Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, said in John 10:10 (NKJV), “The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have [it] more abundantly.” This is a powerful truth! It reveals crucial insight into our purpose, our rights as followers of Christ, and the enemy who seeks to disrupt them. We are born with a desire for more life, and John 10:10 assures us that we can have it increasingly as we put on more of Christ. In Ephesians 2:10, our Heavenly Father calls us His masterpiece. The psalmist said in Psalm 139:14 that we are fearfully and wonderfully made. God created us in His image as self-governing, free-thinking, intelligent beings. He has given us the gift of free-will, and through this gift, we determine the level of abundance we will enjoy by choosing how much we will embody the nature and life of Jesus Christ.
We should also recognize that any power the enemy exercises within this earthly realm is power that humans have given—and continue to give–to him. In Genesis 1:26, we are told that in the earth, God placed dominion, power, and authority on the earth in the hands of human beings. He created us to reign, not over one another, but we have received from our Creator the capacity and right to rein over our own lives. This is the power and authority the enemy craves. Desiring the earth for himself, Genesis 3:1-6 shows how the enemy orchestrated his cunning scheme. It was a plot to deceive God’s first man, Adam, into forking over the power and authority that God had so generously placed in his hands. As we all know, Adam fell for it–hook, line, and sinker. This was a catastrophic error of epic proportions, and it is rightly called “The Fall of Man.”
Because our God is omniscient and brilliant beyond brilliance, He had a plan for our redemption even before Adam and Eve sinned. He pointed to it in Genesis 3:15 (NKJV), “And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, And you shall bruise His heel.” In this verse, God promises that a descendant of Eve, our beloved Savior, Jesus Christ, will ultimately defeat satan, even though the serpent (satan) would bruise his heel. The bruising of Jesus’ heel symbolizes the suffering that he would endure on the cross. So, our Heavenly Father had a plan to restore humanity from the very beginning, even when it seemed all hope was lost.
The Ten Commandments were given to Moses, God’s servant who led the children of Israel out of Egyptian slavery, on Mount Sinai, nearly 1500 years before our blessed Redeemer was born. This period during Old Testament times is known as the Law Administration. Throughout history, God has engaged with His people according to His masterful plan, responding to our growth and maturity as we learn to imitate Him. These different ways in which God interacts with His people are referred to as different “administrations.” God tells us in Malachi 3:6, “I am the Lord, and I do not change,” but we, on the other hand, do change. God has not rushed our evolution; instead, He has been incredibly patient with us as our hearts and minds have transformed in the image of Christ. Corporately, as the Body of Christ, we are steadily becoming more like him with each passing year. The ultimate mark of our transformation will be realized when Ephesians 5:27 (NLT) is fulfilled. We will be “as a glorious church without a spot or wrinkle or any other blemish…she will be holy and without fault.”
There were extreme consequences to breaking God’s laws during the Law Administration, but our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, changed everything. He redeemed us from the curse of the law. Galatians 3:13 (NLT) tells us, “But Christ has rescued us from the curse pronounced by the law. When he was hung on the cross, he took upon himself the curse for our wrongdoing. For it is written in the Scriptures, ‘Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.’” We are now living in God’s administration of grace, but this does not exempt us from the consequences of sin, and people make a huge mistake assuming that it does.
Romans 5:4-5 (NLT) tells us, “And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love.” We should never underestimate the offense that sin is to our Holy and Righteous Heavenly Father. God’s Will is for us to live a blameless, holy life without sin; He tells us this in 1 Thessalonians 5:23. God is our hope, and because this hope will not lead to disappointment, we can trust with absolute certainty that Christ died for our sins, he nailed them to the cross, and paid our debt of sin for all eternity. Because of this, it is within our ability to live a life free of sin, but so few of us do.
Romans 6:23 (NLT) makes it clear that “the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord.” Death is the payment our sin requires, and now that Christ has paid this debt, we are free to live a life of faith, trusting in the wholeness and completeness that his sacrifice and resurrection made available. Because of what God accomplished through Christ, we have the Holy Spirit living within, and Jesus Christ tells us in John 16:13 that he, the Spirit, guides us into all truth. The question is whether we will allow ourselves to be guided by him.
We bring the victory that Jesus Christ won for us into our lives through our faith. There is no other way to walk in his victory. We must believe wholeheartedly in what he’s done for us, and the way that we prove our beliefs is through our actions. If we sin, our wrongdoing is equated to a lack of faith in that aspect of our lives. In essence, sinful actions break our fellowship with God, leaving us exposed to satan and his realm of darkness. However, because of God’s mercy and grace, we can repent of our sins, and He will forgive us. Our repentance restores our fellowship with Him, but we will not escape the consequences of our wrongdoing.
Romans 6:16 (NLT) tells us, “Don’t you realize that you become the slave of whatever you choose to obey? You can be a slave to sin, which leads to death, or you can choose to obey God, which leads to righteous living.” This verse teaches us that whatever we allow to control us becomes our master. If we choose to live in sin, it leads to spiritual death. But if we choose to obey God, we experience righteous living and the freedom that comes from being in relationship with Him.
We are always under the influence of something—either sin or God’s truth. Therefore, everything, from the smallest to the greatest choice we make, has a price. This is a very challenging truth for many to accept but accept it we must if we are going to live the abundant life that Jesus Christ made available. God does not punish us. He has given us the privilege and responsibility to live through Jesus Christ, where sin is no longer our master.
Ephesians 1:13-14 (NLT) says, “And when you believed in Christ, he identified you as his own by giving you the Holy Spirit, whom he promised long ago. The Spirit is God’s guarantee that he will give us the inheritance he promised and that he has purchased us to be his own people. He did this so we would praise and glorify him.” Our Heavenly Father has given us a guarantee, the Holy Spirit who indwells us. Because of this, we are fully equipped with all spiritual blessings, and we can have all the wonderful things God has planned for us. The Holy Spirit is God’s gift to us, and he will help us to live a successful Christian life as we choose to base all our decisions on God’s power, love, and light. ■
Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
“Living Abundantly”, written for Springfield Fellowship © 2025. All rights reserved. All praise and honor to God through Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.