The Renewing of Your Mind

Devotionals for the Renewing of Your mind! Teaching is done in these
devotionals by Keith Baxter. http://www.richesofgrace.com/

Feel free to go to the Audio messages taught by Keith Baxter out of
the Book of Ephesians, here on the King James Bible Believers Site.

Click Here - The Book of Ephesians - Keith Baxter - Click Here

Ephesians 3:5

Which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit;

The mystery is something that has not been made known; it was kept secret since before the foundation of the world. But it was now revealed to the Apostle Paul by the Lord Jesus Christ, and many have asked if only the members of the body of Christ knew about the mystery. I don’t believe so, because verse 5 says that it was not made known to the sons of men in times past. But now it is revealed to the apostles and prophets, but how is this? It is by the Spirit, but did he reveal it to them individually or did they learn it through the teaching of Paul and the Spirit using the word to teach them. We have seen in Second Corinthians Two that the Holy Spirit is our teacher, so it is not surprising that others learned about the mystery, but it was not until after it had been revealed to the Apostle Paul.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Ephesians 2:22

In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.

One of the things that really excited me was learning that God the Father indwells us. I knew that we were indwelt by the Holy Spirit, and that we were in the Lord Jesus Christ and He was in us. But when I learned in Ephesians 4:6 that God the Father was in us all, I had always thought of Him as sitting way up in the third heavens on His throne. Then I had a man ask me how is God indwelling us, and I thought that was a great question. The above verse tells us that we are a habitation of God, a place where God dwells. We also are built as this temple of God, but how does He indwell us? Through the Spirit, it is through the Holy Spirit that the Godhead dwells in us, proving the work of the Godhead and that all persons of the Godhead have a particular purpose in our lives.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Ephesians 1:13

In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise,

We are going to spend the next couple of days looking at the work of the Holy Spirit in the book of Ephesians. Today we see that after we have heard the truth of the gospel of the grace of God that the only response that we could have to the gospel was to believe. Once we believed the gospel, we were saved, received eternal life, but that was not all. We see that the Holy Spirit sealed us, the idea of sealing is to make us secure; I think of the “Ziploc” bags that not only keep the food in the bag, but preserves the food and keeps it fresh. This sealing is also the idea of a stamp, that a head of state would write a letter and stamp it with wax and place their insignia from their ring to seal the letter. This would prove that the letter had not been opened and read before the person to whom it was written, received it. We also see that he is the Holy Spirit of “promise”, and what would this promise be? It is the promise of eternal life, which God that cannot lie promised, before the world began.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Acts 13:48

And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of the Lord: and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed.

In this passage of scripture, the apostle Paul has gone into the synagogue and preached that Jesus was the Christ. He has preached that through Christ only is the forgiveness of sins. Many of the Gentiles enjoyed his words and wanted to hear more, so the next week almost the whole city came to hear Paul. The Jews were jealous and began to speak against what Paul had been preaching. Paul was angry and told the Jews that the word was first to be spoken to them, but since they don’t want to hear the word of God; he is going to the Gentiles. When the Gentiles heard Paul say this they were very excited and believed what Paul said. Through this trusting of the word of God they received the word of God and glorified the Lord and his word.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Ephesians 5:1

Be ye therefore followers of God, as dear children;

I tell my children all of the time as they are getting older, not to be followers, but to be a leader. When we say this we are thinking of the world and the things that the world offers, which is nothing good. So should we follow our friends and do what they are doing? Should we follow what we see on TV or read in magazines? No, we should not follow after these things, but yet we should be followers. We should be followers of God, as children of God. It is only reasonable that we should be followers of God. As a father desires his son to follow after his footsteps and to watch him walk according to the things that he has taught him, God desires the same from his children. We need to first hear what God has taught us through his written word and then follow those doctrines as obedient children of God.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Acts 3:19

Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord;

When we read about the new covenant to the nation of Israel, one of the things that will happen is that God will remember their sins no more. There is a lot of confusion about the new covenant; first before the covenant can be put into place the person who wrote the will has to die, this happened when Christ died on the cross. Does this mean that the new covenant has started? No, it has not. We, the body of Christ, are not the New Testament church, because it was not given to the Jews and Gentiles, but only the nation of Israel. Are those in the “Hebrew” epistles living under the new covenant, the answer again would be no, because for them to live under the new covenant would mean that Peter and the eleven are living under the new covenant in Acts 2. This is just not the case for two reasons; first the nation of Israel is ready to go through the wrath, the time of Jacob’s trouble, the tribulation. I don’t see wrath involved in any part of the new covenant. The second reason is that part of the covenant is the forgiveness of sins as a nation, when does this happen? According to Acts 3:19 “that their sins will be blotted out” when Christ comes back, that is after the tribulation at the start of the kingdom. So the saints living during the time that the doctrine of Hebrews through Revelation are not living under the new covenant yet, but will at the second coming of Christ.

Living in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Exodus 4:30-31

30 And Aaron spake all the words which the LORD had spoken unto Moses, and did the signs in the sight of the people.

31 And the people believed: and when they heard that the LORD had visited the children of Israel, and that he had looked upon their affliction, then they bowed their heads and worshipped.

We see even in the time past that as God was trying to convince the nation that He was going to deliver them, there are two interesting points. The first is after Aaron had given the word of the Lord to the nation, he did signs, and the reason is because the Jews require a sign. The second thing is that the people believed, when they heard; yes the signs proved that what Aaron was saying was the word of God but they didn’t have to do anything, but simply believe. As we continue to learn and understand how God justified men and saved them it is interesting to see that so many times even in times past, the response of Israelites and Gentiles alike was that they simply had faith in what God had told them. This shows that the means of salvation in every age is faith.

Living in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Psalm 112:7

He shall not be afraid of evil tidings: his heart is fixed, trusting in the LORD.

Even in time past there were those that brought false information to the nation of Israel. False prophets would tell them that God is no longer taking care of them, that they would not be able to win battles because God wouldn’t deliver them. A great example of bad information given is at Kadeshbarnea when ten of the spies told the nation that they could not overtake the giants. This was because of their unbelief in God and what he would do for them. David is talking about how they are not to be scared, concerned for those teaching false doctrines, or bad information. Why was he able to stay strong and not let this bother him– it is simply because his heart was set firm in what God had told him. Also, he knew that he was not going put his confidence in mans word but trust in the LORD. Remember the first way that Satan attacks saints today, is by attacking the doctrine so that they will be confused. We need to believe and trust in the word of God, rightly divided.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

2 Corinthians 11:4

2 Corinthians 11:4

For if he that cometh preacheth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if ye receive another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, which ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with him.

We have to realize that Satan works one way and that is through doctrine. Of course he is not going to preach and teach good doctrine, but bad doctrine. If people want to believe in Jesus, he will preach Jesus but another Jesus. The way that he does this today, is by preaching Jesus in his earthly ministry, and not according to the revelation of the mystery. If a person is going to believe that Jesus is their Messiah, then this will not give them eternal life, because it is not the gospel that saves today. Some preach another spirit, which is not the Holy Spirit. Those who say they have been “slain in the spirit” or “baptized in the spirit” are not preaching the Holy Spirit. And those those preach works for salvation, keeping the law, or believe anything other than Paul’s gospel, that Christ died for their sins, are not preaching the gospel of the grace of God. I have talked to so many people in cults and they make it sound like they believe the same thing that we do, but we have to realize that Satan will continue to deceive man through false doctrine.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

Romans 3:1-2

Romans 3:1-2

1 What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision?

2 Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God.

We know that today there is no difference between Jew and Gentile. I know that with God today, He is not a respecter of persons. But there was a time when the nation of Israel was God’s chose people. So was there an advantage to being a Jew? Or was there any profit in being part of the circumcision? Yes, because unto the nation of Israel was given the Law, to separate them from the world. God did not give the law to the Gentiles but yet through the law, the Gentiles are guilty and without blame before God. So the advantage that the Jews had in times past was that the word of God was written to them, but now we see that God is the Savior of all men and we all can have eternal life through faith in God’s word.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Galatians 5:6

For in Jesus Christ neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision; but faith which worketh by love.

Have you ever had someone tell you that you need to do a certain thing to please God? This is the issue that the saints at Galatia are dealing with. They have the circumcision, that is religious leaders after the law coming in unto them and telling them that if they don’t get circumcised God will not bless them. This is just not a true statement, Paul teaches us otherwise when he tells us that whether you are or are not circumcised, you are not going to receive anything more from the Lord. The reason is because we are in Christ Jesus, and being in him makes us perfect and complete. The last thing is that the Lord will accept our faith which is an out working of our thoughts and concerns for others. We have liberty in Christ to be who we are; we need to use that liberty to minister to others in love.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Genesis 15:6

And he believed in the LORD; and he counted it to him for righteousness.

What did a person have to do to be justified? According to Genesis 15:6, all a person needed to do was “believe” in the LORD. The controversy that I have dealt with the JW’s on is James 2 and the fact that they add works to our salvation. They go to James and pull one verse out of context to make their point, but yet in the same chapter James quotes this passage. There was not any question with James that Abraham was not only the father of Israel, but the father of faith had to nothing but believe. He believed what God had told him, and God justified him. The message that was given to him was different than the message given to us, but it is still an issue of receiving the message by faith that justifies a man.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Acts 16:31

Acts 16:31

And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.

I was listening to the radio today and heard a guy talk about his father and that he thought God would forgive him because he was involved in charities. Then I thought of the above verse, because too many people think that you have to be good, go to church, keep the law, do good works, to be saved. Others say that you have to “call upon the Lord”, “ask Jesus into your heart”, “make Jesus, Lord of your life”, “confess your sins, and ask for forgiveness” or “pray the sinner’s prayer”. When the Philippian jailor asked Paul what he needed to do to be saved, the answer was quick and easy. “BELIEVE on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved”, but what were they to believe? The gospel today is that Christ died for our sins, was buried and rose again; of course we do not get this from this passage because it was not given to Luke to reveal this. Also, many wonder what “and thy house” means, this doesn’t mean just because the jailor is saved that his family is automatically saved, but if he believes the gospel I am sure that he will go home tell them what happened, what was told to him and what he believed, and they would trust the same gospel. So let’s not complicate the gospel by adding any type of works to God’s grace.

Rejoicing in Grace,
Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Galatians 3:22

But the scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe.

The one thing that we do not have to question or wonder about is whether or not we are sinners. The word of God has made it very clear and has concluded that all men are under sin that, which is the purpose or intent, is that the promise might be given. What is the promise? It is eternal life, what God has promised to do by the faithfulness of Christ, is to give us life. We see that again it is the faith OF Jesus Christ, not faith IN him, if Christ was not faithful to what God had said he would do, if he was not faithful to do the work on the cross, none of us would receive eternal life. So does this mean we do not have to have faith IN Christ? No, the end of this verse proves that it is our faith in Christ, simply believing in Christ and his finished work on Calvary, that gives us the promise of eternal life.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Philippians 3:9

Phil 3:9

And be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith:

The first part of this chapter is one of the most important chapters to show that the law or the works of the law could never have given anyone righteousness. Paul makes it very clear as pertaining to the law that he was “blameless” but yet he makes such a wonderful statement in verse 9, that we are found in Christ, not in our sins, not in our works, but in the Son of God. Second he says “not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law”, you see that Paul did have righteousness by doing the works of the law, but it wasn’t God’s righteousness but Paul’s OWN righteousness. So what is the answer, “that which is through the faith of Christ”, it is Christ’s faithfulness to God the Father, and to finish the work on the cross that we receive the righteousness of God. How do we get it? It is simply “BY FAITH”.

Rejoicing in Grace,
Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

1 Corinthians 6:9-11

1 Corinthians 6:9-11

9 Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,

10 Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.

11 And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.

Have you ever had someone use verses 9 and 10 or verses like it to prove if a person is saved or not? I have, they have also said that if a person is doing these things then they could never have been saved or could lose their salvation. This is not what Paul is dealing with, with the nation of Israel, what he is dealing with is saying that those people who are lost and drunk are drunkards, those that are unsaved and fornicate are fornicators, a saint is not one of these people. It is in verse 11 that he makes this clear with the statement “and such WERE (past tense) some of you”, this is who they were and what they did before they were saved. But they ARE (present tense) washed (cleansed through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ) sanctified (set apart for the purpose God has created them), and justified (declared righteous). It is through Christ that we are NO LONGER these types of people but instead saints of God, so we need to not do these things, (which is what Paul is getting on their case about) and live in the righteousness that we have in Christ Jesus through faith.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Acts 13:38

Be it known unto you therefore, men and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins:

The nation of Israel was trying to receive righteousness through the law, but this wasn’t going to work. They were trying to receive forgiveness of sins through their merits, but this was fruitless. Paul tells the nation that it is through Christ that they receive forgiveness of sins. As we understand the cross work of Christ, we realize that through his shed blood not only do we receive righteousness, but also the forgiveness of sins. The nation was waiting for the new covenant, in which the Lord Jesus Christ will institute to receive total forgiveness, but today we already have the forgiveness. Let’s not think that there is something that we need to do for God to forgive us, but simply claim the blood of Christ.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Romans 8:3

For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh:

How many times have you heard someone say they need to keep the law to have eternal life? This is just not true today or in any age, why is this? Because of the flesh we are not able to keep the law; it is not possible that anyone could ever keep the law. If the law could have brought forth life then Christ would not have had to die. So what did God do to help man, who was unable to keep the law for righteousness? He sent his own Son, after the likeness of man’s sinful flesh, and took our sin and condemned it in his flesh. It was through his death on the cross that the Lord Jesus Christ sacrificed his body and shed his blood to take care of our sin debt, so that the law can no longer condemn us.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Titus 3:7

Titus 3:7

That being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

What do we get by God’s grace? Well this verse will show us a few things we receive. First we are justified, that is God has declared us righteous even though we are guilty. We see that it is through the grace of God that man receives his righteousness, no man ever deserved it, and righteousness was always given as a gift. This is not the only thing that we have. We are also heirs, we have an inheritance, and God has given us eternal things in the heavens, but we are not only heirs but also joint heirs with Christ. What a wonderful thought that we have all the things that God has given to his Son. How are we made heirs– according to the hope of eternal life. This is not the idea “I hope I get it,” but anticipation of our eternal life that we have in Christ. Why is this? It is because of God’s grace.

Rejoicing in Grace,
Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com

Romans 3:28

Romans 3:28

Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.

When we see the word “therefore” we need to look and see what it is there for. The purpose of the first part of Romans is to prove that all men are sinners, no matter whom you are or where you are from. Paul also makes it very clear that the law could never have justified a person, but instead it condemns man. He then shows it is through believing in the Lord Jesus Christ that a man receives righteousness through Christ’s shed blood. “Therefore” we have come to a final reasoning that a man is declared righteous by faith, and not the works of the law. Works could never give a person eternal life in any age, whether in the dispensation of grace or in the past or future dispensations. Paul just clears this up by saying in case there is any confusion, keeping the law will not justify a man. The way I look at it, if the law is the written righteousness of God and keeping it doesn’t give man eternal life, then nothing that man does in his own power can save him. We need to just simply believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and we can have eternal life.

Rejoicing in Grace,

Keith

2 Cor 5:14-15

www.richesofgrace.com