Day 2560 of the 7 day Bible verse challenge.
Acts 4:12 NIV
No other name. Not your pastor. Not your best friend. Not some saint that other people invoke in prayer. Not another deity that some group believes in. Not our ancestors. Not our future generations. Not ourselves. No other name but Jesus. He is our only hope at eternal peace because He's the only one that took our place and bore our sins and granted us an open door to a salvation that nobody else can offer.
We talked yesterday about the vast difference between what faith is meant to be and what religion has become. Sadly, much of what's offered today is focused far too much on us. It's trying to make us comfortable so that we don't feel pressured to change too much. It's tweaked to make us not feel so bad about being the sinful folks that we are. Modern religion has taken all the focus off of the cross and put it on us and our almighty feelings.
The problem is that this isn't about us or what we want or what makes us feel good. We shouldn't feel good. We shouldn't go looking for a religion that affords us the ease of remaining unchanged. We shouldn't settle for serving our feelings and emotions. We should wake up every single day with the harsh realization that our very best effort still falls short. We should understand that we've messed up so many things that eternal peace shouldn't be on the table.
But we miss those powerful truths when we make it all about us or get lost serving other people or other things. We lose the weight of our salvation when we allow ourselves to think we can earn it by following a list of rules. We lose the gravity of what's been done for us when we let other things take higher precedence and become bigger priorities. We lose what faith should be when we only worry about checking some boxes or believing that we can somehow save ourselves.
We live in a society that tells us all the time just how important we are. So much coddling and trying to make everyone feel warm and fuzzy so that no feelings get hurt and everybody goes to sleep feeling like they're a superstar. But how long can we sit on the throne while our true Savior hangs on the cross? How long can we occupy Christ's rightful place in this story? How long can we keep seeing other things or other people as possible options for our salvation? How long can we make this about us before we understand that we can't do what He did?
Now I know that I've got what many would consider a pretty weird way of looking at things. But if you want to feel all warm and fuzzy inside, think about what's been done for you even though you don't deserve it. If you want to feel loved, special, and important, weigh your sins and mistakes against the message of the cross. If you want to go sleep feeling like a king, remember what the real King has done to give you the ability to sleep peacefully.
We lose so much when the world and its ways become our focus. We miss out on the powerful realizations that the truth of the Gospel conveys. We miss out on the opportunity to grow to understand the gift that we've been given and just how much it cost. We lose the desire to pursue a relationship with our Savior because we think that some other name or some other thing measures up to Him and carries the same chance at salvation that He offers.
Friends, time to cut the nonsense. We can't save ourselves. Worldly religion can't save us. Pastors and priests can't mediate between us and the Father. Nobody and nothing in this world or in the minds of those who have dreamed up all these other beings can possibly do what Jesus Christ did when He carried that cross, died our death, laid in a grave, and then walked out of it a couple of days later. That's salvation. It's not in some perfectly recited prayer. It's not in the golden image of some saint around your neck. It's not in dressing just right in order to appease the higher ups in some church.
Salvation is found in the precious blood of Christ and His willingness to take our place and carry our sins so that we could have the option to lay down ourselves and our lives in order to follow Him where only He can go to the place that He went to prepare for us. This world nor anyone or anything in it can say that. So stop letting other things take His place and realize that He alone is our only hope. Without Him, hope simply doesn't exist.
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