{"id":2384,"date":"2009-12-02T10:22:29","date_gmt":"2009-12-02T15:22:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/?p=2384"},"modified":"2009-12-02T10:22:29","modified_gmt":"2009-12-02T15:22:29","slug":"soap-salvation-is-a-gift-that-cannot-be-earned","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/soap-salvation-is-a-gift-that-cannot-be-earned\/","title":{"rendered":"SOAP: Salvation is a gift that cannot be earned"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Scripture: Romans 9: 16<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>It does not, therefore, depend on man\u2019s desire or effort, but on God\u2019s mercy.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>Observation:<\/strong> God is merciful, and gives us the gift of eternal life with Him because He wants to, not because we earn it.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Application:<\/strong> I will admit I find this hard to accept, although I know it is true because the Bible says it is true. Many times.<\/p>\n<p>My salvation is a gift that I do not have to earn&#8230; and that I cannot earn.<\/p>\n<p>God has chosen to bestow this gift on me because He wants to do that\u2026 even though I am a sinner. And all my serving Him and others isn\u2019t going to get me eternal life\u2026 that gift is already mine. My salvation is not a product of my doing. It is a result of God\u2019s mercy and me accepting that mercy. My efforts to live a life as close to what I think Jesus would want is my choice and it is worshipful, but it isn\u2019t going to get me the ultimate prize.<\/p>\n<p>Of course I still want to please God and live as He instructs. But I also must remember <em>why <\/em>I do what I do and make sure my efforts are carried out for the right reasons and not false ones.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Prayer:<\/strong> Lord, thank you for the gift of eternal life with you. Thank you for loving me so much and showing mercy on me.<\/p>\n<p>Forgive me when I start to think I am earning your love, as that is not possible. You already love me.<\/p>\n<p>Please guide my heart when I am serving you so that my perspective will be where you would have it, Lord.<\/p>\n<p>And thank you for the many opportunities to serve&#8230; and the freedom to serve and know that your love and mercy and grace is not dependent upon that service.<\/p>\n<p><input id=\"gwProxy\" type=\"hidden\" \/><input id=\"jsProxy\" onclick=\"jsCall();\" type=\"hidden\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Scripture: Romans 9: 16 It does not, therefore, depend on man\u2019s desire or effort, but on God\u2019s mercy. Observation: God is merciful, and gives us the gift of eternal life with Him because He wants to, not because we earn it. Application: I will admit I find this hard to accept, although I know it [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2384","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-soap"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2384","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2384"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2384\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2385,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2384\/revisions\/2385"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2384"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2384"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.momstoolbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2384"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}