Psalm 90:12
"So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto Wisdom."
Even unconverted sinners know that their days are numbered. Whether they profess to know God or claim to believe His Word, they feel the effects of the fall in their bodies and minds and can see these effects as they age, battle illness, and ultimately face the prospect of death—all consequences of being fallen creatures in Adam.
From the moment we are conceived in the womb and born into this world, we are dying and will ultimately die physically at the time appointed by God, the Judge of all. "Seeing his days are determined, the number of his months are with Thee; Thou hast appointed his bounds, that he cannot pass" (Job 14:5).
There is no difference regarding the ultimate end of all sinners—whether those whom God, by His electing grace, has redeemed in Christ or those whom God has justly left to condemnation. Both will die physically unless the LORD Jesus comes beforehand at the end of time. "All things come alike to all: there is one event to the righteous, and to the wicked..." (Ecclesiastes 9:2). Sooner or later, we all face the same end in this life. Still, the difference in living forever is WHOLLY and unconditionally by HIM who came, lived, and died for sinners that the Father chose and for whom HE paid the debt, and those in whom the Spirit reveals HIM—Jesus Christ, the Redeemer, Substitute, Advocate, and Representative of HIS people. HE is that sinner's Only and Blessed HOPE.
Herein lies the Wisdom of God to whom those chosen, redeemed, and called out sinners apply their hearts. Many apply their hearts to their own wisdom to navigate the seas of their lives, thinking that they are the captains of their fate. But all such application to natural wisdom is futile and of no avail. To apply one's heart to Wisdom is to live one's life through the Spirit of Christ, looking to the LORD Jesus Christ as the Only Hope in the face of sin and death as fallen creatures. "But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the Power of God, and the Wisdom of God" (1 Corinthians 1:24).
In 1 Corinthians 1:30, Paul specifies three distinct ways in which the LORD Jesus is the Wisdom of God for those He came to save:
He became “their righteousness, holiness, and redemption.” Jesus Christ took their sins upon Himself on the cross so that they might, in return, receive a righteous status or right standing before God (Galatians 3:24).
A second way Jesus is the Wisdom of God for His people is by not only justifying them but sanctifying them forever in the holiness of Christ before God. The writer to the Hebrews affirms, "By the which will we are sanctified [set apart to Holiness[ through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all" (Hebrews 10:10). The LORD Jesus is the Wisdom of God for declaring sinners holy in a manner that conforms to God's holiness and justice. Given an eternity, man, in his best wisdom, could never satisfy a Holy God as the LORD Jesus did by His Wisdom and Sacrifice unto death. "By his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities" (Isaiah 53:11).
Third, Jesus is the Wisdom of God by redeeming each of His elect with His blood and setting them entirely free from sin (Romans 3:23–26). Only the blood of Jesus Christ could pay, and did pay, the price for the redemption of God's elect, whereby they stand justified forever before God by Christ's work imputed to them when He died (1 Peter 1:18–19). It's not when they believe that they are justified, but when Christ died. They believe because God justified them at the cross.
Wisdom from God through Jesus Christ humbly accepts and embraces that we cannot become righteous, holy, or redeemed by any human means. Can we boast, then, that we have done anything to be accepted by God? No, because our acquittal is not based on personal obedience. It is by the obedience of Christ unto death, revealed in the heart by Faith. So we are made right with God through Christ, embraced by God-given Faith alone (Romans 3:27-30).
“For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). The word "lost" here means "That which has been marked out for condemnation and death.” This is our lot as a result of Adam’s fall, and all of us must certainly be condemned were it not for Jesus Christ coming and paying the sin debt for His own. Only after His death was the debt paid and sinners justified before God. Until Christ came and paid their debt, even the elect were under sin’s condemnation. "But before Faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the Faith which should afterwards be revealed" (Galatians 3:23). But since the cross, there is therefore now NO condemnation (Romans 8:1).
Those who have learned to number their days spend them in pursuit of Christ, God's Wisdom and Goodness in the kingdom of God (Matthew 6:33). They don’t have to fear the wrath of God when their earthly lives are over because the LORD Jesus has borne it all away. Rather, they live in the Hope of Glory that when He died to pay their debt, though they die physically, they cannot die eternally (John 11:25, 26).
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