To Call part 5
Salvation isn't dependent on anything we do. Or anything we could do. Jesus saved us, all on His own. And He did it by giving His life for us and giving His life to us. Being made sin for us so that we could be made the righteousness of God in Him. He did it by transforming us from sinner (unbeliever) to saint (believer). He saved us... from our sins. Basically, Jesus made the Way of Grace. The more excellent way. And here's our part. Our ONLY part. It's called the Walk of Faith. And it doesn't make something that's not true, true. It's makes something that's already true... true for you. That's what the good fight of faith is: Laying hold of eternal life. That's the gift of God and it's a gift that He already gave to us. Salvation isn't something that needs to happen. It's something that already happened. It happened when Jesus cried out from the cross, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do." We believed a lie. A lie that said we had to do in order to be. And because we believed that lie, we tried to be someone we thought we weren't by trying to fit our actions into a box. A box defined by external laws. Laws that we couldn't keep for the simple reason that they were external. As a man thinks in his HEART, so is he. Everything real comes from the inside. From the heart. We thought our heart was empty because it felt like there was a love-shaped (God-shaped) hole in it. So God filled that hole by filling us with Himself. By pouring out His Spirit on all flesh. By filling us with the Holy Spirit. The love receptor. So that we could know and believe the truth. So that we could receive (and release) His love. So that we could love Him by loving one another. To me, that's what salvation is. Not trying to get something, but knowing that we have something. Something too good to keep to ourselves. Something that we can't help but share. Because it's not just what we crave, it's what everybody craves. It's the desire of our heart. And when we delight in Him He gives us the desire of our heart. Because when we delight in Him we experience the desire of our heart. And we experience most by sharing it. We feel most loved when we love others. We feel happiest when we make others happy. Calling on the Lord and BEING saved isn't about saying magic words and getting something. It's about filling ourselves with the fulness of what we've been filled with--LOVE--so that it overflows out of us naturally. Focusin on God's love for us, and focusing on our love for other people. We WERE transformed, now we need to BE transformed (into what we were already transformed into). We ARE saved, and now we need to BE saved by calling on our Savior. By partaking of His Divine Nature. By letting what's inside us come out... by knowing and believing that it's in there. Light doesn't shine because you try really hard to make it shine. Light shines because that's it's nature. And as long as it's not hidden deep down under all the surface stuff... everybody can see it shine!