“Dear brothers and sisters, the longing of my heart and my prayer to God is for the people of Israel to be saved. I know what enthusiasm they have for God, but it is misdirected zeal. For they don’t understand God’s way of making people right with Himself. Refusing to accept God’s way, they cling to their own way of getting right with God by trying to keep the law.” (Romans 10:1-3 NLT)
In the above verses the Apostle Paul revealed his heart for his people, the Jews, to be saved. When you read his description of why they’re so reluctant to come to Christ, it sounds a lot like the people I pray for every day. “…misdirected zeal. For they don’t understand God’s way of making people right with Himself.”
Grace is a hard concept for self-righteous people. When someone believes they’re good enough to get to heaven without Jesus, without the grace of God, they’re living a lie. When you boil it all down, our theology is what we believe about God: who He is, what He’s done or not done, how He relates to us as human beings, what He expects of us.
As I think of my own theological position, there are at least three critical elements that must be included. First, a healthy view of grace. Paul writes in Ephesians 2:8-9: “God saved you be His grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it.”
Being in a right relationship with God is all God and none of us. “Whoa,” you may object, “what about MY belief? Isn’t that my part?” The KJV translates verse 8: “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God.” Even the faith we need to be saved is a grace gift from God. The only thing we bring to the table is ourselves and an openness to allow God to do what only He can do in cleansing us and filling us with His Spirit.
So, a healthy view of grace realizes salvation is a gift from God, but it also includes a correct view of sin. The goal of salvation is for us to become a new creation in Christ. Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5:17: “The old life is gone; a new life has begun!” Does this mean we’ll never sin again? No, but that’s our goal.
John 2:1 says: “My dear children, I am writing this to you so that you will not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate who pleads our case before the Father. He is Jesus Christ, the one who is truly righteous.” A theology that believes we can continue to sin as a matter of habit is a defective theology. Sin is our enemy with whom we’ll do battle as long as we’re in these bodies of clay, but the longer we live, the more like Jesus we should become, thus, the less we should be sinning.
The second critical element in my theology is a healthy view of myself. I’m a sinner saved by grace, which means I must constantly, in an ever-increasing degree, rely on God’s Spirit to enable me to walk in newness of life. That means I will always be fully dependent upon the Spirit of God to guide, equip, and enable me to do what pleases God, not me.
If my theology encourages me to follow the dictates of my own heart, that’s a problem. Baptism by immersion illustrates that we die to ourselves and rise to new life in Jesus (Romans 6). To rely on my fickle heart to make spiritually healthy decisions is an oxymoron.
Thirdly, Danny Akin writes: “The bottom line is, if your theology is not breaking your heart for lost souls, you have a bad, defective theology.” To love God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength and not have a heart for the lost in our spheres of influence is a huge red flag. The more we grow in our likeness of Jesus, the greater our burden should become for those who are lost.
Jesus cared enough for the souls of mankind to die! How much do you care?
Food for thought.
Blessings, Ed 😊
Walking With Jesus 