DAILY DEVOTIONAL – June 9, 2020
“The 5 W’s“
Prayer: Dear Jesus, we come to You confessing our sickness and need for salvation. Have mercy Lord, and create in us a new heart of faith to receive Your precious Word and promise of the salvation You have won for everyone on the cross. Amen.
Scripture: Matthew 7:21-23
21 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.22 On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ 23 And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’
Devotional – “The 5 W’s”
In one form or another, we all learned in grammar school the 5 W’s of basic information gathering. Who, what, where, when and why. As is so often the case, some of the most life changing and powerful epiphanies in life come when we get back to the basics. As adults, it is usually times of crisis that force us to stop and re-evaluate our lives according to those 5 W’s. “Who am I again? Where am I at? Why am I here? When will I die? What’s this all about anyway?”
The Apostle Paul implores us in 2 Corinthians 13:5, “Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?” Most of us probably don’t think about the answer to the question “who are you” very much at all. Sure, we often think about who we are in the eyes of others; who we are in the eyes of our boss, in the eyes of our friends, in the eyes of the people and associations that directly affect our life on a daily basis. We always want to make sure they know who we are, or at least, who we want them to think we are.
Amidst the rat race of every day we probably don’t often find the time to quietly and seriously contemplate who we are – who we really are down deep, below the many layers of who we feel we have to be each day. “Who am I?” How we answer the question about who we are makes all the difference in the world and in the world to come.
It is true, as the Scriptures teach, that we are all fearfully and wonderfully made. We all are unique and individually created by God. However, though each of us may have our own identity as individuals, in the eyes of God we are all the same in that all of us have fallen from the glory in which we were created; we are all sinful. Regardless of what you or the person next to you may or may not be good at or better at, we are all ultimately on a level playing field. We are all equally broken and sinful. And though it isn’t necessarily a pleasant thought, the reality of our sin is at the root of understanding who we are not only as people, but even as children of God.
Jesus said in Luke 5:31-32, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.” In other words, if we don’t first know of ourselves that we are sick, sinful and in desperate need of saving, then we cannot know the hope and joy that is the cure, the forgiveness and the salvation that Jesus has made freely available through His life, death, and resurrection.
This is exactly why Jesus came, however. Just as He said in Luke, “I have come to call sinners to repentance.” Who are the sinners? You and me and every single person past, present, and future. God has revealed our sinfulness to us through His Law and His Word and the teachings of Christ. On our own we would never acknowledge who we truly are. It’s too painful. Left to ourselves we would never repent and acknowledge our need of a savior. But God in His mercy has given us His Law and Word and Holy Spirit to convict our hearts, to bring us to the end of ourselves and who we would like to think we are, and repent, so that He can give us the joy of salvation that He died to give us.
Jesus says in John 15:16, “You did not choose me, but I chose you.” And the book of Hebrews declares in chapter 12:1-2, “ Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”
Faith itself is a gift from God. We can no more choose to be saved or choose to believe in Christ than we can, on our own, admit that we are sick and sinful and in need of saving. As Hebrews said, Jesus is the author of our faith, meaning He is the one who composes and writes faith in our hearts. And He is the perfecter of our faith, meaning He is also the One who sustains our faith. We are wholly dependent on Him in every way. And the Good News of the Gospel is that Christ is completely faithful to deliver the faith and salvation He has won for us, first by convicting our hearts to a place of repentance and then by revealing to us His grace and forgiveness and graciously give us the faith we celebrate. The only reason people are not saved and are condemned is because they refuse Christ’s offer and endless attempts to show them their sickness and need for saving, and in the end refuse His gift of faith and salvation already won for us on the cross.
As Jesus said in our Matthew 7 text for today, “many will say to me Lord, Lord…look at all we have done in your name.” Yet Jesus’ reply will be, “I never knew you.” You see friends, we are not saved because we claim to know Jesus or because we identify ourselves as or call ourselves Christians or followers of Christ. We are not saved because we do good or “Christian things.” We are only saved because He knows us. As Jesus also said in John 10, “I am the Good Shepherd. The sheep hear my voice, and I call my own sheep by name. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.”
Who am I? I am a sinner. I am also a saint of God in Christ Jesus. Not because I say so, but because Christ has not only shown me my desperate sickness of sin and need for His grace, but has also shown me and graciously provided for me the grace and faith I so cherish to believe in Him. I take great comfort in knowing that the sureness of my salvation rests not in my feeble and broken hands, but as Jesus said, “He gives me eternal life…and no one will take me out of His hands.” I pray you know and grow in that same sure salvation He has made available to everyone.
God bless all of you. And remember, God has forgiven yesterday, is with you today and has already taken care of tomorrow. Amen.
