Hear these great words again:
“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Ro 6:23 ESV
So let’s say we have received Jesus as Lord, we are born again and Eternal Life is now ours. We even have started reading the Bible, our owner’s manual on how to live this New Life, BTW. While the Bible is all about this Good News, that once we were dead but now we are alive in Christ, forevermore, it is also filled with lessons on how to live the holy life God desires, and designed us to live…and it also shows us the opposite life too.
Here’s the truth, once we go from being a sinner to a saint, we still sin. The difference, praise God, is that we are forgiven. Yet according to the verse above, we still earn the wages of death when we sin. Yikes! But again hear the Good News, if you are born again, this is no longer talking about eternal death. (Here’s another good verse we might get to this year Ro 11:29) It is however talking about the symptoms of death. You know things like depression, anxiety, anger, confusion, frustration, fear…fill in the blank. These symptoms of death can lead to a very difficult and dark life, if we do not know what to do with them. As we read the Bible and see how these symptoms are supposed to draw us to God so we can turn back to this New Life, then we will not be stuck in all that misery. When we sin and sense these death symptoms, we can learn to run to God as fast as we can, to confess the wrong we have done, and receive forgiveness for the sin, moving forward reconciled to God again. Our peace and joy will be restored and we will sense this Eternal Life again. Opening this free gift, learning how it works, then leaning on God Who is the one who actually makes it work, helps us experience this New Life in a whole other fantastic way.
Join me in memorizing 52 verses this year:
January: 1- Jn 3:16; 2- 2Co 5:17; 3- Jas 2:26; 4- Eph 2:10
5- Jn 10:10
6- Ro 6:23
<>< Peace, Diane
