In antiquity, myrrh was like snake oil that was touted as the panacea for anything or the cure-all for everything from colds to bad breath much like Apple cider vinegar is today. We know today that they were just gullible and unscientific and didn't even have the rudimentary medical knowledge, which resorted to superstition such as eating gizzards or drinking urine. If there was any cure, aspirin, for example, it was accidental, pure happenstance, or chance. The Chinese were further along with their alternative medicine of acupuncture. Jesus was given myrrh at his birth as a gift and that is why--it was celebrated for its medicinal value.
Now Christ is our cure-all (not meant in a derogatory manner of speaking) for what ails us--sin, which is the root cause of all our ailments. He is the answer to our dilemma and dual predicament. We have a problem with what we've done (our sins) and must be forgiven and justified by the blood, and we have a complication due to the way we are in our old sin nature (our sin cleansed by the sanctification of the cross of Christ). We must then be forgiven for what we've done and changed from what we are. We must put our faith in the person and work of Christ (knowing Him as Lord and Savior), who paid a price we couldn't pay, on a debt He didn't owe! Greater love has no man than this: That he lay down his life for his friend!
We lose focus when we think of salvation as our helping God out in saving us, or in cooperating--it is not synergistic, but monergistic and that means God does all the work--it is passive and not a cooperative venture, as we receive the gift of salvation apart from any works we've done (cf. Titus 3:5) and any merit we may think we deserve--grace means simply that we cannot add to it, we didn't earn it or deserve it, and we cannot ever repay it!
Now Christ is our cure-all (not meant in a derogatory manner of speaking) for what ails us--sin, which is the root cause of all our ailments. He is the answer to our dilemma and dual predicament. We have a problem with what we've done (our sins) and must be forgiven and justified by the blood, and we have a complication due to the way we are in our old sin nature (our sin cleansed by the sanctification of the cross of Christ). We must then be forgiven for what we've done and changed from what we are. We must put our faith in the person and work of Christ (knowing Him as Lord and Savior), who paid a price we couldn't pay, on a debt He didn't owe! Greater love has no man than this: That he lay down his life for his friend!
We lose focus when we think of salvation as our helping God out in saving us, or in cooperating--it is not synergistic, but monergistic and that means God does all the work--it is passive and not a cooperative venture, as we receive the gift of salvation apart from any works we've done (cf. Titus 3:5) and any merit we may think we deserve--grace means simply that we cannot add to it, we didn't earn it or deserve it, and we cannot ever repay it!
All we have to offer Him is brokenness and strife, all of our sin are to be cleansed in the blood of the Lamb who is worthy--"our righteousness is as filthy rags," according to Isaiah 64:6. We are quickened unto faith and repentance as the gift of God and these are not works as Catholics claim. They are God's gift, but we do them, God doesn't do them for us--we have to make good and take the leap of faith, and show the fruits of repentance per Acts 26:20 that prove it.
In short, it's not what we do for God, but what He does for us that is key and the focus of our attention. I'm not against merit or good works, just against those done in the flesh for salvation and apart from the Holy Spirit. God ordains good works for us to do per Eph. 2:10, "that we should walk in them." However, God rewards us for what He does through us--how amazing! His work in us because we are simply vessels of honor used by Him for His glory ("... the chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever," according to the Westminster Confession of 1646).
Let me add that the Reformers' theology and the rallying cry of being saved through faith is summed up in Jonah's cry: "Salvation is of the LORD." It is not a cooperative venture, nor an independent one, but a passive one whereby we receive Christ as Lord and Savior and subsequent salvation as a free gift. Salvation is either of us, of us and God, or of God alone; the only way to be sure of it is for it to be of God alone, for we are sure to foul things up.
In short, it's not what we do for God, but what He does for us that is key and the focus of our attention. I'm not against merit or good works, just against those done in the flesh for salvation and apart from the Holy Spirit. God ordains good works for us to do per Eph. 2:10, "that we should walk in them." However, God rewards us for what He does through us--how amazing! His work in us because we are simply vessels of honor used by Him for His glory ("... the chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever," according to the Westminster Confession of 1646).
Let me add that the Reformers' theology and the rallying cry of being saved through faith is summed up in Jonah's cry: "Salvation is of the LORD." It is not a cooperative venture, nor an independent one, but a passive one whereby we receive Christ as Lord and Savior and subsequent salvation as a free gift. Salvation is either of us, of us and God, or of God alone; the only way to be sure of it is for it to be of God alone, for we are sure to foul things up.
This is contrary to the tradition of man that says we must qualify for heaven by our deeds. It is human instinct to be incurably addicted to doing something for our salvation, as the Jews asked Jesus: "What shall we do, to do the works of God?" Jesus said, "This is the work of God, that you believe on Him whom He has sent" (cf. John 6:28-29). It's grace all the way as John 1:17 says, "The law came through Moses, grace and truth came through Jesus Christ." Soli Deo Gloria!