I disagree with his approach to the timing of Christ assuming our sinfulness, is otherwise a brilliant exposition of the exchange made by Christ.)

“As our mediator Christ took all the evil that was coming to mankind due to sin and exchanged it in himself for all the righteous goodness of God so that we could enjoy God’s favour…

“Jesus on the Cross said, “It is finished.”
In Greek this is a single word in the perfect tense and means, “to do something perfectly”. “To perfectly perfect.” “To completely complete.” The perfect tense suggests that the work and its effects will remain completely effective from that time on. It will not diminish or fade in its intensity or effectiveness. It will not change or become partial. What is done is done and it cannot be changed.”

This is the effect of the work of Christ – it is to finish something, and the Church understands that work to be the work of mediating a New Covenant between God and man. Included in that Covenant is the total conversion of our fallen human nature into the image of God, a Divine Exchange. In a sense it was an unfair exchange – but to our advantage.

“The heart of the Gospel: Isaiah 53:4-6.
“Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.”

“The central verse: v6—this is the problem of the human race. Here is the diagnosis of the Bible. We have not all committed gross sin. But there is one thing each of us has done: we have turned to our own way, which is not God’s way. The best modern word for that is rebellion. The root problem of humanity is rebellion against God. We are all in the same category; we are rebels. We without exception have gone our own way. But the marvellous message is this: God has laid on Jesus the iniquity of us all.

“Hebrew: iniquity = avon. It not only means iniquity but also all the evil consequences of iniquity, the punishment of iniquity, and the evil consequences that iniquity brings on those are guilty.

Thus: "the Lord laid on the suffering servant the iniquity of us all, the punishment of our iniquity and all the evil consequences of iniquity."

“This leads us to a fundamental truth—a key that unlocks all the treasures of God’s provision. At the Cross an exchange took place, divinely ordained and predicted. All the evil due, by Justice, to come to us came on Jesus so that all the good due to Jesus earned by his sinless obedience, might be made available to us.”

In the view that we are taking here (the Orthodox View of St. Athanasius) we would want to go a little further. This exchange took place – not only at the Cross, but all through the life of Christ. At every point of temptation or trial Christ exchanged a fallen human response for obedience to the Word of God that was within him, his Divine nature. In this way our humanity was again reconnected to the Word of God, fallenness was exchanged for obedience. This in no way minimises the work of the Cross, nor the great glory of it, but it gives the whole of Christ’s life great spiritual significance for us. The beauty of this we shall see in later chapters.

Derek Prince in his book then goes on to outline nine specific aspects of the exchange or the substitution and five specific things we are delivered from. There are other exchanges but these are basic.

The Nine exchanges comprise a complete provision for us as Christians in every area of our lives. God has made sure that we will lack nothing in this life through his provision in Christ.
As we go through these check out and see if there is any area of life that is left uncovered by God’s provision in Christ.

The Nine Exchanges.

1. Forgiveness of sins.

Isaiah 53:5
“But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.”

Confession: Jesus was punished that I might be forgiven.

2. Righteousness in place of sin.

There is a difference between sins and sin. The sinless Son of God took on himself the total sinfulness of the entire race.

2 Corinthians 5:21
“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

The opposite of sinfulness is righteousness.
Jesus was made sin with our sinfulness that we might be made righteous with his righteousness.
We never attain the righteousness of God by trying to be good. The only way to apprehend the righteousness of God is by faith.

Confession: Jesus was made sin with my sinfulness that I might be made righteous with his righteousness.

3. Life in place of death.

Jesus died our death that we might share his life.

Romans 6:23
“For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

There is an enormous difference between what Jesus gives us and what we deserve:
Wages are earned for work and are justice. The free gift cannot be earned.

Confession: Jesus died my death that I might share his life.

4. Blessing in place of curse.

Galatians 3:13,14
“Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: "Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree." He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.”

Every curse that might have come on us came on Jesus instead that all the blessings due him might be made available to us.

The blessing of Abraham: Gen. 24:1. In all things—in every area of life.

How is this relevant to us:
Well, Paul tells us in Galatians that even Christians can come under a curse.
If we try to live our lives on the basis of law – rules and regulations – we come under a curse. The essence of law is that you have to keep all of it to fulfil it and because of our fallen natures we can’t.

If we try to live this way we come under a power of Witchcraft.
Galatians 3:1. "Bewitched" — even Christians can be bewitched, i.e. come under a curse.
The problem in Galatia was the attempt to be righteous by keeping the law, i.e. legalism. Paul says this is witchcraft.

Confession: Jesus took the Curse so that I can have the blessing of Abraham – fullness in all things – in every area of life.

5. Abundance in place of poverty.

Jesus endured our poverty that we might share his abundance.

2 Corinthians 8:9
“For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich.”

2 Corinthians 9:8
“And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in all good works.”

Greek: “all” - five times, “abound” - twice. But it is only received through grace.
Poverty is a curse. The alternative to poverty is riches but Prince prefers the rendering “abundance”.
God offers us abundance, i.e. having enough for our own needs and something left over for others.
There are three levels of provision: insufficiency, sufficiency, abundance.
God wants us to have abundance.

This passage (2 Corinthians 8-9) is dealing with the subject of money. That is clear in the context. Normal rules of interpreting scripture would require us to interpret these promises in the context they are found to find the true meaning.

Confession: Jesus endured my poverty that I might share his abundance.

6. The new man in place of the old man.

Another aspect of the Cross: not what the cross can do for us but what it can do in us.
The old and new man are two of the most important characters in the New Testament.

Romans 6:6
“For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin.”

The old man: the sinful nature we have inherited by our descent from Adam. Every descendant of Adam is born with a rebel within. This fallen nature of sin has in every area been corrupted by the sin in it.

The old theologians used to call this “Total Depravity”. By this they did not mean that we were so totally corrupt that we could not do any good, but rather they meant that there is not one part of our nature that is not touched by sin and in some way corrupted. We are depraved in every area of our being – just some areas are more depraved than others.

The old man is absolutely corrupt morally, physically and emotionally. Corruption is irreversible. The only way to change a person is to make him a new creation. God’s plan is to replace the old man with the new man. “You are a new creation – the old has passed away behold the new has come.”

God has only one remedy for the rebel--he executes him. But the message of mercy is that the execution took place in Jesus on the cross.

In order to be freed from slavery to sin we must do more than receive forgiveness for our past sins; we must deal with the rebel inside. Here is where the cross comes in: our old man was crucified with Christ.

Confession: My old man, the rebel, the corrupt one, was crucified in Jesus that I might be delivered from that evil and corrupt nature and that a new nature might come into me through the word of God and take control of me.

7. His wounding for our healing.

Isaiah 53:4
“Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.”

Jesus was wounded physically so that we might be healed physically.

Griefs: Hebrew literally means “sicknesses”.
Sorrows: Hebrew literally means “pains”.

Notice the tense: “we are healed” literally “Healing was obtained for us” i.e. on the Cross.
When the Bible speaks about atonement it never puts healing in the future. As far as God is concerned healing has already been obtained. We are healed.

Confession: Jesus was wounded that I might be healed.

Finally two aspects of the exchange that provide emotional healing for the wounds of shame and rejection.

8. Glory in place of shame

Isaiah 53:4,5
“Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.”

“Wounds”: both in the physical and the emotional realms.
There are various emotional wounds and healing for all of them is provided through the Cross. But shame and rejection are two of the commonest and deepest emotional wounds that humanity suffers.

Shame: the opposite is glory.
Jesus endured our shame that we might share his glory.
Shame is one of the most common emotional problems of Gods people. Believers are ashamed to let others know they have a problem. Shame shuts you up in a prison.

Hebrews 2:10
“In bringing many sons to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the author of their salvation perfect through suffering.”

Hebrews 12:2
“Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”

He endured shame right through his life: As far as the people in Nazareth were concerned he was illegitimate and they kept reminding him of the fact. In fact the priests resorted to reminding him of this too, “Moses – we know where he came from but we don’t know where this man came from”. This is a direct slur on his parentage. They wouldn’t have said this if they had accepted Joseph as his father but they knew that was not the case.

On the Cross Jesus endured shame—such shame as we can hardly imagine.
There was no form of death more shameful than crucifixion. It was the lowest form of punishment for the most debased criminals. Naked, mockery. What he endured was shame.

Confession: Thank you Jesus that you bore my shame so that I can be released from it.

9. Acceptance in place of rejection.

Jesus endured our rejection that we might have his acceptance.

Rejection can be described as the sense of being unwanted and unloved. You are always on the outside looking in. Other people are “in”; somehow you never are.

1 John 4:19
“We love because he first loved us.”

We are incapable of loving unless love has been awakened in us from someone else's love. A person who has never been loved does not know how to love.

Jesus was rejected throughout his life:
Already mentioned at Nazareth.
Bethlehem – Joseph’s home town. Courtesy would have demanded that his family give him lodging but they refused to do to because of his wife and illegitimate child.
His hometown rejected him – tried to stone him.
On the cross he was rejected: We hid our faces from him. Hung between heaven and earth – the earth rejecting him and heaven not accepting him.
Everyone rejected Jesus - including the Father. God rejected him because he became sinful with our sinfulness.

Ephesians 1:4,5
“For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will…”

We are chosen. We are accepted in the Beloved. This is the ultimate acceptance.
Greek: accepted = to make graceful or gracious, be highly favoured. Being highly favoured is even better than being accepted.

Confession: Jesus endured my rejection that I might have his acceptance.

So there we have it – nine aspects of the exchange made at the cross. Every area of life is met with the provision of God in Christ – just as Peter says ‘All thing pertaining to life and godliness are granted through him” and these are available to us in the “great and precious promises”.

There are other exchanges we will encounter at a later point.


HOMEWORK:

Make sure you understand the principle being taught in this chapter – the Divine Exchange. It is one of the most fundamental things about the work of Christ that you need to know. Many other things flow out of this simple key to understanding: Jesus took our place so that we could take his place.

TRANSFORMER VERSES AND PRAYER:

Use the verses listed for the nine exchanges and the confessions that go with them. Read them out loud daily. Read the verses, the confessions and the prayers. You may want to use these every day for the rest of your life!

Jesus was punished that I might be forgiven.
Isaiah 53:5
“But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.”

Thank you Jesus for bearing my sins, I give you my sin and guilt and receive your forgiveness.

Jesus was made sin with my sinfulness that I might be made righteous with his righteousness.
2 Corinthians 5:21
“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

Thank you Jesus for taking on yourself my sinfulness. I give you my sinfulness and receive your righteousness.

Jesus died my death that I might share his life.
Romans 6:23
“For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Thank you Jesus for dying the death that was mine. I receive your life by the Holy Spirit.

Jesus took the Curse so that I can have the blessing of Abraham – fullness in all things – in every area of life.
Galatians 3:13,14
“Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: "Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree." He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.”

Thank you Jesus for taking the curse and all its consequences. I receive the blessing of Abraham now – prosperity in every of my life.

Jesus endured my poverty that I might share his abundance.
2 Corinthians 8:9
“For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich.”

Thank you Jesus that for my sake you became poor so that I could be rich in you. I receive your abundance now.

My old man, the rebel, the corrupt one, was crucified in Jesus that I might be delivered from that evil and corrupt nature and that a new nature might come into me through the word of God and take control of me.
Romans 6:6
“For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin.”

Thank you Jesus that you took on yourself my old corrupt nature and put it to death. I now receive the new nature, being renewed in your image.

Jesus was wounded that I might be healed.
Isaiah 53:4
“Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.”

Thank you Jesus that on the Cross you took my sicknesses and pains so that I can be healed and whole. I receive your healing and your health now.

Jesus took my shame so that I can receive his glory.
Hebrews 12:2
“Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”

Thank you Jesus that you took my shame on yourself so that I can live in your glory. I receive your glory now.

Jesus took my rejection so that I can receive his acceptance.
1 John 4:19
“We love because he first loved us.”
Ephesians 1:4,5
“For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will…”

Thank you Jesus that you have taken on yourself my rejection and abandonment and the abuse that went with it and have given me the right to be the child of God, accepted in yourself into the Father’s presence. I give you my rejection and receive your acceptance.