Mill City Assembly of God

Are You Saved Or Just Religious

Looking at Romans 9:1-5. – I believe that Paul is speaking out of his emotions, out of his love for God’s people. He sees them as a people who are so bound by their tradition that they cannot see the mercy that was given to them by God. They are trying to "earn" their way to God, trying to get to God by their "works". We must remember that before Paul became Paul the Apostle he was Saul of Taurus – a Jew of Jews, he was religious and self righteous but not right with God, He followed the Law, he did everything according to the law, yet he was "spiritually dead". He killed his fellow Hebrew brothers who believed and preached Jesus and He believed he was doing what God wanted him to. Until he had that Damascus road experience, he was just religious having only a form of spirituality.

Paul is saying in these first few verses that he has great sorrow for those who do not have Christ in their heart; he had great compassion for his countrymen who rejected the truth about Jesus. Remember Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem and as He approached the city, he wept over it – why did he weep over it? Because Jesus knew that the people and their leaders expected a political Messiah and that they would ultimately reject Him as God’s promised Messiah. The word "wept" in the Greek means more than shedding tears, it suggests a lamentation, a wailing, a heaving of the bosom, the sob and cry of a soul in agony. So in this sense Jesus, as God, reveals not only His own feelings, but also God’s broken heart over the lostness of the human race and their refusal to repent and accept salvation.

We, too, should have just as great a concern for those who do not know Jesus as their Savior. How many people around us today are "spiritually dead", how many people have a religion but not a relationship, how many people turn to so many other things and keep on rejecting Christ? My heart, your heart, should break over the spiritual condition of those around us. It is more than going to church, it is more than being a good person, it is more than singing a few songs, it is more than reading the Word, it must be a relationship with the Heavenly Father, we must be a "prepared person". The word prepared means willing and able to do something, made ready.

To me that would mean our lives must be built on the precepts of God, line upon line, the truth of God living and active in our lives so that when we face situations in our lives we will be rooted in God and held together by God. Don’t settle for religion, settle for relationship!!!!!!