When I was doing the church newsletter at my previous church (1000 miles from where I currently live) it included a message from the pastor. This was written by the head elder who frequently filled in for the pastor. I think you will find it a blessing.
Put Christ In The Driver's Seat!
The year was 1972 and the old V-dub (Volkswagen Beetle) I was driving was on its last leg. The car had been faithful since 1972 but it was beginning to get a little tired. One day, while looking at cars at Mobile Dodge (now Champion Dodge) on Highway 90, I spotted the car of my young dreams — a 1970 Dodge Challenger Trans Am with a 340 cubic inch V-8, with what was then called a six pack, 3-2 barrel carburetors pumping out 3310 horsepower connected to an automatic shifter in the floor. What a horse! My only problem was how to get the $3500 I needed to purchase the car. The only solution I had was to turn to Daddy. I begged him for a quite some time, "Please, just co-sign for me. I'll pay for it. I promise!"
Well, the day finally came that the deal was made and I drove off in my new car. As happy as I was, there was a condition on which that "happiness" existed. That condition was $110.00 a month for the next three years. If I complied with the condition, the car was mine; reject it, and the Trans Am would go back.
Matthew 7:7 says, "Ask and it shall be given you." To get that car I had to ask. By myself I was powerless to gain possession of that car. Today, in the struggle to move ahead, to throw off this tired life of sin, God says, "Ask, and it shall be given you." In asking, though, we should also realize that there are obligations attached. Let me, if I may, lay out that condition — a condition similar to the contract I signed to secure ownership of the automobile.
quote:
The condition of eternal life is now just what it always has been, — just what it was in Paradise before the fall of our first parents, — perfect obedience to the law of God, perfect righteousness. If eternal life were granted on any condition short of this, then the happiness of the whole universe would be imperiled. (Steps To Christ, page 62).
Heavy words, aren't they? But before we get bent out of shape about those phrases "perfect obedience" and "perfect righteousness," let's look at the contract I signed to buy the car. I could perform the obligation of the contract. I had a good job, and the money was there to pay the monthly payment. Adam, before the fall, could effect in himself perfect obedience to God's law. But after the fall, things changed. We now have fallen natures, but the conditions of salvation — eternal life — remain the same. If I had lost my job and been unable to pay for the car, I would have had to turn to someone bigger than I, my advocate, who was able to pay.
quote:
These things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. 1 John 2:1.
Jesus is our answer. We cannot
earn salvation by
our obedience, for salvation is a free gift from God to be received by faith. But don't forget this:
Obedience is the fruit of faith. My strength and your strength to comply with the condition is the fruit, the out-working, tangible, touchable, visible evidence of a spiritual in-working principle called faith, which is — Christ in you, the hope of glory.
There is a faith today that says: Just believe. It has no condition of obedience. This kind of faith is really presumption and can only lead to heartache and misery, and finally eternal loss. God's word says, "by grace are ye saved through faith," and "faith, if it hath not works, is dead." Ephesians 2:8; James 2:17.
What is grace? It is help in time of need, the ability to comply through faith. Faith is the hand that takes hold of infinite help. You can say, "Yes, Lord. I believe you can do what you say."
quote:
The life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. Galatians 2:20.
Just as Jesus said to His disciples, "it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you." (Matthew 10:20), your words of life, your compliance with the contractual condition, will be your deeds, your works, the fruit which "speaketh" of whom your true father is. Salvation and immortality are conditional but don't worry, because my Father promises:
quote:
Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee. Isaiah 49:15.
Jesus wrote the contract; He fulfilled the contract on our behalf. Now He wants to bestow its blessings upon us. We are saved by grace (the power) through faith (the acknowledgment) unto good works (the out-working of an inward relationship). Hold on, brothers and sisters, as we press toward the border of Canaan, and let Christ, through you, make those conditions, the compliance of the contract, possible!
Yours in Christ
Don Aubrey
------------------
________________________
Even so come, Lord Jesus
Linda
My first car was a tiny little Fiat (not the sports car variety). The message was written by a friend who was the head elder of the church we attended in Alabama. He owned the Trans AM. And I didn't know him then.