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On Undeserved Salvation


Psalm 51:1-2

"Have mercy on me, O God,
According to your steadfast love;
according to your abundant mercy
blot out my transgressions."
I am a recipient of unfair treatment. Every second that I am not struck down, instantly cast into hell and made to feel the full wrath of God he has not dealt fairly with me. He has shown a mercy that I have not earned. I can not make a sacrifice, nor offer anything remotely valuable in return. There is nothing I can do to deserve it, there is nothing I can do to begin to pay off the debt that my sin has incurred upon me. Isaiah 64:6a says "Your righteous deeds are like polluted rags..." Any righteousness of my own is an insult to this abundant and unfair grace. My pride when I think that I have done something that makes me more deserving of salvation than the next man is naught but an example of how desperately I need salvation and how incapable I am of providing anything to it. Jonathan Edwards phrased it this way, 
I have contributed nothing to my own salvation except the sin that made it necessary. 
All I have done is been a rebellious child, a child who has denied his father again and again. Who ran off with his inheritance and spent it on drink and prostitutes only to discover that peace comes only from being with the father. I have been the child who stayed with his father but who did so out of his own sense of pride, longing to go after his brother and live as he saw fit, who obeyed bitterly and angrily.

So how do we live in light of this? How do we respond to this abundant grace? The only proper response is complete and utter servitude. To give our lives to God as a sacrifice. God is one and so I must serve him wholly. If I give to God only a part of my life then I have not obeyed. If I give to God only most of my life then I have not obeyed. We are called to love God with our whole heart. To give over all my emotions and feelings. My joy is his, my sadness is his, my happiness is his. We are called to love him with our whole mind. To give over all our thoughts. My hopes, my dreams, my unbidden thoughts are his. To love with him our whole soul. My innermost being, the essence of who I am is to be wholly and completely devoted to him, when you cut me down to my core, to my irreducible parts they should be all God's. And we are called to love him with our whole strength. My actions, my every breath is to bring him glory. Every time I go for a bike ride, every time I go to work, every time I do anything it is out of an overflowing and complete love for God.

Always remember, there is nothing you could ever do to earn your salvation. Everything necessary for salvation was taken care of on the cross. All we must do is accept the free gift of God. Romans 10:9 says "If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead then you will be saved." There is no other prerequisite.

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