Bad News, Good News
1Well then, what can we say about our ancestor Abraham? 2If he became acceptable to God because of what he did, then he would have something to brag about. But he would never be able to brag about it to God. 3The Scriptures say, “God accepted Abraham because Abraham had faith in him.”
4Money paid to workers isn’t a gift. It is something they earn by working. 5But you cannot make God accept you because of something you do. God accepts sinners only because they have faith in him.
13God promised Abraham and his descendants that he would give them the world. This promise wasn’t made because Abraham had obeyed a law, but because his faith in God made him acceptable. 14If Abraham and his descendants were given this promise because they had obeyed a law, then faith would mean nothing, and the promise would be worthless.15God becomes angry when his Law is broken. But where there isn’t a law, it cannot be broken. 16Everything depends on having faith in God, so that God’s promise is assured by his great kindness. This promise isn’t only for Abraham’s descendants who have the Law. It is for all who are Abraham’s descendants because they have faith, just as he did. Abraham is the ancestor of us all. 17The Scriptures say that Abraham would become the ancestor of many nations. This promise was made to Abraham because he had faith in God, who raises the dead to life and creates new things.
Bad news: we can’t make God like us. We can’t win his love or earn it.
Good news: we don’t have to.
Basically if God’s acceptance of us relied on anything we could do, we would be lost. There is nothing we can do that will bring us up to God’s standard that he intended for the world. We have, collectively, got it too far wrong. God has every right to be angry with each one of us for the things we have done, and the things we haven’t done that could have made a difference.
But he isn’t.
Not if we come on this journey with him. All it takes to be right with God is wanting to be. Knowing we have got things wrong, and putting ourselves back in his hands. Leaving the past behind and walking onwards with him.
Faith is just that. Confidence, not just in ourselves and our own abilities, but in God’s.
He waits for us to reach out to him.
Thank you Lord
for your kindness to me;
for accepting me,
however far I am from what you meant for me.
May I step out
in faith of you
not me.
Pam's Perambulation 