In part one, we discovered that
God’s demand to be in His presence is perfection. Next, we saw in part two that even though we were created
to be in a relationship with God, our sin separated us from Him. Nothing we can do can repair that
relationship, and the just penalty for our sin is death (physical, spiritual,
and eternal). God loves us, so we heard
the good news in part three that He paid the price of our sin to satisfy His
own holy and just demand by sending His son Jesus. Jesus took the full wrath for the past,
present, and future sins of all people in all times and places when He died on
the cross, and His resurrection proved that God accepted His sacrifice as full
payment. Jesus died for all, but not all
will be saved. God’s Word tells us
exactly what our response needs to be in order to have the gift of Jesus’s
righteousness credited to our account and to live in His perfect presence
forever. We must believe in Jesus, and
Him alone, for salvation. This is how we
accept the gift.
Saving belief in Jesus is not a
factual head knowledge like believing the sky is blue. Even Satan and the demons themselves believe
that Jesus is a real person, that He died on the cross, and that He came back
to life. They witnessed it and know it
to be true. No, the belief that results
in salvation is similar to the belief I had in my parents when I rode in their
car. It is a belief that trusts in,
relies on, and depends on Jesus completely as the one way to salvation based on
his death and resurrection. It is
resting in His completed work to get us where we need to go.
It sounds too easy, so many people
try to add requirements. They say you
must be baptized in water, read your Bible, pray, go to church, give to the
needy, serve in soup kitchens, go on mission trips, give up all your bad
habits, make Jesus Lord over every aspect of your life, and/or complete many
other good deeds before you can be saved.
Even though all these are good, and God calls us to them for His glory,
to reach more people, and to grow us into becoming the people He originally
created us to be in His image, Isaiah 64:6 tells us that they are still only
filthy rags (menstrual rags) compared to Christ’s righteousness. We have to have Christ’s righteousness
credited to our account in order to be saved, and that happens when we believe
in Him alone for salvation. His
righteousness alone can save us. Good
deeds are simply a natural out-flowing of our reconciled relationship with
Christ as we stay close to Him. Romans
4:5 says in no uncertain terms: “But to the one who does not work, but believes
in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness.” Ephesians 2:8, 9 also makes this point
abundantly clear: “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not
of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one
can boast.” This great salvation is
simple as far as what our response needs to be, but it was not easy or
cheap. Remember what Jesus went through. Remember His sacrifice. The gift of our salvation came at great
cost. How foolish we are to think that
anything we could do could add value to the precious gift Jesus already paid
for and offers freely to all who will believe in Him.
After quoting Romans 4 and Ephesians
2, I also want to bring some clarification to a word that is so often abused,
misused, and misunderstood: faith.
Biblical faith is not some mystical wishy-washy concept that floats
around the heads of those who don’t have their feet firmly planted in
reality. God has told us in His Word,
the Bible, exactly what faith is. “Now
faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen”
(Hebrews 11:1). In other words, it is a
strong, confident belief that has no problem with its object being unseen. Faith for faith’s own sake does not save
anyone and can actually be foolish. The
object of the faith is what matters. I
could have faith that my three-year-old nephew could drive me to the grocery
store, but that faith would be sorely misplaced, and it would not result in
anything remotely good. Many children
have faith in an invisible friend, but that friend does not exist no matter how
sincere their faith is. I have faith (a
strong, confident belief) in Jesus now, even though I cannot see Him, because
of the very real evidence He left behind that He is the way, the truth, and the
life. But that’s a topic for another
day. Faith, or belief, only results in
salvation if it is placed in the right person, Jesus, because that person is
the one doing the saving.
If you haven’t yet believed in
Jesus, know that He loves you, and no matter what you have done or what has
been done to you, you are not too far gone for Him to save. You don’t have to clean yourself up before
trusting Him to save you. Believe in Him
now, and He will bring about transformation in your life as you grow in your
relationship with Him. He has paid the
steep price to be able to offer you this gift.
You can be all you were created to be and be fully and finally satisfied
in your relationship with Him. He just
asks you to accept His gift by believing in Him. Trust Him, and like I find rest when I ride
in a vehicle driven by someone I trust, you too will find rest for your
soul.
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