Friday 25 Jan 2019

January 25: Romans 4:1-3,23-25

Key Verse: Romans 4:3
What does Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”

Devotion:
It may seem to many that the Old Testament is a book which was written for the people who lived before Christ and the New Testament was written for those of us afterward. But, in truth, the whole bible was written for all. They may not have had the New Testament back in the days of Abraham, but they certainly had the same truth we have nowadays; it’s just that we now have hindsight because we have the knowledge of what Christ did for us on the cross to look back on too. God has not changed the law from being one way before Christ and another way after Christ; we are the ones who seem to want to read something new into God’s Word.

God has always required faith in Him. Adam and Eve were required to have faith in following what God had said. They may well have been able to walk with Him in the Garden of Eden, but when it came to their time alone, they had to believe what God had told them and trust in that. Yet they, like us, chose to take a different path back then! Abraham was not justified because of all the work he did; he was justified by the fact he believed in God. Each one of the great rulers and prophets have shown us we have to believe in God before He will consider us. That does not mean He does not love us before we believe, far from it. Why else would He have sent His Son to die for a sinful world if He did not first love us?

Our bibles are here for us to learn the truth and to know God is real and through our belief in Him, we will be justified. Our bibles are here so we can know the law and learn we have made mistakes. Through those mistakes we can learn about how much God loves us. When we know this truth, we can see just how He has an ultimate plan for everything and that gives us the wherewithal to believe in Him. With that belief comes trust and our faith in Him is built up. That is when we can see how precious a gift Christ gave to us on the cross and will strengthen our faith even more. We are justified through our faith, through our belief, just as everyone before us. God does not change!

Points to Ponder:
What does it take for you to believe in something?

What will it take for God’s Word to sink in?