In a world driven by action, it’s hard not to believe that we don’t have to work for our salvation. Rather, we work out our salvation. When I came back to my home church for the summer, I found myself being overly zealous and trying to do all these things with our youth. The underlying cause of it all was a sense of guilt for leaving them and also the mistaken belief that if I just threw myself into doing “Godly” things, it would make up for the lukewarmness I was feeling in my heart.
Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village. And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to his teaching. But Martha was distracted with much serving. And she went up to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me.” But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.” [Luke 10:38-42].
Jesus simply wants us to come to Him and listen. Salvation is simple – we believe that Jesus died for our sins, and we repent and come back to Him. Why do we try to complicate it by adding in all these rules or things that we ‘should’ do? We just make it harder on ourselves to attain this new standard that we placed on ourselves, not God. God, thankfully, does not save us based on the works we do for Him. I have to believe that God does not love me, or any of us, any less because I haven’t evangelized to as many people as Billy Graham or Reinhard Bonnke. Nor am I any less saved, or any more in need of saving than them. Our faith and love for God comes first, and everything else falls into place after, as natural outflows of what we believe and prioritize.
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast [Ephesians 2:8-9]. I have been saved by grace, through faith. You have been saved by grace, through faith. We are not even saved by faith. If we were saved by our faith, we’d be in trouble every time our faith was shaken. But no, God’s constant gift of grace to us is salvation. God has already set us free from the law of sin and death; there is no need to chain ourselves to these rules of what to do when we’ve already been freed. As we grow in our relationship with Him, we learn to draw closer and closer to His grace, faster and faster as we finally realize we cannot and can never redeem ourselves.
Got to live right just stay in line, you’ve heard it all at least a million times and like me you believed it. They said it wasn’t works, but trying harder wouldn’t hurt. It sounds so crazy now but back then you couldn’t see it. But now here you are, eyes open wide. It’s like you’re seeing grace in a brand new light for the first time. Let us be the first to welcome you. Welcome to the life you thought was too good to be true. Welcome to the new.
You broke your back kept all the rules, jumped through the hoops to make God approve of you. Oh tell me was it worth it. The whole time you were spinning plates. Did you stop to think that maybe He is ok with just you? There’s no need to join the circus. And now here you are with a new point of view. And now it all makes sense why it’s called the Good News. [‘Welcome to the New’ – MercyMe]
Where Is Water 