Meditate On
There Is Only One Way
If you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe
in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For
with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession
is made unto salvation. For the Scripture says, “Whoever believes on Him will
not be put to shame.” For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, for
the same Lord over all is rich to all who call upon Him. For “whoever calls on
the name of the Lord shall be saved.”
Romans 10:9–13
The apostle Paul tells believers who have been born again
in Christ that God the Father “has delivered us from the power of darkness and
conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption
through His blood, the forgiveness of sins” (Col. 1:13–14). Notice that there
has been a change of location. You used to be under the power of darkness. But
the moment you believed in Jesus, you were moved and placed under the blood of
Jesus, where there is perpetual forgiveness of sins.
To understand the total forgiveness of sins, we have to
understand the value of the person Who sacrificed Himself on the cross for us.
He alone, because He was sinless, could pay for all the sins of every man. When
our Lord Jesus died at Calvary, He took all of humanity’s sins with one
sacrifice of Himself at the cross. He took the judgment, punishment, and
condemnation for all sins upon Himself. That’s the value of the one Man, Jesus.
He is an overpayment for all our sins.
Now, does that mean that everyone is automatically
forgiven? Of course not! Read today’s scripture carefully. While everyone’s sin
is paid for, every individual needs to make a personal decision to receive the
forgiveness of all their sins by receiving Jesus as their personal Lord and
Savior. Jesus is the only way to salvation. There is no other way except
through Jesus and His shed blood.
There is no ambivalence in scripture as to how a person
becomes a born-again believer in Christ. To be saved, you have to confess with
your mouth that Jesus is your Lord and believe in your heart that God raised
Him from the dead. Therefore, anyone who tells you that everyone’s sin is
automatically forgiven and that you don’t need to receive Jesus as your Lord
and Savior in order to be saved is scripturally inaccurate. Such teachings are
heretical and are lies from the pit of hell. There is no salvation without
Jesus. There is no forgiveness without the cleansing blood of Jesus Christ.
There is no assurance that all our sins have been forgiven without the
resurrection of Jesus.
But today, as born-again believers in Christ, there is
forgiveness and the amazing assurance that our salvation is secure and we will
never be put to shame! This is our reality
today—we can enjoy His presence, His righteousness, and
His help every day and in every season.
BLESSINGS
JOSEPH PRINCE
