Good Morning, Meetpastordan Readers…I woke up last night with the recollection of this question being asked when I was still leading a men’s spirituality class at Saint Patrick Center here in St. Louis. It seemed like such an innocent question, but in fact it was an extremely profound question because the answer has eternal ramifications. I remember that a certain young man talked about growing up in a church environment, but he still didn’t know if he was saved or not. Then I started wondering if others might be facing that same quandary? That kept me awake until it was dog-walking time, so I’ll continue my thoughts with you right now.
The obvious question to clarify the question in the subject line is, “What are we being saved from?” And I would answer, “We’re being saved from ourselves.” And here is why I say that.
When a baby is born, what is the first thing it does? He or She cries. No doubt the pat on the butt by the physician prompted that cry, but it doesn’t take the baby long to figure out that if it wants something, whether it is to be held or to be nursed, it cries. So at this point, the first thing the baby has become aware of is “self”. From this point forward, our natural instinct is to focus on self. If something feels good or tastes good, we want more; if something exalts us, we want more; if something makes us happy or gives us a “zingggg”, we want more. The point is, unless we make a choice along the way to change that focus, we can go from the cradle to the grave living in our own self-fulfilling capacity.
When God created us, we were created to be in relationship with Him…just like Adam and Eve. They lived in Paradise; God was their provider; they wanted for nothing. But all of that ended when SIN entered the world. Eve and Adam took the focus off of God and put in on themselves when they yielded to satan’s temptation and deception: “The woman was convinced. The fruit looked so fresh and delicious, and it would make her so wise!” (Genesis 3: 6) That act of disobedience led to them being banished from Paradise. But not only were they banished from Paradise, so were all future generations. Therefore, unless each one of us decides to restore that original connection that existed between “self” and our Creator, each one of us will also be banished from Paradise.
But because God is a loving, merciful and gracious God, not to mention omniscient, He knew this was going to happen even before He created the world (and Man). Ephesians 1:4-5,10 tells this story: “Long ago, even before He created the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in His eyes. His unchanging plan has always been to adopt us into His own family by bringing us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and this gave Him great pleasure. And this is His plan: At the right time He will bring everything together under the authority of Christ – everything in heaven and on earth.”
That original act of disobedience in the Garden delivered this message from the creation to the Creator: “We can be our own god; we don’t need you.” To that, God replied, “Go for it.” Romans 1:28-32 describes God’s attitude about that matter: “When they refused to acknowledge God, He abandoned them to their evil minds and let them do things that should never be done. Their lives became full of every kind of wickedness, sin, greed, hate, envy, murder, fighting, deception malicious behavior and gossip. They were backstabbers, haters of God, insolent, proud and boastful. They were forever inventing new ways of sinning and were disobedient to their parents. They refuse to understand, break their promises, and are heartless and unforgiving…And worse yet, they encourage others to do the same;”
After “The Fall” (when sin entered the world), God let Man choose his own destiny until we proved without a shadow of a doubt that we were “utterly helpless” (Ref. Romans 5:6) to overcome the issue of SIN (being self-reliant rather than God-reliant) through our own effort. In our utterly helpless state, He implemented the plan referenced above in Ephesians 10. His plan was always to provide a Redeemer (Savior) to do for us what He knew we could never do for ourselves. In other words, His plan was always to save us from ourselves, because He wanted His “Masterpiece” (Ref. Ephesians 2:10) to spend eternity with Him in Paradise.
Unfortunately for Man, God’s standard for entering Paradise is pretty high. In fact, it calls for perfection. “You must be holy because I am holy” (1 Peter, 1:16) In other words, if we are stained with sin, we can’t even get through the “pearly gates.” But the good news is, God’s plan takes care of that obstacle. It’s called The Gift of Grace, meaning we didn’t earn it, nor do we deserve it. But God was still willing to provide a Savior (Jesus Christ) to pay the penalty for OUR sins. When we believe and accept what Jesus did for us on the cross, in God’s eyes we are now covered with the blood of Jesus and we are SIN-FREE! We are a new creation in Christ! Now we are worthy and acceptable to enter Paradise to be with God, Jesus and all Christ-followers forever.
As it says in John 3:16: “For God so loved the world, He gave His only begotten Son (to pay the penalty for OUR sins), that whoever believes in Him, will not perish, but will have eternal life.” When we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior, we inherit what Jesus did in our place on the cross. This is what it means to be saved!
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May God Bless Ya abundantly…
Dan Presgrave (a.k.a. Pastor Dan)
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