ALL YOUR CARE

Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you. 1Pe 5:7

The Lord’s believing people in this world are not without cares. Strong’s Greek dictionary says that the world “care” in 1 Peter 5:7 has the idea of “distraction” to it. We have many things that would “distract” us from centering our attention on God Himself, His grace and mercy to us and what He has told us and promised us in His Word. They would distract us from the peace, joy and comfort that God gives. On top of this are all the trials, troubles and tribulations of this life. By the Holy Spirit, Peter gives us a command that we are to follow hour by hour. “Casting all your care upon Him..” Cast here means literally to throw on Him! We are to throw on our Almighty God “ALL” our care! Not part, not most but all. All that would distract us from what He has given us in His well beloved Son. Furthermore, we are to keep “casting” these cares on Him and here is the reason, “for He careth for you.” How do we know this and how can we be assured of His care for us? It is in the evidence of what He has already done for us and given to us! He has given us Christ, the Best, the One who is ALL! All our afflictions, all our heartaches, we are to cast on Him because He has cast all our sins on Christ who has borne them away. “Cast thy burden upon the LORD, and he shall sustain thee: he shall never suffer the righteous to be moved.” (Ps 55:22) The glorious God cares for us! He is concerned for us, interested in us and we matter to Him. We are loved by Him in Christ our Righteousness.

Gary Shepard

I passed a church sign recently that read: “Your Future Depends on How You Live Today.” My first thought was how that this statement pretty much sums up the message of false religion in our day. The truth is far different! How Christ lived and much more, how He died, is what our future depends on! Salvation is totally in His work and not our works. “Not by works of righteousness which we have done but according to His mercy HE saved us…” Titus 3:5

Gary Shepard

God’s love to his Son, as a Mediator, is an everlasting love; Thou lovedst me, says Christ (John 17:24), before the foundation of the world. This love was a love of complacency and delight; for Christ as Mediator, was from everlasting, then by him, that is, the Father (Pr 8:30), as one brought up with him, and was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him. Now God loves his elect with the same love he loves his Son as Mediator. Hence Christ prays for the open and manifest union between him and his people; That says he (John 17:23), the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me. If God therefore has loved his Son, as Mediator, from everlasting, with a love of complacency and delight, and he has loved his elect from everlasting with the same love he has loved him, then he must have loved his elect from everlasting with a love of complacency and delight: and, indeed how can it otherwise be, since the elect were always in Christ their Head, in whom they were chosen before the foundation of the world? And they could not be considered in him but as righteous persons, through his righteousness, with which God is always well pleased, because by it the law is magnified, and made honorable; and so Christ is often said to be God’s beloved Son, in whom not with whom, he is well pleased (Mt 3:17; 2Pe 1:17); which designs not his person only singly, but all the elect, as considered in him, who together with Christ, are the objects of God’s eternal delight and pleasure.

John Gill

In stark contrast to that grace of the Spirit called humility is fleshly self-promotion. Where self-promotion is there can be no glorifying God because self-promotion is only self-righteousness on display! Self-promotion is always “I, me, mine, my name” and every thing that can be done to call attention to US. God has chosen the foolish, the weak and the base that “no flesh should glory in His presence.” (1 Cor. 1:29) Paul said, “Let us not be desirous of vain glory…” and all glorying in man is just that, “vain glory.” Let us be careful of this evil for when we see it in us least I’m afraid we are guilty of it most!

Gary Shepard

God's love to sinners was manifested in the gift of His Son

Love gives. Love gives the best. "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life" (Joh 3:16). Christ so loved the church that He gave Himself for it: "Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it" (Eph 5:25). "I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep" (Joh 10:11). As a typical Jew, Nicodemus thought God loved nobody but Jews, but our Lord told him that "God so loved the world (Gentile as well as Jew), that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever (Gentile or Jew) believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life" (Joh 3:16). Until they were taught better, Christ's own apostles thought all the sheep were among the Jews, but the Savior corrected them by saying, "As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down my life for the sheep. And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd" (Joh 10:15-16). The sheep among the Jews were in a fold, a ceremonial enclosure which distinguished them from the Gentiles. The sheep among the Gentiles had not been subjected to ceremonial laws. In saving the sheep among the Jews Christ led them out of the fold (Judaism), and made them one with the Gentile sheep that heard His voice, so that there is only one flock and one Shepherd. All of God's people are one in Christ, for "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus" (Ga 3:28). This does not teach that there are no distinct spheres of service, but it means that all the saved have a common salvation