When Abram was ninety nine years old, the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him, “I am Almighty God; walk before Me and be blameless. (Gen. 17:1)
What an incredible verse of scripture. Can it really be true of every person? The answer is yes. When you read this verse what do you hear? What we hear is immensely more impor- tant than what we read. Reading scripture is very important and we will hear the voice of Jesus when we read. While it is very important to read the word we must realise that faith does not come from reading it only comes from hearing. So! today if you hear His voice, harden not your heart. So today as we read this verse above I ask again what do we hear? Let us look at the possibilities. Some ways of hearing it as we apply it to ourselves could be like this:
1. My God is almighty and He has told me to walk before Him in a blameless way in obedience to His commands.
2. My God has told me that He is an almighty God and He is able to keep me from falling and present me blameless before Him.
3. My God is almighty therefore I will walk before Him and He will keep me blameless. That is probably enough for the point I am going to make. These are just three of the understandings that could be taken from this verse or to put it another way these are just three of the things you might hear when you read this verse. I believe all three of these are very good but I believe they are all fall short of what is truly being said and what I believe we should be hearing from the voice of the Spirit. I will write out the verse again with my own words added in to amplify it and illustrate what I believe is the voice of God to Abram and to us. My added words are in brackets.
I am almighty God (and because I am almighty you can now) walk before me (in my sight) and (consider yourself to) be blameless.
I believe this is the only way this verse could be heard in light of the new covenant in the blood of Jesus. The words “before me” can only mean that we are blameless in His sight. The words “almighty God” tell us the founda- tion of our blamelessness which means that it has nothing to do with us. It is because of His great power and loving kindness toward us that He has bestowed upon us His unspeaka- ble gift of right standing before Him in love. The following verse from the apostle Paul is all the confirmation we need.
And you, who once were alienated and ene- mies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight. (Col. 1:21-22)
“Holy, and blameless and above reproach in His sight”. These are almost the exact words which Abram heard from God. Before Abram heard these wonderful words of grace from His maker he thought he had a part to play in keeping himself holy and blameless in God’s sight. Then He realised that God was almighty and far greater than he and had ever imagined and had actually taken care of everything leaving nothing be done. Of course everything had been taken care of long before he heard it, but he kept making himself an enemy of God by thinking his wicked works separated him from God and needed to be overcome before he could be blameless. He considered himself an enemy of God in his mind and consequently could not hear the truth. Then he heard those glorious words that he was already blameless in God’s sight and he believed it.
Believing it from the heart makes all the difference in the world. Let me say that again. Believing it from the heart makes all the difference in the world. Believing we are blameless in God’s sight is easy when we are skipping along and everything is going well. When things are not going so well and perhaps we are falling short in our own sight it is of the utmost importance to believe we are still blameless in His sight. We do not have to exert effort to believe this, we just believe it because it is true. Nothing has changed, we are still under grace and grace by it’s very nature is unconditional. If God has decided to place us under unconditional grace you can be sure He will not change His mind. This is what it means to have faith in the blood of Jesus. We can hear a word many many times and become so used to it that it loses it’s meaning for us. The word “unconditional” means that there are no conditions attached to the gift of God. He gives His unspeakable gift to us without finding fault as the following verse shows.
Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God. (1 Cor. 2:12)
It is very important for us to consider the verse which immediately follows Colossians 1:22 because it can stumble many from receiv- ing this wonderful gift of blamelessness in God’s sight. So here it is. I will connect the end of verse 22 to it so we will see the cause of doubting.
To present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight…. if indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which was preached to every creature under heaven, of which I, Paul, became a minister. (Col. 1:23)
We have already seen that the gift of blamelessness is bestowed upon us freely without conditions but verse 23 seems to be adding a condition by saying the words “we are considered blameless if indeed we continue in the faith”. We need to see that we are blameless in God’s sight whether we believe it or not. It is a fact that we have been crucified with Christ and buried with Him and raised with Him because the scripture teaches us that Jesus tasted death for all men. (Heb. 2:9) It is true for all men that the gift of blameless before God is prepared for them but they do not know it. Like we said before, knowing it makes all the difference in the world. While we moral spiritual beings and are in these mortal bodies the Spirit of Christ will keep our hearts alive in the truth of His word if we continue in His faith. If we do not continue in the faith of Christ we are still considered blameless in His sight but it will be of no effect in our lives because we will not have the power to hold unto it. It will be like the apostle Peter says in the following verses.
For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For he who lacks these things is shortsighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins. (2 Pet. 1:8-9)
It is not the case that the gift and the call of God was taken back for the gift and call of God are without repentance (Rom. 11:29). It is more the case that it was let go through neglect, shortsightedness, blindness and forget- fulness. God has given the measure of faith to every man (Rom. 12:3) so there is no need to pump yourself up to believe that you are blameless in His sight. Just simply accept it and lean upon it with all your weight. Give sub- stance to it by agreeing with what God says about you. Speak it out in your confession and the Spirit of God will lead you into the experi- ence and reality of it, glory to God. Tell the devil and your brothers in Christ and all that you meet that you are blameless and God will strengthen you in it. This is the breakthrough which will bring you into a wide open space and bring fruitfulness in your life. It is upon the foundation of our blamelessness Christ that we know without doubt that the prince of this world has nothing in us just as he had nothing in Christ.
I will no longer talk much with you, for the ruler of this world is coming, and he has nothing in Me. (John 14:30)
He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He made us accepted in the Beloved. (Eph. 1:4-6)
We have been chosen in holiness and blameless- ness so what possible problem could we be having with His choice of us. AMEN.
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