ERCC DEVOTIONAL (TEKAN) DAILY SPIRITUAL DIET; TUESDAY 12TH SEPTEMBER, 2023
TEXT: ROMANS 4: 13 - 25.
SPIRITUAL FOCUS: SALVATION IS A GIFT FROM GOD.
Yesterday we heard the Apostle Paul show the Romans that salvation is not available through keeping the laws. Today he shows them and us today that observing and keeping cultural beliefs and having respect for them, will not save us.
What Paul is trying to make us understand is that we can receive God's salvation by believing in Him alone. This is true for salvation the forgiveness of sins is not obtained by the preservation of anything, for it is God who works, not us.
t is our belief in Him, our acceptance of what He did for us, that is, eternal life because He does not want us to go to hell. This shows how much God loves us. It is love that led to His Son, Christ Jesus, crucifixion to give us God's gift of salvation and forgiveness of sins. The Lord did not do this for us because we deserve it, but by His grace alone (Eph. 2: 8).
By grace, Abraham believed God's promise before he was circumcised. It is this faith makes God happy and saved him. Brethren, let us think and answer. Do we have the same faith as Abraham? We must not rely on the ability or effort to preserve laws and customs as the world does. All of these will not benefit us. If we are to please the Lord God, and He will bless us, we must believe in Him today as Abraham did.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT: Jesus death makes everlasting life possible for us.
PRAYER: Lord God, I beseech You, allow me to come to You in faith, not because of works, in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
ROMANS 4: 13 - 25 (KJV).
13 For the promise, that he should be the heir of the world, was not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the law, but through the righteousness of faith.
14 For if they which are of the law be heirs, faith is made void, and the promise made of none effect:
15 Because the law worketh wrath: for where no law is, there is no transgression.
16 Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace; to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed; not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham; who is the father of us all,
17 (As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations,) before him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were.
18 Who against hope believed in hope, that he might become the father of many nations, according to that which was spoken, So shall thy seed be.
19 And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah's womb:
20 He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God;
21 And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform.
22 And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness.
23 Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him;
24 But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead;
25 Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.
