Topic: Grace All The Way [Saturday June 4, 2016]
Text: Romans 15:14-22
Key Verse: “I have therefore whereof I may glory through Jesus Christ in those things which pertain to God” (Romans 15:17).
Nearing the close of his seminal epistle to the Romans, Apostle Paul goes back to the key concept of grace with which he started the letter. The book continues with the affirmation that we are saved by grace through faith in the finished work of Jesus Christ at Calvary.
Paul’s stand in this Spirit-driven presentation is that he became saved not by self emancipation but through the all sufficient merit of Christ. If any remarkable work for the Lord must be credited at all, the Motivator must be Christ who saved him. Put more aptly, Paul laboured so strenuously because he was saved and not in order to be saved. That should be the attitude of those who come to the knowledge of Christ. Christ simply redeemed mankind by His grace and rescued him from the broad way to hell. Once saved therefore, we need to doggedly continue in the narrow way.
Such a career must be one of gratitude to the Master, without whom we would have been lost eternally. The Apostle speaks of striving to preach the gospel in far flung regions where Christ had not been mentioned. Striving suggests toiling, struggling and exertion of extraordinary effort in a given task. The church of Jesus Christ is looking for such men and women in an age with jaded doctrines of self-adulation.
The church must go back to the old days when grace was sufficient for the saints and no credit was given to them for work done for the Lord. It is this motivation of the grace of the Lord that would carve in us the image of that faithful servant in Luke 17:7-10.
Thought for the day: God’s inalienable grace is the propelling force into heavenly habitation.
Bible Reading in one Year: 2 Samuel 1-2
DCLM Daily Manna was written by Pastor William Folorunso Kumuyi; is the founder and General Superintendent of the Deeper Life Bible Church situated at KM 42 on the busy Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, Nigeria.
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