It is interesting how we start out a whole new life being a follower or disciple of Christ by grace. It's a free gift. FREE. The FREE gift of eternal life through Jesus Christ.
It is by grace we are saved (delivered from judgment and made partakers of Christ’s salvation) through believing and not because of works or fulfilling any law. If it was by fulfilling any law then we could brag about what we had done to deserve it and subsequently take pride in ourselves.
No, our salvation or entrance into the Kingdom of God isn’t the result of anything we could possibly DO. I’ve never run across anyone who has experienced salvation who minds quoting that scripture and proudly declaring – it is by grace through faith we are saved.
I wonder then why so many Christians quickly feel like they have to DO all the right things in order to receive blessings from God. So much of the church-world goes right from receiving grace for salvation to behavior modification. We try to get ourselves all cleaned up and fix all our bad habits and behavior. We become very conscious of sin and spend a lot of our time before God reminding Him of how bad we are and what we have done wrong and then we wonder ...where did the joy go?
All the while God has said (Col:2:6), as you have received (by grace) me, walk in me (by grace). We start out by grace through faith and we continue our walk by grace through faith. God is more interested in transforming us from the inside out by our continual experience of His love and goodness than He is in our desperately trying to modify our behavior and struggling constantly with sin.
We didn't earn our entrance in the kingdom of God and we can't earn the blessings once we are in.
Stay tuned for more on this next post…
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