The Bride of Christ!

A bride prepares herself for the big day. Sometimes it takes months, to prepare. Get the dress; makeup artist, shoes; ring; the list goes on. No bride wants to look shabby on their day.

The bible calls us “the bride of Christ”. Revelation 19; 7 reads “Let us be glad and rejoice, and give honour to him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready”. Note the phrase “the bride has made herself ready”. Revelation 21; 2 describes the glorified bride.

We know that our clothing is spiritual. So let’s look at what our own clothing looks like.

Revelation 19; 8 “And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints”.

Just as a bride prepares herself, so should we the church prepare ourselves. The good news is that the Lord helps us prepare as long as we yield to this.

Ephesians 5; 25- 27 “ Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it;
 26 That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word,
 27 That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish”.

Note verse 27? “That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, (just like a natural bride would not want spot nor wrinkle) or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish”.

Verse 26 says that the we are sanctified and cleansed with the washing of the water by the WORD. This is what Gods words does for us, as this is why His Word must be our priority.

Now let’s look at a part that is mainly ours. We can learn from the parable of the ten virgins.

Many of us are familiar with the parable of the ten virgins (Matthew 25; 1 to 13). Five were wise and five were foolish. The bible says that the wise took oil in their lambs while the foolish did not take oil in their lamps. When the bridegroom came, the wise had oil, just trimmed it and were ready while the foolish virgins had to go out to buy oil and the door was locked.
The foolish virgins were not ready. Why were they called foolish? Because they should have been ready. Wisdom is to be ready. Ephesians 5; 17 reads “ Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is.”

So what does oil do? As the determining factor here was oil.

• Oil keeps something burning.
• Oil keeps something effective
• Oil enables sight
• A lamp is only effective with oil.

Nobody will make you ready. You have to make yourself ready by the help of the Lord. The Lord wants us to be ready.

Will you make the necessary adjustments to ensure this is so?

The Lord loves us and we have been bought with a price. We are His priced possession and He longs for us. The least we can do, is to be ready!.
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©Copyright Bisi Oladipupo 30th July 2020
 
 

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