Devotion - January 10, 2015 Then Peter began to speak: “I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism but accepts men from every nation who fear him and do what is right. Acts 10:34-35 Are you a “Christian-By-Association”? In other words, do you consider yourself a Christian because you can point to your familiarity with the trappings of Christianity? Perhaps you can rattle off happy memories of going to Sunday School or a Christian Day School. Perhaps you can recall what it was like to be in the children’s Christmas program on Christmas Eve. Perhaps your parents and grandparents were active in the church life and you’ve inherited some family connections and personal relationships with various pastors and teachers. If that’s all you’ve gotten out of your exposure to Christianity, however, you’ve got nothing. God does not show favoritism. It does not matter to God how active your parents were at church. It does not matter to God how many songs you sang in Christmas Eve services of your childhood. It does not matter to God how many pastors and teachers you know by name. If you or I think God will accept us because we’re familiar with some trappings of Christianity, then we are not hearing him. Our ears are closed. And a moment is coming when we’ll be in for a real shock. What matters to God is our relationship with Jesus. What matters to God is our trust in Christ as our Savior from sin. What matters to God is the forgiveness we possess through faith in Jesus’ perfect life and death in our place. What matters to God is that our personal eyes of faith are fixed upon his Son. No favoritism. Only Jesus. And Jesus alone makes all the difference in the world. Your world too. Prayer: Heavenly Father, forgive me for all the times I have not focused on your Son. Wash me in his blood. Renew my zeal for the gospel. Amen. Todays Devotion is brought to you by WELS and WhatAboutJesus. This devotion was selected from the Daily Devotion archive. Creative Commons License This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.
Posted on: Sat, 10 Jan 2015 15:16:18 +0000
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