Friday Reading: Romans 11:28-33
Key Verse: Romans 11:32
32 For God has shut up all in unbelief, so that He might show mercy to all.
Devotion:
When we take God’s Word literally we find that there are people that we should avoid and keep clear of; those people being them that do not want to believe in God. We should not allow their ways of life to pollute our ways as we follow God... But that does not mean that God does not love them! How would we have got to know God if He did not love us? How would we have got past the barrier that is set up to prevent sin from getting to heaven? There is absolutely no way that we can span that barrier without Jesus Christ.
God does not look down and think about how sorry He is for giving us a way of getting to heaven even though we are sinners. He does not look back with regret because of the sinful lives that we still live – even though we proclaim ourselves to be Christian. Instead, His mercy covers our indiscretions! If we had always believed in God we would not know His mercy; we would not know the extent of His amazing love for us. Instead He has allowed us to find out just how much of a sinful bunch we are and then extended His mercy towards us.
God wants us to know just how much we have done against Him so that we will come humbly in repentance before Him. Then He will be able to show us the all-covering mercy that He has towards us. Then we will begin to understand the extent of His love towards us! Does this mean that He has caused us to sin in the first place? Far from it! We chose the sinful path we trod, but He allowed us to make our own choices. He tried to show us right from wrong, but we rejected Him. He continued to love us even when we forsook Him. When we turn back to Him, we too can find just how much He loves us and how much He has already done for us without us knowing about it... Without Him, we are eternally trapped by our own sins...
Points to Ponder:
Have you ever felt really bad about what someone else has done?
How must God feel about our lives?
