Romans 10:9


If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved ~ Romans 10:9

Salvation in Christ is a precarious thing. It demands from us that Jesus be declared as Lord of our life. Our human nature finds that challenging, as we erroneously think this means giving all my control to Another makes me less than. Yet, the truth is, when I give up all I am to Christ, He makes me more than! We live in an age where I want to be my own person, do my own thing, set my own values, faith, morality. I want to claim my rights to do what I want to do. This is a dangerous time. Yet Jesus said, “if any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way, take up your cross, and follow me. If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it. And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul?” (Matthew 16:24-26). Jesus came that all might be saved to eternal life, yet not all will choose Him, for the reason of self. Self is a powerful deterrent, yet self is not real without Jesus! To declare Jesus “Lord” is to declare He has the power and authority over you. Declaring Him Lord over our lives means we owe our service and obedience to Him. The oxymoron of the thing is, when we truthfully declare Him as our Lord we gladly, freely, willingly give all we are to His service! We desire this! Do we lose? Yes! We lose selfishness and want, greed and lust, envy and pride, jealousy and hate! We lose our old self of the world and gain our true self in Christ!
Devotion by Pastor Julia

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