December 9

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…to create in Himself one new man… Ephesians 2:15

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🔊 The word ‘created’ is a word that human beings cannot, strictly, use of their own efforts.  A story is told of two scientists who claimed they could create life in the laboratory.  God heard of this, and came along to observe.  One of the scientists was really hoping to impress God with his skill, and reached for a jar of clay.  But God interrupted him and said, “Excuse Me, that’s My clay; use your own!”  Scientists have indeed succeeded in manipulating DNA, but they cannot create life.  Spiritually, we may think that we have to make the best of what we are by our natural inheritance.  But God answers that He is able to create something in us that was never there before.  The Christian life is not just making do with the character and qualities we have inherited naturally.  It is letting God have His way, to call things into being that were not there before.  God spoke a universe into being, and He works in us in the same way.  Don’t count on your own resources, or you’ll be discouraged.  Believe in the Creator God.  This is the faith of Abraham, who had to be brought to the end of his own inventiveness.  He realised that what God was asking of Him was impossible.  But God wanted Abraham to let Him do the impossible, and give him a son through a barren wife in their old age.  God waits till all our resources have proved insufficient, and we look to Him to do something that we could never do.