my salvation

As you begin today's entry, it is important that you have first accepted your Salvation. In accepting your Salvation, you accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, both acknowledging and accepting that Jesus Christ died on the cross for all of your sins, bringing you back into the presence of God.

Acceptance that justifies and makes you right in the eyes of God through Jesus Christ. This is a rebirth, why you are born again as a believer in Christ. A rebirth that takes place first spiritually, leading to an external conversion.

John 3:5-6

⁵ Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. ⁶ That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

spirit first, then the natural

Where many struggle in the acceptance of their Salvation is the expectation of an immediate external conversion in the proclamation of their Salvation. A Salvation that first begins internally in your spirit and then leads to an external manifestation. An external manifestation that is a process and takes time.

It always takes place in the spirit first, and the natural follows. The spiritual being dealt with first is always important.

You see that when Jesus healed the paralytic lowered from the roof, He first addressed the forgiveness of his sins before He addressed the man’s healing. The man came for the external, but Jesus wanted to first address his spirit.

Mark 2:1-12

¹ And again he entered into Capernaum after some days; and it was noised that he was in the house. ² And straightway many were gathered together, insomuch that there was no room to receive them , no, not so much as about the door: and he preached the word unto them. ³ And they come unto him, bringing one sick of the palsy, which was borne of four. ⁴ And when they could not come nigh unto him for the press, they uncovered the roof where he was: and when they had broken it up, they let down the bed wherein the sick of the palsy lay. ⁵ When Jesus saw their faith, he said unto the sick of the palsy, Son, thy sins be forgiven thee. ⁶ But there were certain of the scribes sitting there, and reasoning in their hearts, ⁷ Why doth this man thus speak blasphemies? who can forgive sins but God only? ⁸ And immediately when Jesus perceived in his spirit that they so reasoned within themselves, he said unto them, Why reason ye these things in your hearts? ⁹ Whether is it easier to say to the sick of the palsy, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, and take up thy bed, and walk? ¹⁰ But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (he saith to the sick of the palsy,) ¹¹ I say unto thee, Arise, and take up thy bed, and go thy way into thine house. ¹² And immediately he arose, took up the bed, and went forth before them all; insomuch that they were all amazed, and glorified God, saying, We never saw it on this fashion.

So if you seek to receive your Salvation and begin the work of healing in your life, you need to go back to the entry my condition, my egypt (entry 001), and first receive forgiveness by addressing your spirit, and pray the prayer of your Salvation to acknowledge and accept that Jesus Christ died on the cross for all of your sins.

Once you’ve completed its reading, you can return and complete this entry concerning your Salvation, as this entry is built upon your Salvation and its acceptance.

Let’s begin,

in today's entry, you will be diving into the understanding of your Salvation and the covenant you have entered into with God in the acceptance of your Salvation. It is in the complete understanding of your Salvation that you can…

• Have a better relationship with your Salvation
• Prioritize and value your Salvation beyond just words in the vocal proclamation of your Salvation
• Confidently in faith, accept and work out your Salvation

In understanding your Salvation, you need to both be aware of and comprehend the covenant you have entered into in accepting your Salvation.

what is a covenant?

For starters,

what exactly is a covenant?

A covenant is an agreement, a contract between two parties with terms and conditions.

In a contract, there are two parties and each party has a role: one, a receiver, and two, a giver. In the covenant that you have entered into with the acceptance of your Salvation, you are the receiver, and God is the giver.

As the receiver, you are receiving the forgiveness and healing of your sins, being justly made right in the eyes of God, allowing you back into His presence.

God, the giver, is giving this to you freely by His Grace. A freely given Grace not based upon merit or good deeds. Your Salvation cannot be worked for nor earned, but solely received in your acceptance. This is the power of the Grace and Mercy of God.

Important note: This freely given Grace and Mercy is an important aspect of your Salvation you must grasp, as it confirms and clarifies that you cannot and must not try to get right with God before accepting your Salvation. Only Jesus can justly make you right in the eyes of God. There is nothing you can do to make yourself right in the eyes of God without Jesus Christ.

To say that you must get right with God first is to nullify the necessary work of Jesus Christ.most highlighted & shared

You don’t get clean before you shower; the shower is what makes you clean, or else if you got clean before the shower, you wouldn’t need the shower. Jesus is your shower!

Come as you are, and Jesus will meet you there. He is the cleanser. You are made clean through Him. Only He can perform the work of your forgiveness and healing, nothing and no one else.

Back to the covenant (contract),

the covenant between you and God is initiated and fulfilled in your acknowledgment and acceptance of Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, and what He did on the cross.

For many new or maybe even mature born-again believers in Christ, they are unaware that in accepting their Salvation, they’ve entered into a covenant with God and the terms and conditions that come along with this covenant.

A lack of awareness, which then leads to a lack of responsibility, prioritization, and respect for their Salvation. A Salvation that was only words spoken to gain access to heaven or to be healed of the sins they have experienced and committed.

The issue with this perspective and understanding is that you immediately in the Spirit receive forgiveness and are made clean, but having never worked out your healing in the natural. Leading to you never fulfilling the external conversion, giving the illusion that your Salvation was not effective and had no power in your eyes.

A misunderstood realization that causes you to lose faith and drift from fellowship with God, the very fellowship through which this covenant is lived out.

Hebrews 11:6

⁶ But without faith it is impossible to please him : for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.

working out your salvation

It is in your diligent seeking of Him that you work out your Salvation. Through a developed relationship and growth of understanding of God, the healing is fulfilled and the external conversion is manifested.

This is a process that takes time, not because of the incapability of God, but because of the hearts of man. Like the Israelites, you too can be a stubborn, stiff-necked people.

Because many have nonchalantly accepted their Salvation and entered into a covenant with God without understanding and prioritization, they find themselves never giving intentional attention to the process of working out their Salvation.

Never grasping the magnitude of their Salvation, hoping for the external conversion to take place. Exercising faith in their Salvation without any work.

Unfortunately, it does not work that way.

A child that is breastfed beyond the years of its youth, never moving to the mature food of an adult, will die (Hebrews 5:13-14). You see this process with the Israelites; this is why the first generation died in the wilderness, and the process took over 40 years. God did not intend for it to take that long (Deuteronomy 1:2).

You see in God physically defeating the Egyptians, parting the Red Sea, leading them with a cloud by day and fire by night, and bringing manna from the sky; it was nothing for God to physically take them into the Promised Land.

He wanted to heal the people through a relationship with Him before they could physically enter into what He had in store for them. It was in the wilderness that they formed and developed into a people who had a relationship with God. A relationship that increased their faith and trust in God.

God requires that His people work. It is in the working out of your Salvation in the natural that you form and develop a relationship with God, the giver.

Philippians 2:12-13

¹² Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. ¹³ For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.

Work out. Katergazesthe. Katergazesthe from katergazomai (κατεργάζομαι), Strong's G2716, to work fully, to accomplish, to carry through, to bring to completion. (Greek)

You, too, have been delivered of your sins (Egypt) through your Salvation (taking the Israelites from Egypt and across the Red Sea), but must work out your Salvation (journey through the wilderness) to enter into everlasting fellowship with God, heaven (Promised Land). The acceptance of your Salvation is the beginning.

the new covenant of grace

Now, let’s better understand the New Covenant of Grace you entered into with God.

That’s right, in this being a new covenant, there were previous covenants God made that have brought you to His final covenant through Jesus Christ. The covenant you have entered into is the fifth and final covenant.

It is in your New Covenant of Grace that God intends to write the terms and conditions on your heart, not on stones and tablets.

Jeremiah 31:31-34

³¹ Behold, the days come, saith the LORD , that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: ³² Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the LORD : ³³ But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD , I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people. ³⁴ And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the LORD : for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the LORD : for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.

Ezekiel 36:22-32

²² Therefore say unto the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord GOD ; I do not this for your sakes, O house of Israel, but for mine holy names sake, which ye have profaned among the heathen, whither ye went. ²³ And I will sanctify my great name, which was profaned among the heathen, which ye have profaned in the midst of them; and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD , saith the Lord GOD , when I shall be sanctified in you before their eyes. ²⁴ For I will take you from among the heathen, and gather you out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land. ²⁵ Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean: from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you. ²⁶ A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. ²⁷ And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them . ²⁸ And ye shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; and ye shall be my people, and I will be your God. ²⁹ I will also save you from all your uncleannesses: and I will call for the corn, and will increase it, and lay no famine upon you. ³⁰ And I will multiply the fruit of the tree, and the increase of the field, that ye shall receive no more reproach of famine among the heathen. ³¹ Then shall ye remember your own evil ways, and your doings that were not good, and shall lothe yourselves in your own sight for your iniquities and for your abominations. ³² Not for your sakes do I this , saith the Lord GOD , be it known unto you: be ashamed and confounded for your own ways, O house of Israel.

The first covenant God made was with humanity through Noah (Genesis 9). The second with Abraham and his future seed (Genesis 17). The third was with Israel on Mount Sinai with Moses (Exodus 19-24). The fourth was with King David and the coming Messiah (II Samuel 7). And the last and final, the New Covenant of Grace for both Jews and Gentiles through Jesus Christ.

Hebrews 8:6-13

⁶ But now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises. ⁷ For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second. ⁸ For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah: ⁹ Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord. ¹⁰ For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people: ¹¹ And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest. ¹² For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more. ¹³ In that he saith, A new covenant , he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away.

Covenant. Diathekes. Diathekes from diatheke (διαθήκη), Strong's G1242, a covenant, a testament, a disposition, an arrangement established by one party for another. (Greek)

New. Kainen. Kainen from kainos (καινός), Strong's G2537, new in kind, fresh, unused, not merely recent but of a different quality. (Greek)

Hebrews 13:20-21

²⁰ Now the God of peace, that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, ²¹ Make you perfect in every good work to do his will, working in you that which is wellpleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ; to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

It’s important you understand the history of the covenants God has made with His people to first better understand God and second the frailty of man. You see that God time and time again seeks ways to meet man where they continue to fall short.

It is through Jesus Christ that this work is made final and complete. This is an everlasting covenant that will right the wrongs of man in their frailty, restoring God's relationship with His people.

What you see in Jeremiah 31:31-34 is a prophecy relevant both in that time and the time to come through the Messiah, Jesus Christ. The house of Israel and the house of Judah are the two houses of God's people, Israel.

Yet through Jesus Christ, you who were once aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise have been brought near and grafted in (Romans 11:17). Restoring humanity as a whole.

Ephesians 2:12-13

¹² That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world: ¹³ But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.

terms and conditions

Every covenant has terms and conditions. As you reviewed the four covenants prior to your final New Covenant of Grace through Jesus Christ, you can see that God always gave His people terms and conditions upon which they were to abide within their covenant with Him.

Where many fall short in living out the New Covenant of Grace is that they are misled by the illusion that through the Grace of God, they are rid of any terms and conditions. This is not true, and to suggest such a thing would not align with the nature of God. For you serve Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever (Hebrews 13:8).

A God of structure and order, not lawless grace that would leave man unto himself.

You see that the terms and conditions set within the covenants before your New Covenant of Grace were all designed to keep God's people protected and safeguarded from the ways of the nations that surrounded them.

It is in your New Covenant of Grace alike that the terms and conditions are designed for the same reasons: to protect you from the natural repercussions of sin and prevent you from falling into apostasy due to following the ways of the world.

So, what are your terms and conditions, you ask?

god's moral law

When you accepted your Salvation, you accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. To accept Him as your Lord, you accept His rulership over your life (John 14:15). A rulership that is structured by the Ten Commandments. God's Moral Law is designed to govern His people in His rulership as Lord over His people.

Now it is through Jesus Christ and the Grace of your New Covenant that He is also your Savior. In your frailty, you will always fall short of God's Moral Law. It is then that you are saved by your Savior and find the Grace of God through the ultimate and final sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross.

Jesus Christ dying on the cross was the ultimate and final blood sacrifice for sin. This is what it means when you tell someone that you are saved because of what was done on the cross.

The terms and conditions of the New Covenant of Grace are set in place for you, not against you. It is once you establish a new perception and understanding of the terms and conditions of your New Covenant of Grace that you possess a new relationship with the terms and conditions.

It is in abiding outside of these terms and conditions that a people come to experience the sin inflicted upon them, and commit the sin they inflict upon others. It’s a never-ending cycle that further and further separates people from the presence of God.

Let me be clear,

the terms and conditions within your New Covenant of Grace are not for your merit, nor does it mean you are working for your Salvation through good deeds. The terms and conditions are set in place to keep you in the covenant and in protection.

It is without these terms and conditions that you will naturally fall into sin and away from the presence of God. Again, they are for you, not against you.